Treasures of Galápagos [Quenched]

[DiM]

i can't see the image

edit// solved

Dim you asked for number on the map...are you going to comment on the gameplay?

as soon as i get my head around here i will. probably later this night when i finish my work. it's been a hell of a week with no days off.


edit//
2 quick questions so i have all the data needed for a proper comment:

1. is there a bonus for number of terits? 3 for 9, 4 for 12....
2. the snorkel bonus of -1 is applied just to the snorkel terit or is it a general bonus? i mean if it's general then it is substracted from the total bonus, if it's only on the terit then it applies just to the armies on the snorkel.

[cairnswk]

i can't see the image

edit// solved

Dim you asked for number on the map...are you going to comment on the gameplay?

as soon as i get my head around here i will. probably later this night when i finish my work. it's been a hell of a week with no days off.

Sorry Dim...don't mean to be pushy, but normally you're in there like Flynn...Errol that is Hehehehe....

edit//
2 quick questions so i have all the data needed for a proper comment:

1. is there a bonus for number of terits? 3 for 9, 4 for 12....

no i don't think that is necessary, and this map is designed for quick gameplay

2. the snorkel bonus of -1 is applied just to the snorkel terit or is it a general bonus? i mean if it's general then it is substracted from the total bonus, if it's only on the terit then it applies just to the armies on the snorkel.

I think it will apply to the reef tert...that way it would require that anyone wanting to benefit from the combined snorkel bonuses would have to ensure enough troops are forted there to get the bonuses.

What do you think?

[yeti_c]

edit//
2 quick questions so i have all the data needed for a proper comment:

1. is there a bonus for number of terits? 3 for 9, 4 for 12....

no i don't think that is necessary, and this map is designed for quick gameplay

So you mean that the usual - you have 12 territores you get 4 armies per turn doesn't count on this map?

So you are going to override the reinforcements in the XML?

C.

[cairnswk]

edit//
2 quick questions so i have all the data needed for a proper comment:

1. is there a bonus for number of terits? 3 for 9, 4 for 12....

no i don't think that is necessary, and this map is designed for quick gameplay

So you mean that the usual - you have 12 territores you get 4 armies per turn doesn't count on this map?

So you are going to override the reinforcements in the XML?

C.

Is that possible? Can you advise me on that C.

[DiM]

i will come back later this night with a longer analysis but following your response i see a big problem. a very big one i might add.

so a player starts with 10 armies on the reef and a -1 bonus. he gets nothing for the terit count so when he presses begin turn he gets nothing to deploy and his 10 armies drop to 9. now he has to kill 4 troops on 2 terits to get to a water source and get a bonus. frankly odds are many people will fail this 9v2v2 attack and remain without a bonus. if this happens the game is over for them since they have no troops to deploy and they just have to sit and wait for another player to come and kill them.


a very silly situation would be if all the players have bad dice and end up with 1 troop on the reef and nothing else. it would be a dead game where nobody can do anything.

so my suggestion for this is to add a bonus for number of terits. this way each player will have 3 troops each turn to afford attacking.


i will return later.

[cairnswk]

so my suggestion for this is to add a bonus for number of terits. this way each player will have 3 troops each turn to afford attacking.

Is not each player going to get three at the begin of each turn to move with regardless of where they are bonus wise, plus the game already gives a bonus for number of terts. Slow one, but at least it is a bonus.

While i want this to be a quick play map, i don't want it to be all over in two rounds. most players from what i have seen on most maps only take one tert at a time at the beginning of games.... but def awaiting your analysis!

[DiM]

so my suggestion for this is to add a bonus for number of terits. this way each player will have 3 troops each turn to afford attacking.

Is not each player going to get three at the begin of each turn to move with regardless of where they are bonus wise, plus the game already gives a bonus for number of terts. Slow one, but at least it is a bonus.

While i want this to be a quick play map, i don't want it to be all over in two rounds. most players from what i have seen on most maps only take one tert at a time at the beginning of games.... but def awaiting your analysis!

you said there will not be a bonus for number of terits you own. this means the players won't get 3 troops each turn. they will just get the -1 on the snorkel.

i'm confused. so is there a bonus for the number of terits you own or there isn't?

[cairnswk]

so my suggestion for this is to add a bonus for number of terits. this way each player will have 3 troops each turn to afford attacking.

