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Post by WxCougar on May 4, 2014 9:40:03 GMT -6
I agree that 00.09 would be a great spot and was briefly excited until I counted the hexes.
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Post by WxCougar on May 4, 2014 10:10:19 GMT -6
Here's a quick and dirty compilation of the various hexes talked about. Some are observations by others and some are my own. The order here is alphabetical and has no reference to preference of any one person.
AA: * Plus: A spot that people will wander to from the starting town Thornkeep. A higher traffic area for adventurers. * Minus: It may also attract aggressive folks being close to Thornkeep. While all good and neutral start there for now, it will be the neutral main post. Its reputation is a lawless town. * Plus/Minus: It is isolated from three big allies. * Plus: It is between the three big allies and could be good for trade. * Plus: There is some defensibility being in the mountains away from the main pass. * Minus: Could be blocked into the mountains by other groups. * Plus: Our miners/crafters would have access to ore.
AC * Plus: Would be flanked by two ally groups. Very safe location. * Minus: Would need to work with the others to expand efficiently, especially with two other potential settlements in the area (if chosen to go to other groups other than the three existing if we choose AC). * Plus/Minus: Likely in a Nation Building scenario with AB and AD. * Plus: Our miners/crafters would have access to Ore.
P * Plus: Plains hex, good for food growing. * Plus: Near forest hexes for our Ring of Wood and some building supplies. * Minus: Distant from allies, but could be an in-between for the three large organizations. * Plus/Minus: Near, but not on, one of the highly traveled roads. Could be a good neutral spot. * Plus/Minus: Not too far from skymetal, but would compete with O.
S * Plus/Minus: Forest hex predominately * Plus/Minus: Near skymetal * Plus/Minus: First settlement from Fort Inevitable Area toward the skymetal hex using the entrance point (white X). * Plus/Minus: Isolated but not terribly far from the AD/AB area. Could be a good neutral location as well.
T * Plus/Minus: Between our two groups of allies. * Plus: Varied hexs * Plus/Minus: Near skymetal * Plus: Mountains help with security on one side. * Minus: No direct access to the mountains. * Plus/Minus: Near Emerald Spire and would have to go near it and W to get to the Mountains.
Y
* Plus: Near our allies at AD/AB * Plus/Minus: Not near skymetal * Plus/Minus: Would be the first location people traveling east toward AD/AB would reach. * Plus: Forest hex with plains nearby for food. Also near mountains * Plus/Minus: Can act as protection to the mountain pass. * Plus/Minus: Can still reach swamp area but are not next to it.
Z
* Plus: Near our allies at AD/AB * Plus/Minus: Not near skymetal * Plus: Can act as staging area for swamp exploration * Plus/Minus: In a forested hex with a unique resource with a swamp hex nearby. * Plus: Can act as a staging ground for groups headed toward Emerald Spire
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Post by Drake on May 4, 2014 10:28:51 GMT -6
I'm leaning toward Z, but it does depend on where the new hexes are added. With Woods, Swamp and a plains hex not far it has good resources. The Swamp could be put almost entirely under our control giving us an advantage in trade.
From what I'm reading, the advantages we would have just by getting ANY settlement may allow us to move from our starting spot into a non-EE spot that would be more advantages quickly. This is especially true if we can get TEO and T7Vs help with resources to establish at a spot advantageous to an alliance. If we decided to go that route we would want to put ourselves near our destination, but also where we can get good bulk resources for building.
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Post by Nymerias on May 4, 2014 11:09:28 GMT -6
I would like to discuss if proximity to a skymetal hex is really that important in our considerations. Lets throw down some facts we do know about it and some assumptions to consider. We do know that all crater hexes will be monster or monster home hexes. This means we will never be able to claim them or build POIs and Outposts. The materials that will be gathered there are likely to be really high in value and thus rare and hard to find. Lets also consider the assumption that they are going to be higher tier materials and harder to gather. Lets also consider the assumption that it might be a PvE dangerous environment because it is such a valuable area. If those hold to be true we might not be able to handle gathering from a crater early on in the game. We might need to have more advanced training, refining, or gathering buildings already built up in our home settlement to be able to make venturing in there worth it. Going on that assumption I would not want to give a hex high priority if it just based on proximity to skymetal if it means we are going to be struggling to get the resources we need to advance our settlement to the point of being able to access the skymetal. Along those lines of assumptions we could also consider that by the time we are prepared to harvest craters the distance we traverse to get there might not be as much of a hinderance.
