Some years ago I contributed a board that also showed a programming concept with http://www.wargear.net/boards/view/Merge+Sort.

Today I began thinking of adding another one in a similar vein, Quicksort. The map might look like this:

Jvlibhguqyswetndkxofrcamzp
Ibhgedfca Vluqyswtnkxormzp
Bhgedfca  Lqstnkormpu Ywxz
A Hgedfc  K Qstnormpu Wx Z
  Gedfc     Nomp Stru  X
  Edfc      M Op R Tu
  Dc F         P    U
  C

abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz

The idea would be that each group in the top section is the pivot. (Handily marked by being a capital letter.) Within a group you can attack to/from the pivot, and to/from the same character on the levels up/down. Except that in the sorted set on the bottom, you can attack your neighbors. The directions of attack, of course, are the movement of letters, and the comparisons that you can make.

Moving down, each pivot is moved to its correct location as the group is divided into 2, and you get a space. So, for instance, J is moved to the first cap. Then in the second one both I and V are placed correctly. And so on. (This is actually how quicksort works when you do it in place in an array.)

I was thinking a bonus structure of the form that each group is worth half its size (rounded down), and owning a letter all the way up/down is worth 5. With the idea that while you don't have to hold many territories to own "j", the top one is really hard to hold.

Does this sound like an interesting/playable/educational/stupid/whatever map? Does it sound like something that is worth creating? (I have no idea what a good strategy could be.)

I'm pretty sure I failed that assignment in my First year (read: only) programming class. 

It sounds like it'd be pretty open (no alot of choke points), but might be fun. Definitely educational. 

I'd be willing to try playing on such a map. Sounds like an interesting project.