Map: World of Geometry Remake - bigger and better!

[Zeldor]

That map is based on Twan's well-known World of Geometry. I wanted to just adjust it to team game I am hosting and simply replace water starting locations with land ones. But well, it came out to be a much bigger task, pretty much drawing it from base. I redraw all borders from scratch, increased size of starting valleys [to accomodate one team of two], redesigned caves [to make them more balanced, which meant 2 more garrisons], added plenty of new magic sites [uniques!], improved garrisons [stronger, more balanced, with supply items, so they don't starve], filled all provs with patterns from Twan [if they look familiar then yes, they are from Cradle of Dominions map].

Specifics:
- 415 provinces, 23 of them water [no water starts though]
- wraparound
- 2 VP worth Isle of Eternia with plenty of connections, with 50k pop, Throne of the World, Citadel of the Lore Masters, The Mountain of Power, The Basalt Forge
- 8 high-pop cities on plains [hexes], 4 magic sites in each [really cool ones]
- 8 summoning sites around central island [coastal provs between 4 cities], 3 summoning sites in each province
- 6 gateways [linking to central island and connecting 4 players through caves], with magic path discount sites + cool poptype + 3 more sites
- 12 caves linking to gateways, with unique magic sites
- 24 special garrisons between player valleys and plains [5 commanders of specific nation + 100 troops of that nation]
- cave entrance guards [tough monsters protecting cave provs]

3 map files:
- Team Arena: 2x12 teams or 24 players [interesting bloodbath madness], suggested settings: 150% gold and resources, normal research
- Cave Starts: 12 players, starting near caves, suggested difficult research
- Plain Starts: 12 players, starting near caves, suggested difficult research

Runs Best on CBM [tm]!


TGA file:
http://www.mediafire.com/?zjnwuziwyll

Preview [now in more compact size]:


Map files in attachment.

Update 1 - 412 was not marked as no-start province, fixed [thanks Atul]
#randomequip 4 on commanders used only in cities and gateways now [too many random artifacts on the map, thanks WingedDod]

Fixes with 1.2 version:
- province names changed to black, so they are more visible
- in Cave Maze and Gold Rush prov #218 is worth 1 VP, not 2
- problem with no VPs at #218 fixed
- some garrisons were still starving: added Cauldron of Broth there
- cities on plains had incorrect garrisons; N,E,W,S cities now have 120 Defenders of LA MAn instead of 250 Militia, 4 outer cities have 180 Longbowman instead of 300 Militia
- some commanders got lower #randomequip, because it was resulting in too many artifacts placed on the map [still waiting for better command]

Fixes with 1.4 version:

(369) Missing Waste tag.
(330) Missing Forest tag.
(292) Missing Forest tag.
(155) Missing Forest tag.
(104) Missing Waste tag.
(240) Missing Swamp tag.
(239) Missing Swamp tag.
(237) Missing Forest tag.



(245) - (223) Missing connection

(349) - (342) Missing connection

(283) - (307) These two provinces shouldn't be connected


Garrisons:

- #122 garrison has 12 mammoths [was 20]
- #181 has 40 eponi knights [was 30]
- #288 got 15 Guhyakas
- All supply item carries received Boots of Youth, to prevent old age death that happened in some cases
- SCs at central island have Winged Shoes now

Caves:


- cave entrances with garrisons have 15k pop now
- 6 gateways have 25k pop
- 12 provs leading to gateways have 10k pop
- middle provs in caves have 5k pop


Goal was to increase income for players that start near caves, as standard cave pop is usually 1-4k.

- no more recruitable troll kings in gateways


Bugs:

- Some garrisons had "Amulet of Resilicience" equipped, obvious typo fixed.
- no more randomequip 4, which could result in indies getting artifacts

--------------------------------------

There are 6 cave provicnes linking to central island, called gateways. Every one of them has recruitable Troll Kings for 150 gold. They are located at 3,7,68,383,405,114.

There are also some hidden poptypes, 3 of them actually, in rear cave provs behind water.

poptype 69 are Asmegs, A2H1 size 3 giants
poptype 67 are Dwarven Smiths, so E3 + 110% FAED mages
poptype 70 are Svartalvs, so E2D2 + 100% FAED mages
both 67 and 70 also have Vaetti Hags, cheap with just 100% SDNB

Provs with them are marked as "Many sites" [same as garrisons leading to plains or cave entrances].

#setland 28
#poptype 67

#setland 61
#poptype 69

#setland 11
#poptype 70

#setland 331
#poptype 67

#setland 401
#poptype 69

#setland 399
#poptype 70

#setland 406
#poptype 67

#setland 413
#poptype 69

#setland 16
#poptype 70

#setland 1
#poptype 67

#setland 33
#poptype 69

#setland 225
#poptype 70

[Executor]

Wow 32 MB this will take a lot of time to download...

[Zeldor]

I updated map file - it was missing garrison at #218 [Isle of Eternia].

[JimMorrison]

Wow Zeldor! This is my first actual look at it..... I'm quite impressed, you've really done a great job with this one!

[Loren]

Every attempt I have made to start a game on this instantly fails--it can't find a starting province.

[fungalreason]

Loren, there's aren't any starts for water provinces on it. So if you, or one of the AIs ends up getting a water nation, you'll get that message.

[JimMorrison]

If you go in the mad editor, and make one of the central lake provinces a valid start..... you could get an interesting challenge from whoever lands there.

Seems like for SP, your best bet is to manually select opponents though, and avoid aquatic starts. (Tip- use Single Age Mod, and have 24 total players, just be ready to rush your "partner".)

[Zeldor]

I will put .map files with 12 player options tomorrow. Really busy weekend, huh. But I guess MP game with 24-player version free-for-all elimination deathmatch [so 12 players left after early bloodshed] could be really interesting. But it's not good time of the year to start new games, so maybe in 1-2 months

P.S. No, do no try to open map file in map editor and modify terrain/neighbours etc there and save it as same file! It will annihilate all your other things in the .map file, as it overwrites it with just what you have in map editor So new name and copy special content there [but be prepared to recheck all neighbours, as map editor loves to change them].

[PashaDawg]

Excellent job, Zeldor!!

[Zeldor]

I think I will replace some commanders with #randomequip 4 to #randomequip 3, I will leave 4 in the strongest garrisons only. That command is unfortunately not working as well as I expected and I don't want too many artifacts on indie commanders.