A little artisanal map... with 1225 provinces

[Twan]

... 170 underwater, more than 100 in an underworld of cave provinces. This map also features naval roads and gateways allowing to travel to distant locations.

http://img373.imageshack.us/img373/8649/oeridiapetitewo4.jpg


The zip file is too big for this forum, you can download it here :

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=1SG62P4Z
or here... http://rapidshare.com/files/7260437/oeridia.zip.html

(I'm searching a better host as these free download services are very slow, if someone want to host the file just do it)


This map has a very long story. It was the map of a diplo/role artisanal pbem game on the World of Greyhawk I've organized about 10 years ago, including provinces for areas like the temple of elemental evil, the drow underworld etc... (I've for sure ftaghned a lot with the size, just imagine that it was the board of a non automated game, with a printed version where I moved the units each weak following the orders of about 40 players -I've stopped after a year, realizing I couldn't continue and do anything else of my life in the same time-).

Anyway, having this map on a disk since my first PC, it would have been criminal not to adapt it for dominions, so I've started to add sea provinces (the first version had just naval roads) and to "white pixelise" it for dom2. Then I've realised that the game was scandalously limited to 500 provinces, I've waited 3 more years, and finally I've finished the adaptation for dom3.

Note that this map is more than a little old and isn't as pretty as many recent creations.

Considering the size of the map I can't also be sure that I've given to all provinces the right terrains and neighbors, I publish it now mostly because it would take some more years to fully test it alone, so consider it a beta version. Normally borders you can cross are orange and unpassable borders red, and all the special connexions are resumed on the left side of the map. If you find errors pm me.

You are supposed to start on a province with at least 4 land neighbours if you are a land nations (or 3 sea for a sea nations) and all wastes, caverns, underworld entrances and swamps are nostart as well as the isles and the two southern continents, but I may have forgoten some bad start positions. The central region around the Nyr Dyv Lake counts many very big cities like Greyhawk, Dyvers etc... and all these provinces and their neighbors should be nostart too. So the players start in the positions of the civilized kingdoms of the Oeridia continent, with lots of lands to colonise out or under it, as well as the vast uncivilized wastes of the north and the west to explore and the rich free cities to conquer in the middle.

In this first version, the map hasn't special garnisons and poptypes and has only a few special provinces, mostly the biggest cities.

In the next versions I plan to develop more special locations, with special guards etc... like in the Faerun map, especially the underworld regions. I will perhaps also make a Greyhawk mod to create adapted poptypes, monsters, etc...

[Gandalf Parker]

OK
http://www.dom3minions.com/files/oeridia.zip

[WraithLord]

Looks good http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Looking forward to the specialized map.

[Edi]

Hmm, I seem to be getting competition for the big maps. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif
This monster only outweighs the biggest Faerun map by a factor three...

Should be REALLY good when you add the specials. I like the graphics just fine, even if a bit more earth-tones plains would perhaps look better.

Edi

[Twan]

Thanks Gandalf.

[Agrajag]

Wow, this is pretty awesome!
I think I'll try it today http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

By the way, Opening up the image in Photoshop and applying a Smart Blur (2[or maybe 3?] pixels, 45 threshold, high quality, normal mode) smooths most (though not all) of the more troublesome over-pixelated areas, with only mild damage to the image (swamp bushes of a specific kind got blurred). It keeps mountains/castles and the like the same way they were before, but makes most of the terrain easier on the eye.

Also, Edi, 666 Posts http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

EDIT: Forgot to mention you should first copy-paste all your white pixels to a new layer, then do the blurring, then make sure no new white pixels were added, then past the white pixels back.

[calmon]

Great map, i'll try it out in a very big sp game and hopefully in some mp games later! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

In addition to #knownfeature "Volcano" you could also add the new dom3 sites:

#knownfeature "Desert" (+death/heat scale)
#knownfeature "Rain Forest" (+growth/heat scale)
#knownfeature "Tundra" (+cold scale)

for the deserts, jungles and tundras. That would be some nice features and provide some natural heat and cold in the provinces.

