Hello! So im making a map of a region and im planning to do the thing where big cities are made out of very small provinces and there would be like a zoomed in version of the city map somewhere else
(check "the Greater Element" map to see what im talking about)

so, the question is:
How much cities should i do that thing for, because only the top 5 would be boring, but way too much would be excessive, im thinking around 20-40 because thats around the amount of subregions on the map so atleast all of their capitals would be detailed


(Sorry if i have bad english)

for more context: the map would have around 2000 territories excluding city ones

I'm not really into developing maps, but I think something you should consider is like how many players are ideal to play it.

the idea of making that detailed cities the capital cities of their respective regions is good, though.
I think 40 would be too much in general. Even 20 seems hard to manage in general, but I can see a number around 20 working fun in multiplayer games.

If I'm not wrong, you want to like give 2000 territories to whole map and 4000 to cities, in average for 20 cities that takes 200 territories for cities (~8-9 turn to fully take even when empty), and closest 2 cities will be also 8-9 turns apart on average. (I may or may not be miscalculating as did the calculations kinda quick). And it sounds good to me, but like also what you think is important.
Best of luck,I hope you make a map that would be fun to play.

If the map is already 2000 territories, you are probably more limited by the map file limits than anything else.

Have you started on the map already? How are you planning to show the detailed cities?
Or will you figure out how you show them once you decided how many to make?

20 to 40 seems reasonable for so many territories, but I'm not sure you can fit them all on the map in a way that doesn't become messy.

Edited 10/30/2024 18:26:46

@UzayAltay the detailed cities are probably going to be around 8-20 provinces in size, not 200 lol

@JK_3 Either put the all city maps on the side of the map, or group the cities by superbonuses and put them near them like The Greater Element does it

If you want, i can show you my WIP with similar insets for cities. I tend to overexaggerate, as anyone can tell you, but it could be useful for you for a comparison with yours and your plans.

My "mistakes" have been to make them too "big", meaning with too many territories. The issue is that you are playing with two scales: macro to micro, but the game allows you to move one tile per turn: if you make the cities with too many territories, the result would be that players would be able to move across the world by the time another army traverses a city.

To me, that rings a bit odd, which is why I am moving towards having less numerous tiles and more numerous cities.

(just join the Mapmaker Discord server if you want to talk more)

@Coenquistatore sure, where do i join

For some reason I thought cities are going to be more detailed.
If it's gonna be 8-20 territories, then 20 would be less than ideal I believe and you should approach to around 40? I don't really know, other people which are more interested in mapmaking can help you more.

@UzayAltay okiy