[SPOILERS] Map Creation Thread

[Maksim]

Overall, everything looks much better now.

General comments

1. Most standard map scripts remove peaks (and tundra) within the fat cross of the starting settler. It looks like the one you are using does not. I would suggest removing the peaks from everyone's starting positions and replacing them with plains\grassland hills.

2. Grains are much more powerful than animals (pig, sheep and cow), as Animal Husbandry takes longer to research, has pre-requisites, and is not as useful as Agriculture.

Perpentach

Desert and plains sheep - yuck. Oasis is promising; in this position my instinct would be to move to the desert hill 2NW. So perhaps the starting position could be moved there (and the peak currently 2N of the settler changed to a plains hill?).

Varn Gosam

Good starting position, but change the peaks 1NW and 1NW-1N to grassland and plains hill.

Arendel

A non-irrigated wheat and a FP is decent but there are no other riverside grasslands nearby to put farms on. I would suggest moving the Wheat to 1S of the settler to make it riverside, and change the peaks in the south (2S and 2S-1W) to hills.

Flauros

Quite powerful position for early commerce, with most tiles riverside, Wines available with Crafting, and starting on a plains hill. Change peaks into hills, and they should be good to go.

Mahala

Good position once the peaks are transformed to hills.

Is there a Copper resource anywhere in the vicinity? If not, perhaps one in tundra north of the Wheat should be available.

Hannah

Good position once the peak 1SE-1S is transformed to a plains hill. Interesting choice whether to move settler 1S on first turn.

Copper is nowhere to be seen - perhaps place it on the tundra hill in the deep south (6S of the settler) to the west of two peaks?

Beeri Bawl

Too many peaks around to the west - maybe change some to hills so that there can be a viable city in the cotton area? The peak 2W of the settler wants to be a desert hill, the one SE-S probably wants to be a grass hill, and NE-N wants to be a plains hill.

[DaveV]

Flauros can also build his second city by the Remnants of Patria, which would give him a very strong production city: RoP gets +2 hammers each from Education and Feudalism, which is the natural research path for the Calabim.

I'd recommend putting both Remnants of Patria and Yggdrasil in a very poor area: tundra, jungle, or ice. These specials alone are worth settling a city; with decent surrounding terrain, they're imbalancing.

[SevenSpirits]

Overall, everything looks much better now.

General comments

1. Most standard map scripts remove peaks (and tundra) within the fat cross of the starting settler. It looks like the one you are using does not. I would suggest removing the peaks from everyone's starting positions and replacing them with plains\grassland hills.

Do you actually believe that having peaks in the capital BFC is significant? "The start position normalizer removes them" is not a great reason for taking them out by itself, as the normalizer does a whole bunch of things to try to ensure you're not screwed as a substitute for actually balancing the starts, which it isn't smart enough to do.

Or do you specifically think those starts don't have enough hills?

Perpentach

Desert and plains sheep - yuck. Oasis is promising; in this position my instinct would be to move to the desert hill 2NW. So perhaps the starting position could be moved there (and the peak currently 2N of the settler changed to a plains hill?).

Hm, did you not notice the Flood Plains? That's actually the best food tile, so I'm not sure how to take your comments since you didn't mention it. The Oasis is a bit worse because you can't improve it; I added the plains hill river sheep to compensate for that. (Other civs got 2 FPs or equivalent.)

However I do agree that this city in particular has too many dead tiles. I think I should add a lakeside grass and turn the peak into a grass hill.

Arendel

A non-irrigated wheat and a FP is decent but there are no other riverside grasslands nearby to put farms on. I would suggest moving the Wheat to 1S of the settler to make it riverside, and change the peaks in the south (2S and 2S-1W) to hills.

Putting the wheat riverside would give this start more food at low sizes than all the others. I'd rather add ~2 river grass, which does seem like a good idea.

Mahala

Good position once the peaks are transformed to hills.

Is there a Copper resource anywhere in the vicinity? If not, perhaps one in tundra north of the Wheat should be available.

There's a copper in the tundra straight north, and another NEEE of that wheat. however the latter is equidistant to the dwarves, so I think I'll move both those sources closer to both those players.

Hannah

Good position once the peak 1SE-1S is transformed to a plains hill. Interesting choice whether to move settler 1S on first turn.

Copper is nowhere to be seen - perhaps place it on the tundra hill in the deep south (6S of the settler) to the west of two peaks?

Funny you mention it, that hill already has copper on it. The symbol just didn't show I guess.

