[No players] Big epic lurking - PB74

[Mjmd]

Some general observations. I'm assuming that is land tiles? Over 150 tiles / player for most of these which seem really high especially again as most of these big games peter out due to exhaustion of empire size. How open are you to moving capitals?
 
Maps:
-1 Reason I ask that last question is that on maps like #1 could move tight spaced people. If there is someone isolated on an island would could easily do something like move Egypt west and then plop the other player down NE of current position south of jungle. Agreed good shape.
-2 I also like this shape; maybe even more. Would probably connect Egypt east west up NE and NW but get rid of a bunch of the tundra down low / make part of that an island. Really looks like there needs to be someone south of Mali, but maybe someone is just off screen? Even still seems like lot of space west of Pink (brain farting on civ).
-3 agreed doesn't look great
-4  ya a few of these would need moved and I don't like that island layout as much.
-5 in general not a fan of dual islands. If you just sank most of that island and moved Spain and NA to where they are needed the rest of the shape doesn't look bad. 
-6 If they didn't want a big and small this is actually a great base for a pangea but with islands, but as is probably not. 
-7 Ditch it. 
-8 would probably cut through the far south to make it navigable, but I still have some neighbor balance concerns just from what I can see that I don't know are fixable even with moving capitals and some changes to land.

My picks from here are 1, 2, and maybe 5.

From snaky section
-1 not a fan. Looks like a lot of semi isolated or dual situations. 
-2 as long as there are at least 3 people to a continent I also like this one a lot. Some capital moves, but I like the shape. It reminds me of a map at the beginning of some book I've read.....
-3 I think this falls into could probably be made to work with a lot of moves and lot of edits, but probably not a good base.
-4 I worry for every player pictured at the bottom on that spit of land. No.

So from snake I like just #2.

Edit: I'll try to take a look tonight at the more promising ones in full by downloading files. Above comments are just from available screenshots.

[Krill]

The first map looks good. The big games kinda benefit from the weirdness as well.

[Qgqqqqq]

Open to moving capitals, though would like some assistance if so. Would prefer not to sink or raise too much land - I actually like having the polar regions impassable, as I feel it makes the rest of the map more strategically important.

Yeah, its land tiles, but remember that that includes a bunch of islands and we still have some people super close to one another. If you want to roll some Huge / High sea levels I'd consider them.

[Mjmd]

Edit: in honor of Pics thread tile and because this post is long, here is a sea shanty!



So after going into all of the ones I said I liked before, I really only like map 1 normal. But I like it quite a bit.

I only found 1 map I liked with high water level (well I also found an interesting pangea, but again not the assignment). And by "liked enough" I meant I found something that with some work can be made to work for a much tighter map, but I think its TOO tight. Here it is just in case.

map 1 high water level - 2045 tiles


That being said here is normal map 1, which I think I like better and honestly seems tight enough.

For the capital moves I would recommend doing before balancing them. I can do that and then let you do capital making / balancing or you can do everything. Totally up to you; if you want to move capitals don't want to steal your thunder and I'm fine doing less work . I haven't noted it in all cases, but I kind of like making all the capitals coastal. The naval wonders are a big deal here and just saying "you started inland so you have much less chance" seems bad". Doesn't mean they all have to be seafood starts and some of the starts can easily connect just via 1-2 water tiles inserted.

Main continent western half:

The obvious thing is that France shouldn't be alone. Basically my idea is to connect greece and arabia via France. Might see if I can figure out tools to just actually move the land or might manually move some of and incorporate island that is already there. Honestly of all the moves this is the one I would prefer you do, but up to you and not sure how much technical expertise you have. Edit: I have none, need to absorb Tarkeels post.

I also like moving Persia basically to where I scirbbled some green. Khmer would move south as that area of the world is pretty crowded. 



Other half:

On main continent obvious move is NA. Then I moved a couple others for spacing.

The mini continent would move china over other side. Maybe move Inca NE as well.



Other edits would be to make sure everyone has AN island. Might move 1 or 2 of the astro islands into the north sea to give somewhat even access to those.

Let me know if you want me to do anything.

[Qgqqqqq]

I was going to come here and say that of the maps we rolled, I like Map 1 the best - so glad you agree. It has the most interesting shape, even if some work will need to happen to it.