Some little bugs i found:
987 seems to be a forest but the map means its farmland.
382 should've farmland
461+481 have 2 mountain symbols, maybe this is intended!?

[Edi]

Agrajag, yes, I know I'm evil. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Do you by any chance have the possibility to post the smoothed map? Or do you know how to do the same in GIMP?

Because as soon as I'm done with the bulk of the DB work, this map is going to get a spin.

Edi

[Agrajag]

Edi said:
Agrajag, yes, I know I'm evil. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Do you by any chance have the possibility to post the smoothed map? Or do you know how to do the same in GIMP?

Because as soon as I'm done with the bulk of the DB work, this map is going to get a spin.

Edi


I'm not sure how you would do that in GIMP.
I will however try and upload a zipped version of the smoothed map.

The problem is that the last time I smoothed the map I missed some white pixels (got my technique wrong), so now I have to redo it. Only since its a 150 megabyte map, Photoshop now claims it can't save it as .tga because there isn't enough space in the scratch disks (??).
I'm now trying some stuff to force it to save it, and if I'm successful, I'll upload it to one of those servers Twan initially used and see how that works.

And will edit accordingly http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

EDIT: GAH! The most compression I can get is an unwieldy 33.7 megabytes, unlike Twan's magical 10 megabyte file :\
I'm not sure where I can upload such a massive file, nor do I know if my internet connection will handle it :X

[Twan]

Mine was zipped with ALzip, a very good freeware (it takes 1 or 2 minutes to zip big files but really reduce the size to a minimum, not like the official Winzip). But even a 10MB file is too much for the forum (3 MB max IIRC).

As I haven't photoshop and Xnview offer no way to save the white pixels if I use filters (I've tried to reduce the pixelisation effect before releasing the map but abandonned as I had 600 white pixels to recreate) I'm interested by your blurred version too.

[Daynarr]

Edi said:
Or do you know how to do the same in GIMP?




Just load the map, go to filters-blur and select blur. It does job fine. However, I still have to check if it messes up white pixels.

[Agrajag]

Smart Blur is different from regular blur, I'm not sure about the precise algorithm, but as far as I can see, it only blends adjacent elements if they are already sufficiently close in color. That means that different shades of grass blend together well, but mountains won't blend.
Like I said, it isn't perfect, a few buildings got blended, and a few spots that needed some blurring were left as in the original, but I like what I got.
I'm going to set the map to upload and leave the computer while I go about my day, I'll see how things worked out when I get back home.
EDIT: http://rapidshare.com/files/7419784/oe2.rar.html
Its not a miraculous change, but its pretty nice http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Daynarr]

Ok, tested it and normal blur in Gimp really messes up white pixels. If you use it you won't be able to play on that map. Unfortunately there is no smart blur in Gimp.

Agrajag, thanks for the file. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Agrajag]

Daynarr said:
Ok, tested it and normal blur in Gimp really messes up white pixels. If you use it you won't be able to play on that map. Unfortunately there is no smart blur in Gimp.

Agrajag, thanks for the file. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif


You are welcome http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

And the white pixel problem isn't solved thanks to the smart blur, all the smart blur does is blend things in a way that is less likely to blur things that you want to remain focused.

For the white pixels I just used the magic selection tool (allows you to select all instances of a certain color [or color range] on the image) to copy all the white pixels to a new layer, then blurred the original layer, then made sure there are no new white pixels (by using the magic selection tool again on a white pixel, and then making every white pixel into a 250,250,250 pixel), then put the white pixels back.

[Ballbarian]

In GIMP, use select by color to select the white pixels, copy & paste to another layer or a blank image of the same size as the original map, perform whatever blurs you want and then paste the clean white pixel layer back over the map.

Hope that helps. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Agrajag]

Ballbarian said:
In GIMP, use select by color to select the white pixels, copy & paste to another layer or a blank image of the same size as the original map, perform whatever blurs you want and then paste the clean white pixel layer back over the map.

