Is there a standard format or preferred protocol for drawing a new map? Is it possible to draw a map and have it serve any purpose without the requisite programming knowledge to back it up? I will draw a map that illustrates my idea. I might very well have no idea what I am talking about. I never claimed to be anything other than a guy that likes to play diplomacy and talk about and think about diplomacy.

Getting riled up about anything said on the internet is kinda nuts. Especially when it is an esoteric discussion about a game. People say stupid things in the world all the time. If any of us get upset when an idiot speaks we will likely be upset a great deal.

Besides, the wings don't actually go on the car, it goes on the propeller that is on the car. Everyone knows that.

I am just so goddamn angry at the points ScubaSteve just made.
And keep your freakin' helicopter car off my lawn! You chopped my poodle to ribbons last time you came over... That was a very sad day for my grandma.

Steve, post any kind of map that shows your ideas, I also have no idea how to format things but a picture is worth a billion words! Show us the ideas and frankly, sometimes an idea in your head doesn't look so good when "on paper" and some bad ideas work better than you thought, seeing it is what is required!
Please do post it!!!!

and helicopter cars are just stupid! Those rotors might hurt someone, but my airplane car, strap some wings on me baby!

Mr. Tom, The sea lanes concept, while it may come across as confusing, is actually quite simple. There are the 'greater' sea spaces, as they are normally. Then, within each of those spaces, there are sub-spaces which are connected to the sub-spaces touching them in their own and other oceans (as if it were a lot of small oceans) as well as to the greater ocean which they are in. You can move between sub-oceans, between greater oceans, or between a sub-ocean and a greater-ocean. You can still move about the greater oceans quickly as if there were no sea lanes, but the sea lanes enable far more fleets to go about, and make fleet stalemates quite difficult.

Not a fan, I'm not saying it wouldn't work, this idea most certainly would work as I understand it, but I still can't get over the need for something so drastic. I also don't like the changed strategy it forces upon all, while it helps vs stalemates, it hurts those blocking others from movement, can harm convoys, not to mention the confusion factor. The game is also not fleet heavy, adding these zones is nothing but a late game "fix" for something that really is not broken. Why not add these to land spaces as well? Honestly, why not?

Do you have a problem with a stalemate in a standard game? Those games that end up with two huge powers usually stalemate (on land) why is this game supposed to be different? BIG powers that arise at the same time simply stalemate with each other, some mapping errors that make a stalemate easy should of course be fixed, we do not want to encourage them by any means, but to kill them at any cost is just wrong. Those who want to claim they don't belong in the game are simply wrong. A nations should be able to attempt a stalemate in the right situation, it's part of the standard game, it should be part of this game. It was pointed out that the Hudson Bay has seen several such stalemates, well, there you go, a space that needs to be redrawn (and has if you see the new ideas posted). But to act so drastically to ELIMINATE part of the game simply because you don't like it in the later stages, that's like taking the standard game and splitting the black sea in two because you don't like early bounces. You don't like divorce so you do away with women. Over reaction in my opinion. Instead of a drastic change, try something a bit less severe that may work. I showed the new map idea, it has several added spaces while not reducing interaction, it also adds a new entire arctic ocean, it adds another power and has a few redraws all over the world, it will absolutely not end every stalemate but it may very well reduce the number to something more tolerable, again, I do not LIKE stalemates but also like the basic game complete with it's warts!

the suggested sea lanes would not REDUCE stalemates on land, it would eliminate them, making sea spaces different from land spaces. Oh, I am also VERY concerned with the playability of Oceania and others with this suggestion

on land??? On SEA obviously

I'm interested in people's thoughts regarding the changes in the Arctic region.

Folks?

* ARC divided into 3 territories, and Greenland is made connected to Baffin island.

Note the split on the far upper left of the map, it helps keep the two arctic supply centers apart and on different sea spaces and the division made also helps make the Bering Sea have an extra option! The land bridge from Greenland to Baffin Island also allows for more pressure to be put on the Hudson Bay (a known stalemate area) and makes Baffin Island slightly more strategic, it had been of limited value before this. Also adding a northern sea option has an effect on the other sea areas helping further reduce stalemates. This new map will not cure all, but it looks good and worthy of a playtest (not to mention the many other changes you guys are not familiar with...welcome Saudi Arabia!?)

slow day at work...
Some ideas raced through my mind and one came to me that should have been obvious to us all. What about some "trigger" point to then suddenly kick in the sea lane idea? I have no idea how things are automated here (I do my games by hand) but I have to think it would be relatively easy? Sort of flicking a switch. You guys know better where that trigger point should be, after a certain year, after a player reaches a certain size, after 2 (or more?) players get to a certain size? ...whatever the trigger, keep with the standard game and then boom, sea lanes!? (best of both worlds?)

