[Idea] New 'Feudal' map

[gimil]

Hi guys,

I am contemplating starting a new Feudal map. Traditionally I would usually make this map as part of a coordinated effort with other foundry goes, braining storming and bouncing ideas in private until a satisfactory map is produced, ready to hit the foundry.

However this time I would like to discuss the ideas and concept of this new map with the whole community before putting digital 'pen to paper'. What do you guys want to see in the next Feudal map? What do you like from Feudal War an Feudal Epic, that you want to see in the next map? what don't you like? and what would you like to see new? You you like to see it larger? More playable positions or less? Tell me what you want!

I have some initial ideas that I would like to add myself :

-Remove the traditional 'take and hold all castles to win' objective and replace it using the new losing condition, along the lines of: 'A player is eliminated if they no longer hold a castle'.
-Instead of every playing starting with just a castle, they instead start with their whole kingdom region.
-Kingdoms still have the traditional bottlenecks to enter/exit kingdoms. But they are protected by some kind of medieval gate. It would come across as this - a kingdom gate has x number of neutrals on it, in order for an opponent to invade another kingdom they have to smash through the neutral gate. Friendly troops within the gate can pass through it my a simple one way boarder.
-I still plan to keep the old +x auto deploy for castles and villages to maintain some sort of tradition.

But as I said, I want to hear what you guys wants. So let me know!

What we possible have on the table so far:

• Losing Conditions
• 12 castles
• Starting with all or most of your castle realm
• Gates
• Increased auto-deploy
• Decaying village regions
• Towers

[Sniper08]

i dunno about starting with all the territories within the castle,i doesn't seem right for a feudal map.i like the lose castle and you're eliminated.that gate system is very interesting indeed.

Perhaps have the regions between castles decaying like in oasis,it would certainly create a new way to play a feudal type map.For villages a perimeter would need to be set for where the decay starts.

also another possible idea instead of starting with 2 castles you start with one castle and one village.this could be problematic when it comes to gameplay but its different.

instead of the usual 5 and 3 auto deploys it can be upgraded to 15 and 9? or higher/lower than 15 or 9 depending on how you see this map going,

[gimil]

i dunno about starting with all the territories within the castle,i doesn't seem right for a feudal map.i like the lose castle and you're eliminated.that gate system is very interesting indeed.

I would agree here. Starting with the whole kingdom was my least favourite of my ideas. One I was not 100% sold on.

Perhaps have the regions between castles decaying like in oasis,it would certainly create a new way to play a feudal type map.For villages a perimeter would need to be set for where the decay starts.

I do not fully understand what you mean here?

also another possible idea instead of starting with 2 castles you start with one castle and one village.this could be problematic when it comes to gameplay but its different.

I do not know what to make of this, it may be a little to far from the traditional feudal. Although as an idea, there could be a number of villages that start with a castle, and they could al be within the kingdom, rather than outside it, maybe.

instead of the usual 5 and 3 auto deploys it can be upgraded to 15 and 9? or higher/lower than 15 or 9 depending on how you see this map going,

This is an interesting proposal, especially with the increase in allowance for map sizes. I could create a larger map with larger bonuses.

[Sniper08]

Perhaps have the regions between castles decaying like in oasis,it would certainly create a new way to play a feudal type map.For villages a perimeter would need to be set for where the decay starts.

I do not fully understand what you mean here?

when you leave the borders of your castle after you pass the 10 neutral if you leave 25 troops out there for 1 turn at the beginning of your next turn you lose 1 or more off the stack so it becomes 24 or less depending on the decay rate.
For example the feudal war map would have the lake area and the northern plains as decaying in my idea. the villages would be safe and maybe the territorys bordering the villages wouldnt have the decay aswell.like i said a perimeter would need to be set as to were the decay starts and ends.

I do not know what to make of this, it may be a little to far from the traditional feudal. Although as an idea, there could be a number of villages that start with a castle, and they could al be within the kingdom, rather than outside it, maybe.

villages within the kingdom area sounds like a interesting idea. i dont not how feasible it would be as ppl would just sit on their castle for longer and games would become drawn out.


also i dont know if you have considered this but feudal epic has only 1 way into the castle area and feudal war has two so maybe for this one extend it to 3 or 4.

[greenoaks]

i would like to see more castles (24) because if CC does an upgrade that allows 12 players your map could be perfect for that. it would also mean a larger map size would be used to fit in the regions.

i don't like the idea of starting with the entire realm but i do of the decay outside of a realm or a village's area of control.

[Evil DIMwit]

This looks like an interesting direction to move Feudal. Sort of a Feudal 2.0 (assuming Epic is something like 1.2).