Hope that helps. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif


You forgot to mention that you need to check the blurred image for no new white pixels, and change those.

[Gandalf Parker]

Absolute white (255,255,255).
A blur usually blends pixels to the next pixel so a white dot would become a grey smudge. Im not sure that any blurring would create pure white but its probably good to check.

Beware of alpha channels also. Ive created maps where nearly all of the map, or sometimes just the water, was transparent so that I saw the woodgraning background there. Very ugly.

[Agrajag]

Gandalf Parker said:
Absolute white (255,255,255).
A blur usually blends pixels to the next pixel so a white dot would become a grey smudge. Im not sure that any blurring would create pure white but its probably good to check.


It is good to check, because last time I didn't check I ended up with a non-functioning map :X
I suppose that maybe a 255,255,255 adjacent to a 255,255,254 (for example) could create an extra white pixel. Or maybe the program uses some strange blurring algorithm :X

[Twan]

Attached new version of the map file.

* some terrain or neighbor errors fixed
* desert, tundra and rain forest sites used for provinces of these terrains (and some terrain changes, ie the frost forest provinces are now forest with a tundra site instead of forest + waste)
* all neighbors of very big cities (30k+ pop) should now be nostart

I'm waiting for the Unit ID and Sites DB lists to developp special poptypes and provinces.

I've started to prepare units for a Greyhawk mod (it will replace the units linked with many poptypes, so Oeridia will have its own recruitable indies with random garnisons made of them, the following map files giving a specific poptype to many provinces ; in addition special locations will have special guards - I'll try to replace poptypes by poptypes in relation, so if you prefer to have Hoburgs than D&Dian gnomes and halflings you will have hoburgs in their provinces if you don't use the mod -).

Anyway it's a big work and I think a final version won't be finished before some months.

[MythicalMino]

does this lock anyone elses' game up? Everytime I pick this map, my game locks up like crazy....I don't get any type of error, just that it locks up and I have to ctrl-alt-delete....then shut the program down via processes.

[Twan]

I've played 70 turns without big problem testing this map with 21 nations, the only I had was a crash to desktop or two when using one of the "gateways of the ancient" (it seems it's a problem when the program draw a very big movement arrow, once the game is reloaded the arrow is here and the movement work).

It's probably a memory or processor issue as the map is very big.

[MythicalMino]

I cannot even get it to start up, though....When setting up your game, right after you choose your map, it should load up a picture of the map. Right before that pic loads up, it locks up.

[Agrajag]

It most probably is a memory or processor issue like Twan said.
There's quite a long wait for the map after you click the name when creating a new game.

If it takes so long to load that you think the game froze, I think you should just give up http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif , you could probably get it to load if you wait long enough, but hosting times will kill you eventually.


Thus spoke a man with 1.5 Gygabytes of DDRAM. (Only a meagre AMD Athlon 64bit 3000+ processor though http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif)

[B0rsuk]

I sign up as Mictlan !

[PvK]

Ah, I missed the message that there was a playable version of this - I thought it was going to be months still.

So I gave it a try, and well, am still playing... got hooked again.

This is a wonderful map for those of us who can get hooked by a huge world. I know you mean to do a lot more work but the version as of now (part way through the thread) is very nice, with a good amount of custom stuff on it already (I like the Tundra terrain sites where appropriate, for instance). I think it's a good idea to play it with the random sites turned down a few notches (or even to 0% base chance) since there are hand-placed sites and the map is so enormous. The teleporters and underground areas make it more than just a huge map. I like the "this was an old huge RPG campaign" flavor too, even though I'm not a D&D fan (TFT & GURPS, yes...). Anyway, I'm having a great time with it, and will let you know if I have any specific feedback.

On the issue of the lag with the map, I have some but not too much. I am sure it is because the map image is so large, and with all the detail, I wouldn't want it smaller. The issue will I think tend to be not so much the system RAM, but the amount of video VRAM on the video card.

