From what I can tell, Civpanel5.gif is somewhat darker than the surrounding panels, and there are some light blue artifacts in the Eastern Mediterranean. Are anyone else seeing/having these problems?

I can vouch that the source files he creates the GIFs from are not darker. I certainly see many strange artifacts in the GIF versions, and I'm not sure where they come from.

I see it as well... let me checkout the sourse PSD.. might be a color issue there.

I had no problem with the artifacts when I converted your PSD over for the PBEM map...
There is also banding in the three modified panels (again in the sea zones)

FYI, all of my comments are for the map edition that was current at the end of December.

I was noticing some slight variations in color - but most printing will ignore it as they can't process that fine at that level of detail.

I noticed a few *small* artifacts in the Med - it looks like what would be left from erasing text (probably the name of the water area.)

I have printed the "massivemap" and noticed that the seams in a few areas are visible (about 3 pixels wide). I pulled it up and cleaned up a few of the seams and left a few as is and then printed to see what helped or didn't help. I ended up printing with the bitmap at about 330dpi to maximum the size on the printer I was using (I am guessing that it was drawn to 360 dpi, which would put the size pretty close to the maps from the original box)

Map Panel 11

The darker green that is on the southern coast of the Arabian penninsula - almost looks like it is dithered in the GIF that I have of it. That's the darkest color in Saba, Himyar, Aden, etc.

I noticed it while working on a seam in "massivemap". Of course, with practically any printer it is going to be not visible.

Does it look better now?

Yep, a lot.