I've been worrying that my game might be too big for my goals of a game that I can play with my gaming group in an evening. With 11 companies, it would be towards the larger side of 18xx games, although not one of the few monster games such as 18C2C or 1825 with all units in play. Even if I can streamline the system a bit (and it remains to be seen whether I can achieve that), the game might take rather longer than I'd like. Bear in mind that my companions and I aren't the fastest players.
So in a fit of either madness or inspiration, I tried hacking off some of the map, on the assumption that the corresponding companies will also be removed. Scotland has been replaced by off-board areas, as has more of East Anglia. These changes remove the NBR, Caledonian and GER. The LSWR territory has gone too. The result is noticeably smaller, with just 52 playable hexes and 7 companies.
I'm quite taken with it. It might make more sense to keep 8 companies instead of 7, so that in a 4-player game, everyone can have the chance to run 2, but I think it'll be worth experimenting with the smaller version.
Sunday 22 November 2009
Saturday 21 November 2009
More map analysis
In my last post, I mentioned that my draft map has a lot of "dot towns". I wondered how this, and other aspects of the map, compared with existing games. So one evening I wrote a table that compared certain values for 1825, 1830, 1856, 1861, 1812, 1889, 18EU and Steam Over Holland.
Starting with towns and cities, I found that the ratio of town hexes to total hexes varies from 10% (1861) to 23% (18EU). My draft map was on 38%; as I thought, it was clearly higher. For cities, the ratio in existing games varies from 15% (1861 again) to 33% (1825 Unit 2). Here my draft map was closer, with 33% equalling the highest existing game. Although it has more "big cities", which is a category that (depending on the game) includes "OO" cities named cities with higher values than the norm. Conversely, the ratio of plain hexes was far lower than the norm at 30%, compared with the 50%-75% found in existing games.
I also compared the number of town and city hexes per company in the game. Here my draft map is well within the norm, reflecting the fact that the game has more companies than many others.
I also looked at terrain. Britain Under Steam doesn't have the usual mountain and river hexes; it's more like Steam Over Holland in that it has mountain hexsides. So for both of these games, I counted the number of hexes adjacent to a mountain or river hexside and used that value. The result is 29% of the total hexes, which is squarely within the "expected" range.
Finally, I counted the number of "plain" hexes, by which I mean playable hexes that don't contain any terrain, towns or cities. At 16%, the score for my draft map is very low, matched only by the terrain-heavy (and smaller) maps for 1889 and 1825 Unit 2.
Based on this information, I plan to review each town on the map to see whether it would work better as a plain hex. Some of them represent genuinely important towns that it would not make sense to remove. Others may need to remain towns so that the tile upgrade path is appropriate for that location. But there should be some that I can remove.
To complicate matters, I may also be downgrading some of the cities, which will of course increase the number of towns again! I may well end up with more populated hexes than the average game. I don't see that as necessarily a problem, provided that they are all justified (and that the game plays well, of course!).
Starting with towns and cities, I found that the ratio of town hexes to total hexes varies from 10% (1861) to 23% (18EU). My draft map was on 38%; as I thought, it was clearly higher. For cities, the ratio in existing games varies from 15% (1861 again) to 33% (1825 Unit 2). Here my draft map was closer, with 33% equalling the highest existing game. Although it has more "big cities", which is a category that (depending on the game) includes "OO" cities named cities with higher values than the norm. Conversely, the ratio of plain hexes was far lower than the norm at 30%, compared with the 50%-75% found in existing games.
I also compared the number of town and city hexes per company in the game. Here my draft map is well within the norm, reflecting the fact that the game has more companies than many others.
I also looked at terrain. Britain Under Steam doesn't have the usual mountain and river hexes; it's more like Steam Over Holland in that it has mountain hexsides. So for both of these games, I counted the number of hexes adjacent to a mountain or river hexside and used that value. The result is 29% of the total hexes, which is squarely within the "expected" range.
Finally, I counted the number of "plain" hexes, by which I mean playable hexes that don't contain any terrain, towns or cities. At 16%, the score for my draft map is very low, matched only by the terrain-heavy (and smaller) maps for 1889 and 1825 Unit 2.
Based on this information, I plan to review each town on the map to see whether it would work better as a plain hex. Some of them represent genuinely important towns that it would not make sense to remove. Others may need to remain towns so that the tile upgrade path is appropriate for that location. But there should be some that I can remove.
To complicate matters, I may also be downgrading some of the cities, which will of course increase the number of towns again! I may well end up with more populated hexes than the average game. I don't see that as necessarily a problem, provided that they are all justified (and that the game plays well, of course!).
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