Croatia

[dakky21]

Hey peeps, last few days I had a hard time with Photoshop, since I am really newbie at that point.

I've made quite a progress with this map, and wonder what you think.
There are still missing names and those small circular fields could be smaller if I knew the right size.

edit: I also thought of ADDING main regions of Bosnia & Herzegovina (Republika Srpska, Hercegovina i Bosna), which would ease the gameplay because then there won't be one choke point in the middle of Croatia (Karlovac)

There are 29 territs and 6 land regions which form a bonus with islands from the same color.

So, to sum it up, I thought that map should be:
- divided in 6 land "regions", each with geographically name, like "Eastern Croatia, Central Croatia, Southern Croatia etc."
- islands should be in sea regions, which form a bonus together with land regions
- each "region" should be worth a bonus (that needs to be put to test)
- there will be 3 sea routes, just like in real life (Rijeka-Split-Dubrovnik ferry line)
- there are 4 major cities which should have a bonus when hold together

Take a deep breath and tell me, was it worth? At least I learned something new



Everything is saved properly, so I have last 6 modifications saved differently, so anything can still be changed and redone.

Notice that I was drawing a map by myself, and therefore, some territs could not be same as they are in real world.

Thank you in advance for giving me thoughts (bad one are welcome too), and I would really like to hear from a pro, in order to make this map playable soon!

Bye

[Industrial Helix]

Its a good start... you're gonna have to make sure names fit in everything and I'd highly suggest making the small map at this point to make sure everything is legible at that size. You also need a legend with bonus values.

As for whether or not you should add Slovenia and Bosnia, it's up to you. Perhaps you could follow some of the BeNeLux map style on working out bonuses.

[runewake2]

You have a pretty good chokepoint going. I like the map and it looks good but your blue territory seems a little thin. You can block off a part of the map with a single territory. I would suggest adding a plane going over Bosnia so you can move a different way around this.

Other than that it looks very good. I like it.

[dakky21]

Hey, thank you both for answering. The airplane idea isn't bad, however I think that One-way bombardments would be cool, but that would mean more complicated map. I like the simplicity. Adding trains or roads would kill the idea of "simple".

Although, I know that it can't stay like this. I'll add three Bosnian territs and two-way airplane lines between each city (4 of them in Croatia, Sarajevo in BH). I guess that would be enough for a good start.

Will keep you posted as soon as I learn how to draw train lines

[dakky21]

Version 2 with added Bosnia & Herzegovina:

Click image to enlarge.

I've split it on the ethnic base (Croats, Serbians and Bosnian) so the "Republika Srpska" in which Serbians go, is quite a large territ...

That should remove the choke point on Karlovac in Croatia (central blue territ)

The legend is added and the bonuses should be corrected.
Whole B&H should be one Bonus region.

The main cities in Croatia should also go within the surrounding territories and that bonus should be removed.

[Industrial Helix]

You need to put some names in the territories to make sure everything fits.

[The Bison King]

I think you need to make the color of the 4 cities bonus more different than the slavonija bonus. They're kinda close. Also I think the bonus amounts need some tweaking as well. For example I don't think that central should be worth more than Slovanija, and Medimurje should be WAY less than +4. For 2 territories it should be +1, +2 at max.

[theBastard]

if this is map about Croatia, the Bosnia is a little baseless, I think. maybe Bosnia should be only crossing road from North-east Croatia to coastal. you could do two or three crossing points there, maybe killer neutrals...

[dakky21]

Okies,

what about this one. Removed Bosnia territs, added three main airplane routes (which would remove choke point on Karlovac), and added all names which fit almost perfectly.

Click image to enlarge.

I'm still worried about only 29 territs and that's why I thought of adding Bosnia.

Another way to go would be adding map of Zagreb with its regions, and putting it over Bosnia. That would add about 10 territories more.

