Eastern Terror*

Hello AtWar Community!

It's been a while since I've made a map (or even play Afterwind/AtWar) but I am back with a new project: the middle east! I found a high-definition satellite map of part of Southwest Asia (the Middle East) from NASA's satellite images website (

Some key features to look forward to:
-Accurate populations per city (using the latest data & estimates)
-The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL), Syrian Civil War factions, Kurdistan, Israel, Hezbollah, HAMAS, Al-Qaeda, Jordan, Turkey and more for coverage of multiple areas
-Jordanian - Israeli border dispute
-Unique units per faction (mostly as handicaps for cases like HAMAS where they're in a small Gaza Strip, so that Israel can't easily take them down)
-Unique unit pictures per faction
-Cities have pictures based off of their population level
-Territories have pictures based off of the starting occupant
-Events**
-and more!

I also might make a second edition that includes North Africa and possibly more of Southwest Asia.

I'm not sure if any of you remember my first map I made back when there was Afterwind Alpha (or was it Beta? It was for the new Afterwind that became AtWar), but I made a map based off of Medieval II: Total War Crusades Campaign, and I put a lot of emphasis on the units structure. This map, as well as what I've done for the many given-up maps in the past, will focus on accurate population on top of the units focus from my first map.

I hope this turns out to be a good, fun map!

Any suggestions are welcome!

Edit:
*Name is subject to change
**...



EDIT (3/19/2015):
FACTIONS NOTES
I will have guidelines for role-play game hosting for the scenario.
Background info: In the Arab world, there has been fighting between the Shia and the Sunni Muslims since near after the death of the prophet Mohammed. Ever since Mohammed's death, Shia and Sunni Muslims have fought each other bitterly, not considering their opponents as Muslims, but as being worse than the infidels. For role-players, this would mean fighting between Shia and Sunni militant (or terrorist) groups is encouraged. For example, HAMAS would most likely fight Hezbollah rather than fight Al-Qaeda.

Factions and their dominant religions
Sunni:
-The Islamic State
-Al-Qaeda
-HAMAS
-Saudi Arabia
-Mujahideen Shura Council (Sinai)
-Kurdistan
-Turkey*
-Kuwait*

Shia:
-Hezbollah
-Iran
-Iraq (in the scenario version, Iraq will be left with mostly Shia areas)

Jewish:
-Israel (secular, but majority Jewish population)

Christian:
-Lebanon (secular, but majority Christian population in scenario; Hezbollah controls Sunni areas)

NOTES POST! This is for my own use, and for your viewing. These are the approximate, rounded populations per settlement in this map (rounding up and down to the nearest multiple of 30,000).

Cities:
Syria: Malikiya:
-Al-Malikiya (appx. 30,000)
-Village (there's a lot of uncharted villages that can be seen from satellites)

Syria: Al Qamishli
-Al Qamishli (appx. 180,000)
-Amuda (appx. 30,000)

Syria: Al Hasakah
-Al Hasakah (appx. 240,000)

Syria: Darbasiya
-Al-Darbasiya (8551)
-R'as al Ayn (appx. 30,000)

Syria: Markada
-Camp Da'ish (fictional)
-Ash Shaddadi (AKA Al-Shaddadeh. appx. 60,000)
-Al Busayrah (6,199)
-Diban (9,000 real world, estimated surrounding areas to give 6 reinforements/turn for 180k pop)





Israel: Northern District
-

Israel: Golan Heights (occupied by Hezbollah for balance)
-

Lebanon: Nabatieh
-Nabatieh (appx 90,000)

Lebanon: Beqaa
-Baalbek (appx 120,000)

I look forward to this. It's a long way from being finished, I take it?

Kirjoittanut International, 19.03.2015 at 05:42

I look forward to this. It's a long way from being finished, I take it?

Yup, a long way.

I am letting everyone know that my ambitious project is still ongoing! I have finished the borders for Lebanon's districts and almost finished on Israel's districts. I also, of course, have the cities and provinces of northeast and far east Syria finished.

There is one thing I'd like to bring up: the map is too big. Yup, too big! So those militia deathstacks won't work and transporting troops will take a long time, so I am taking note to have cheap transport units available. In the beginning, they're not necessary since every country is fighting an internal conflict.

