Map of The Baltic States [V8, P.5]

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 3:15 am

--> GREEN FOR GP, BLUE FOR GR
--> THIS MAP WILL BE MADE UNDER MAPMAKERS GUILD'S NAME
--> FOR ALL VERSIONS, PLEASE BROWSE THROUGH THE WHOLE THREAD

small map (632 X 571) (V1.0.08S)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v8_1.jpg[/bigimg]

large map (822 X 743) (V1.0.08L)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v8_2.jpg[/bigimg]

Dear all,

I have just finished making a map of the Baltic States (Estonia, Lavia and Lithuania) which are located in north eastern Europe.

small map (632 X 571) (V1.0.01S)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v1_1.jpg[/bigimg]

large map (822 X 743) (V1.0.01L)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v1_2.jpg[/bigimg]

For this map, I used the largest subdivisions of these three countries as the unit of lands in the game. In the game, players can only attack adjacent lands, but regions where the capital cities are located (marked with "+" can attack each other).There are no impassables at this stage in this map.

If the player holds Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, he can get +4, +6, and +4 troops respectively. If he holds all the capital regions, he may have a bonus of +1 troop. Also if he holds all the outer boundary territories (adjacent to sea or adjacent to non-Baltic regions) with the capital region, he can get +5 troops. However, if he holds all the outer boundary territories WITHOUT the capital region, he will get -2 troops per round!

This is all about my new map. Please give me some comments and suggestions! Thank you very much!

Regards,
Scania N113

Industrial Helix · Post by **Industrial Helix** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 8:52 am

Well, its a good start and would make for a great map, here's some crits:

The Introduction, while interesting, is a bit not needed. You can still keep it but I'd suggest doctoring it up some. Bullet points just aren't doing it for me.

On the game play notes you don't need to say whether or not there are impassables or that adjacent terrs can attack adjacent terrs.

I'd suggest using a mini map to point out which bonus region is which as well, as opposed to saying it in the notes.

As for the capitols, you're going to need something bigger than a plus sign I think. Where the army circles go you could use a star to designate the capitols or something.

The bonuses, in my opinion, are way to big. I'd suggest breaking it down into smaller regions and maybe adding another bonus for holding the whole state?

Impassables are something you might want to consider. I think they have the potential to spice up this map some and bring in some better game play.

The little islands in Estonia... you could consider making those playable areas. Maybe as a single playable are like a gulf territory or something.

I'd suggest using a better font as well. This one is just too plain and doesn't convey the culture or dynamic of the area. Perhaps something along the lines as a middle ages Germanic font?

The country is also just floating out in space. Use non-playable area to adding in Russia and Poland. Show where the sea is.

The flag is quite a neat combination, I think you can still doctor it up some though, but its a good start.

Overall, its a good start and best of luck on the map!

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 9:53 pm

Here is the most updated map at this stage.

small map (632 X 571) (V1.0.02S)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v2_1.jpg[/bigimg]

large map (822 X 743) (V1.0.02L)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v2_2.jpg[/bigimg]

Changes made:
(1) breaking up the bonus areas
(2) adding a small map to indicate the bonus
(3) making the capitals more obvious
(4) modifying the font of the texts in the map

Please give more comments and suggestions to me, so I can bring a better map to Conquer Club. Thank you very much!

Peter Gibbons · Post by **Peter Gibbons** » Mon Jul 20, 2009 10:40 pm

I think this actually has the chance to be a very good map. I know some find them boring, but I really like straight-geography maps.

Anyway, a few critiques/suggestions:

1) You're going to need/want a better visual background. To be honest, I'd suggest incorporating the surrounding geography as the background. I'm presuming you got the basis of your map from here:

http://wikitravel.org/upload/shared//th ... ns_map.png

It would need some work, but I think the water should be incorporated on the west and north and then the greyed-out land mass to the south and east.

2) The bonus regions are WAY too big. I'm not a geopolitical expert on the territories within each country, but I'd suggest finding a way to break each country down in 3 sub-regions so that you end up with 9 total bonus regions. Since Latvia has more subdivisions, it will obviously have the three biggest bonuses, but I still think this could work. You could then shade the three bonus regions within each country as a different color. As it stands, though, you can't have 51 regions with only 3 bonuses--the game would never work.

