[Abandoned] - Exodus

[isaiah40]

Well the most confusing thing about this map is the Israel one way attacks. It looks like the Afghanistan powerpoint that the DoD produces with arrows going every which way. The one way attacks are going to need BOB to be able to see as a whole and make it easily understandable.

I also question the necessity of having the pillars on map, rather than off map features.

Okay so, Israel's Journey should be switched back over to all two way attack routes with a couple of one ways then. The pillars are on because they are an integral part of the journey. That being said, maybe I can place one of them somewhere else?

Anything else that you (or anyone else) think can be done game play wise?

Did you ever think of putting the Jordan river up at the top of the map? It probably end up being decorative, but if I remember correctly there was a significant story about Joshua leading the Israelites across the Jordan into the promise land by crossing the river.

Yes I could put it there, on the other hand since this map is about Israel making the loooooonnnnnng journey from Egypt to just before they crossed into the promised land (as IH mentioned earlier, this is really a story about Moses leading the Israelites), I'll skip it until (when this map gets into Beta) I do the second of this series called Israel - The Conquest (or something like that).

Unfortunately, IH, I think Mr. Benn is referring to the whole thing, by use of the word 'still'- as in "still doesn't think that the subject matter translates well."

Marshal can you please tell me what you mean by;

Personally, I think the map is a bit rough but the uniqueness of the theme is worth sticking with it.[/qoute]

Plus, there's an impressive amount of progress that's been made since this map first came out.

Thank you Marshal I really appreciate it!

[Evil DIMwit]

1. I'm not too fond of the 1-way attacks going towards Canaan. For one, it makes Cannan the least defensible, and therefore least desirable, area of the map. And there's not even a worthwhile bonus there. It makes more sense to me that the Canaan area be full of bounty, possibly neutral to start with since it had to be conquered. And if you must have one-ways, they should flow in the opposite direction -- after all, Israel's journey was wrought with adversity.

2. I think it's just a bad idea to have all plagues and pyramids attack each other. At this scale, "All __ attack each other" makes that part of the map just way too open. Why not just associate each pyramid with a plague, or something like that?

3. Maybe writing out English with Hebrew characters is going to pass over some people's heads, but don't think you can get away with that on my watch. I've translated your mangled mutant left-to-right Hebglish into actual Hebrew and cast it into a couple of fonts based off ancient Hebrew texts: One is from about the 9th century BCE and uses some old-school letter shapes; the other is from about the 2nd and looks much more like modern Hebrew letters. There were a couple of older fonts, from much closer to 1400, but they were missing a couple of letters, and at any rate the text was presumably written much, much later.

[isaiah40]

Sorry for the delay, RL has me swamped, but hopefully I should have an update here in a couple of days as I am already working on hte next update.

@evil, thank you for the suggestions, I will be using the fonts in the proper order on the next update (right to left that is as well).

[isaiah40]

Sorry for the delay folks, but here is V2.5 finally!!!

Changes made from evil suggestions and remove the army circles since the map looks better without them. Added in bonus for holding any 4 of the cities. I also remove the one way attacks and added in a couple one ways.

V 2.5

Click image to enlarge.

[natty dread]

The red sea crossing on the legend is a bit hard to match to the one on the map... I had to look quite a bit before I figured out which territory resets to 3.

Perhaps if you just put in the territory name in the legend, then people wouldn't have to guess about it.

[isaiah40]

Any on else for game play suggestions?? Yes natty, I'll make the change when I have more changes to make.

If no Game play issues, maybe graphics workshop??

[Industrial Helix]

Do you think the bonuses are a little too crammed in one region or another? Seems like a player who gets a start in the lower left is gonna win.

[isaiah40]

Do you think the bonuses are a little too crammed in one region or another? Seems like a player who gets a start in the lower left is gonna win.

Good point! Hmmm .... Maybe I should have all the starting territories in the middle, separated by 4 - 5 territories so it won't be easy to take out the next player. I'll work on it and see what I can come up with. Maybe have your reinforcements for holding X number of Israels Journey, and X number of cities?

Now that I think about it, I wonder if a build your own bonus structure would work well for this map??

Ideas? Comments??

