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From: robison@eosp1.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.games.emp
Subject: Re: Survey of Worlds
Message-ID: <255@eosp1.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 2-Nov-83 14:13:52 EST
Article-I.D.: eosp1.255
Posted: Wed Nov  2 14:13:52 1983
Date-Received: Sun, 6-Nov-83 06:00:53 EST
References: <508@ariel.UUCP>
Organization: Exxon Office Systems, Princeton, NJ
Lines: 29

I've been getting mild flames for releasing a map of the Empire
world at the start of the game.  I'm listening carefully, because
we are all inexperienced Empire players here, and the voice of
experience is criticizing us.  It may be because of our lack of
experience that the world map has helped us get off to an exciting
start.  Therefore, thanks for the critical responses. BUT:

Steve and Alb both seem to think that publishing a map means
disclosing EVERYTHING.  Steve referred to "a map of our lives"
as an appropriate simile.  Now look:  having a map at the beginning
of the game is like driving in New Jersey while using, not even a road
map, but a map of the forest 300 years before.  And the map doesn't
tell you what all the PLAYERS are going to do; it only whets your
curiosity.  We're still playing a game of "bump and discover".
We just have a leg up on trying to plan where to bump.

 A little history: One of us knew about Empire from having played
 it as a board game in College.  (By the way, the board game may have
 been superior to the computer game.  It certainly contained
 much more variety in every way.)  We got our idea of disclosing the
 map from the board game, which starts with a beautiful map of the
 world, including census information, available to all players.
 The board game is a totally open information game; it's still a
 "bump and discover" game, full of uncertainty and surprises.

				- Keremath,  care of:
				  Robison
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