The Black Sea [July 2nd] V.2, Pg. 1 & 4

[tkr4lf]

I know natty can help you with that, since you're using gimp if I remember correctly.

MOVED into the Drafting Room!!

Yup, still using GIMP.

And thanks for the move!

[Oneyed]

Isle of Rhodes in your map is Isle of Crete in reality.
will be also Aegean Sea, Sea of Azov and Sea of Mamara playable territories? because I can not see place for army numbers.
in legend, replace "Each" with symbol of city and delete part where is "city symbol = city".
each city lies in "its" region, but Rostov does not.
maybe some impassables would help.

Oneyed

[tkr4lf]

Isle of Rhodes in your map is Isle of Crete in reality.

Good catch. Not sure how I missed that. Thanks!

will be also Aegean Sea, Sea of Azov and Sea of Mamara playable territories? because I can not see place for army numbers.

I hadn't planned on making them playable terits, but it's something I can look into. Anybody else think this would be a good idea as well?

in legend, replace "Each" with symbol of city and delete part where is "city symbol = city".

Can do.

each city lies in "its" region, but Rostov does not.

Yeah, I missed that one. I had it in my mind to go back and do it, but I had gotten busy with doing something else on the map, and completely forgot about it. It's in my list of things to do for the next update.

maybe some impassables would help.

Oneyed

Impassables are in my list of things to do for the next update as well. They're pretty much a must for this map. Otherwise, the map is way too open and most of the bonuses will be almost impossible to hold.

Thanks for the input! Please keep coming back and commenting, I can use the extra eyes. Mine seem to miss things...

I'll be working on the next update tomorrow/this weekend, so expect an update before too long. It does take me a while to do things though, I'm kind of slow with it.

[Oneyed]

will be also Aegean Sea, Sea of Azov and Sea of Mamara playable territories? because I can not see place for army numbers.

I hadn't planned on making them playable terits, but it's something I can look into. Anybody else think this would be a good idea as well?

I just ask, because I saw sea names. if they will not be playable territories delete names or make them less visible.

Oneyed

[Flapcake]

I realy like you idea for this map, and Its a good start too.

personaly I think this would do good for graphics, dont use drop shadow on outer border for the land areas (looks confusing and flikers my eyes) use outer glow instead, make a copy of the border and put on outer glow and insert layer in middels of water and land.

Your font for territorys names, "strong" are to much when so many names are close together, try smooth or crisp, or non also here, drop shadow dont work, especialy when its not global, get rid of the shadow and try outer glow, or aleast tune down the shadow and give it some distance.

I love the colours your using, very nice, also the texture are nice. good work so far

[tkr4lf]

will be also Aegean Sea, Sea of Azov and Sea of Mamara playable territories? because I can not see place for army numbers.

I hadn't planned on making them playable terits, but it's something I can look into. Anybody else think this would be a good idea as well?

I just ask, because I saw sea names. if they will not be playable territories delete names or make them less visible.

Oneyed

Ok, I can do that.

If I decide to make them playable, I can just make all sea terits killer neutrals able to assault all bordering land regions and all bordering seas. That would eliminate the need for sea routes, but it would also serve to make the map less open, especially in the Aegean/Mediterranean Seas, since I planned on having multiple sea routes, for example, From Laconia to both The Greek Isles and Crete, from The Greek Isles to Tekirdag, Republic of Cyrpus, etc.

Well, so I guess it would serve to close off the map a little by making only one assault route through the seas, but would open it up by making the seas able to assault any land region it borders.

I don't know, I'll have to think about which way works better with the current gameplay.

[tkr4lf]

I realy like you idea for this map, and Its a good start too.

Thanks!

personaly I think this would do good for graphics, dont use drop shadow on outer border for the land areas (looks confusing and flikers my eyes) use outer glow instead, make a copy of the border and put on outer glow and insert layer in middels of water and land.

Ok, I can do that no problem.

