[NO PLAYERS] PB25 Lurker Thread - Then Happy I, That Lurk and am Belurked

[goataku]

Welcome Goataku! Who do you think the contenders are?

Thanks! There's some players in this I haven't seen play before, but Commodore+dtay feels like an obvious top tier team. Can GJ match them without melting down over scouts stepping on pigs? Will HAK get more than six cities?

[Old Harry]

Close as we are to finishing the snake, how much remains on the map?

Anyone think the map needs more work?

I removed the barb machine gun .

[Fintourist]

Just had a brief look. I think the shape/structure is interesting and will provide I tried to look around and decide which start would I want and could not do it (which is good). However I think I found my least favorite, start number 5. Based on overall geography, I did not look at resources too closely. So if you balance-wise want to make changes that would be the place, I think. One never knows entirely which way players prefer to expand, but I think there is a reasonable change for no. 5 to get squeezed.

[Merovech]

I can take a look at it in a few hours.

[Old Harry]

Thanks FT - I added a bit more land for start 5, and it does have some pretty strong resources nearby, so I think I'm happy with it now.

PB25 v8

I've put all the leaders and civs in, still including the number signs so you can see which is which. If anyone (hi Merovech!) wants to give it a final going over for howlers tonight I'll send it to Caledorn tomorrow.

To do:
- Remove number signs
- Make Joey blue
- Send to Cal

[BRickAstley]

worldbuilder file has some players already settled & scout moved.

[spacetyrantxenu]

Suggested map changes:

• Not all starting locations are on fresh water. This is something the regular map scripts normalize for. Needing fresh water are: Four and Nine
  
  
• Zulu's iron is pretty far away from the spawn point, while others have iron in the capital BFC. Putting strategic resources in the capital's BFC is risky (hi Retep, PB16!) but it isn't unfair if it's available to everyone.
  
  
• I would recommend revealing the full BFC for every player. The topography does this for you for some of the players, but not for all. But I guess they've already picked so it doesn't matter that much. It's more to help them not make a terrible decision on T0 and move away from their source of copper....Zulu are in this game again.
  
  
• Looks like everyone has at least two early happy resources available. Some have more, but whatever.
  
  
• Looks like Two needs coal.
  
  
• Nine may not get uranium -- it's in a border region that could easily be lost to Six. Six has an alternate source much closer to home. I'd move Nine's uranium closer to the start in case we make it to the point where they want to nuke each other. (Or not -- I scrolled the map further south and spotted Nine's uranium in the southern island).
  
  
• There is an ice tile southwest of Nine -- will that cause problems in trade group connections? The southern and northern passes are both navigable for boats but I don't know if the ice patch matters for connecting trade groups by water.
  

The map looks fun, thanks for rolling it. It still isn't too late to decorate those two large islands with advanced barbarian civs.

[spacetyrantxenu]

Here's the lay of the land. Don't look if you want to explore with the players (and haven't looked at the map file...).

Obviously the borders are just for a relative idea. I took the picture without selecting the option for including water tiles because that makes the land outlines unclear. Also, we could use some more color swaps. Red and blue are woefully underrepresented here.

[Merovech]

Initial Impressions:

1) So far, I haven't found any obviously mistaken tiles, though there are some that could not be naturally generated, like grassland hills gold and riverside, non-capital grassland hill stone (if you want, I could make a whole list of them, but I don't think that they are important). As long as they are balanced overall, however, those tiles should not be problems, unless you specifically wanted them to not exist. Fake edit: There is one lake crab in the isthmus near the spices, with a tile of land between it and the closest saltwater. This is not an inherently obnoxious tile (3F2C pre-workboat, 5F2C w/ workboat and no buildings), but perhaps it is unintentional.

2) There is an Egyptian lion and the vision that goes with it, north of Carthage. I might have created that without initially noticing, however.

3) I would absolutely not add any super-barbs, or barbs in general. This map is way too tight for that.

