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Zoeskyfarm
174 Posts
    
EDMONTON - CANADA
 | | 07/07/2008 12:09 PM |
| Haven't taken epic into account, but will eventually. Needs lots o feedback.
cheers,
-zsf
Field of Ruin - Good map for Large Titans, as the vic area is central, this was a staple for the UltroForge (ultroloth and Fire Giant Forgepriest) back in 1.0, but the only other thing i have to say about this map is... i just don't like it. (which can be a big advantage to everyone, especially if you like it.)Â
Dragon Shrine  - Good map for resistances and sacred circles (+2 attacks), if you get the right starting area you can make it to the dual vic area on this map in the 1st round if you have a speed 8 fig or more.
Broken Demongate - Bottleneck map good for a mix of powerfull range with melee protection to block, the original map is all messed up with the starting area for the b side says victory area. But once clarified, the Boken Demongate is now Fixed. So, it's the fixed broken demongate.
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| Fantastic Locations 1: Fane of the Drow |
Drow Enclave - Used to be great for summoning, still good map for charging and radius burst effect with the big open area, vic areas hard to reach for both sides.
Fane of Lolth - This map is a weird one, it does have a good look, and the blood rock, sacred circles, you will need fast creatures to get to the vic area (from either side) in the 1st round. Lots of spots to avoid ranged warbands, and yet you would be surprized what ranged warbands can pull off on this map, becareful and check your blind spots.
Mithral Mines - An old school favorite, this one is great for incorpreal figs, and lightnight bolts with my experience. Best to only have one or two large figs for this map, as you will be better mobil with medium or smaller figs. And unless you have insubstantal, good luck getting to these vic areas.
Tomb of Queen Peregrine - One of the 1st Epic maps, great for bombing the starting area if the other opponent isn't paying attention. Good for charging, and ranged warbands as well. Vic areas, once again, are hard to get to. But over all a good map for almost any warband, unless you need lots of cover.
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| Fantastic Locations 2: Hellspike Prison |
Hellspike - The introduction to smoke, and the realization of the benifits of blindsight. This map is made for ranged warbands, lightning bolts are the best, and soon to come bat will make this map a arcane warband build favorite. (Hellspike Anaysis) http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/mi/20051124a
Magma Keep - This is an old school favorite of mine, there is of course the big long hallway that everyones talkin about, this is where the battles go down, and in my experience who ever controls that choke point will win, there is just something about standing in the right spot to win a battle, vic areas are hard to get to but this is a great map for people who want to try and get vic areas out of the picture and mix up a little range and a lot of smack down.(Magama Keep Anaysis) http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/mi/20051110a
Mushroom Cavern - A great anti-being bombed 1st round map, with still combat taking place right away who ever wins initive will most likely have a better chace of getting to the vic area 1st round if they need to, as it can be done with speed 6 on the right side, the risky terrain is cool but never happens. The dangerous terrain is great for sliding figs and taking extra damage. (Mushroom Keep Anaysis) http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/mi/20051117a
| Fantastic Locations 3: Fields of Ruin |
Keep of the Fallen Kings I - If you have Animated statues this is a good map for them. Also a good map for ranged and speedy bands, not much difficult terrain, i really like where the vic areas are placed on this one, just behind where the battle ends up taking place every time, and its always tricky getting into your vic area.
King’s Road - A very popular, and personal favorite. This map offers alot of diversity because it is a very wide open map until you take into consideration the forrest. With about 60% of the map covered in forest it is best to have a mix of ranged attackers and beater in this map, or just straight beaters with some speed.Â
Dungeon of Blood - Great for warbands with lots of activations and/or attacks, i used to play two Mariliths on this map worked great cause when you have serveral chances to attack in a round, the chances of hitting a critical improve. (hope that wasn't to obvious for everyone) Also the circle in the victory area give a +2 on all attacks! Just watch out for that pit that is right there as well. Way back in the day when i was running the Mariliths we had a dispute (Vince and I) about the vic area that has the sacred circle, i believed that there was a pit (because there is) and the vic area was only the 12 square surrounding the pit. But for some reason i will never know, Vince was convinced that it was just for role playing and that it wasn't ment to be incorperated with DDMs. We played for a few months before i had the right back-up on the forums to prove my theory (thanks WotC).
| Fantastic Locations 4: Dragondown Grotto |
Dragon Graveyard - Don't see this one much, but is a very basic map. Almost every battle will end up right in the middle, sometimes off to the side, but it gets old quick. However, if you need that central dual vic area in the mix then this is an option. However the Spikes comming up out of the ground near the center are considered statues, so perhaps this would be another good choice for those statue powers.