That being said I don't know if S or -06.12 should be that high on our lists because their proximity to starmetal doesn't really outweigh the downsides to me. I know you put Plus/Minus for all the points about starmetal, and I am saying I agree with that classification. I think proximity to starmetal is more of a neutral point than a positive thing. Thoughts?
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Post by WxCougar on May 4, 2014 12:10:21 GMT -6
Technically I should have put Plus/Minus on those near Skymetal too. I will fix that.
I personally don't hold being near skymetal or not as one of my major factors when deciding a location. But then, I'm not a crafter or gatherer either. There is the benefit of a skymetal hex near AB to help for those wanting to foray into a crater that's near a friendly if we don't want to position ourselves near one.
Most important to me is food and building. As a settlement in the landrush (and hopefully placing, which I am sure we will), we will at least have a few buildings to start with. The rest we get to build ourselves. We can get food from the plains, forest, water and swamp hexes from what I'm gathering (at least good sources of these). Building materials will be in wood, highlands and mountain hexes.
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Post by Lorhayden on May 4, 2014 19:15:58 GMT -6
I think that initially being close to skymetal will be pointless, however as the game goes on it will become increasingly important. Caravans leaving skymetal hexes will be strong targets for raids and crafters/gatherers will want a short supply line to the metal. So is it important yes, when we first start not really.
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Post by spacemuffler on May 7, 2014 0:02:06 GMT -6
I agree that the starmetal hexes will be something of a burden in the short term for EE as they will primarily be a source difficult wandering encounters, however if during the EE timeline we are able to harvest this metal in any decent fashion we will be well setup to hoard the valuable until such a time as our Role levels catch up to us in that we are able to functionally process it without destroying its value, and that we can prepare a load of it for our higher ranking, leveled PCs.
Failing all that, as for AA I'm SURE the very close proximity will end up giving us a measure of control as to who we "allow" to pass through our settlement to work the site. It will be MUCH easier for us to defend the 2 mountain pass hexes leading up to the plateau than it would be to say discourage other nations from working the nearest crater site on a settlement location such as at T. Sure it is close, be we would have to move caravans across at LEAST 8 wilderness hexes to get the material to town, compared to two such hexes it would require for AA.
Defensively speaking, AA will be VERY hard to take given the amount of height advantage we will constantly maintain on invading forces coming up the mountain path. Mechanically, we dont know what exactly that may mean for us besides better visibility, and the obvious hail of arrows and boulders we can throw at them while they make the 2-3 mile hike up a path in hostile territory.
As a farmer, AA is not very good for my interests. I personally prefer anywhere with an adjacent forest and plains hex so I can work on my herding and agriculture, but passing up the tactical and mineral advantages of AA is something that I think helps cement my opinion on the matter.
EDIT: Upon help finding the new map, I am still quite a bit dazed and confused as it seems the format has changed, and the map itself has as well. For the time being disregard my comparison to T, although I still think AA is a good bet for us, and that moving our settlement south to AC might be a bit unwise simply due to the fact that the location is a minimum of 10 hexes away from a major trade route, something that I think will be essential in EE as I doubt we will initially be able to finance building a road that long, much less staffing it with proper security so that our goods dont simply get stolen every time our caravans hit the forest. That being said IF AB ends up being settled by a strong ally of ours then it will make sharing the load much easier.
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Post by Nymerias on May 7, 2014 7:39:14 GMT -6
I'm sorry but I'm confused. AA isn't near any crater sites.
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Post by Nymerias on May 7, 2014 10:44:06 GMT -6
Paizo's site is down? I know it is wishful thinking, but could it have anything to do with launching GW's site? I know they needed a way to incorporate the two accounts together...
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Post by chaiguy on May 7, 2014 11:03:26 GMT -6
I'm not having any trouble with the Paizo website, maybe it was a very small disruption in the site?
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Post by chaiguy on May 7, 2014 11:24:07 GMT -6
I'm sorry but I'm confused. AA isn't near any crater sites. It's possible that they are thinking of either the site NE of hex T or the site SE of AA itself. The latter is closer to hexes W and AD, so I would say that overall hex AA seems like it would not have a strong possition to infulence starmetal trade IMO.
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Post by spacemuffler on May 7, 2014 20:19:42 GMT -6
I think I'm a bit confused here. I think what happened was I was looking at an old version of the map for my discourse, I'll flex my googlefu and see if I can try and make more sense.
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Post by Nymerias on May 7, 2014 20:25:29 GMT -6
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Post by spacemuffler on May 7, 2014 20:27:42 GMT -6
Thanks Nym, and an edit will follow with updated locations.
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Post by WxCougar on May 7, 2014 20:30:29 GMT -6
Carbon, are you able to see any PMs?
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