3) I'd do away with the whole "hold outer boundaries" for a bonus thing. It might make logical sense, but for traditional gameplay it's way too confusing and way too random.

4) As I said above, a lot of people don't like straight geography and will hence suggest something different to alter things. I'm not suggesting these things per se, but you might want to consider:

A - Putting territories in Russia that could then "invade" the Baltics (with multiple strike points). These could start as neutrals.
B - Making the bodies of water their own territories, or incorporate sea attack routes.
C - Putting three airports (one in each capital) to facilitate attacks between the capitals.

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Tue Jul 21, 2009 1:19 am

I will add some more bonus regions, and I will also create the sea and non-playable countries (such as Belarus and Russia).

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Tue Jul 21, 2009 3:45 am

Regarding what Peter Gibbons have suggested, I designed a very different map.

small map (unknown dimensions) (V1.0.03S)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v3_1.jpg[/bigimg]

large map (unknown dimensions) (V1.0.03L)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v3_2.jpg[/bigimg]

Changes made:
(1) adding Moscow and Minsk with the support of history facts
(2) agreeing with the copyright
(3) adding some interesting bonus
(4) adding different colours to the map

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Wed Jul 22, 2009 9:23 pm

For this most updated map (version 3), I have saparated the sea and the land. Also I have added some interesting features, such as the region "Minsk" and "Moscow". The most important part is that I have added more bonus regions to the map, so that the game play can be more balanced!

Also, please give me more comments and suggestions, so the progress of making this map can be much more faster than before.

jpcloet · Post by **jpcloet** » Wed Jul 22, 2009 10:15 pm

I found this via Callouts, I fixed the link BTW.

As for this map, if you are going to do the +2 bonuses, Do different shades of color on the background rather than the text. Most of the names are difficult to read as you have yellow text on a yellow background. I'd also lose the weird coastal bonuses, but that is just me as I don't see them coming into play that often at all.

neanderpaul14 · Post by **neanderpaul14** » Wed Jul 22, 2009 10:26 pm

As an American of Lithuanian descent I don't believe that Russian invasion points on this map is appropriate, unless of course you intend to make this a historic or war based map.

Other than that its a decent map.

the.killing.44 · Post by **the.killing.44** » Wed Jul 22, 2009 10:40 pm

We need a map of this area, nice start.

Firstly your map is ~90px too tall, so you'll need to fix that. There is an absolute ton of dead space on the map, most of that being 170 px of gray on the right (I agree that you should take off the russian territories and just keep the Baltic Republics). Another thing would be to rotate the map a bit clockwise, which would enable you to condense the canvas by a good amount while maintaining what you have.

About the map itself, you have some things to work on, mainly making sure the areas outside the country borders would be clean. Going over the names, choosing a more stylish font would be nice, and if you do that giving it (and the borders) an outer glow would improve the clarity of everything. Right now the names are very hard to read.

The legend is rather bleh — a black sans serif font. If you'd give it some sort of nice, organized look (and getting rid of some of those bonuses — you have a ton) would be a big plus. Check out the NYC map for some ideas.

Is that legend area yours, or someone else's? You need to make one by yourself if its not.

I'll check in again after an update — you've got a good start but things to work on

.44

TaCktiX · Post by **TaCktiX** » Thu Jul 23, 2009 12:43 am

Here by request, swooping down to crush all your hopes and dreams, and some other threatening rubbish.

Graphics:
- The tripartite flag just doesn't do it. It looks very divided, and the flatness of it only detracts. I would suggest full flags, with some overlap to note the three countries involved in a slightly more "full" way. Perhaps add some shadow to it to make it stand out more.
- The army circles look a little bit small, particularly considering the information you're containing on them. It's also very hard to make out those different circles, particularly since the colors make a big difference.
- The "ye olde" font in use for Russia and Belarus is distracting, and since those aren't even countries in play (with exception of the two Moscow and Minsk territories), confusing.
- The sans serif font is a little bit small, and hard to pick out against the background.
- Overall the map is detailed, but very flat. Generally speaking, there has been a movement by the Foundry to keep things seeming 3D to a small extent, whether that be the application of Drop Shadow (like on the title, or the flags, or the minimap) or Bevel/Emboss (on the territories proper. Texture also helps instead of solid color, though the colors you picked are pretty good for discerning country from country.

