Version 1.02 is now being hosted at the new site, here. Please go there for the newest version, which now includes a custom version with AI pretenders for LA.
The version referenced below is now obsolete.
Anastasia: 684-province Map for Dominions 3
Current version v1.02
UPDATE 2010-04-29
A minor update that increases the map zoom (it was still quite cramped) and marks a couple more provinces NoStart in the Standard Version.
As before, there are absolutely no changes to the actual map TGA image files. So if you've already downloaded them, there is no need to download the full versions attached to this OP. Instead, get the small ZIP with just the updated .map files and readme attached to my latest post. (I can't attach it to the OP because of the 5-file limit).
I have renamed the "cartoonized" version to "artistic," because the "cartoonized" thing is misleading -- that version of the map is most certainly not cartoonish, but that is the name of the GIMP filter used to modify it that way.
DESCRIPTION
Anastasia is an painstakingly-edited and polished 684-province map (561 land, 123 sea), sized at 4000 x 3000, originally generated by Dom3's map generator. Much of the work involved adjusting terrain to make the surrounding sea province regions contiguous (adding channels and such), and cleaning up the borders to be clean and neat. I have also added a couple of mountain ranges beyond those generated and made the rivers a bit nicer.
As of now, it looks like it will make for a very nice epic-scale game, and seems to have a decent number of chokepoints. At 20 provinces per player, it accommodates 28 land players and 3-5 sea players.
Feedback is very welcome.
STATUS
The map itself is in a finished status, and has been through the wringer a few times checking for errors or gaffes.
What remains to be done is (1) to hand-name all provinces using regional naming schemes, and (2) to add a variant that uses a pool of 40 or 50 #start-tagged provinces.
Aside from the lack of hand-naming, the map is quite playable and complete at this point.
OTHER NOTES
The map TGA image file is available in two versions: a standard version and an Artistic version (which gives it something of a hand-drawn look). They are fully-interchangeable in an ongoing game.
The .map and other files in each download are identical, and are provided in both downloads for convenience.
I have put up previews of the final version (standard and Artistic versions) and a preview image of the map as originally generated without the modifications I've made, for reference. If you switch quickly between the images, you can get a sense of how much change it's seen, as well as the nature of the changes.
(If you have GIMP, you could also generate the same version I've put up as the Artistic version yourself using GIMP's Artistic/Cartoon filter -- I used the default settings. It's as easy as, in the latest version of GIMP, pressing ALT-R-A-R, ENTER, and waiting 20 seconds.) It looks a lot better (and more natural) than it sounds. Also, if there is demand, I can also put up a smaller (say, 2000 x 1500 resolution) version if 4000 x 3000 is unwieldy for some.
Anastasia v1.02 (684-province map)
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