This is Sparta!? [2 JUL 2012] v4 P. 1 & 2

[Campin_Killer]

To be honest, red is my favorite color, so I put that in there. As for blue, it was just something I thought should also go in there. I had to adjust the lightness on blue to make sure it wasn't too close to the sea color. The other colors I just played around with the spectrum and put in the ones I liked. I'll probably end up having to adjust the colors because it might be a disadvantage to colorblind people. I haven't run a Visicheck on it yet, though.

[koontz1973]

Do not worry about the CB tests yet. Everything will change between now and then.

[ManBungalow]

Hey, now here's an idea I really like.

Lots of work will have to be done, but that's to be expected.

The main problem I notice is how many regions are in each bonus relative to the total number of regions on the map.
Given any drop, it would be almost impossible to take an entire bonus.

There are lots of things you could do. I'd probably split the purple/red areas into smaller bonuses, but that's just me. Perhaps you could make a map inset of the Greek HQ in which you could capture regions in the city.

Also, there are some aspects of the battle which could be really cool if incorporated properly into this map. Perhaps you could have a series of 1-way attacks from the Persian side to attack the pass. Maybe you could split the pass into several regions...with the front line being a killer neutral...I'm not sure about that bit though.
At a stretch, you could think of a novel way to include the Ephors, who had a political power to remove (attack?) the Spartan king.

This could potentially be an exclusively 1 vs 1 map, but it's probably better not to be.

People here can offer you all sorts of graphics tips, but that will come later.

[Campin_Killer]

Version 1.7.5

Click image to enlarge.

Changes

• Faded the Spartan symbol out
• Redid the borders *although I did go over and too short, so I'll be cleaning that too*

Hey, now here's an idea I really like.

Lots of work will have to be done, but that's to be expected.

The main problem I notice is how many regions are in each bonus relative to the total number of regions on the map.
Given any drop, it would be almost impossible to take an entire bonus.

There are lots of things you could do. I'd probably split the purple/red areas into smaller bonuses, but that's just me. Perhaps you could make a map inset of the Greek HQ in which you could capture regions in the city.

Also, there are some aspects of the battle which could be really cool if incorporated properly into this map. Perhaps you could have a series of 1-way attacks from the Persian side to attack the pass. Maybe you could split the pass into several regions...with the front line being a killer neutral...I'm not sure about that bit though.
At a stretch, you could think of a novel way to include the Ephors, who had a political power to remove (attack?) the Spartan king.

This could potentially be an exclusively 1 vs 1 map, but it's probably better not to be.

People here can offer you all sorts of graphics tips, but that will come later.

As for the bonuses, I didn't even think about that when I put out the last version. I'll split purple and maybe red, I might leave it as the big bonus.

I like the idea of the one-way attacks for sure, and might have the last part of the pass as one-way attack routes into the Greek HQ, as that was how the battle went.

The point about the inner-HQ buildings, it could be done, but I am average pretty bad at drawing buildings. Overhead maybe, but....I'm not sure. I might play around with GIMP a little later.

If I did the Ephors of Sparta it might get out of whack then. Not only because of the Spartan warrior mindset but, years before the battle the Spartans had visited an Oracle at Delphi that allegedly told them that to save Sparta, a king must die for it. So I don't think they'd remove a king that was in battle. It just doesn't go with the map, in my opinion.

To-Do

• Split Mountain Pass bonus region
• Add 3-5 one-way attacks into Greek HQ
• Greek HQ Minimap? (possibly)
• Mountains at bottom (not happening if I do HQ minimap)

[ManBungalow]

Changes

• Faded the Spartan symbol out

Go to the layer with the lambda/Spartan symbol.

Choose the tool for 'selection by colour' (middle of the top row on this image - ignore the rest of that, it's just an image I found on google);



Select the white bit around the lambda.

Select -> Feather -> 2.5 (ish).

Delete.

This will get rid of the white box around the symbol.

=========

You could also go to the layers selection and change the mode from 'normal' to 'overlay'. See what it looks like, anyway.

[Campin_Killer]

v2

Click image to enlarge.

Changes

• Added Win Condition (Tentative)
• Split up Mountain Pass Bonus
• Added Inner Greek HQ map
• Took out the white around the symbol (thanks MB)
• Added one-way attack thru mountain pass
• Added army circles for clarity

Yes those are my buildings and, yes, they do suck. I can't exactly figure a way to put a building on there unless I copy and pasted a big tent and 2 other tents.

To-Do

• Clean up that ugly border with the end of the pass and Greek HQ
• Better Inner HQ buildings
• Clean up borders in general
• Should probably make the win condition clearer

On the topic of feedback, one question was nagging me.

Do you think I went overboard with the mountains?

[ManBungalow]

Okay, cool.

Yes those are my buildings and, yes, they do suck. I can't exactly figure a way to put a building on there unless I copy and pasted a big tent and 2 other tents.

Do you think I went overboard with the mountains?

One thing about pasting images from the internet...
...many things are copyrighted.
I don't think an organisation is going to come knocking for the sake of a picture of a tent - even if somebody did make a connection - but as a general rule of thumb, graphics on maps have to be original.
Maybe some cartographer could give some better guidance on this matter.

As for mountains, they can be dealt with later. I've never had a map quenched, but I know that a map has to have well-developed gameplay before proper progression can be made anywhere else. The buildings, too, can be developed later.

Oh, one other thing...I like the look of the water. How did you make it?

