Weather

[lomyrin]

Yes, I like the latest series of weather boundary lines.  They are now clearly visible at a glance for all zoom levels.
 
The only remaining visibility question areas are the sea boundaries with the a little lighter blue line where they coincide with weather boundaries. That could still use a more discernible difference.
 
Lars 

[Incy]

It's the weather in the hex (and not in the seazone) that matters for invasions and shore bombardment.
You can have an invasion fleet in a blizzard seazone, but still unload + shore bombard into a non-blizzard weather hex adjacent to (or inside!) that seazone.

The weather in the seazone is ONLY used for modifying naval combats. As long as the search boxes are inside the correct weather zone I think there will not be any confusion. Any unit doing something will always be inside the right weather zone!!

On the other hand, I think not being able to read/understand national borders/weather borders/seazone borders properly without a lot of knowledge about how the various borders switch color all the time might be VERY confusing to newbies.

btw, I don't think you should use straight lines, but hoped you could be able to lay out the weather boundary (mostly) along other hexsides than those with sea borders. It would make for a whole lot less weather boundary clutter on the map, because there would be no more "weather islands" like seen in the baltic, pacific, etc. I do not understand how it can lead to misunderstanding.

Incy

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

ORIGINAL: Incy
I tend to agree with Froonp on this one.

But how about redoing the wether zoning in oceans a bit?
If the weather zones can be drawn a bit more "natural", rather than follow seazone boundaries, I think it would look a lot better.

For sea zones, instead of following the circumference of a seazone, the weather zones could go throgh/across the sea zone. But the weather of a seazone would always be the part of the zone where the seabox was located.

Example 1, Baltic:
Weather boundary would cross straight from south of stockholm across to Estonia, taking care to put all the search boxes in the temperate zone.

Example 2, Solomons sea:
Weather boundary goes further east & south, so no island are in the "wrong" weather zone

Example 3, Bismarch + South China seas:
Weather boundary goes roughly straight eastwards from (a hex south of) Singapore through these 2 sea areas

I think some of the changes you propose here would change game play. Or at least make it more likely for the players to become confused. Shore bombardment and invasions depend on the weather in the sea area. If an all sea hex is adjacent to a coastal hex but the weather boundary is drawn such that the all sea hex is in a different weather zone from the rest of the sea area, which weather zone applies isn't obvious. By the rules, it is determined by where the sea boxes are located (I believe). but having the immediately adjacent all sea hex clearly placed in a different weather zone will make that more difficult for the players to see/understand/accept.

I looked at drawing the sea area boundaries as straight lines (as in the WIF FE paper maps) but that is tricky to do, especially because the location of the center dots in the all sea hexes has to be perfect in every instance - because the placement of the center dots determines the movement cost for air units to fly into sea areas.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Incy

It's the weather in the hex (and not in the seazone) that matters for invasions and shore bombardment.
You can have an invasion fleet in a blizzard seazone, but still unload + shore bombard into a non-blizzard weather hex adjacent to (or inside!) that seazone.

The weather in the seazone is ONLY used for modifying naval combats. As long as the search boxes are inside the correct weather zone I think there will not be any confusion. Any unit doing something will always be inside the right weather zone!!

On the other hand, I think not being able to read/understand national borders/weather borders/seazone borders properly without a lot of knowledge about how the various borders switch color all the time might be VERY confusing to newbies.

btw, I don't think you should use straight lines, but hoped you could be able to lay out the weather boundary (mostly) along other hexsides than those with sea borders. It would make for a whole lot less weather boundary clutter on the map, because there would be no more "weather islands" like seen in the baltic, pacific, etc. I do not understand how it can lead to misunderstanding.

Incy

Removing the pockets of "weather islands" changes WIF FE dramatically by changing the weather zone for those islands.

Parallel lines running across the ocean (sea area and weather zone boundaries) not only changes the game from WIF FE, it also would be visually unappealing (at least to me).