-Instead of every playing starting with just a castle, they instead start with their whole kingdom region.

I actually like this change. Pretty much everyone starts by taking their whole realm, or their whole realm minus one territory (for spoils bombards). Doing it this way would take some of the initial luck out of the equation (it would also be a fine way to take away cheap spoils bombarding if anyone thinks that's a problem).

-Kingdoms still have the traditional bottlenecks to enter/exit kingdoms. But they are protected by some kind of medieval gate. It would come across as this - a kingdom gate has x number of neutrals on it, in order for an opponent to invade another kingdom they have to smash through the neutral gate. Friendly troops within the gate can pass through it my a simple one way boarder.

This is an interesting suggestion, but I fear it might encourage stacking too much to give such a defensive advantage. Then again, by giving players some security in their homeland they might be encouraged to leave the nest and explore a bit more, especially if they can't just bombard within their realm freely for spoils. Still, I think overall this element will make games longer and I don't think Feudal really needs that...

-Remove the traditional 'take and hold all castles to win' objective and replace it using the new losing condition, along the lines of: 'A player is eliminated if they no longer hold a castle'.

On the other hand, this suggestion would make games shorter, which would be welcome. That is, unless it encourages more turtling at the bottlenecks and limits players' strategic decisions even more. This would probably be more effective for lower number of players where each player has more castles to start with, so that they can afford to lose some. Which brings me to...

i would like to see more castles (24) because if CC does an upgrade that allows 12 players your map could be perfect for that. it would also mean a larger map size would be used to fit in the regions.

I think this idea would go well with losing conditions on the castles. Maybe not necessarily 24, but something in the 16-24 range sounds good. To compensate, you might give fewer regions to each realm, which I don't think is a disaster.

[gimil]

i would like to see more castles (24) because if CC does an upgrade that allows 12 players your map could be perfect for that. it would also mean a larger map size would be used to fit in the regions.

I think this idea would go well with losing conditions on the castles. Maybe not necessarily 24, but something in the 16-24 range sounds good. To compensate, you might give fewer regions to each realm, which I don't think is a disaster.

Now more castles is a suggestion I can get on board with. Although 16-24 sounds a little to much of a jump for my liking. I am thinking more along the lines of 12 castles for this instalment. That means that only 7 and 8 player games would start each player with 1 castle but leave 4-5 castle empty meaning that deployment is random and the starting game varies alot for 7 and 8 player games. Also the non assigned castles give players something to go for other than each other in 7-8 player games in order to secure their position.

when you leave the borders of your castle after you pass the 10 neutral if you leave 25 troops out there for 1 turn at the beginning of your next turn you lose 1 or more off the stack so it becomes 24 or less depending on the decay rate.
For example the feudal war map would have the lake area and the northern plains as decaying in my idea. the villages would be safe and maybe the territorys bordering the villages wouldnt have the decay aswell.like i said a perimeter would need to be set as to were the decay starts and ends.

This is just like AoR2 if I remember correctly. I like this idea as it encourages people to use their troops or loose them it would also stop people hoarding large chunks of land as you can quickly loose those territories with this. Might even allow for a winter theme like AoR2. 'Feudal Winter'.

[Sniper08]

i would like to see more castles (24) because if CC does an upgrade that allows 12 players your map could be perfect for that. it would also mean a larger map size would be used to fit in the regions.

i don't like the idea of starting with the entire realm but i do of the decay outside of a realm or a village's area of control.

12 casltes sounds good any more and the map would be cluttered in my opinion.if the castles are increased will the number of villages be increased?

when you leave the borders of your castle after you pass the 10 neutral if you leave 25 troops out there for 1 turn at the beginning of your next turn you lose 1 or more off the stack so it becomes 24 or less depending on the decay rate.
For example the feudal war map would have the lake area and the northern plains as decaying in my idea. the villages would be safe and maybe the territorys bordering the villages wouldnt have the decay aswell.like i said a perimeter would need to be set as to were the decay starts and ends.

This is just like AoR2 if I remember correctly. I like this idea as it encourages people to use their troops or loose them it would also stop people hoarding large chunks of land as you can quickly loose those territories with this. Might even allow for a winter theme like AoR2. 'Feudal Winter'.

i dont play AoR2 much but yeah it would force ppl to use their stacks and it may stop the quick breakouts to get to the village aswell.


another possible new feature could be a reseting neutral on the kingdoms entry point.

[gimil]

another possible new feature could be a reseting neutral on the kingdoms entry point.

If I do go with the gate idea, I was thinking that once it is knocked down, its gone!

