Please use hexagons instead of squares!

[t0mme]

It's both - diagonal movement is screwy on squares because you're actually travelling farther than if you travelled in horizontal or vertical lines (simple Pythagorean theorum tells you why). But with hexes all distances are always equal, no matter which direction you move in. It just happens that it also has better aesthetic qualities, as well.

Aaah, I'm beginning to see the light, thanks frekk. Sounds good, why stick to the tiles than, other than for tradional sake?

 

[apatheist]

If I understand your question correctly, you want tiles because it makes it really easy to quantize what would otherwise be (effectively) continuous. It's a lot easier to deal with a single, uniformly-sized tile than it is to have to control game play over a continuous range. Does your unit move 420 km per turn or 430 km? Is the city radius 500km or 498km? Does your cultural border extend 120km or 140km? Do opposing armies automatically enter battle when they are within 2km or 3km? Using large, consistently-sized tiles avoids having to think about all that stuff, with little loss to game play.

I care about hexes because they are a relatively decent way to achieve a spherical game board. Besides that, I'm perfectly fine with square tiles.

 

[t0mme]

So the difference between them in terms of gameplay experience is minimal.

 

[Akka]

The problem that is annoying with hexe, is that there is no 90° angles. So you can go in a direct line on a vertical or horizontal basis (depending on how is the hexe), but you'll zigzag if you try to do the same in the other line. Makes lines strange-looking, particularly weird on roads and railraods.

 

[Xen]

squares are teh roXXors. hex sux.

 

[MattII]

Squares are probably easier to code and work with, (both in terms of modding and gameplay), but hexagons give better distance calculations (as far as I can see) and there are two buttons left over on the number pad for scrolling between units.

 

[frekk]

Does your unit move 420 km per turn or 430 km?

Hardly, the distortion is closer to 40% on diagonal, so its actually - do your units move 420km or 593km (just use Pythagorean theorum). That's a pretty big difference.

The problem that is annoying with hexe, is that there is no 90° angles. So you can go in a direct line on a vertical or horizontal basis (depending on how is the hexe), but you'll zigzag if you try to do the same in the other line. Makes lines strange-looking, particularly weird on roads and railraods.

Not so ... you can go in a direct line in any of the six directions, from the middle of one face of the hex to the middle of the same face in the next hex. It will be a straight line. So you could radiate straight lines out in six directions from a central point, and still follow the grid. That's two less directions than squares, but then again, too many straight lines don't look natural on the map anyway (which is why roads and rails and rivers bend and twist a bit, to look natural).

Now if you try to run a line that doesn't follow the grid, like a road say, it will look funny, but this is true with squares too. Eg, a road running in a straight line that is east-by-northeast could look fine on a hex grid, but it won't follow the square grid very well because it has to be a perfect 45 degree angle to do that.

Finally, it is actually squares that encourage zig-zagging, not hexes. Because of the diagonal distortion, scouts reveal more terrain by always moving on the diagonal, zig-zagging on the diagonal one or two squares as they go and still getting to their destination just as fast as if they had gone there in a straight line (at least, where the destination and departure points are at right angles - if they're already at a diagonal it doesn't matter so much). With hexes, the fastest way from A to B is always in a straight line, and although your scout will reveal more terrain by deviating along his way, it will slow him down to do so.

 

[apatheist]

Hardly, the distortion is closer to 40% on diagonal, so its actually - do your units move 420km or 593km (just use Pythagorean theorum). That's a pretty big difference.

Um, I was answering t0mme's question about why there should be tiles at all.

 

[Crayton]

Oh ya, I forgot. I always go diagonally with my scouts. When I automate them, they don't go diagonally. I can't think of the word. It's a ploy, an easy escape, a bug, 'taking advantage of', a cheat.... What's the word!?!
Actually, squares are easy to work with especially because the compass has been divided into N, S, E, and W; not, N, T, E, S, O, and W.

 

[t0mme]

Oh ya, I forgot. I always go diagonally with my scouts. When I automate them, they don't go diagonally. I can't think of the word. It's a ploy, an easy escape, a bug, 'taking advantage of', a cheat.... What's the word!?!
Actually, squares are easy to work with especially because the compass has been divided into N, S, E, and W; not, N, T, E, S, O, and W.

you mean an exploit?

 

[frekk]

you mean an exploit?

I wouldn't really call it an exploit, since the AI takes advantage of it too. It's just an ugly solution, that's all.

Actually, squares are easy to work with especially because the compass has been divided into N, S, E, and W; not, N, T, E, S, O, and W.

You use a compass to play civ?

 

[Akka]

Not so ... you can go in a direct line in any of the six directions, from the middle of one face of the hex to the middle of the same face in the next hex. It will be a straight line. So you could radiate straight lines out in six directions from a central point, and still follow the grid. That's two less directions than squares, but then again, too many straight lines don't look natural on the map anyway (which is why roads and rails and rivers bend and twist a bit, to look natural).

So that doesn't contradict what I say, there is no 90° angle in straight line, and you have either horizontal straight line, either vertical. Why did you said "no" ?

Finally, it is actually squares that encourage zig-zagging, not hexes. Because of the diagonal distortion, scouts reveal more terrain by always moving on the diagonal, zig-zagging on the diagonal one or two squares as they go and still getting to their destination just as fast as if they had gone there in a straight line (at least, where the destination and departure points are at right angles - if they're already at a diagonal it doesn't matter so much). With hexes, the fastest way from A to B is always in a straight line, and although your scout will reveal more terrain by deviating along his way, it will slow him down to do so.

