Conquer Club

Version 14.
1. impassables enhanced on map and legend and moved from top to bottom
2. starts on Monarch and first treasury space beefed up to 6 each
3. titles on command vessels enhanced



and with the starts and neutrals

Finally had a chance to look it over. Looks good to me, will play it in Beta right away.

DoomYoshi wrote:Finally had a chance to look it over. Looks good to me, will play it in Beta right away.

Is it easily understood DoomYoshi?

cairnswk wrote:

DoomYoshi wrote:Finally had a chance to look it over. Looks good to me, will play it in Beta right away.

Is it easily understood DoomYoshi?

Instead of text can you represent instructions through pictures?
Mainly the Treasury movement.

Nola_Lifer wrote:

cairnswk wrote:

DoomYoshi wrote:Finally had a chance to look it over. Looks good to me, will play it in Beta right away.

Is it easily understood DoomYoshi?

Instead of text can you represent instructions through pictures?
Mainly the Treasury movement.

one-half of the treasury movement already has an upwards arrow...
the other bit i think would be doable if there was heaps more space....i'll look at it though.

cairnswk wrote:

Nola_Lifer wrote:

cairnswk wrote:

DoomYoshi wrote:Finally had a chance to look it over. Looks good to me, will play it in Beta right away.

Is it easily understood DoomYoshi?

Instead of text can you represent instructions through pictures?
Mainly the Treasury movement.

one-half of the treasury movement already has an upwards arrow...
the other bit i think would be doable if there was heaps more space....i'll look at it though.

i've just tried it and graphically there are going to be too many arrows going back and forth

cairnswk wrote:

cairnswk wrote:

Nola_Lifer wrote:

cairnswk wrote:

DoomYoshi wrote:Finally had a chance to look it over. Looks good to me, will play it in Beta right away.

Is it easily understood DoomYoshi?

Instead of text can you represent instructions through pictures?
Mainly the Treasury movement.

one-half of the treasury movement already has an upwards arrow...
the other bit i think would be doable if there was heaps more space....i'll look at it though.

i've just tried it and graphically there are going to be too many arrows going back and forth

Just throwing it out there. Thanks for trying it out though

Nola_Lifer wrote:...
Just throwing it out there. Thanks for trying it out though

i had thought of it earlier 'coz i recognise it is very wordy...
it is difficult because there needs to be arrows going to and from from every treasury square to each command vessel unit as well as SS or LB...yeh, just too much

I can understand it. It seems wordy but I don't have better suggestions.

This map will receive the gameplay stamp in the next 24-48 hours, so if anyone has any concerns/comments/suggestions, now is the time to make them known.

nolefan5311 wrote:This map will receive the gameplay stamp in the next 24-48 hours, so if anyone has any concerns/comments/suggestions, now is the time to make them known.

Yes i have comments....are the bonuses all good? Not enough discussion has taken place about these yet.
For instance...
1. the Monarch & their Treasury.... a player will get auto-deployed 1+1+3+4+5 for each of those square held.
Do they need to get another +11 for holding all that as stipulated in the top section.

2. for the single ships...does it need to be 9 on either side of spanish or English or can it be a combination of both sides for the +1 bonus and is +1 enough for 9....coinsidering you get +1 for holding a supply ship or land base.

3. army de parma and fireships...i am sure these bonuses are not correct.

4. if supply ship is worth +1, then surely command ship must be worth +2

Stamping for gameplay is happening far too early IMHO, and not enough analysis has occurred,

Don't worry, no stamp will be given till we're all sure that the map is really ready to go.
Moreover a little bird told me that iancanton, our gameplay guru, is going to double check the map.

Finally, althought my current rank is really shitty and certainly I'm not a gameplay expert, I'll take a look at your map tomorrow and I'll try to give you an answer to your questions/concerns here above.

Nobodies

thenobodies80 wrote:...
Finally, althought my current rank is really shitty and certainly I'm not a gameplay expert, I'll take a look at your map tomorrow and I'll try to give you an answer to your questions/concerns here above.
Nobodies

no hurry tnb80...i also want to do some analysis there to offer something from my perspective, although like you, i am also no gameplay expert.

