Scenario: World of Geometry (337 prov)

[Twan]

Version 0.4

It's probably not the definitive version (changes to the garrisons need testing) but as there were errors in the last, I release my actual one.

Fixes :
- re-verified the map and corrected some neighbour errors (removed 193 198 added 122 137)
- all knownsite -> knownfeature
- all "(monster name)s" --> "(monster name)"
- the "flying cow of pharaex" was a kraken instead of a shedu (and died in turn 1 in its land province)

Other changes :

- bonus for the weakest big monsters and the keepers of the gateways : an heroic ability for many (they get some starting xp but not too much, so players should be able to have heroes by turn 3 or 4), + 2 wyverns bodyguards for manticores, + 2 scorpion men bodyguards and 3 scorpion beast units for scorpion kings

- all big monsters garrisons get a telestic animate with blood 1 but no slaves (the goal is to avoid the auto rout phenomenon - the human mages were sometimes exhausted very fast, the magic beings dissolved and the big monsters even if still alive and not tired were auto routed due to the resulting 75% losses) - telestic animates also keep their holy powers (armies of skeletons were too good against my garrisons with no priest) and the ones of gateways provinces get holy 3 to smite a little

- human and aquatic bonus garrisons recieve some indie priest(s) as well (sea fathers for seas) ; cities get a bonus of 20 heavy infantry + a mage from their sites

- many of the v0.3 bonus garrisons toned down, they were often more efficient than the ones with big monsters (the Black Towers with a demon summoner get 3 demon knight as starting units but no longer are in addition with normal troops ; many other have a little less units)

- the commanders of special garrisons of the same type now get different items, so no garrison is exactly like another ; globally fewer items per garrison but more powerful

- less gems for indie mages globally

- + 1 bonus site per gateway province, all schools now have a bonus somewhere (and conjuration in all gateways)

- a little less population in the starting areas

[konming]

With so many "Black Tower"s it would be quite unfair to blood nations. Now everyone can blood hunt effectively and for cheap.

Also about the mountain circle provinces, why do some get sites while others do not? There are no logical or balance reasons for it.

Some cave provinces are still not balanced. (Starting from some positions, you can get great sites very soon into the caves, others will get no sites in many steps).

[Twan]

There are indie mages sites of all paths. Astral and some elemental mages can be found in the cities (metal orders, sorceresses in mirror wall palace, sages, alchemists and navigators) and blood only in the random garrison table (also including an illusionist site, the underworld with gnomes, a pyromancers site, litter skull). All positions had the same probability of getting one close. I've just rolled the black tower more often than some others.

Anyway I think it would be hard for a player to get all paths in magic-users sites (except by finding some naturally). The total of added mage sites is about 25 for 337 provinces. And there are four black towers on all the map (with growing armies of demons due to their circle master with soul contract).


Changing the sites so each nation has one indie mage site close instead of full randomness, isn't a bad idea (but it can't be totally balanced anyway, nations getting a site of their own path nearby won't have the same diversity as others). I'll probably adjust the mage sites distribution in the next version.

(I'm making a new version of the tga with pictures for special sites and see the problem with the black towers : 3 are in the west half of the map, including 2 in the mountains)

[Zeldor]

I have just found that The Depth [279] has a magic site [fire one] without any description. Just a picture.

Serenity [13] has Cathedral of the Spheres, which should enable 2 units, but they are land only so it does not give them...

[Twan]

They are not added sites. It's probably a bug due to the deep sea + cave combo if the computer use land sites, I'll make all deep seas caves just deep seas in the next version.

I will also nerf a little Pharaex in next release, a sphynx with earth (prot 38 with his bonus and a spell) + astral magic (b-e & luck) and gems to avoid fatigue can be really unkillable sometimes. I was thinking he would lose the battle after the death of his generals and crushers, but it seems immobiles are unaffected by the auto rout system (or don't know how he not only stayed but continued to cast up to the round 50 against my test army, when I had the "independants are routed" message around round 20). I will probably remove his gems and perhaps reduce his levels.

[Twan]

Version 0.5

New version of worldofgeometry.tga, with many special sites shown (most of the added mages and summoning sites have a little picture on the map). The .tga (with the new .map file) is attached to the first message of the thread.

Only two connections have changed : 94 is now neighbor of both 83 and 89 (to respect the symetry with 266 neighbor of 276/277) and there are now ports connecting caves 19 and 5 (to solve a balance problem : the player starting in 32, only neighbour of the sea nations in the caves, had less possibilities to expand in the underworld)

Except that, the terrains and connections are the same, so you can use the old tga if you don't want to download another big file (only the new version of the .map file is attached to this post).


Fixes :

- all deep sea caves -> deep seas (to avoid land sites or poptypes on them)

- an area of the caves (SW of the map) didn't have the special garrisons/sites other regions had

- #knownsite "Troll Pitt" didn't work as their is a land (272) and a sea site (433) with the same name ; replaced the "" by sites numbers

- some sea random garrisons were bugged and drawned (don't know why... anyway all I've found have been replaced by others)


Other Changes :

- distribution of special sites redone : the circle of mountains provinces get some "enter to summon" sites but no (added) indie mages sites ; there is 1 indie mage site and 1 site to recruit interesting units (usually trolls or troglodytes) in the caverns per land player ; there are 2 mages sites per sea player but as all only have water mages it's not a big advantage for sea nations ;

- note that "many sites" provinces have no added special sites (but more chance to have some to find) and provinces with special sites have some known ones but only normal chances to have more

- new special sites get adapted garrisons

- a new kind of special garrisons : the players are no longer the only exiled out of the circle of mountains : worshipers of all the pretender gods enslaved by Pharaex are there too : 24 new garnisons added, each one using the units of one nation (20 EA nations and 4 LA have been used). These little armies are established at the choke points between players, making a little harder to cut the road of your neighbours to the central plain. All players can conquer a realm of 12 or 13 provinces without having to fight a special garrison, the land players having 13 provinces in this "potential realm" have a little less pop in their starting area.

- some little changes for big monsters garrisons (2 or 3 of the weakest get some magic powers back, some more bodyguards, some bonus units removed for the best, some monsters exchange their place to balance players roads to the gateways)

- many provinces get a non random name to avoid repetitions

EDIT : V0.5b

There were 2 missing neighbours (53 87 and 213 217).

EDIT : attachment removed (next version available in the next page of the thread, or first message)

[Twan]

Chart of the new map :