Conquer Club

Mod Note:Abandoned - If resurrected, this one must be checked again.

VERSION 19

LARGE:



SMALL:



XML: http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/12/14 ... %20XML.xml

Previous Drafts: 18L 18S 17L 17S 16L 15S 15N 14L 14S 14LE 13L 13S 13LL 12LW 12SW 12LS 12SS 11LM 11L 11S 10L 10S 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

Starting Territories: 42

Starting Neutrals: 22 (2 on pawns, 4 on other pieces)

Map Features: Autodeploy, Conquest Gameplay, Dead Space, Naming Challenges, One Way Borders, Ranged Attack, Starting Neutrals, Victory Condition

show: Original Post

Hi John, nice start so far. You've taken on a tricky project for a first effort. This idea has been attempted more than once - search the foundry and you'll find a couple of threads on chess maps. Others have had better graphics, but yours is better thought-out from the start.

Here's the problem this map runs into: of the 64 squares, only 26 are pieces on your map. That means 38 don't have a piece and therefor cannot attack, so it is likely - especially in a five or six player game - that somebody will start the game with ZERO territories from which they can attack. Game over for them. Even if you start with just one or two you can lose those in the first round and you're effectively out of the game before you ever get a turn.

Or are you suggesting that the squares without pieces aren't territories at all? It makes the map more playable, but leaves you with only 26 territories, which is thin.

Using the 4 player chess board configuration.. it basically is the same but has 3 extra rows of 8 squares added to each side... thats 96 extra squares... that should be sufficient...maybe

also... maybe a 3D chess configuration as in the STAR TREK CHESS BOARD

EXCELLENT AWESOME idea!

i think this is an excellent idea, however, i think it would be cool if every space had a chess piece that could attack in the manner of its piece. that way, it may not look like a usualy board but it would still take some of the critical thinking involved in chess.

I think blank spaces ought to be able to attack pieces but not each other.

I dont like the idea of having the entire board taken up with pieces as it would be much to complicated.

anyway, good luck with the map

Try Making every square a playbel area...
and having the continents designated by:

Blank Spaces connected (No Chess Pieces) have a bonus value
for example: the top left corner has
7 Blank Spaces connected - this could be considered a continent

also, Make the pieces continents: for example
Any Pawn = +1 men
Any Knight/Bishop = +3 man
Any Rook = +6
Any Queen = +8
Any King = +10

Maybe even give Negatives If you have off color pieces... (ie. 3 White Pawns a black Rook = 9 but since there off color you get a minus 3)

Maybe having both queens negate each other or having King & Queen together give a special bonus.... Maybe the king is actually worth Nothing or you need the king to get the bonus for the pieces………Interesting and Fun I think

Hey, all, some good suggestions so far, and a few that I would like to address.

I think that making empty spaces territories is a good idea. Perhaps they could only attack the four squares around them, giving all but 4 places (A1, B1, G1, and A2) access to a chess piece. Then, if you own the king and queen of a color, blank spaces of that color give +1, and chess pieces of that color give +2. Note that it is still possible for the map to have only 26 territories, but the 64 territory idea sounds pretty good.

I had thought about it earlier, and I want to avoid the 4-player chess idea. The point of this map is to be unique, yet remain familiar and have mass appeal. Surely many more people have played 2 player chess than 4 player chess, and I think the 2 player version would be more well received.

Also, negative troops for off-colored territory will not work, because you would have to evacuate your king and queen of the same color (assuming that you own them) to attack the enemy on a different color. That would be awkward.

Also, regarding the pieces being continents by themselves, that seems biased towards the player that starts off with a king or queen, because they get a +10 or +8 from the get-go. (I'm really shooting you down here, aren't I, Keredrex? Sorry...)

Anyway, I would like to know whether the legend on the bottom (the one showing the movement of pieces) is necessary, because removing it would save space, and possibly eliminate the need for scrolling.

I also want to know if further graphical work needs to be done on this map, and who should do it. Since the only graphics program I have is MS Paint, this is about the extent of what I can do, aside from a background image and some more colors. I suppose this should wait until all the good ideas are implemented, but it might be necessary if this is ever going to become a real map.

Thanks for the support, and keep the ideas coming.

I like it.
Questions:
Is it possible to make the black and white pieces and placement the same/ mirrored from one side to other, then all empty spaces neutral armies.
you start all black pieces I start all white, conquest style.

