[Abandoned] - Vietnam

[kengyin]

some random factoids

-i drew the landing crafts by hand, its not copy and pasted
-the ho chi minh trail is direct copy and paste but i scaled and rotated and shifted until it went to the right territories
-the planes are actually f4 phantoms which arent bombers but they are so recognisable and much more realistic than pixelated bombers
-the territory borders are drawn with 9 pixel fuzzy brush at 0.30 using stroke
-there are the same number of territories in both north and south vietnam
-5+5+4+4+4+5+5+3=35 which is also the number of layers, 3+5=8 which is the number of bonus regions
-i think red river delta is the hardest region to hold

[natty dread]

Really nice! It's a huge improvement.

At this point, though... it would be better to work on the large image. It will be much easier to create the small image from the large than the other way around.

Fortunately, at this point you can still scale up pretty easily... first scale the image to the large map size, then all you need to do is re-stroke the borders.

[League]

wow that looks really good! Nice touch with the F4's. Historically correct.

[kengyin]

you know, i dont think it even looks like it needs restroking, the borders are quite smooth. its mainly just the copy and pasted stuff thats blurry, which i can sharpen.

[murdocho]

Looks good. Personally I'd write new text for the objective this time

[kengyin]

Current Version

v8.0
-added texture to the land area
-added gradient overlay to the image
-changed the ho chi minh trail back to flowing red lines
-changed the bomber and landing craft and arrows and lines graphics
-changed the mountains graphics
-changed the text font to sans
-changed bonus names and numbers font to capture it
-rearranged the impassables display and included note about bridges
-took out one way attacks from carrier to landing craft
-bombers now all attack each other and carrier
-changed position of one HCMT area to between ha tinh and the meeting point of the 2 lines to north vietnam
-uss enterprise now has decay of 2
-added subtle colour differences between the 3 bombardments to help differentiate


thats all i can think of for now i think

[natty dread]

You should re-stroke those borders... at least the ones around the bonus areas. Perhaps make them slightly thinner...

[kengyin]

Current Version

v8.1
-made the bonus borders thinner
-gave the rivers and sea some texture
-gave the computer screens some texture also but a lot less depth


well that previous version lasted just over half a day with only one comment between versions too. i gave the sea and computer screens some texture because they looked a bit too flat

[natty dread]

The HCMT looks blurry.. I think you need to redraw it.

[Riskismy]

corrected your typo for you yes that does seem fair to me

No typo. I read that as a +1 bonus.
Glad I was wrong. Simply couldn't get why you didn't see my point.

[kengyin]

v8.2
-made the HCMT one single colour
-put borders around HCMT
-added signature

[kengyin]

Current Version

v8.3
-made the rivers part of the sea layer rather than own layer
-added drop shadow for the playable land areas


man, i am seriously getting thinner and thinner on my updates, its quite hard to have major changes when only 2 people comment on your map. i know you said it is the journey not the destination that matters, however it does give good encouragement knowing that you have moved on because right now it feels as if only a few people care about this and thus it is very stagnant. i understand your point that it doesnt matter where you are you can still develop the map but i should tell you that i often feel ignored in real life too so i am often low on morale, something as simple as being moved (not that you have that power, but just so you understand why i wish to be moved) to gameplay would really help quite a bit

[natty dread]

Don't feel bad about it. Lots of times there's very scarce feedback to be had... people have jobs & other RL commitments, and also not so many people visit the foundry... you're doing good, just keep at it. You'll get used to the workflow.

Have you submitted a design brief? I think your map is starting to be in a state where a review for a draft stamp might be a possibility.

Your latest changes are good ones. I would consider maybe extending the drop shadow to all land area. Perhaps also increasing the distance of the shadow from the land just slightly.

Also, the fighter jets and the landing crafts look slightly blurry. Perhaps you can try enhancing those somewhat.