[natty dread]

Now that I think about it, I wonder if a build your own bonus structure would work well for this map??

Sounds interesting. How did you plan on doing it?

[isaiah40]

Now that I think about it, I wonder if a build your own bonus structure would work well for this map??

Sounds interesting. How did you plan on doing it?

That is the question! I'll have to take a few days to mull it over. Of course ideas and suggestions on how I can achieve it are always welcome!!

[natty dread]

On the plagues, the legend says "can and be attacked from these." I assume it should read "can attack and be attacked from these" right?

[isaiah40]

On the plagues, the legend says "can and be attacked from these." I assume it should read "can attack and be attacked from these" right?

Would it be confusing if I left it the way it is? Or should I change the wording of it? I would have to make a little more room for the extra words, so if it makes it clearer than I'll do it.

[MarshalNey]

Marshal can you please tell me what you mean by;
Personally, I think the map is a bit rough but the uniqueness of the theme is worth sticking with it.[/qoute]

Plus, there's an impressive amount of progress that's been made since this map first came out.

Thank you Marshal I really appreciate it!

ummm.... did I neglect to reply to that? Was that really 2 months ago... Maybe, I was just trying to emulate the long journey of Moses?

The 'roughness' I am referring to centers around three things (not the graphics, which I like):

(1) The gritty, low-level bonuses- inlcuding the 1for every 4 territory bonus- remind me of the fun I have playing Imperium Romanum... except that this is a conquest map filled with neutrals. Games could be excruciatingly long with such low bonuses (and even a negative bonus!). Or they would boil down to players trying to kill each other and ignoring the bonuses.

(2) There are some icons that have no gameplay bearing, yet they're all over the map. This is fine, if they didn't draw so much attention...

(3) The legend is a bit hard to read although it's a lot better than where it started... a couple issues were already brought up, like the difficulty in identifying the Red Sea Crossing

Anyway, the map has a strong concept and you've done wonders translating a very challenging and complex theme into a CC map. Again, I apologize for the long delay.

[natty dread]

On the plagues, the legend says "can and be attacked from these." I assume it should read "can attack and be attacked from these" right?

Would it be confusing if I left it the way it is? Or should I change the wording of it? I would have to make a little more room for the extra words, so if it makes it clearer than I'll do it.

You should change it.

"can and be attacked" is not even proper english, you know...

[isaiah40]

Thanks natty, will do the changes when I have more than just a couple of changes to do.

Here's what I was thinking about concerning a build your own bonus type map.

1) Egyptian Pyramids 9 territories (not including Raamses) for the normal +1 for every 3 held.
2) Israel's Journey 40 territories - +2 for every 4 held
3) Plagues - For each column of plagues you would get +1, and for holding all the plagues I figure to lower them (well they are plagues ya' know) to +6, i.e. Flies, First Born Dead and Murrain would give you +1 and so on.
4) Hold both the Pillar of Fire and the Pillar of Cloud for +1
5) Of course the hold any 4 cities for +3 would remain.

How would this work? Feasible?

Please give me your insight and suggestions and ideas!

[isaiah40]

Any suggestions or ideas??

[natty dread]

Oh crap, I meant to reply to this but the got distracted and forgot it. I've been meaning to have a deep look at the gameplay here...

1) Egyptian Pyramids 9 territories (not including Raamses) for the normal +1 for every 3 held.
2) Israel's Journey 40 territories - +2 for every 4 held
3) Plagues - For each column of plagues you would get +1, and for holding all the plagues I figure to lower them (well they are plagues ya' know) to +6, i.e. Flies, First Born Dead and Murrain would give you +1 and so on.
4) Hold both the Pillar of Fire and the Pillar of Cloud for +1
5) Of course the hold any 4 cities for +3 would remain.

1) sounds good.
No problem with 2) either.

3) hmm... But that one column has one more plague. It should get more than the others...

4 and 5 seem good to me.

Yeah, everything seems to check except number 3...

As for other gameplay.. I wonder about the city in the south. It's a bit separated from the other cities, so it'll be hard to combine for the city bonus. Perhaps it would be worth to make into another kind of territory, perhaps a special city that gives a bonus... I'm sorry, I know so little about the Exodus, I don't know if that makes any sense, I'm just speaking of purely gameplay perspective.