Suggestion two:

make contintents in the background, divide the board up with suttle colors, they will have edges borders and piece to piece border the too like Riskopoly.

add just two more pieces to upper left t fill board, empty spaces only attacked adjacent, space/pieces, pieces attack approprietly.
This sets up natural barriers too

Just my .02 keep it going!!!

I was working on this a long time ago and only got to the point you are now. Thinking of how to pull it off.

I did also try to setup a 4-player chess board. Only using the actual pieces and they could only attack the way the pice could move. The problem I came up with is that there are an infinite number of possible arrangements. I stopped because I was not going to spend the time personally and in the forum debating on whether the yellow king should be move 1 space to the left or if the blue knight needed to be bordering another pawn. It made my head spin. You are happy to use what I had as a start.

i love this map idea and would be more then happy to help you in the xml coding protion if you need it.

Hey all, thanks for the support. I made a new version of the map, with some changed rules. Tell me if you like them. I also added a background image... one step closer to the Final Forge. I took out the movement instructions as well... I assume those are not necessary, if they are, tell me so I can put them back. Comment, dissect, and criticize this map as much as possible. Thanks!

why would every empty square get a bonus, and i would specify somehow about which 4 squares a chess peice can attack

your kings are both in danger that is not possible in real chess

Loving the idea...

My suggestions are this.

1) Blank squares should be able to attack up down left and right.

2) Squares with pieces should be able to attack as blank (up down left and right) and as the piece that they are attacking... i.e. Bishop attack all diagonals... Rook all verticals and horizontals etc...

3) Love the bonus idea for the King... of course - he's the most important piece... so you could make him even more important... not sure it should be for blank territories though - but for the pieces only... (Also make him start neutral)

4) I'm not sure where you got the position from... but obviously there are a number of real life game positions that could be used... and if you had a specific name for the position that could be part of the title?! (I.e. Slavic Defense)

C.

Few More Suggestions...
Obviously Graphics...Get some Clean Images For the Pieces

I think the pieces on the board should be sort of like turrets....Example

I dont think the pieces should attack every square around them...
They should only attack as they do in chess...

A Pawn Should attack the 2 diagnol Front Squares... But be attacked from any adjacent....
A Bishop Should Attack all Diagnol squares (Like Bombardment)...
A Knight Should Attack JUST like his Chess moves...L...Like Bombardment
( the knight Is only a bombardment Unit-it can be attacked from any adjacent Square)
A Rook...Like the Bishop But Up Down Left Right
A Queen - Bishop & Rook Combined Essentially
A King - Again easy... But Aonly Adjacent Squares

I also think that the PIECES should only advance armies on to other PIECES...example if a knight attakked a pawn it can advance... But not to a square

Since All PIECES are bonus areas... the board should have some Automatically designated Neutrals... I see this game becoming a conquest of the Squares Using the Pieces as Strength to take over the land....again See my previous post for the Bonus ideas...

But for this to work the positions should be thought out a bit... you may not want certain pieces to imeadiately attack others... also the Strong pieces should be THREATENED by other pieces which justifies the bonuses...The KNIGHT is important... it is the only "turret" that can threaten a Strong piece (Queen) and Not Face retaliation....WHAT DO YOU THINK? I just want to see a map like this become reality I think it will be HOT... If you need help (Idea Or Graphically- i don't do XML)Let me know.

the above post is very good, the positions should be though out to stergically place the bonuses, i am a chass player and i might have a few suggestions soon

Awesome post, Keredrex. As far as graphics, this is about the extent of what I can do on MS Paint, so I would need a real map artist to work on it once all the ideas are hammered out here.

Also, I agree that the pieces should only attack as they would in chess, because, come to think of it, the instructions can be confusing, and having the pieces attack adjacent empty squares would give them too much power. I guess that would mean that blank squares in the piece's movement zone could be attacked, which makes sense, since they could move there anyway. The bishop, for instance, would attack every piece of the other color, plus every square that it could move to in real life chess. (All the ones on its diagonals.) The pawn could attack pieces on a one square diagonal, but would move only to the empty square in front of it. Then, the empty squares would attack up, down, left, or right.

There's one problem with pieces not being able to put armies on empty squares, that being that all of the units would eventually condense onto the pieces, and not be able to get off. If you had no empty squares, then, you couldn't deploy there, and you'd be stuck on the pieces forever.

Regarding the queens, I put knights where they are for exactly that reason... one queen is under attack by two knights, the other by one. And, they can't attack back. Makes them a bit easier to capture, I'd say.

john9blue wrote:Awesome post, Keredrex. As far as graphics, this is about the extent of what I can do on MS Paint, so I would need a real map artist to work on it once all the ideas are hammered out here.

