[Spoilers] Lurker Thread - No Players!

[Kuro]

Yeah, Krill needs Whales just for the hell of it now.

[Gaspar]

Two comments, looks like Krill got a bit over-compensated there. Might want to find a way to give TT some of Krill's "land."

And secondly, I'd really love to give that tool a spin on some other maps. The one I made for 19 and PB4 for starters.

[Kuro]

I'm surprised Dazed isn't thinking to settle 1 to the left.

[SevenSpirits]

I want to try out that program too, novice! Looks really cool. One thing I'd add is an option to allow influence spread over coastal water. Something like 6 cost to move from land to coast and 2 cost from coast to coast is what I'd try.

[darrelljs]

Can we add a sign telling dazed where to settle ?

Darrell

[scooter]

Few comments:

1. Yeah, I think I might've helped him a bit too much. Well he came even with Dazed and Yuris, but TT got squeezed a bit much and MH got *really* squeezed.

2. One thing to keep in mind - that the map thing can't take into affect things like jungle... So there's a couple parts where I"m not so convinced a player will claim something as easily as the map says, because they'd have to get through slow-developing terrain to do so. Just something to keep in mind - that it's not totally perfect, but it certainly helps for evening things out.

3. Whoops, I will give Krill a forest.

4. The whale thing is funny and all, but knowing Krilll and most of the players, the humor will wear off quickly, but the imbalance will last for months. There's lots of whales near his start though (and I'll slip one more in maybe), so overall he'll still get some. Just not going to give him furs AND whales, but it seems unfair to make him hook whales with a WB while everyone hooks their fur with a worker.

[novice]

2. One thing to keep in mind - that the map thing can't take into affect things like jungle... So there's a couple parts where I"m not so convinced a player will claim something as easily as the map says, because they'd have to get through slow-developing terrain to do so. Just something to keep in mind - that it's not totally perfect, but it certainly helps for evening things out.

Yeah it's definitely a tool but not the full answer. However, assigning different costs to different terrains is certainly a possible feature.

Spoiler-free discussion thread opened in the general forum.

http://realmsbeyond.net/forums/showthread.php?t=4850

[scooter]

Start position edits: Krill goes from one to zero forests?

Actually, on further review, the screenshot Darrell sent Krill has no forests that I didn't include... However I went ahead and forested his furs to make it like everyone else. I did some rough checks on forest balancing, adding some forests to a few places where people had less...

I spent a lot of time on MH's start, as he had the least amount of land (according to the mapper) and his land quality really failed the eye test. Check this out - to his west:



See all the food resources on that west continent? Yeah, me neither. His land was rockier/plains-ier than everyone elses (this screenshot was after I improved it a little) so I improved that - adding quite a few land resources and a healthy amount of seafood. Also, I slightly extended the land to his immediate west, connecting that tiny island to his home territory, and I also slightly extended the northern bottleneck to be a little south... Basically, just north of this screenshot is Yuris, and Yuris will likely get to this area first, so closing the gap here gives MH a more realistic shot at this land. In general though, MH's land quality was quite low, so I made a lot of improvements. No time for lots of screenshots, but I'd appreciate it if someone took some time to look things over to see if anything big was missed . Here it is:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/5826112/PBEM20/P...wordWBSave

[scooter]

Alright, here is a breakdown of my "final" version assuming no further issues:



This looks like Dazed and TT are low on land tiles, but honestly, I think it's actually pretty even at this point. Reason being is Inca's numbers are somewhat deceiving, as he has to get through jungle, so he likely won't claim as much as it looks. Greece (top in land tiles now) on the other hand has some weird geography where they could struggle to actually get all that land... Also, while Dazed and TT have fewer land tiles, they have higher food/tiles ratios, so that should theoretically boost them enough that they can claim land possibly better than the map actually indicates.

Land tiles breakdown:
1. MH - 183
2. Krill - 170
3. Yuris - 169
4. TT - 150
5. Dazed - 149

Tiles/Food ratio:
1. Yuris - 5.45
2. Dazed - 5.73
3. Krill - 5.48/1
4. TT - 6/1
5. MH - 6.77/1

I think that last column could more accurate be put "Land Quality indicator" or something like that. Actually, that sounds like a good suggestion for the program, so I may comment on that in the main thread. So this means that for every 5.45 tiles, Yuris has a food. This is where you see what I mean - that MH's land is quite a bit more "barren" than say, Yuris, although he has arguably more land at his disposal. I think from this data, I should probably give a bit of a boost to TT especially and maybe MH a tad more. Perhaps tone down Yuris a bit and/or improve Dazed if he has some bleak areas, as Yuris/Dazed should be pretty equal at the top, and TT should probably be closer to Krill (like I said though, Krill's land number is slightly deceiving as he has a slightly above-average amount of jungle).

Any thoughts? Anything you'd like to see? Again, the most recent version is here:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/5826112/PBEM20/P...wordWBSave

And that's before I make any of these final changes.