Your font for territorys names, "strong" are to much when so many names are close together, try smooth or crisp, or non also here, drop shadow dont work, especialy when its not global, get rid of the shadow and try outer glow, or aleast tune down the shadow and give it some distance.

Ah, thanks for this feedback. I was wondering how the font was being perceived. I really like the font I'm using for this map, it seems to go well. Luckily, there is a standard font and then the bold font, so I can switch from the bold to the standard for the terit labels and see if that looks better.

I can also mess around with the drop shadow for the font and see if I can't give it a little more distance. Or, it may look better the way it is when I switch from the bold font to the regular version of the font. As far as tuning the shadow down, it's already down to 50% opacity, I can set it down further if need be. But I'll wait and see how it looks with the skinnier font first.

I love the colours your using, very nice, also the texture are nice. good work so far

Thanks! The color scheme is basically a rainbow, lol. It goes around the black sea, green to yellow, yellow to orange, orange to red, red to purple, purple to blue, blue to green.

Thanks for you feedback and support! Keep an eye out sometime this weekend for the next update.

Oh, also, I've updated the first post with new stuff for me to do for the next update, based on the feedback I've received so far.

[tkr4lf]

Some more feedback I could still use:

Are the borders clear enough? Do they look pixelated?

How is the placement for the army circles? Any issues anybody notices with those? (Other than the obvious places where they don't fit without going over/under borders and names.)

Will it be an issue with how I've handled cities/terits with the same name? As you can see, I named the region (e.g. Antalya) and then simply added (City) to the name for the city (e.g. Antalya (City)). Is that an acceptable solution or do I need to find a different name to use for those terits?

The cities...Do they look ok? I'm sure they will probably need to change eventually. An idea I had is to have one icon for the victory condition cities and one icon for the rest of the cities. Do you guys think that will be necessary, or is it clear enough which cities I'm referring to in regards to the victory condition?

[AndyDufresne]

Some more feedback I could still use:

Are the borders clear enough? Do they look pixelated?

They do look pixelated, you'll probably need to eventually fix 'em up. In terms of actual border placement, some places seem often linear...like the bonus zones at the top of the map. Turkey's region look more natural. What did you use to base your borders on?

Will it be an issue with how I've handled cities/terits with the same name? As you can see, I named the region (e.g. Antalya) and then simply added (City) to the name for the city (e.g. Antalya (City)). Is that an acceptable solution or do I need to find a different name to use for those terits?

I'll let some of the more advanced Foundry folks comment on this, since I am not sure.

The cities...Do they look ok? I'm sure they will probably need to change eventually. An idea I had is to have one icon for the victory condition cities and one icon for the rest of the cities. Do you guys think that will be necessary, or is it clear enough which cities I'm referring to in regards to the victory condition?

I think you've probably got the right idea for the icon (a couple of buildings), but they'll probably have to evolve as the graphics get better.

I'll dig more into this map hopefully in another couple of days or a week or so!

Keep up the work,


--Andy

[Peter Gibbons]

I really like this idea--both the area and the concept.

I think graphics will work themselves out over time and you have a good start, so nothing much to add there at the moment. I would suggest you're going to need a new, clearer font, but that might just be my personal taste. I also think the symbol for the city should (and eventually will) be more sophisticated.

For gameplay, a few questions/points:

1) Each city autodeploys +1 and gives a +1 bonus? I know there's a lot of territories on the map, but that seems like a lot. How are the cities going to start? Neutral 2? Regardless, I think the autodeploy is going to be more than enough and might even be too much already given how many cities there are on the map. Perhaps something more like Fractured America/China or the USA Map pack, where X number of cities equals a bonus.

2) Is the Black Sea as a killer neutral the best method to go about connecting the territories around the perimeter? What about making the cities on the Sea act as ports, which can attack each other? Just seems like using the Black Sea as a giant territory that appears to border at least 22 land territories is a recipe for disaster.