Forest Cliff Lair - This map has an intersting blood rock vic area, with a waterfall nearby that grants conceal to the opponent that is targeted by a ranged attack. Good map for high speed creatures with cone effects.  Basically has three entry points the middle and the sides, the walls that run along the middle that make the waterfall, are a great place to take refuge from ranged attacks from the other side as you begin to engage.
| Fantastic Locations 5: Frostfell Rift |
Hailstorm Tower - Another personal favorite, this map has a dual central vic area, with the beginning full of difficult terrain, this map would problably best suit a large flying titain with high spead (dragon?!?), a good anti range warband map, and the dual vic area is a sacred circle!
Frostfell Rift - A good map for sliding, lots of pits and also a good map for ranged warbands and figs with flight insubstantial or burrow (Frostfell Rift Anaysis)
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/mi/20080605b
Caves of Chaos - Good defensive map with the big room in the cave. The battles usually take place in the blood rock, just at the entrance. This map doesn't get much use as it doesn't really syenergyz with anything except maybe summoners and that's old school. There is a sacred circle and a pit on this map but both are in positions that the battle normally doesn't take place. On another note i bet there is a great strategy to be found on this map perhaps if you get the cave side you can use high speed combined with insubstantial and burrow to surprize flank your opponent in the caverns, never know, it could work.
| Fantastic Locations 6: City of Peril |
Markertplace - This map is so dumb, confusing and yet, interesting. Another map that has seen little to no play In 1.0 the market squares were almost like the forest squares, but different in that they blocked line of effect after it went through 2 lines of the same market square. Now that act just like the forest squares for 2.0 and this looks to be a very open map with lots of line of site, but with it comes almost no protection. Use large base figs on this map and lots, high speed if you can get them (great map for charging), then you can have a small or medium creature blasting spells with some meat inbetween to protect them.
Ratfang Sewers - This map is great, fun idea and works great for undead and construct warbands (nonliving), due to the sewer sludge effect, in 1.0 is was basically stench, now its... its... does anyone know? At any rate this ones got some good and bad mojo, depending on how you look at it. One great thing about this map is that it is by far the best anti-blast map having the secret doors in the starting areas that act like walls, but you can move through them. One really lame, yet legal bad thing that can be done on this map is you can actually trap you opponent inside there starting area, if they just happen to set up all on one side, the shadow dragons and a devlar segent activate 3 figs to shadow jump and clog the only openings and stick the other figs in the vic area to collect points, then the opponents only chance out is insubstantial or burrow.
| Dungeons & Dragons Miniatures Game Starter Set Maps: |
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Dwarven Outpost - This map had that nastalgic feeling like we were getting another outpost (the drow outpost released earilier was a gift to the DDM community) We still have yet to see what real support it provides for the warbands out there, the outpost itself provides questionable protection for ranged attackers, as there are just to many entrances into this place its more like the dwarven outpost ruins. But of course you will still have the rest of your warband to keep them occupied. There are some River squares on this map and covenently place in the middle is an interesting dual vic area spot that is 4 square big, if a large, mean, titan, wandering monster, gets to start there, its game over. Ya bridge! And just to clarify there are a few squares that have water and bridge in them the way you determine which is which is whatever type take up the most space.
Flooded Ruins - a good map for ranged but maybe not the best the pillars get in the way more than you would like, but other than that there is nothing that is powerfull enough with the aquatic type that you really have to worry about on this map except maybe 7 koa toas. The only map with a portal at the moment and man is this important to try and control, but good luck doing that if you dont have a little range and even then you still have to play it smart, as that teleportal will make you do some dumb things.
Jungle Temple - This map reminds me of a sketchy kings road for some reason. Central Dual vic area, i really dont have much advice for this map as it is so new. and i havent really played it.