Gameplay:
- Too. Many. Bonuses. I know you're meaning to put in a lot of options for the map, but it's an overload. Add to that the confusing circle-based scheme, and it's hard to tell WHAT is the bonus except for the minimapped +8, +10, and +6 regions. Instead of circles, how about shades of the primary colors? You've got a blue up top, a red in the middle, and a yellow below, of which there are a ton of different shades. You could even go so far as to make each country shades of their respective flags (since they do have lovely solid color flags). That would remove all the circle colors, and allow your Capital Regions bonus to shine out.
- Agree on removing Moscow and Minsk, they don't add much, and they detract from the Baltic States theme.
- The Remarks section is too small. It's readable, but very difficultly so. You can also pare down the wording to be significantly shorter. We don't need complete sentences in maps, thanks goodness.
- The bonuses section is very long and drawn out, and could easily be pared down, or incorporated into the minimap (with exception of the capitals). Go with the shades idea and that should be a relative piece of cake to incorporate.

Ah, it feels good to get out on the field of mapmaking and get a map

.

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Thu Jul 23, 2009 12:45 am

Frankly speaking, this is really my original work. The following version is the most updated map I made regarding the.killing.44 and post.

small map (632 X 571) (V1.0.04S)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v4_1.jpg[/bigimg]

laege map (822 X 743) (V1.0.04L)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v4_2.jpg[/bigimg]

Changes made:
(1) cutting Moscow and Minsk since it is not needed and the map has to be smaller
(2) did not replace the tri-colour flag because I think that it is quite special
(3) cutting some of the bonus since it makes the map become overload
(4) changing the colours of the words to make it appear more clearly

Once again, I hope that all of you can give me more comments and suggestions!

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Thu Jul 23, 2009 2:18 am

The most updated map can also satisfy some of [player]TaCktiX[/player]'s requests. Of course I will continue to create a better version.

Industrial Helix · Post by **Industrial Helix** » Thu Jul 23, 2009 9:45 am

Well, since you've got different areas of land colored to reflect the bonues, I'd go ahead and get rid of the circles. Replace them with dots at a turned down opacity (which seems to be the norm with maps, take a look at a few maps and see what I mean).

I think some teture to the map would go a long way as well, try some things out and see which you like best.

thenobodies80 · Post by **thenobodies80** » Thu Jul 23, 2009 5:48 pm

Hi Scania N113,

Good start.
I like geographical maps but you have to add something that increase the "baltic feeling". For example the sea is flat, you could add a background with something that remind to the people about those places.
For example:

show

About flags, TaCktix gave you a good advice, I'm agree.
Agree with Industrial Helix about circles, with dots instead of cirlces you have something like this, the map will be nicer

You have to work on bonuses (try to use a bonuses spread sheet to have a starting point), for example nobody will hold Ziemeli (10 territories) for a +2 bonus.
I think you have to add some impassables specially for the central part, and specially for ziemeli. Some zones are unholdable and people will play only trying to hold the All Lithuania or all the Estonia.
Or maybe you can think to have different bonuses, for example (with some impassable borders added):
pietus +1 (3/5 required)
siaure +1 (3/5 required)
All lithuania +4
Rietumi +2 (5/8 required)
Dienvidi +2 (5/8 required)
Ziemeli +4 (6/10 required)
All latvia +10
laas +1 (3/4 required)
pohi +2 (4/6 required)
louna + 1 (3/5 required)
All estonia +6
Finally for neutral zones (Russia and Belarus) try to use a different font , less attracting.

Looking forward your next update
Have a nice day

thenobodies80

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Tue Jul 28, 2009 7:54 am

Thank you very much for your advice! I really appreciate it! However I am going to be on vacation next week, I am afraid that the progress of creating this map have to come to a pause.

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Mon Aug 17, 2009 9:04 am

Long time no see! I have a new update for this map finally!

small map (632 X 571) (V1.0.05S)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v5_1.jpg[/bigimg]

large map (822 X 743) (V1.0.05L)
[bigimg]http://www.freewebs.com/emacuwt/baltics_v5_2.jpg[/bigimg]

Changes made:
(1) modifying the bonus using the Bonus Spread Sheet provided by thenobodies80
(2) did not add transparent dots because it may look strange, instead I used nothing
(3) adding some 3D figures to the map to make it become more lively (not too flat)
(4) changing some of the fonts

As usual, please give more comments, so I can bring a better map again. Thank you very much!

