The Great Lakes -- [Quenched]

[WidowMakers]

This one is for you Keyogi.
Here is my new idea for a map. The Great Lakes. Basically every US state and Canadian province that borders them is in the map. Also the lakes are territories themselves. I broke up the states into territories based on a prominent city in the area. I know I have made mistakes but this it the first draft.

What do you think.
P.S. The text at the bottom "Only Port Territories can attack lakes or be attacked by lakes needs to be changed. Basically what I wanted it to say was that the only land territories that can attack the 5 lakes are port territories. Also that the lakes can attack each other , by way of connecting rivers or lakes, and the port cities. I don't have a good way of wording this yet so any suggestions would be helpful.

I know it is TOO WIDE. I am going to chop off some of the side by Minnesota.



Each state or province has their corresponding flag in the background of their borders.

[spinwizard]

it is abit busy with the back grounds of the states...

[happy2seeyou]

I like it! I have been waiting for someone to do a map like this. Good job.

[luckiekevin]

What I love

* the geography of the great lakes region makes for a good map

* I love how the map is angled as if it were laid down on a table

* I love the fonts.. ALL the text looks really nice especially the "The Great Lakes". Love the shadow behind it and the color scheme

* the idea of putting the flag representing the area on the map.

What I think can improve

*I agree that it is a bit busy and some adjustment of the contrast might be needed.

* Although I like the idea of the flags being part of the map, they are not dark enough to really see but are so light that they make the map a little harder to read. Almost as if it were a color newspaper that got wet.

* the legend where you explain impassable border can be a bit clearer if needed. mabe the text and the example need to be smaller and side by side like the legend of a road map and how it describes the type of road.



Amazing start. Some people work months to get their maps to this point. You've got some skills

[Guiscard]

I agree. Great first draft. Will pay attention to this one.

[Serbia]

This is awesome! Can't wait until it's ready!

I also like the flags, I didn't notice them all right away though, is it possible to try to darken them up a touch, so they are more visible?

[Pro_Snowboarder]

Looks sweet. I was kinda dissapointed tho, i thought it would be a Great lakes map, not the great lakes and surounding land arieas. I think a good map could be just the great lakes, and no land areas. just a thought.

[casper]

Woah... yeah this looks great!!

As a resident of Illinois, gotta disagree with the naming of some of the territory names though. Springfield should be renamed Champaign / Urbana or just Champaign if that's too long. (home of U of I). Springfield is actually due south of Peoria..not east or north. Granted Springfield is the state capital but the way you have the state split up it doesn't make any sense.

Moving on to Indiana and Michigan..Goshen should be South Bend. Lansing should be Kalamazoo. Cadillac should be Traverse City. Or move the circle down and rename it Grand Rapids.

And then the rivers. There is no major river that splits Indiana and Illinois that far north or in Michigan either. And the Ohio River certainly does not flow north where you have it splitting Dayton and Columbus. Dayton is also a lot further south btw. I realize though that you probably put these there for strategic reasons but overall it's just not realistic.

Overall very impressive. Needs a lil work but I think it's a great start. So nice to open a new thread and not see complete crap.

[oaktown]

at first glance, my only concern would be the size - but you've already mentioned that you're on it.

Can you give us the territory count?

[Jedimika]

Nice. But, once again Vermont and Lake Champlain get the shaft. *sigh*

[DiM]

so this is the geographical map you were talking about.. nice.
i don't quite like the idea that the lakes are territories. i would have preffered the lakes as impassable borders with some routes between ports.
and i don't get the ports attacking lakes thing.
one port can attack each lake or what?

[casper]

so this is the geographical map you were talking about.. nice.
i don't quite like the idea that the lakes are territories. i would have preffered the lakes as impassable borders with some routes between ports.
and i don't get the ports attacking lakes thing.
one port can attack each lake or what?

Chicago can attack Lake Michigan but Milwaukee cannot.

btw Why is Toledo a port and not Cleveland?

[DiM]

so this is the geographical map you were talking about.. nice.
i don't quite like the idea that the lakes are territories. i would have preffered the lakes as impassable borders with some routes between ports.
and i don't get the ports attacking lakes thing.
one port can attack each lake or what?

Chicago can attack Lake Michigan but Milwaukee cannot.

i understood that part but can chicago attack lake ontario??

[Ruben Cassar]

Mon dieu! This map is going to be awesome...

[keiths31]

I like it too. Very different and it's nice to see my hometown of Thunder Bay represented in another map.

