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This is the polished version of the map I've been creating. I've played from several places on the map and am happy that the "imbalances" I've found are realistic. If you start in Europe, expect a crowded brawl for space. Starts in China, would be more calm, but also more isolated from potential trade partners. Starts in Britain or Japan are about the toughest, due to isolation, nearby competitors and limited space. I'm only attaching one version of the map (which can be modified for Antarctic starting positions if you want to use a save game editor). Hopefully, a patch will answer the problem of placing civ starts. (-11 Dec- or maybe not. . .
)
These are the characteristics of this map:
a) Map is 180 by 180 tile map. Based on that and the amount of resources, it's appropriate for 16 civs. Eight civs gives a little more breathing space if you wind up in Europe though. Barbarian activity is "raging".
b) Starting positions: I have 16 places that correspond to "actual" starting locations for the 16 civs, but I have added seven others that help spread out the starts. These seven locations are: US Pacific Northwest, Coastal California, Argentina, Mali, Indus River valley, Moscow, and an additional China location (Yangtze River).
c) With very few exceptions, the coastlines were done rigorously on a square-by-square basis to match a Mercator map that I modified, by compressing the high latitudes, and expanding the tropics and northern temperate latitudes. There is also a slight east-west stretch in Europe to make it more recognizable and to make room for the five civ starting locations that are in Europe. Overall, this means a reasonably recognizable map that has more "playing area", and less useless arctic tundra, and polar oceans. Because the map does not include anything north of 75 north, I made it impossible for ships to circumnavigate the globe in the Arctic - true to the real world; there is no "Northwest Passage". The map also does not cover anything south of latitude 60 south.
d) Topography and bathymetry are based on maps in atlas', and from http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/fliers/94mgg01.html
Even if you don't like the civ map attached, visit the NGDC site!
e) Forest cover is primeval. Europe, Brazil, and the Eastern US have far more of their primeval forest than in any other map I've seen. This is important because these thick forests delay the eventual high fertility of Europe/Eastern US. The civs that start in the Nile, Indus and Fertile Crescent have a huge early advantage because of that delay. The disadvantages of those river valleys are that they are surrounded by marginal land. You will notice that there are opportunities for "canal-cities" that allow ships to cross at Panama and at Port Sa'id, Egypt. I've also included several islands that are not exactly large, but might be considered strategic (especially in the South Pacific).
f) Resource distribution is based on information gathered from the net, including data from the United States Department of Energy (petroleum, coal, and uranium). Some resources are spread out generously, and others are very regional and limited. Based on my test games, the ancient strategic resources (horses and iron may be slightly difficult to get in ancient times, but by medieval times, you should have them pretty well secured (no horses in Americas - the horse culture of the plains Indians did not appear until the 1800's). Saltpeter might be too plentiful, but the era that saltpeter is needed has tended to be short. Coal is plentiful, but "clumpy" in distribution. The modern strategic resources (oil and uranium) are not nearly as plentiful as coal, and they are not widely distributed. Luxury resources are of variable scarcity, and distribution. There is for instance enough wine, spice, and fur for 16 civs, but not enough ivory, silk, or incense.
g) There are still no "goodie huts". This does punish the civs with the expansionist quality, but I just don't like the idea of technology "appearing". There are still ample reasons to explore - you still want to find your neighbors and beat them to the choice colonization places. Another problem is that a civ located on Japan or the British Isles will lose out almost entirely on goodie huts.
Note: I have included the documentation in Microsoft Word and the Excel file that contains some of the USDOE data I used for oil and uranium.
If you want to modify the starting locations, to have correct locations for instance, you need to add sixteen tundra islands to the map in the Antarctic, start a game, save it immediately, and then use one of the save game editors posted here on the Files forum. The coordinates for the civ locations are on the first spreadsheet of the Excel file. Its tedious to correct the starting locations, but not hard.