For the gameplay side... I have some concern over the southern part. It seems really choked, there's not many options for movement from the southern end... I would advise adding some sea routes. Perhaps one that connects Quang Nam, Ninh Thuan and Ca Mau?

[kengyin]

good suggestions, thanks

[Riskismy]

For the gameplay side... I have some concern over the southern part. It seems really choked, there's not many options for movement from the southern end... I would advise adding some sea routes. Perhaps one that connects Quang Nam, Ninh Thuan and Ca Mau?

`

I agree. Perhaps a few planes/airports could open up the map a bit between north and south.

[kengyin]

well they were at war with each other so i dont think they wanted to open up airports to each other...

[kengyin]

Current Version

v8.4
-added sea connections from ca mau to binh thuan and ninh thuan to quang nam
-put bridges and dmz under the texture
-sharpened the bombers and landing craft a bit
-made drop shadow encompass all land area
-shifted drop shadow down and right a bit

[kengyin]

i was just looking around to see if i could improve my legends and came across this



i thought that type of top secret document files type thing might work well since with the texture of the map it looks more like those maps on the wrinkled paper rather than something digital which is what my current legend displays are (and even thats not realistic), also since there are tabs on it i can keep the text on the side still (the vertical text).

[Riskismy]

well they were at war with each other so i dont think they wanted to open up airports to each other...

Yeah, thanks for ignoring my point on some irrelevancy. As far as I know they flew in airborne cavalry in choppers.

In any case, do I understand it right that the only path to Enterprise is from Da Nang?
That seems like a bottleneck to me that doesn't make up for the access that HCMT provides from north to south. How about making the new sea routes go to Enterprise as well/instead?

[whitestazn88]

"well done on your victory in korea" is a massive stretch of historical accuracy, but whatever

[kengyin]

well they were at war with each other so i dont think they wanted to open up airports to each other...

Yeah, thanks for ignoring my point on some irrelevancy. As far as I know they flew in airborne cavalry in choppers.

In any case, do I understand it right that the only path to Enterprise is from Da Nang?
That seems like a bottleneck to me that doesn't make up for the access that HCMT provides from north to south. How about making the new sea routes go to Enterprise as well/instead?

i could include a helicopter option but im not sure if i have enough room in the territories or in the legend in order to fit it in. if i did i could have a helicopter ship connecting to the enterprise and quang nam with just H symbols in random north vietnam territories. but because this is a major gameplay thing that wasnt in my small version i dont think i could make space for it in the small version.
i could change the sea routes to 3 way attack between enterprise, quang ngai (currently quang nam is attacked by 5 different territories a bit too much) and ninh thuan though, but im not yet sure if that is better or worse for the gameplay.
this is finally a major issue which i neither fully agree nor disagree and would like some more opinions on this matter.

"well done on your victory in korea" is a massive stretch of historical accuracy, but whatever

its called propaganda, who knows how many statements out there are bent and exagerated

[kengyin]

oh by the way, if this thing gets quenched then i will by premium as a reward

[natty dread]

oh by the way, if this thing gets quenched then i will by premium as a reward

If this thing gets quenched you won't need to

[kengyin]

Current Version

v9.0
-added drop shadow to HCMT
-ditched drop shadow for connecting lines
-added helicopter assault from helipad to helicopter targets, changed legend accordingly
-changed sea connections to uss enterprise-quang ngai-ninh thuan 3 way connection
-added specified territory names for HCMT legend


so basically the helicopter assault gives south vietnam 2 more ways into the north since before there was only 2 before and they were killer neutrals. its kind of a 3 tier assault pattern, theres the landing craft landing on the coastal territories (the beaches), then the bombers bombing the important cities inland, then the helicopters landing further deep inside enemy lines to infiltrate the enemy.

[Riskismy]

I think this open it up a lot. Thanks for considering my suggestion!

Here's another: Maybe there's a point to giving a bonus for holding some combination of enterprise and/or bombers?