Well with the way things went I managed to find some time last week to get cracking on the redraw. Followed up with some weekend time and finished off with a few hours yesterday. It is in the OP for all to see! The interest shown by several players in other parts of the site helped spur on this tranche of work. Thanks for the encouraging words.
The changes that were deemed necessary to apply to the map were made apparent during the first game and were written up in the AAR here.
Main changes:
- New territory and home supply centre for Spain - Canary Islands
- Major reskin
- Boundary change in Russia, Germany and Italy
- New territories added in Central Africa
- Additional production supply centres added to the map for the smaller powers
- Merge of Zahedan and Birjand into 1 territory - Zahedan
- Removed Lebanon
- Removed Sudan and Czechia as supply centres, added Congo, Austria and Slovakia
- Better visualisation of land bridges
- A few name changes
- It got bigger. A few pixels wider and around 300px taller
- Change in victory conditions
Canary Islands
A major change. This is a new supply centre on the map and a new starting home supply centre for Spain. Spain was considered to be too weak and this will hopefully change that. It also gives Spain a more vested interest in Africa which I hope will excite the goings on there. While it is an island on the map the Canary Islands are seen as an extension of the African mainland for purposes of army movement. An army in Canary Islands may move to Morocco or Western Sahara without a convoy, and an army in either of those territories may similarly move to Canary Islands. Additionally, a fleet is not restricted in any way by the Canary Islands. A fleet in Morocco may still move to Western Sahara and vice versa, or may move to Canary Islands. A fleet may also convoy an army through the Canary Islands. E.g. A fleet in MAO and a fleet in CAN may convoy an army from SVE to WSA.
Reskin
The main part of the reskin was to trace the real maps of the world properly. The last map was draw freehand and this has now been traced from other maps. I have also added some cosmetic improvements such as the lakes in Russia which form part of the White Sea canal, and islands such as Cyprus, Cape Verde and Socotra. This reskin is what took most of the time.
The reskin has been done in GIMP. If any other GM's would like a copy of the map please PM me and I'll be happy to provide it.
Boundary changes in Germany and Italy
France was considered too weak in the first game. I felt it came down to a lack of starting options. It was a little less straightforward than Spain's problem. To overcome this one the territories in Germany and Italy have been tweaked slightly to "point" them more to the east. A new territory has been added in Germany - Baden-Württemberg. It is to the west of Munich and thus Munich no longer borders Switzerland, which has a knock on effect of preventing Munich from being able to capture Belgium in the opening year. A territory has been removed in Italy - Apulia. This means that Naples now borders the Adriatic Sea and Venice. To compliment this change Italy's starting units will be switched around. They will now start with a fleet in Venice and Naples and an army in Rome and Milan. These two changes are aiming to ensure that France's starting options are greater. France can almost definitely take Switzerland now and also can almost definitely take Belgium. With a modest amount of diplomacy France should have little difficulty in starting the game with a good opener.
Boundary change in Russia
Irkutsk has been replaced by Ufa and has also moved 1 node to the west. It is now slightly closer to the action in Europe. A new territory has been added between St. Petersburg and Murmansk - Karelia. There was a bit of a stalemate up there towards the end of the last game and this is aiming to solve that.
New territories added in central Africa - Gabon, Congo, Uganda
From the first game a clear impregnable stalemate was created in Africa with relatively few units. Obviously with enough units you can create a stalemate anywhere but these new 3 territories will make it that bit harder to create one in Africa.
Additional production supply centres for the smaller powers
To prevent too much disparity between the larger powers and the smaller powers later in the game, all those countries with only 3 home supply centres - and Britain - have been given an additional production supply centre which once captured they can build units in. All powers now have 4 or 5 supply centres from where they can build units. They are indicated on the map by the coloured dots. But for full clarification: Britain has Ireland, East Africa has Somalia, Egypt has Israel, Poland has Lithuania and Ukraine has Sevastopol. Britain has been given Ireland as a production centre as it will likely lose Gibraltar. Spain now has the Canary Islands and does not need an additional production supply centre.
Merge of Zahedan and Birhand into just Zahedan
Birjand was superfluous to the board. It didn't help Iran or hurt Iran in any tangible way and has been removed. Zahedan now borders Turkmenistan.
Removed Lebanon
Again, it didn't do anything. Throughout the entire 16 year first game not 1 power entered the territory. It was also hard to add with the new trace as Lebanon is a tiny country, and with Israel already being distorted the entire region ended up looking weird to accommodate this territory. Thus it was removed.
Removed Sudan as a supply centre, added Congo
Sudan has been removed as a supply centre and Congo has been added as a supply centre. I felt that having Sudan as a supply centre was forcing E. Africa and Egypt into war with one another from the get go. This now presents diplomatic options over the centres in central Africa and Saudi Arabia. While they may still go to war early on there is the option to not do so.
Removed Czechia as a supply centre, added Austria and Slovakia
Poland already suffers from having Belarus on it's border which both Ukraine and Russia also border. With the adjustment of German centres Munich now borders Czechia. To prevent Poland having the same situation on both sides, the supply centre in Czechia has been removed and two new supply centres added: Austria and Slovakia. This is primarily to ensure Poland has greater starting options but also there to entice Germany further into the extended Balkan region and thus helping France as well. The extended Balkan region now has 9 supply centres to grab.
Better visualisation of land bridges
I was asked several times during the first game whether x and y were connected by a land bridge. If you can't see the new bright red arrows indicating the land bridges I will facepalm very hard before politely asking you to look for the bright red arrows.
A few name changes
Szczecin has changed to Pomerania as no one seemed to know what Szc stood for (and didn't check the list of abbreviations). Pomerania is better known and really fits the naming structure better anyway.
Czech Republic has changed to Czechia as per their new name.
Irkutsk has changed to Ufa to more correctly represent the geography of the world.
Got slightly bigger
To reskin this so it looks proper I had to enlarge the map. Mostly on the vertical axis (just 23px on the horizontal). I know that this map was large already but to fix the skewed countries I needed to do this. I hope this does not put any players off. Given that most of the extension is on the vertical I am hopeful it won't!
Change in victory conditions
The victory conditions have been reduced to 40 centres, a little below half. The full update to these rules can be found in the OP.
Next run
I won't be running this till at least September. However, if you would like to play this map please do say something and I will reserve you a spot (provided you have at least 1 forum game under your belt). To the players who have already mentioned something and what encouraged me to get this finished I have already reserved spots for you. All players with reserved spots will of course need to confirm participation when I do run the game later this year.
