Oasis [Quenched]

[Hotdoggie]

I dont like the wording on the win objective...you use the word capture twice.

Could you say "to obtain the treasure" instead?

[wcaclimbing]

I dont like the wording on the win objective...you use the word capture twice.

Could you say "to obtain the treasure" instead?

Nice catch there.
I'll have it changed in the next update (along with a few other things up there to make all of the writing a bit more manageable.)

[lanyards]

How are all the territories going to be named?

--lanyards

Grand Oasis 1, 2, and 3
small oases = "oasis of ______" (I need suggestions for these. cause I need 20 names)

Everywhere else will be names that would make sense for the area. such as "farmhouse", "northland", 'battleground", "graveyard", "dunes", etc.

and then more generic names (similar to those on the AoR maps) for the places I can't think of names for.

Do you think that will work?

I think it will work for the Oases and the sides were there is green land, but in the middle were it is dessert area, is it going to be just Dessert 1, 2, 3, 4...... all the way till around 60? That is the only way you could do it that I can think of, because it would be hard to make up that many names, and why would dessert area were nobody lives have a name. You gotta come up with a solution to the naming.

--lanyards

[TaCktiX]

Perhaps you could borrow from the names of the Oases. Name them things like "Oasis of [mythic-sounding name]", then name the desert area around each of them "[mythic-sounding name] Desert #".

[wcaclimbing]

Perhaps you could borrow from the names of the Oases. Name them things like "Oasis of [mythic-sounding name]", then name the desert area around each of them "[mythic-sounding name] Desert #".

But what about the countries between the oases?
I made it so each oasis is connected to some of the others by only one territory.
Equal distance from both, how would you decide what to name it?

I don't really like the idea of using numbers, because it leads to confusion in attacking (at least from me. I have a bad habit of attacking XX 2 when I meant to attack YY 2.... stuff like that.) Also, that would mean that each area would have to have some special division, such as thicker border lines or colored terrain. I want to leave the terrain as clean and realistic as possible.

Basically, I will use numbers if I have to, but I really want to find a better way, if there is one.
It wouldn't be too much trouble for me to make up a bunch of names. DiM did it on his maps. It isn't too difficult. I would like that way more. Numbers just aren't that fun for me to play on.

My next update will probably have details on each Oasis, as well as an example of how I could do country names (I wouldn't name everything, just a few of them to see what it would be like). I'll make this first version using normal names (no numbers) so we can see how it would look. If using names just won't work, then I'll try it with numbers instead.

[sfhbballnut]

I don't see a way around numbers at this point, names are gonna be so cluttered and confusing on the map it'll be unplayable, not to mention look awful, lets get some armies on the map and a couple small attempts at names, numbers, other systems etc, and see what looks good/ like it'll work then determine the best direction to head in

[DiM]

a few minor things.

1. could you make different smokes? i don't like how you copy pasted the same smoke layer on every village. also you could make them in diff directions since the wind is not the same over such a large space.
2. the paths are too clean. so instead of using a brush to draw them use burn tool. or if you want a brush then set 2 colours n it and make the brush jitter between them. (for example a light brown and a dark brown). it will add more realism to the paths.
3. the trees are way too small. they seem more like bushes rather than trees. compare them to the houses.
4. the houses range from huge to tiny. i mean check out the huge brown house in lower left corner and compare it to the tiny red one one inch above it.
5. also about strange proportions, the rocks. some are bigger than a house.
6. same goes for the sheep. pretty big compared to the houses.
7. and the camp fire. normally a camp fire is rather small. let's say max 3ft in diameter but you have camp fires the size of small houses.
8. in the lower right corner there's a brown thing following a border, like a wall or fence. what is it??
9. the river is way too close to the desert. i mean let's say the brown house near the river is 15 feet long, this means that at roughly 50 feet away from the river the desert starts. that's way too close.
10. i think there are too many oasises (what's the plural for oasis??). i mean normally you walk for miles and miles before you find one, where as here you stumble upon one every 100 feet or so. plus the main attraction for an oasis is that it is an isolated piece of heaven, hard to find and very rare. when i see so many i really don't consider them a rare commodity.

[bryguy]

a few minor things.

1. could you make different smokes? i don't like how you copy pasted the same smoke layer on every village. also you could make them in diff directions since the wind is not the same over such a large space.
2. the paths are too clean. so instead of using a brush to draw them use burn tool. or if you want a brush then set 2 colours n it and make the brush jitter between them. (for example a light brown and a dark brown). it will add more realism to the paths.
3. the trees are way too small. they seem more like bushes rather than trees. compare them to the houses.
4. the houses range from huge to tiny. i mean check out the huge brown house in lower left corner and compare it to the tiny red one one inch above it.
5. also about strange proportions, the rocks. some are bigger than a house.
6. same goes for the sheep. pretty big compared to the houses.
7. and the camp fire. normally a camp fire is rather small. let's say max 3ft in diameter but you have camp fires the size of small houses.
8. in the lower right corner there's a brown thing following a border, like a wall or fence. what is it??
9. the river is way too close to the desert. i mean let's say the brown house near the river is 15 feet long, this means that at roughly 50 feet away from the river the desert starts. that's way too close.
10. i think there are too many oasises (what's the plural for oasis??oasis'). i mean normally you walk for miles and miles before you find one, where as here you stumble upon one every 100 feet or so. plus the main attraction for an oasis is that it is an isolated piece of heaven, hard to find and very rare. when i see so many i really don't consider them a rare commodity.

11. The trees seem placed at random, cause you have some RIGHT next to the desert, and others place roughly (by gestimation) 3 miles away (like i said gestimation)
12. WHY IS THERE NO WATER AT ANY OASIS'??? maybe at least put some at the grand oasis
13. if your gonna add names to the territories, then your gonna lose some territories to fit the names in and the army numbers
14. Whats with the lines on the buildings? to me it makes them look like cardboard boxes....
15. Where is the light coming from? you should at least have some tiny shadows, or a tiny bridge reflection

[wcaclimbing]

a few minor things.

1. could you make different smokes? i don't like how you copy pasted the same smoke layer on every village. also you could make them in diff directions since the wind is not the same over such a large space.Yeah. I can do that.
2. the paths are too clean. so instead of using a brush to draw them use burn tool. or if you want a brush then set 2 colours n it and make the brush jitter between them. (for example a light brown and a dark brown). it will add more realism to the paths.I'll distort the paths some and make them blend better. They can be improved.
3. the trees are way too small. they seem more like bushes rather than trees. compare them to the houses.Bushes, trees, little grass spots, doesn't really matter, does it? There wont be any trees, so I guess you can call them bushes. Should they be different?
4. the houses range from huge to tiny. i mean check out the huge brown house in lower left corner and compare it to the tiny red one one inch above it.lol @ the tiny red house. I never really realized how small that was (I am drawing it all at 2x size). I can fix that one.
5. also about strange proportions, the rocks. some are bigger than a house.If they were drawn to scale, you wouldn't be able to see them. I can shrink some of the bigger ones, though.
6. same goes for the sheep. pretty big compared to the houses. Probably wouldn't hurt to shrink my sheeps just a bit.
7. and the camp fire. normally a camp fire is rather small. let's say max 3ft in diameter but you have camp fires the size of small houses.I dont really know what to say for this one. They make big fires? You wouldn't know it was a campfire if it was any smaller. People would be asking "whats the smokey cloud looking thing doing on the map?"
8. in the lower right corner there's a brown thing following a border, like a wall or fence. what is it??That can be fixed. I just drew it in, forgot to change it later.
9. the river is way too close to the desert. i mean let's say the brown house near the river is 15 feet long, this means that at roughly 50 feet away from the river the desert starts. that's way too close.Would you rather have me chop out the river and just have solid boring green all the way down? I put it in there to bring a bit more color in.
10. i think there are too many oasises (what's the plural for oasis??). i mean normally you walk for miles and miles before you find one, where as here you stumble upon one every 100 feet or so. plus the main attraction for an oasis is that it is an isolated piece of heaven, hard to find and very rare. when i see so many i really don't consider them a rare commodity.The plural is oases, btw. And yes, there are a lot of oases in here, its quite exaggerated, but I want the oases to be something for everyone. I don't want the fight to revolve around a few oases, I want it to be focused on taking the Grand Oasis. There are enough oases for everyone to take a few, so everyone has a fair chance at winning. If other people think there are too many, then I will change it, but I think having a lot will work best for gameplay.

About naming the territories, I changed my mind. I think using numbers will be the cleanest way to go, but that still leaves us with deciding how to organize them. I could do all 1-90ish numbers, it could be split North 1, North 2, South 1, South 2, etc. I dont think it would work to name it like this:

Perhaps you could borrow from the names of the Oases. Name them things like "Oasis of [mythic-sounding name]", then name the desert area around each of them "[mythic-sounding name] Desert #".