Beeri Bawl

Too many peaks around to the west - maybe change some to hills so that there can be a viable city in the cotton area? The peak 2W of the settler wants to be a desert hill, the one SE-S probably wants to be a grass hill, and NE-N wants to be a plains hill.

Sure, I can take out a few of those peaks.

[SevenSpirits]

Flauros can also build his second city by the Remnants of Patria, which would give him a very strong production city: RoP gets +2 hammers each from Education and Feudalism, which is the natural research path for the Calabim.

I'd recommend putting both Remnants of Patria and Yggdrasil in a very poor area: tundra, jungle, or ice. These specials alone are worth settling a city; with decent surrounding terrain, they're imbalancing.

I definitely need to take out Remnants of Patria from there, the FPs already make that site very strong. When I was placing it I was looking more at the jungle to its north and missed that proximity. I guess Yggdrasil could stand to be moved too, but in its defence it's far in the north in an area with no other food bonuses (except a FP... oops) and right between two civs.

Thank you and Maksim both for your comments.

[SevenSpirits]

My todo list before feedback was actually two items long: 1) get Remnants of Patria out of there and 2) consider removing some of the unit-producing lairs from right next to start locations. For example there are a couple ruins next to Perpentach which I think might be problematic. Any opinions related to this?

[Maksim]

Do you actually believe that having peaks in the capital BFC is significant? "The start position normalizer removes them" is not a great reason for taking them out by itself, as the normalizer does a whole bunch of things to try to ensure you're not screwed as a substitute for actually balancing the starts, which it isn't smart enough to do.

Or do you specifically think those starts don't have enough hills?

Both of those, actually.

Main one is that, depending on barbarian activity, luck, Orthus, etc the players may be stuck on their first city for a long time - the capital should be a good site, and have the potential to switch into a hammer-heavy configuration. Having too many hills is not going to be an issue (not enough food\happiness to work them all), but having too few is problematic.

Second, since we won't be able to balance the positions perfectly, I would go with the common practice - if it's good enough for standard maps, it's good for us too.

Perpentach

Hm, did you not notice the Flood Plains? That's actually the best food tile, so I'm not sure how to take your comments since you didn't mention it. The Oasis is a bit worse because you can't improve it; I added the plains hill river sheep to compensate for that. (Other civs got 2 FPs or equivalent.)

However I do agree that this city in particular has too many dead tiles. I think I should add a lakeside grass and turn the peak into a grass hill.

Fair enough. I did note the FP, but felt that FP alone was not really that great (not counting plains hill sheep since animal-based food resources are not that great in FFH!). I do prefer your suggestion, though - the Oasis does balance it out as well.

Arendel

Putting the wheat riverside would give this start more food at low sizes than all the others. I'd rather add ~2 river grass, which does seem like a good idea.

So the peaks in the south are changed to hills, and the hills on the riverside are downsized to grass? That works - probably even better than moving the wheat.

Mahala

There's a copper in the tundra straight north, and another NEEE of that wheat. however the latter is equidistant to the dwarves, so I think I'll move both those sources closer to both those players.

Fair enough.

Hannah

Funny you mention it, that hill already has copper on it. The symbol just didn't show I guess.

Yeah, I noticed something there but wasn't sure which metal it was. I really like that spot now.

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And thanks for doing all this work - this is a really good job.

[SevenSpirits]

Changes done, here's the new save.

I left a couple of the mountains in BFCs - sorry but we'll just have to disagree philosophically on that. It's less significant than many other factors we haven't even bothered to discuss, so it's not a big deal.

Patria is just gone. Yggdrasil was moved 1N. I moved a couple of the ruins. Things that I said I'd do in my reply to Maksim, I did. I also made a few minor changes where I noticed that a player could get a significantly better start by moving for two turns, to remove those opportunities. There are still some options for 1-turn moves, though I wouldn't be surprised if everyone settled in place.

I tried each position for about 20 turns out (catching a few of the unfair starting position move opportunities in the process), and nothing surprising or debilitating happened.

I'm planning to give the save to the players in ~12 hours. If you wish to check it, do so soon!

[SevenSpirits]

I've uploaded a zip containing both
1) The save I sent to serdoa, and
2) The scenario file I made it from.

It would be good for a lurker with patch O and the zombie fix (i.e. the exact same mod that the players are supposed to have) to first try to open Serdoa's save (temp password is timepasses). If you get the incompatible assets error, then the problem is on my end, and it would be helpful of you to create a new PBEM save for Serdoa from it. (PBEM->New Scenario->Play as Perpentach->Keep settings the same->Save it.) (If those instructions are wrong, I guess that's where the problem is, haha.)