The three starting positions on the pyramids are too close to each other... they seem to all be able to assault each other?

And I'm not sure if it's wise to have a starting position at the cities... too easy to get that +3 bonus in the start, while none of the other places can get such an easy bonus.

That's all I have for now.

[isaiah40]

Oh crap, I meant to reply to this but the got distracted and forgot it. I've been meaning to have a deep look at the gameplay here...

1) Egyptian Pyramids 9 territories (not including Raamses) for the normal +1 for every 3 held.
2) Israel's Journey 40 territories - +2 for every 4 held
3) Plagues - For each column of plagues you would get +1, and for holding all the plagues I figure to lower them (well they are plagues ya' know) to +6, i.e. Flies, First Born Dead and Murrain would give you +1 and so on.
4) Hold both the Pillar of Fire and the Pillar of Cloud for +1
5) Of course the hold any 4 cities for +3 would remain.

1) sounds good.
No problem with 2) either.

3) hmm... But that one column has one more plague. It should get more than the others...

So if I have a +2 for the third column, would that suffice?

4 and 5 seem good to me.

Yeah, everything seems to check except number 3...

As for other gameplay.. I wonder about the city in the south. It's a bit separated from the other cities, so it'll be hard to combine for the city bonus. Perhaps it would be worth to make into another kind of territory, perhaps a special city that gives a bonus... I'm sorry, I know so little about the Exodus, I don't know if that makes any sense, I'm just speaking of purely gameplay perspective.

Thank you natty!! Yes I was looking at that, and at the moment I am looking to see if there is anything else that I can put down there or change it to. Or just delete it all together.

The three starting positions on the pyramids are too close to each other... they seem to all be able to assault each other?

Once I get enough changes to be made I will be changing the starting positions to reflect more of a build your own bonus/conquest style map.

And I'm not sure if it's wise to have a starting position at the cities... too easy to get that +3 bonus in the start, while none of the other places can get such an easy bonus.

That's all I have for now.

True. I'm mulling over the idea of all starting positions on Israels Journey, but I may have to have a starting position or two on a couple of Egyptian cities

It seems like this would be the best way so that the plague and Egypt bonuses will come into play. Now that I think of it, would it be better if I increase the Israels Journey bonus to +2 for every 3 territories to help offset the plague and Egypt bonuses??

[natty dread]

Hmm, hard to say, it's always easier to evaluate gameplay when you have some visual clues, so let's see a new update and take it from there

[iancanton]

how do u attack the egypt bonus?

ian.

[isaiah40]

how do u attack the egypt bonus?

ian.

You can attack the Egypt bonus through Raamses, as it is part of the bonus Maybe I should make that a little clearer.

[Evil DIMwit]

I agree that it's not the best idea to make some cities of your start positions. In a similar vein, your pyramid start positions are much closer together than the others, which can cause an unfair disadvantage or advantage.

Also, as Ian said, it's not clear how to access the Moses, Aaron, and Pharaoh (which you misspelled) territories -- or do I think the bonus for owning those 3 and an Egyptian city makes much thematic sense. It might be better to just strike them from the map in the name of simplicity.

[isaiah40]

I am working on the next update and will have it posted in the next few days I hope!

[isaiah40]

Okay finally got a new update!!

Changes made:
- Moved starting positions to Israels Journey
- Moved Moses, Aaron, and Pharaoh onto the map and connected them to Sais, Tanis and Raamses
- Reworded the attack phrases in the Plagues according to Natty's suggestion
- Any 2 cities or pyramids you now get +2
- Any 2 Tabernacles you get +2, though I'm thinking of any 4 for +2

That's it for now so without further ado, I present you with Version 2.6!!

Click image to enlarge.

[Evil DIMwit]

Now I feel that Hashmonah, Jobathah, and Makheloth are disadvantaged by starting in the center. Meanwhile, with the tabernacles giving so much bonus, there's little reason any player would want to expand out to Egypt. Even with +2 for 2 pyramids, the tradeoff for having to take all the neutrals in the West probably won't be worth it.