I hope my eagerness to get it stamped didn't lead you to believe I wasn't being thorough, cairns. If you want, I will unsticky the thread and leave it in the GP stage for a couple more weeks, give more people a chance to look it over.

nolefan5311 wrote:I hope my eagerness to get it stamped didn't lead you to believe I wasn't being thorough, cairns. If you want, I will unsticky the thread and leave it in the GP stage for a couple more weeks, give more people a chance to look it over.

eagerness i suspected. thoroughness was not suspected. yes please unsticky it due to large number of issues to be discussed.

i very much suspect that the basic layout of the map, after ur changes, is virtually there (apart from the fact that some command ships can still be bombarded by enemy ship start positions) and only the bonuses and neutrals need more critical attention.

antwerp and brugge have no army count. bruxelles is anomalously in french, while the other nearby regions are in dutch; brussel is more logical.

although the overall package looks better if there is legend at top and bottom with the playable map in the middle, this doesn't work so well when trying to understand the bonuses.

it makes more sense for the ship bonus to be valid for 9 single ships of the same nation, so that a player will tend to accumulate ships from one side of the battle. it's not at all obvious that a command ship is part of this bonus and, unless a player is familiar with trafalgar (which has a similar concept), it probably wouldn't even cross his mind in his first armada game. this needs some explanation in the legend.

one might wonder why certain parts of the english channel give such high bonuses of +2 to +4 for holding 3 to 5 regions. after all, they're just areas of empty sea, while conquering 9 ships gives just +1. i understand that the sea areas cannot bombard, so they need some bonus to compensate, but the difference appears to be excessive.

ian.

iancanton wrote:i very much suspect that the basic layout of the map, after ur changes, is virtually there (apart from the fact that some command ships can still be bombarded by enemy ship start positions)

Did you examine the chart i did 2 pages back ian?
Can you advise where you see that because they were all located well away from each other...perhaps i am mistaken

and only the bonuses and neutrals need more critical attention.

definitely agree.

antwerp and brugge have no army count.

Fixed.

bruxelles is anomalously in french, while the other nearby regions are in dutch; brussel is more logical.

sorry, not sure what u mean here

although the overall package looks better if there is legend at top and bottom with the playable map in the middle, this doesn't work so well when trying to understand the bonuses.

i beleive this is the best solution as players may not have to scroll so far when looking up something.

it makes more sense for the ship bonus to be valid for 9 single ships of the same nation, so that a player will tend to accumulate ships from one side of the battle.

Agreed and Fixed next version

it's not at all obvious that a command ship is part of this bonus and, unless a player is familiar with trafalgar (which has a similar concept), it probably wouldn't even cross his mind in his first armada game. this needs some explanation in the legend.

Agreed, and because CV has it's own bonus, i have stated it is not part of the +1 for 9 bonus...so does that need increasing?

one might wonder why certain parts of the english channel give such high bonuses of +2 to +4 for holding 3 to 5 regions. after all, they're just areas of empty sea, while conquering 9 ships gives just +1. i understand that the sea areas cannot bombard, so they need some bonus to compensate, but the difference appears to be excessive.
ian.

it was appropriate to include the main battles of the journey, and these are included as continents to battle over....i would be happy to adjust bonuses where needed. please advise further

VErsion 15.

cairnswk wrote:

iancanton wrote:i very much suspect that the basic layout of the map, after ur changes, is virtually there (apart from the fact that some command ships can still be bombarded by enemy ship start positions)

Did you examine the chart i did 2 pages back ian?
Can you advise where you see that because they were all located well away from each other...perhaps i am mistaken

são luis can bombard san martin. scout can bombard ark royal.

cairnswk wrote:

bruxelles is anomalously in french, while the other nearby regions are in dutch; brussel is more logical.

sorry, not sure what u mean here

bruxelles is the french name for brussels (brussel in dutch), while gent, brugge and ieper are dutch names for these cities (gand, bruges and ypres in french), calais is a french name (kales in dutch) and antwerp is in english (antwerpen in dutch and anvers in french). we need some consistency here.

cairnswk wrote:

although the overall package looks better if there is legend at top and bottom with the playable map in the middle, this doesn't work so well when trying to understand the bonuses.

i beleive this is the best solution as players may not have to scroll so far when looking up something.

on the contrary, players may have to scroll to both top and bottom to make sure that they have the complete picture, for example the treasury is in both the top and bottom part of the legend.

ian.

iancanton wrote:

cairnswk wrote:

iancanton wrote:i very much suspect that the basic layout of the map, after ur changes, is virtually there (apart from the fact that some command ships can still be bombarded by enemy ship start positions)

Did you examine the chart i did 2 pages back ian?
Can you advise where you see that because they were all located well away from each other...perhaps i am mistaken

são luis can bombard san martin. scout can bombard ark royal.

Thanks for those ian...fixed in V15 above, please refresh your browser.

cairnswk wrote:

bruxelles is anomalously in french, while the other nearby regions are in dutch; brussel is more logical.

sorry, not sure what u mean here

bruxelles is the french name for brussels (brussel in dutch), while gent, brugge and ieper are dutch names for these cities (gand, bruges and ypres in french), calais is a french name (kales in dutch) and antwerp is in english (antwerpen in dutch and anvers in french). we need some consistency here.