[WidowMakers]

I also like the flags, I didn't notice them all right away though, is it possible to try to darken them up a touch, so they are more visible?

As far as the flags go, the darker they are the harder it is to read the territory text. I might just update the map without them to see what everyone thinks.

Woah... yeah this looks great!!

As a resident of Illinois, gotta disagree with the naming of some of the territory names though. Springfield should be renamed Champaign / Urbana or just Champaign if that's too long. (home of U of I). Springfield is actually due south of Peoria..not east or north. Granted Springfield is the state capital but the way you have the state split up it doesn't make any sense.

I will look into fixing that. How and what do you suggest I do?

Moving on to Indiana and Michigan..Goshen should be South Bend.

Goshen is my hometown. I have taken some liberties as the map author to put in Goshen.

Lansing should be Kalamazoo. Cadillac should be Traverse City. Or move the circle down and rename it Grand Rapids.

Done!

And then the rivers. There is no major river that splits Indiana and Illinois that far north or in Michigan either. And the Ohio River certainly does not flow north where you have it splitting Dayton and Columbus. Dayton is also a lot further south btw. I realize though that you probably put these there for strategic reasons but overall it's just not realistic.

I downloaded maps of each state with specifically made to show rivers. There are rivers there. They may not be as large as I have described but I did not make them up. I needed to have some borders and as some of us know, there are no mountains in Indiana.

Overall very impressive. Needs a lil work but I think it's a great start. So nice to open a new thread and not see complete crap.

Thanks. I try to get my idea out right the first time. It saves a lot of posting and talking for no reason. This way everyone can get a feel for my vision of the map at the start.

at first glance, my only concern would be the size - but you've already mentioned that you're on it.
Can you give us the territory count?

There are 45 territories. I think after I clip the west side of the map and maybe shrink the Large one down a bit, it will be much more appropriate for the site.

Nice. But, once again Vermont and Lake Champlain get the shaft. *sigh*

Sorry.

so this is the geographical map you were talking about.. nice.
i don't quite like the idea that the lakes are territories. i would have preffered the lakes as impassable borders with some routes between ports.
and i don't get the ports attacking lakes thing.
one port can attack each lake or what?

Chicago can attack Lake Michigan but Milwaukee cannot.

i understood that part but can chicago attack lake ontario??

I said in the 1st post that this portion was not worded correctly. Basically the port territories can attack the lakes they touch. From there the lakes can attack each other by way of the rivers and such that connect them. The lakes can only attack the land at port territories. It is very wordy so I need to get some advice on how to condense it better.

[funkeymunkey]

I think its pretty good, but it need a little work though.

[Coleman]

You could just draw routes instead of this whole port concept.

[WidowMakers]

You could just draw routes instead of this whole port concept.

You mean basically having arrows in/out of the lakes and port territories. Do you think players would understand that other territories cannot attack the lakes?

[pancakemix]

I think arrows would make the map too busy. You don't need all of that.

BTW, Pittsburgh is spelled with an H.

[abbiem]

my eyes are hurting by looking at it

[Samus]

at first glance, my only concern would be the size - but you've already mentioned that you're on it.
Can you give us the territory count?

There are 45 territories. I think after I clip the west side of the map and maybe shrink the Large one down a bit, it will be much more appropriate for the site.

People will want you to increase that by 3 to 48. And by "people" I mean me.

Since you're already redoing Illinois, I would suggest starting there. Based on your current region distribution this would be the best place to make a region larger (that entire SW area has several small regions right next to each other). I would suggest 2 more in Illinois and maybe 1 more in Ohio, perhaps Pennsylvania.

Also, you should rename the territory "New York" to be either "New York City" or just "NYC" if space does not permit, so that it is distinguished from the region name "New York."

More comments to come. This map really interests me, but I'm a bit busy at the moment.

[Coleman]

Well I'm just going to give a run down on what I think right now.

The Good:
Concept is great, layout is great, map is pretty.

The Bad:
The docks. The red rim thing isn't really an ideal way to label them, but I understand you don't feel done yet.

The Ugly:
While I understand the artistic reasons for the way the text is displayed on an angle with the rest of the map, it is really hard to read and match up what goes where bonus wise.

[wiggybowler]

Looks busy but like it could be fun

[Unit_2]

i think that you need to rename scranton as harrisburg and name harrisburg as phily.

also take the names of the bonuses and make it "stand out" more.

other wise i think its good.