[Gandalf Parker]

My really large maps with specials tends to get complaints about lockups, but its really just that the game takes a LONG time to create the first turn. Especially if the map uses lots of randoms.

I find that assigning set items (instead of #randomequip), assigning province names, naming assigned commanders, etc will help with that lag.

[PvK]

BTW Gandalf, if you haven't tried playing on this map, I would recommend it. It reminds me of playing in some GM's giant RPG world. The different locations feel like they could have some background to them.

[HoneyBadger]

This looks really neat,
I'm holding out for the roomier 1500 province map though

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

[PvK]

Southern Hraak Forest (1186) looks like it should have Forest terrain.

[HoneyBadger]

Don't you know the legend?

The Elders speak of the time when the hemp plants in Southern Hraak grew as tall as trees and glittered with THC crystals as heavy as a thick snowfall.

Then one day the hoburgs moved in...

.................................................. .........

...but the Elders preserve the memory of that golden age.

[iceboy]

Edi said:
Hmm, I seem to be getting competition for the big maps. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif
This monster only outweighs the biggest Faerun map by a factor three...

Should be REALLY good when you add the specials. I like the graphics just fine, even if a bit more earth-tones plains would perhaps look better.

Edi



Hi I love the big maps! Have you posted yours anywhere? Thanks!

[Edi]

Not yet. It's still in the works, but will be coming out in the near future.

[jutetrea]

How do you use the cave passages? I get the neighbor line, but can't click on the destination?

[Twan]

My map is a little too big and it seems in some cases problems occur with very long movement arrows. Sometimes the arrows never appear, or appears only if your screen is on the first province (but you don't see them on the destination). One or two times I even had a game crashing when drawing the longest arrows (I recommend to do a "save game and quit" and reload before doing the very long range movements, to be sure not to lose the other orders ; zooming out to see the two provinces also reduce arrow drawing problems).

...but I never had an impossible movement, so I don't know for your problem (which provinces are concerned ?).

[Meglobob]

Twan said:
My map is a little too big and it seems in some cases problems occur with very long movement arrows. Sometimes the arrows never appear, or appears only if your screen is on the first province (but you don't see them on the destination). One or two times I even had a game crashing when drawing the longest arrows (I recommend to do a "save game and quit" and reload before doing the very long range movements, to be sure not to lose the other orders).

...but I never had an impossible movement, so I don't know for your problem (which provinces are concerned ?).



Twan, I am enjoying playing your Greyhawk map, the problem is the length of time it takes to draw the movement arrow. You have to be patient and wait for your computer to catch up, particularly if you have a old, slow machine like I have.

This problem occurs on other big maps as well and is not isolated to Twans map.

[Twan]

Yes an option for instant arrows instead of the drawing animation would be cool.

[jutetrea]

I've got a dual core 3800, 7800 GTX vid, 2 gb ram and a moderate hard drive. Usually have no problems (other than longish turn times depending on how epic the game is).

I've let it sit for 10 min and nothin... does the "move" orders on your commander come before or after the arrow is drawn? I never get the "move" command either... so it might just be getting hung up on the drawing somehow and never getting the move command to go through? I haven't played it in a few days but i should have some time today.

[HoneyBadger]

This is really a beautiful effort. I was wondering, though, why you decided to stop at 1225? Not that 1225 isn't an awesome effort, but we've got a group of people on the Perpetuality thread discussing creating a 1500 (or more, if that's possible) province map for use with a massive multiplayer game of 70+ nations. I'd *really* like to use your map, because it's a mod, and such a nice map, as an advertizement for mods in general.

I was wondering if you had any interest in extending your map by 275 provinces? I wouldn't expect or want you to change it in anyway, just possibly extend the area it covers by a degree.

[Gandalf Parker]

1500 is the max now for maps

[HoneyBadger]

When are they going to bump it up to 6000?

[Gandalf Parker]

Heehee. Probably Dom4. Believe me, Im a big pusher for big caps on things. But the early map settings caused A LOT of problems when I was crash-testing them. We cut back on many of them. Even the 1500 province maps I make now has been known to crash some peoples computers, and take so long on the initial game creation as to make people think it has locked up.

