Mapmaker(s): Minister X
Number of Territories: 44
Special Features: just a large autodeploy and some strong starting neutrals to protect it plus allocated deployment via "start positions" on eight adjoining/nearby terts (see below)
What Makes This Map Worthy of Being Made: Everybody loves the human-sacrificing Aztecs! This map is simple and attractive (if I say so myself) yet presents some unique gameplay aspects. How soon will it be worth going after the Tenochtitlan tert?
Question: do I understand start positions correctly? In this game there will be eight. They are: TLT, ZOQ, NON, QUE, TIC, HUE, XOX and COL, otherwise known as all the red terts (Azteca continent) that don't start neutral. With eight players, each will get one. With seven, six will get one and one will get two. With two players, neither will get zero but otherwise it could be 7-1, 6-2, 5-3, 4-4, etc. IS THIS CORRECT?
The potentially interesting (and possibly controversial) gameplay element is the TNC (Tenochtitlan) tert and all this stuff surrounding it. A +4 autodeploy is a nice bonus: I want to make it tough to get to. Have I made it too tough or too easy? To give everyone a close-to-even chance to get to TNC I employ "start positions", where the eight non-neutral terts I've designated are subject to this rule, and I quote from the XML tutorial, "When the game begins these start positions will be split up randomly amongst the players. If there is a remainder, the territories of those start positions are dealt out in the same way as other territories." So what's it like to start in CUE versus ZOQ? You're one tert farther from TNC but you have the choice of four ways to exit CUE. ZOQ has only two exits. COL and HUI are the farthest from TNC but access other continents and are more likely to escape the cauldron of continent Azteca and be useful elsewhere.
Outside of Azteca this is just a smallish and perfectly normal map. (Exception: the Lakes continent is divided into two parts - hardly unusual.) Movement is a bit more restricted than most, but not by much. The real interest here is Azteca: will it and TNC be determinative often enough but not too often? Should I make the continent bonus larger or smaller?
BTW: Although the shape of the whole has been distorted a bit to fit onto an 800x798 map, the names and positions are historically accurate (if not comprehensive and thorough - I couldn't include every known named village). I've not shown the dike in the lake because it would only sow confusion.
Map Image:
- Click image to enlarge.
