Balkans - or - The Balkan Peninsula

[patsfan44]

So since France doesn't make a good map to play, I have decided the community of MC should try to make a map in the Balkans.

The Balkans seem to have some good terrain for play ability. Plus it is pretty square.

So we need to give the map something special game play wise, and that is what I need every bodies ideas. Start tossing.

Also I have no clue on what countries include the Balkans so please help me understand what countries make up the Balkans. (i.e Greece)

Here is a quick sketch of the areas I would like to be in play. (Might not be only the Balkans but whatever)
Plus I also plan to break up the commands into regions.

 

[Sebrim]

1. well, the Balkans are known for recent wars and conflicts, so we could make something akin to the Conflict: Africa map.

2. the command borders you have in your second image are basically the borders between sovereign states (except the South-East (where Turkey continues in the grey area) and the North-East (where your borders are simplified a bit - the Ukraine continues past Moldova, which doesn't have a single stretch of border with the Black Sea))

3. The first map you posted depicts the Balkans, which is the name of the mountain range, the second one is more like Southeast Europe, politically defined, although the countries in the North would deny being part of Southeast Europe - since that region is considered wartorn and/or Orthodox...

4. I'd be happy to help with the regions within the commands.

 

[patsfan44]

1. well, the Balkans are known for recent wars and conflicts, so we could make something akin to the Conflict: Africa map.

2. the command borders you have in your second image are basically the borders between sovereign states (except the South-East (where Turkey continues in the grey area) and the North-East (where your borders are simplified a bit - the Ukraine continues past Moldova, which doesn't have a single stretch of border with the Black Sea))

3. The first map you posted depicts the Balkans, which is the name of the mountain range, the second one is more like Southeast Europe, politically defined, although the countries in the North would deny being part of Southeast Europe - since that region is considered wartorn and/or Orthodox...

4. I'd be happy to help with the regions within the commands.

Seems you have some good knowledge about the regions that would be classified as the Balkans and/or southeast Europe. So do you think that we should go along with southeast Europe or Balkans and exactly what countries are considered to be part of either region.

 

[Sebrim]

I'm a researcher focusing on the Orthodox Church, which is necessarily closely connected to this region, so yeah, I kind of know it.

I can imagine four scenarios:
a) leave it as it is, call it Southeast Europe
b) move the whole map a bit south - possibly tilt it a tiny bit - so that the whole of Greece - including Crete - is there, but Romania, Hungary and Slovenia are left out - that would be 'Balkans' (as inyour first map)
c) make it a map of the Eatsern Mediterraniean, including bits of Italy in the West, the African North coast in the south and all the way to Israel in the East.
d) make it a map of former Yugoslavia and part of its neighbours. That could do for an interesting storyline.

To me, a) has the problem that Greece is cut in half, which looks stupid. It would be like a map of Florida without the areas south of Miami....

I'm no good at graphics, but I'd happily contribute with ideas and geographical/societal information. However, I don't want to put too much effort into this if nobody else is interested.

 

[patsfan44]

Hey thinks for the info I will whip something up in a minute.

I think I am feeling b. is the best idea just cause it seems that it wouldn't seem like I just randomly chose countries.

Yeah I will get back to you asking about other stuff I am sure.

 

[patsfan44]

Hey I know you said Romania and Slovenia usually isn't included, but most maps of the Balkans I have seen include them in the region.
(i.e. The image above)

Also I just would like to toss em in anyways...

 

[Cardinalsrule]

ok, so you have 13 commands there, now break them up into regions within each... I think you have a good start here.

maybe a bit of artistic license could give moldava a border on the black sea and a route to attack out so that its not completely blocked in by romania? An attachment to turkey maybe?

and you could add crete as a 14th command, a couple of sea routes to greece and turkey

 

[Sebrim]

Hiya - yes, it was Hungary that bugged me the most. Now that's out, it's fine.

Greece:

Bulgaria (this was the division until 1998):

Romania (the historical princes are shown in different colours):

Those are the biggest ones - I can come back with more info later.

 

[th-child]

The maps often has a theme -- e.g. the cold war map, or the african conflicts. The balkan peninsula is an interesting place, and always has been. So i think this map could be placed in the past, too. The time of the first balkan war or the ottoman empire comes to mind.

Also i think moldova is definitely not part of the peninsula -- romania is arguable, but moldova is out for sure. But the more commands the better, so i think you could include hungary, too.

 

[ndrm31]

I would like a word of the map studios' makers, in this time of bugs, w'all deicided taht the best for the site was to sort some bugs, in my case I already posted and I think, started a new thread that before to create new maps, a good choice will be to include a) fog of war in the maps, since that I know *since nukes was created that the idea was to have it sometime in the site *for those taht doesnt know what Fog Of War is, in another online sites u have the option to play those games where in a game you only see the border regions that the other player has, and since starting a game we have to chose in turn order, : *sequential, I guess that in some moment a freestyle game play was thinked about *again, freestyle in turn order, is that once the turn starts all players may move at once, so coming back to new maps, I think that I would prefer to have new settings for all our maps, that would mean many new maps, or new ways to playing, and enjoyng them, that to have new maps *new maps that I allways love

 

[leagaepr]

To be honest, I believe you shouldn't include the expression "Balkans" because it is really hard to define. South East Europe makes more sense. Also, why don't you go for a Greece map? The map Sebrim posted would surely be awesome to play on.