4) I am a little worried that the Ottomans have no back line, while Carthage has a pretty sizable portion, even if a lot of that is, as the crow flies, closer to the Celtic capital.

5) The back line issue is especially bad for the Celts, actually. The Holy Roman Empire has a huge back line, and even though it doesn't actually brush up against Bibracte because of the mountains and lakes, I still think that this is unbalanced.

6) The Aztecs and Dutch also have, imo, outsized back lines.

7) The map looks like a ton of fun, interweaving the water and land.

In-depth Analysis:

1) novice's MapTuner agrees with me about back lines and territory distribution, both when including islands and when not including islands. There are basically three and tiers, with substantial difference in quality between them, mostly based on total tiles available, as average tile value is fairly consistent, by both MapTuner's calculations and my eye test. In the first tier, we have the Holy Roman Empire and the even better Carthaginian Empire. Then follows a huge drop-off to the middle tier, occupied (in decreasingly good order) by the Aztec Empire, the Dutch Empire, the Indian Empire, and the Celtic Empire. The difference within this tier, while not as large as the difference between the Aztec and Holy Roman Empires, is still sizable. A moderate drop-off occurs before the final tier, the poor Zulu, Ottoman, and Incan Empires. MapTuner actually quantifies the Holy Roman and Carthaginian Empires as worth more than double the Incan Empire, although I would not go that far.

To summarize, I love the idea, and the overall quality of land seems pretty consistent. In addition, I understand how difficult it is to evenly distribute 9 civs, and I cannot fault you with some inequalities. However, I do not think that this map is ready; it needs some capital re-localization and related edits. I think that this is definitely doable within the confines of this map. MapTuner is great at giving suggestions for this, though I would also look with your eye afterwards. In fact, I ran its start finding tool for just a few minutes, and without even any actual tile adjustments, which you would obviously need to keep strategic, etc. resources the same, it found locations that appear much better balanced to my eye.

[Old Harry]

[*]Not all starting locations are on fresh water. This is something the regular map scripts normalize for. Needing fresh water are: Four and Nine

How bad is it for the starts not to have fresh water? I could move the oasis nearer to both.

[*]Zulu's iron is pretty far away from the spawn point, while others have iron in the capital BFC. Putting strategic resources in the capital's BFC is risky (hi Retep, PB16!) but it isn't unfair if it's available to everyone.

Iron added. Everyone has copper

[*]I would recommend revealing the full BFC for every player. The topography does this for you for some of the players, but not for all. But I guess they've already picked so it doesn't matter that much. It's more to help them not make a terrible decision on T0 and move away from their source of copper....Zulu are in this game again.

Too late for that now.

[*]Looks like everyone has at least two early happy resources available. Some have more, but whatever.

Everyone should have three.

[*]Looks like Two needs coal.

Good spot.

[*]Nine may not get uranium -- it's in a border region that could easily be lost to Six. Six has an alternate source much closer to home. I'd move Nine's uranium closer to the start in case we make it to the point where they want to nuke each other. (Or not -- I scrolled the map further south and spotted Nine's uranium in the southern island).

Moved.

[*]There is an ice tile southwest of Nine -- will that cause problems in trade group connections? The southern and northern passes are both navigable for boats but I don't know if the ice patch matters for connecting trade groups by water.

Dunno - I guess we'll find out .

The map looks fun, thanks for rolling it. It still isn't too late to decorate those two large islands with advanced barbarian civs.

Thanks, but Mero says not to .

Mero:
1. I'm not too worried about that.
2. I think it was you...
3. Yes sir!
4. Ottoman land is lusher than others, to give them a bit more of a chance, I dunno if that will be enough...
5. In theory the sea border is their backline, but yeah, it's a 9 player map, this is very hard to balance... I could cut one of the ways around the mountain range so the HAK border is mostly backline?
6. Perhaps moving the Celts and Zulu north a bit helps that?
7. Thanks!