Japan:Sengoku Jidai v0.21 - pg 2

[skepticCS]

Everything's looking good so far, with the V2 map will there be colour coded territories as to the respective warlords? (Keeping in line with the video game Samurai Warriors as a template, the Oda being black and purple, the Date being green as examples).

Well, this is one of the questions I would like to pose to the community. I'm considering four main options:

1 - Standard "continent"-style bonuses for each clan requiring player hold all territories to receive the bonus armies.
2 - Clan "continents" which provide a bonus for every x territories held within them (a la Feudal War/New World).
3 - Region-based bonuses which provide armies for every x territories held within a certain portion of the map (A la England).
4 - Incremental bonus for every x territories held ANYWHERE on the map.

These will be in addition to bonuses relating to certain combinations of imperial characters held (in the inset) and the auto deployed troops on each player's clan castle. I am partial to options 3 and 4, but I am open to considering 1 and 2 as well as any others I have not thought of.

I am also concerned with balance for each starting position. As mentioned above, I have made sure that all castles are at least 6 territories away from each other and 6 territories away from the imperial palace, but I one thing I did not ensure was that each castle had relatively equal access to the same number of territories. I'm thinking 5 to 6 territories firmly within the sphere of influence of each castle. These would be territories that are within reach of the player (dice notwithstanding) within the first 2 to 3 rounds, but would take neighbors 3 to 5 rounds to secure (though it could be possible for a neighbor to simply "break in" to these territories earlier if they put everything into it). That will be the next step for me, gameplay-wise.

I'm going to leave the poll up for anther few days, but I personally really prefer the direction of v0.2. With this in mind, I am updating my "To Do" list for the map:

To Do (v0.2):

Gameplay
- Nail down impassibles (I'm pretty happy with them now, but I may add another 1 or 2)
- Determine the territory bonus structure
- Settle on gameplay layout (attack routes, neutrals, resets, etc) for the inset territories
- Decided on how many neutral armies for each territory
- Set victory condition(s)

Graphics
- decide how much to retain from v0.1
- inset
- main map
- territory names
- background
- impassibles
- castles
- sea routes/ships
- legend
- title
- mini map (if necessary)

The graphics stuff will become more specific when the time comes to serious consider those things, but if anyone has any thing to suggest, graphics or gameplay, please do so!

[ghirrindin]

I prefer gameplay option number 2. I think it would most capture the feel of enfeoffing the peasantry in your rise to power as emperor of Japan! Given the feel of the map, options one and four would come off as flat and stale, while I do see some of the same merit in option 3.

[skepticCS]

I prefer gameplay option number 2. I think it would most capture the feel of enfeoffing the peasantry in your rise to power as emperor of Japan! Given the feel of the map, options one and four would come off as flat and stale, while I do see some of the same merit in option 3.

I agree with the assessment regarding options 1 and 4 and was expecting those to be out of the equation right off the bat, but I'd still like them to be out there for consideration. As to option 2: It can certainly work out that each clan has 6 "home" territories, including their castles, with me having to add/remove only 1 or 2 territories here and there. I'm not opposed to this idea, but I'm still not set on it over option 3 yet. My main reasoning is that if we, for the sake of simplicity, assume that each province represents a minor, non-playable clan, what justification would there be for grouping them in relation to the playable clans? What significant difference would there be between two minor clans on either side of these fictive borders? I realize this logic is more historical and less gameplay related and seems to argue more for option 4 than anything, but it's a concern that I have.

One way to balance this out may be to provide a bonus to players controlling x territories in a sphere of influence in which they do not own the castle. So, for instance, the Hojo player would get +1 for every 2 Hojo territories they control (since they hold the Hojo castle) and +1 for every 3 Takeda territories they hold without holding the Takeda castle. For me that is a good balance between gameplay and historical concerns.

I am planning on making the central region of the map attached to the imperial province bonus-wise, so that holding the emperor plus any 2 (or 1) central territory provides a +1 bonus. This might be enhanced by holding more imperial palace territories.

What do you all think?

[natty dread]

For the bonus structure, you might consider resource pairs. Such as, hold "peasants" + "rice fields" = +2... etc.

I think it'd be more realistic than any system based on the territory count. I mean, for the feudal daimyo, the peasants were the most important resources of the land they controlled: they did all the work that made the lands profitable.

Then you could have different resources, like gold mines, forests... IIRC there was a large forest industry in Hokkaido at the time.

