Attention Mapmakers: Soviet villages

Bob Walters

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 6, 2017
Messages
868
Reaction score
360
Location
Santa Clara, California
Country
llUnited States
My Mcafee antivirus warns me that this site is dangerous.
Sorry about that. It is odd though because, I use both Norton and Malwarebytes (designed to work with others) and I did not get either a virus or an exploit warning while accessing the site. I am very careful about malware as I worked in data recovery for awhile.
 

Robin Reeve

The Swiss Moron
Staff member
Moderator
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Messages
19,593
Reaction score
5,557
Location
St-Légier
First name
Robin
Country
llSwitzerland
Sorry about that. It is odd though because, I use both Norton and Malwarebytes (designed to work with others) and I did not get either a virus or an exploit warning while accessing the site. I am very careful about malware as I worked in data recovery for awhile.
I believe you.
I presume all our antimalware systems can be overcautious and not allways agree between them.
And, yes, Russian sites present diverse levels of danger.
 

Bob Walters

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 6, 2017
Messages
868
Reaction score
360
Location
Santa Clara, California
Country
llUnited States
I believe you.
I presume all our antimalware systems can be overcautious and not allways agree between them.
And, yes, Russian sites present diverse levels of danger.
It is also possible that the site became infected after I accessed it. It is too bad really as it had some great close ups of he log buildings that were mentioned earlier. It also showed some grain elevators/silos that were likely to be used. One thing that I found interesting is that there is an abandoned Ukrainian farming village in game S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Call of Pripyat that looks like it was lifted from this period (including outhouses). The interesting thing about the STALKER series is that most of the buildings are taken directly from the exclusion zone and there are pictures that matches the village that was included. Also, as I understand it, the authors visited the site in question so the depictions are pretty accurate.
 
Last edited:

DPetros

Member
Joined
Jul 13, 2007
Messages
152
Reaction score
77
Location
vista, CA
Country
llUnited States
I've been sketching out some Russian villages along the line of Mark's photo postings.
It's easy to over-do the inclusion of too many fences, of putting in too much 'ASL terrain'. It can easily get too crowded and miss the overall 'effect' that I think is needed.
Back to 'design for effect' here. Sometimes less is better. These Russian villages were fairly open, flimsy, and in ASL terms not like a Western European village; dense, hard-cover, twisty-windy.. So, in order to design them (the use of ASL terrain) for the right effect (open, flimsy, softer-cover, streched out), fewer fences, smaller houses, less crowded terrain is needed. Not every field should be completely surrounded by Hedges (fencing) - even though the pictures show such. Only some of those fences shown were sturdy enough to justify a +1 TEM - not all of them.
 

Mister T

Elder Member
Joined
Aug 12, 2006
Messages
4,204
Reaction score
1,680
Location
Bruxelles
Country
llFrance
I've been sketching out some Russian villages along the line of Mark's photo postings.
It's easy to over-do the inclusion of too many fences, of putting in too much 'ASL terrain'. It can easily get too crowded and miss the overall 'effect' that I think is needed.
Back to 'design for effect' here. Sometimes less is better. These Russian villages were fairly open, flimsy, and in ASL terms not like a Western European village; dense, hard-cover, twisty-windy.. So, in order to design them (the use of ASL terrain) for the right effect (open, flimsy, softer-cover, streched out), fewer fences, smaller houses, less crowded terrain is needed. Not every field should be completely surrounded by Hedges (fencing) - even though the pictures show such. Only some of those fences shown were sturdy enough to justify a +1 TEM - not all of them.
Seems a sound approach imo
 

Helmseye

Member
Joined
Feb 9, 2012
Messages
798
Reaction score
125
Location
twickenham
Country
llUnited Kingdom
according to the book "Ivan's War" due to the scorched earth policy and general warfare in the Ukraine many returnees found it difficult to find there home villages due to total devastation and that very few original survivors stayed near the original hometowns

I wonder if in the rebuilding of villages in post war they went back to a wild west style of village all centered around a road rather than the spread out version of villages that can still be found in places like Tula
 

Bob Walters

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 6, 2017
Messages
868
Reaction score
360
Location
Santa Clara, California
Country
llUnited States
according to the book "Ivan's War" due to the scorched earth policy and general warfare in the Ukraine many returnees found it difficult to find there home villages due to total devastation and that very few original survivors stayed near the original hometowns

I wonder if in the rebuilding of villages in post war they went back to a wild west style of village all centered around a road rather than the spread out version of villages that can still be found in places like Tula
The Germans did their share torching villages in Ukraine that was how Piper's command got the name "Blowtorch Battalion."
 

Pitman

Forum Guru
Joined
Jan 27, 2003
Messages
14,104
Reaction score
2,371
Location
Columbus, OH
Country
llUnited States
Your second picture shows a dead-end street which must be a street off a main road or a secondary street. The third picture shows two parallel roads connected by two side streets with the properties between those roads all separated by fence. That's not a subdivision? Albeit a crude looking one if it is. <g>

The pictures also show the road network reconnecting in a similar manner to how RandyT0001's geoboard does. I don't know if the exact look can be achieved with hexes unless the fencing and hedge artwork isn't drawn along the hexsides. It would be interesting to see what that looks like, but will it effect the LOS rules much?
I didn't say look at my pictures, I said read my post.
 

