I was poking around the site earlier today looking for some four player ffa maps to use for AotP using actual terrain as opposed to the cardboard mats.There were a few things I noticed in common across the existing maps I looked at:
- First, they were too big; 96 start zone spaces, and sufficient board space to give armies of that size the breathing room they need it totally overboard for an AotP map (and frankly that's just a lot of table space).
- Second: the terrain requirements were very high. Personally, I have what I feel to be a terrain collection that's just beyond the large end of reasonable, and even i can't build some of these four player maps I'm seeing.
- Third: "Marvelscape" maps, being smaller and generally more dynamic appear to be more appropriate for the smaller AotP armies. (Though I have read a bit about height advantage being far more decisive in AotP games.)
So how do these affect how a map should be built? In a normal heroscape map, generally speaking you would want to make sure that ranged units can't take uncontestable height in one turn, that melee squads have avenues of attack, avoid Raelin perches, mirroring the battlefield through the start zones is generally more interesting that mirroring between them. But these general rules don't necessarily apply when you're looking at AotP scale games.
Has anyone played enough AotP games with custom maps to have a sense of how one wants to go about building an AotP map? I played around a bit at trying a couple of my own this evening, but I'm not sure if I'm on the right track here.
Prototype 1: dungeon
This is my first attempt at an AotP map. I intended the red start zone spaces to be additional spaces for a sort of . . . advanced or chaos mode. Ultimately I realized that starting the Red Planeswalkers that close to the oppenent can lead to some very early kills which are, undesirable.
Prototype 2: swamp
I like this map much better, but it doesn't feel quite right (that and there are way too many sets involved).
Does anyone have any experience in building these sorts of maps? Does anyone have any tips, tricks, or general rules they've found useful that they would be willing to share?
*As a quick note, I personally haven't played much AotP yet. I got a few games in shortly after release, but the base set fell very flat. I feel like there are enough units and spells out now to make the game . . . playable. And I'd like to give it a fair shake now that there's some substance to it.