Conquer Club

Just thought I'd give people a peek at how my new project is coming along...

Ruthlessontogeny PM'd me a while back with permission to use his basic map with proper Latin territory names (his original thread is here...

As long as that is still OK with him, I've started cracking on with what I hope could be a playable Rome map - the Holy Grail of the foundry, it seems



What do you all think? Worth carrying on with? Graphically fitting so far? I'll add territory names and suchlike soon, and then I really would like a proper discussion about the gameplay, as this seems to be an issue with some of the recently quenched maps...

Latest Update:

FINALLY!

ive been wanting a roman map for ages, all the others got knocked out by the too close to europe argument but i think this one is different enough and you will proberbly get it through

Maby the white round the coast is a bit much though

Balsiefen wrote:FINALLY!

ive been wanting a roman map for ages, all the others got knocked out by the too close to europe argument but i think this one is different enough and you will proberbly get it through

Maby the white round the coast is a bit much though

Yeh the colours and suchlike are open to total change, don't worry... Just wanted to get the basic map design down.

I like this too, alot.

What about having Morocco, Algeria and all those surrounding countries be extended so that there are no 'dead' countries at the bottom of the map?

actually that makes it more accuraate as the romans never conquered the sahara

Syzygy wrote:I like this too, alot.

What about having Morocco, Algeria and all those surrounding countries be extended so that there are no 'dead' countries at the bottom of the map?

Yeh I did consider a 'conquering' type map, like that of Rome: Total War, but I thought in the end it was a better representation to go with just the boundaries as a whole.

I would definately play this!

Guiscard wrote:

Syzygy wrote:I like this too, alot.

What about having Morocco, Algeria and all those surrounding countries be extended so that there are no 'dead' countries at the bottom of the map?

Yeh I did consider a 'conquering' type map, like that of Rome: Total War, but I thought in the end it was a better representation to go with just the boundaries as a whole.

Alright, cool.

Gotta love Rome: Total War, I only really suggested that because I'm used to that map.

Should Rome be made a separate 'country' with a bonus of one as well? (Or is it too early for such a suggestion?)

Syzygy wrote:

Guiscard wrote:

Syzygy wrote:I like this too, alot.

What about having Morocco, Algeria and all those surrounding countries be extended so that there are no 'dead' countries at the bottom of the map?

Yeh I did consider a 'conquering' type map, like that of Rome: Total War, but I thought in the end it was a better representation to go with just the boundaries as a whole.

Alright, cool.

Gotta love Rome: Total War, I only really suggested that because I'm used to that map.

Should Rome be made a separate 'country' with a bonus of one as well? (Or is it too early for such a suggestion?)

I don't know really... Might be a problem fitting army numbers and suchlike on such a small area. The territory itself will be called Roma, and I was envisaging a pretty heavy bonus for control of it specifically, and probably a pretty high one for the red continent itself to try and make it the centre of the map.

I was thinking of maybe a port system where all the ports can attack Rome as a one way to keep it a risky territory to hold on to...

I like it. Should Hibernia be a territory, though? It wasn't part of the Roman Empire.

pancakemix wrote:I like it. Should Hibernia be a territory, though? It wasn't part of the Roman Empire.

The presence is pretty heavily debated (some argue there was a Roman presence and others not). I included it because a) It was on the original source map and b) to minimise dead space. It also gives a rounded 44 territories rather than 43 without (unless I've counted wrongly).

A bit of material from the main map source

Yay! I second Balsiefen's FINALLY!

I'm thinking the bright colours and white lines might be a bit too much. I'm having a bit of trouble looking at the map for too long so perhaps consider darker territory colours or darker territory lines.

I find the yellow and orange might be a bit too close to each other in colour. Also the pink next to the red might not be such a great idea.

Anyway, get cracking on this map Guiscard, we've all been waiting too long!

I like the brightness, I like that there is finally a Roman Empire map worth playing, but I don't like the pictures in the "dead" territories.

Finally! Anyway, map already looks pretty decent. I was thinking it might be a bit similar to the Europe map but the territories are more compact so that shouldn't be too much of a problem.

Good luck with this - I really want to see a Roman map quenched sooner rather than later

Guiscard can you add the island of Melita as it was part of the Roman Empire please? Btw, Hibernia was never part of the Roman Empire. There was a plan to invade it but the Romans decided it was not worth it.

On a separate note, the colours as Keyogi said are a bit too bright and I think black border lines are better. The colour schemes need to be changed a bit as well...I think it's better if you keep a single colour per continent instead of the shades. Also for my poor colour blind eyes North Africa and the Asian region are too similar.

Looking good for a first draft though. Kee up the good work!

An idea about the some bonus cities...you could link Roma, Carthago and Byzantium using ports. They were 3 of the most important cities in the Roman Empire.

hell, i kinda like it as it is.

Ruben Cassar wrote:Guiscard can you add the island of Melita as it was part of the Roman Empire please? Btw, Hibernia was never part of the Roman Empire. There was a plan to invade it but the Romans decided it was not worth it.

On a separate note, the colours as Keyogi said are a bit too bright and I think black border lines are better. The colour schemes need to be changed a bit as well...I think it's better if you keep a single colour per continent instead of the shades. Also for my poor colour blind eyes North Africa and the Asian region are too similar.

