Does anyone play a Torroid/Doughnut map? (The GeoRealism "globe" problem)

[primem0ver]

I really do want to know if anyone plays doughnut maps. I see this as a major complication to an already existing problem which needs to be resolved. That is the point of this thread... to resolve the "globe" problem.

The problem is what to do with the poles. On a true globe this isn't a problem. A plate at the poles has the same basic shape features as anywhere else. Motion can be simulated relatively easily (assuming cells on such a map are well thought out in advanced).

With a cylindrical map, this becomes rather complicated. With a toroidal map I can't decide if it will be easier or more complicated... but temperature issues on the interior will make everything really odd... (though we can still simulate things normally...the passing from the top to the bottom will get very odd indeed).

We need to find a solution. Here is my proposal (at least for cylindrical maps):

Let us have a plate on the north and south pole that is essentially, nearly off the map and make them permanent. It will constantly move in either a east-west direction or a west-east direction. This will keep these plates off the playable map. They can be randomly assigned as oceanic or land to make the landforms of bordering plates interact differently (or should we simply make them both oceanic?).

What are your thoughts?

 

[AIAndy]

Sounds good. I think pretty much everyone plays on cylindrical maps.

 

[Koshling]

Yeh, I think AIAndy is right. However, simulation on a toroid should really be easier than on a cylinder in some ways, since the projection is length-preserving everywhere, and there are no singularities, which the poles are on a cylindrical map. I think you should think about a toroid as if it REALLY were a toroid (forget spheres for those maps), so imagine a (forget real physics and just go with geometry - the Greeks were right!) toroid that rotates about it's center (in it's own plane) and a 'sun' that performs a circular motion in a plane perpendicular to the plane of the torus, passing through the center at one extreme edge of the circle (so the sun circles a cross section of one side of the torus, but because the torus is also rotating all areas see the sun regularly). If the diameter of the sun's 'orbit' is increased you can get a different distance from it depending on the 'latitude' of where you are on the torus - hence warmer and colder areas by latitude.

Everything is continuous functions, but you still have temperature gradients by latitude. Should be an easy thing to base modeling on!

PS - such maps should add a religious effect of some sort to the discovery of geometry

 

[primem0ver]

PS - such maps should add a religious effect of some sort to the discovery of geometry

Now that was seriously funny!

 

[ls612]

Sounds good. I think pretty much everyone plays on cylindrical maps.

Sure. I think to a certain extent we already remove the poles from the actual map, so this would just codify that in map generation.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Last time I played on a Torroid map was with RoM/AND. So yes, but not often.

 

[Thunderbrd]

This made me think... with multi-maps we could eventually have a polar map for N and S poles. That could be interesting... especially with terrain damage in effect.

Moderator Action: *snip*

 

[Hydromancerx]

*smacks head* not the "hollow earth theory". You need to lay off the Coast to Coast AM.

What's next the hollow moon?

 

[Thunderbrd]

I thought it might make for a neat game option

Moderator Action: *snip*

 

[primem0ver]

*smacks head* not the "hollow earth theory". You need to lay off the Coast to Coast AM.

What's next the hollow moon?

Another serious burst of laughter!

 

[The_J]

Moderator Action: Attention, the parts of this thread about hollow earth and other related stuff are now in this thread in the offtopic section.