3) I think the victory condition is arbitrary and somewhat ambiguous. Why should the 10 cities "around" the Black Sea be worth more than the others? Plus, if you need to hold a specific 10 cities, I think they should look different than the other cities. I think I know which 10 you mean, but it would be much easier to make it visually clear. Regardless, I think a victory condition based on the cities might be too much here. I think this could work better if it were more like Fractured China/America or Nordic Countries, where the capitals are just part of the game.

4) Is there a Rostov and a Rostov city territory? It seems like something is omitted there.

5) I think that, in general, you're going to have to make the city names much more clear (perhaps a different font) and you're going to have to make it clear which territories that cities can attack. Can they only attack the territories that contain them? Can they attack adjacent territories to the territories found within? I think a very clear, more visually-pleasing legend is going to be an absolute must.

[tkr4lf]

Some more feedback I could still use:

Are the borders clear enough? Do they look pixelated?

They do look pixelated, you'll probably need to eventually fix 'em up. In terms of actual border placement, some places seem often linear...like the bonus zones at the top of the map. Turkey's region look more natural. What did you use to base your borders on?

For the pixelated borders, is it just the territory borders (the thinner ones) that look pixelated, or is it all the borders (the thicker and thinner ones)?

As for what I based the borders on, they're mostly artificial. My reason for this is that the actual administrative borders for these countries are freaking tiny. Honestly, the borders for Russia are about the truest to original I have here, and even they aren't really even, oh, maybe 75% accurate. Basically I tried to combine multiple administrative districts into each territory.

I kind of think the Turkey borders probably look more natural since they're much bigger than the others. I can go back and redraw all the territory borders (which I will need to do anyway, since they're pixelated) to try to get them more natural looking, and perhaps to more closely match up with the actual administrative districts. I will never be able to get them 100% accurate though, as then the army numbers, much less the territory labels, would never fit.

Will it be an issue with how I've handled cities/terits with the same name? As you can see, I named the region (e.g. Antalya) and then simply added (City) to the name for the city (e.g. Antalya (City)). Is that an acceptable solution or do I need to find a different name to use for those terits?

I'll let some of the more advanced Foundry folks comment on this, since I am not sure.

Fair enough.

The cities...Do they look ok? I'm sure they will probably need to change eventually. An idea I had is to have one icon for the victory condition cities and one icon for the rest of the cities. Do you guys think that will be necessary, or is it clear enough which cities I'm referring to in regards to the victory condition?

I think you've probably got the right idea for the icon (a couple of buildings), but they'll probably have to evolve as the graphics get better.

I'll dig more into this map hopefully in another couple of days or a week or so!

Keep up the work,


--Andy

Cool, I can work on the city icons more. I was actually considering making the icons be skyscrapers, since the map uses modern political boundaries for countries, and honestly the icon I have now is more of a medieval type looking building.

Thanks for the feedback, Andy, I look forward to hearing more from you!

[tkr4lf]

I really like this idea--both the area and the concept.

Thanks!

I think graphics will work themselves out over time and you have a good start, so nothing much to add there at the moment. I would suggest you're going to need a new, clearer font, but that might just be my personal taste. I also think the symbol for the city should (and eventually will) be more sophisticated.

As for the font, I'm using Book Antiqua. I quite like it for the map. I think you're referring to the territory labels here? If so, I used the bold version of Book Antiqua for them, which is why they come off as too strong, I think. I'm going to redo them using the normal Book Antiqua and I'll post that and we can see how it looks. If it's still not a good fit, then I can easily find something else that works better.

As for the city, I'll work on it. I commented more on that aspect in the previous post responding to Andy.

For gameplay, a few questions/points:

1) Each city autodeploys +1 and gives a +1 bonus? I know there's a lot of territories on the map, but that seems like a lot. How are the cities going to start? Neutral 2? Regardless, I think the autodeploy is going to be more than enough and might even be too much already given how many cities there are on the map. Perhaps something more like Fractured America/China or the USA Map pack, where X number of cities equals a bonus.