Looking good for a first draft though. Kee up the good work!

I know you love Malta and all, but I really do think it is a little too small to add as an independent territory. Due to the nature of the map I've been forced to combine some territories, for example Sicily and Southern Italy, and I really don't think adding an extra territory just for Malta is justified. There are many islands which I have not included as individual territories which could be. I'll certainly add it graphically though.

As for Hibernia, the historical jury is out, as it were (there is evidence for and against), and I've read up a bit on this recently. I think I'll get rid of it, though, as it seems this question is going to keep coming up.

The colours can certainly be chopped and changed, but I'd rather keep the shades as I believe it breaks up the block of colour you have otherwise. it worked pretty well in my Mongol map, and I'd like to achieve something similar here

. Is it just the orange and green you have a problem distinguishing between? I'm going to swap the colours around anyway, so which would be best to have next to one another?

Your idea about the three cities sounds like a good one to investigate. Perhaps +2 for Roma, +1 for Carthago and +1 Byzantium and +5 for all three? Anyway, we'll deal with that later...

Ruben Cassar wrote:An idea about the some bonus cities...you could link Roma, Carthago and Byzantium using ports. They were 3 of the most important cities in the Roman Empire.

The idea is good but the facts are not good.

Byzantium/Constantinople did not become that important until after the division of the empire.
Carthago however could be among the three if you only look at the first centuries after Caesar.

I assume from the map that this is the huge ancient empire and not just the early republic or the later greek-macedonian eastern empire of byzantium..

POPULATION OF CITIES:
In the Principate, the five leading cities were ROME, ALEXANDRIA, ANTIOCH, EPHESUS, and CARTHAGE. In 100 A.D., Rome boasted a population of over 1,000,000 permanent residents; Alexandria was perhaps between 500,000 and 750,000. The cities of Antioch, Ephesus and Carthage had populations on the order of 350,000 to 500,000 residents.

http://www.tulane.edu/~august/H303/hand ... lation.htm

Definitely include Alexandria among the cities and loose Byzantium/Constantinople or the map will be historically ridiculous..

snufkin wrote:

Ruben Cassar wrote:An idea about the some bonus cities...you could link Roma, Carthago and Byzantium using ports. They were 3 of the most important cities in the Roman Empire.

The idea is good but the facts are not good.

Byzantium/Constantinople did not become that important until after the division of the empire.
Carthago however could be among the three if you only look at the first centuries after Caesar.

I assume from the map that this is the huge ancient empire and not just the early republic or the later greek-macedonian eastern empire of byzantium..

POPULATION OF CITIES:
In the Principate, the five leading cities were ROME, ALEXANDRIA, ANTIOCH, EPHESUS, and CARTHAGE. In 100 A.D., Rome boasted a population of over 1,000,000 permanent residents; Alexandria was perhaps between 500,000 and 750,000. The cities of Antioch, Ephesus and Carthage had populations on the order of 350,000 to 500,000 residents.

http://www.tulane.edu/~august/H303/hand ... lation.htm

Definitely include Alexandria among the cities and loose Byzantium/Constantinople or the map will be historically ridiculous..

Yeh very good point. Was about to post something along these lines (although I agreed earlier) but it seems as though you beat me to it

The problem with including both Carthage and Alexandria is that they're both in Africa, which will perhaps make it too powerful. Carthage should have a sea link to Corsica or Sicily anyway, so I might as well scrap the idea and just have Rome as an individual bonus city and make sure that most continents link to the Italian peninsula somehow to stop it being such a safe haul.

You should darken the map a bit.

OK... Update time:



Added territory names, sea routes, bonuses... Darkened the colours a fair... Moved the title, added some background graphics...

Haven't dealt with the colours yet as I want people to comment more on what colours they'd like to see where, and also Ruben to let me know what colours can't go next to one another (if any other than Africa/Asia) Obviously anything can and will be changed, so comment away!

edit: Just realised I've used both numbers and words for the bonuses... Had meant to use just words, but let me know what you think of either!

looks very promising, however, I dont feel that you should award 2 armies for just holding Roma. It gives way too much of an advantage to anyone holding it in the first round (you'd just load up there and keep raking in the armies). Likewise, a 4 army bonus for holding just Roma and Carthage would have an even greater distorting affect upon the game.

steve monkey wrote:looks very promising, however, I dont feel that you should award 2 armies for just holding Roma. It gives way too much of an advantage to anyone holding it in the first round (you'd just load up there and keep raking in the armies). Likewise, a 4 army bonus for holding just Roma and Carthage would have an even greater distorting affect upon the game.

Yeh I've been thinking about this and have come up with a couple of possibilities:

Firstly, either could be conditional on holding another continent, so the bonus would get pretty important later in the game but it would stop people starting off too powerfully...

Secondly, I was considering using the soon-to-be-introduced XML changes to make both start neutral, which would sort of show how you have to 'win' Rome from the senate and people to become Emperor. I think I'm leaning more towards this idea at the minute.

Either way, I really do want to keep a bonus for Rome at least because of its immense importance.

I particularly like your second idea, with the territory beginning neutral. I think it would add an interesting element to the game play.