Has anybody ever tried a ETO MA?

[Spikes]

All I can say is this map looks awesome and I can't wait to see it in rotation.

[oboe]

We can work these issues, I believe. While it will never be perfectly balanced it can be improved on.

As a point of reference, the City for each country is represented in a geographical location. The Red City is located generally where London would be, the Green City is located generally where Berlin would be, and the Blue City is located generally where Rome would be. I believe these need to stay as they are.

The other Strat facilities can be moved as needed to balance the accessibility.

I think one of the strong points of this map, is the uniqueness of each country. No two are the exactly the same. Each has strong points and weak points, very much like the ETO was in WW2.

Totally agree on the static current locations of each City - very important to have the locations of London, Rome, Berlin on this map (as well as the refinery at Ploesti in Romania).   And also agree, it will never be perfect, and the differences due to geography are part of the map's character.

For MA gameplay, you may need to fill in some gaps where bases are remote - e.g. the Eastern Med may need some additional island bases - perhaps stick one on Malta, and/or the Isle of Rhodes at 14.6.7.    I think it would be acceptable to increase the size of these small islands somewhat if even a small airfield seems too large to place on them.   What's important here is the historicalk significance of the island base (Malta) as well as evening out base density in the empty areas.

Like Spikes I am really looking forward to seeing this map in the rotation.  Thanks for letting us watch and comment on your progress!

[JimmyD3]

Converted a base from each country to a small airbase, with maproom. Moved Dar strats for the Red and Blue countries to try and even them out some what. Still checking each base for elevations, aircraft launches, gv access at each spawn, checking terrain to insure not to many trees etc. Check out a135, A144, and A154.

[JimmyD3]

Down to just the V-bases to check now, we are getting closer. What is the opinion of adding that third BB group? Do we need more Ports with cv/bb groups?

To me the spawns look a little hectic/busy, any comments?

I hope to Up load the map, first draft, within the next week. 

[oboe]

I like seeing BB groups but 2 is probably sufficient given the smaller size of the waterways on this map.  With 3 CV groups, that's 5 fleets for each country.

I would really like to see a BB Group based at Taranto (P71).  Can you associate B104 with P71 instead of P75?   Taranto is where the Italian capital ships were berthed and where the British staged a daring torpedo plane attack that successfully crippled the Italian fleet.

I agree the spawns look hectic/busy.   I have seen other maps (can't recall which one offhand) which limit spawns to only nearby bases, but I don't know which strategy is best for online arena play.   My guess is more spawns would make the map harder to flip?  But it does seem like at least a few of the crossing spawns could be removed, esp. ones that are more than 1 sector in length.  You might also remove spawns into strats - I don't know if they are worth it.   Seems like they would be used as pesky vehicle strat raids more often than they would be used as vehicle resupply route for the strat.

You've got some Vbases without any spawns at all - V147, V148, V158, V159, V155, is this an oversight?  Seems to me every VBase should have at least one spawn out, and one spawn in.

I suppose that VBases should have more spawns than airfields - since this is the way Vbases project their power on the map.  Airfields should primarily project their power through airplanes, not vehicle spawns (my thoughts only, ymmv).

Its looking great JimmyD3!   Very excited at the prospect of this map coming to the MA!

[Spikes]

I think it looks great. What is the process to update maps once they are submitted? I'm just thinking...let it go and get some data once it's been in the game for a few rotations, get player feedback, and make some changes (if it's easy enough to do).

[JimmyD3]

I like seeing BB groups but 2 is probably sufficient given the smaller size of the waterways on this map.  With 3 CV groups, that's 5 fleets for each country.

I would really like to see a BB Group based at Taranto (P71).  Can you associate B104 with P71 instead of P75?   Taranto is where the Italian capital ships were berthed and where the British staged a daring torpedo plane attack that successfully crippled the Italian fleet. This is no problem, will try to get it done this weekend.

I agree the spawns look hectic/busy.   I have seen other maps (can't recall which one offhand) which limit spawns to only nearby bases, but I don't know which strategy is best for online arena play.   My guess is more spawns would make the map harder to flip?  But it does seem like at least a few of the crossing spawns could be removed, esp. ones that are more than 1 sector in length.  You might also remove spawns into strats - I don't know if they are worth it.   Seems like they would be used as pesky vehicle strat raids more often than they would be used as vehicle resupply route for the strat.
They just appear to be to disorganized I guess is the word I'm looking for lol. As to the strat spawns, I believe they are essential, a lot of the new players get their initial perk points from resupping. Currently there are no cross country Vbase spawns.

You've got some Vbases without any spawns at all - V147, V148, V158, V159, V155, is this an oversight?  Seems to me every VBase should have at least one spawn out, and one spawn in. Yeah I am working those as we speak. Was trying to set them up for support/Re-supple purposes, may have to  rethink that.