Lastly, if you have comments feel free to send them to me either directly by email or posted here. I will seriously consider all comments. However, I really want to retain control over the form of the map on this thread. As I work on this map, I will keep editing, albeit slowly sometimes and reposting the edited map with the documentation.
Thanks.
Size of file is 94Kb.
)These are the characteristics of this map:
a) Map is 180 by 180 tile map. Based on that and the amount of resources, it's appropriate for 16 civs. Eight civs gives a little more breathing space if you wind up in Europe though. Barbarian activity is "raging".
b) Starting positions: I have 16 places that correspond to "actual" starting locations for the 16 civs, but I have added seven others that help spread out the starts. These seven locations are: US Pacific Northwest, Coastal California, Argentina, Mali, Indus River valley, Moscow, and an additional China location (Yangtze River).
c) With very few exceptions, the coastlines were done rigorously on a square-by-square basis to match a Mercator map that I modified, by compressing the high latitudes, and expanding the tropics and northern temperate latitudes. There is also a slight east-west stretch in Europe to make it more recognizable and to make room for the five civ starting locations that are in Europe. Overall, this means a reasonably recognizable map that has more "playing area", and less useless arctic tundra, and polar oceans. Because the map does not include anything north of 75 north, I made it impossible for ships to circumnavigate the globe in the Arctic - true to the real world; there is no "Northwest Passage". The map also does not cover anything south of latitude 60 south.
d) Topography and bathymetry are based on maps in atlas', and from http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/fliers/94mgg01.html
Even if you don't like the civ map attached, visit the NGDC site!
e) Forest cover is primeval. Europe, Brazil, and the Eastern US have far more of their primeval forest than in any other map I've seen. This is important because these thick forests delay the eventual high fertility of Europe/Eastern US. The civs that start in the Nile, Indus and Fertile Crescent have a huge early advantage because of that delay. The disadvantages of those river valleys are that they are surrounded by marginal land. You will notice that there are opportunities for "canal-cities" that allow ships to cross at Panama and at Port Sa'id, Egypt. I've also included several islands that are not exactly large, but might be considered strategic (especially in the South Pacific).
f) Resource distribution is based on information gathered from the net, including data from the United States Department of Energy (petroleum, coal, and uranium). Some resources are spread out generously, and others are very regional and limited. Based on my test games, the ancient strategic resources (horses and iron may be slightly difficult to get in ancient times, but by medieval times, you should have them pretty well secured (no horses in Americas - the horse culture of the plains Indians did not appear until the 1800's). Saltpeter might be too plentiful, but the era that saltpeter is needed has tended to be short. Coal is plentiful, but "clumpy" in distribution. The modern strategic resources (oil and uranium) are not nearly as plentiful as coal, and they are not widely distributed. Luxury resources are of variable scarcity, and distribution. There is for instance enough wine, spice, and fur for 16 civs, but not enough ivory, silk, or incense.
g) There are still no "goodie huts". This does punish the civs with the expansionist quality, but I just don't like the idea of technology "appearing". There are still ample reasons to explore - you still want to find your neighbors and beat them to the choice colonization places. Another problem is that a civ located on Japan or the British Isles will lose out almost entirely on goodie huts.
Note: I have included the documentation in Microsoft Word and the Excel file that contains some of the USDOE data I used for oil and uranium.
If you want to modify the starting locations, to have correct locations for instance, you need to add sixteen tundra islands to the map in the Antarctic, start a game, save it immediately, and then use one of the save game editors posted here on the Files forum. The coordinates for the civ locations are on the first spreadsheet of the Excel file. Its tedious to correct the starting locations, but not hard.
Lastly, if you have comments feel free to send them to me either directly by email or posted here. I will seriously consider all comments. However, I really want to retain control over the form of the map on this thread. As I work on this map, I will keep editing, albeit slowly sometimes and reposting the edited map with the documentation.
Thanks.
Size of file is 94Kb.
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