German/Italian Unif.[D, Gp, Gr] BETA, all files p.1

[natty dread]

Always from large to small.

I learned this the hard way...

[Industrial Helix]

Porkenbeans - Yeah, graphically speaking its easier to downsize. What I intended to do with this map was figure everything out small and then go large once I was ready for major graphics modifications.

killing - I think the mountains are good, but they need a little tweaking and cleaning up. It's not going to be a major change.

ender - added to the to do list.

Red - Thanks! I'll adjust the borders a little to fit the names better. As for France, I think it was a major power during the wars of unification for both new states. Bismarck knew that he couldn't bring Germany to full power without pushing down France and Italy couldn't unify without a major power to counterbalance Austria. Balance of Power politics and war was a major factor for the creation of these states and that's why I'm trying to give the great powers more of a presence on the map.

it_oddball - I see your point about the troop generating centers but I think you might be looking at it differently than I am. You're looking at them as trooper generating areas for Germany or a Germany oriented player, but what you need to keep in mind is that they're also troop generating areas for an Austrian player or a French player or a Danish. If a player starts in Germany he's going to have to contest with players that started in Austria or Denmark or France.

sam levi - yeah, I think nobodies brought it up earlier. The problem with the individual kingdoms in the center is that there's to many of them and its hard to assign bonuses to each one without giving away the bonus. I didn't want to have a bunch of one ter. bonuses in the center of the map. So I grouped them as a single bonus. But as time goes on the historical inaccuracy nags at me so it might change yet, though I'm not sure how to do the bonuses. I'll give it some thought and any suggestions or ideas would be great.

As for Nice and Savoy, P-S sold it to France in exchange for help during the wars, hence Savoy is a duel occupied territory between P-S and France, Nice is too small to do such a thing graphically so I gave it to France.

I threw Croatia in there because when I cropped the area of Europe it was there and also part of Austria-Hungary. Croatia and the Dalmatian coast were also territorial ambitions of Italy's for quite some time. Furthermore, the naval battle of Lisse is out that way and I needed to round out that connection on the map.



Thanks everyone or the great feedback and input! I should have a new version coming up pretty soon answering these raised points.

[porkenbeans]

Yeah, it's like nat said, he learned the hard way. He most likely had to start from scratch to do his large version. To produce a quality map takes a lot of time and effort. So, why on earth would anyone want to double that by working on the small version first ? It makes much more sense to start with the large version, and just remember to make your text large enough that it can be scale down, for the small version.

[natty dread]

Well, not quite from scratch, but I know I'll have to do lots of finetuning on the large image in the future, if my map ever gets past the drafting room...

[porkenbeans]

Well, not quite from scratch, but I know I'll have to do lots of finetuning on the large image in the future, if my map ever gets past the drafting room...

Well put it this way. Everything that you enlarged, has lost detail. Some things may not be so easily evident, but There Is loss of detail in Every brush stroke, believe me. These people that say to start from the small, do NOT understand this, and their eye is just NOT trained well enough to see it.

[Industrial Helix]

I've got a new version that should address many of the concerns brought up. The only thing I haven't tackled yet is the sea connections, which I'm still trying to figure out how best to do.

The biggest change made is the addition of Lorraine in the Alsace region. I figure two provinces were annexed from France, so its historically accurate, and it helps to balance out some gameplay.

Cologne changed to Köln. Fixed Piedmont to Piemont. Fixed the game objective typo as well.

Redrew the borders.

Click image to enlarge.

Click image to enlarge.

[Raskholnikov]

Objective: Win ALL 4 Iron Crosses....

There ARE 5 Crosses!

(For all Next Generation fans, you know EXACTLY which episode I'm alluding to here )

[Industrial Helix]

No idea what you're talking about but I fixed the Objectives on my version of the map. Thanks!

[porkenbeans]

There are "FOUR" lights.

[thenobodies80]

Onward and Upward

[Industrial Helix]

Thanks Nobodies! Well, I guess the next stage is to evaluate and fine tune the gameplay. So thoughts on that would be great!

[AndyDufresne]

I'm really liking the stylistic view of this map---the borders, territories, colors, lines, etc. But the title gets an unfortunate thumbs down. It clashes a little too much for my taste.


--Andy

[iancanton]

is there a case for putting luxemburg, which was part of the german confederation, into the purple-and-white hatched area? the length of the name is obviously a problem, but lux can be written in belgium, with a line pointing to the troop circle. does berlin, rather than mecklenburg, start neutral? there is a missing border between pfalz and nuernburg. riems ought to be reims.

http://www.zum.de/whkmla/region/lowcoun ... 51839.html
http://www.zum.de/whkmla/region/lowcoun ... 91867.html

to eliminate the awkward 2-region +2 bonus, i suggest shrinking the torino region and splitting the expanded lombardia into milano (western half) and custoza (eastern half). the current custoza region can be renamed cremona, which is more accurate for its location. custoza is not shown on the map below, but it is located close to lake garda. bastin ought to be bastia. good work so far, except for the sea routes!

http://www.big-italy-map.co.uk/map-of-lombardia-map.htm

ian.

[Industrial Helix]

Thanks Andy and and Ian.

I removed a bunch of stuff from the logo... I agree it doesn't mix well with the graphics. This seems to work alright but I'm gonna mess with it still. Any ideas are appreciated.

I changed the sea routes, still not perfect but better. I wish I could do dashed lines but its difficult with photoshop.