 

[patsfan44]

I would prefer that the site developers to devote all their time sorting out the many many many bugs and niggles and server issues before they start adding maps and complicating things further with new maps and stuff like fog of war. Yes, it would be nice to have new options, but I'd rather have them on a smooth surface.

The map forums are for just playing around with creating maps. None of these ideas will likely get made soon or implemented. These maps are just thinking about the future of what maps will be added.

Also this does not take time away from the site developers at all. Don't know what you and ndrm are thinking when we are just drawing up some ideas for maps.

 

[patsfan44]

To be honest, I believe you shouldn't include the expression "Balkans" because it is really hard to define. South East Europe makes more sense. Also, why don't you go for a Greece map? The map Sebrim posted would surely be awesome to play on.

Noted. When I see the area of Southeast Europe in general though it always includes Italy. I just want the countries in the general region of the Balkans. Can you think of a better name?

 

[patsfan44]

I would like a word of the map studios' makers, in this time of bugs, w'all deicided taht the best for the site was to sort some bugs, in my case I already posted and I think, started a new thread that before to create new maps, a good choice will be to include a) fog of war in the maps, since that I know *since nukes was created that the idea was to have it sometime in the site *for those taht doesnt know what Fog Of War is, in another online sites u have the option to play those games where in a game you only see the border regions that the other player has, and since starting a game we have to chose in turn order, : *sequential, I guess that in some moment a freestyle game play was thinked about *again, freestyle in turn order, is that once the turn starts all players may move at once, so coming back to new maps, I think that I would prefer to have new settings for all our maps, that would mean many new maps, or new ways to playing, and enjoyng them, that to have new maps *new maps that I allways love

I honestly don't believe it is the map makers job to create Fog of War. That will have to be some code that must be created for it.

 

[Cardinalsrule]

yeah, I think patsfan is correct, for changes in gameplay like Fog of War, code is required which it seems like won't happen until the 'issues' are fixed, and we all agree that is paramount. However, that doesn't mean that maps can't be worked on, and possibly even released, since I don't believe that Wids and Shep are working on the coding. (I could be wrong, it does happen occasionally, in which case I will whine and cry. )

 

[patsfan44]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South-East_European_Cooperation_Process

I guess we could call it Southeast Europe. My bad.

 

[Shepherd]

Hey all, I got wrapped up in cranking out the Sea of Japan map and ignored this thread completely... let's correct that.

For starters, Patsfan is correct - any time that Wids or Rj or I devote to this site does not reduce the hours being put toward fixing bugs and finding ways to improve the game engine. Map production isn't a site priority, but discussion about and creation of new maps won't stand in the way of development work.

As for this map, it's interesting. It's a very mountainous region with major rivers, so we don't have the issues I see in both France and the Ned/Lux/Belgium maps - no natural way to protect commands.

There seems to be a problem as to what map is being developed here. Is it a map of the Balkan Peninsula, or a map of Southeast Europe. Personally, a map of the Balkans sounds far more catchy. Since there seems to be no definitive answer as to what exactly "the Balkans" are - the Greeks don't like the think of themselves as being part of the Balkan states, for example - I think that we can take some liberties and do what will make the best map. If we call it The Balkan Peninsula we can include every country that is all or mostly in the region.

If we want to make a large-ish map (80+ regions), which seems to be what users want so we can have more 12p games, I'd be as inclusive as possible. I think it makes sense to include Romania. Moldova is slightly probematic from a gameplay point of view since it's only neighbor is Romania, but since Romania might be a really large command, hard to conquer command it lessens Moldova's strategic value.

Patsfan, do you have the tools to start updating the map with regional borders? Because I think this idea has some potential.

 

[RjBeals]

nicely put shep. None of us map makers have any control over the coding, and believe me, we want bugs and development just as much as anyone else. Our original task was to create some maps to launch the site with, then nurture maps in development while we occasionally create & launch new site maps. Fog of war would kick ass, but we can't do anything to speed that up.

I have been taking a back seat, waiting to see what where the development goes. I don't want to put any effort into a map if the engine is going to change, and mean back-tracking the huge amount of time with layers and coordinate positions.

I like where this map is headed. keep going - at the very least, it's fun to develop!

 

[PKHustle]

I'd like to see some kind of Draig-tower or some other new setting with this map. If you could find a way to make it a medium to large map that is. I think it'd work well.

 

[Cardinalsrule]

only thing is, PK, that any special coding for specific terts, like was done on the 12 Domains map, will indubitably slow down the release of the map. I myself would rather see a great new (large) map come out sooner, even if it doesn't have any special conditions. Also, (my opinion only) I don't think that large maps need any special conditions to make the gameplay great. The classic massive is still one of the most popular maps, and there's nothing 'special' about it.