Any Map Modders Interested in Helping RS?

**cherryfunk** · December 07, 2006, 10:49 AM

dvk and I have been talking about the maps being used for Roma Surrectum, and we're both less than satisfied with the current Icetorque War Map -- the big map that roughly doubles the scale of the territory, in effect 'zooming' in to provide a more detailed world.

The problem with the current map is that, while it is absolutely beautiful in terms of the terrain, the distribution of the regions is not ideal. For example, while Sicily is twice as large as it is in the Mundus map, it has the same number of cities. Given how important the island was at the time, both dvk and I feel that an increase in scale should also result in an increase in the number of regions. The same is true of Greece -- twice as big, but with no additional regions. Meanwhile, much less important areas like Britain and the Sarmatian steppes have more regions.

Ideally, the big map used for Roma Surrectum should place greater emphasis on regions like Sicily, Iberia, Greece, Asia Minor -- areas that are important for a large number of factions -- and less emphasis on areas at the edge of the map that are really sideshows in most campaigns.

So we're wondering, is there anyone following the development of Roma Surrectum who has experience altering the regions on a map? Is anyone willing to help redesign the Big Map so it provides a better gameplay experience?

**Northern Ranger** · December 10, 2006, 04:08 AM

Hi, first, I've been following this mod for a while and it looks great!
I can add regions for you, and I know some for Sicily/Italy/Greece which may help
Please can I become a BETA tester, and i'll try out some new provinces for the big map

**Vlaanderen Vrij** · December 10, 2006, 05:10 AM

A hint, Gent was the greatest city of the county of Flanders in te Middle Ages and the secon largest town of Northern Europe after Paris (with Bruges in third place), only the Italian city states could match such a population rate... Would you be able to put next to Bruges and Antwerp a third Flemish city??? It would certainly reflect the wealth, industrialisation and high urbanisation of the region at that time

good luck

Double post merged - Tyr

**Tyr** · December 10, 2006, 06:51 AM

Originally Posted by Vlaanderen Vrij

A hint, Gent was the greatest city of the county of Flanders in te Middle Ages and the secon largest town of Northern Europe after Paris (with Bruges in third place), only the Italian city states could match such a population rate... Would you be able to put next to Bruges and Antwerp a third Flemish city??? It would certainly reflect the wealth, industrialisation and high urbanisation of the region at that time

good luck

Roma Surrectum starts at 280BC.

Originally Posted by Northern Ranger

Hi, first, I've been following this mod for a while and it looks great!
I can add regions for you, and I know some for Sicily/Italy/Greece which may help
Please can I become a BETA tester, and i'll try out some new provinces for the big map

PM dvk901 about offering to help and to BETA test.

**IceTorque** · December 10, 2006, 07:44 AM

Adding more regions is one of the easiest things to mod.
Map Making Tutorial The Scriptorium.
http://forums.totalwar.org/vb/forumdisplay.php?f=77

Free editing tools that I used to make WarMap.
http://www.mnwright.btinternet.co.uk/
http://www.irfanview.com/main_download_engl.htm
http://www.eecs.wsu.edu/paint.net/

I'm not sure which version of WarMap your using, but imo too many regions makes the gameplay degenerate into siege fest total war, which pretty much defeats the purpose of the large scale map. Depending on how many regions you add you'll have to restrict how many pieces are on the board to avoid too many battles every turn, turn slow down and turn/game freeze.

**cherryfunk** · December 10, 2006, 08:26 AM

Hey IceTorque, thanks for responding! dvk and I are huge fans of your maps, it's great to hear from you.

I'm not sure either exactly which version of the WarMap we're using, but here's the region layout:

What we'd like to do is not so much add new regions, as to redistribute them, so that for example Britain has fewer regions, but Sicily has 1 or 2 more, Malta is added as a region, etc. -- basically we'd like to have the map emphasize the mediterranean area and de-emphasize less important (for the time period) areas like Britain, Russia, and so forth.

Roma Surrectum has several new factions such as Syracuse, the Bosporan Kingdom, and the Kingdom of Pergamum, and we'd like to maximize the gameplay possibilities of these new factions by putting more emphasis on their parts of the map.

**IceTorque** · December 10, 2006, 09:09 AM

I know the 'seige total war' thing bugs some people, but quite frankly, I intended Roma Surrectum to be a fun to play long slugfest to win.

Yes, I hate siege-fest, but I hate even more having to fight too many battles.

What needs to be done to this map, per screenshot above, is 'combine' regions in the Northern area in Russia and Sarmatian areas where there is no point having so many regions

Just make sure that there is not more than fifty pixels between settlements, or the AI may not behave properly.

And thanks IceTorque for your help

I would like to be of more help, but i'm just too busy with my new map for Medieval 2. This ones a monster, and I'll be struggling to keep all settlements within fifty pixels of each other if the max regions is still 199.

Looks like a nice mod, I'll look forward to playing it when it's released.

**dvk901** · December 10, 2006, 08:50 AM

This map was created by IceTorque, and then Webbird took it and did some work on it himself...mountains, layout, regions, etc. I think it already has 198 regions (200 max). I know the 'seige total war' thing bugs some people, but quite frankly, I intended Roma Surrectum to be a fun to play long slugfest to win.
What needs to be done to this map, per screenshot above, is 'combine' regions in the Northern area in Russia and Sarmatian areas where there is no point having so many regions, and then add them to areas like greece, sicily, Aetolia, Italy or the Carthaginian area. There are roughly 20 regions in the Scythian area...why? Nothing ever happened up there in this era, so it's a waste. That could be cut to 8 or so, and then those regions created in more important areas.
That's what Cherry and I have been discussing.
And thanks IceTorque for your help..