Screens shots

[Angelo]

Hi,

Decided to ATG a try but have one very small issue that is nagging me.

All the screen shots I've seen show the hexes has been sort of elongated. Is there any way to make the hexes... well you know... more like hexes?


Regards,
Ang

[Tac2i]

All the screen shots I've seen look in proper proportion to me. May be what you are seeing is based the resolution you have your monitor set at or perhaps its your DPI setting or some combination of those.

[Lipa]

I think what Angelo means is the fact that the hexagons are not symmetric as in other wargames, but are instead a bit squeezed on the vertical axis. I'm afraid this is hard-coded in the game and cannot be changed.

[Angelo]

Thanks for the replies.

Yes, they do look kind of odd to me.

Not sure how much of an issue that would become for me.

[Lipa]

It's strange at first, but after a few turns into the game you'll begin to ignore it and even grow used to it. So in no way should this be the reason for not giving this great game a try.

[Lion9]

Huh. Funny thing, but I have spent some time now looking through many of the threads that include screenshots, and I never even noticed that the hexes were stretched vertically.

Maybe because many of the screenies did not have the hex overlay? Or, it is time to go see the Op Doc and get the "reading glasses" uprgraded?

Well and anyhow, as Dr Freud might tell us were he not in a different ether-plane... a hex is a hex is a hex. Far better IMHO than those games where you just shove a whole stack of units from one mis-shaped "area" to another, and call it a WW2 ETO GS game. [;)]

[Jeffrey H.]

Now that he points it out, I notice it too. I guess it's alwys been there I just never specifically noticed it. I often remove the "raster grid" from my games in fact that's a defualt setting to me.

[Angelo]

How does the 'stretched' effect user made maps?

Do you have to stretch the maps to get the distances right on the game maps?

[Grymme]

i have never felt it being a problem when creating maps, and i have made maybe 50 of them, the largest being ca 290*240 or 73 000 hexes.
 
So i would say it is not a problem.

[Lipa]

It's no problem at all when it comes to maps etc. You just imagine that the hexes are symmetric and that the vertical span is the same as the horizontal, and that's it. The difference isn't too big anyway, and after a few games your eyes (and brain) will adjust.

[Angelo]

I'm a bit confused.

Let's say I import a real world map into AT and each hex is 10 miles.

It appears to me that a unit that move 10 hexes north/south move 100 miles and the same unit moving 10 hexes east/west move more than a 100 miles.

Does the game engine stretch the map to compensate for the difference?
Or would I have to stretch the real world map before importing to AT?
If I do have the modify the map how much to you have to stretch the map to get more accurate distances?

[Grymme]

In AT you dont import a map automaticly. What you do is that you import an imagefile (for example a map). That image is then laid as an overlay on your choosen blank map. So if you want to make a world map in 100*20 hexes then you import a world map and the world map will indeed be stretched, but not to compensate for the hex irregularity thing but to compensate for there being only 20 Y-hex rows.

Here is an example of a map made in ATG. It used the FITE scenario in TOAWIII as a precursor and that was never a problem, so if TOAWIII is ok, then ATG is no worse. Its an screenshot of the overview, closeups can be seen in the FITE thread in the mod section.

[Angelo]

Thanks for the responce but I'm still not getting it.

Let say I have a map that is 100 miles by 100 miles and I import the image to AT using a 10 by 10 hex map. Each hex should be 10 miles across. The image file would be a square. I expect that the AT map would a rectangle.

If the AT map is a rectangle, how much is the distortion? And is there an easy method to modify the image map prior to loading so that the distance east/west and north/south are consistant in AT?

[Grymme]

As far as i know it would not be an issue because, as you ask, the map image will be stretched to accomodate the number of hexes chosen for the map you want to make. That means that if you load a 50*50 map taken from a game where the hexes do not have this "rectangular" issue the X39Y39-hex from that map should still align with the X39Y39 of the AT/ATG map.
 
I dont know how to explain it better. I am not 100% sure though, but this is as i remember it.
 

[Vic]

@Angelo
If you cant agree with the fact that the hexes resemble like 54x48 distance units then you will have to pre-scale the image you are using as an overlay. If i am correct you would multiply the width of the overlay image with 48/54.

best regards,
Vic

[Angelo]

Thanks I think I understand.

The image map will auto fill the AT map to whatever number of hexes there are.

So I'd have to play with the image map until I get the right distances per number of hexes.

Although seems to me to be a poor design decision. The designer could have simply used real hexes![&:]

[ernieschwitz]

I for one have never been bothered by it...

[Josh]

I'm with you Ernie, never was aware of it, and now I *am* aware of it I still don't know what we're talking about [&:] LOL
Or just maybe I was always too busy playing and not noticing it, could be.

[Lion9]

ORIGINAL: Angelo

Thanks I think I understand.

The image map will auto fill the AT map to whatever number of hexes there are.

So I'd have to play with the image map until I get the right distances per number of hexes.

Although seems to me to be a poor design decision. The designer could have simply used real hexes![&:]

Maybe it was done that way so that the squared-off counters would fit a bit better in the hex? I can recall many board-games I have played where the counter corners would very slightly exceed the hex dimensions. Thus, stacks would be hard to manipulate unless you used tweezers or something similar (though, J Prados "New 3rd Reich" did provide a map you could purchase where the hexes were significantly larger -- I bought it and am glad I did!)

Anyhow, IDK, just a guess.

As is, the map accuracy would be ~ 88.888 % correct, and as I mentioned, it doesn't bother me at all. However, I CAN appreciate that a dedicated map-maker would like to have his own map STRICTLY in accord with -- as-the-crow-flies, and quite precise. [8D]