Landmarks of Valhalla- Thoughts on a Potential Terrain Proje

[Archie97]

There's been a lot of talk on the forum and Facebook lately about creating a C3V-style project to create new terrain expansions. It's something I've thought about a bit in the past, so I'll assemble those thoughts here for anyone else who may be interested in the idea.

• If these expansions are to be comparable to, and compatible with Classic 'Scape and C3V, balance is the most important factor. Just look at the effect a poorly balanced map can have on a game, it can easily decide the winner before the first dice are rolled, and any map with poorly balanced terrain pieces will never be a balanced map.

• If a piece is balanced enough to be usable in competitive play, it must also be WORTH using. It's presence needs to offer a level of strategy or dynamism to a game such that it is a better game for that terrains part in it. This can be as simple as blocking LoS or creating and obstacle, but it has to do something.

• Stepping away from pure design matters, the piece has to be easily purchased, replicable, or otherwise available to any player that wants access to it. Terrain presents a slightly different set of challenges to those C3V have faced with miniatures. There is a far wider range of products and supplies that can be used for terrain, but none of them are going to be ready to go out of the box. C3V have their no painting rule, which for miniatures I believe is the right call. Painting miniatures can be fiddly and intricate, and is definitely not everyone's cup of tea, and access to units shouldn't be determined by that factor. Terrain pieces are going to need some level of construction and most likely painting, but great results can be achieved with very simple techniques when you're working on a slightly larger scale and detail isn't so key. By using readily available supplies and equipment, and providing clear, comprehensive tutorials, anyone should be able to reproduce high quality, identical terrain pieces in their own home.

• 3D printing could be an invaluable asset to this project, but it is not without it's issues. Firstly, and most obviously, not everyone has access to a 3D printer. This is counteracted significantly by the incredible 'Scaper community, I have absolutely no doubts that anyone who wanted 3D pieces could access them, but of course it's only reasonable to expect that the person who printed those pieces would be compensated for both the time and resources used on them, which brings up the potentially dificult topic of people attempting to profit from the project. Once again, I think the community spirit of 'Scape players will largely solve this, but it is something to be aware of. The other issue would be permissions around STL files, which would require either designing the files amongst ourselves, or getting consent from the designers of files available on Thingverse and such. Once again, unlikely to be a huge issue, but perhaps one nonetheless.


I'm sure there's an awful lot more that could be said about the idea, but for now, these are the major points that spring to my mind, I'd love to hear other people's thoughts on the potential project, as well as any opinions on what I've expressed here.

[S1R_ART0R1US]

Hi Archie97, this echoes a lot of my thoughts. In particular, I think the "production tutorial" aspect will be important, aesthetics to fit with classic scape, and balance through play testing are needed. All these will be reflected in some EoV guidelines I'm producing.

[Archie97]

I'm glad to hear that! I've just seen what's happened in the EoV thread. I take it you've now got the reins for the project? If so, I think I could see the project taking on a shape somewhat closer to how I had envisioned it earlier on in its life. I would be very interested in being involved were that the case.