Corrected bonuses and forgot to remove main cities as main cities are now part of the bonus of each region. To avoid confusion with colors.
And just noticed, its not Brod-Moslavina, it's Brod-Posavina. Will be changed in next update.

[natty dread]

I'm worried that you won't be able to fit army numbers in all territories.

Your image is a weird size... It's too big for a small image, but kinda small for a large image, lol...

The map is currently 730 x 585 pixels. A small image can be 630 x 600 at max. So if you take a 100px slice off from the side - making it 630x585 - you could make this your small image, and make the large image 33% larger - that is 840x780 pixels, which is well within the large image limit of 840x800.

[dakky21]

Ok, here we go with all three possible versions.
I've generated the first image through that XML builder posted on Tutorials forum:

Click image to enlarge.

every single number fills correctly and even 88's fill correctly though there may be little overlapping, could be fixed easily with 0.5 px larger diameter

Click image to enlarge.

small image of resolution 630x543

Click image to enlarge.

large image with resolution 840x724

I've also generated full valid XML through that tool.
XML: HERE
Notice that all three images are resized down from a large map with 1400x1100 resolution, so it may look blurry. I hope it can be resized better.

Update: I've just come to a point that sea territories are not mentioned in a legend. They are part of a bonus, and should be called like that. Will fix that in next update
(example: "Sibenik more", "Juzno more" and "Split more" are a part of "Dalmacija" region and should be called "Dalmacija Sea - North, central and south" rather than this way.)

Update #2: I thought of making a map with Croatian local names but I hear from non-Croats that they have trouble reading our names, so what you think, should it be "more" or "sea" and "Dalmacija" or "Dalmatia" .. etc.. "City of Rijeka" or "Grad Rijeka" ?

[natty dread]

You shouldn't do the XML until you have received the gameplay stamp. I mean you can, but you'll be doing much extra work, because the gameplay - and thus the XML - is likely to change many times still.

What you should be doing now (if you haven't already) is submit a design brief to the design brief thread (at the top of this forum.)

[dakky21]

@ natty_dread
I want to correct a map to be as much as possible good, before submitting it to Design Brief thread.

Anyways, I'm still looking for suggestions, ideas, etc. so I can make the map better.

[natty dread]

@ natty_dread
I want to correct a map to be as much as possible good, before submitting it to Design Brief thread.

No need for that. Your map doesn't need to be developed at this stage. The design brief is just an application to advance your map to the next level, which is gameplay workshop. There your map's gameplay will be worked in shape, then comes graphics workshop, where the graphics are honed to perfection. Then the final forge where the final tweaks are done.

The sooner you get your design brief approved, the sooner you get into the real map development.

[Industrial Helix]

OK, those names are tough to read.... you wanna zoom in on Croatia a bit more? Perhaps turn it a little as well.

[Industrial Helix]

Just a heads up, I see you've submitted your design brief and there's a few things that come to mind regarding what you need to do to get this map to the next stage.

1) Increase the font size, its too small even for the big map. It will be unreadable on the small.
2) I want to see a preliminary small map to get an idea of how its going to look at the small scale.
3) Better use of space. It looks like the playable area takes up about 1/4th of the actual image. Try some tilting and enlarging. You've got a weird shape to begin with, but that doesn't mean it needs to hold you back. Get creative.
4) I'd like to get a better idea of what the final graphics are going to look like, as they stand now, they need some attention.
5) Update your first post with your most current image.

I'll speak with my partner in cartography and see what can be done next after the above have been taken care of.

[uckuki]

hello

maybe you can try split screen, something like
Egypt: Upper map, having a split
somewhere around Karlovac and 2 parallel
maps.

that way you'd save a lot of space.
otherwise, map of Croatia is
impossible without including whole of Bosnia
(due to her Croissantness)

also, you could have a map-within-map
for capitol Zagreb (due to its importance
- 1/4 population, political and business
center). the game objective could be to
hold 4 big cities (Split, Rijeka, Osijek
and Zagreb) and Karlovac.