[novice]

Updated balance report:

Player 0
Boudica of Germany
150 land tiles. (107 grass, 43 plains, 0 deserts, 0 tundra, 0 snow. 46 forests, 12 jungles, 0 flood plains, 0 oasis)
446 total food potential.
1.56 food per non-ocean tile.
314 total hammer potential.
1.10 hammers per non-ocean tile.
136 coastal tiles.
17 ocean tiles.

14 strategic resources (3 horse, 3 ivory, 2 iron, 1 oil, 2 stone, 2 copper, 1 coal).
12 happy resources (3 ivory, 3 silver, 2 fur, 2 spices, 2 whale).
25 food resources (6 fish, 3 corn, 4 clam, 1 wheat, 2 pig, 2 crab, 1 sheep, 2 whale, 1 cow, 2 rice, 1 deer).
25 health resources (6 fish, 3 corn, 4 clam, 1 wheat, 2 pig, 2 crab, 1 sheep, 2 spices, 1 cow, 2 rice, 1 deer).


Player 1
Suryavarman of Greece
183 land tiles. (149 grass, 33 plains, 1 deserts, 0 tundra, 0 snow. 55 forests, 16 jungles, 0 flood plains, 0 oasis)
499 total food potential.
1.61 food per non-ocean tile.
292 total hammer potential.
0.94 hammers per non-ocean tile.
126 coastal tiles.
6 ocean tiles.

10 strategic resources (1 oil, 1 copper, 2 marble, 2 horse, 1 aluminum, 2 iron, 1 coal).
11 happy resources (1 incense, 1 wine, 3 gems, 3 dye, 1 fur, 2 whale).
27 food resources (5 clam, 2 crab, 4 rice, 3 sheep, 1 banana, 2 corn, 3 cow, 1 deer, 2 wheat, 1 fish, 1 pig, 2 whale).
26 health resources (5 clam, 2 crab, 4 rice, 3 sheep, 1 banana, 2 corn, 1 wine, 3 cow, 1 deer, 2 wheat, 1 fish, 1 pig).


Player 2
Wangkon of Inca
170 land tiles. (124 grass, 45 plains, 1 deserts, 0 tundra, 0 snow. 44 forests, 8 jungles, 0 flood plains, 0 oasis)
464 total food potential.
1.58 food per non-ocean tile.
314 total hammer potential.
1.07 hammers per non-ocean tile.
124 coastal tiles.
5 ocean tiles.

9 strategic resources (1 stone, 1 iron, 2 horse, 1 coal, 1 aluminum, 1 copper, 1 uranium, 1 marble).
14 happy resources (1 wine, 6 whale, 5 gems, 1 fur, 1 silk).
31 food resources (6 whale, 2 fish, 2 pig, 1 wheat, 4 sheep, 5 cow, 4 corn, 3 clam, 1 deer, 1 rice, 1 banana, 1 crab).
26 health resources (1 wine, 2 fish, 2 pig, 1 wheat, 4 sheep, 5 cow, 4 corn, 3 clam, 1 deer, 1 rice, 1 banana, 1 crab).


Player 3
Gilgamesh of China
169 land tiles. (130 grass, 35 plains, 4 deserts, 0 tundra, 0 snow. 37 forests, 15 jungles, 0 flood plains, 1 oasis)
548 total food potential.
1.61 food per non-ocean tile.
305 total hammer potential.
0.89 hammers per non-ocean tile.
172 coastal tiles.
24 ocean tiles.

14 strategic resources (3 horse, 1 aluminum, 2 iron, 2 uranium, 2 marble, 2 copper, 2 oil).
11 happy resources (3 sugar, 4 whale, 3 silver, 1 fur).
31 food resources (7 fish, 5 pig, 2 sheep, 2 clam, 1 crab, 3 wheat, 3 sugar, 2 corn, 4 whale, 1 deer, 1 rice).
27 health resources (7 fish, 5 pig, 2 sheep, 2 clam, 1 crab, 3 wheat, 3 sugar, 2 corn, 1 deer, 1 rice).


Player 4
Willem_van_oranje of Russia
149 land tiles. (101 grass, 48 plains, 0 deserts, 0 tundra, 0 snow. 46 forests, 0 jungles, 0 flood plains, 0 oasis)
432 total food potential.
1.49 food per non-ocean tile.
334 total hammer potential.
1.15 hammers per non-ocean tile.
141 coastal tiles.
16 ocean tiles.

11 strategic resources (3 iron, 2 horse, 1 uranium, 2 stone, 1 oil, 1 copper, 1 coal).
13 happy resources (7 whale, 1 spices, 3 silver, 1 fur, 1 gold).
26 food resources (2 fish, 7 whale, 4 sheep, 4 clam, 2 wheat, 3 crab, 2 corn, 1 deer, 1 rice).
20 health resources (2 fish, 4 sheep, 1 spices, 4 clam, 2 wheat, 3 crab, 2 corn, 1 deer, 1 rice).