Far East Asia

Far East Asia

Brief tab showing command bonuses

Stats

Regions: 42
Commands: 8
Special Features: Inner Commands, Dead Space

Strategy and Tips

With the Far East Asia map we introduce a feature that may trip some players up: some of the bonus commands are nestled within larger commands. If you take a look at the Indian Subcontinent, you'll see that there are two levels of bonuses there. The +3 "India" bonus is awarded once you hold the five regions that make up the country of India - this is the 'nestled' command. If are also able to control the three regions of the same color with + symbols (Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh) the bonus increases to +4.

The same holds true for the islands; hold political Indonesia for a +2 bonus, but add East Malaysia and the Philippines to bump the bonus up to +4.

The purpose of creating the nestled commands was to create a medium-sized map with both small commands that were attainable early in the game, and large commands that would allow a player to do some damage. Players who go after Mongolia - the smallest and, in most games, the easiest bonus to attain - might be kicking themselves down the line when they are facing opponents who gradually picked up a +4.

Also watch out for Taiwan, which is not a part of any command.

Recommended settings
Singles: 3-6p
Teams: 4-8p
Reserves: Escalate
Reinforcemtns: Path/Anywhere, 1/3

History

We didn't want to go too long without somehow representing Asia in a MC map, but it's such a vast continent with so much potential for a MajCom map it was difficult to narrow it down to a specific area. The primary mapmaker - Shepherd - wanted to split the continent into chunks that had some sort of shared historical or cultural identity. The "Far East" is certainly a western term, but it evokes a sense of foreign mystery that we hope we've captured in this map.

Shepherd came up with the basic design of the map after going to an exhibit of Japanese wood block prints; the outlines of the land, the bonus key, and "chop" signatures reflect such a look. After struggling with the color scheme, Badorties came up with the beautiful water color effects.

The idea behind the nested commands is explained above, but it should also be noted that making Taiwan an independent region and not part of a command was based on the modern history of this island-country. Culturally it is most closely related to China, and China considers Taiwan to be one of its provinces. Politically the island remains fiercely independent from its mainland cousins. As it is not culturally or politically aligned with the Japanese islands to the north, nor with the Philippines and the Indonesian islands to the south, it seemed fitting to let Taiwan stand on its own.