Also, ....

I can help with some of the graphic work.... I think we are on to something big here... If we get good ideas from the club this could be a spectacular map

Maybe the pieces can advance men only to the immediate attacking square... for example..
the bishop can bombard their diagonals and advance in to the four immediate corners...
or maybe the pieces can attack and advance to just pieces...
but the king can advance to Pieces and squares...
bascially you use the pieces to fight the all the pieces to the king then you can travel the squares... of course if you own squares then you can advance on the squares also.....this could potentially create impassable borders that become bridges.... Yeah this is gonna be friggin awesome !!

Keredrex wrote:

john9blue wrote:Awesome post, Keredrex. As far as graphics, this is about the extent of what I can do on MS Paint, so I would need a real map artist to work on it once all the ideas are hammered out here.

Also, ....

I can help with some of the graphic work.... I think we are on to something big here... If we get good ideas from the club this could be a spectacular map

Maybe the pieces can advance men only to the immediate attacking square... for example..
the bishop can bombard their diagonals and advance in to the four immediate corners...
or maybe the pieces can attack and advance to just pieces...
but the king can advance to Pieces and squares...
bascially you use the pieces to fight the all the pieces to the king then you can travel the squares... of course if you own squares then you can advance on the squares also.....this could potentially create impassable borders that become bridges.... Yeah this is gonna be friggin awesome !!

the thing i don't like about this is that it would be extremly hard to conqueor if you got eliminated to just the peices. I like the idea of all the peices being able to attack any square they were gona be on, that way it's easier to attack the whole board, we just have to make sure that there are squares that are unatackable by other peices.

I have an idea. You can make all of the pieces neutral to start out. Everyones armies start on the empty squares. Then Make it so that you can use the new objective feature. Make an objective to own all of one color and the opposing teams king. Also I like the idea that all of the empty territorys attack any adjecent squares. THe pieces bombard any of the territorys that they can normally attack.

turtle32 wrote:the thing i don't like about this is that it would be extremly hard to conqueor if you got eliminated to just the peices. I like the idea of all the peices being able to attack any square they were gona be on, that way it's easier to attack the whole board, we just have to make sure that there are squares that are unatackable by other peices.

Why would it be hard???? the Pieces have there own bonuses... my earlier post......

Keredrex wrote:Try Making every square a playbel area...
and having the continents designated by:

Blank Spaces connected (No Chess Pieces) have a bonus value
for example: the top left corner has
7 Blank Spaces connected - this could be considered a continent

also, Make the pieces continents: for example
Any Pawn = +1 men
Any Knight/Bishop = +3 man
Any Rook = +6
Any Queen = +8
Any King = +10

Maybe even give Negatives If you have off color pieces... (ie. 3 White Pawns a black Rook = 9 but since there off color you get a minus 3)

Maybe having both queens negate each other or having King & Queen together give a special bonus.... Maybe the king is actually worth Nothing or you need the king to get the bonus for the pieces………Interesting and Fun I think

.... a Pawn by itself is +1... if someone is solely on Pieces they have plenty of bonuses to accommodate advancement to the King...... think of it like a pyramid.........
...You have the Squares - holding a group gives you a small bonus lets say +2...
.. you attack and take over a rook and a pawn... now you have +7...
You advance along whatever pieces to get to the king....
from the king you can go back to the Squares... essentially the king will be the end of the BRIDGE to another territory of squares...

maybe the king could be less valuable bonus wise cause it is essentially a defensive piece....whoever has the squares around the king would want to defend that king

Probably a bit late to suggest this, but it'd be neat if the map started off with the pieces in the opening position. Don't know if you could program a 1-1 game so that one player would get all white and the other would get all black, leaving the open territories neutral, sort of like a no man's land, but that'd be cool.

I say that this map is GENIUS!
Go for it I say and maybe include the en passant deal or likely castling.

I think it would lose its eplayability if it was a map of the Starting positions of A chess Game.... ...It would be a Symmetrical board...not very appealing......Also en passant and Castling would require the designation of the Territory ( King-For Example) to somehow Change...Put we don't have animated maps yet so it doesn't really work here.....I really wnat to know what the club thinks of my ideas...READ MY POSTS IN THIS TOPIC, PLEASE and let me know what you think and who wants to help me make it ..... I can do CONCEPT, and GRAPHICS WORK... But I need a master of XML to let me know if this is at all possible