Is not each player going to get three at the begin of each turn to move with regardless of where they are bonus wise, plus the game already gives a bonus for number of terts. Slow one, but at least it is a bonus.

While i want this to be a quick play map, i don't want it to be all over in two rounds. most players from what i have seen on most maps only take one tert at a time at the beginning of games.... but def awaiting your analysis!

you said there will not be a bonus for number of terits you own. this means the players won't get 3 troops each turn. they will just get the -1 on the snorkel.

i'm confused. so is there a bonus for the number of terits you own or there isn't?

sorry DiM...cross communications....
1. the default +3 for every turn & +1 for every three terts will still apply
2. i thought you were talking about me stipulating bonuses for number of terts - that won't happen.

[DiM]

so my suggestion for this is to add a bonus for number of terits. this way each player will have 3 troops each turn to afford attacking.

Is not each player going to get three at the begin of each turn to move with regardless of where they are bonus wise, plus the game already gives a bonus for number of terts. Slow one, but at least it is a bonus.

While i want this to be a quick play map, i don't want it to be all over in two rounds. most players from what i have seen on most maps only take one tert at a time at the beginning of games.... but def awaiting your analysis!

you said there will not be a bonus for number of terits you own. this means the players won't get 3 troops each turn. they will just get the -1 on the snorkel.

i'm confused. so is there a bonus for the number of terits you own or there isn't?

sorry DiM...cross communications....
1. the default +3 for every turn & +1 for every three terts will still apply
2. i thought you were talking about me stipulating bonuses for number of terts - that won't happen.

ok then all is good. i will post my analysis as soon as i finish some reports as i really need to take a break.

[Kaplowitz]

why do you get -1 for a snorkel?

[cairnswk]

why do you get -1 for a snorkel?

thanks for visiting Kaplowitz

1. to get you moving about the map
2. to ensure you keep enough armies on that snorkel to keep the decay process happening so that you can get other bonuses....twisted gameplay like LOL
think of it as an achillies hell for each player.

[DiM]

i won't say the things that i like. i will only point out what i don't like and what flaws i find.if i don't mention something it means i like it. sorry but my time is very limited.

first i don't like the lugger bonus. i think it adds nothing to the gameplay since you already get a bonus for having a lugger and a snorkel.

second i don't like the imbalance of the starting locations.
for example reef 1 is clearly in a very advantageous position. he has a small corner with 3 bonuses defended by 1 terit. the lugger. and from that terit he can build a lot of troops and launch a big attack. so he starts in reef 1 and takes 4 other terits (11 neutrals) and in the end he gets a bonus of 10+3 for number of terits and -1 on the snorkel if he has troops there. but since there's no need to keep troops on the snorkel it's safe to assume he'll get 13 troops each round to deploy on the lugger. that's huge. no other reef has such a possibility as they have to fight the other reefs as well as having to defend the bonuses from all directions.

the imbalance continues in the other reefs too. for example reef 2 has 3 connected bonuses that he can take without the need to attack non important terits. i'm talking about marchena pintmar and pinta.

another thing i'm worried about is the openness of the bottom half of the map. it is basically impossible to establish a base there because of the huge number of borders and the fact that other reefs are so close. this causes 2 problems.
a. in standard games the players there will cannibalize eachother allowing somebody from the upper part of the map to build relaxed and come in for the kill
b. in assassin games if somebody happens to be in the bottom part with the target really close i'm afraid a kill in the first few rounds is very possible.

and while analyzing the gameplay i noticed a few graphic problems on the borders.
is I3 connected to S1?
or santiago to isiago?
or T1 to isabela west?

also in santa fe terit the shadow of the water resource falls over the SC4 border making it hard to spot.

[edbeard]

the more complicated our maps become, the more a 'gameplay testing' system is needed.

I like the solo luger bonus because if someone takes over your snorkel, you can still stick around.

The -1 might be very good to provide an incentive NOT to kill your opponents in the early going. I eliminate you early on but now I have a -2. Doesn't sound like a smart strategy so it could work.

[cairnswk]

the more complicated our maps become, the more a 'gameplay testing' system is needed.

I like the solo luger bonus because if someone takes over your snorkel, you can still stick around.

