by Kevin Ames
This variant will work with any map and most rules. Basically just take the existing supply centers and randomly place them on the board, including sea spaces. Then, randomly give each power an equal number of starting SCs on the board. The game begins in the adjustments phase. The powers may then build from any owned SC during the game. This variant works especially well with the blind variant. Thus, the powers are not even aware of where all of the SCs are, let alone who owns them.
The number of starting supply centers can vary depending on the tastes of the GM and the players, as well as the map used and the number of players in the game. For example, for a seven-player game on a standard map, players can start with one supply center and scramble for more, they can start with three, as most players do in the standard game, or they can start with five, leaving no neutral supply centers on the map.
At the time of this writing, there have been 3 test games of this variant all of which have been blind and random. The first had nine players on standard map with one starting SC each. The second had eight players on a standard map with one SC each. The third had seven players on an empire map with three SCs each (with a larger map and fewer players, the larger starting size works out better).