[Sniper08]

another possible new feature could be a reseting neutral on the kingdoms entry point.

If I do go with the gate idea, I was thinking that once it is knocked down, its gone!

ah right the gate idea you didnt really expand on what that would be but the resetting neutral was just a thought the gate would ne something new.is it possible for the xml to let one players troops pass through a neutral but not let another players troops pass through it?

[gimil]

another possible new feature could be a reseting neutral on the kingdoms entry point.

If I do go with the gate idea, I was thinking that once it is knocked down, its gone!

ah right the gate idea you didnt really expand on what that would be but the resetting neutral was just a thought the gate would ne something new.is it possible for the xml to let one players troops pass through a neutral but not let another players troops pass through it?

No, but what I can do is make it to enter the kingdom you have to go through the gate neutrals, while if you are coming out of the kingdom you can have a one way border that skips over the gate. The only problem with this idea is that once you troops are out of the kingdom they can't get back in without attacking the gate.

[greenoaks]

now that i think about it 24 is too many, 12 is a much better number. that allows 1 castle each in a 12-player game

is it possible to not give castles the ability to bombard their realm. that would remove the stack and wait that is common now.

[nebsmith]

I like the idea of changing the winning conditions, but I think losing when you lose your castle will encourage peolple to stack on their castle.
How about changing it to controling half the castles, or a number of castles and villages.
To go with the idea of winning by controling a number of castles and villages. You could incorporate the decay mentioned earlier, call it Plague, and make it worse in the villages.

Another idea would be to introduce a third type of building to be included in the winning objective, maybe a monastery.

[gimil]

I like the idea of changing the winning conditions, but I think losing when you lose your castle will encourage peolple to stack on their castle.
How about changing it to controling half the castles, or a number of castles and villages.
To go with the idea of winning by controling a number of castles and villages. You could incorporate the decay mentioned earlier, call it Plague, and make it worse in the villages.

Another idea would be to introduce a third type of building to be included in the winning objective, maybe a monastery.

I think your suggestions move away from what Feudal is about. The objective has always been 'simple' yet realistic. I want to maintain that.

[nebsmith]

ok I can see how what I suggested gets away from what Feudal is about.
I do think, though, that losing by not holding a castle wouldn't encourage players to move, unless they had more than one castle to start with. Or you go with the one way exit defended by neutrals if a single castle start is used.
Having said that, losing by not holding a castle is both simple and realistic and I would be interested in trying that form of gameplay.

[rdsrds2120]

another possible new feature could be a reseting neutral on the kingdoms entry point.

If I do go with the gate idea, I was thinking that once it is knocked down, its gone!

Would there be a way to have it start on the field as one value, then once you own it, have it reset to another? Starting out at the traditional 10 then turning into a 4 or something would be ok with me. If there's a winter theme, it would keep out the draft

-rd

[gimil]

another possible new feature could be a reseting neutral on the kingdoms entry point.

If I do go with the gate idea, I was thinking that once it is knocked down, its gone!

Would there be a way to have it start on the field as one value, then once you own it, have it reset to another? Starting out at the traditional 10 then turning into a 4 or something would be ok with me. If there's a winter theme, it would keep out the draft

-rd

Actually that may be possible. But I am not 100% sure!

[ManBungalow]

Good to see you thinking about another map, Gimil.
I foresee people telling you that Feudal has 'been done', but just ignore them.

I very much like the gate smashing idea. It's never been done before and totally fits the theme.

I admire the relative simplicity of the the existing Feudal maps, but I think you could introduce some new gameplay features for this installment.
Perhaps you could have towers scattered around the landscape, with a juicy autodeploy and bombardment range?
Or maybe 'major' kingdoms (which would have to begin as neutral, I suppose) which offer greater bonuses than regular kingdoms?
And what comes to mind when you think of castles & kingdoms? For me, it's Lord of the Rings. I remember all the civilians hiding in a cave behind the castle during one siege. It might be possible to incorporate some method of having troops within a kingdom which have some 'tax' to attack, in a similar vein to the gates. IE, when an enemy runs in and takes all the regions in your kingdom, you rush out of the caves and punish them. IDK, I'm just suggesting things that come to mind in a monologue now.

[gimil]

I admire the relative simplicity of the the existing Feudal maps, but I think you could introduce some new gameplay features for this installment.

That is exactly what I want to keep in all the Feudal maps. This one should be no different. Of all the ideas you suggested the only one that really keeps that simplicity is your tower idea. It could be a tool for those that play alot of FOG. These towers open up large portions of the map to see and bombarded, maybe.

