Peter Gibbons wrote:I really like this idea--both the area and the concept.
Thanks!
Peter Gibbons wrote:I think graphics will work themselves out over time and you have a good start, so nothing much to add there at the moment. I would suggest you're going to need a new, clearer font, but that might just be my personal taste. I also think the symbol for the city should (and eventually will) be more sophisticated.
As for the font, I'm using Book Antiqua. I quite like it for the map. I think you're referring to the territory labels here? If so, I used the bold version of Book Antiqua for them, which is why they come off as too strong, I think. I'm going to redo them using the normal Book Antiqua and I'll post that and we can see how it looks. If it's still not a good fit, then I can easily find something else that works better.
As for the city, I'll work on it. I commented more on that aspect in the previous post responding to Andy.
Peter Gibbons wrote:For gameplay, a few questions/points:
1) Each city autodeploys +1 and gives a +1 bonus? I know there's a lot of territories on the map, but that seems like a lot. How are the cities going to start? Neutral 2? Regardless, I think the autodeploy is going to be more than enough and might even be too much already given how many cities there are on the map. Perhaps something more like Fractured America/China or the USA Map pack, where X number of cities equals a bonus.
Well, I wanted to give them the autodeploy to emphasize their importance, and to make holding them especially worthwhile. I wanted to give them the small bonus because most of the bonus areas on this map are rather big. There's really only 3 or 4 small(ish) bonuses, other than the 2 one-territory bonuses (Republic of Cyprus and Macedonia), Serbia, Moldova, Georgia, and I guess Northeast Turkey. Having the cities give +1 to your drop would make it easier to get enough going to be able to take one of those larger bonuses, and hold it. But I'm not married to this idea, so it can be changed if enough people feel like it should be.
I had planned on having the cities start either neutral 2 or 3, and having the territory that the city is in start as a neutral 2 or 3 as well, making taking the cities an investment.
Having the cities function more as a collection bonus could be an alternative, but I'd like to get more feedback on that issue.
Peter Gibbons wrote:2) Is the Black Sea as a killer neutral the best method to go about connecting the territories around the perimeter? What about making the cities on the Sea act as ports, which can attack each other? Just seems like using the Black Sea as a giant territory that appears to border at least 22 land territories is a recipe for disaster.
Well, the reason I didn't want the cities to directly be seaports is because of the victory condition. I wanted it to be harder to take and hold all 10 of the cities. Having it as a playable territory does solve the problem of having tons of sea routes going all through the area, but it can be changed if need be.
Originally, the Black Sea wasn't going to be a playable territory. It was simply going to have sea routes plastered all over it. But, I liked the killer neutral idea because it clears up that area, plus it allows for easy movement across the sea, but not too easy. Once I adopted this idea, I had to make the cities separate from the territories, otherwise it would be too easy to take the 10 cities needed for the victory condition.
Like I said, it can be reworked, but it probably needs to be something other than just having sea routes all over the place, because I think it will look pretty messy with that many sea routes.
Peter Gibbons wrote:3) I think the victory condition is arbitrary and somewhat ambiguous. Why should the 10 cities "around" the Black Sea be worth more than the others? Plus, if you need to hold a specific 10 cities, I think they should look different than the other cities. I think I know which 10 you mean, but it would be much easier to make it visually clear. Regardless, I think a victory condition based on the cities might be too much here. I think this could work better if it were more like Fractured China/America or Nordic Countries, where the capitals are just part of the game.
My reasoning behind making the 10 cities surrounding the black sea as the victory condition was that in order to hold those territs, you would have to have a pretty good grip on the black sea, and that controlling the Black Sea should mean victory, since this map uses the Black Sea as the main focal point. Does that make sense?
It's not so much that the cities around the black sea are worth more than the others, it's more that if you control those major cities around it, then you control
it. And controlling it should be what the map is about.
I agree they should look different than the other cities if they are going to be the victory condition. I actually asked about that in an earlier post. But it's good to have some confirmation that it's a good idea to differentiate graphically between them.
To be clear, the cities that would be in the Victory Condition are: (going counter-clock-wise) Sevastopol, Odessa, Constanta, Varna, Istanbul, Zonguldak, Trebzon, Batumi, Krasnodar and Rostov.
Peter Gibbons wrote:4) Is there a Rostov and a Rostov city territory? It seems like something is omitted there.
Yes, there is supposed to be a city and a territory there. I missed it. I had actually planned on going back to get it, but then got busy doing something else with the map and must have looked right over it when I was checking everything before I uploaded it. That will be fixed in the next update.
Peter Gibbons wrote:5) I think that, in general, you're going to have to make the city names much more clear (perhaps a different font) and you're going to have to make it clear which territories that cities can attack. Can they only attack the territories that contain them? Can they attack adjacent territories to the territories found within? I think a very clear, more visually-pleasing legend is going to be an absolute must.
My plan was to have the cities only capable of attacking and being attacked by the city they are in. I can understand how it's not very clear at the moment.
I'll work on the font issue, and I can work on the legend as well. I may have to reduce some of the territories in Southwest Turkey in order to expand the legend, because right now it's just not big enough. I can't reduce the font size much more in the legend or I risk it being unreadable, especially once I make the small version. So I think I'll have to expand it.
Thanks for your feedback! I appreciate all of it. Keep an eye out for my next update, I will try to include as much of the feedback I have received as possible.
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sorry) the mountain ranges are not bad, they just seems to "float" on top of the image, they dont look integrated, some shadow and color fade can fix it .