I made the changes that Ian suggested. Luxembourg seems like it might be a good idea to include, as Ian pointed out, it was part of the Zollverein and was an issue between Germany/Prussia and France. I just realized I forgot to update the legend... next update it is then.

Here they are:

Click image to enlarge.

Click image to enlarge.

[ender516]

I am a little concerned that the three-way sea route connections are unclear. Can Roma attack Calatafimi? Can Elba attack Cagliari? The sweep of the lines force a sharp turn which is a little non-intuitive.

[Industrial Helix]

Yeah, I basically took the sea route idea from Kabanellas' Third Crusade map. Basically, if two sea lanes connect at sea then it acts as a cross roads. I see what you mean about it being counter-intuitive at this point, however, I think it will clear up during a game pretty quick.

[jefjef]

Hi Industrial!

Thought I'd stop & peek. (when do we get to play Amer colonies?)

Just a few minor things. I sure like blueish water.

Sea routes. White would look better. I liked the dashes you had in previous version.

The multiple routes coming off Cagliari. How about ya tie em all together?

The route from Ajaccio maybe connect it to Sassari instead.

The Lissa sea route. How about joining it a tert or two south? OR better yet an additional route to like Bari. You could use a little more flow and weight added to that bonus.

Thanks.

[ender516]

Hi Industrial!

Thought I'd stop & peek. (when do we get to play Amer colonies?)

Just a few minor things. I sure like blueish water.

Sea routes. White would look better. I liked the dashes you had in previous version.

The multiple routes coming off Cagliari. How about ya tie em all together?

The route from Ajaccio maybe connect it to Sassari instead.

The Lissa sea route. How about joining it a tert or two south? OR better yet an additional route to like Bari. You could use a little more flow and weight added to that bonus.

Thanks.

If the multiple routes coming off Cagliari were to be tied together, it would imply more attack routes than the current arrangement has, for example, Genoa vs Calatafimi. I'm not saying that's bad, it's just different.
In fact, if all those routes were tied together, one might consider adding a Tyrrhenian Sea territory. Did maritime battles play a part in this history? Would it make sense to represent mastery of the seas in this area?

[Industrial Helix]

I'll maybe blue up the water and I'll try white again with the dots.

As for the sea routes, the only major sea battle was at Lissa between A-H and Italy. I could definitely adjust the connection south as Jefjef points out, it could use from more connections. The sea routes in the west reflect the established routes of the islands. It seemed to me that it made sense that France would connect with Corsica and Piedmont would not. The same applies to Piedmont's connection to Sardinia as France would have no business with a connection there. The Corsica/Sardiana connection seemed logical to me given the closeness of the islands. I figured Piedmonte/Sardinia needed a connection to the southern tip of the boot as historically there was an invasion there. I believe there was historical precedent for the link to Rome.... though i can't recall it off the top of my head. I believe Garibaldi left from south Italy to Rome at some point.

[jefjef]

You have good west established sea routes. But look at maybe connecting the route from Ajaccio to Sassari instead.

And look at connecting Provence to Bastia instead.

It would remove the hop, skip & jump feel to that area. Increases the strategic value of two terts and marginally lightens the weight on Cagliari.

Is 5 for A Kiralysag Magyarorszag right? Seems it should be worth 4 compared to the others & considering it's location.

But if you add a sea route to Bari area then 5 for sure would be good.

[Industrial Helix]

Blued up the sea and adjusted the sea lanes. Added one to Bari. I decided not to switch it to Bastia because I don't want the islands to be too easily threatened. I figure the sea should have some sort of barrier effect.

Click image to enlarge.

Click image to enlarge.

[iancanton]

it made sense that France would connect with Corsica and Piedmont would not. The same applies to Piedmont's connection to Sardinia as France would have no business with a connection there. The Corsica/Sardiana connection seemed logical to me given the closeness of the islands. I figured Piedmonte/Sardinia needed a connection to the southern tip of the boot as historically there was an invasion there. I believe there was historical precedent for the link to Rome.... though i can't recall it off the top of my head. I believe Garibaldi left from south Italy to Rome at some point.

i agree with all of this. however, elba should have a connection only to toscano, as it wasn't a trading or transport crossroads, nor did it play any part in battles. this will give to stati della chiesa one non-border region out of four. corsica can also be tied more closely to france by connecting ajaccio to either nice or cote d'azur (this helps with fortification by linking two border regions).

ian.

[alexandrois]

With the italian map i would add some port symbols and just say all ports connect

[Raskholnikov]

That would totally change the entire game-play dynamics. Not sure it fits with the author's vision for this game...

Lets say we have Venice, Genova, Naples, Palermo, Brindisi... the minimum I think. To hold a region one must cosolidate each port to be stronger than up to 4 other players combined... This may work in different types of games without region bonuses - but here, I think it would make it very hard to win any region bonuses at all. The entire dynamic of the game would shift towards consolidating one's own port and denying others theirs. Anyway, that's just my feeling.

[Industrial Helix]

Ian- I see your point, I'll drop the elba connection. As for adding another connection for France... I'm hesitant but it might be a good idea for gameplay. Like I said before, i don't want the islands to be too difficult to hold... but I think it might make it slightly easier to hold France if I did add the connection. I'll try it out and see how it fits.

alex- Well, see Rash.'s answer. That's the basic reason I don't want to tie them all together.

Rash. - Yeah, agreed. Good insight!