Well, I wanted to give them the autodeploy to emphasize their importance, and to make holding them especially worthwhile. I wanted to give them the small bonus because most of the bonus areas on this map are rather big. There's really only 3 or 4 small(ish) bonuses, other than the 2 one-territory bonuses (Republic of Cyprus and Macedonia), Serbia, Moldova, Georgia, and I guess Northeast Turkey. Having the cities give +1 to your drop would make it easier to get enough going to be able to take one of those larger bonuses, and hold it. But I'm not married to this idea, so it can be changed if enough people feel like it should be.

I had planned on having the cities start either neutral 2 or 3, and having the territory that the city is in start as a neutral 2 or 3 as well, making taking the cities an investment.

Having the cities function more as a collection bonus could be an alternative, but I'd like to get more feedback on that issue.

2) Is the Black Sea as a killer neutral the best method to go about connecting the territories around the perimeter? What about making the cities on the Sea act as ports, which can attack each other? Just seems like using the Black Sea as a giant territory that appears to border at least 22 land territories is a recipe for disaster.

Well, the reason I didn't want the cities to directly be seaports is because of the victory condition. I wanted it to be harder to take and hold all 10 of the cities. Having it as a playable territory does solve the problem of having tons of sea routes going all through the area, but it can be changed if need be.

Originally, the Black Sea wasn't going to be a playable territory. It was simply going to have sea routes plastered all over it. But, I liked the killer neutral idea because it clears up that area, plus it allows for easy movement across the sea, but not too easy. Once I adopted this idea, I had to make the cities separate from the territories, otherwise it would be too easy to take the 10 cities needed for the victory condition.

Like I said, it can be reworked, but it probably needs to be something other than just having sea routes all over the place, because I think it will look pretty messy with that many sea routes.

3) I think the victory condition is arbitrary and somewhat ambiguous. Why should the 10 cities "around" the Black Sea be worth more than the others? Plus, if you need to hold a specific 10 cities, I think they should look different than the other cities. I think I know which 10 you mean, but it would be much easier to make it visually clear. Regardless, I think a victory condition based on the cities might be too much here. I think this could work better if it were more like Fractured China/America or Nordic Countries, where the capitals are just part of the game.

My reasoning behind making the 10 cities surrounding the black sea as the victory condition was that in order to hold those territs, you would have to have a pretty good grip on the black sea, and that controlling the Black Sea should mean victory, since this map uses the Black Sea as the main focal point. Does that make sense?

It's not so much that the cities around the black sea are worth more than the others, it's more that if you control those major cities around it, then you control it. And controlling it should be what the map is about.

I agree they should look different than the other cities if they are going to be the victory condition. I actually asked about that in an earlier post. But it's good to have some confirmation that it's a good idea to differentiate graphically between them.

To be clear, the cities that would be in the Victory Condition are: (going counter-clock-wise) Sevastopol, Odessa, Constanta, Varna, Istanbul, Zonguldak, Trebzon, Batumi, Krasnodar and Rostov.

4) Is there a Rostov and a Rostov city territory? It seems like something is omitted there.

Yes, there is supposed to be a city and a territory there. I missed it. I had actually planned on going back to get it, but then got busy doing something else with the map and must have looked right over it when I was checking everything before I uploaded it. That will be fixed in the next update.

5) I think that, in general, you're going to have to make the city names much more clear (perhaps a different font) and you're going to have to make it clear which territories that cities can attack. Can they only attack the territories that contain them? Can they attack adjacent territories to the territories found within? I think a very clear, more visually-pleasing legend is going to be an absolute must.

My plan was to have the cities only capable of attacking and being attacked by the city they are in. I can understand how it's not very clear at the moment.

I'll work on the font issue, and I can work on the legend as well. I may have to reduce some of the territories in Southwest Turkey in order to expand the legend, because right now it's just not big enough. I can't reduce the font size much more in the legend or I risk it being unreadable, especially once I make the small version. So I think I'll have to expand it.


Thanks for your feedback! I appreciate all of it. Keep an eye out for my next update, I will try to include as much of the feedback I have received as possible.

