I didn't participate in previous talks about Edwardian, and I really don't want to highjack this thread, so I'll make it brief.

Is there a need to have the unit markers be square v slightly larger rectangle? Now we're not even talking square v hexagon or hexagon v triangle. Was something wrong with the boats/cannons of Edwardian that necessitated this change? For Italy/Austria, the difference is a bit more noticeable, but especially for France/Germany/Russia, the contrast (there's that fun term! :) ) is quite poor IMO.

>Is there a need to have the unit markers be square v slightly larger rectangle?<

Yup - to annoy you.















Joking!

>Was something wrong with the boats/cannons of Edwardian that necessitated this change? <

The units of Edwardian 2nd Edition were supposed to be the flags from start, but due to limitations of my own free time I went for the simplest thing I had in hands (the cannons/ships).

When making up 3rd Edition, @VaeVictis and I sought to return to the original concept and make flags as the units. Why, you ask? My answer is that the flags look better. Perhaps @VaeVictis has a different reason.

>For Italy/Austria, the difference is a bit more noticeable, but especially for France/Germany/Russia, the contrast (there's that fun term! :) ) is quite poor<

Hmm, is the contrast (fun term indeed) poor for you? I should take some more looks at the map, I spent quite some time with it so far yet didn't notice what you appoint.

Given how the flags are similar in structure (especially Germany & Russia) perhaps a colored outline (as in the 1800's unit icons) might improve contrast?

"Given how the flags are similar in structure (especially Germany & Russia) perhaps a colored outline (as in the 1800's unit icons) might improve contrast?"

Well, you know my opinion about using flags period from the other thread...but keeping it contained to this thread, I'd steer clear of colored outlines as the major contrast of units. To be honest, I barely noticed that the armies/fleets in Edwardian v3 had different outlines on them. It's something easily overlooked. At a bare minimum, different shapes that aren't so similar seems wise, although again, I'd be concerned about consistency across different maps on the same platform and how that could potentially confuse people in a "meta" sense.

>different shapes that aren't so similar seems wise<

I see. Like a square and an inverted triangle? Or are these too similar as well?

>I'd be concerned about consistency across different maps on the same platform<

That returns to the question I posted in the other thread: "is vDip's ultimate goal of fun hurt by non-standard icons?"

If the answer is "yes", then what can be done about it? What will be the new standard? Should we retrofit all variants ever released with new, perfectly-distinct unit icons?

I don't know the answer to these questions, but I suspect that vDip's salad of variants won't be going anywhere. It's nonetheless a healthy topic for discussion, though perhaps it should be made elsewhere so not to "hijack" (as @drasno says) attention away from the variant's gameplay and dynamics.

For what it's worth I quite like the original version's army cannons and ship icons. I know they were more simplistic but I felt they captured the flavour of the game really well!

I don't dislike the new units, but I do agree that they are not super distinct; particularly Russia/Germany/France.

Looking specifically at the units here, I think one way to improve the contrast would be to accentuate the shape difference - namely by making the ships narrower. I don't think that the outline difference is too notable.

> I felt they captured the flavour of the game really well!<

I agree @FrozenDog! However one thing people criticized (here I think?) was that the icons "felt lost" in the countries. For example, it was "hard" to identify Austrian units within Austrian territory.

The flag icons suffer no such problem - they stand out from both each other and from the territories themselves.

>one way to improve the contrast would be to accentuate the shape difference - namely by making the ships narrower<

Hmm, nice idea - something to think about. I will experiment with different sizes.

@G-Man (replying from the other thread)

You made an observation regarding the flag icons. As discussed there and elsewhere, here's what we can possibly have (credits to @VaeVictis for the beautiful art):

Army: https://www.dropbox.com/s/xibudhzoqklcs7u/armyFrance.png?dl=0

Fleet: https://www.dropbox.com/s/5zfxy3r5bw6jzeo/fleetItaly.png?dl=0

We can tweak them in a looooong number of ways, so don't consider this final.

Yes, I like those better.

Some of my favorites icons are:

The Patriot (Who Controls America -- only one icon in the game, but so apropos)
Tank (Classic)
Fleet (Greek Diplomacy)

Least favorite:

Small Square with A or F (Divided States)
Small Square & Rectangle (Imperial Diplomacy)
Square & Hexagon (Napoleonic)

Magnified maps, whether large or small maps, like the initial view of Known World 901, also make any icons look better. E.g., the Shields and Fleets look great here.

