Natural Maps

[Chagan_Arslan]

Ok in this topic i would like to recive feedback of my maps
i am and will be making maps with little to none buildings, as i will try to create diverse terrain that will offer fun battles rather than village raid maps

so give here your opinions etc.

things common for all maps(hopefully):
- neither side is at advantage
- no roof camping possible
- no hills poping everywhere, almost flat terrain in most cases
- main fighting ground reachable for both teams at the same time


Bazaar :
Archers "you cant handle the truth", access to the roofs is blocked. Ninjas favorite ?

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Mirage :
Run fast to the oasis, and fight for you right to clean water! Just dont drop dead into it as this will piss off everybody, or fuck them you can drop dead where you like

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River Delta v2:
Out of all places both guys thought the best place to make battle is river delta, no seriously. So you have river and lots of bushes that you cant see shit in, just great.

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Tilting at windmills :
Both armies are marching on aroad, seems like the road is too small for both armies. The fight occurs.. crazy..

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Quarry :
Two filthy rich snobs, one quarry, two castle builds orders!

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Dune :
In the middle of Sahara two armies fight for the remains of the caravan, what are they doing in the middle of Sahara is unclear

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Khan Provegrond - the tournament arena v2 :
It includes 5 arenas : jousting, cavalry, melee, ranged, horse archery. Designed for easier crowd control, and more enjoyable tournaments.

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video preview:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VeIInSO_xFM

Battle of the Mounds :
Crom! Grand me revenge! And if not than go to the choppa!

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Taj Apskaft:
This city is know for a temple of Monkey Stick. Both armies fight for the right to pillage. Blasphemers! :
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Pathfinder Island:
Two groups land on this deserted island to secure the grog barrels. As the old Sumerian poverb says.. "You got to fight, for your right, to party".
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Hun in the sun (new) :
This villge is into human sacrifice to the god of sky Tengri. Many dangers lie here, but at least its not the bees!
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Makadesh (new) :
Ever wanted to do some scuba diving ? Well look no further this map is for you (scubas not included).
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Download link:
http://www.mbrepository.com/file.php?id=2534

[Kophka]

Awesome amigo, I like maps that look like real battlefields, rather than counter strike esque house to house fighting maps. Well done!

My only gripe is that the windmill map picture is missing. It just shows the River Delta map again.

[Tai Feng]

Speaking of which, what is the reason we don't have any forest maps? Fps drop?

[Kung Fu Jesus]

One of my maps is a forest map that just got added to the rotation this past weekend. It can tax lower end systems.

[Kong Ming]

Yes, FPS drop is the main reason you can't go hog wild with foliage.  The maps are looking good Chagan, I look forward to trying them out!  Aesthetically speaking, some of your ground textures look a little repetitive.  Try breaking them up with a little layering, or else use the ground color tool to do a little color variation.  Just a thought.

EDIT:  Most noticable in Bazaar and Mirage

[Chagan_Arslan]

Yes, FPS drop is the main reason you can't go hog wild with foliage.  The maps are looking good Chagan, I look forward to trying them out!  Aesthetically speaking, some of your ground textures look a little repetitive.  Try breaking them up with a little layering, or else use the ground color tool to do a little color variation.  Just a thought.

EDIT:  Most noticable in Bazaar and Mirage

yeah ground textures looks repetitive from screenshot perspective, but from ground level it isnt so noticable ;] but yeah i might give some colors to those streets to blend it more

as for trees i heard that they can put lower-end machines at the edge.. so i think i wont be doing those

[Chagan_Arslan]

added new map "Quarry"

[panderson]

The maps look pretty sweet. 

As a cav, I am looking forward to playing on them  

My one suggestion would be to put some slight elevation changes in the maps to slow down cav.  It would be really easy to charge around on windmill and mirage as they are right now. 

[Kafein]

Feedback on "River Delta" : really one of the best maps we have on EU4, keep up the good work !

