A popular theory for how the earth was made involves it being at one point being molten. Putting this as the setting for a map is my idea for a map, which if done right could look totally wicked. The game play would go something along these lines:
The cooling continents (or pangea, whichever) are the bonus areas, and the rest of the earth is molten (auto-decay territs). Each player starts out with two territs, one on the main mass of connected continents, and one which consists of one of 8 islands around the board. If a player loses his island, the player is eliminated, thus providing diverse strategies for either gathering lots of bonuses, or maybe just taking one and then striking out for another player's island.
Some details on the islands: Islands are auto-decay: they are kept at one troop, but they are protected by some decent sized neutrals, along with the auto-decay that occurs once a player takes the territ.
Now, I'm not sure what the background for this map would be: who are the troops representing; what is the importance of the islands? Perhaps the troops represent some early life forms (bacteria?) that are isolated on their own island, and are now trying to spread to the main lands so as to spread their species. (please note that I am not endorsing evolution with this map, I am in fact against evolution, but that doesn't mean all life got here at the same time)
With this map having cooling continents, some may argue that the earth was covered in water first, and therefor this map doesn't work; with this map, we can either a. ignore that and realize that it's a cool map even if it isn't totally correct, or b. just use that fact to give more freedom in creating what the continents look like.
In creating this map, if people show interest, I'm going to need someone to take over graphics.
