New Continents Map

I am putting off working on my house map for a couple of days so that I can look at it with a fresh set of eyes before I think it's complete.

Meanwhile, I started working on a new continents map. This map will be different, as the layout is completely made up and is not based on Earth. If you want, consider it a new world or how our world could have been if continents shifted/formed differently. There are still six continents, but one less territory and no Australia.

This is pretty early on. Territories are currently represented by lame squares, and connections by white lines.

those are some pretty funny continent names.
definitely more balanced that the world map. I like it.
Looks like this will take a lot less time then your house map to finish. Awesome.

It looks like it is some aliean planet the way it glows. More balanced definatley than the world map. Cool

I decided to re-arrange the layout above. Next image I upload will have the continents in similar locations to where their colors will coincide with the colors of the world map. One major change will be flopping red for yellow to balance game play. I think it'll be easier for players to get familiar with the map that way, and more likely they'll understand it represents a world. Thus, territories can attack from the far left to the far right and vice versa.

Game play decisions affecting the future of this map:
- I don't want an Australia with only one entrance.
- I don't want a South America where it get's sandwiched between two bigger continents.
- I want to provide incentive for players to attack instead of building up.
- I don't want someone to feel that they have to use every single army on their border to break up another player's bonus.

Because of the factors above I plan to give every continent exactly 3 control / access points, each of which will connect with only one other continent. For example(this example will be more clear in next update to the image): the red continent will be connected to the blue continent, the yellow continent, and the green continent. The connections will be islands (9 in total). These islands will play a key strategic role as explained below.

Main map feature:
- Although the 6 main continents will have normal bonuses, there will be an additional +2 bonus for controlling all 3 island territories adjacent to the continent. So, if you held all of the red region and it's 3 islands, a player who holds green, yellow, and or blue continents are unable to get their +2 bonus, but could still receive their continent bonus.

Ok, the first update to the map has been posted above. I still need territory names. I will consider suggestions. I did the territory boundaries the same for all continents, but Aeria and Nalndo lines seem to not care to look like the others. I will attempt a fix at my earliest convenience.

I know, I know... just like my last map, I'm being lazy with the connections... I'll have to see what I can do to make those look good when I get a chance. But, for those curious, the islands can only attack either one or two territories on the continents near them. You probably can guess most of the connections by by looking at the map.

I hope it's more clear with the update posted to see what I was mentioning in the previous post. If the bonuses are unclear, or if the wording in the legend could use some refinement, please let me know.

On a side note: I think the Eonap continent looks like a fish. This was unintentional.

I figured out what's wrong with the territory borders -- they are too fuzzy.

here's an idea for the territory names. use this random name generator and set the obscurity level to 99. pick out any names that sound like they could be places and just keep running the generator until you find enough. Lump similar names together into a continent.

I need to do a little polishing, but I thought I'd post my work of the day before going to bed.

Here's the next update:

Because this is a made up map, not an actual geographic location, it's very flexible. That is the main reason it was so easy to change the Aeria to not look so much like a puzzle, and why I named all territories on the same region starting with the same first letter. So please, please, give me feedback that relates to game play if you have any. I will of course take suggestions for the look and feel of the map as well. Let me know what you think of the changes made to the islands and the description in the legend of how islands work.

Things I'm considering changing for look and feel of the map:
-Tilt any connector to at least some degree other than a right angle unless it is for attacking the other side of the board.
-Still messing with the shading, I am hoping to give it a feel like it's a map that was crumbled up at one point.
-Considering adding in an inner territory shading similar to the USA map. I had a shading in the previous version at the top, not sure yet what I want.
-I want a different color for the legend background. I got lazy and kept it. I don't think it's bad, just think it could be better. I want that part to have more of a canvas looking color.
-I may make the islands a little larger. I expanded them enough to fit in the * and the text, but I think they kind of looked cramped.
-It may be slightly or very slightly confusing for the islands to have names that start with letters of the continents. Considering changing all of them to starting with an "I" or something else.

I LIKE IT!!!

I am really excited about this map. The game play will be awesome.
Players will have a double incentive to attack an island. They will break someone else's + 2 bonus and potentially gain a + 2 bonus themselves. This hopefully will mean more attacking and less building up.

The naming scheme is great. It makes it easy to find where the territory is for the card you have. Plus all the names are short and fast to type.

I am not sure I agree with the region bonuses though. It might be better to add + 1 to all of them. I'll have to think about it.

Cool map looking forward to playing on it!

I agree, the naming is very cute, and the gameplay is very promising. Glanru, you are becoming an expert on risk map design

awesome

"CUTE" how can you say "CUTE"? You make it sound like a puppy or something.

@Vexer: If you compare the bonuses here to the world map, you'll find they are as close as possible existing numbers used for territories in the region and number of territories required to hold the region (border territories such as Alaska, Greenland, Central America, etc).