Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: SamuraiProgrammer

My wife has encouraged me to frame and hang my set of WiF maps in the game room.  They are beautiful.

However, as much as I would like to do so, I can't see myself devoting 170 sq. ft. of wall space. 

BUT...

What I would like to see is an atlas style booklet with color maps in it.  This could be useful in hotseat games and also for pondering strategies when the computer is otherwise engaged.

Furthermore, while we are dreaming....

There is an inexpensive reporting engine for Delphi that natively produces PDFs. Wouldn't it be great to be able to produce map images at the press of a button so you could email them to yourself for lunch-break at work?

  Steve
     Dean

Not really a serious proposal for this version, but there is always version 2.0

And that reporting engine is called, ...?

ORIGINAL: composer99

There is a nice piece of software called SnagIt which I have that I can use for capturing images. Right now I use it on my Cyberboard PBEM module if I want to capture parts of the map for pondering over (or to send to others).

I've used HyperSnap 6 for the past year and how zero complaints about it. It is how I produce all the screen shots I post.

ORIGINAL: abj9562

ORIGINAL: Ubercat

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets



Not a 17 foot diameter. A 5.4 foot diameter is all you need to achieve a circumference fo 17 feet.

That sounds like an awesome project. You'd have to be VERY precise though. It would suck if you did all the work and it was a couple inches too big or too small.

-Ubercat

Or perhaps make the map out of a heat shrink plastic and mount it on a ball put it on a pole and tilt the axis. A MWiF globe eh!

I am investigating different media on which to print the full map. What aspects/features/capabilities would you like that media to have?

ORIGINAL: abj9562

ORIGINAL: Ubercat

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets



Not a 17 foot diameter. A 5.4 foot diameter is all you need to achieve a circumference fo 17 feet.

That sounds like an awesome project. You'd have to be VERY precise though. It would suck if you did all the work and it was a couple inches too big or too small.

-Ubercat

Or perhaps make the map out of a heat shrink plastic and mount it on a ball put it on a pole and tilt the axis. A MWiF globe eh!

Your post reminds me of a question I've been pondering. Is there ANY size "sphere" which could be made up of hexes and they'd all fit together? I know that a socker ball is covered with hexes and .... five pointed figures, and also happens to match a buckyball carbon molecule. I want to know if it can be done using only hexes if you make it big enough. What a world map you could make!

Obviously I haven't been pondering TOO hard, or I'd have found some geometry forum somewhere and posted the question. So, any science experts who know the answer or an easy way to find it?

-Ubercat

ORIGINAL: Ubercat

ORIGINAL: abj9562

ORIGINAL: Ubercat




That sounds like an awesome project. You'd have to be VERY precise though. It would suck if you did all the work and it was a couple inches too big or too small.

-Ubercat

Or perhaps make the map out of a heat shrink plastic and mount it on a ball put it on a pole and tilt the axis. A MWiF globe eh!

Your post reminds me of a question I've been pondering. Is there ANY size "sphere" which could be made up of hexes and they'd all fit together? I know that a socker ball is covered with hexes and .... five pointed figures, and also happens to match a buckyball carbon molecule. I want to know if it can be done using only hexes if you make it big enough. What a world map you could make!

Obviously I haven't been pondering TOO hard, or I'd have found some geometry forum somewhere and posted the question. So, any science experts who know the answer or an easy way to find it?

-Ubercat

The word you want is tesselations. I am familiar with the common ones for 2 dimensions but not for 3 dimensions.

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
And that reporting engine is called, ...?

Rave Reports (which I think still comes with Delphi) is the one I use. I upgraded to the BEX version and don't remember if the PDF rendering is already there or not. See if you have a class TRvRenderPDF in the Rave section of your component palette. If so, you are set already!

If not, I recommend the Borland Extended Edition (BEX). It also has the predecessor, Report Printer Pro which gives you the ability to create code based reports.

www.nevrona.com


Hope this helps

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

ORIGINAL: Ubercat

ORIGINAL: abj9562



Or perhaps make the map out of a heat shrink plastic and mount it on a ball put it on a pole and tilt the axis. A MWiF globe eh!