[Campin_Killer]

Overhead view of the Gulf (of Mexico) that my brother took when we were taking a helicopter tour of the area around Perdido Key. I put it above my sea layer and turned to opacity down to around 25.

[tkr4lf]

Overhead view of the Gulf (of Mexico) that my brother took when we were taking a helicopter tour of the area around Perdido Key. I put it above my sea layer and turned to opacity down to around 25.

That's awesome.



Some feedback for your latest version:
I like the changes you've made. The Greek HQ inset adds a nice touch. Is it necessary to hold all 3 terits of the inset as well as all 3 terits of the Greek HQ bonus area to receive the bonus?

I like that you broke up the bottom bonus into two different ones. I still think you should break up the Persian bonus into 2 smaller ones. As it is, it will be very difficult to hold that with how big it is. I also think you could probably fit a couple extra territories in there. Supply dump jumps out at me immediately as one that could be split into 2 or more territories. I say this because the map is pretty low on terit count as it is. I count 29 territories including the Greek HQ inset, but not including the 2 one-way assaults, since I assume those start neutral.

Again, love the water.

As for mountains, I don't personally think you went overboard, but perhaps others might. Like ManB said though, all of that can be worked out later.

It says that rivers are impassable, but it looks like there is a river between the Pass Entrance terit and the Rocky Wasteland terit, with no route. How do you get from one side to the other?

Overall, nice update. Looking forward to more!

[Campin_Killer]

Some feedback for your latest version:
I like the changes you've made. The Greek HQ inset adds a nice touch. Is it necessary to hold all 3 terits of the inset as well as all 3 terits of the Greek HQ bonus area to receive the bonus?
Yeah I gotta make that more clear in the key. But, yeah, it would require the holding of the pass, Greek HQ (inner & outer) and Persian Camp

I like that you broke up the bottom bonus into two different ones. I still think you should break up the Persian bonus into 2 smaller ones. As it is, it will be very difficult to hold that with how big it is. I also think you could probably fit a couple extra territories in there. Supply dump jumps out at me immediately as one that could be split into 2 or more territories. I say this because the map is pretty low on terit count as it is. I count 29 territories including the Greek HQ inset, but not including the 2 one-way assaults, since I assume those start neutral.
Yeah, I've probably given some territories too much room and will be working towards adding more territories in the next update. The Persian rear may be split into 2 different bonuses, but I'm on the fence right now as whether or not to split it.

Again, love the water.

As for mountains, I don't personally think you went overboard, but perhaps others might. Like ManB said though, all of that can be worked out later.

It says that rivers are impassable, but it looks like there is a river between the Pass Entrance terit and the Rocky Wasteland terit, with no route. How do you get from one side to the other?
I got too conservative, for lack of a better word, and was afraid of accidently overlapping the bonuses when I was using free select. Something else I need to fix in the next update

Overall, nice update. Looking forward to more!

[Campin_Killer]

v3

Click image to enlarge.

Changes:

• Split the Persian Rear bonus
• Fixed the river misconception
• Fixed another area where it looked like there was a river

To-Do:

• In hindsight, I think I need to change the new bonus' color
• Clean up some of the blotted borders
• Clean up the area around the mountains where they don't completely cover the blue (smack in the middle of the map, and is ugly in my opinion)
• EDIT: Just noticed the different text in the key, gotta fix that too

Do you think I should change that new bonus color?

[tkr4lf]

Yeah, I would change the color of the new bonus. Fuschia (or whatever color that is) isn't very pleasing to the eye.

It looks like the Persian Camp color in the legend doesn't quite match up with the Persian Camp color on the map. Also, it's kind of hard to read some of the Legend information due to the water. Maybe putting it all in some sort of box with a different color background would help that?

You may have answered me already on this, but I'm still confused about it. It says there is a +2 bonus for Greek HQ. To get that +2, do you have to hold Spartans, Withdrawal Route, Greek HQ, and all 3 of the Greek HQ- Inner territories?


Keep up the good work!

[Campin_Killer]

Yeah, I would change the color of the new bonus. Fuschia (or whatever color that is) isn't very pleasing to the eye.

It looks like the Persian Camp color in the legend doesn't quite match up with the Persian Camp color on the map. Also, it's kind of hard to read some of the Legend information due to the water. Maybe putting it all in some sort of box with a different color background would help that?
I might try to make it looks like it's on an old scroll. Not sure how to do this on GIMP, so if you see a guide link, that'd be a big help. As for the color, I'm not sure what went wrong there, but I'll look into it

You may have answered me already on this, but I'm still confused about it. It says there is a +2 bonus for Greek HQ. To get that +2, do you have to hold Spartans, Withdrawal Route, Greek HQ, and all 3 of the Greek HQ- Inner territories?
Ha, I should probably make it even more clear that for the +2 you must hold the outer HQ

Keep up the good work!

[Campin_Killer]

v4

Click image to enlarge.

Changes

• As requested, changed the bonus color
• Fixed the faded colors in the key, it was because it was on the same layer as the Spartan symbol
• Added a semi "old-paper" texture to the key
• Fixed text in key
• Covered the blue under the mountains
• Minor border fixes

To-Do:

• Fix up the borders a bit more
• Fix the key where it doesn't meet the edge

[AndyDufresne]

I think this is a decent idea for a map. What is your overall goal in terms of thematic graphic? What do you see this project looking like visually?


--Andy