Should Imperious make a map for this?

[Imperious Leader]

ok FYI im at 65% done, as i get closer to completion i tend to do more work.

[Imperious Leader]

ok map at 85%, probably before end of week

[pfc_pander]

My whole week suddenly got much better! Great news!

[foxymethoxy]

Awesome!! Where might I find your other custom maps?

[Imperious Leader]

Variants and House rules ( stickied)

[innohub]

Thumb up!!

[Imperious Leader]

Map will be released about 4pm tomorrow.

On this i felt Germany should have grey territories ( as opposed to grey green). The rest is standard colors.

[Imperious Leader]

https://www.mediafire.com/?bq3ge4ltdn4hcqj

Ok have a look, scrutinize for errors, spelling, etc. Do you like the colors?

[pfc_pander]

Forgive me I have just finished a 16hr shift at work.  After some much needed sleep and rest I will take a close look at the map.  As for the colors go I think they are fine but I’m much more partial to your supreme maps that resemble the OOB maps.

[Imperious Leader]

Well consider that i had a very poor scan of the OOB map, which didn’t lend itself to that technique that we have with my Supreme maps.

[innohub]

I spot 1 small error - the tank is supposed to cost 6 instead of 5.

Thanks for the great map - will look if I see any other issues.

[Black_Elk]

Looks solid! As for the colors, I prefer the German territories in gray the way you have them here. I remain  partial to the original game board designs, before the switch was made to topographical with just a hint of color. I think there was a certain charm to the Classic map with its more vibrant color scheme. It was more inviting and easier to read at a glance. The muted colors of Revised were an eye sore to me. I like a high chroma/saturation politcal map for the gameboard. Topography has no influence on the gameplay in A&A, so I like a map that pops and catches the eye at a glance instead. Red Russians, Brown Brits, Green Americans, Gold Japanese, and Gray Germans, A high chroma blue for the sea and simple tan for Neutrals. To me that gives the map the feel of a boardgame rather than a complex wargame, (which is a good thing for an introductory board) where everything is easy to read at a glance for the start year 1942. I think the official gamemap is somewhat dull and offputting to look at in this respect.

There should also be more variation in color “value” (as opposed to variation in hue, chroma/saturation). The current map is a struggle for the colorblind when it is made so drab. I am not colorblind myself, but if you desaturate the map you can see why more variation in color value would be better.

Its important to go with either high saturation/chroma for the map, or high saturation/chroma for the plastic units. To give them both a consistent value (the same for each, so national units: national territory) And then to put the variation between different nations into the color “value.” For anyone who doesn’t know what I am saying, color value describes what the color looks like in grayscale when it is desaturated.  Variation here is better than variation in hue (chroma/saturation) because it is easier to read, not just for the colorblind but for everyone. The same thing with the sea zones. Ideally the sea zone color should be at a markedly different value than that of land territories (I prefer lighter for the sea, darker for the land, basically the exact opposite of Revised.)  :-D

Official 1942.2 went drab for both, which makes the board less exciting to look at, and represents a design fail in my view.

I miss the compass rose of the original Classic map, and wish they would bring it back.

I also find the ipc counter at the top annoying in 1942.2, I lament the loss of paper money. The ipc counter is less new-user friendly, looks silly when 2 or more nations have the same total ipcs, and overall is just a very poor use of precious space on the gamemap. Money was a hundred times better and more useful both for teaching new players and for simple tracking. I will never understand the logic of replacing money with a counter, you lose something important to the “feel” and experience of the game by getting rid of the cash.

But given what the 1942.2 map is OOB, this seems a nice complement. I just wish the design of the OOB was stronger. I still find the distortions around Europe Africa and Asia to be quite silly. It is definitely possible to make a map which is less cartoonish in its shape and depiction of the world without sacrificing space to house units. But I feel like they always go with the same ridiculous projection. There is a happier medium between mercator and A&A, but they have yet to pull it off to my satisfaction. :)

[Imperious Leader]

I tried to keep with OOB purists by keeping the IPC track ( which looks stupid). Yes the cartography is horrible and it seems things stretched north south axis.

Thats one of the reasons why i didn’t want to make this map, because it’s so hideous. I made it for people who just want a larger 42.2 map and have never played it or will.

[Black_Elk]

Yeah I feel you :)
Its definitely cool for people who like the OOB, and should serve well its purpose. I will use it, until the next boxed redesign. It’s very helpful to have more space for units. Thanks for putting in the work

[Imperious Leader]

https://www.mediafire.com/?275bhgcb929jec6

Here is another version with color changes and correction for 6 ipc tanks. Color changes for USSR, UK, USA, and China.

[Black_Elk]

Looks clean. I dig the punched up colors

The UK and Canada reads a little darker to me than the territories more in the south, but it might just be an optical illusion from the border color bleed.

I especially like Germany Japan and USA with the punched up color.
Might go a little more red for the soviets.

On the whole I like it. I will probably print one out for a game soon. Thanks again for making it available

[Imperious Leader]

NP

[Imperious Leader]

https://www.mediafire.com/?hl61jg35qc9lmjj

Sorry but i had to tweek some mistakes i found and enhance USA color. This is the final version.

[P-Unit]

Thank Imperious, I will print this map (after I make some minor tweaks for our groups liking).

My group has the same preferences as Black_Elk on map colors, preferring distinctive sharp contrasting colors over “realistic” textured map and colors. Our group also has a color-blind player and this is a big consideration for us.

We also prefer not to have the background images, IPC track, and purchase chart on the map but that’s something I can easily Photoshop away. Imperious, one suggestion for future maps. It would be nice to have pdf layers that users can turn ON/OFF before printing, such as IPC tracks, charts, bg images, text, city icons, etc. That gives options to try to tailor to various likes.

Again, great job, love the map!!  :-D

[A Former User]

Hey don’t know if this was intentional, but playing today, we realized there was a second sea zone “19” just south of Burma. There is already a sea zone 19 by central america. Is this an error?