[Twan]

I'll think about adding some provinces in the north (as the "inserted province" function doesn't work, I cannot cut my big provinces in the middle of the map without having all the neighbours etc.. to redo).

But for the moment, after a long pause, I'm working on my mod.

[HoneyBadger]

I was able to do 1500 province maps on mine without a problem-the wait was long, maybe 10-15 minutes-and I'm using an older computer. It was very nice at the time I bought it, but still, it's a several-years-old laptop.

I think people with less powerful computers generally know they've got less power, and can scale back their settings, accordingly. I probably wouldn't personally push my own computer much past 1500 when doing 'random map', but that still leaves a place for people who could, and building maps from the ground up.

[Gandalf Parker]

Hmmm I had forgotten that I had this hosted on my servers until I was checking the logs to see if anything I was doing was getting accessed at all. (they were, so I guess I will keep going).

When I saw reference to Oreidia I couldnt remember what it was. Had to search. This is a cool map. Im sorry I forgot about it. Glad to bump this thread.

[Humakty]

I wonder why some people want bigger maps. I haven't finished most of my SP games on GoG map, and I don't know if I will ever use such a map. It's an awesome job that have been done in any way.
Bravo Twan

[Juzza]

I know what you mean! I have trouble playing Aran, it justs gets boring and tedious after a while, all that micro management, it's just too much!!

[Humakty]

We shouldn't complain about the logistics. If I remember correctly, in dom2 you had to ship your gems between your labs(I only played the demo).On really big maps, I think it could have made my head burst !!!

[Endoperez]

Humakt said:
We shouldn't complain about the logistics. If I remember correctly, in dom2 you had to ship your gems between your labs(I only played the demo).On really big maps, I think it could have made my head burst !!!



Gems have never been limited to just one lab. However, DomPPP didn't have a common research pool, so you had to set each researching mage to research a spesific school, and change all of them if you changed your mind. There weren't any gem pooling options either, so gem-generating items and blood hunting were quite tedious.

[Humakty]

Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa

[reverend]

I know that this is resurrecting an old thread, but I just recently found this map while looking for new material to play with. So far, it's great and the underworld passages and the port connections help speed up movement as well as provide an additional strategic layer.

Hopefully you'll make more maps like it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Edratman]

I just decided to play this map for the first time last week. Initially the size seemed to be a bit much, but I'm now playing heavily modded games and I've now got 28 MA nations now, so I thought I would give it a try.

This map is a lot of fun to play. It doesn't appear to be balanced for MP, but as a SP I really enjoy it. There are many provinces that allow you to travel long distances to non-adjacent provinces. I'm thinking that I will be playing this map continuously for several games.

[PvK]

Yes, I've been playing a game (on and off) on this map for a year now, and am still quite enjoying it. There's an appeal for me to the hand-made role-playing origins of the map and also to the "it's enormous" factor!

I think it works well if, like me, you like to play in a thematic style, rather than treating the game as a logic problem to beat (though with mods, it could probably be made into a tough logic problem).

I have a couple of technical concerns though, about when my huge game might run into the hard-coded units-in-the-world limit (it hasn't yet), and a balance issue about when I will reach critical mass against the AI nations (though at that point, I could either declare victory or complaisance, perhaps letting many turns go by without doing much in order to let the AI regenerate a more interesting situation).

[jfp3]

Hail Gents,

I just started a game on this map a few nights ago and have yet to figure out how to get a force to enter caverns. I have force at one end, left click normally to move to proper cavern province, but no corresponding line indicating a move shows up, nor does my unit indicate a "move" pending.

Is there something I'm missing to venture into the Caverns from the main surface? Help! I want to emerge at an unsuspecting nemesis' BBQ unannounced :-)

BTW...amazing map. Just amazing. Reminds me a bit of the old "Empire of the Fading Suns" game maps.