I didn't talked about "encouraging zig-zagging", I talked about you WILL zig-zag in case you're trying to make a straight line in a 90° of another.


I still say that a simpler method is to make that diagonal movement cost 1,5 points.

 

[kryszcztov]

@ Akka : In chess, you don't need 1.5 movement point to move in diagonal with your king. Will you feel more immersed that way ? And BTW, spending just 1.5 movement point per turn is plain silly when you have rounded movement points. And what's more, it shouldn't be 1.5, but sqrt(2) : good luck with this irrational number !

@ frekk : People usually refer to cardinal directions on a map. Do you see the problem ? And in what direction would you put your hexagons ? You basically have 2 solutions.

 

[Akka]

@ Akka : In chess, you don't need 1.5 movement point to move in diagonal with your king. Will you feel more immersed that way ? And BTW, spending just 1.5 movement point per turn is plain silly when you have rounded movement points. And what's more, it shouldn't be 1.5, but sqrt(2) : good luck with this irrational number !

Chess isn't really dealing with very accurate distances

Sqrt(2) is actually 1,4 and something, which can be approxmated to 1,5 with no problem.

And there is absolutely nothing silly with spending partial movement points. How do you think that road movement is managed, genius ?

Tsss, disappointing, Chris, disappointing

 

[kryszcztov]

Chess isn't really dealing with very accurate distances

Well, it looks like Civ isn't either. Remember, the world is a cylinder...

Sqrt(2) is actually 1,4 and something, which can be approxmated to 1,5 with no problem.

I can also approximate it to just 1 with no problem (what they have done so far).

And there is absolutely nothing silly with spending partial movement points. How do you think that road movement is managed, genius ?

If you think that roads make you spend 0.333333... movement point, then you're wrong. It's another system, like if there were 2 scales of movement points. One for non-road movements, and one for road-movements, the interaction between both being, when you reach 3 on the road scale, you increase 1 on the other one. The least you could do is changing the movement system so that it only gets integers numbers. And it still would be false, at least very far from what an RTS could do in this regard.

Tsss, disappointing, Chris, disappointing

 

[Truronian]

Hmm...

1) Hexs wouldn't make a nice large sphere. The thing about Footballs and BuckminsterFullerines is that they employ the same number of pentagons and hexagons:

This is a special case. It doesn't work on larger scales, so unless you want to play civ on a very small grid, then you are out of luck.

2) Bear in mind that the movement point system is not meant to be directly proportionate to time. Just think of diagonal movement as slightly faster marching, if you must.

3)1.5 movement points to go diagonally = Iv played a game that did this, but not for very long.

4)Tactically, I think hex based games are weeker. I cant really explain why, but squares tend to lead to more strategy

5)Historically, squares have been used more than triangles. eg. American streets, national borders, topology, buildings. Our world is square based, and as such I think Civ should be aswell

And finally, if it aint broke, dont fix it

 

[SonicX]

Truronian. Open 3dStudio max and create icosahedron or whatever it's called and count the pentagons ... it's ALWAYS 12, no matter what the number of hexagons is.

5)Historically, squares have been used more than triangles. eg. American streets, national borders, topology, buildings. Our world is square based, and as such I think Civ should be aswell

Note the American streets, the American borders (and artifical african borders) ...
European borders are curlier and resemble fractals more than squares European cities are perfectly round, as most large cities are built in rings instead of along streets.
And buildings ? What does a building's shape have to do with the tiling ???

 

[Truronian]

@Sonic X

Would it be posible to post a pic of a larger version of the shape? I don't have the required software. I can;t visualize how it works (are there flat planes?).

As for the the squares business, I was just pointing out that humans are conditioned towards squares, thats why they are so prevelant i society. I believe that square civ holds more appeal psychologically.

Incidentaly, did anyone ever play populace the beginning? They somehow had a square grid that wrapped to a sphere.

 

[apatheist]

4)Tactically, I think hex based games are weeker. I cant really explain why, but squares tend to lead to more strategy

If you can't explain why, then you're just some guy making a wild assertion. Besides, I doubt you have the data to reach that conclusion with any degree of confidence.

5)Historically, squares have been used more than triangles. eg. American streets, national borders, topology, buildings. Our world is square based, and as such I think Civ should be aswell

That's not completely wrong, just mostly wrong. Straight lines are the exception. Before the industrial age, there were few straight lines in cities or borders. What mattered was easy of transport, and rivers, roads, and topography shaped that. Buildings are irrelevant because they operate on a completely different scale.

 

[SonicX]

@Sonic X

Would it be posible to post a pic of a larger version of the shape? I don't have the required software. I can;t visualize how it works (are there flat planes?).

This is a 4x triangalized icosahedron and a 18x triangulization of an icosahedron.
I've made the pentagons visible, as you can see, there are 12 in the same place as they are on a soccer ball (or football, whatever)
I think you can see the potential of a highel level of triangulation.
A fitting icosahedron is possible with any triangilization of a pair number (2, 4, 6, ... 142, ...)

I didn't make the hexagons in the 18x one visible though, I ain't got THAT much time. But I think you can see what happens if you take 50x ... the triangles almost flatten out and hexagons appear.