[Gillipig]

Your territory labels are a bit too dark and thick. Try using some different fonts to come up with a good fitting one. Also remove the black line in the bottom of your houses, it makes them look pasted on top of the map. Which they are of course but you don't want it to look like it .

[tkr4lf]

Your territory labels are a bit too dark and thick. Try using some different fonts to come up with a good fitting one. Also remove the black line in the bottom of your houses, it makes them look pasted on top of the map. Which they are of course but you don't want it to look like it .

Will do. Thanks.

[tkr4lf]

Does anybody have any further input on these 2 issues?

2) Is the Black Sea as a killer neutral the best method to go about connecting the territories around the perimeter? What about making the cities on the Sea act as ports, which can attack each other? Just seems like using the Black Sea as a giant territory that appears to border at least 22 land territories is a recipe for disaster.



3) I think the victory condition is arbitrary and somewhat ambiguous. Why should the 10 cities "around" the Black Sea be worth more than the others? Plus, if you need to hold a specific 10 cities, I think they should look different than the other cities. I think I know which 10 you mean, but it would be much easier to make it visually clear. Regardless, I think a victory condition based on the cities might be too much here. I think this could work better if it were more like Fractured China/America or Nordic Countries, where the capitals are just part of the game.

Should the Black Sea stay as a killer neutral able to attack all bordering land terits, or should it not be a playable terit and instead utilize sea routes to open up the area? Or, maybe it stays as a killer neutral but is only able to assault certain terits around the black sea, like maybe only terits with a city in them? Any thoughts on this?

And what about the victory condition? Does it seem too arbitrary? Does it work how it is? Does my reasoning for having the 10 cities surrounding the Black Sea as the victory condition make sense? Or should I get rid of the victory condition and simply have the cities as a part of the map? Or have something else as the victory condition?

I would appreciate any feedback on these two issues. I need to know what more people think about these before I can do certain updates. Thanks guys.

[cairnswk]

Nice start tkr4lf...

Things i like...imho
1. the sea is great
2. the land texture
3. the colours fit well together design wise and they appear OK colour-blind wise.
4. there is a good smattering of regions large and small, although i haven't examine gameplay to any detail

Things that could use improvement...eventually
1. border lines are pixelated
2. i think the territory font is quite heavy and looks bolded, some names i would have trouble reading. Perhaps something less bolded/heavy...along with the names in the Mediterranean - these are also hard to read...perhaps some outer glow might fix that.

Good start otherwise, i look forward to seeing where this goes.

[tkr4lf]

Nice start tkr4lf...

Thanks!

Things i like...imho
1. the sea is great
2. the land texture
3. the colours fit well together design wise and they appear OK colour-blind wise.
4. there is a good smattering of regions large and small, although i haven't examine gameplay to any detail

Thanks, but I'm surprised about the water. I mean, I think it looks ok, and definitely better than before, but I really think it could look better. Either way, thanks for the kind words.

Things that could use improvement...eventually
1. border lines are pixelated
2. i think the territory font is quite heavy and looks bolded, some names i would have trouble reading. Perhaps something less bolded/heavy...along with the names in the Mediterranean - these are also hard to read...perhaps some outer glow might fix that.

Pixelated border lines will be fixed in the next update.

Territory font will be as well. I actually used the bold version of Book Antiqua for them, I'm going to try the regular version. As long as I don't think they look like crap that way, then I'll include that in the next update and let you guys judge how it looks.

Good start otherwise, i look forward to seeing where this goes.

Again, thanks! Your kind words mean a lot, especially considering who they are coming from.

Keep an eye out, I'll have the next update soon. I've been kind of busy so far this weekend, but I will definitely have one out sometime this week.

And if you do get a chance to look at gameplay, can you give your thoughts on the last post on page 2?

[PereiroSaus]

Way to go, bro...!

I would clear the font a bit, yeah

[tkr4lf]

Way to go, bro...!

I would clear the font a bit, yeah

Thanks.