[Chagan_Arslan]

added new map "Dune"

@panderson, glad you like it, but i think that Tilting at windmills have plenty of room where cav will have problems, area with "apple trees", canal, and trees along the road, as a cav you know how hard is too kill someone circling around a tree with a lance ;]

As for mirage the point to get to oasis asap, and during the time you get there both sides are vurnable to cav attack, such conditions will propably led to cav battle first not hunting infantry running to oasis. Also on such huge open ground, cav looses element of surprise IF infantry looks around.

@kafein thanks ;]

[Toffi]

Yeah I like most of them, especially the last one "Dune".

[Erasmas]

All maps are cool for real melee battles, ranged will hate them. IMHO when you think about balance you need to take into consideration various char types. Apart from that - thumbs up.

PS - Yes, that is a xbow in my sig 

[Chagan_Arslan]

All maps are cool for real melee battles, ranged will hate them. IMHO when you think about balance you need to take into consideration various char types. Apart from that - thumbs up.

PS - Yes, that is a xbow in my sig 

yes i see you are one, but are you saying archers/crossbowmen were only usefull when they sit on a roof ? from what i remember ranged troops handled themselves quite good in battles whitout the need to go on the roofs

for me roofs and big hills/mountains on maps are negative fun factor, it always leads to people going on the highest point of the map or closest roof...

now, what i try to achive is to get those players feel "naked" ( what no place to climb on? no roof to go on ? ) and force them to use tactics, cooperate with their team, look around, respond to enemy moves rather than repeat pattern (climb shoot die)

medieval wasnt about capturing buildings, it was all about open field battles and believe it or not but all classes had their place in such enviroment
and also i made them with the idea to bring some variety and balance map rotations between open and village maps, but it seems people are used to those village maps and have hard time finding their role on such maps

[Noble Crassius]

Awesome work but mirage looks like a cav paradise, Infantry will cry tears when this map pops up. Being cav myself I can say this would be my fav map to play on  .

[Tai Feng]

yes i see you are one, but are you saying archers/crossbowmen were only usefull when they sit on a roof ? from what i remember ranged troops handled themselves quite good in battles whitout the need to go on the roofs

for me roofs and big hills/mountains on maps are negative fun factor, it always leads to people going on the highest point of the map or closest roof...

now, what i try to achive is to get those players feel "naked" ( what no place to climb on? no roof to go on ? ) and force them to use tactics, cooperate with their team, look around, respond to enemy moves rather than repeat pattern (climb shoot die)

medieval wasnt about capturing buildings, it was all about open field battles and believe it or not but all classes had their place in such enviroment

Nah.

Archers/xbowmen *are* at a disadvantage on the map such as Dune, which doesn't mean it's a bad map or the one that shouldn't be there (I like it, and I'm usually xbowman).

No amount of tactics will eliminate the fact that map favors cavalry and less other classes.

Medieval combat as any combat *was* about capturing geostrategical locations, and not random open fields. And key points were always buildings.
I am yet to see some information on how many medieval battles were fought on open field, since many keep assuming that was so. I don't believe it at all. Armies only fought where they had advantage, unless they the general was bad tactician and his decisions were emotional (example: Battle of Krbava). An army will therefore only engage the other in the open field if it considers the opponent equal in strength. If it considers itself inferior, it will try to lure the enemy into forest, or something like that. If an army has superior cavalry it will engage in the open field, if not, it will try to lure the enemy into the forest. That kind of things.

Moreover, Warband isn't Total War and does not depict large-scale warfare of any kind. It depicts exactly that - war bands. Small groups of men, who certainly did not make a shield wall in the open field but fought mostly in woods, villages, and such.



To get back to a map such as Dune - good thing is that usually classes are mixed in cRPG. Otherwise surely a cavalry based faction would win almost all the time on this map. Thats just how it is, regardless of tactics being used. Anyone who played Beta knows how Rhodok vs Swadia battles looked like. And how Khergit vs anyone else battles looked like. And we're talking about Native where crossbows shoot much faster, and archers too.