Keep at it

Kirjoittanut Pheonixking929, 12.06.2015 at 13:54

Keep at it

Thanks!

Project is back. I will give a preview of some of the finished country borders today!
Note:
The map is based off of information that is now out-dated. Territory has shifted, so there will be some changes.

So I've taken a break from Syria and Iraq (provinces in screenshot not visible), and after a few months, I've finished "Israel" and "HAMAS"
Populations are rounded up, using Wikipedia as a reference.

Preview:



Yes, every city, town, village, port has a picture. Every province has a flag to indicate which faction originally owns it for the scenario that will come after the map is completed. I just hope the HTML 5 editor, when released, does not cause me to lose anything.
SP multiplier is currently at 100%, hopefully I can use that as a guideline to help me maintain a balanced map. I've also tested out various unit movement ranges (which is why there's two units) to ensure that their movement speed isn't too fast; however, that also means it will take a long time to march an army from Gaza to northeastern Syria.

Provinces by Faction:
Israel
Israel: Northern District
Israel: Haifa District
Israel: Central District
Israel: Tel Aviv District
Israel: Jerusalem District
Israel: Southern district

HAMAS
HAMAS: Gaza
HAMAS: West Bank N.
HAMAS: West Bank S.
HAMAS: E. Jerusalem

Hezbollah
Israel: Golan Heights


EXTRA (because AtWar is awesome)
Hezbollah
Lebanon: Nabatiye
Lebanon: Bekaa
Lebanon: Beirut

Lebanon
Lebanon: South
Lebanon: Mt. Lebanon
Lebanon: North

Syria has many provinces without cities, with the exception being some Islamic State territory and Kurdish territory (I'm almost finished with the Kurdish province and cities). Lebanon's provinces are finished but I only have a couple of placeholder cities.
The coastline is finished for the most part. I just need to make the Turkish and Egyptian coastlines impassible territories so that no one is sailing ships over what's supposed to be land.

What are your thoughts of the map so far? I am eager for input.
I've worked more on Syria. In order for Syria to have the general territorial shapes from over the course of the past year to the near-present, I can't exactly follow the Syrian governorates/districts/provinces map.
After Syria is Jordan and then Iraq.

I like map avatar, easily recognizable.

Kirjoittanut Skanderbeg, 06.12.2015 at 13:12

I like map avatar, easily recognizable.

Haha, I was talking about receiving input on the borders' appearance.

Work has been resumed. It's been almost a year since I've started this project, I should have finished it a long time ago, haha.

Update:
Syrian borders almost finished. Then I have Iraq and Jordan left to draw; but, before I draw Iraq and Jordan, I will fill up Syria and Lebanon with cities and release a trailer as well as a Syrian Civil War scenario. The scenario will be available by the end of the next weekend or the weekend following, if my schedule allows that.
I've been working on this map for a year, off and on. The information is a bit out-dated, but for the most part, the controlled territories have not changed to any drastic extremes since I started making this map.
Edit:
There have been territorial changes that have been taken into account, as well. Jabhat al-Nusra will be a faction in the scenario, acting as a neutral that will be allowed to pick a side. Jaysh al-Islam's few territories... not sure what to do with those.

Once again, this map uses population estimates (rounded) from Wikipedia on the cities. There are images for every province/territory/geographical area and pictures for every city, with the largest and most historic cities having their own unique image.

Still working on this.
60 "countries" (territories) and counting, and I haven't even finished Syria's governorates yet, I have finished Israel, HAMAS/Palestine, and Lebanon a long time ago, though Lebanon is still missing cities for its provinces.
There's still an empty Jordan and an empty Iraq that needs to be filled.
AtWar Earth map has 197 countries and it spans the entire world. My map has 60 countries, and that's just Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, and most of Syria -- I expect in the end to have around 150 territories.
Israel, Palestine, and Lebanon have a total of 16 territories. Syria has a total of 44 AS OF NOW, more will be added tomorrow.

