Limes

[Permafrost]

Thank you. I'm on my way

[isaiah40]

Question: Where is the attack route going up from M3 going? I see it going to the edge of the map but I don't see it going anywhere else.

[Permafrost]

Excatly, it leads to somewhere out of the map and reflects the historical sea route to the latter Denmark.

[Permafrost]

...

The whole rivers attacking downstream seems redundant as most territories attack downstream anyways. There's a few that don't, but why not just open up the connection through the forests to make it so and spare yourself some unnecessary complication. The same thing applies to the red dotted lines through the woods... just make them a regular connection through the woods. You can keep it the same for the sea though, that makes sense.

Sorry, but I still didn't get your point completly. Why do you make downstream-attacks and forestpaths equal? They work completly different. Rivers are one of the features in this map. There are territories which only profit from them (the river springs where nothings goes upstream) because they can attack an additional territory but cannot be attacked by more than it's direct neighbours. Furthermore, players may take also advantage of terretories which generally caN attack and be attacked this way but not in the current gameplay situation: player red owns every territory along the river -> this way, nobody else can take advantage against him due to special river transportion/attacks.

[Industrial Helix]

Well, if you want to keep them then you're going to have to make it clear somewhere which way the rivers run... i mean, its obvious to you and me but some people don't know these things.

[Permafrost]

Ok, the flow direction seems to be a must.

But another question (with a little introduction):
We recently checked our XML here but there was a problem. The Syntax ist correct with one exception: our "header" which determines what is the pixelsize of each small and large map version cannot be handled by the checking script.

<title>Limes</title>
<smallwidth>600</smallwidth>
<smallheight>600</smallheight>
<largewidth>800</largewidth>
<largeheight>800</largeheight>
<filetype>png</filetype>

Is it wrong to place it in there? It seems that it cannot be transformed to influece the gameplaymap because the result stays the same without the extra code. The end of the story is that every position of the units is displaced by certain amounts of x and y. We have no final clue what is going on. If you wanna try to reproduce and check yourself what I'm talking about then use these links:

http://www.conquerclub.com/mapmaker/index.php
map size = large
XML: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/13547611/Limes.XML
map: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/13547611/Limes_preview_07_s.png


Thanks for helping

[Industrial Helix]

My advice is not to even worry about XML at this stage. You've got the gameplay workshop and the graphics workshop to get through yet before you tackle the XML.

[Permafrost]

[30.12.10] Here we go again. I did many small changes like put a gradient onto the river systems to point out where the thing goes downstream. The colours of some notations on the map are different now as well as there have been some changes at the legend. The biggest advance are bigger dots as background of unit numbers. Additionally, they are a little bit more transparent now. I hope I solved the the problem with forests, swamps and grazing lands. They became easier to distinguish from the unit corridors in between and I reduced the shadow effects so there is more visvible corridor space now.

Click image to enlarge.

[Industrial Helix]

Hmm... that was a pretty innovative solution to the rivers. Do they attack downstream through the Limes?

Now, the next problem is the red dots through the forests... they're unnecessary. If you want to simulate a trail, make a skinny normal path to the places they go.

And lastly, reduce clutter by getting rid of the army circles. Army circles should only be used if absolutely necessary.

[Permafrost]

Concerning the army cylces:
I've tested the map with some numbers on it and you really need them in cases of river fields. So I standardised it to one sort of army cycle.

And if the forest paths are that disturbing, then I will get rid of them as you said.


Edit: Hard to say. If your army is for example at T2, you are able to attack downstream to GS3 because you can bypass T1 at the German side. But if you are at T1 you cannot bypass GS3 because it is Roman. To get back to you question: Yes, they attack through the Limes but move downstream only at the German side.

[Permafrost]

Na, fortget what I said about readability of army numbers without cyrcles behind them. It works if I put some numbers to a new position.

[Industrial Helix]

The army circles really look awful. They're like bland Christmas tree ornaments. If you do Army circles they've got to be the plain standard circle or none at all. Given the complexity of your map, I highly suggest that you make room above every territory name to fit the 888 number.

[natty dread]

If you do Army circles they've got to be the plain standard circle or none at all.

Ouch, IH.

[Industrial Helix]

If you do Army circles they've got to be the plain standard circle or none at all.

Ouch, IH.

Well, there's room for flair, but these giant spheres and not going to work.

[Kochknecht]

Hrhr, we gonna print this map on Monday and will play it many times .. u know ... checking for woooorse gameplay bugs ^^

greetings

[Permafrost]

And thats's the map we will be playing on:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/13547611/Limes_print.png

As there are no other changes in this map version than erading the army cycles there will be no update in first post.

[isaiah40]

Looking a whole lot better with those army circles, cleaner, crisper easier on the eyes. A couple of things (actually three things):

First, this update is way toooooo big! Though it would be nice to see maps that big (still too big for my liitle 15.4" laptop monitor ) you need to shrink it down to a maximum of 840x800 for the large.

Secondly, I would suggest to always update the first post so it is easy for people to view the most current version, no matter how small the changes you made.

Thirdly, as a suggestion to prevent confusion for other players. Can you remove that sea attack route going into never never land? I was confused when I first saw it, and knowing people here they will complain about it after it's quenched. Better to take care of it now than later.

[Kochknecht]

Well,
i think it was a huge sucess, we have had some discissions and some good clues. ANd Yes the Sea attack Route to never never land will be erased.

Here two Pictures of this evening

Click image to enlarge.

Click image to enlarge.

Greetings
Koch

[Industrial Helix]

Can I have your teapot?

[Kochknecht]

Well i suggest you`ll have to ask my wife XD

[AndyDufresne]

I like the progress you've been making. Visually, right now, the non-playable areas to me stand out more than the play-able areas, and it makes viewing the board almost counter-intuitive---I find myself looking at all the green patches and not at the white/low-visually catching gameboard areas. Could this be reversed a little?

From a gameplay stand point, I'll have to give it a more thorough look over soon.


--Andy

[Kochknecht]

Well from a gameplay point of view. While playing we were very surprised how well balanced the map ist at this point. Permafrost will update some gameplay changes in the next version of the map

[Permafrost]

Except for Raetia and Noricum and the starting Neutrals in bonus territories, Kochknecht.

[Industrial Helix]

I still think that if you dropped the army spheres it would vastly improve the image.

[Industrial Helix]

I'm hoping to see an update from this one soon.