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Drow Outpost - A gem! Back in 1.0 if it wasn't the kings road it was the drow outpost, this map saw alot of play back in the Underdark - War of the Dragon Queen phase, as the big fast titans (usually Aspect of Kord) would rush the choke point and destroy everything that came to collect. Then figs with flight, became popular counters to the titan warband on this map as they would fly past the titan over the pits and kill the back up first, usually getting rid of lot o snake swiftnesses.
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Blue Dragon Lair - This map came into play just before a qualifier, i remember it well as the dci floor rules were updated the day before the tournament and it drove everyone crazy. I remember telling Vince that day that the Blue dragon lair was legal and he argued with me untile i was able to show him the dci update. This map is one of the few maps you have to choose from for having a big map vrs a small one like the kings road. There are more square, not sure exacty how many, but it does make a difference, if your looking for a map with a little more space, this is it. Or if your paranoid about blasts, lot o room here, tiered of cones, no worries. Plus the vic area is easy to get to but you have to share it with you opponent, where many great games of ring a round the desert pillar will be played.
Evermelt - You might be surprized at how good a map this can be for ranged, and even more so once that bat is legal. Take a close look at the smoke and the fire squares as the fire doesn't count as a smoke square, and you will see how much you can still blast off with radius effects. Other than that, it's a nice big map, will keep you free from 1st round blasts and crazy stuff like that. However after that your on your, own as this map just has one big blaaa in the middle and sure its a dual vic area but man, its just like fighting on the dragon graveyard, you know that almost everytime most of the battle will take place in the fire pit or nearby.
Other great reads to better understand the strategy behind it all...
(Activation Order, Who Goes First?)
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/mi/20051222b
(Learning from Losing)
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/mi/20060105b
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Vrecknidj
Warlord
10253 Posts
United States
| | 07/08/2008 7:14 AM |
| Wow, that's a lot of information in one post. Thank you for this. That first post will be a great one to edit with updated information as time goes by. Perhaps it'll warrant either a sticky, or being referenced in a stickied post.
Dave | |
Knowledge Arcana editor issues 5-9, Phoenix Lore Magazine editor, assistant editor for Rite Publishing;
My Trade Thread and My Reference Thread; Winner of WBC IV, IX and XIII; Rule #0: bshugg is always right! | |
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Pedro
Commander
3922 Posts
Czech Republic
| | 07/09/2008 12:38 AM |
| That's a great thing, thanks!
It might be good to add links of Vreck's map scans that are lying around here somewhere so it is in one place.
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2007 & 2008 Czech Republic Champion
2008 Czech Republic's Player of the Year
2.0 Champion of Necromancers! (preferably not Evil:-))
Next Icon Called Shot: Baldur's Gate pack - Khalid, Jaheira, Minsc (and BOO!), Imoen, Xan, Sarevok...
Against the Giants Called Shot: Phoenix (/no luck)
Demonweb Called Shot: Yagnoloth (I like demons!)
Feywild Called Shot:
Starter 2009 Called Shot: | |
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Dordledum
Commander
3149 Posts
Netherlands
| | 07/15/2008 12:33 PM |
| Very useful indeed, there was some good map analysis of the kast starter maps on the gleemax boards a few months ago (by Dave IIRC),
D. | |
Member of the Bearded Devils
Champion of the Huge Spider (WotDQ 46/60), A New Umber Hulk (DoDe 57/60), and Hardcopy Printed DDM 2.0 Stat-Cards for all Minis! | |
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Pedro
Commander
3922 Posts
Czech Republic
| | 07/15/2008 12:37 PM |
| | Yeah, that was the same he posted here. | |
2007 & 2008 Czech Republic Champion
2008 Czech Republic's Player of the Year
2.0 Champion of Necromancers! (preferably not Evil:-))
Next Icon Called Shot: Baldur's Gate pack - Khalid, Jaheira, Minsc (and BOO!), Imoen, Xan, Sarevok...
Against the Giants Called Shot: Phoenix (/no luck)
Demonweb Called Shot: Yagnoloth (I like demons!)
Feywild Called Shot:
Starter 2009 Called Shot: | |
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