After the shogunate was formed, controlling the gold mines was one of the elements that kept them in power. The shogunate owned all the gold mines in the land, and if anyone found any new mines, they would automatically belong to the shogunate. They didn't want the daimyo to become too rich, they could become a threat to the shogunate after all.

However your map is about the Sengoku Jidai era, and if I'm not hugely mistaken the shogunate only came to be after the Tokugawa clan "united" (=conquered) the country, which happened at the end of the warring states -period. So including the shogunate in the map would be an anachronism?

[skepticCS]

However your map is about the Sengoku Jidai era, and if I'm not hugely mistaken the shogunate only came to be after the Tokugawa clan "united" (=conquered) the country, which happened at the end of the warring states -period. So including the shogunate in the map would be an anachronism?

The shogunate had existed for centuries before the Sengoku period. In fact, the Onin War, beginning in 1467 that seems to be generally recognized as initiating the Sengoku Jidai, was started over control of the the existing shogunate. The interesting thing with this war is that, by this time, the title of shogun had become hereditary to the Ashikaga family and two main sets of daimyo (led by the Hosokawa and Yamana clans respectively) fought, not to declare themselves shogun, but to install their own puppet Ashikaga shogun (one of two brothers I believe), essentially becoming the shadow government of a shadow government. I am not entirely certain how this changed over this period and whether Tokugawa, Oda, or Toyotomi upheld the Ashikaga position, but would appreciate someone with more knowledge of this subject than I to offer up their thoughts. So that's why I have the shogun's hall as a capturable objective.

There is definitely some logic in your suggestion to use resource pairs. As with other feudal societies, I suppose control of people is more important than land. I would imagine this is even more so in a country as mountainous as Japan where resources are not evenly spread across the terrain. And it WOULD be a way to even out the bonuses across the map and eliminate fictive clan "continents". It would also add more and diverse bonuses. I am a little afraid of cluttering up the map, however, and I am worried adding resources might do that. I'll have to see how this would work on the map and maybe put it to a vote.

[natty dread]

The shogunate had existed for centuries before the Sengoku period. In fact, the Onin War, beginning in 1467 that seems to be generally recognized as initiating the Sengoku Jidai, was started over control of the the existing shogunate.

Oh wow, I was completely wrong here then... carry on then

[skepticCS]

The shogunate had existed for centuries before the Sengoku period. In fact, the Onin War, beginning in 1467 that seems to be generally recognized as initiating the Sengoku Jidai, was started over control of the the existing shogunate.

Oh wow, I was completely wrong here then... carry on then

No worries, mate. Feel free to call me out on any inaccuracies you notice. I'll just as likely be wrong as right most of the time.

[natty dread]

Yeah... well perhaps my misconception was because the shogunate had far less power before the tokugawa era... Before the tokugawa, the daimyo were pretty much independent. Afterwards, well... if the shogun would say to the daimyo "go commit seppuku" the daimyo would be shit out of luck

[skepticCS]

Yeah... well perhaps my misconception was because the shogunate had far less power before the tokugawa era... Before the tokugawa, the daimyo were pretty much independent. Afterwards, well... if the shogun would say to the daimyo "go commit seppuku" the daimyo would be shit out of luck

And THAT kinda power is a great thing to fight for...AND a great foundation for CC map

[skepticCS]

Click image to enlarge.

v0.21

I'm currently running with natty_dread's suggestion to add a resource element to the map. I added two main "resources": manpower and mines. I also developed a symbol and plan to incorporate farmland into the mix, but the end result saw the map way too cluttered (in my opinion), leaving little room for province names and such. Though It's not represented here, I delimited a six-territory "sphere of influence" around each castle. I used this area as a basis for where to place resources. Basically, each castle has relatively easy access to two manpower territories early on. Expansion beyond that (assuming a full map of 8 players) will require them to content with their neighbors. Mines were placed on two "neutral" territories on the south and north sides of the island. These territories are not officially in the sphere of influence of any one clan, though it is probably obvious that certain clans could get to the mines easier than others. For that reason, I demanded that a player control 3 manpower before they can gain the mine bonus. That way, even if a player quickly takes the mine, no benefit will be received until they actually go out and conquer manpower from other daimyo.

I added a bonus of +6 for any player holding the shogun's hall and 10 manpower. Essentially, a player in this position has conquered more than half of the island is firmly controls the shogunate, even if there are detractors. The way I expect this to play out is that two players eventually emerge strong in the north and south and they jockey over control of the imperial palace and the two manpower units in the central region of the map. However, I imagine some players will secure territories on the opposite side of the island BEFORE going for the imperial palace and plenty will ignore the palace altogether in favor of gunning for their opponents, but I wanted to give players some incentive to go for the objectives if they are so inclined.