I need to dig into the details - I haven't examined the map closely, and some of your pictures don't display for me. I agree re moving first before anything else. I can do transposing.

I'm not sure on two points that you've suggested though. Firstly, I'm not sure about moving France. Is it so bad for them to start alone? They'll have to go to the mainland eventually as they don't have enough land, but it seems like some variety. Perhaps its just too hard for them to conquer overseas pre-galleons - but I don't want to write semi-isolation off before thinking about it.

Similarly, I'm not sure I agree re coastal start. There's only really TLGH that is likely to fall in the first city - the Colossus is just as likely to land in a later one. And pushing everyone to the coast feels unnecessarily homogenising - we're making those wonders stronger as well.

I'm also not sure about deleting so much tundra and ice. Yes, a huge patch near someone is unfun, so I'd hit the top of the Eastern continent and the bottom of France. But the other places you've X'd I disagree. Making hay out of tundra isles seems fun, and the small northern strip harmless.

[Qgqqqqq]

I struggled to find it easily - how many land tiles total and per player were PB66 and 59?

[Mjmd]

147 tiles / player PB66 and PB59 I think was 120+ ish.

If you are having trouble with pictures maybe a different browser? I can try reposting as well.
https://i.imgur.com/gGpfMHi.png
https://i.imgur.com/Ndi6gkk.png

It is mainly not fair for Frances opponents; they can focus on wonders and a beeline to astro. Although depending on how game turns out it could be bad for France itself as can't make any situation of a weak neighbor. It also adds a neighbor to Greece. In my random maps I tried to make sure everyone had AT LEAST two neighbors. In a semi random map I think we should do the same. Having only 1 neighbor (or 0) vs your opponents 2+ is pretty unfair.

I don't mind keeping the southern ice and tundra as I was mainly thinking of deleting anything that didn't have food just to give the players a more accurate tile count . That land isn't usable anyways so its just fishing villages. The northern Tundra on main continent I was deleting was for Ethiopia's benefit mainly as had planned on moving them up there. Sure could green their cross, but it still gives them crap to expand to compared to other players. Better to just cut it off and I would move any seafood south to new coast.

[Mjmd]

Got main continent moves done and little bit of editing. If I moved a capital I tried to move some or all of whatever started with it most of the time, but again, do whatever balancing you want, I'm staying out of the capital balancing part. Still have to do mini continent, but it got late. Can either send a version back to me or move them.

[Qgqqqqq]

MJ, I really appreciate you looking at this, but this is quite a bit of editing you've done, including some you didn't even mention in the thread. What happened to all of the area South of Korea? They're super jungle-choked now. What happened to NA, the region looks completely different? If we do edits to land in a substantial way like that it opens more questions about what we're going to do more broadly, and I don't have the time to fully balance this map, that's not what I signed up for.

I can also tell some of the former capital regions by how lush they are, but it's not labelled so it's hard for me to make decisions about it in a way that remains fair for players that don't have a former capital next to them.

I don't want to throw what you've done out, but it looks like you were thinking of a more substantial balancing exercise. If you want to pick up the ball and run with that, I don't have any objections

But if you don't have time for that, I'm going to look at the original to try and get a better sense of what's occurred so I can think about anything I'd do differently and any consequential changes.

[Mjmd]

I just saw mass desert and made Korea an island instead (everyone should have one). Can certainly add land back in if someone looks short. I haven't taken a look at the mini continent yet much. I did note I was going to move NA so they weren't hanging out there on their own. Made their old land into the islands.

I 100% should have noted where old capitals were. My bad. Really should just be Arabia, Khmer, Ethopia, and Mongolia. although I remember one of those was a lot of luxuries which occur elsewhere in pockets. I do remember taking out Mongolias clams when I added them into their moved spot.

I did semi fast changes to give people islands / move people around as noted above with the purpose of balancing neighbors and slightly tightening up (although the two ends of the main continent are still pretty hefty, but its solid land which I'm hopeful helps). I don't mind doing editing. If you want to switch the work back and forth we could do that. Again, I'm not keen to touch the capital balancing so if you want to work on main continent capitals and send it back in 19-20 hours that would work.

Or you can ditch a lot of what I did, no hard feelings. I would still recommend the moves in some capacity. I actually really like that you didn't do unristricted leaders and they were normal pairings. Made knowing who was who a lot easier.