I was thinking about modifying and promoting a new version of one of my maps, and realized that if someone had played some games on the old version, they might not bother reading the description/rules very careful on a new game and get caught by surprise.

Maybe if players have played a map before and the version of the map is now different from the last game they played on it, it could popup and say something like "This map has changed since the last game you played, please review the board and rules careful."

Also, maybe it would be nice if when a mapmaker promotes a new version of a board, they could select 'this is a minor change', in which case the popup would not appear.  That way if it's just a graphical update or something pretty minor they could indicate that.

yes it would be nice as i do bad enough dont need any surprises...

How much change will the map undergo? Unless it's just fixing obviously broken game mechanics,  updating the graphics, or making some adjustment to the starting scenario, I would highly recommend leaving the old version as an "original" scenario or some-such instead of deleting it all together. That way, players will know that they're playing a non-original scenario when they join the game, and be expecting some new twists and turns.

Kjeld - I was thinking specifically of my Invention board.  I'll probably make a few changes.  Things like having the war tech attack bonus reduced, the capital city defensive bonus reduced & adding a 10-20% assimilation bonus when you take someone out.  Maybe a few other 'minor' changes.  Do you think in that case it would be better to leave the original scenario?  If the new one is clearly better I'm reluctant to do that.

Ozyman wrote:

Kjeld - I was thinking specifically of my Invention board.  I'll probably make a few changes.  Things like having the war tech attack bonus reduced, the capital city defensive bonus reduced & adding a 10-20% assimilation bonus when you take someone out.  Maybe a few other 'minor' changes.  Do you think in that case it would be better to leave the original scenario?  If the new one is clearly better I'm reluctant to do that.

That would sound like a significant-enough change to warrant a new scenario.  

Agree with ATH

So keep around the old scenario even though the new one is clearly superior?  Or I guess if I have more than one scenario than I can just delete the old one and give the new one a new name so it is obvious it is something different?

If I understand correctly,  they would have that you delete the old scenario and add the new scenario with a different name.  If this is the case, I disagree with them.  My sense is that you are trying to "tweak" the mechanics of the existing board, and therefore don't wish to "rename" it.  If you feel the tweak is enough that veteran player's should probably know about it, then my recommendation would be to also tweak the actual board image enough that they notice something's different.  It could be a permanent change, or maybe something as simple as putting a v2.1, or New and Improved Dice Mods announcement somewhere on the board.  Then maybe after a few months you could take the notice off the board and update the version again.

Here's a related question.  If a scenario is retired, can a new scenario be ever added sometime later with the exact same scenario name?

Agree with M57.  If you think your board needs to be improved then do so.  You can put version notes in the description.  M's idea of making your own "popup" on the board itself is great

Yeah, I think I agree with M57 also.  I'll have to think of something to add to the board image to announce the change.  M - I have no idea about your question regarding scenario names.

M57 wrote:

If I understand correctly,  they would have that you delete the old scenario and add the new scenario with a different name. ...

No, this is not what I meant.  From Ozy's post it sounds like the tweaks would be significant enough to be a new scenario while keeping the old as "Default."  In my mind it sounds exactly like the Default vs. "Solar" scenarios for Colossal Crusade.

AttilaTheHun wrote:

M57 wrote:

If I understand correctly,  they would have that you delete the old scenario and add the new scenario with a different name. ...

No, this is not what I meant.  From Ozy's post it sounds like the tweaks would be significant enough to be a new scenario while keeping the old as "Default."  In my mind it sounds exactly like the Default vs. "Solar" scenarios for Colossal Crusade.

Gotcha..

Yeah -- the line between "tweak" and "new scenario" can be a blurry one.  Heck, as you all know, the line between "new scenario" and "new board" gets me confused.