Sure everyone has already noticed, but the new map has cut a rediculous amount of territory out of the old one.

For example

Island/Old Map Tile Count/New Map Tile Count/Percentage remaining

Yssam/55/19/34
Ruby/30/15/50
Cairn/29/17/59
Niff/34/20/59
Total subcontinents/148/71/48

As can be seen above, they have completely annihilated the land available to the subcontinents. To make matters worse, people have already observed that only 3 cities remain per holding.

Even with the reduction of holdings however, many of the holdings are only seperated by a single tile now, while other cities remain just a tile away from protected starter towns.

So here is my concern. There simply isnt enough land available for the people in the game. At the original DF launch, the world map was barely enough to contain the population then. There is simply no way that this new map can provide for full pop servers, let alone 75% of that.

Additionally, I think it is well understood that war is a primary aspect of DF. With this map and the dramatic lack of available territory, the initial wars will be devastating for the game. World war scenarios are not unimaginable, and should one of these occur, you are going to end up with half the server being crammed into starter zones with no where else to go.

It is already bad enough that the new map makes holding ownership impossible for the vast majority of small/medium clans ingame. What is worse though is that the map is destined to lead to massive population drops very early into the game. There simply isnt enough space.