I suppose that VBases should have more spawns than airfields - since this is the way Vbases project their power on the map.  Airfields should primarily project their power through airplanes, not vehicle spawns (my thoughts only, ymmv).

Its looking great JimmyD3!   Very excited at the prospect of this map coming to the MA!

I'm still having a blast, still have about 3 v bases to verify, then I'm going to take a hard look at the spawns. See if I can't redesign something that is still functional but cleaner. I'll keep you all posted. 

[JimmyD3]

I think it looks great. What is the process to update maps once they are submitted? I'm just thinking...let it go and get some data once it's been in the game for a few rotations, get player feedback, and make some changes (if it's easy enough to do).

As I understand it, Once they are in rotation, they are pretty much fixed. However I plan to upload the map to allow review, before we submit it to Hitech. That should be the opportunity for others to review the map and provide their feedback. Now if Hitech is willing to allow updates, I have no problem with updating the map. We'll just have to play that by ear I guess.

[JimmyD3]

Here is the latest revision. Need to go back and review the spawns

[Spikes]

As I understand it, Once they are in rotation, they are pretty much fixed. However I plan to upload the map to allow review, before we submit it to Hitech. That should be the opportunity for others to review the map and provide their feedback. Now if Hitech is willing to allow updates, I have no problem with updating the map. We'll just have to play that by ear I guess.

Gotcha, I was not sure how that works. It may be something to ask him when you're ready for him to review/submit. I would imagine if there ended up being a glaring problem or advantage and an easy solution, hopefully he'd be willing to update it.

[oboe]

Jimmy, do you have a set of guidelines you use when creating the spawns?   For example, the number of spawns based on a field type, i.e. VBases have 3 spawns - one spawn in and two spawns out, small AFs, one spawn in and one spawn out, Medium and Large AFs, 4 spawns, etc.   Anything like that?   I'm just wondering how its done, what the rationale is for placement, etc.    I have this idea that spawn placement can make or break the playability of a map, but I don't have enough of an understanding of overall MA strategies to know what kind of spawn arrangements tend to work best.

My observations on the current spawn placement:

One concern I see right away is the large AF Red 22 in Spain - it is 1/2 sector away from blue VBase V159, which has a direct spawn into the Blue Ammo Strat on the island of Sardinia in the Med.   So at the beginning of War, the Red country is only one base capture away from threatening ground assaults of a Blue strat.   It may be better to have rear area bases, or large centrally-located bases, spawning into Strat locations, rather than front line bases?  (This is a good example of a potential spawn placement guideline I was wondering about above).

Another thing that looks unusual to me is the mutual supporting spawns between the Red Vbases in southern Norway (V139) and V136 in eastern Germany (Cologne?).   It just doesn't look realistic to me that two Vbases separated by this distance, with intervening bases between them, would support each other in this way.   Just my impression, for what it's worth.

I might also suggest that front line Vbases should open avenues of ground attack into enemy territory, so for example the Blue Vbases V155 and V159 in Spain should have spawns supporting ground assaults against the closest Red bases, and likewise for the Red Vbases (V138 and V140) in Spain - they should have spawns into the nearest Blue bases?

I'm very excited about the spawn arrangement in North Africa (apart from a front line base, Blue A94, with a spawn into a Strat).   It looks to me like it will encourage the kind of back and forth base-hopping assaults that were characteristic of the ground war in North Africa.

<S> for all your hard work on this terrain! 

[JimmyD3]

Oboe, I generally view spawn setups as follows: Every base needs 2 spawns in, with no more than 4 spawns out. Limiting spawn outs bases on air field size might be workable. I have been redoing the spawns, trying to clean them up, eliminate long distance spawns (V139/V136). I will post a new updated map of what I have done so far, later today.

I had been trying to keep the v-base separated from the enemy bases, and utilize them more for support and resupping. Remember any airfield has a VH to allow gv attacks cross country. That is  not however set in concrete.

I will go back and review the strat locations again, we don't want another Buzzsaw strat attack right off the bat.

[JimmyD3]

Here is the latest map with spawn updates as well.

We could change a few bases around for gv cross country spawns. Change A106 to a vbase, and 2 way spawns to v136. Change A24 to a vbase with 2 way spawns to V155. Finally install 2 way spawns between V151 and V146.

[oboe]

I was curious about where the bases are located in the real world, so I built a political map overlay.  I couldn't find a matching map projection, so I had to piece the map together with lots of skewing, warps, distorting, etc - but I think its close enough for my purposes.  I've added yellow dotted line international borders, and reduced the opacity enough so you can still see the bases, and which city/towns and countries they may represent.

I'm REALLY looking forward to this map.  Could be the best addition to AH this year for those who like WWII history and bombing raids.  I think Kenai has built in interesting spawn arrangements for exciting game play, and Switzerland is sortof reserved for tank-town type battles.   


 

[JimmyD3]

Very interesting Oboe, seems we did manage to get things close.