I'm working on the next update now. I've redrawn the terit borders, they look much better now, not pixelated anymore. I've merged some territs to make more room/ensure better clarity. Also enlarged the legend a bit to allow for more information. I've cleared up the font issue, I think. I'll let you guys be the judge of that. I've still got lots to do for this update though, so I won't be posting it for a while unless somebody really wants to see the few changes I've made so far.

[Industrial Helix]

Firstly let me say that I love the concept. However, I think your greens are to similar. I also think a minimap would be better than the colored words. Rivers or mountains would be an excellent addition as the map feels pretty wide open to me.

I can't honestly tell if the Aegean is a territory of its own, or if maybe that is Attica's circle just a bit misplaced. Tighten it up a bit, get circles as close as possible to the words. Unless absolutely necessary, put the circle and name on the land it belongs to. At the very worst, put the name at least partially on the land and the dot at the end of the word.

Also, what you have listed as Rhodes is not Rhodes, but actually Crete and that city is Heraklion. On your map, Rhodes is two islands east of Crete.

[tkr4lf]

Version 3:

Click image to enlarge.

New to Version 3:
- Added Impassables (Yes, they're not pretty. Yes, they're just mountains. I plan on doing forests as well, possibly some rivers. For now, I just wanted to get the impassables in place so I could get feedback on the placement and the effect on gameplay.)
- Added Sea Routes
- Fixed Territory Borders (Hopefully cleared up the pixelation issue, cleared up the issue with room for army numbers/circles, hopefully made the borders look more natural, deleted/merged some territories to make room for legend/army numbers/circles.)
- Changed the font. Hopefully it's not so strong now. Could use feedback on this issue.
- Fixed Rostov territory/city label issue.
- Fixed the Isle of Rhodes territory; Changed it to Crete. (Regarding IH's post, I could have sworn Rhodes was on Crete. I learn something new everyday. Will change the city name to Heraklion next update.)
- Got rid of drop shadow around the land and switched to an outer glow. Could use some feedback on how this looks.
- Removed black line from bottom of city icon to make it look more natural.
- Changed the legend. (Updated bonus values due to impassables being added, clarified assault routes for cities, changed the background for the legend.)
- I tried to make a minimap to show the bonus values, but had no luck with that. There wasn't enough room in the legend. Instead, I put the bonus values on the bonuses themselves. Could use feedback on how this looks. Also, will it be enough? Do I need to indicate the bonus values in the legend even though they're indicated on the bonuses themselves?
- Changed some territory names, adjusted some due to actual territory adjustments.
- Dropped any sea names that aren't playable territories.


Still to do:
-Come up with a better city icon.
-Graphically differentiate between victory condition cities and regular cities.
-Clean and spice up the legend.
-Make the water look more realistic.
-Spice up the map border.



Feedback I could use:
- How is the placement of the impassables? I don't need comments on how they look, I know they look like crap. The mountains will be redrawn later. How is the placement? Is the effect on gameplay ok?
- Is the font better now?
- Does the outer glow on the land look acceptable?

[tkr4lf]

Firstly let me say that I love the concept.

Thanks!

However, I think your greens are to similar. I also think a minimap would be better than the colored words. Rivers or mountains would be an excellent addition as the map feels pretty wide open to me.

Ok, I can work on making more difference in between the greens. Are there any in particular that are too similar? Or are they all too similar?

As for impassables, they were added in the latest update. Keep in mind, they look like crap, and were added solely to show the placement I had in mind and to gauge the effects on gameplay. The mountains will be redrawn, and I plan to mix it up with forests, mountains, and possibly rivers.

I can't honestly tell if the Aegean is a territory of its own, or if maybe that is Attica's circle just a bit misplaced. Tighten it up a bit, get circles as close as possible to the words. Unless absolutely necessary, put the circle and name on the land it belongs to. At the very worst, put the name at least partially on the land and the dot at the end of the word.

For now, the only body of water that is a playable territory is the Black Sea. All of the territory labels and army circles have been moved around as of the latest update, can you see if I have the same problem on this version?