Because every territory (excluding one or two of them) is touching an oasis, and many of them are touching two oases, and a few are even touching 3. how would we decide which oasis each goes with?

11. The trees seem placed at random, cause you have some RIGHT next to the desert, and others place roughly (by gestimation) 3 miles away (like i said gestimation)Would you prefer a pre-planned grid system for the trees? go show me a forest that isn't random (excluding ones planted by humans).
12. WHY IS THERE NO WATER AT ANY OASIS'??? maybe at least put some at the grand oasisThat will be done.
13. if your gonna add names to the territories, then your gonna lose some territories to fit the names in and the army numbersYep.
14. Whats with the lines on the buildings? to me it makes them look like cardboard boxes....My people live in cardboard boxes just for fun. their real home is just off the side of the map, in an enormous mansion.
15. Where is the light coming from? you should at least have some tiny shadows, or a tiny bridge reflectionLight is coming from top-left. Check the shadows on the houses, rocks, and the sides of the river.

Did I miss anything?
This is still the map ideas forum. I thought the graphics-bashing didn't begin until at least the main foundry.

[bryguy]

a few minor things.

1. could you make different smokes? i don't like how you copy pasted the same smoke layer on every village. also you could make them in diff directions since the wind is not the same over such a large space.Yeah. I can do that.
2. the paths are too clean. so instead of using a brush to draw them use burn tool. or if you want a brush then set 2 colours n it and make the brush jitter between them. (for example a light brown and a dark brown). it will add more realism to the paths.I'll distort the paths some and make them blend better. They can be improved.
3. the trees are way too small. they seem more like bushes rather than trees. compare them to the houses.Bushes, trees, little grass spots, doesn't really matter, does it? There wont be any trees, so I guess you can call them bushes. Should they be different?
4. the houses range from huge to tiny. i mean check out the huge brown house in lower left corner and compare it to the tiny red one one inch above it.lol @ the tiny red house. I never really realized how small that was (I am drawing it all at 2x size). I can fix that one.
5. also about strange proportions, the rocks. some are bigger than a house.If they were drawn to scale, you wouldn't be able to see them. I can shrink some of the bigger ones, though.
6. same goes for the sheep. pretty big compared to the houses. Probably wouldn't hurt to shrink my sheeps just a bit.
7. and the camp fire. normally a camp fire is rather small. let's say max 3ft in diameter but you have camp fires the size of small houses.I dont really know what to say for this one. They make big fires? You wouldn't know it was a campfire if it was any smaller. People would be asking "whats the smokey cloud looking thing doing on the map?"
8. in the lower right corner there's a brown thing following a border, like a wall or fence. what is it??That can be fixed. I just drew it in, forgot to change it later.
9. the river is way too close to the desert. i mean let's say the brown house near the river is 15 feet long, this means that at roughly 50 feet away from the river the desert starts. that's way too close.Would you rather have me chop out the river and just have solid boring green all the way down? I put it in there to bring a bit more color in.
10. i think there are too many oasises (what's the plural for oasis??). i mean normally you walk for miles and miles before you find one, where as here you stumble upon one every 100 feet or so. plus the main attraction for an oasis is that it is an isolated piece of heaven, hard to find and very rare. when i see so many i really don't consider them a rare commodity.The plural is oases prove me wrong y dont ya, btw. And yes, there are a lot of oases in here, its quite exaggerated, but I want the oases to be something for everyone. I don't want the fight to revolve around a few oases, I want it to be focused on taking the Grand Oasis. There are enough oases for everyone to take a few, so everyone has a fair chance at winning. If other people think there are too many, then I will change it, but I think having a lot will work best for gameplay. unless someone decides to be greedy....

About naming the territories, I changed my mind. I think using numbers will be the cleanest way to go, but that still leaves us with deciding how to organize them. I could do all 1-90ish numbers, it could be split North 1, North 2, South 1, South 2, etc. I dont think it would work to name it like this:

Perhaps you could borrow from the names of the Oases. Name them things like "Oasis of [mythic-sounding name]", then name the desert area around each of them "[mythic-sounding name] Desert #".

Because every territory (excluding one or two of them) is touching an oasis, and many of them are touching two oases, and a few are even touching 3. how would we decide which oasis each goes with? how about just Desert 1, desert 2 etc and oasis of [mythic-sounding name] and Fertile Land 1 etc?