Steven Pleva

Elder Member
Joined
Jun 28, 2007
Messages
3,425
Reaction score
1,080
Location
Connecticut
Country
llUnited States
I think hedges are a poor representation of the fences. Few of them blocked LOS. Therefore, I would be more inclined to make them LOS hindrances with preferably new artwork. The buildings should be SSR'ed to 1/2 level. They had no height compared to the surrounding hills. You might even consider SSR'ing the buildings LOS hindrances like huts. JMHO...
Steve
 

rwpikul

Member
Joined
May 5, 2007
Messages
36
Reaction score
10
Location
Toronto
Country
llCanada
I think hedges are a poor representation of the fences. Few of them blocked LOS. Therefore, I would be more inclined to make them LOS hindrances with preferably new artwork. The buildings should be SSR'ed to 1/2 level. They had no height compared to the surrounding hills. You might even consider SSR'ing the buildings LOS hindrances like huts. JMHO...
Steve
I think it would be better to stay with the hedges and simply have the downgrading as a standard SSR along the lines of:

All hedges are treated as a +1 LOS hindrance which cost 1MF (inf/cav), 1MP (tracked/halftrack) or 2MP (other vehicles) to cross.
All walls are treated as hedges.
 

Bob Walters

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 6, 2017
Messages
868
Reaction score
360
Location
Santa Clara, California
Country
llUnited States
I went back and checked the link from the original post and there are a few taller buildings mixed with the lower buildings. I should point out that the same village late in the war is likely to have a great many fewer taller building than early in the war.
 

DPetros

Member
Joined
Jul 13, 2007
Messages
152
Reaction score
77
Location
vista, CA
Country
llUnited States
I'm a great fan of simplicity. SSR's, long-winded rules to define small matters, for me are distracting. I love to play ASL, but don't have much time to play or fuss with those kind of details. I'm getting older too - and the older I get the less fuss is wanted.

Overloading these Soviet-style villages with either too much terrain or too many rules seems to be moving in the wrong direction. I say, keep the terrain spare and simple. Apply the 'design-for-effect' principle (using existing terrain and rules to effectively represent what we want. ie: using Brush to represent crops, Orchards to represent light trees, Hedges to represent low-lying bushes, Wooden buildings or Huts to represent the shabby little wooden shacks).

Since the OP, I've been designing several new Russian/Ukrainian looking boards using authentic photographic source materials. I've designed mainly small, strung-out villages, but also other kinds of 'Soviet' looking boards such as large towns (not cities), open farmland, hills, etc..

It's true - ASL has not portrayed Russia/Ukraine terrain well enough to date as Mark says. The majority of ASL terrain so far has represented European terrain; dense, ornate, substantial..., and has done that pretty well. Russian/Ukrainian terrain on the other hand has been neglected. I think this is true for a couple reasons; 1) designers have a limited knowledge of what this terrain was really like - we're products of our own environment, 2) standard ASL play lends itself to wanting a lot of terrain; ie. the play of the game needs places to fight from, rout to, hide in, etc.. More authentic Russian/Ukrainian terrain can do that, but just a bit differently.

I hope that the MMP guys will be open to the idea of more Russian/Ukrainian terrain types, because there's a mess of them coming their way soon :)
 
Last edited:

von Marwitz

Forum Guru
Joined
Nov 25, 2010
Messages
14,357
Reaction score
10,205
Location
Kraut Corner
Country
llUkraine
Since the OP, I've been designing several new Russian/Ukrainian looking boards using authentic photographic source materials. I've designed mainly small villages, but also other kinds of 'Soviet' looking boards such as large towns (not cities), open farmland, hills, etc..
Let us see some, please.

von Marwitz
 

Bob Walters

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 6, 2017
Messages
868
Reaction score
360
Location
Santa Clara, California
Country
llUnited States
How about quarter size boards that one can print out on a color printer? Many modern fairly inexpensive color printers will print on cardstock.
 

RandyT0001

Elder Member
Staff member
Administrator
Moderator
Joined
Dec 5, 2016
Messages
1,055
Reaction score
1,272
Location
Memphis, TN
First name
Cary
Country
llUnited States
SV2as1.png This map of a Soviet village is on side A of a double-sided board that MMP recently introduced.
 

Brian W

Elder Member
Joined
Jan 29, 2003
Messages
7,216
Reaction score
1,024
Location
USA
Country
llUnited States
This map of a Soviet village is on side A of a double-sided board that MMP recently introduced.
I like this best of all, except for the height of the hills, or at least the steep slope of some of the hexes.
 

footsteps

Just visiting
Joined
Oct 19, 2007
Messages
7,379
Reaction score
3,532
Location
Ontario
Country
llCanada
I like this best of all, except for the height of the hills, or at least the steep slope of some of the hexes.
I agree with Brian. The height & steepness of the hills destroys the Steppe feeling. I'd prefer much lower hills (maybe just Level 1), with Brush and Orchards dotting the landscape. Perhaps extend the Gully onto one of the hills.

I like the village layout.
 
Top