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ANASTASIA: 684-province Epic-Scale Map for Dom3
Version 1.01
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DESCRIPTION
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Anastasia is an painstakingly-edited and polished 684-province map (561 land,
123 sea), sized at 4000 x 3000, originally generated by Dom3's map generator.
Much of the work involved adjusting terrain to make the surrounding sea
province regions contiguous (adding channels and such), and cleaning up the
borders to be clean and neat. I have also added a couple of mountain ranges
beyond those generated and made the rivers a bit nicer.

As of now, it looks like it will make for a very nice epic-scale game, and
seems to have a decent number of chokepoints. At 20 provinces per player, it
accommodates 28 land players and, theoretically, 6 sea (though more likely 3-
5 -- 5 is definitely pushing it, and 6 will unavoidably jam them together).

This "little" map here involves far more hours of labor than it likely appears
to.  I hope it is worth it (I'm certainly enjoying it so far).  If you enjoy
it, I'd be very glad to have feedback. If you don't, well, I'd appreciate
feedback there, too (particularly as to how it could be improved).


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MAP IMAGES
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I've made the map TGA image file itself available in two variants: the
standard version as generated, and an Artistic version on which I've used the
GIMP Artistic/Cartoon filter (don't worry, it doesn't actually look
"cartoony).  I prefer the latter, myself.  Both have the same filename, and
are fully interchangeable in an ongoing game.  Swap them at will.


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MAP VERSIONS INCLUDED
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As for the .map files included, they are most definitely *not* interchangeable
in an ongoing game, so choose carefully.  (Dom3 stores all map data in the
savegame itself, and never again references the .map for that particular
game.)


[ ] STANDARD VERSION: This version has all provinces with less than 4
    neighbors flagged as NoStart. All provinces with 4 neighbors have been
    flagged as NoStart *if* they lack sufficient resources (less than 2
    forest/mountain provinces adjacent) or are situated next to undesirable
    territory (swamp, for example). Any province with 5 or more neighbors is
    fair game, regardless of the terrain."


[ ] PLAIN VERSION: This version has no provinces marked Start, NoStart, or
    ManySites, so it should really only be used with SemiRanDom's nation-
    placement.  (Unless you mind players getting home provinces with 2
    neighbors and so forth).


[ ] CUSTOM VERSIONS: These versions are as the Standard Version above, but
    include a slate of thematic custom pretenders for all nations for EA and
    MA.  If you have played my version of the Glory SP map, it is the same
    set of pretenders.

    The custom AI pretenders used are created using the criteria I found in
    the custom gods given in SemiRandom -- in other words, AI pretenders are
    all awake but get 150 bonus points as if they were dormant.  In most
    cases, where nations has their own national pretender(s) available, I have
    used them.  I should note that, since flavor was an important element here,
    the custom pretenders are workable but by no means optimal.  However, all
    are created with a mind to long-run viability, and none are given the
    horrible scales the AI often chooses.

    CAUTIONARY NOTE: To use the Custom map variants, you *must* edit the .map
    file and either remove or comment out (replace # with -) the entire
    entries for gods/nations that are either (1) being played by a human
    player (else it will override the player's choices), or (2) will not be in
    play at all (else the game will error out).

    I am not sure whether Cheat Detection hits AI players, but you may want to
    turn it off just in case, as it will detect them as having cheated because
    of their 150 bonus points.

    NOTE ON USING MOD NATIONS AS AI PLAYERS: If you wish to play using custom
    nations as AI players and want to specify their pretender in the same
    manner, just use one of the listings in this file as a template, make the
    pretender in the game's pretender creation tool, and copy the stats into
    your template version.  Be *sure* to change the nation number in the
    scales as well as the heading of the entry, and remember that scale
    effects are negative (unluck, unmagic, etc.), so negative numbers are
    good.




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STATUS
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The map itself is in a finished status, and has been through the wringer a few
times checking for errors or gaffes.

What remains to be done is (1) to hand-name all provinces using regional
naming schemes, and (2) to add a variant that uses a pool of 40 or 50 #start-
tagged provinces.

For those who have check out the first release version of it, you'll likely
notice I have eliminated the overabundance of Freshwater provinces I
designated in the original version (resulting in way too many cherry provinces
with high populations). I also split one province and found two provinces I
"misplaced" (accidentally failed to merge down the province marker pixels
after moving them -- really easy to do in GIMP), bringing the total from 681
provinces to 684.

Nonetheless, aside from the lack of hand-naming, the map is completely
playable at this point.

I appreciate your reading my notes here.

Cheers,
Globu


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-- PLANS FOR NEXT STAGES IN DEVELOPMENT
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[ ] Hand-name all provinces, again as per the same method used in my version
    of the Glory SP map (regional naming schemes; West Aurelia, Northeast
    Aurelia, and so forth).

[ ] More variants: (1) a version with 40 or so best provinces marked as Start
    (to avoid interference with SemiRandom's fiddling), and (2) possibly a
    version with chosen start locations, as done in my Fixed-Locations version
    of the Glory SP map.


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VERSION HISTORY
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v1.01 -- Made a couple of more provinces NoStart in the Standard and Custom
         versions (490 and 492). They're not horrible, but definitely below-
         standard. Increased mapzoom again 1.10 -> 1.25, as it was still
         quite cramped in the interior of the map.

v1.00 -- Added Custom EA and MA versions. Map zoom 1.00 -> 1.10. Set
         maptextcol. On the Standard version, flagged as "ManySites" all
         provinces with graphics suggesting such (monoliths, etc.). Moved
         notes from .dm file to readme.

v0.96 -- Separate release of the cartoonized version of the map, otherwise
         identical to v0.95. Both versions now released in parallel.

v0.95 -- Minor nonfunctional alterations to map image (a few more province
         marker pixels horizontally moved to be better-centered).

v0.94 -- More corrections to neighbor and territorial designations for ten or
         so provinces. About 10 more provinces designated as NoStart
         (provinces with 4 neighbors where less than two of the neighboring
         provinces do not have forest or mountain). MAP .TGA IMAGE FILE
         CHANGED; BE SURE TO OVERWRITE IT WITH THE UPDATED VERSION.

v0.93 -- Corrected some neighbor designations.  Completed map version with
         NoStart designations.

v0.92 -- Complete revamp of map (again!); most province marker pixels moved so
         as to be better-centered in their respective provinces.  Rediscovered
         a couple of provinces that had somehow been misplaced (probably
         accidentally deleted the marker pixels in GIMP), bringing the
         province total from 681 to 684.

v0.91 -- Complete revamp of map. (Version lost to a hard drive crash.)

v0.90 -- Original release.


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CREDITS
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[ ] The devs at Illwinter for, truly, the ultimate strategy game, and for
    their labor of love that includes a very usable map generator.

[ ] Ballbarian and Gandalf Parker for advice and tips.

[ ] Ballbarian for his superb MapForge, without which this would be -so- much
    more tedious.

[ ] The developers of GIMP, the Free graphics editor I used for the map.


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PERMISSIONS
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This map is released to the public domain, and may be used, altered,
incorporated and considered a contribution as seen fit.