[thenobodies80]

Would there be a way to have it start on the field as one value, then once you own it, have it reset to another? Starting out at the traditional 10 then turning into a 4 or something would be ok with me.....

As far as I know this is not possible. We have just one neutral tag, if you want a killer neutral on that region you have just to modify that neutral tag
(<neutral>10</neutral> --> <neutral killer="yes">10</neutral>)
so if you code it to start with 10 armies, then it will reset again to 10 armies.
I'm pretty sure because I wanted to do the same thing for a map (austro hungary - dual monarchy) but I had to change my plan for that damned reason!

-Kingdoms still have the traditional bottlenecks to enter/exit kingdoms. But they are protected by some kind of medieval gate. It would come across as this - a kingdom gate has x number of neutrals on it, in order for an opponent to invade another kingdom they have to smash through the neutral gate. Friendly troops within the gate can pass through it my a simple one way boarder

This make me think about a rare defensive technique (even though it was widely represented in many movies) used during the middle ages: Hot petroleum (or tar, pitch, water, oil, etc).

[gimil]

Would there be a way to have it start on the field as one value, then once you own it, have it reset to another? Starting out at the traditional 10 then turning into a 4 or something would be ok with me.....

As far as I know this is not possible. We have just one neutral tag, if you want a killer neutral on that region you have just to modify that neutral tag
(<neutral>10</neutral> --> <neutral killer="yes">10</neutral>)
so if you code it to start with 10 armies, then it will reset again to 10 armies.
I'm pretty sure because I wanted to do the same thing for a map (austro hungary - dual monarchy) but I had to change my plan for that damned reason!

Is it not possible to code a territory with a starting neutral and a reset, with the reset only taking effect if a player (as opposed to a neutral) controls it?

[thenobodies80]

the reset, or killer neutral takes effect only if a player control it....no sense in resetting a neutral territ. But the value is always the same.

[gimil]

the reset, or killer neutral takes effect only if a player control it....no sense in resetting a neutral territ. But the value is always the same.

yes but can't I do something like this?

<territory>
<name>Gate</name>
<neutral>10</neutral>
<neutral killer="yes">10</neutral>
</territory>

Which will let it be neutral 10 at the start of the game, because it is neutral the killer neutrals will not kick in until someone controls the territory? Or are these two tags incompatible in the same territory?

[natty dread]

yes but can't I do something like this?

<territory>
<name>Gate</name>
<neutral>10</neutral>
<neutral killer="yes">10</neutral>
</territory>

No I don't think that's possible, you can only have one <neutral> tag inside the <territory> tag.

[Victor Sullivan]

The thought of another Feudal map makes me tingle with joy!

Haha, it's funny everything that gimil has said about each idea presented so far is almost entirely in agreement with my own thoughts. It'd be cool if you could compile a list of all gameplay elements you're considering in the first post, gimil. Here's what I've gathered thus far:

• Losing Conditions
  
  • I very much like this! Makes the mad dash to someone's castle worth it. You may want to consider using a starting position max of 2 with this to make it feasible for 2-4 player games.
• 12 castles
  
  • I like the idea of more castles to support the hopefully up-and-coming 12-player addition, and to just give the newer version some freshness to it without doing anything fancy.
• Starting with all or most of your castle realm
  
  • I could take it or leave it, though I think I'm more for this than against, especially if the decaying village regions goes through.
• Gates
  
  • Love it! And I definitely think this should just be a standard neutral, no killers. I'd think somewhere in the twenties for the neutral value, but it would all depend on what the auto-deploys and bonuses are.
• Increased auto-deploy
  
  • I think this could be good. Whether it is increased or not, things will probably be balanced out to make both the increased and un-increased be virtually the same in most regards. That being said, I do think the increased auto-deploys would be just a bit better and a little more interesting.
• Decaying village regions
  
  • This is the feature I'm most iffy about, especially if these village reasons border the gates - it would make it really difficult to stack enough troops to overcome the gate neutrals plus the stack the player probably has defending that border. In addition, this could scare people from moving out. On the flip side, though, I think this would add a fun strategic aspect, and it would be more difficult to defend entire village realms, allowing other players to move through the land easier.
• Towers
  
  • I very, very much like this idea. Fog games would be tenfold more fun with these, given the bombardment powers. I also picture the auto-deploy on this as less than a village. The only questions I have are, "What regions should a tower be able to bombard?" (Do we want to do it as a range 2 or 3, or all regions in a certain village realm, etc.?) and "Will the towers have realms of their own, like villages, or will they be within a village realm?".

Adding too much more would stray away too far from the original Feudal concept, IMO. So nice to see old faces in the Foundry!

-Sully