The Fight for Alexander's Empire [Quenched]

[Mr. K]

"Alexander's Empire" for short.



Right now its got I think 41 territories, but that can be changed easily.

For some history, after Alexander's death, his enormous empire was left with no heir. They didn't know what to do with it to prevent total warfare, as there was no one legitamately should have been in control of it all.
So, it was split up amongst 4 of Alexander's top commanders, Ptolomy, Kassander, Antigonus, Seleucus. Those are, respectively, the baby blue territories, dark blue territories, gold, and orange.

In this map, you are fighting to reconquer all of Alexander's empire for yourself. Depending on what continent you conquer first, you can imagine as if you're that commander looking to conquer the empire.

Some important notes: 1, the map is very wide. I'm going to keep working on it with this wideness until its done, then i'll even it out some.

An Idea i'm toying with is the concept of sea borders. Controlling the seas was very important. In this map, owning the Agean and the Mediterranean can be VERY useful. If you're trying to control Kassander's empire (dark blue), and you don't spend the time to conquer the Agean, then you're turning what could be a 2 border continent into a 5 border continent, and it wont be worth holding. Likewise with Ptolomy's empire (baby blue), you could end up with a 4 border continent rather than a 2 border one.
The Agean and the Mediterranean will not be a part of ANY continent (i'll make note of it in the legend), but perhaps I can add a bonus of 1 for owning both seas.
Also, i'll make sure to add a direct path from Cyprus to Cappadocia

For the record, this is a very rough draft. I'll make the borders in Kassander's empire more clear later, as well as make it more pleasing to the eyes, and add black dots and uncrossable borders (blocking entrance into Armenia and Paphlagonia from Cappadocia and Media, as well as a uncrossable border for India Superior on its left side) and all that other fun stuff.

[Banana Stomper]

i like the historical theme, makes it a bit more interesting.

There are a couple things i'm not very fond of in the layout. The two blue regions on the left are both very small, easily defended regions. Then you have two regions that are a bit bigger as you move toward the right accross the board. Then the mega continent, and then another small one on the right.

I think this set up could lead to difficult gameplay. i think that the outcome of the game may end up being ultimately decided by which side of the map you're on. you can immagine someone getting a region early on on the left hand side, having a relatively simple time of taking more regions that aren't very difficult to hold. There's no way accross except through the orange region.

However, i think think this is an easy fix. Though this might historically be a bit of a stretch, this could definitly be solved with a route from the west to the east similar to the alaska-kamtchatka border in the classic map.

[onbekende]

Or maybe solve this with some borders to be one-way which represent the attackroute Alexander used.

[Jota]

I'd just like to say that I like the idea of including the seas as really useful countries that are outside of any continent.

[Bozo]

My only concern is the layout of the map ( yes I know that this has been brought up) to fix it all you need to do is divide up the biggest continant and morphe a couple small ones together.

[Hoff]

I hope that you dont keep the black. Try to do something else to show that its not part of the map.

[reverend_kyle]

2 comments.
1. visual appeal not great, you may already know that just putting it out there.
2. controlling the water is a good idea i know the program lux deals with that especially in american history lux, but you should make them not part of a continent.......also are you even doing continent bonuses?

[AndyDufresne]

Interesting idea of owning the seas and landmasses (similar to a previously suggested concept).

---Addressing the seas...perhaps an interesting idea would be no bonus for the seas, other than having it added toward your calculation for country occupation deployment. Adding a bonus of 1 for say any 2 seas seems illogical. Someone could easily start out with 2, 4 perhaps even more seas. This could become quite an imblance (though it could be argued that it's like starting out with a continent, but starting with seas seems more probable due to dispersion and not centralization).

---And as suggested earlier, perhaps changing the areas that aren't part of play to something lighter...say a textured brown of some sort. Also just to throw in, be careful of white letters for words...too often than not they are hard to read unless it is an extremely dark colored and textured map.


--Andy

[Mr. K]

Thanks everyone for your responses. To fix the point made by Banana Stomper, I plan to break up the orange continent into two splitting it into 4 to the northeast and the remaining 7 for the rest.

The graphics I know don't look good yet, I want to get a more official set-up before I start messing around with blending the different layers and all that.

Personally I really liked the black, but if its that unliked i'll see what I can do about it. I truly don't understand why a brown or something else would look any better, I think it would just look confused. I'll try it out though.

Like I said, I planned on having the oceans not be part of any continent at all, and give them no bonuses for owning them. I through out the idea of maybe a bonus of 1, but like I expected I don't think its a very good idea.