OK, i have changed them all to Dutch - i think, thank you for those language alternatives.

cairnswk wrote:

although the overall package looks better if there is legend at top and bottom with the playable map in the middle, this doesn't work so well when trying to understand the bonuses.

i beleive this is the best solution as players may not have to scroll so far when looking up something.

on the contrary, players may have to scroll to both top and bottom to make sure that they have the complete picture, for example the treasury is in both the top and bottom part of the legend.
ian.

From a design pov, i prefer this layout because the top and bottom enclose the map.
Your are correct for functionality however. The only thing i would be prepared to do is drop the bonus legend below the current bottom legend...if you can imagine how that would look...and even then i am not sure i would want to do that as i beleive it would look ghastly. Sorry, just my opinion.

PS: Ian, i have just spent an hour of so experimenting with the layout and moving things around.
1. i moved the top legend to below the current bottom legend, and this created greater issues with the bonuses being so far away from the actual map bonuses, it is still necessary to scroll from bottom to top to see the relevant areas on the mpa itself referred to in the legend.
2. i then moved the top legend to above the current bottom legend and (as much as it looks ghastly) there is some functionality there however, from the top of the map to the bottom of the monarch positions which is the play area, is still 700 pixels high thereabouts.
3. the current layout from top of map to bottom of monarch areas is only 620 pixels - not too far out of the min 600 pixels for small maps.

Whichever way one goes and on the basis of the above, i am reluctant to move anything.

thanks for trying, anyway. just trying to anticipate the comments about the legend at the graphics stage.

there are still a few territories (i'm using territories to mean non-treasury regions and presume that this is the meaning in the legend) that can assault or bombard an opponent's start: diana and doncella, aid and poole land supply, bull, rainbow stern and ft(a), ft(a) and london land supply, zuniga and vanguard stern and moon, scout and brighton land supply.

can all territories bombard 2 in any direction, or just ships? i'm assuming it's all territories, since the legend doesn't say otherwise.

in the treasury, is it worth breaking up the upward arrow to make it clear that u cannot assault two treasury squares above?

tilbury fort (not fort tilbury) is on the north side of the river thames, not the south. if u don't have enough room for the army count up there, then just extending the green colour and the western border line to the other side of the river will be fine, as long as there's no doubt that it assaults york.

http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/tilbury-fort/

ian.

iancanton wrote:thanks for trying, anyway. just trying to anticipate the comments about the legend at the graphics stage.

and i appreciate your efforts there ian.

there are still a few territories (i'm using territories to mean non-treasury regions and presume that this is the meaning in the legend) that can assault or bombard an opponent's start: diana and doncella, aid and poole land supply, bull, rainbow stern and ft(a), ft(a) and london land supply, zuniga and vanguard stern and moon, scout and brighton land supply.

ah yes...will fix.

can all territories bombard 2 in any direction, or just ships? i'm assuming it's all territories, since the legend doesn't say otherwise.

well that is a point for discussion i guess. naturally ships would be able to, but should that be extended to land also, do you think?

in the treasury, is it worth breaking up the upward arrow to make it clear that u cannot assault two treasury squares above?

good point...will fix.

tilbury fort (not fort tilbury) is on the north side of the river thames, not the south. if u don't have enough room for the army count up there, then just extending the green colour and the western border line to the other side of the river will be fine, as long as there's no doubt that it assaults york.
http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/tilbury-fort/
ian.

Ah, ok. i can re-arrange that.
Will have something for those changes in the next few days.
Please advise you thoughts on the land assaults two terts away.

it makes complete sense that all ships, armies and land supplies ought to be able to bombard; it's questionable for battle sites, english non-supply territories, beacons and treasury regions.

SS for supply ship looks much neater than L.B. for land base. remove the dots?

ian.

iancanton wrote:it makes complete sense that all ships, armies and land supplies ought to be able to bombard; it's questionable for battle sites, english non-supply territories, beacons and treasury regions.

SS for supply ship looks much neater than L.B. for land base. remove the dots?

ian.

Thanks for that ian. Those aspects above should be addressed in this version 16.

Disdain and Diana in the legend are different colors and shapes than the same ships in the map. When you get to graphics, that should probably be fixed to avoid confusion.

The beacons should have either beacon at least with 2 or 3 neutrals to avoid giving the british players too much advantage (unless it was the beacons that caused the battle to be won - I'm not very familiar with this battle).

Perhaps some key territories could also have a higher neutral bonus. Not sure which ones to put it on though.

wow it has changed since I came last time
few remarks

I read all legend complex but understandable
except for the second part of Treasury Movement
does it mean the first row of treasury is attackable from command vessel, SS, LB ?

what is the difference between +1M and +1T in the treasury

I would restrain bombardment to command vessel only
as larger ship they are controlling at range
smaller ship shouldn't be
neither land bases but I'm not sure