Beef Cuts Idea

[the.killing.44]

Wait, this wasn't a joke map?

[RjBeals]

of course it's a joke map, but it's a good enough joke map to make it to the forge. I mean - imaging pulling out a board game with a handful of your friends, and it's a map of a cow. lol. I think it's great.

[carlpgoodrich]

8 Butcher knives as starting points... as if the conquer maps haven't been overplayed either.

BUT it would be interesting if butcher knives could attack all cuts.

Wow! Talk about a unique gameplay. Plus, it would completely tie into the theme of beef cuts, where the butcher can in fact "attack" any cut he wants. This would make those little bonus regions much harder to hold (you would have to defend all the territs) and would really put emphasis on strategy, especially in the first few turns. I think this is a really great idea and I hope the rest of the community agrees. I have gone from liking this map as a novelty to thinking it could be a really great map to play.

[army of nobunaga]

I agree helix... that idea would make this map extremely unique and still simple but deep... the recipe for a hit map. I dont necessarily agree that the conquer maps are overplayed but maybe they just need some different approaches like this one.

If the knives can attack all cuts, you might have to change the bonus structure a little bit... or maybe even make the "sticks" into "bones and have the knives attack all bones...

I like the ideas that are being generated now... before i wasnt too excited about a deadlock map with sticks and a cow in the background, but it has some potential i think now.

[DAAAAAAANG]

Having butcher knives that bombard every other territory would ruin this map and any hope it ever achieving decent game play. There would be no way to block in card games or hide in fog games. Plus in team games I would just be stacking on a partner until they had enough to go through a butcher knife and kill another player. The idea is okay and fits with the map, but I don't think it's good for game play.

[carlpgoodrich]

Having butcher knives that bombard every other territory would ruin this map and any hope it ever achieving decent game play. There would be no way to block in card games or hide in fog games. Plus in team games I would just be stacking on a partner until they had enough to go through a butcher knife and kill another player. The idea is okay and fits with the map, but I don't think it's good for game play.

There are some good points here, although I think they can all be overcome. I never think the idea was to have the knives be able to attack each other. So fog of war games would still be at least slightly different than sunny ones. I guess there would have to be some territory (maybe a food critic?) that can be attacked from the cuts that has a very large killer neutral that can attack the knives. And the knives wouldn't bombard the cuts, they would one way attack them.

I thought about how some people would just deploy onto their knife (or their partners knife) and not attack. Maybe have a -1 decay (with a minimum of 1) on the knives? Or something else to keep people from hoarding.

My point is that I am a firm believer that this site needs more maps with completely different game play, like WWII Poland or Das Schloss. For sure, there will be some people who won't like it, but I think a map where starting positions can attack 95% of the map has a spot in CC, and it completely fits in with the theme of Beef Cuts.

[natty dread]

If you put in knives that attack all territories, they should definitely be killer neutrals with a hefty amount of neutrals.

[Industrial Helix]

Well, i'm thinking knives as starting points. Perhaps do it like 3rd crusade and have the starting points with the rest as regular deployment.

Also get rid of the connections between the cuts.

And perhaps the prime cuts, like sirloin or something, could attack the knives?

[carlpgoodrich]

IH, I'm a bit disappointed you don't see the beauty of your original suggestion (or at least in how I interpreted it ). If there are starting positions which can attack the entire cow (which is full of neutral 1's ), then its like manual deployment on steroids: you get to decide what regions you want to focus on from the start, whether you want to battle with some other player for a "quick" bonus or take a chance on a large region, etc. A simple -1 decay on the knives should be sufficient to force people off the knives. This would be such a different style of game and would require such a different strategy and approach, it would be like having another "game type" setting.

Am I the only only one who thinks this is genius? Did people not understand what was meant in my earlier posts or does everyone just disagree with me? Are there practicality issues I have missed?

[Industrial Helix]

Well, there's some problems with that. Who in their right mind would waste men on a bonus of 4 territories that can be attacked by 7 other players? And if there is decay on the knives, then they lose their value. Essentially they'd be starting points and after a round the game turns into standard... whats the point of the knives?

[army of nobunaga]

Well, there's some problems with that. Who in their right mind would waste men on a bonus of 4 territories that can be attacked by 7 other players? And if there is decay on the knives, then they lose their value. Essentially they'd be starting points and after a round the game turns into standard... whats the point of the knives?

You could do this, but would need to make the reward worth the risk.. Like bonus of 10 armys per round or something.

[carlpgoodrich]

Well, there's some problems with that. Who in their right mind would waste men on a bonus of 4 territories that can be attacked by 7 other players? And if there is decay on the knives, then they lose their value. Essentially they'd be starting points and after a round the game turns into standard... whats the point of the knives?

Doesn't this contradict itself? The point of the knives is that any bonus region can be attacked by 7 other players. This is in addition to drastically changing the strategy of the first round, similar to the difference between automatic and manual deployment.

