Pitboss 9 Organizing Thread

[Twinkletoes89]

Then that's fine for me

[Jowy]

Isn't fractal highly random? What if the map we roll is two continents, separated by ocean, one has two players and the other five? With tech trading on, those two have no chance in the game. Also it might get a bit boring with continents. That's why I would prefer something else, like the settings Q created.

[Twinkletoes89]

That scenario is why I suggested the roller does 3-5 different fractal rolls and then chooses the best one from them.

A map like that clearly wouldn't be chosen

[Bigger]

Isn't fractal highly random? What if the map we roll is two continents, separated by ocean, one has two players and the other five? With tech trading on, those two have no chance in the game. Also it might get a bit boring with continents. That's why I would prefer something else, like the settings Q created.

i've played mostly fractal in SP for years. Its almost always pangea. very rarely there will be an island with one or two civs on it, but the map creator can always veto and reroll those maps.

[Jowy]

Okay I'm convinced, either map is fine by me.

EDIT: And I went straight on to roll some maps with default fractal settings to learn the script, and 8/10 maps rolled had one or two civs in a lone small continent seperated by ocean from the rest. It can work if the map maker rolls enough to get a good one though :P

[Cornflakes]

Anything I've missed? Do we want to reconsider the half-ban on War Elephants and let everyone train them as Khmer can?

I vote no. This really should have been nailed down before the civs were rolled, but the consensus before was NO so lets keep that.

About the map I honestly don't care as long as whoever rolls it knows how to identify a bad map (although I have to disagree that fractal rarely rolls island civs ... my default SP map if i want a quick no-thinking setup is fractal w/ standard settings, and very often one civ is off on an island if the size is standard or larger).

If it's Pangaea we want just tell the mapmaker to choose the specific Pangaea conditions but not reveal them here. In that case we really wouldn't know a lot about the map except that it's single continent. EDIT: but again I don't care what we play on, and I'd be perfectly happy with a lakes map.

[Qgqqqqq]

I don't like fractal due to some civs being shut off till astronomy.
I prefer something where water is abundant, but pre-optics contact/circumnav is available, so Big_and_small, a lakes script, archipelago/snakey/low sea etc.

I'd rather the lakes thing, though I can go with consensus.
I didn't realise 18 was off a different script, I thought it was just full_of_resources with some interesting settings.
I use FoR a bit, so if the roller needs advice on settings I can point them out (not saying I should choose them, but working out the resources x1.5 et al can be a little daunting).

If we go with public diplo, it should be before contact IMO.

[Cornflakes]

OH, Twinkletoes suggested Large size? We have 7 players and the default number for large is 9. Don't you think that will be too much?

I also just just rolled six or so toroidal/fractal maps, and not one of them look good. 2/3 of them had 1-2 civs isolated pre-astronomy. On Large size at least two civs always started in an ice wasteland, on Standard size at least one always started in the ice wasteland, and usually a second.

Out of curiosity I tried a a few cylindrical maps and got maps that to my eye looked MUCH better. None of the maps was a pangea, but only 2/5 had a civ isolated pre-astronomy. One of these just had a trough one tile wide and about 4-tiles long of ocean separating two larger landmasses, and I would not be opposed to the mapmaker filling in such a trough like that with galley-navigable water.

[Twinkletoes89]

I do not want us to have people separated by astronomy as the numbers aren't high enough for that to work.

A big and small map might be nice, but I think to save time and discussion, the lakes script is probably best

[Twinkletoes89]

We can do standard too, I thought large was the consensus though