The white lettering I used because they were on a black background. If I end up changing the color of those areas then I'll fix the writing to make sure it looks okay.

Thanks for the comments, keep them coming.

[Banana Stomper]

The black sorta pops out and makes it seam like the focus, and everything else settles into the backround. Try a lighter neutral tone for those black areas.

[rocksolid]

Hey,

Not to suggest you start over from zero, but I think you'd like this idea. At the time Alexander was rampaging around the Middle East, their concept of where the earth stopped was very different - one of his goals traipsing around India was to find the outer sea and boat around to the top of the Nile and re-enter the Mediterranean that way. Anyway, this is what they thought the world looked like, and maybe you want to use this as a base to give it a more historical feel...

[AndyDufresne]

I particularly like the idea above...or at least something similar to it. I think such a style of the map, would make it feel and look less like a middle east map with different countries and continents.


--Andy

[Banana Stomper]

definitely not a bad suggestion. This is a good way to keep coming up with "real" maps that continue to offer new land. I like it a lot.

[Mr. K]

Thanks for the suggestion, but i'm not gonna lie, I don't really like the idea at all.

Plus, the whole feel of the map isnt' that you're Alexander. If possible, I want to create the feel that you're one of his generals trying to expand from your given territories out and conquer the entire empire for yourself.

[Haydena]

But the thing is... It just looks a bit too much like the greece and middle east maps combined in my opinion...

I like rocksolids idea, but if you can make something of it Mr K... I'm all for more maps to play, it just feels like it's already been done in a way

[kronas]

I like the map, it is very nice.

[Mr. K]

Hmm... Well if people feel that way I could scrap the project. Personally I thought it would be an interesting one to play for the historical feel it could give. Also I thought the oceans and the idea of controlling the seas being incredibly important could be a fun new feature. Also I know a lot of people complain about the Middle East map. This could be like a newer version with better graphics, but without copying it. It'll still be much different, but for those who wanna play in that general area on a pretty looking map.

[AndyDufresne]

I wouldn't scrap the whole idea of the map. The historical quality gives it value. But I would suggest looking into perhaps a different layout of it all, perhaps not exactly like what Rocksolid found, but something that will set it apart in visual appeal from the middle east map.


--Andy

[Haydena]

Yeah, don't give up Mr K. Make it look a bit different and loads of people are gonna play it. I love the style of the Ancient Greece map!

[Mr. K]

Well I haven't even begun to work on the visuals yet, so don't worry about that. All I did was put some colors down and the names down, so yea theres going to be a lot of changes in the visuals before i'm done with this. The picture there is just to give ya the idea.

[Marvaddin]

The idea of controlling seas is good, but then how about make countries the other seas, too? So, maybe they could be an sparse continent, but with a great bonus...

[rocksolid]

Hey K,

I know Alexander's meant to be dead...but his successors visualized the earth the same way. I was watching Oliver Stone's Alexander last weekend, and they have Ptolomy as a kind of narrator, and he's tracking Alexander's progress throughout the movie on one of them oldie maps...and the controlling the seas idea could work just as well on the antique map. However, one weird deal on the antique map would be that if you conquer the territories on the periphery, you'd be conquering seashores that never actually existed except in the Hellenistic imagination...

Anyway, I just threw it out there as an option, and one that might allow you a little more liberality of style than an accurate map. But I had been wondering if the (un)popularity of the Middle East map wasn't in there somewhere... I look forward to playing on whatever map you make of this area.

[Mr. K]

Anyway, I just threw it out there as an option, and one that might allow you a little more liberality of style than an accurate map. But I had been wondering if the (un)popularity of the Middle East map wasn't in there somewhere... I look forward to playing on whatever map you make of this area.

Actually I didn't realize how similar it was the the middle eastern map until people started mentioning it. Then I realized thats another reason this map might be good to have.

[thegrimsleeper]

Well, I think your map's got a good concept behind it, and I rather like the idea someone else threw out there about a string of coutries that had linear attack options, so you'd be following the path that Alexader took in real life... It seemed like an interesting idea. I also think that the "antique" map would be worth doing as well, I'd like to see one day a map like that... 1400-style, where going west either brings you back to India or off the edge of the world.

Also, as far as the Middle East map is concerned, I heard a rumor that someone was working on a re-rub of that... but you didn't hear it from me.

[kronas]

Don't scrap the map, it is a great idea. I think it would be a great one as is.