11. The trees seem placed at random, cause you have some RIGHT next to the desert, and others place roughly (by gestimation) 3 miles away (like i said gestimation)Would you prefer a pre-planned grid system for the trees? yes plz
12. WHY IS THERE NO WATER AT ANY OASIS'??? maybe at least put some at the grand oasisThat will be done. ty
13. if your gonna add names to the territories, then your gonna lose some territories to fit the names in and the army numbersYep.
14. Whats with the lines on the buildings? to me it makes them look like cardboard boxes....My people live in cardboard boxes just for fun. their real home is just off the side of the map, in an enormous mansion. really? cool
15. Where is the light coming from? you should at least have some tiny shadows, or a tiny bridge reflectionLight is coming from top-left. Check the shadows on the houses, rocks, and the sides of the river. you cant barely see it....

Did I miss anything?
This is still the map ideas forum. I thought the graphics-bashing didn't begin until at least the main foundry. it starts at different places for each map

[DiM]

a few minor things.

1. could you make different smokes? i don't like how you copy pasted the same smoke layer on every village. also you could make them in diff directions since the wind is not the same over such a large space.Yeah. I can do that.
2. the paths are too clean. so instead of using a brush to draw them use burn tool. or if you want a brush then set 2 colours n it and make the brush jitter between them. (for example a light brown and a dark brown). it will add more realism to the paths.I'll distort the paths some and make them blend better. They can be improved.
3. the trees are way too small. they seem more like bushes rather than trees. compare them to the houses.Bushes, trees, little grass spots, doesn't really matter, does it? There wont be any trees, so I guess you can call them bushes. Should they be different?
4. the houses range from huge to tiny. i mean check out the huge brown house in lower left corner and compare it to the tiny red one one inch above it.lol @ the tiny red house. I never really realized how small that was (I am drawing it all at 2x size). I can fix that one.
5. also about strange proportions, the rocks. some are bigger than a house.If they were drawn to scale, you wouldn't be able to see them. I can shrink some of the bigger ones, though.
6. same goes for the sheep. pretty big compared to the houses. Probably wouldn't hurt to shrink my sheeps just a bit.
7. and the camp fire. normally a camp fire is rather small. let's say max 3ft in diameter but you have camp fires the size of small houses.I dont really know what to say for this one. They make big fires? You wouldn't know it was a campfire if it was any smaller. People would be asking "whats the smokey cloud looking thing doing on the map?"
8. in the lower right corner there's a brown thing following a border, like a wall or fence. what is it??That can be fixed. I just drew it in, forgot to change it later.
9. the river is way too close to the desert. i mean let's say the brown house near the river is 15 feet long, this means that at roughly 50 feet away from the river the desert starts. that's way too close.Would you rather have me chop out the river and just have solid boring green all the way down? I put it in there to bring a bit more color in.
10. i think there are too many oasises (what's the plural for oasis??). i mean normally you walk for miles and miles before you find one, where as here you stumble upon one every 100 feet or so. plus the main attraction for an oasis is that it is an isolated piece of heaven, hard to find and very rare. when i see so many i really don't consider them a rare commodity.The plural is oases, btw. And yes, there are a lot of oases in here, its quite exaggerated, but I want the oases to be something for everyone. I don't want the fight to revolve around a few oases, I want it to be focused on taking the Grand Oasis. There are enough oases for everyone to take a few, so everyone has a fair chance at winning. If other people think there are too many, then I will change it, but I think having a lot will work best for gameplay.

1. k
2. k
3. if they are bushes then i'm fine with them but the colouring could use some variation. make the brush to jitter between colours, make some green some brown some yellowish, etc.
4. k
5. yeah i know it sucks but yo want realistic landscape don't you? this means proportions have to be kept realistic. i remember somebody wanted me to add people on the boats on AoR and make them fight. that would have been nice but it also would have meant to make the ships the size of mountains
6. k
7. i can live with big fires. maybe they are big to roast those huge sheep
8. k
9. i can live with a close river just for artistic purposes
10. thanks for the plural. you could add other resources and bonus terits and reduce the number of oases. after all it would seem only natural that people would need a camel pen (transportation) some sheep (food) and water before venturing into the desert.

[InkL0sed]

Did I miss anything?
This is still the map ideas forum. I thought the graphics-bashing didn't begin until at least the main foundry.

Usually the first thing people mention with me

Don't use resources, I like the idea of focusing the gameplay on oases.