Your post reminds me of a question I've been pondering. Is there ANY size "sphere" which could be made up of hexes and they'd all fit together? I know that a socker ball is covered with hexes and .... five pointed figures, and also happens to match a buckyball carbon molecule. I want to know if it can be done using only hexes if you make it big enough. What a world map you could make!

Obviously I haven't been pondering TOO hard, or I'd have found some geometry forum somewhere and posted the question. So, any science experts who know the answer or an easy way to find it?

-Ubercat

The word you want is tesselations. I am familiar with the common ones for 2 dimensions but not for 3 dimensions.

Thanks. I googled it along with 3D and didn't come up with much. Most links seemed to be about Eschers sculptures. I suspect that it's impossible simply because anything that fits perfectly in 2D, probably can't work in 3D. At least that's what intuition is telling me.

-Ubercat

Your post reminds me of a question I've been pondering. Is there ANY size "sphere" which could be made up of hexes and they'd all fit together? I know that a socker ball is covered with hexes and .... five pointed figures, and also happens to match a buckyball carbon molecule. I want to know if it can be done using only hexes if you make it big enough. What a world map you could make!

Obviously I haven't been pondering TOO hard, or I'd have found some geometry forum somewhere and posted the question. So, any science experts who know the answer or an easy way to find it?

-Ubercat

Not sure, but can you imagine playing on a world map like this?:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dymaxion_map

As for the Hex Geodesic...I just spent an hour writing a specious 'proof' that it could not be done.
 
I read it to my wife and she said "couldn't you just.....' 
 
That prompted me to do some more searching in a different way.
 
Feast your eyes upon this....
 
http://www.sou.edu/cs/sahr/dgg/pubs/gdggs03.pdf
 
Specifically page 13.
 
Also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geodesic_grid
 
 
Perhaps Steve can work this out for Version 3  ????
 
(Run Duck Cover and HIDE!!!!)
 
Have a great weekend everyone!
 
Dean
 

ORIGINAL: SamuraiProgrammer

As for the Hex Geodesic...I just spent an hour writing a specious 'proof' that it could not be done.

I read it to my wife and she said "couldn't you just.....' 

That prompted me to do some more searching in a different way.

Feast your eyes upon this....

http://www.sou.edu/cs/sahr/dgg/pubs/gdggs03.pdf

Specifically page 13.

Also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geodesic_grid


Perhaps Steve can work this out for Version 3  ????

(Run Duck Cover and HIDE!!!!)

Have a great weekend everyone!

Dean

Wow. Just...... wow. I'm a budding programmer and your username suggests you have some experience in that area. How tough would THAT be to program? (The globe on page 13, implemented as a game map)

-Ubercat

How hard would it be.... hmmmm.
 
Before going any further, I am not seriously suggesting that this be done for a wargaming project as I actually think there are good reasons not to do it.  (I will explain later in the post.)
 
Also, how hard something is not the only picture.  Some things are not that hard, but are still very time consuming.
 
If one had experience with using DirectX, it would be easier than you think.  (I have experimented with DirectX and have never been able to get it to behave like it should.  My biggest problem is that I have avoided learning C++ but all of the documentation uses C++ examples.  The Delphi support components I have found are generally subsets of the entire DirectX API and that causes its own problems.  I expect that with the advent of dotNET as a programming paradigm, it will get a little bit easier.)
 
Anyway...
 
The map would have to be reworked and there could be some play balance issues depending on how things changed near the north pole.
 
The globe would be defined as a series of triangles (6 for each hex).  The wireframe would be symmetrical and should not be hard to design.  The image of the map would be 'mapped' onto this wireframe and DirectX should do the rest of the work.  Currently, there are 70,200 hexes on the map.  This will shrink near the north pole but may grow due to the necessity of including the south pole.  So for estimation, lets use 70,000 hexes.  That will be 420,000 polygons.
 
