Should R'lyeh and Atlantis swim upriver?

Targa · #1 February 6th, 2004, 01:19 AM

For those who haven't been following the map thread:

I'm in the process of making a new map, which has a sea and several lakes. The lakes are all connected to the sea via rivers (all but 1, which will be connected in the wrap-around Version of the map). You can see a preview of the (unfinished) map here:
http://www.techno-mage.com/~targa/webmap.jpg

I am still new to the game, and have yet to play as R'lyeh or Atlantis, so I really don't have a feel for what's going to play best, or be in the best interest of game balance.

The question is:

Should the inhabitants of R'lyeh, Atlantis, or any other nation that acquires aquatic/amphibious abilities be able to "swim upriver" to the inland lakes (or vice versa)? ie: The lake provinces will be #neighbor to the adjoining sea provinces. You can see a quick reference to what I mean here:
http://www.techno-mage.com/~targa/webmap2.jpg

Some have suggested that the two water nations are already powerful nations in their own right, and that allowing them to gain "instant access" to interior landmasses would put other players at a disadvantage. What's your opinion? Take the poll.

Norfleet · #2 February 6th, 2004, 03:21 AM

Connecting the lake DIRECTLY to the sea would be a little much, since it's equivalent to teleportation.

Why not make one or more intervening river provinces? Make them small, set them to have no population or sites, and let them swim through those: If the river provinces are rather long and border many land provinces, this also gives Vanheim, CoTS Marignon, and anyone who forges a Pocket Ship the interesting ability to sail the rivers.

Argitoth · #3 February 6th, 2004, 03:27 AM

if you can only swim down river... how do you go backwards?..

How do you get back to where you want to be?

undead dolphin hacker · #4 February 6th, 2004, 03:45 AM

I voted yes, if only because the ratio of sea :: land is kind of... well, bad, if you couldn't access the inland lakes.

Norfleet · #5 February 6th, 2004, 04:14 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Argitoth:
if you can only swim down river... how do you go backwards?..

How do you get back to where you want to be?

I don't think you can make one-way neighbors in Dominions II. If you can go from A to B, you can go from B to A.

Argitoth · #6 February 6th, 2004, 07:01 AM

Actually you can!

Norfleet · #7 February 6th, 2004, 07:54 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Argitoth:
Actually you can!

Meh? That's not in the mapedit manual. That isn't even part of the editor. How's that work?

#8 February 6th, 2004, 07:57 AM

[Bad Diagram of Impossibility Removed]

[ February 06, 2004, 07:19: Message edited by: Zen ]

Norfleet · #9 February 6th, 2004, 08:45 AM

Well, according to the mapedit PDF, the #neighbour command says "Makes it possible to move between these two provinces in both directions". I was under the impression, therefore, that the single command set a symmetric link, and you didn't need two commands to set a link between two provinces.

This is further corroborated by looking at a map file, where there's only one #neighbour command linking a pair of provinces, with no second #neighbour command for the reverse link.

So by setting #neighbour A B, you've automatically set the reverse link, and the command #neighbour B A is redundant and does nothing whether it's there, or you remove it....

Am I missing something here?

#10 February 6th, 2004, 09:11 AM

It might have been discussed and my memory only held apart of it.

Edit: Yep. It was an "As of yet" comment before the actual release

Here is the link: http://www.shrapnelgames.com/cgi-bin...=000499#000006

So the word is not yet, but maybe in the future.

[ February 06, 2004, 07:19: Message edited by: Zen ]