Map Thread: Eww, what is that? Displaying the Dregs

[Mardoc]

Go away players. Everyone else, come on in! We've got a map to make!

[Mardoc]

So, the recent trend has been to fairly dull and dispiriting maps, but exciting civs. Let's reverse that trend! Dispiriting civs deserve excellent land .

I'm planning to make this a very lush map. For 5 players. The players did a lot more listing of what they don't want than what they do, but mostly it came down to balance, FFH-style, without going so far as mirrored starts.

What does that imply?

• Unless you talk me out of it, Blessings of Amatheon
  
• Small size
  
• Need a fairly balanced map geographically - probably circular
  
• Stick the Big Three in the center of the continent
  
• Lots of grassland, some plains, few Tundra/desert
  

The first thing is to pick a map script. I've been trying out a few, but so far I haven't really found one that I like. The closest I've come is Arboreal - it makes a nice green circle of a map - but it covers it in forest and deer. Which is either very unbalancing toward the Ljo, or is going to require a LOT of hand editing.

Pangaea, Erebus Continent, etc seem to give me rectangles. It's tricky to space 5 civs reasonably around a rectangle - someone always ends up in the middle. Then of course many (most?) of the other scripts have a theme that just so happens to be unpleasant - tundra, plains, jungle, no water...

I'm going to keep experimenting, but maybe you, fellow lurkers, already know the answer to my dilemma? If so, speak up!

[Krill]

So, the recent trend has been to fairly dull and dispiriting maps, but exciting civs. Let's reverse that trend! Dispiriting civs deserve excellent land .

I'm planning to make this a very lush map. For 5 players. The players did a lot more listing of what they don't want than what they do, but mostly it came down to balance, FFH-style, without going so far as mirrored starts.

What does that imply?

• Unless you talk me out of it, Blessings of Amatheon
  
• Small size
  
• Need a fairly balanced map geographically - probably circular
  
• Stick the Big Three in the center of the continent
  
• Lots of grassland, some plains, few Tundra/desert
  

The first thing is to pick a map script. I've been trying out a few, but so far I haven't really found one that I like. The closest I've come is Arboreal - it makes a nice green circle of a map - but it covers it in forest and deer. Which is either very unbalancing toward the Ljo, or is going to require a LOT of hand editing.

Pangaea, Erebus Continent, etc seem to give me rectangles. It's tricky to space 5 civs reasonably around a rectangle - someone always ends up in the middle. Then of course many (most?) of the other scripts have a theme that just so happens to be unpleasant - tundra, plains, jungle, no water...

I'm going to keep experimenting, but maybe you, fellow lurkers, already know the answer to my dilemma? If so, speak up!

I know the players said no donut, but you can carve a hell of a lot of land out of the donut to make it look more realistic, and it does need a lot of land carving out if you start it on a small map, so it's feasible.

[Azoth]

I know the players said no donut, but you can carve a hell of a lot of land out of the donut to make it look more realistic, and it does need a lot of land carving out if you start it on a small map, so it's feasible.

Donut also comes with the option of filling the centre with more of the same green land, leaving you with one giant circle, which you can then edit further. You could even go with a Tiny filled Donut.

[Mardoc]

I know the players said no donut, but you can carve a hell of a lot of land out of the donut to make it look more realistic, and it does need a lot of land carving out if you start it on a small map, so it's feasible.

Donut also comes with the option of filling the centre with more of the same green land, leaving you with one giant circle, which you can then edit further. You could even go with a Tiny filled Donut.

Hmm, ok, I'll have to give that a try. The other thing I found that seems to work decently is Tilted Axis set on Massive Continents, but a Donut is likely to be a bit easier to balance, and less likely to have the game be about me. I figure the appropriate philosophy here is that the map should fade into the background; a perfect map is one where the players never talk about its creation, just the plans for themselves and their foes. And you're both right that I have a good amount of carving/adding to do anyway; if it's obvious where I want to work, it won't really take a lot of time.

I do agree that the takeaway I got from the players was mainly 'not artificial-looking' rather than 'not donut'.

[Gaspar]

I thought Donut when the map was being discussed. its very lush, green, and easy to balance 5 players around equally. You can make a donut, do some terraforming to make it look more natural, and then use the center as a bit of a wonderland.

I had this thought when they were discussing the map. What if the objective was to make the land "ideal" for each civ, to accentuate their positives and make up for their shortcomings. Spitballing here:

• Ljosalfar have forests pretty much all around their swath of land, just deforesting their commerce specials.
  
• Lanun have the land set so they can easily get 2-3/coves a city in their slice of the donut, with ample hills on the mainland to make-up for their production issues.
  
• Calabim have lots of food resources, to amplify their production methods and help with their natural unhealth.
  
• Khazad have lots of commerce specials, and a fair number of rivers.
  
• Doviello have ridiculously lush land, and copper at their capital.
  

