This idea tickles me. And particularly I like the Dictatorship and Communism bonus structure.

For other political systems, consider that "Democracy" is as easily subdivided as you did with "Dictatorship" and "Monarchy" (which is a dictatorship, btw, since that is a one-man rule... unless you mean ...

Victor Sullivan wrote:Fair enough. I thought the idea was at least worth discussing.

-Sully

Indeed it is... I think I or someone I know proposed this once before though... wait, I've got it- TheBastard and his original maps, like Reconquista. He eventually sort of came up with a scheme, but it was complicated.

Btw, for the record I think the second of Ender's options (to not use the Accused in starting positions) could only be negative in the sense that thematically the gamepaly might suffer a bit by excluding players from taking a role as Accuser or Accused. However, even this wouldn't necessarily be ...

lostatlimbo wrote:Wow. Well done! This is an awesome list.

No kidding, Winged Cat you took something and ran with it. Amusing list and yet very thematic

I do have to say, that although I'm no graphics expert I think the previous version with the smaller, 'softer-looking' boxes was more visually pleasing. The larger boxes do make the map look more cluttered, and they are larger than they need to be to accomodate the army numbers. In fact, the army ...

Hmmmm, I think that either one or both of us is confused about the nature of starting positions as proposed... I confess that it may be me 8-[

As I understand it, starting positions as you showed in the XML psuedocode below-

Code: Select all
<positions>
<position>
<territory>Ann Putnam Jr ...

I'm going to put this map up for review in the next bulletin. The gameplay looks reasonable to me, I'll see what the other CAs think. If there are no unaddressed concerns from the CAs and community in the next week or so, expect a stamp.

-- Marshal Ney

things that need discussed:

1. sully's suggestion to restrict the territory bonus to the land area. how would i explain this on the map?
2. research names.

(1) "There is no territory bonus for Tech regions." That's about as succinct as I can come up with at this time of night.

(2) I'm assuming ...

So my anonymous XML source tells me that it might be best to use the 'max' command to limit the number of starting position 'batches' to 1, so that smaller games (i.e., 2-player, 3-player & 4-player games) won't have a distribution problem.

In this case, I'm thinking that organizing the starting ...

Given the large amount of ground that each region represents, I think it could be argued either way for ER5. Frankly, since it works better for the gameplay, in my opinion I say keep it and let history be fudged just a tad. There were quite a few Federal skirmishers roving in front of the main lines ...

OK, the starting positions look mostly fine, but there's an XML question to which I'll be getting an answer by tomorrow that should clear things up for me.

The XML question involves coding start positions so that bonuses can't be dropped. Right now, the map has 5 Accusers, 7 Accused (2 hanged) and ...

On the buggy stops - 1 - will maintain flow around the map
On Meeting houses - 3 - don't want these as too easy to get, players need to fight over them
On witch hill, prison and judges and reverends - 5 - high in order to be not easy to get until end game
On all other non-starting positions - 2 ...

Sorry, didn't mean to neglect this...

Question 1: Yes, I think 24 works. It will join the select company of Poker Club and maybe several other maps I can't recall with several sets of starting positions... Certainly it mitigates my personal dislike for conquest maps, so I'll probably play it ...

As there are no current concerns regarding gameplay and the community has had time to weigh in with comments, I hereby grant this map the Foundry seal of adequacy!



Congratulations MinisterX!

Regarding bonus-on-drop: in looking over what I'd have to do to eliminate the chances, I realized I made a mistake in my calculations. They're really about half of what I said they were. (I forgot about some of the neutral starters I already had!) Still, if it would be easy enough to reduce the ...

I set up a spreadsheet to calculate how often a bonus would be earned on the drop. It's not 100% foolproof but it's got to be close. If anything, I've been conservative. (Details if asked.)

With eight players the chances are negligible. With six they're about 3%. One in 33 games would have a drop ...

The Tech Victory Objective seems odd to me, however. Why all of level 3? Why not a pair from each level, for instance?

you don't need ALL of level 3. just all of the Human lvl 3 or all of the Alien level 3.

and this is done because there are 4 winning objectives and they all need to be balanced ...

Excellent-looking map, the title and the dreamcatcher in particular really clinch the theme.

I have an idea, not sure if it's worthwhile but the flavor text seems a little understated. It looks a bit like it's part of the legend instructions rather than part of the map's story. In particular the ...

This map will get the gameplay stamp in 48 hours, if there are no further comments in that area that need to be addressed.

As for the clarity issue concerning the river and the wall, I think in this case the redundancy only strengthens the intended meaning, rather than causing any confusion or ...

I actually think that the tech trees don't need much in the way of gameplay 'spice'; the map is modestly complex as it stands. None of the additions I've seen suggested (with all due respect to the wonderful and constructive commenters who made them) seems to support/enhance the theme or goal of the ...

So far so good, your placement of neutrals follows logically and should eliminate the worst outcomes of a 'lucky drop'.

I'm going to fool around with some math and figure out (if my brain is up to it) the probability of dropping any of those 4-region bonuses. There are a whopping 7 of them, which ...

This is a conquest map? I just don't see it as conquest. I see it more as a standard map with dispersion bonuses. Perhaps instead of conquest just have starting neutrals to prevent freebie bonuses?

I agree with this strongly, but if this was meant to be a conquest map from the beginning then of ...

I agree with Minister about the bombardments. While they would be a nice touch in a more complex map, I believe that Minister is aiming for a moderately simple gameplay framework. Given that goal, the number of gameplay elements should be small, probably no more than one, possibly two 'non-standard ...

There seem to be a lot of 'isolated' regions that can only break out or be attacked by going through a buggy killer neutral, which could have consequences for escalating games for instance, but really I don't consider that a big deal... it could even be rather interesting.

As for the bonus values ...

The latest font coloring was *much* easier to read for me, just fyi.