The world is a ball

A ball on which we live and die. On which we walk round no matter which way we walk.
I have an idea on a map for earth and I can't belive it wan't done before(or maybe it was and I should learn how to look) But someone should make a ball map of earth and not just the donut ones that are out, and it should be big, real big... not reccomanded for slower computers. I mean Japan a real empire with more then three cites big. And it should have both the north and south pole and you get the picture by now and I'll stop typing now.


The ball is falling!!

What exactly would make a map stand out as a ball ?

One problem is that there's a limit to how big you can make maps.
Plus, if the map allowed each empire a realistic size, then it would never be able to run on current PCs.
Japan makes up a tiny proprtion of the world's surface, but it would need at least 30x40 suares all to itself.

But still, if you or anyone else ever manages to make a map like that I'd love to try it out, it sounds like a really fun map. There could be bonuses for being the first to reach each ploe and things like that. But then that would probably be becoming a mod, not just a map.

The problem is: it is mathematically impossible to completely cover the surface of an orb with squares.
In fact, it is extremely difficult to cover the surface of an orb with any regular geometric unit. I know it works with a combination of 60 tiles with 5 and 6 corners (The result looks like a ball for soccer), but it seems incredibly difficult to make a mod for that. Besides that, 60 tiles is very few for a civ4-map, you would have to divide the tiles.
Good luck and have fun

Gigaz said:

The problem is: it is mathematically impossible to completely cover the surface of an orb with squares.

Click to expand...

Ah it is possible, just with very very tiny squares

Gigaz said:

In fact, it is extremely difficult to cover the surface of an orb with any regular geometric unit. I know it works with a combination of 60 tiles with 5 and 6 corners (The result looks like a ball for soccer), but it seems incredibly difficult to make a mod for that. Besides that, 60 tiles is very few for a civ4-map, you would have to divide the tiles.
Good luck and have fun

Click to expand...

What would work, perhaps, is to frame up the north like a normal earth map, but make the pole 1 tile, so if you're on the pole you can access the every 2nd row tiles.

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Geez... I didn't think it'd be so hard...

Equilateral triangles can do it; 20 of them, each divided into as many more as you want. You get something that looks something like this. (Click the little map on the left side and ignore the maps that use hexes.)

As the map is, there are no mysterious gaps needed to account for the curvature of the Earth, but for the triangle-based map you have these gaps. It's possible that a computer could "wrap up" the 20 sided figure and present a single face with all its adjoining faces together so you never see the gaps, and with the view zoomed out, there's not much distortion in the globe view.

Using a triangular map would allow you to use 3, 4, or 6-directional movements. For 3 directions, you move only across edges, for 6 you can also move across points to directly opposite points. For 4, you can move left or right across edges and up or down across edge or point alternately.

There would be an oddity at one of the major vertices, where only 5 triangle points come together instead of the usual 6; I'm not sure exactly how it would be handled, because in the 4 or 6-direction movements, you wouldn't be able to move in one direction (up if on the north 30 degree line, down if on the south 30 degree line; traveling across poles can simply be prohibited, or you can allow movement to any of the 5 triangles surrounding it.

- - -

Okay, so we know it's doable, why would we want to do it?

On our Earth, the poles are pretty much worthless, but having shorter routes on the north or south sections of the map would make some movement options seem faster by going that way. On planets with different values, the poles might be habitable, but the equator is too hot or otherwise inhospitable - perhaps full of deserts. Some planets may be more oblong than others, making it all but impossible to cross the equator. Some planets might be tidally locked, meaning only a ring around the world is habitable - the light-pole has all desert, the dark pole is always frozen and nothing grows there anyway.

Essentially, having a round world allows Civ to model more, and more-varied planets than ever before.

Hello Grishnash, everyone.....check this little thread here:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=252254

Plus, if the map allowed each empire a realistic size, then it would never be able to run on current PCs.

Click to expand...

I've got a P805D overclocked to 3.5 Ghz, 2 Gig RAM, RadeonX1600Pro, etc...a moderate rig by today's standards....I am saddened as well by the inability for larger maps

However, we can hope that computing power will continue its exponential progress into the future....in five years, we might be able to play on, say, a 160x100 map (thats 640x400 tiles! )....I think back to when I first played Mafia...choppy at best on medium settings....now when I play it on my current rig maxed out, its smooth as silk...

Jeff