[Incy]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

Removing the pockets of "weather islands" changes WIF FE dramatically by changing the weather zone for those islands.

Parallel lines running across the ocean (sea area and weather zone boundaries) not only changes the game from WIF FE, it also would be visually unappealing (at least to me).

I don't propose changing the weather in those island hexes!
I just propose drawing the borders differently so there are no borders around islands anymore.

And I also don't propose using straight lines, I still want hexside lines. Se pickture for example of what I mean. I've drawn in some extra boundaries in white, and yellow is boundary that can be deleted

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Incy

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
Removing the pockets of "weather islands" changes WIF FE dramatically by changing the weather zone for those islands.

Parallel lines running across the ocean (sea area and weather zone boundaries) not only changes the game from WIF FE, it also would be visually unappealing (at least to me).

I don't propose changing the weather in those island hexes!
I just propose drawing the borders differently so there are no borders around islands anymore.

And I also don't propose using straight lines, I still want hexside lines. Se pickture for example of what I mean. I've drawn in some extra boundaries in white, and yellow is boundary that can be deleted

Ah, now I understand what you mean.

Actually this simply reveals a weakness of the WIF design: when a sea area is bisected by a weather zone boundary, the whole sea area is considered to be experiencing one type of weather, though the land masses within the sea area can have different weather depending on whether thaey are above or below the weather zone boundary.

The trouble I have with your proposal (which looks very nice in fine weather, as shown in your drawing) is that when I draw in the weather effects (rain, storm, etc.), they should either:
(a) be the same for the entire sea area, which goes against the location of the weather zone boundary, or
(b) follow the weather zone boundary, which goes against what the weather is in the sea area.

[Incy]

Good question. I have 3 proposals:

1) Just draw the weather as today (even if it doesn't match the weather zone)
2) Draw the weather according to weather zones even if some seazones get two weatherpatterns (the actual ships will always be placed inside a zone with correct weather anyways, because the search boxes are on the correct side of the seazone)
3) Is a bit more fancy. At sea, there is no difference between rain/snow and storm/blizzard. Why not use a separate weather overlay for sea hexes? For example small waves for rain/snow, and big waves for storm/blizzard? It would add to the graphic variation of the game, and it won't look that wierd when "waves" rather than "weather" crosses boundaries. It will also "remove" information where it's not needed, it will be easier for players to think about fine/bad/very bad weather for seas, rather than consider all 5 weather types and understanding how each of them work at sea.

[Incy]

A variation of 3) could be to not draw separate sea weather, but rather a big weather system graphic centered around each searchbox. Smallish weather system for "bad" weather, big storm system for "very bad" weather. Make it a huge graphic maybe 6 by 6 hexes? The map would look just like a satelite photo !!

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Incy

A variation of 3) could be to not draw separate sea weather, but rather a big weather system graphic centered around each searchbox. Smallish weather system for "bad" weather, big storm system for "very bad" weather. Make it a huge graphic maybe 6 by 6 hexes? The map would look just like a satelite photo !!

This would be rather easy to do. All sea hexes would not display a weather overlay and an extra 'weather sea box' could be added the the 10 existing sea boxes to indicate weather. It could also be simplified, as you noted, to bad versus very bad. Downside is that is doesn't match the rest of the weather depictions in the land hexes.

I am still open on this design issue. I expected that the addition of weather zone boundaries would cause us to have to revisit weather overlays (though I definitely do not want to start from scratch).

What do other forum readers think?

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
The white is very powerful but I need that for when it crosses all the different types of land terrain. It is actually thinner than the blue lines (5 versus 7), but still jumps out more.

Why not making the weather zone boundary thinner when it is adjacent to sea ?

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

10th and last in the series. Zoom level 3. Most of the map will look like this, with the weather zone boundary extending roughly horizontally and only occasionally paralleling a country border. I do not believe the width should be increased more than what is shown in this set of screen shots (7 pixels wide). I prefer 5 but only marginally more than 7 - either works for me.

Why not 6 pixel wide then ?