The -1 might be very good to provide an incentive NOT to kill your opponents in the early going. I eliminate you early on but now I have a -2. Doesn't sound like a smart strategy so it could work.

very good thinking edbeard!! top of the class -> and smarties for edbeard!

[DiM]

the more complicated our maps become, the more a 'gameplay testing' system is needed.

I like the solo luger bonus because if someone takes over your snorkel, you can still stick around.

The -1 might be very good to provide an incentive NOT to kill your opponents in the early going. I eliminate you early on but now I have a -2. Doesn't sound like a smart strategy so it could work.

i eliminate you early on because you are my target in assassin

and even if it isn't assassin it's still good to eliminate somebody early and the -2 won't stop people from doing it because the minus applies only to the snorkel terit so if i leave 1 troop on the snorkel i lose nothing

[cairnswk]

the more complicated our maps become, the more a 'gameplay testing' system is needed.

I like the solo luger bonus because if someone takes over your snorkel, you can still stick around.

The -1 might be very good to provide an incentive NOT to kill your opponents in the early going. I eliminate you early on but now I have a -2. Doesn't sound like a smart strategy so it could work.

i eliminate you early on because you are my target in assassin

and even if it isn't assassin it's still good to eliminate somebody early and the -2 won't stop people from doing it because the minus applies only to the snorkel terit so if i leave 1 troop on the snorkel i lose nothing

But if you lose 1 army on a tert with 1 army, doesn't that change the tert to neutral, therefore you lose the bonuses.

[edbeard]

no. it stays with you having 1 army on it

[DiM]

the more complicated our maps become, the more a 'gameplay testing' system is needed.

I like the solo luger bonus because if someone takes over your snorkel, you can still stick around.

The -1 might be very good to provide an incentive NOT to kill your opponents in the early going. I eliminate you early on but now I have a -2. Doesn't sound like a smart strategy so it could work.

i eliminate you early on because you are my target in assassin

and even if it isn't assassin it's still good to eliminate somebody early and the -2 won't stop people from doing it because the minus applies only to the snorkel terit so if i leave 1 troop on the snorkel i lose nothing

But if you lose 1 army on a tert with 1 army, doesn't that change the tert to neutral, therefore you lose the bonuses.

nope

stupid debug message. got fastposted

[cairnswk]

no. it stays with you having 1 army on it

Mmmm...well what can we do to achieve this...perhaps yeti_c needs to be in on this xml discussion

[cairnswk]

I have seen this happen in some game...wasn't it one of yours Dim?

Or does this decay process only apply to bombardments.

[DiM]

I have seen this happen in some game...wasn't it one of yours Dim?

Or does this decay process only apply to bombardments.

in bombardments armies are turned neutral.

in decay they drop to 1 but don't go neutral.

[edbeard]

I think there was some talk in the XML thread about a thing that makes territories become neutral at the start of a turn.

that doesn't really help here though


btw, I have smarties in my drawer right here

an aero too

[DiM]

I think there was some talk in the XML thread about a thing that makes territories become neutral at the start of a turn.

that doesn't really help here though

you're right. the killer neutrals. but as you said they don't work here.

[cairnswk]

I think there was some talk in the XML thread about a thing that makes territories become neutral at the start of a turn.

that doesn't really help here though

you're right. the killer neutrals. but as you said they don't work here.

well...looks as though this is finsihed for now then...ON VACATION.

[DiM]

I think there was some talk in the XML thread about a thing that makes territories become neutral at the start of a turn.

that doesn't really help here though

you're right. the killer neutrals. but as you said they don't work here.

well...looks as though this is finsihed for now then...ON VACATION.

what? don't be crazy. why vacation?

all you need is to balance the map a bit. and this can be done by removing some terits in the lower part to create impassables, adding a few more connections to the reef 1 corner to make it more open and then tweak the neutrals where you need some fine tuning of the balance.

i don't like symmetrical maps so for example in the aor maps i tried as much as possible to put the resources at variable distances from the castles and then balanced this through neutrals.

for example mua castle needs to take 3 terits to get both resources on that island while ghyr needs 5 terits. if i had used the same neutral values everywhere it would have been total imbalance but i put different values and calculated the chances for each castle until they were close enough to be considered balanced. so mua has to kill just 3 terits but those 3 terits have more troops than the 5 terits ghyr has to conquer thus providing balance. do the same here.