This is the First in our Series of Random Map Scripts for the Age of Empires II: The Conquerors Expansion. Every two weeks Conquerors Designer Greg Street will made available to our interent players a Custom Designed Random Map for use with the Conquerors.
This download also includes the 46 page random map documentation.
Map Name: Capricious
TO PLAY: Copy this map into your Conquerors Expansion RANDOM directory. To create a game using this or other custom maps, select "Map Style" as "Custom".
On this evil little map, there is no predicting what resources you will find. Oh, lumber is always in abundance since the trees don't go away, but that is all you can depend on. Food, gold and stone might be at normal levels, might be in short supply, or might be in great abundance. Basically, when the map is generated, it randomly decides whether food, gold and stone are in double normal levels, at normal levels, or at one-half normal levels. All three could even be at high-levels, giving a resource bonanza, though there will never be more than one resource at low level.
The ramifications for strategy can be enormous. Faced with only 2 berry bushes, you may be forced into Dark Age farming. On the other hand, finding 10+ stone mines in your town could mean no limits on Town Center or Castle construction as well as forests of towers. Greedy civs like the Saracens and Byzantines will delight on a map where they never run out of gold, while cheaper civs like the Goths and Britons might do just fine when they can only afford wood and food units. Of course, you won't know what your early strategy can be until you explore a little.
Aside from the resources, the map is fairly open, with a bit of water around the edges. Standard Relics are placed and you should be able to play against humans or the AI at all map sizes and all game types. As with all of the maps that Ensemble Studios will release, you can open Capricious to see an example of Random Map scripting, or even edit it yourself using any text editor. If you like a little unpredictability on your maps, give Capricious a whirl.