If your map includes one of the following feautres it is cancer:
1 territory: 1 income bonuses
bonuses have similar income:territory ratio
bonuses are similar size
bonuses within bonuses
territories have the same number of connections
few choke points
large variations in territory size
long connections over water

Behold the one true europe and its adherance to the rules of noncancer:

and behold cancer europe in its many guises





for shame.

Edited 7/22/2015 15:58:08

There is no Europe but Europe; dead piggy is the prophet of Europe.

Edited 7/22/2015 16:14:09

I am Europe thy Europe map
Thou shalt not have other Europe maps before me
Thou shalt not take the name of Europe, thy Europe map in vain
Remember the day Europe went public and keep it holy
Honor thy teammate and opponent
Thou shalt not boot
Thou shalt not surrender early
Thou shalt not pick outside Island, Central and Russia
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy teammate
Thou shalt not covet thy opponents teammate

Amen

So Large Earth is Cancer (Caucasus)

This topic brings memories from a great song:

"He had a lot to say
He had a lot of nothing to say
We'll miss him"

"Come down
Get off your f***ing cross
We need the f***ing space to nail the next fool martyr"

Really? Every day I open a forum someone from "PRO" clan member makes fool out of himself. I even feel sorry for the Falcon Clan thing on off-topic - at least they show who they are, rather than disguise their stupidity and ignorance.

You may be a great player, but obviously a mental one. Go play your glorified Europe map 10 000 times and forget all other options of the particular game. Different setting and map combinations.

And thank you Professor of Ignorance for spamming the General Forum with your folly. Seems it is the High-ranked ladder privileges.

Am beginning to doubt that are any decent-reasonable clans at all! Only Trolls, nolifers and just fools! It seems that even 13-year old kids forum is more sophisticated than this one. I propose to close down this forum once and for all - so new players would not leave after reading this c*** here.

^ I have a feeling that Tampona's picture (specifically the quote on it) is extremely relevant here.

ALL GLORY TO THE ONE TRUE EUROPE MAP!

The Cardinals should elect a new Pope of Europe map.

The thing is that the current Europe map is the only one that doesn't make for boring or overly imbalanced 3v3's. The cancer symptoms piggy described are all pretty important for an interesting/playable/good map to not have. The issue is that these cancer symptoms are also standard rules that people obey when making maps because they don't know any better and because they're already way too common.

Edited 7/22/2015 19:15:27

long connections over water


The actuall length of the Icelandic connection routes is unrealistic.

^ I thought that too, and then I figured he might've been referring to connections that skip territories in the middle. Like the weird ones in some Europe maps where you connect a corner of Spain with a corner of France, or in the maps where some territories are "ports" and connected to territories that are far away, skipping closer territories in the process.

From Piggy

If your map includes one of the following feautres it is cancer:
1 territory: 1 income bonuses
bonuses have similar income:territory ratio
bonuses are similar size
bonuses within bonuses
territories have the same number of connections
few choke points
large variations in territory size
long connections over water

Behold the one true europe and its adherance to the rules of noncancer:

From Knyte

"The thing is that the current Europe map is the only one that doesn't make for boring or overly imbalanced 3v3's. The cancer symptoms piggy described are all pretty important for an interesting/playable/good map to not have. The issue is that these cancer symptoms are also standard rules that people obey when making maps because they don't know any better and because they're already way too common."

Correct me if I understand wrong! First of all I am not saying the Standard Europe is bad! I like it, a lot people play it and it has definitely strategic value - as a lot players take it seriously, they have analyzed in depth. I have not played other maps so my evaluation might be biased. After all I do not like those maps, so I wont even bother with them. The standard Europe is definitely easy to understand, not overlayed bonuses like others have. But!

Basically every map can be imbalanced with poor settings. I would not call all of them cancer settings. (Leaving out the other Europe maps as they seem poor to me as well)
- 1 Territory, 1 income bonus! - Nothing wrong with it. That it does not fit for "standard gameplay" does not make it un-strategic or cancer with other settings.
- Similar Bonuse/territory ratio - Like wtf? If one makes similar ratio map (presume same borders and other balance functions) it is cancer? Greatest bias I have heard.
- Bonuses within bonuses - I tend to agree over all. But I would not claim it to always be like that. Take for example Jerusalem map - the tower-castle or whatever it is called insude bonus and walls. Works fine and creates different strategic value.
- Similar size? Cant even understand what he/she means? Like if they are same size in physical terms on screen, so they would create good view of map and distance? It is bad? Or i understand it wrong? I assume he/she means Bonus/territory ratio. Same critique as second one!
- Few choke points. I have learned to call those "Bottlenecks". They are create strategic element. But it is not must have in good map! So many different playstyles-Templates-game-modes that do not need them and would de-value the overall functionality of it.
- Same Nr. of connecting territories - again! It is not one-way-street. How cant he/she look the broader picture.
- Long connections over water - Generally, yes bad, as it distorts the image and understanding of map-territory distance. But again it can balance the map by creating a circular movement option to eliminate the map border-value due to fact being in corner and better protected.