I'm not sure why the images, that I posted, aren't showing up anymore. Another map preview will be coming soon anyways, and I'm glad to be working on the project again.
Of course, I hope players keep in mind that this map (and the future scenario) was started in the spring of 2015, and I was using Fall 2014 information. I've also done extensive research on socio-political atmosphere in the Levant, and some research on battle tactics. If there's anyone from the Levant here that I can talk to, I would greatly appreciate being able to get in touch. I've talked to some people from the Levant, specifically a couple of Christian refugees who came here as a result of the war and they spoke of the growing anti-Christian sentiment in Syria that was a result of the war and the reason for them fleeing. I'd like to talk to some other people who have family or friends over in the Levant or know someone who does, or anyone with useful information or works I can study up on.

Edit:
March 6 was the last time I worked on the map, haha. Wow, it's been a long while.

Edit 2:
Also, I am open to having collaborators. I am looking for some assistance with economy, since I have long forgotten how to make a balanced economy on a map. I also am just near finishing Syrian borders, I still have Iraq to do and I would greatly appreciate assistance with that. Edit: I forgot, I also have Jordan to do still.
Any atlases or other mapping sources for settlements and information on settlements is greatly appreciated, especially the location of religious, ethnic, and possibly militia groups.

Edit 3:
All right, I've finished the territories in Syria and added more cities (with rounded populations, each city individually briefly researched). There are a total of 64 territories on this map, so far, that make up a total of 4 countries: Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria. I still have to do: Jordan, Iraq. In the end, I expect around 128 total territories.

Edit 4:
Tested some movement range again.
Map dimension: 5900 x 4400... with 64 countries.
World map is 9999 x 5400... with 197 countries.
My map will ultimately have around 128 total, I will try to add more but so far, the map has been fairly balanced. The finished product will ultimately not have balance since I aimed for realism; but, for the sake of the game, I will make sure the disadvantage in horrible positions will have a chance. Teamwork will be important in the scenario verison.
I'm thinking about releasing what I have once I finish the cities in Syria, then work on Jordan and Iraq while players try out Israel, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria map or even make a scenario.

Ill play that.

Kirjoittanut Need Mental Help, 29.06.2016 at 12:32

Ill play that.

Sweet, thank you!
----
To-do list for today:
-Add cities to Syria.
-Add units.*

*maybe

Borders look very professional and well drawn

Kirjoittanut Viruslegion, 29.06.2016 at 23:59

Borders look very professional and well drawn

Many thanks, I've been trying my best!

UPDATE:
Added a lot of cities in Syria! I will finish adding cities in Syria tomorrow, then I will begin adding cities in Lebanon. After Lebanon, I will create a mini scenario, focusing either entirely on the Syrian Civil War or mostly on it, meaning I may or may not add Israel, Palestine, Hezbollah, Lebanon; or, I might just not add Israel and Palestine to the abridged scenario.
I will begin working on Jordan three days from now. When Jordan is finished, I will work on Iraq then release the final scenario and eventually release the map for creating scenarios (and maybe cloning). This map is definitely out-dated, as I've said earlier and the shape of the territories are more similar to those of late 2014 through some time in 2015.

Perhaps the change name of the map, good luck!

Kirjoittanut Sinjid, 30.06.2016 at 00:45

Kirjoittanut Viruslegion, 29.06.2016 at 23:59

Borders look very professional and well drawn

Many thanks, I've been trying my best!

They look OK i guess....

Kirjoittanut The_Empirezz, 01.07.2016 at 05:26

Perhaps the change name of the map, good luck!

Thank you!
I think I will change the name. Originally, I was wanting to go from the Levant to Pakistan.

Kirjoittanut Professor Adog, 01.07.2016 at 16:13

Kirjoittanut Sinjid, 30.06.2016 at 00:45

Kirjoittanut Viruslegion, 29.06.2016 at 23:59

Borders look very professional and well drawn

Many thanks, I've been trying my best!

They look OK i guess....

There are many mistakes I have made with them, that is true. Over time, I have gotten a bit better. For the most part, it's just clicking, and it's not pleasant when you have minor arthritis.

Edit:
I didn't mean to double post, could a moderator merge my double post please?

Rebalanced the economy.
Added a lot of cities. Finished adding Lebanese cities.
Half of Syria still needs more ciites, though all districts have their capitals.
I still need to add units.

Then I will release the first version of this map.

More to do:
-Add Jordan
-add Iraq

This has been a WIP for far too long. I am going to release a Syrian Civil War+ scenario. When the map itself is finished, it will be available raw, unless popular demand has me release the map as it currently is (Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria).