So I wanted to lurk this super-badly, and therefore volunteered to make their map. I'm a bit nervous, though, given the field. If I leave in a major imbalance, they're all talented enough to take advantage.
Plus, honestly, cylindrical natural-looking but balanced is a high bar to clear even in an ancient game, let alone advanced start that hasn't been played here before.
So...anyone have any advice for me?
Here's my current thinking:
Size and script
Map needs to be a bit bigger than usual, because of the turbo-boosted start. Maybe 200 land tiles/person. I also want to aim for the smaller end of relevant water, so that there's a chance land units stay relevant. Maybe 20% water. I can't decide how dense hills should be in general. More hills shifts the balance away from knights and toward 1-movers.
I'm not sure what script will produce that result. Probably something like Lakes or Fractal?
Initial Starting Area
Starts absolutely must have hills available to found on, to keep rushes from being realistic. Need those longbow bonuses. Also must provide Iron and possibly horses? Do I want to make Knights easy to get? Is it more of an imbalance for knights to be easy, or for them to be hard and therefore non-universal?
Should I go for mirrored 7x7 starts? I tend to think yes, because I don't want the game to be determined on T0. The main downside is that is about a quarter of the total available tiles. Tricky to manage both that much mirroring and leave the overall map natural-looking.
Overall Land Shape
I think it's got to be a 3x2 offset grid. Lakes style is requested, so I don't have to do anything in particular except make sure the lakes connect/isolate everyone equally.
Resources
Most resources are already unlocked in this era. Free Forges make metals particularly valuable. I lean toward giving them mostly Calendar resources at the starts and making gold/silver/gems require more work. Maybe those will even be on islands?
I do need to make sure that all the strategics are common. Losing due to 'I didn't know I needed to settle there until it was too late' is infuriating, while the advantage of sparse strategics is mostly that they can be a target at the start of a war.
I
Lushness
Probably going to end up on the lusher side of things. I feel like people have more fun racing for the prizes than trying to eke out a civ from a weak map, even if it does shift the relative value of traits and civs.
Other
Given that everyone starts with Iron Working, I'm tempted to include a lot of jungle, especially on borders, maybe also on a bunch of the happy resources. Delay interaction and growth curves a bit.
Plus, honestly, cylindrical natural-looking but balanced is a high bar to clear even in an ancient game, let alone advanced start that hasn't been played here before.
So...anyone have any advice for me?
Here's my current thinking:
Size and script
Map needs to be a bit bigger than usual, because of the turbo-boosted start. Maybe 200 land tiles/person. I also want to aim for the smaller end of relevant water, so that there's a chance land units stay relevant. Maybe 20% water. I can't decide how dense hills should be in general. More hills shifts the balance away from knights and toward 1-movers.
I'm not sure what script will produce that result. Probably something like Lakes or Fractal?
Initial Starting Area
Starts absolutely must have hills available to found on, to keep rushes from being realistic. Need those longbow bonuses. Also must provide Iron and possibly horses? Do I want to make Knights easy to get? Is it more of an imbalance for knights to be easy, or for them to be hard and therefore non-universal?
Should I go for mirrored 7x7 starts? I tend to think yes, because I don't want the game to be determined on T0. The main downside is that is about a quarter of the total available tiles. Tricky to manage both that much mirroring and leave the overall map natural-looking.
Overall Land Shape
I think it's got to be a 3x2 offset grid. Lakes style is requested, so I don't have to do anything in particular except make sure the lakes connect/isolate everyone equally.
Resources
Most resources are already unlocked in this era. Free Forges make metals particularly valuable. I lean toward giving them mostly Calendar resources at the starts and making gold/silver/gems require more work. Maybe those will even be on islands?
I do need to make sure that all the strategics are common. Losing due to 'I didn't know I needed to settle there until it was too late' is infuriating, while the advantage of sparse strategics is mostly that they can be a target at the start of a war.
I
Lushness
Probably going to end up on the lusher side of things. I feel like people have more fun racing for the prizes than trying to eke out a civ from a weak map, even if it does shift the relative value of traits and civs.
Other
Given that everyone starts with Iron Working, I'm tempted to include a lot of jungle, especially on borders, maybe also on a bunch of the happy resources. Delay interaction and growth curves a bit.
EitB 25 - Perpentach
Occasional mapmaker
Occasional mapmaker