by Tiller on Tue Feb 23, 2010 5:41 pm
Whatever happened here, I like the old version of the map better. The starting territories (Jones/J1/J2 etc) don't help you at all on the rest of the map, because they're now not only +2/+1/+1 instead of +2/+2/+2, but they're also autodeployed, and likely trapped behind the neutral at Access Point nearly every turn after people have gone through that. That's why BOB is showing 3 armies instead of 7, you'll get 3 to deploy wherever, and 4 more scattered near your starting location. You'll be near base (3) income for a very long time until you can get over 12 territories, the 60-odd resetting defenders on the big guns are completely out of anybody's league in a no-cards game before turn 50 or so (and heaven help you if you fail your rolls bombing the start locations), and bonuses are very hard to come by even in a mature game. I see the way this is set up now as being far more likely to cause stalemates and frustration than before, unless someone manages to take the whole castle or something, players are always going to have piddly income plus a bunch of autodeployed paratroopers who now highly resist being destroyed from the single AA bombard that can't be restocked nearly as well as the 3 from before. A 2-player game might work okay this way, or an escalating card game, but most game variations I've tried to think through seem to be severely nerfed by the changeover, I can see games going 200 turns easily, mostly at 3-5 armies per turn outside the southwest, before someone can get either all the objectives or bombing the start locations.
(Granted, my games were some of the few that switched over from the old map and there are major problems and confusion from that switch - though it makes for some entertaining logs, and some things seem more streamlined now. But I've looked into several new games that people have started up now too and the income thing doesn't look very easy to overcome. I still love the idea for the map, but I'd say it needs more tweaking).