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

ORIGINAL: Incy

A variation of 3) could be to not draw separate sea weather, but rather a big weather system graphic centered around each searchbox. Smallish weather system for "bad" weather, big storm system for "very bad" weather. Make it a huge graphic maybe 6 by 6 hexes? The map would look just like a satelite photo !!

This would be rather easy to do. All sea hexes would not display a weather overlay and an extra 'weather sea box' could be added the the 10 existing sea boxes to indicate weather. It could also be simplified, as you noted, to bad versus very bad. Downside is that is doesn't match the rest of the weather depictions in the land hexes.

I am still open on this design issue. I expected that the addition of weather zone boundaries would cause us to have to revisit weather overlays (though I definitely do not want to start from scratch).

What do other forum readers think?

I am strongly against having the Weather zones boundaries crossing in the middle of sea areas as Incy propose it.

Sea box sections can be moved on the map, and so their position is no garantee that the player will know the weather zone for a Sea Area.
Just look for example at paper WiF, there is only 1 sea area where the weather zone is not clear, and we keep getting questions about it, regulary, after 10 years that the game is played.

Moreover, I for one do not find this disturbing (that the weather zone boundary is drawn around islands), for me this just make it even clearer that the weather in those islands is not the same as the weather in the surrounding sea area, and clearer that the whole sea area is under the same weather. With Incy's version, it would be less clear, as there would be no weather zone boundary around those islands, and the weather in the surrounding sea area would be unclear.

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Incy
3) Is a bit more fancy. At sea, there is no difference between rain/snow and storm/blizzard. Why not use a separate weather overlay for sea hexes? For example small waves for rain/snow, and big waves for storm/blizzard? It would add to the graphic variation of the game, and it won't look that wierd when "waves" rather than "weather" crosses boundaries. It will also "remove" information where it's not needed, it will be easier for players to think about fine/bad/very bad weather for seas, rather than consider all 5 weather types and understanding how each of them work at sea.

I like this, but without the previous idea of the weather boundaries being changed.
Showing the weather at sea in another way may be good looking.

Another argument against "cutting sea areas in 2 (or more) weather zones" : When you are in a high level of zoom (large hexes), with the screen centered in a sectin where youonly see a part of the sea area, a player will be confused into believing he can't send planes at sea, if the weather boundaries show him that he first hexdots are in storm à blizzard.

No no, the weather into the whole sea areas should be accurately shown, both with consistent graphics, and with consistent weather zones boundaries.

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Incy

A variation of 3) could be to not draw separate sea weather, but rather a big weather system graphic centered around each searchbox. Smallish weather system for "bad" weather, big storm system for "very bad" weather. Make it a huge graphic maybe 6 by 6 hexes? The map would look just like a satelite photo !!

Nice idea too.

[Froonp]

Isn't the "side by side" boundaries & borders a possibility ?
I believe it would be the best.
If necessary, a couple of pixels could separate the, as Ballista shown in post #66, without necessarily have one boundary being dashed or dotted.

Isn't the WiF FE way a possibility too ?
A very large light blue line (without the darker blue blobs if you want), and the other lines would be within this wide line when they are overlaping (see post #65, and imagine the blobs are not here)?

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Froonp
Isn't the "side by side" boundaries & borders a possibility ?
I believe it would be the best.
If necessary, a couple of pixels could separate the, as Ballista shown in post #66, without necessarily have one boundary being dashed or dotted.

Isn't the WiF FE way a possibility too ?
A very large light blue line (without the darker blue blobs if you want), and the other lines would be within this wide line when they are overlaping (see post #65, and imagine the blobs are not here)?

Side by side has problems as to which color goes on which side. Take the simple example of a Y intersection. If white is on the right side of the Y then which side of the upper left extension is also colored white? The colors will not be contiguous. One within the other is a possibility, but I have already seen 3 inside of 5 and that was a disaster - it looked like a mistake/smear.

Odd numbers for the width reduce the distortion effects of zooming.