What I am trying to say is how come such a high-ranked ladder player (not saying I am better - I am a rookie here) would think that there is only one way to play this game. After all has not the developer given such a broad setting options for us to play with them and suit for our game-play? Why preach about your personal style and call it superior? It leaves, at least to me, rather bad image of oneself. I would have imagined such player to have higher reasoning skills. Even random order has its strategic effect if used with right map-template. Every above mentioned factor of a map gives a Host option to create different style-strategy and gameplay. Calling one of maps - which would be really unbalanced with wrong settings to be superior seems not adequate.

Well so there's two core issues with the things piggy's calling out:

- Some things (like perfectly consistent ratios) make the map bland and uninteresting. Not all 2's should be equal. You should be forced to make trade-offs frequently- because that's what's needed for strategy. It's not because it's not standard/widely done (on the contrary, most maps display at least one of these cancer symptoms); it's because it makes a potentially interesting game rather bland/vanilla and takes out the basis for strategy in many cases. You shouldn't be able to classify bonuses that easily- i.e., "All 2's are the same" but instead have somewhat unique advantages/disadvantages to each decision, because that's what requires you think, calculate, and strategize.

- Others (like weird long-distance connections, 1 territory bonuses, bonuses within bonuses/superbonuses) are imbalancing and again, make decisions in the game too easy instead of presenting interesting tradeoffs and allowing for different strategies to flourish. "Should I start here or there?" "Well the second place is way more OP. Start there."

Basically, the cancer symptoms all limit strategic decision-making in some way, leading to uninteresting games.

That said, there probably are exceptions. Superbonuses don't always ruin maps, for example. But I don't think piggy made this post in perfect seriousness; he just seems to be vocalizing the common (among strategic players) view that no map so far has come close to matching Europe.

Edited 7/22/2015 20:23:54

You want some really f***ed up cancer? Try this one out for size. I give you....

God. before this, I thought my first (abandoned) map was the worst possible thing out there.

"Why preach about your personal style and call it superior?"

Its entertaining. Its a rhetoric device to establish voice. It stimulates conversation and hopefullly some of these objections will resonate because they evoke an emotional response. And when you come to make a map you will smile to yourself and think "no i wont connect southern france and scotland, not today" and the world will be a better place.

Filling my post with equivocations and qualifiers makes it boring. I like snappy posts. I rate yours a 3/10 it could easily have just been the one sentence i quoted.

Edited 7/22/2015 20:48:03

Well in this case either Piggys or overall Warlight communities definitions of Strategy is rather narrow.

- "Some things (like perfectly consistent ratios) make the map bland and uninteresting." Yes and again absolutely no as well. For many reasons. It looses trade-offs and value of certain territories, but will raise the value of position of territory - place to expand or counter opponent. In team games higher emphasis on positioning so everyone would fight and have expansion area and so on. Strategic factors a lot if carefully thought over. Trade off are not necessary for Strategy it is just one and sole-one ability to show strategy. I can rather find arguments against unique advantage/disadvantage as it reduces strategy by creating unbalance due to factor of First-Pick - unless you want to place all strategy in picking phase.

- Again Trade-offs are just one variable amongs many. Not required for interesting game. Long-distance connections do not make decisions easy! They make it harder due to fact you have more possibilities and you must calculate more your moves.

- Rather the OP is limit to strategic decision making. And these are not exception, unless there exists a written-down guide to standard game, which is claimed to be TRUE and other false - leaving out ladder at moment from discussion.

- Strategy lies on the system you create. Starting with Map (and its options-functions-variables) linked with optional-settings. It does not come down to few factors mentioned above and OP. Yes you can limit and broaden it by offering or reducing. I mean make it complex or easier to understand in sense of what effect it has for example using 1 card or all cards. But saying that No-Card game is less strategic is absurd.

https://www.warlight.net/wiki/Map_guidelines

"One property of a great map is that players can tell at a glance, without doing an analysis, approximately how many turns it takes to get from one territory to another. For example, on the Earth map, all territories are approximately the same size, and all connections between territories over water happen between territories that are relatively close to begin with. Long connections make it harder to spatially visualize the map layout. A similar effect can happen when territories are drastically uneven in size"

You're wrong the Ottoman map is much better.