A couple other points. Since the balance of this game is such that Khazad and Doviello are playing against 3 of the most popular civs, their land needs to be the best to give them a chance. So once you think you have balance, add another few rivers, an extra plains incense, that sort of thing, to those two civs.

In the interest of making water/OO interest for civs other than Lanun, maybe throw a few islands out there, PB2 style. Maybe put like a treasure chest for each civ on one island per civ, to recreate the quest island idea from PBEM8, without reusing the whole concept?

Also - I believe I read somewhere that Blessings of Amathon doesn't actually do anything, or worse, works to opposite effect. I could be wrong here, but I seem to recall reading that.

[Commodore]

Why not feed the dwarves and the barbs a little more, by adding weird flavor bonuses. Hill floodplains? Extra non-barbarian lairs to pop?

Another idea would be to string 'em out on a long band, maybe tilted axis? If they're all in a 1-2-3-4-5-1 row that's fair too.

[Mardoc]

I thought Donut when the map was being discussed. its very lush, green, and easy to balance 5 players around equally. You can make a donut, do some terraforming to make it look more natural, and then use the center as a bit of a wonderland.

I had this thought when they were discussing the map. What if the objective was to make the land "ideal" for each civ, to accentuate their positives and make up for their shortcomings. Spitballing here:

• Ljosalfar have forests pretty much all around their swath of land, just deforesting their commerce specials.
  
• Lanun have the land set so they can easily get 2-3/coves a city in their slice of the donut, with ample hills on the mainland to make-up for their production issues.
  
• Calabim have lots of food resources, to amplify their production methods and help with their natural unhealth.
  
• Khazad have lots of commerce specials, and a fair number of rivers.
  
• Doviello have ridiculously lush land, and copper at their capital.
  

A couple other points. Since the balance of this game is such that Khazad and Doviello are playing against 3 of the most popular civs, their land needs to be the best to give them a chance. So once you think you have balance, add another few rivers, an extra plains incense, that sort of thing, to those two civs.

In the interest of making water/OO interest for civs other than Lanun, maybe throw a few islands out there, PB2 style. Maybe put like a treasure chest for each civ on one island per civ, to recreate the quest island idea from PBEM8, without reusing the whole concept?

Also - I believe I read somewhere that Blessings of Amathon doesn't actually do anything, or worse, works to opposite effect. I could be wrong here, but I seem to recall reading that.

Hmm. Overall, I like the idea. My only concern is that it might lead down the rabbit hole of how much of the game is due to the player skill, and how much is due to my map. On the other hand - that'll be there regardless, particularly since the players have already made it clear that I need to do some of this balancing, to ensure Lanun coast and Ljo forest and Khazad pigs, etc.

Why not feed the dwarves and the barbs a little more, by adding weird flavor bonuses. Hill floodplains? Extra non-barbarian lairs to pop?

Another idea would be to string 'em out on a long band, maybe tilted axis? If they're all in a 1-2-3-4-5-1 row that's fair too.

I don't want to do the long band because it doesn't really leave me a good way to handle the Big Three. Giving extra bonuses to the weaker civs, though...very tempting.

Overall, my biggest fear is making the game about reading the map and me, when it really should be all about these five players and leaders.

[DaveV]

Also - I believe I read somewhere that Blessings of Amathon doesn't actually do anything, or worse, works to opposite effect. I could be wrong here, but I seem to recall reading that.

My recollection of discussion I read is that Blessings of Amathaon creates extra copies of bonus resources, but the map gets filled up so that resources later in the list don't have enough eligible locations and so are relatively sparse. The very last resource, IIRC, is Reagents, and there's a good chance it won't appear on the map at all.

Presumably, hand editing could add more instances of the sparse resources.

A thought on balance: if you go with donut map, each civ will have two neighbors, and they will have a big impact on the game's difficulty. Put the Doviello between the Lanun and Calabim, and they'll have to devote some early hammers (and maybe research) to defense.

[Gaspar]

Echoing what others have said...

I understand you don't want this game to be about the map, but firstly, we all know already Charadon can't win without substantial help. I would definitely aim the map to have the best possible situation for him - metals at the capital, lush terrain, several rush options nearby. Even doing all that I think he's got no chance. Its worth noting that this is really probably not the worst 5 teams FFH has to offer, its just that others have already given some of the crappy combinations a try in other games. I'd for sure put Sandalphon in this game, probably in place of Alexis, as the Calabim have no place in a dregs game. Sure Alexis is the worst Calabim leader, but the Civ is still mighty strong. Faeryl should probably have the Elf spot as well. Artus and Falamar might just belong here, though.

Anyway, I think the bottom line is I'd try and make the game not about the map by giving every civ the best possible resources to succeed. Ljo get lots of forests, deer. Khazad get mining happys, lots of rivers, and arable land. Doviello get their copper, get plenty of food and production at the capital, and targets nearby. Lanun get tons of land based production to offset their crappy native production. Calabim get food. And everyone gets commerce specials handed out like condoms in a college dormitory.

That's my two cents, anyway.