Map suggestions (was Re: ExRM Campaign Status Reports)

[pannonian]

A suggestion for the next ExRM update. Give the settlement in the north to Germania, so it doesn't waste time trying to take it, but can turn south immediately. Another possibility is giving Brittany to the Britons, thus giving them a bridgehead on the continent.

[Quinn Inuit]

(I moved this because I thought it might clutter up the other thread with follow-up discussion, since it's a fine idea worthy of consideration.)

I've been seriously considering that. Sveaby (that northern province) is proving to be vastly more trouble than it's worth. I think we're just going to fold it into Denmark.

As for Brittany, I've also thought about that, but IME the AI doesn't handle provinces separated by the sea well and I'd like to have the Brits operating more as raiders.

What does everyone think?

[Lateinshowing]

Maybe give the Brits more than one starting territory on their island so they can expand better than they usually do? I don't know if that would help since the problem is with the AI pathfinding (or pathloseing as the AI does).

[decimator22]

I say give the brtts just 1 settlement in the mainland so they don't make peace everyturn they attack the gauls.

[Jamey]

A suggestion for the next ExRM update. Give the settlement in the north to Germania, so it doesn't waste time trying to take it, but can turn south immediately.

My suggestion was to make Scandanavia effectively an island rather than including its coast in Denmark. Quinn was talking about making all of Scandanavia part of Denmark (he wants to try to free up another settlement or two anyway). Either solution is fine with me.

Another possibility is giving Brittany to the Britons, thus giving them a bridgehead on the continent.

I say give the brtts just 1 settlement in the mainland so they don't make peace everyturn they attack the gauls.

I've had the Britons at war with the Gauls (and allied with me) for a decade. They still haven't succeeded in taking Remi despite repeatedly landing on it (they just sail home after a few turns of not attacking). I think there's something really wacky going on with the AI. Oddly enough, the AI has done just fine in capturing Noviomagus in games where Germania leaves it wide open.

I think the best solution would be to run some experimentation on British expansion using a virtually empty map. Based on what I've read about maps and the AI, moving the Calleva and/or Remi ports could make the AI suddenly work. Ideally you'd have the Britons in Calleva surrounded by a bunch of empty rebel settlements. Quinn, do you by any chance have a bare bones descr_strat.txt that you've used for map testing?

[Delvecchio1975]

my two cents:

Sveaby: is REALLY unimportant, i'd unify it with denmark. if you make it an island germania might feel like invading it. - unless you GIVE it to them of course. hum, anyway, the freed up settlement might be used somewhere else, but then again, Gemania can really USE an extra settlement for financial purposes, right?

The Britons: there was some problem with I think Begrum in India before on the edge of the map - huge stacks standing next to it, but not sieging. moving the settlement one spot east solved that. maybe worth a try with Remi? I'm not in favour of giving the britons a settlement on the continent, they simply didn't have one in that time ...

[Jingles]

Well in my Germania campaign (up until I killed the Britons off) The boys in blue were quite effectively raiding my coastline with ships full of warriors. I don't think we need to give them a province on the mainland. Besides you'd probably get the annoying situation in vanilla where they steamroll europe.

[decimator22]

The problem i have already posted this, Is that when the AI doesn't have a land border they will try to make peace with the faction it invaded. So there invasion are always bad. You could also put a little peace of British border in gaul, and also a little peace of Greek border in Egypt.

[Quinn Inuit]

Interesting. I think I'll float that to a mod question forum. I'm not sure if that's been tried, and I don't know what effect it would have on the AI.

Besides, don't the Greeks and Ptolemies share a border on Crete?

[Ivanelme]

Yes they have a boarder on Crete.

If some regions are being taken out of Germania, it would be interesting to see some additions in Sicily. I mean there is already Messana, Syracuse, Agrigento, and Lilybaeum. It might make it cluttered but you could add one city from like, Drapana, Segeste, Panorma, Enna, and Tyndaris. Each of them were involved in the First Punic War. If any one was to be added I would go with Enna, just cut off the holdings of Syracuse to that little round bit (which is more historically accurate) and use the Messana, Agrigento, and Syracuse for the Enna border placing it about half way between Messana and Agrigento if you were to draw a line between the two.