The tax collector bonus is one of those incentives. I was also thinking of adding another bonus related to the court nobles (hold court nobles + 3 castles = 3 armies). I'm not sure what to do with the advisor and regalia territories. Right now they are simply more buffers between the gate and the ninja.

Speaking of the ninja, I will be moving its connection so that it can only be accessed after going through the empress (entirely a gameplay concern, no historical basis that I know of).

Finally, the big change is the addition of a victory condition. I will probably up the castle requirement to 6, but other than that, I have no changes to that element of the map. Any thoughts?

[natty dread]

Well, I'd like the farmlands (rice paddies?) included in the map somehow. After all, you got to feed your armies. No army moves without food.

I think it can be done without cluttering the map. There are lots of those manpower icons, you could change some to farm icons.

Ps. I love that you included castles. They were a very big part of japanese warfare.

[skepticCS]

Well, I'd like the farmlands (rice paddies?) included in the map somehow. After all, you got to feed your armies. No army moves without food.

I think it can be done without cluttering the map. There are lots of those manpower icons, you could change some to farm icons.

Ps. I love that you included castles. They were a very big part of japanese warfare.

Hmmm. So don't add farms, just split the current manpower territories with farms. That could work.

[ghirrindin]

Part of me thinks that adding farms would be somewhat unnecessary. After all, the site has roughly 150ish maps that don't take feeding an army into consideration. However, given the theme of the map and the added dimension of role-playing as a feudal lord, I think agriculture could really set this map apart. Perhaps have the bonus as something everyone can easily get, and have it be a fairly significant bonus (auto-deploy?) key to success on the map. This feature would be especially fun in instances of chained fortifications, as you would learn a harsh lesson in keeping your supply lines open.

[skepticCS]

Agriculture is, indeed, making an entrance into the upcoming version of the map. I'm going to try out what natty suggested and simply replace half of my manpower territories with agricultural territories and make the bonuses result from pairs of the two rather than cumulative control of one or the other. The manpower + mines combo will remain the same, but the manpower requirement to gain the shogun's hall and victory condition will be reduced. In this upcoming version of I will also be including European technology in the form of Galleons of the coast of certain locations of the map to simulate the important role the introduction of teppos (guns) had on Japanese warfare of the period. Right now, I am planning on attaching the European ships to the north and south coast territories of the central region (where the receiving end of the one way ship attacks land). Holding one of these ships grants the controller +3. However, holding both will negate the bonus entirely, simulating the social and political ramifications of embracing the other European import, Christianity, too enthusiastically. Both of these effects have some basis in history, but, most importantly, I think they make sense gameplay-wise by forcing players to choose between breaking an opponent's bonus and losing their own. I've thought about actually making it -1(to 3) armies for holding both as a real disincentive to break that bonus, but if I do that I would have to provide a way for players to at least neutralize the European ships, and I'm not certain I would like to do that. I'm open to suggestions, though.

Ghirrindin, your supply chain idea sounds really interesting. I know it's not what you meant, but reading your post made me envision a bonus structure based up control of contiguous territories as a prerequisite for gaining certain bonuses. I do not imagine that would be XML-able, but it would certainly be a unique feature and lead to some exciting gameplay. Imagine bringing the most powerful daimyo's march on the capital to it's knees be leading one risky assault behind his lines, forcing him to redeploy and counter your efforts.

Of course, I like completely agree with your perspective in its intended sense (as I understand it) as well. Right now, the bulk of every player's initial forces will be autodeployed on their castle(s). As they take more bonuses, they will gain a more flexible deployment, but I still envision that +6 autodeploy on every castle to be a continually important source of power requiring a careful management of "supply lines". You don't want to gun for the capital too quick, leaving an enemy in your half of the island who can sneak behind and cut off your fort routes of even knock out one of your castles. That's my goal, as I've said: push players into slower consolidation before making any hasty moves.

Just so you all know, I have not posted any updates because I am currently making significant graphical enhancements to the map before posting up the new version. They will still be extremely rudimentary in graphics foundry terms I'm sure, but at least it will be easier on the eyes.

[ghirrindin]

On second thought, I'm not sure just how much food they were transporting across the countryside in feudal Japan. I get the feeling that food was probably pillaged from farms as armies advanced into enemy territory. I'm sure you know the historical contours of the period better than I do, so you should do what you see fit. But I still think the idea of implementing food production into the map has potential.