Evil DIMwit · Post by **Evil DIMwit** » Mon Aug 17, 2009 9:54 pm

On the one hand, this map is far too open. Ideally your bonus regions would at least have some impassable boundaries around them so that it wouldn't take so many border territories to hold them. Except for the Estonian regions and Pietus, hanging on to any of the bonuses would be very difficult.
On the other hand, there isn't much in the actual region that would tend to form a natural border. Tricky...

Peter Gibbons · Post by **Peter Gibbons** » Mon Aug 17, 2009 10:05 pm

Evil DIMwit wrote:On the one hand, this map is far too open. Ideally your bonus regions would at least have some impassable boundaries around them so that it wouldn't take so many border territories to hold them. Except for the Estonian regions and Pietus, hanging on to any of the bonuses would be very difficult.
On the other hand, there isn't much in the actual region that would tend to form a natural border. Tricky...

Excellent point. Maybe the number of international border crossings should be limited? Like two Estonian-Latvia crossings and three Latvia-Lithuania crossings? Just throwing something out there. This map has a long way to go, but it does have potential.

If that happens, there probably also need to be port connections, as well. Because, if that doesn't happen and someone holds Estonia or Lithuania in a multi-person non-escalating game, it's over.

Industrial Helix · Post by **Industrial Helix** » Tue Aug 18, 2009 2:52 am

I would suggest only working on the small map at the moment as it will be easier to perfect the small map and then just upsize it when it come time.

All the colors and lines seem to have a very pixelated and over-saturated feel... you might want to do something about that.

Start adding some gradients and style to the map, take a look at a few other maps on CC and imitate some of the features you like, but don't directly copy them. Use them as an influence.

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Tue Aug 18, 2009 2:52 am

On the other hand, there isn't much in the actual region that would tend to form a natural border. Tricky...

Sorry, I cannot catch what you mean. Can you explain to me? Thanks!

Evil DIMwit · Post by **Evil DIMwit** » Tue Aug 18, 2009 10:10 am

Scania N113 wrote:
On the other hand, there isn't much in the actual region that would tend to form a natural border. Tricky...

Sorry, I cannot catch what you mean. Can you explain to me? Thanks!

Well, the Baltic States are on a flat plain without much in the way of major rivers (there are lots of rivers, but they aren't very major). That means that having no impassable boundaries is a fairly accurate reflection of the region's geography, but it also means that the Baltics' geography wouldn't be too fun to play Conquer Club on.

Is that clearer?

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Wed Aug 19, 2009 8:43 pm

Well, the Baltic States are on a flat plain without much in the way of major rivers (there are lots of rivers, but they aren't very major). That means that having no impassable boundaries is a fairly accurate reflection of the region's geography, but it also means that the Baltics' geography wouldn't be too fun to play Conquer Club on.

Is that clearer?

Well, I do not regard this as a problem because in the actual region there are forests, which I can make them the impassables. Whether it is fun, just depends on different people of different views.

Evil DIMwit · Post by **Evil DIMwit** » Wed Aug 19, 2009 9:12 pm

Scania N113 wrote:
Well, the Baltic States are on a flat plain without much in the way of major rivers (there are lots of rivers, but they aren't very major). That means that having no impassable boundaries is a fairly accurate reflection of the region's geography, but it also means that the Baltics' geography wouldn't be too fun to play Conquer Club on.

Is that clearer?

Well, I do not regard this as a problem because in the actual region there are forests, which I can make them the impassables. Whether it is fun, just depends on different people of different views.

Oh, dear, how did I forget forests? Yes, forests, those will serve you well.

Scania N113 · Post by **Scania N113** » Fri Aug 21, 2009 4:23 am

Regarding all the comments, for the next version I am going to add some impassables (using different features in reality, such as rivers, hills, forests, etc.) in order to control the bonus. Also as stated by Industrial Helix, I will try to fix the graphical problems, but it can actually be fixed later. Hopefully, my next version can come in a few days. After this week I am going to be busy because school starts.

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