Reducing the white border for weather boundaries between all sea and coastal is doable without much effort. But Lars (and you) were complaining about having difficulty seeing the thinner lines.

The WIF FE scheme for weather zone boundaries is something I consider as, at best, a last resort. Besides personally finding the dotted lines unattractive, circles do not zoom well. Trying for subtle effects (at the 1 or 2 pixel level) is doomed to fail under one or more of the 8 levels of zoom (zoom doomed?).
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I agree that not showing the weather in every hex can present problems when the player is using a high level of zoom.
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I am wondering where and how often the names of the weather zones should be displayed. One possibility is to add it to the name for the sea area, perhaps in parentheses under the sea area name. Since that is right next to the sea section boxes, it will always let the players know which weather zone each sea area is in. Right now the names for the weather zones are not shown anywhere on the map.
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I have looked at using red instead of pink for the overlap of country borders and weather zone boundaries. That is a little more forceful/noticeable, and in my opinion, it looks ok.

[Froonp]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
Reducing the white border for weather boundaries between all sea and coastal is doable without much effort. But Lars (and you) were complaining about having difficulty seeing the thinner lines.

My difficulties seeing the thinner lines were inland. When it is next to the sea area, the white stands out so well, that it was clear even in the previous examples that you posted.

[Froonp]

Side by side has problems as to which color goes on which side. Take the simple example of a Y intersection. If white is on the right side of the Y then which side of the upper left extension is also colored white? The colors will not be contiguous. One within the other is a possibility, but I have already seen 3 inside of 5 and that was a disaster - it looked like a mistake/smear.

Side by side, for me it is not important which is on which side. The important thing is that if both colors are here, I can focus on one color (& forget the other) and understand the countries, weather zones, and sea area boundaries more easily. By changing the color, you oblige me to decode that rose is dark red in one case and white in another case, and to understand that blue is white in one case and dark blue in another case. For me, this make understanding the map in one glance more difficult.
But I've not seen how it could look with the boundaries side by side, maybe it is ugly ?

[Froonp]

I am wondering where and how often the names of the weather zones should be displayed. One possibility is to add it to the name for the sea area, perhaps in parentheses under the sea area name. Since that is right next to the sea section boxes, it will always let the players know which weather zone each sea area is in. Right now the names for the weather zones are not shown anywhere on the map.

You have the information in the task bar of the game, I'm not sure it is important to display it on the map.

Because of the map gigantic size, and because of the multiples levels of zoom, you're sure to miss the weather zone name anyway, even if it is displayed on the map.

[qgaliana]

Speaking for at least one of the colour impaired, I'm having a lot of trouble with the changing colour of lines. Side by side would be better.
 
But as long as I can toggle it all off and mouse over (or something) to check weather that's 99% what I'll wind up doing. So the lines won't matter.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: qgaliana
Speaking for at least one of the colour impaired, I'm having a lot of trouble with the changing colour of lines. Side by side would be better.

But as long as I can toggle it all off and mouse over (or something) to check weather that's 99% what I'll wind up doing. So the lines won't matter.

I am very senstitive to what player with different color perceptions see. It's over 10% of the male population (which make up most of the target market for MWIF). Becuause I personally have no way of testing this, and people with different color perceptions are often reluctant to speak up, I have been aggressively soliciting their point of view. That's that only way I know of finding out if I am doing a good job for them. Please, don't be shy, I need to know what you see.
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Yes, the weather zone is shown as part of the information panel(s) on the current hex, and it's not possible to make it visible everywhere, all the time. Nonetheless, I believe adding it at somewhere should be done so the player can tell what the weather zone is in places other than directly under the cursor.
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I have been thinking about making the country boundaries a toggle (on/off). If I do that in combination with the same for the weather zone boundaries, that should solve the problem over the land. Over the sea is different. When looking at sea areas the players will want to know both the sea area and weather zone boundaries at the same time. Or am I wrong, and adding a toggle for sea area boundaries would solve that problem too?