As for my the best icons of units are on Stabbeurfou site. They accurately convey the atmosphere of the board game

@G-Man

"Who Controls America"s anthropomorphic choice of unit icon is most curious. I always wondered what a game of Diplomacy would look like with small human representations of armies.

For example, German units with the spiked helmet, Turkish units with the fez, etc.

I will take another look at KW901, but I don't think the same atmosphere is replicable here.

@Flame

I like Stabbeurfou's units too, especially the choice of colors.

Though I prefer a smaller (anti-infantry/armor) cannon than these huge pieces of artillery pointing high in the sky.

In case someone wonders what Stabbeurfou's units look like: http://www.stabbeurfou.org/Partie.php?nom=Anton

The flags there remind me of Droidippy (may it rest in peace).

"Who Controls America"s anthropomorphic choice of unit icon is most curious. I always wondered what a game of Diplomacy would look like with small human representations of armies. For example, German units with the spiked helmet, Turkish units with the fez, etc".

Bring it on!#@%!

To all who asked questions about the pieces being changed from 2nd to 3rd editions:

The reason Enriador and I thought of changing the pieces to flags was partly for aesthetics and partly for function. The function side of things is truly a double edged sword since some of the flags (stupid tricolors!) are very similar where crests, coat of arms, and distinctive crosses and saltires are absent. The intent was to facilitate the ability to jam symmetrical rectangles and squares into tight spaces where the asymmetrical icons sometimes bleed over their designated area (especially on the small 750x678 map).

This all said, however, I am amenable to a return to ships and cannons. I like the Lord Nelson class pre-dreadnought and the French 75mm, so I wouldn't mine seeing those retained at all. (I actually vaguely remember reading somewhere, though I cannot recall specifically, that Calhamer initially wanted plasitc/metal castings of French 75s for armies in the original production but they weren't available or something like that)

I doubt anyone has a major issue with the missing ships and cannons per se, or the new use of flag based icons. From the comments I was able to follow, before Enriador went 10 pounds of bat-shit crazy in a 5 pound bag, the issue was that the shapes and size of the chosen new icons are not dissimilar enough to provide a clear read of the map and unit positioning. This would certainly be my criticism of the new icons. I actually like the flags, and find them quite attractive. I would also note that the cannon and ship units mentioned are rather droll icons, but they are easily distinguishable. With the falgs presented here I just cannot clearly see what is an army, and what is a fleet because the look so similar, and that's viewing them on a PC. Imagine trying to view these icons on a mobile phone as so many players do these days.

As for the variant, the map is otherwise pleasing, but it remains unclear why this particular incarnation of the European map has been created. The reasons provided by Enriador on the opening post make no sense to me. They imply some kind of flawed design with the original "Classic" map, which simply does no exist. Now if the reason that map changes were made was to promote some manner of predisposition to historical alliances in some 'Edwardian' era, then that might make more sense. But no such rational has been provided. Maybe there was a design to see what play was like starting with more than three units, but again this is not mentioned. Perhaps as the variant designer, you can elaborate on the reasons for the map changes.

@RUFFHAUS

Good points on the flags, especially for mobile users, though I don't think that Enriador blew a gasket. He's just defending our reasoning for initially choosing the flags as easily distinguishable pieces (at least from the background of the board).

I discussed the motivation behind Edwardian in the original Edwardian thread. The intent was by no means to 'improve' Classic (and I'm not sure if Enriador ever stated this), but rather to simply expand the scale of the game, set in the original time period for the sake of unique gameplay based on more opportunities for openings and greater threats from opposing players. The idea was simply to have more pieces per player and to enlarge the board to include parts of the Near East not included in Classic. Nothing more, nothing less, and certainly not pretending to improve an already classic board game.

@VaeVictis

I never stated that Edwardian (or its units) is an improvement over Classic. I did say it was an improvement over 1900's dynamics though (a variant that provided a loose inspiration to Edwardian's predecessors), but that was in a much older thread somewhere else and of course, a strict matter of preference.

As I said in private, I am game for either flags or cannons/dreadnoughts. You offered an interesting (third) alternative that I will port here and show to see what people prefer.

As promised, here's @VaeVictis' latest set of icons for Edwardian 3rd Edition! The tricolour flags now have additional elements to better set them apart.

https://vdiplomacy.com/variants.php?variantID=130

Better functionality for sure. Thanks on that. Still prefer the old ones though.