After the first round, most people would keep just one troop on the knives. However, there is the treat that a player will deploy onto their knife, therefore making it so that bonus regions must be defended everywhere, at least a little. I agree that the value of the bonus regions must be made slightly higher than they would be otherwise for it to be worth the risk. Also, some of the larger regions would need to be broken up, so there are more two and three territory regions.

As an example, lets say it is the third round, no one is about to cash and no one has more than 11 territories. You have a bonus region of 3. You know that the max anyone will be able to deploy is 3 (so they can attack with a max of 4), so you only need to protect each place with 3 at the most.

[army of nobunaga]

guess, this is a gameplay thing we all should mull over... its up to the map designer to take this to the next step before we can even worry about gameplay.

[shocked439]

I love this idea, The knives are a fun idea too. They could be auto deploy starting points like new world too. Each one only able to go after specific cuts.

[The Bison King]

I think we lost the OP again... If I had to guess he probably feels like this has gotten completely away from him.

[Evil DIMwit]

IH, I'm a bit disappointed you don't see the beauty of your original suggestion (or at least in how I interpreted it ). If there are starting positions which can attack the entire cow (which is full of neutral 1's ), then its like manual deployment on steroids: you get to decide what regions you want to focus on from the start, whether you want to battle with some other player for a "quick" bonus or take a chance on a large region, etc. A simple -1 decay on the knives should be sufficient to force people off the knives. This would be such a different style of game and would require such a different strategy and approach, it would be like having another "game type" setting.

Am I the only only one who thinks this is genius? Did people not understand what was meant in my earlier posts or does everyone just disagree with me? Are there practicality issues I have missed?

I do like this idea. Is there a way to attack the knives, though? Or perhaps there's just a victory condition to hold 60% of the cow so we don't have to bother with that?

How about a victory condition to hold at least one territory of every cut? That'd be different.

[carlpgoodrich]

IH, I'm a bit disappointed you don't see the beauty of your original suggestion (or at least in how I interpreted it ). If there are starting positions which can attack the entire cow (which is full of neutral 1's ), then its like manual deployment on steroids: you get to decide what regions you want to focus on from the start, whether you want to battle with some other player for a "quick" bonus or take a chance on a large region, etc. A simple -1 decay on the knives should be sufficient to force people off the knives. This would be such a different style of game and would require such a different strategy and approach, it would be like having another "game type" setting.

Am I the only only one who thinks this is genius? Did people not understand what was meant in my earlier posts or does everyone just disagree with me? Are there practicality issues I have missed?

I do like this idea. Is there a way to attack the knives, though? Or perhaps there's just a victory condition to hold 60% of the cow so we don't have to bother with that?

How about a victory condition to hold at least one territory of every cut? That'd be different.

A victory condition to hold at least one territory of every cut.. that would be really cool! I like it. However, I think for assassin games you need to be able to kill an individual player, no?

There was some talk about having a food critic and/or an animal rights protester that would start with a very large (killer?) neutral and can attack the knives and can be attacked by the cow (either any cut or from specific places). I like the idea of a food critic because I like the idea of the meat attacking the person eating it . There's something pleasing about that: knives attack meat, meat attacks critic, critic attacks knives (which represents chefs, butchers, etc).

[Evil DIMwit]

I'm wary of putting in too many things that aren't cow, but what must be done must be done, I suppose.

[Industrial Helix]

I'm wary of putting in too many things that aren't cow, but what must be done must be done, I suppose.

Well, to be honest, I think it would work as a fine simple gameplay map... go back to using knives as bridges?

[natty dread]

To be honest, I wonder if the mapmaker will ever return... I also wonder if you guys will keep throwing suggestions for many years even if he doesn't

[carlpgoodrich]

To be honest, I wonder if the mapmaker will ever return... I also wonder if you guys will keep throwing suggestions for many years even if he doesn't

Oh, I will! No doubt

[Evil DIMwit]

I'm wary of putting in too many things that aren't cow, but what must be done must be done, I suppose.

Well, to be honest, I think it would work as a fine simple gameplay map... go back to using knives as bridges?

That's true too. Maybe we should have a whole meat pack?

[Industrial Helix]

I'm wary of putting in too many things that aren't cow, but what must be done must be done, I suppose.

Well, to be honest, I think it would work as a fine simple gameplay map... go back to using knives as bridges?

That's true too. Maybe we should have a whole meat pack?

PORK CUTS!

[Evil DIMwit]

I'm wary of putting in too many things that aren't cow, but what must be done must be done, I suppose.

Well, to be honest, I think it would work as a fine simple gameplay map... go back to using knives as bridges?

That's true too. Maybe we should have a whole meat pack?

PORK CUTS!

Only it he agrees to do the graphics, I presume?

[natty dread]

No, pork should do a "Pork & beans" map, which would consist of a plate full of pork and beans. Each slice of pork would have +1 autodeploy and the beans are killer neutrals. Knife attacks the beans, and fork attacks the pork.

Hold fork, pork and get it in your mouth to win the game.