Back to David's variant (Tom I'm working on yours as it stands now)
I'm looking at China and wondering if some of that area couldn't be put into use. I'm thinking that while it is an unenterable zone, you could have some sort of diplomatic immunity rule, where each territory adjacent to china are adjacent to each other.

So for instance Kashgar is adjacent to Gartok, Nepal, Assam, Ava, Shan, Hanoi and Haiphong. Put a straight between Taiwan and China to add Taiwan into the trans-china exchange network.

just a thought about how you could bring the Eastern half of the board closer to the Western half of the board.

That would help, but I'm thinking it's not enough since such a large chunk of players at the bottom right of the board are fleet heavy. The game is certainly not unplayable, I think Kaner and I think the interaction could be better is all, you can't expect all players to have to work with all other players but the more interaction the better and we would like a bit more is all.

Regarding the last two messages:

Providing mutual adjacencies for all land provinces bordering China might increase east-west contact somewhat, but it is very unrealistic from a geographical as well as a historical point of view. Those borderlands contain some of the most rugged deserts, mountains and jungles on the entire planet.

I think the changes I am working on will increase interaction somewhat, but you need to consider that in variants this size, when you have Powers that are compact, rather than having scattered dots, players on one edge of the map will not have early tactical interactions with their most distant opponents.

The changes I am working on will hopefully increase interactions in the middle of the map, while also addressing some of the other comments I have received here and elsewhere.

How about a transform option then? Being able to change your fleets to armies and visa-versa would create a really interesting tension around the mainland coastal regions.

A possibility, but one of my considerations when designing a variant is to change the rules as little as possible, and only for a good reason. With every rule change, you decrease the pool of players willing to give a variant a try, because they just don't want to be bothered learning new rules. I'd like some playtests before adding further rule changes

Personally speaking, for me a new rule is a good reason to give a new variat a try. I love new experiences, otherwise I'd be still playing Classic on some other site. And btw, "transform" is not a new rule, at least here.

Funny, I kind of agree with BOTH the last two comments? How can I agree with David and his wanting to change rules as little as possible and yet agree with Guaroz that changed rules are often fun new experiences? ...doesn't really need to make sense does it? When designing I agree with David, try and stick to the basics, the map is the difference! Everybody likes and embraces the tried and true while changes confuse and bewilder people and even turn some off. But change is also sometimes fun, in some games it is sometimes required. I have designed games that had voting procedures, some that had "wing" units and nuclear bombs, I had games with river spaces, I have a game where I borrowed heavily from the game Civilization that has unknown maps, all spaces are player named, options to improve your cities and to improve your units power. I had yet another game with different convoy rules. All these changed rules when I said I like the tried and true??? Sometimes situations dictate what needs to be done and change is required, embrace the change while at least attempting to keep it simple!

So, David, do try to keep it simple but never get too hesitant to try something different, wildly different if it helps. The bottom line is not how "standard" the game is bit how much fun it would be to play. That is not taking anything away from your current design, it looks interesting! But if you come up with some crazy idea, don't dismiss it too fast simply because it's different, "standard" may be good but if you have a crazy plan that makes it better, then run with the insanity, embrace it!

At the risk of throwing Tom into an apoplectic fit, which I would do by simply saying good morning without buying him coffee and bacon, the revised map that he's linked up adds some new territories, and will create some interesting new play dynamics in *some* areas. And while it pays some heed to the problems with the seas spaces (the northern hemisphere looks entirely more playable now), it absolutely fails to address the the fact that South America, remains an impenetrable fortresses, where stalemate lines can be easily erected around the continents. This dos not lead to more diplomacy, it leads to more games being forced to end faster. Players that resort to stalemate lines have done so because diplomacy has failed, and players that do so in the mid game are either lazy, bad, and/or apathetic. None of those attributes are good for Diplomacy either. And while this may be Tom's intention because his games play using voting rules to determine victory, it does not suit the play here where we use supply center totals.

The revision is not a total loss though. I want to say again that the work in the in the northern hemisphere is very good, and adds game dynamics whether you implement an "icebreaker" rule or join open the spaces for year round travel. And the land bridges to Baffin Island And Greeland add playability and fun to the map. I'm not sure what the purpose of adding Novaya Zemlya to the maps was, because on one hand it addresses the same problems that are ignored in South America (while Africa has been subtlety addressed), but since those issues seem to be anathema to the map designer, I'm confused. I want to say, "great work!" but I have a feeling that any benefit that I see from it was unintentional. I would also note that the recoloring of the nations is much more graphically attractive, and removes the overabundance of pink shades on the map we presently use, while also removing the dreaded Amazon-Empire/Turkey clash nightmare.

