Pitboss 20 signup/setup thread (Tides of War game organization)

[Krill]

Let's finalize settings and scout for a mapmaker for ~2 days. Then we'll close signups and get the map made.

Before looking for map maker suggest you decide what you want from the map to test out the mod.

[Lord Parkin]

The main tiles to keep a close eye on are flood plains and plains hills. Each flood plains tile is effectively an irrigated Rice for an AGR civ, while each plains hill can get a free hammer for a PRO civ. That being said, I wouldn't change the ratios of either of those two terrain types on the map from the usual amount - just try not to cluster them together too much, especially flood plains (though I think this is usually the case anyway).

Until Biology/Railroad, the only other tiles AGR/PRO get bonuses from are resource tiles - any food resource plus Sugar for AGR (except plains Cow), and Copper/Iron/plains Horses for PRO. I don't think there's any need to change the distribution of these resources from the norm - a map with a typical, slightly generous distribution of resources should do fine (e.g. PB4). From my experience 1-3 tiles per city (on average) which can get the AGR benefit and 1-3 for PRO does not feel unbalanced.

I'd suggest avoiding a lakes map in order to give us a chance to try out the naval mechanics - large lakes (e.g. PB4) would probably be fine, or alternatively a land mass surrounded by water... or some combination.

That's about all I can think of at the moment - anything anyone else wants to add?

[SevenSpirits]

I would say fairly typical RB map with enough water for some naval action (25%+ water). Additionally, my preference is generally to have lots of neighbors and contested land and not too much land that clearly belongs to a single player. And like LP said just keep in mind that FP are a tiny bit stronger than normal.

[Lord Parkin]

Oh, I guess Marble and Stone should be able to be placed a little more freely given their nerf - maybe less need to place them only at special locations equidistant from players.

[Kuro]

I would say we probably shouldn't have mirrored starts, as we would want to test the mod in a non-mirrored enviroment, because it shouldn't be imbalanced that a different start makes it too easy for one trait/trait combo to run away with it. Maybe keep Charismatic's buff in mind?

[Krill]

Random map with starts brought up to a minimum standard, to a hand built map?

[Krill]

I would say fairly typical RB map with enough water for some naval action (25%+ water). Additionally, my preference is generally to have lots of neighbors and contested land and not too much land that clearly belongs to a single player. And like LP said just keep in mind that FP are a tiny bit stronger than normal.

Do you want a map built to spec like occurs in base BtS games, random shit that happens in RB mod, map maker to keep the new mod rules in mind...anything else?

[Lord Parkin]

Yeah, don't go overboard with the happiness resources available to each player as Charismatic is even more sensitive to their numbers than usual. Definitely no more than you'd get on a random map script.

[Krill]

If you guys want, I can design and build a map that fits the "kind of generic" in terms of what RB maps tend to be like, with the following sort of settings:

170-ish tiles per player
Enough water for naval warfare to be relevant/wharf to be buildable in greater than 15% of total world cities
Not go overboard on number of hills/flood plains.
Balanced strategic resources (horse/iron/oil and copper)
Majority script built but hand balanced (ie starts not broken and not a vast difference in resources available to each start)
Majority of land will be contested
Toroidal

I can build it by 1800 GMT Monday if you agree to settings amongst yourselves by 2030 GMT Sunday.

[SevenSpirits]

I am not a fan of the random map with minimal tweaks on capitals thing.

I talked with Krill and he said he'd be willing to roll some toruslands and make sensible edits. This sounds great to me. He has time on Monday so we'll need to finalize the settings and player count by then. I'll post tentative settings for discussion later today.