Unfortunately you commented on Version 2 just before I uploaded version 3, so some of your complaints, etc. have been addressed, or at least I think they have. Any new comments/complaints on version 3 would be appreciated.

Also, what you have listed as Rhodes is not Rhodes, but actually Crete and that city is Heraklion. On your map, Rhodes is two islands east of Crete.

Wow. I swear, I have always thought that Rhodes was on Crete. I checked google maps to verify your information, and you are right. Amazing, I learn something new everyday! Thanks for noticing that, it will be fixed in the next update.

[Flapcake]

Looking better, still some work to do

The font you using, I like it realy much, fits the theme, but the drop shadow destroys the true design, its to sharp/strong and close, try just to have plain, if a effect are needed, outer glow wont have a huge impact on the font design, some times less is more.

the outer glow on border to the sea are certainly worth working on, suggestion make the transition more soft and wider, to give the effect that the sea are hitting the coast line.

army cirkles are not realy needed, they seems to cluttering up, maby only used for the sea, I dont know

(have to comment sorry) the mountain ranges are not bad, they just seems to "float" on top of the image, they dont look integrated, some shadow and color fade can fix it .

one question, how do ya assualt the Black sea ? and maby hold all 10 cities seems a little tough

Good work, encourage to keep goin

[Industrial Helix]

I like the changes you've made so far, but the city on Crete is Heraklion not Rhodes.

[tkr4lf]

I like the changes you've made so far, but the city on Crete is Heraklion not Rhodes.

Thanks. The Rhodes/Heraklion issue has been brought up, it will be changed.

Looking better, still some work to do

The font you using, I like it realy much, fits the theme, but the drop shadow destroys the true design, its to sharp/strong and close, try just to have plain, if a effect are needed, outer glow wont have a huge impact on the font design, some times less is more.

Hmm, I can try the font without any drop shadow, but it will look exactly like the font in the legend. Perhaps I could try lowering the opacity of the shadow even more, or adding more space in between the actual font and the shadow. Or I can try an outer glow. Anybody else have thoughts on this?

the outer glow on border to the sea are certainly worth working on, suggestion make the transition more soft and wider, to give the effect that the sea are hitting the coast line.

OK, I can work on it.

army cirkles are not realy needed, they seems to cluttering up, maby only used for the sea, I dont know

My main reason for having the army circles right now was to make sure all of the army numbers would fit. I figure if the army circle will fit, then the army numbers will fit as well. I can remove them if they just make it look cluttered.

(have to comment sorry) the mountain ranges are not bad, they just seems to "float" on top of the image, they dont look integrated, some shadow and color fade can fix it .

Haha, yeah, they look like crap. They're going to be completely redrawn eventually, so I'm not too worried about them "floating" since these particular mountains will be gone.

one question, how do ya assualt the Black sea ? and maby hold all 10 cities seems a little tough

As of now, the Black Sea can be assaulted by and assaults all bordering land territories. This can be changed if enough people think it should be. So far only one person has expressed concern about having it as a killer neutral that assaults and is assaulted by so many territories. Does anybody else agree that it should be changed? One thought on how to change it is to make it so that it can only be assaulted by and only assault territories that border it that also have a city in it, or perhaps the cities directly. I don't know. Just throwing out an idea.

Good work, encourage to keep goin

Thanks.


Unfortunately, I'm going to have to abandon this for a while. I'm leaving CC within the next few days. I don't know how long I'll be gone, it could be 6 months, it could be a couple of years. It's not exactly voluntary, so there's not much I can do about it.

I fully intend on working on this when I do get back.

I don't know exactly how this will be handled, since this doesn't have any stamps yet. Will it stay here in the drafting room, or will it be moved to abandoned?

I would prefer that nobody else take this up, since I really would like to work on it when I get back. But, it does seem to be a popular concept, so I guess if an established mapmaker really wants to take it up, then they can do so. I guess it's whatever at this point.

Sorry guys, I know I have a terrible track record on making maps, and this just makes it worse. But like I said, I fully intend on making this map once I get back, assuming nobody else has picked it up.