EDIT: Link for a map from wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Romanarrival.JPG

[Quinn Inuit]

That's what I mean. If the Cretan border doesn't make them fight, what will?

As for Sicily, I'd rather not give it any more provinces from a gameplay perspective. Sicily is pretty rich as is, and if we gave it more provinces it might become unbalancing.

Update: Decimator, I discussed your idea with Aradan. He thinks it might work, but I don't know if I have the map/AI skill to implement it.
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=190449

[Jamey]

That's what I mean. If the Cretan border doesn't make them fight, what will?

I've seen Greece do great when it takes Rhodes then Crete. It gets messed up when it takes Crete then Rhodes.

[Quinn Inuit]

Ah, there's the problem. I think this calls for some win condition tweaking.

[decimator22]

Well the factions that really have problems with this are:
Carthage (invades rome by sea and then asks for peace..)
Greeks (Captures Crete and then they send 2 full staks to attack Ptolomies and ask for peace everytime.)
Britons (once they unify Great Britain, Every invasion they do is a failure as they ask peace again.)

I believe just changing those factions will make it more smoother gameplay.

[Wien1938]

Sardis is too far to the East. It should be closer to Smyrna. Move Corinth to actually block the Corinthian Isthmus, then it becomes a truely vital city. Rename Antigonea to Lychnidos; Thessalonika should be on the north east coast of the Thermaicos Gulf, not the north west.
Otherwise, the only complaint I can make is that the Ptolemaics truely speaking should have Greek style cities, but then how does one then represent the Egyptian cities which did not change? (Unless they are placed at Huge size, but not given things like Royal barracks?)

[Quinn Inuit]

decimator:
Carthage we're going to fix.
Greece seems to have skewed priorities, but I think we can fix that with some win conditions work and the new map PatricianS is cooking up for 3.4.
Briton is more complicated. I've seen a lot of successful invasions, too. But we'll look into it.

Wien1938:
Ok, I'll check those out. One question, though: why rename Antigonea?
I don't think we should fix Corinth. Cities that block a land route tend to screw up the AI (cf. Rhegium from RTR, which we fixed in 3.3).
As for the Egyptian cities, what do you mean? If the Egyptian cities didn't change, how can they be Greek style?

[Wien1938]

Antigonia is 1. the wrong name, the best match is Antipatria, 2. as Antipatria, is in the wrong place as Antipatria is very close to Apollonia (which is in the correct place) and falls under the agis of the Epirote monarchy. The town of Lychnidnos is located on the southeast shore of Lake Lycentis (roughly the present location of "Antigonia").

Corinth: Ok. No worries.

Egyptian cities: If the faction type for the Ptolemies is placed as Greek/Hellenistic (architectural style), but the Egyptian cities are already "huge" cities, then they cannot be changed to a Greek style. This could represent the enormous wealth of Egypt but also the difficulties of ruling it - cultural differences.
This way, the other cities for the Ptolemies could be Greek style colonies (as places like Halikarnasos were comparatively hellanized) and Cyprus was completely hellanized (last paragraph) under the Ptolemies.

[Quinn Inuit]

That's an interesting idea. I hadn't thought of that. I'm concerned the Egyptians might get substantial bonuses from being able to build to the top of their tree from the get-go, though.

[Wien1938]

That's a risk, certainly. However, if the land is well developed but the population sullen and with lack of government buildings (AOR/Barracks/temples etc), then the Ptolemaic player or AI would have to chose between investment or expansion (and risk of rebellion).

[pannonian]

Would it be possible to free up some resource slots? If you can allocate a resource slot to represent the native Egyptians, you could give the rebellious cities high unrest to represent their rebelliousness, but also allow a building tree for those regions to represent integration. In MNM, Maced0n used the integration pre-auxilia buildings to represent integrating barbarian lands, who are less ready to accept civilisation. This could be done for Egypt.