[bryguy]

Did I miss anything?
This is still the map ideas forum. I thought the graphics-bashing didn't begin until at least the main foundry.

Usually the first thing people mention with me

Don't use resources, I like the idea of focusing the gameplay on oases.

yea resources fit in with builder and AoR but not here...

[gimil]

If you included terr names in the next update we can get this out of here

And as a suggestion, use text links rather than img links for all your old updates. Also include all starting neutrals, these are the kinds of thinhs to keep oaktown happy and get hte gameplay stamp that little bit quicker.

[wcaclimbing]

3. if they are bushes then i'm fine with them but the colouring could use some variation. make the brush to jitter between colours, make some green some brown some yellowish, etc. I'll see what I can do.

7. i can live with big fires. maybe they are big to roast those huge sheep

9. i can live with a close river just for artistic purposes
10. thanks for the plural. you could add other resources and bonus terits and reduce the number of oases. after all it would seem only natural that people would need a camel pen (transportation) some sheep (food) and water before venturing into the desert. I could take out a few of the oases and replace them with camel herds. So we can have giant camels that can be friends with the giant sheep and they can all sleep under the giant rocks next to the tiny houses

Gimil:
Territory names will be in the update after next (next update will be finished oases graphics).
Good idea. I'll link to the old ones from now on. I just want both up there now to make it easy to compare them.
I'll make a starting neutrals map after we are sure the territories are in the right place.

[gimil]

okey im happy with that, im just trying to rush you out. Its getting a little sticky in here you know.

[wcaclimbing]

okey im happy with that, im just trying to rush you out. Its getting a little sticky in here you know.

I'll be gone eventually. Feel free to move me out any time.

[gimil]

okey im happy with that, im just trying to rush you out. Its getting a little sticky in here you know.

I'll be gone eventually. Feel free to move me out any time.

Got standards to follow you know

[wcaclimbing]

Here is a version of the map that only shows where the neutral armies go. The Black spots are where players start in the beginning of the game.
All the numbers are the numbers of neutrals on each area.
Yes, I know the colors on the numbers are a bit painful to look at. Its just to show what goes where (at least, what I think goes where.)

Basically, the closer you are to the Grand Oasis, the more neutrals you encounter. Cause the desert is easy to travel in, but gets more difficult the farther you go.

http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r315/wcaclimbing/NeutralsImage1.png
[please don't post this as an image. I'm leaving it as a link so the people that don't need it don't have to see it.]

---note---
A few of the oases might be removed. The neutrals will then be about the same as those in the desert around them.

[InkL0sed]

EDIT: Whoops, sorry about that wcaclimbing.

I think the inner oases should be more like 5, and the Grand Oasis territories should be 10. But that's just my intuition speaking.

[wcaclimbing]

I think the inner oases should be more like 5, and the Grand Oasis territories should be 10. But that's just my intuition speaking.

Inner oases 5. Sounds good to me.

And for the Grand Oasis, it could bump to 8, but I want it to be possible to take at least part of it early on, so the fighting begins early. I guess we need a 3rd opinion on this, though.

[sfhbballnut]

I think as many more as you think reasonable on the Grand oasis, especialy since its an objective. Picture a flat rate game, in a set or two you could have the center and with a little luck you'd be uncontested. We'll see.

*edit* 10 sounds like a good number to me, not so much as to make it impossible and barely part of the game until many rounds in, and not so little as to make it easy, causing frantic dashes in every game with no strategy. 10's stiff, but I think this needs that

[gimil]

Is this a good idea (the idea, not the image)?
it's great. I love it!
48% [ 47 ]
it'll work, but needs a few changes.
40% [ 39 ]
probably won't work, without major changes.
5% [ 5 ]
It'll never work...
5% [ 5 ]
other.
1% [ 1 ]

Total Votes : 97

sorry for the delay

[wcaclimbing]

Neutrals map updated:

http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r315/wcaclimbing/NeutralsImage1.png
(please don't post the image. keep it as a link)

I changed the Inner Oases to 5 and the Grand Oasis to 10.

---NOTE---
I am removing some of the small Oases and moving others around. Expect there to be 15-16 oases in the next update (current update has 20).

[gimil]

All we need for this one to get stamped is terr names and this:

Information Requirements on the first post of a maps thread
1. The number of territories currently on the map.
2. The number of continents. (If this makes sense for your map)
3. Descriptions of any unique features or areas.