All Units Should Be Produced When the Last Player Ends Turn

[tabanli]

I think this might be the source of the problem. I come to the conclusion that we can never make a balanced map without specifying the starting position. So if I know that in a map North starts first and going clockwise, then I can do adjustments. For example I can do a one time thing by giving gold at the first ruin in an increasing order. North gets less, South gets more. Or I can give a permanent gold favor by adjusting city income. First player get 20 gold at his capital, second get 30 etc.

[KGB]

Tabanli,

I don't believe you need to specify start order by color to guarantee a balanced map. You just have to space out cities far enough apart that you can't attack from one city to another where you expect players to meet (middle, side or where ever). As long as you can't go directly from city to city it doesn't matter who goes first.

As an example look at the Battlefield map made by Igor. It's large, the cities are spread out, the middle section is hard to capture etc. It makes zero difference whether you go 1st or 2nd on that map in a 2 player game or 4th in a 4 player game. The same is true of plenty of other maps like Bullrun, Snowflake etc.

It's only 50x maps where you have to be particularly careful and ensure that there is sufficient space between cities. It's very very hard to balance 50x maps which is one reason I don't play them.

That said, I do think it would be nice on scenario maps if certain colors could be selected to always go first to allow recreation of the Illuria turn order for instance. But you should never rely on turn order to balance maps because you are then assuming that players *must* do things in certain order which takes all the fun out of the game.

KGB

[Versace]

Who goes first does matter a little bit even in big maps, regardless of terrain. Smaller the map the more it matters of course. First one is always 0,5 turns ahead. 1 in his turn and 0 when it is opponent's turn. If you say it does not matter at all then you should be fine not moving and not building production in your first turn as that essentially puts you as the second to act.