So, great work in the north, and a good start in Africa but in the southern hemisphere that concept is abandoned. Yes an Antarctic sea space is added, but it's draw such to only further insulate the southern continents, which compounds rather than corrects the problems. Why is the Arctic Ocean divided into three spaces, and the Antarctic is drawn as one? That's just bizarrely inconsistent. Another map clogging problem compounded is the one at Galapagos Islands, which is left drawn as a sea territory, but functions as a land territory, meaning that no convoys can pass through. This is bad enough in itself, but the new map now does the same thing with Cape Verde Islands, and adds the new occurrence of this at Zanzibar to the list of bugs. I like the use of all three spaces as supply centers, and as islands, but giving the land mass and a sea space zone of control only contributes to the clusterfork.

I do like the redraw of the Chile Basin border allowing Lima access to it, and shifting it's landfall point to meet with Valparaiso. Unfortunately the redraw just made Pitcairn Island even more of a fortress by dropping Chile Basin as an adjacent space, cutting the number of such spaces from five to four. Overall in South America, the added seas spaces are a bone thrown to a starving dog. South America needs more non supply center coastal spaces, like the ones that were added in Africa.

So overall it's a start, but incomplete, and in my opinion unnecessarily so. Clearly a lot of work went into the effort, but why play test something now when it clearly leaves a great number of the know issues on the map? I still think that the real answer to this congestion on global maps is to redfine who we look at ocean spaces, and to give proper respect to the oceans as playable territories. Oceans comprise a large majority of the earth's surface. They cannot be tamed, owned, or predicted. This very fact only helps to justify the use of a new territory type like Mr. Cohen's "high seas" rule for Ocean spaces. I would have preferred to see that explored rather than dismissed out of hand. That concept has been tried, and it has worked. It would work again here, and it would add an infinite number of diplomatic possibilities, including many good reasons to keep smaller nations alive,simply because any nation with a fleet in the game game make themselves extremely useful in the stackable high seas.

Try it before you dismiss it! and one thing you failed to mention and can not know until played, even the simplest of changes ripples across the globe. So the several changes in this area and that could very well affect an area that did not change so dramatically. I am not saying the fix is going to work this way, but we also can't know for certain if it will not, not until played out.... give it a shot before dismissing out of hand, then (as I always do) I evaluate the problems and address them. The map has changed a LOT since it's start (anyone want a look-see at the first map? I can dig it up I'm sure) the game has evolved and has been changing per player input!

Guaroz and Tomahaha, I am not afraid try new rules. I have done so often enough over the years in the variants I have designed. I just do so sparingly, and only when rule changes are needed for play balance, realism, or to give a specific flavor to a variant. I try to keep things as simple as possible for a number of reasons:

1. I don't want to drive off potential players.
2. I want to make a GM's job as easy as possible, for manual adjudication purposes.
3. I want my variants to be easy to code for automated adjudication systems.

I'd rather try to improve things through good map design. And sorry for any confusion; I have seen the "transform" rule used before. I just meant "new" to the variant I am designing.

Ruffhaus8, "Mr. Cohen" is my father. LOL

exactly what I was stating! I was speaking in general of any and all variants, try to stick to the basics (for the reasons you give and more) but don't be shy to embrace change when it will help. (and I am no fan of transforming units either)

I feel like transforming fleets is quite a useful mechanic, but that after 1300 it is completely unfeasible (when ships were simpler, a good army could make a fleet, like in the 1st Punic war).

How is the development of this variant proceeding David?

Sorry for not seeing this before, but I have started a new job, and have been quite busy (Memo to self: Win lottery so as to be able to play Dip full time). I have made a few tweaks to the map, and added back in navigable rivers to East Indies (but not river convoys), see the variants at http://diplomiscellany.tripod.com/id23.html and http://diplomiscellany.tripod.com/id24.html. I believe that both East Indies and Spice Islands are ready for playtesting, but I do not have the time to run them right now.

Volunteer GMs, anyone? :^) I'd love to observe, and I can help with rules questions.

For those out there that are interested - I've started coding WWIV-sealanes, it's a lot of work and it is likely that other variants will come out earlier. However I would like to ask the for your opinions regarding the transform option being implemented in WWIVsealanes? should it be included or not?

transform on any game other than an ancient sort of variant is just plain stupid if you ask me...it's like you are turning a military game into a fantasy game where wizards twinkle their nose turning destroyers into tanks???

The transform option adds fantastic possibilities to a Diplomacy game !