Well, it seems like all the civs now have realised that it's a little cramped. Seems like most civs have discovered both their neighbours. Cramped map means lots of border diplomacy, and 2 neighbours per civ around the donut gives interesting diplo diplomacy. All turning out very fair and exciting, so very well done to the mapmakers!!!
If loads of civs go for naval expansion, then there won't be too much advantage for any one spcific civ. But with seemingly all the civs concentrating on land borders, then maybe there will be a large opportunity available for the first one or two civs to prioritize island colonization??? Whilst galleys/sailing are a bit expensive and significant analysis is needed before committment to naval colonization, I'm surprised that no-one has even mentioned or considered it (even if they don't act on it now, but just that they consider it for future plans). Every civ knows that there is a landmass across the sea from their (allotted) capital, and many should probably have deduced by now that by reasons of fairness and meta-mapping, that this is likely the case for all civs. So even if it is too early now to make the investment for island colonization, then I'm very surprised that no-one at all is even considering or mentioning it for their future plans or discussions.
I've no idea whether naval power is a great way to win the game, but players could certainly have a lot of fun with amphibious invasions of capitals, particularly due to the way the map is set up!!! One strategy (only works if you're one of the one or two doing it) is to get a reasonable borders-share of the torus with a couple of minor concessions in return for NAP with your two neighbours, and go naval! (The C&D mapscipt experts who guessed the torus map ages ago have been in a position for quite a while to guess the number of extra-toroidal tiles - sure they have plenty of calcs with higher priority, but this is a pretty short/easy calc I think, and maybe very useful for planning long-term strategy...). All of this is very easy for me to say of course, since I've seen the map and the players haven't.
It's a pretty natural reaction to concentrate on your mainland. As all 10(?) players are doing. And I guess people are concentrating on that since that is where the borders are. And you expand on your mainland first due to the investment required for sailing/galleys. But for no player (most of whom strategize in detail) not to even think or talk or strategize about the extra-torus tiles??? When they knew about them from turn 1 at their starting location???
I notice that Jowy/Yaz is the one civ without copper. And they now know that they don't have copper (but of course presumably don't know that everyone else does have it in reach). Does anyone reckon that this will affect things? (I don't remember all the details of the mapmaking, but my impression was that this was a misclick/oversight rather than anything deliberate - policy was for everyone to get copper a few tiles away on the mainland, but there was one civ for which it was missing, in the NW I think, presumably Jowy/Yaz). So it is potentially a pretty risky situation for Jowy/Yaz without copper, especially between Spulla & Rego/darrell/Sunrise... Risky for the moment, but they'll be fine once they get diplo or iron... Seems that they have some NAP with their neighbours for now...
If loads of civs go for naval expansion, then there won't be too much advantage for any one spcific civ. But with seemingly all the civs concentrating on land borders, then maybe there will be a large opportunity available for the first one or two civs to prioritize island colonization??? Whilst galleys/sailing are a bit expensive and significant analysis is needed before committment to naval colonization, I'm surprised that no-one has even mentioned or considered it (even if they don't act on it now, but just that they consider it for future plans). Every civ knows that there is a landmass across the sea from their (allotted) capital, and many should probably have deduced by now that by reasons of fairness and meta-mapping, that this is likely the case for all civs. So even if it is too early now to make the investment for island colonization, then I'm very surprised that no-one at all is even considering or mentioning it for their future plans or discussions.
I've no idea whether naval power is a great way to win the game, but players could certainly have a lot of fun with amphibious invasions of capitals, particularly due to the way the map is set up!!! One strategy (only works if you're one of the one or two doing it) is to get a reasonable borders-share of the torus with a couple of minor concessions in return for NAP with your two neighbours, and go naval! (The C&D mapscipt experts who guessed the torus map ages ago have been in a position for quite a while to guess the number of extra-toroidal tiles - sure they have plenty of calcs with higher priority, but this is a pretty short/easy calc I think, and maybe very useful for planning long-term strategy...). All of this is very easy for me to say of course, since I've seen the map and the players haven't.
It's a pretty natural reaction to concentrate on your mainland. As all 10(?) players are doing. And I guess people are concentrating on that since that is where the borders are. And you expand on your mainland first due to the investment required for sailing/galleys. But for no player (most of whom strategize in detail) not to even think or talk or strategize about the extra-torus tiles??? When they knew about them from turn 1 at their starting location???
I notice that Jowy/Yaz is the one civ without copper. And they now know that they don't have copper (but of course presumably don't know that everyone else does have it in reach). Does anyone reckon that this will affect things? (I don't remember all the details of the mapmaking, but my impression was that this was a misclick/oversight rather than anything deliberate - policy was for everyone to get copper a few tiles away on the mainland, but there was one civ for which it was missing, in the NW I think, presumably Jowy/Yaz). So it is potentially a pretty risky situation for Jowy/Yaz without copper, especially between Spulla & Rego/darrell/Sunrise... Risky for the moment, but they'll be fine once they get diplo or iron... Seems that they have some NAP with their neighbours for now...