This map represents the quickest I've ever got the basic pattern.  The HWs were 4 connectors, but in moving into ring 1, we found that one of the connectors was a moon, making the HWs in reality 3 connectors.  The other ring 1 worlds looped back to one another, and because I had seen it before very recently in 1257 and 1261, the map screamed *CUBE* at me.  This on T2.  I said, "Oboy!  We're on a cube."  Then I took a second look and said, "Oh, shoot!  We're on a cube."  This was because my HW was in a corner.  Since FBI likes to equalize starting positions as much as possible, and since there are only 8 corners to a cube, I concluded that there were only 8 people in this game.  FBI had already said there was a less than normal number of players in the game, but only 8?  I had never heard of a game with only 8 players before.  But it turned out to be true.

On T3, when I went to ring 2, I found that this was a hollow cube, with no interior worlds.  When I met people on T4, I guessed the dimensions of the cube to be 7x7x8.  This left 5 extra worlds, which I was hoping to be the HW and first ring of a ninth player connected in some weird way to the faces of the cube.  But it turned out that they were black holes.  The middle world of each 7x7 face had an extra connector that was a black hole.  These black holes were in turn each connected to the last 3 worlds.  We were hoping that these were some fantastic worlds with lots of industry and mines and other goodies on them.  The black box was allowing movement to a destination world by going through the world that had the same number as the fleet it was on ( e.g. ordering F1W2W3W4 would make the fleet move F1-->W1-->W4.  So these black holes could be circumvented and the goodies captured.  I tried it, and fell into another black hole.  We then assumed that the remaining two worlds were black holes also.

Final world disposition is shown on the map.  This game was won by Yarnbarn.

Joe

Editors note: This map is similar to the SW-Z1226 posted which was 6x6x11 worlds. The larger number of players allowed the HWs to be on the faces of the cube and there were only 3 solo moons scattered at random throughout the universe.