Map Making Questions

[Gandalf Parker]

Arralen said:
I guess it works like this:
If site: Check what site. Random.
If site not possible: Reroll.
If site unique and already in the game: Reroll.
If site possible and rare: Reroll once.

This looks like it answers something I have wondered. If a province has a chance for 4 sites, and you are especially eager to find a castle or a blood summoning site, then you increase your chances if you do an earth site-search spell, then next round a blood site-search spell, and THEN let your rainbow mage check it. Checking with an air/water/nature mage first might "use up" your chances for a site there.

[Endoperez]

I thought sites are created at the beginning of the game... How else could Well of Pestilence provinces have Death scale even if you have Growth?

[Kristoffer O]

correct

[Gandalf Parker]

Ahhh so it runs thru that routine when it creates the game? Good.

[Kaljamaha]

Thanks for the responses everybody. However, I still am not clear on the pop thing. So, lets say a that a province has x population if it is plains, 1.5x if it is farm lands. How much does it have if it is both? 1, 1,5 or something in between?


K.

[Arralen]

"farm" means (IIRC) 1,5x pop, 0,5x ressources. "Plains" is just that - plain - it's the base for everything else, you can't have "Plains & Farmland".

All terrain modifiers add up, though. (Or mayb they even multiply. I'll have to do all the number checking some day, unless the devs tell us). That means, creating a province that is both farm land and mountain does not make any sense, as the boni cancel each other out (mostly. In fact, I found this combo to suck most - no pop, but no ressources either.)

So I recommend for mapmakers is to use special terrain and "small" provinces sparingly. Going overboard with these will result in a map that lets everyone move only 1 prov/turn everywhere - with 'armies' not bigger than 50 Inf because there isn't either sufficient money nor supplies for more units.

Do not draw provinces first, and then check what terrain they have ("ok - it's mountains to the left, tick it, grass in the north, tick it, it's small, ok, oh, and here's a swamp, just another tick in the editor .."). Draw your map, then place the borders at the edges of terrain features (as it's done with the original Illwinter maps).

[Kaljamaha]

Arralen said:
"farm" means (IIRC) 1,5x pop, 0,5x ressources. "Plains" is just that - plain - it's the base for everything else, you can't have "Plains & Farmland".

Right, poor example, however the other terrain types are stackable. You can have a "mountain forest waste swamp with fresh water" province.

All terrain modifiers add up, though. (Or mayb they even multiply. I'll have to do all the number checking some day, unless the devs tell us). That means, creating a province that is both farm land and mountain does not make any sense, as the boni cancel each other out (mostly. In fact, I found this combo to suck most - no pop, but no ressources either.)

This is what I was asking. If the site frequency is always the best of the terrain types, I was wondering how population is determined.

So I recommend for mapmakers is to use special terrain and "small" provinces sparingly. Going overboard with these will result in a map that lets everyone move only 1 prov/turn everywhere - with 'armies' not bigger than 50 Inf because there isn't either sufficient money nor supplies for more units.

Do not draw provinces first, and then check what terrain they have ("ok - it's mountains to the left, tick it, grass in the north, tick it, it's small, ok, oh, and here's a swamp, just another tick in the editor .."). Draw your map, then place the borders at the edges of terrain features (as it's done with the original Illwinter maps).

Well what I did was first draw the general contours of the terrain an terrain types and then lay the borders on it. But not to worry, the map won't have more than a handful, I'd estimate some five to ten provinces with dual terrain type. I was just wondering how it affected everything.


K.