Then we have to render the counters.  Each counter will be a box with 6 sides.  4 of the sides will be small, but will need to be there to perpetuate the illusion of a solid.  Each side will be made of two triangles.  So that is another 12 triangles for each counter.  At 3600 counters, this will be another 43200 polygons.  Now we have a standard display of a scene with up to 463,200 polygons.  At 30 frames per second (minimum for smooth scrolling) , this works out to between 13 and 14 million polygons a second.  Many graphics cards will perform at this rate.
 
The problems begin in estimating how much video memory will be needed.  I don't know for sure, but my gut feeling is that the polygon descriptions would take up 16 to 32 MB of video RAM.  Then you have to allocate video memory for the images. Chalk up quite a bit more memory for that.  Suddenly, we are in a situation where not everyone is going to have a computer that will run the application well.
 
Certainly there are economies to be gained by the use of LOD scaling (providing different versions of the wireframe and images based on how far away the object is).  These things come at a price of processing speed.  Again, the minimum requirements for such an application may not be the average requirements for the demographic that the game is designed for.
 
Also, when delving into DirectX, you are much more reliant on the manufacturer's drivers (small pieces of software that actually manage the behavior of the video card) and you can lose all credibility and much support time trying to deal with those problems.
 
Yes, it would be beautiful.  Yes, it would look great!  But, as a marketing decision, I think it would be a bad idea.
 
 
 
 
 

Thanks a lot for the informative reply. I've been leaning heavily towards looking into DirectX. Your post just reinforces that. Not for this map necessarily, but in general.

My biggest programming weakness has been to figure out how to go from simple console programs (an ATM simulation or a craps game, etc.) to actual, bona fide, GUI'd strategy games. It's looking more and more like DirectX can enable it all, from a 3D FPS, to a 2D tile based wargame.

As for languages, I learned C back in the early 90's, but couldn't get a grip on C++ at the time (learning resources were lousy compared to today). I'm in school now and just finished my second C++ course, and my first Java course. Java was an afterthought, but I LOVE the automatic garbage collection and lack of pointers. I decided to focus on Java as a career, but now it sounds like C# takes the good parts of Java and puts them into C++. The fact that C# appears to have a brighter future than Java means I'll probably switch focus again.

I want to program games, but it looks like a rough job. It may be better to get some kind of 9-5 software maintenance job and do my own games at night. 14 hour days, sweating over Madden '11 or something, wouldn't leave me any free time to do games that I want to do.

Maybe after Steve reaches the finish line and takes a well deserved break, he'll let me pick his brain about the general structure of MWIF. [:D] Not actual sourcecode of course. Just something along the lines of "The six weather zones were implemented with an ENUM. Each hex object stored the Enum corresponding to the zone it was in. The units were objects that... " etc.

To everyone who has no interest in this topic, I apologise for the derail.

-Ubercat

The use of DirectX has advantages and disadvantages. S_P_ covered some of them.

It is pretty safe to just assume every advantage is also a disadvantage, and vice-a-versa. For instance, 3-D modelling (actually 2.5 dimensions) can be done by off-loading a lot of the memory and processing duties to the graphics card. That frees up memory and processing cycles for the main program. But then you need to support all those different graphics cards - or not, and suffer the outrage of players whose card is not supported.

Personally, when I read about Microsoft deprecating older elements of DirectX, I lost interest in it for a 2-D game (like MWIF). MWIF doesn't need real time 3-D images.

====

MWIF has hundreds of enums (Pascal equivalents).

Using a buckeyball - a spehere made of pentagons and hexagons ie... a football / soccerball could be used and would maintain the spherical movement capabilities with very slight distortion. Very impractiable to do well on a flat map. Perhaps one day we will have a globe shaped container with a printed WiF map. I for one would likw to have a globe on my desk that is MWiF based and of course a bigger one for my garage to plan MWiF strategy with magnetic counters of course!

Ubercat,
 
A good 9-5 job working for business programming in a small independent consulting firm will give you a wonderful education on all aspects of programming except, perhaps, DirectX.  Try to find someone that will mentor you in high level design.  It will make you more valuable (i.e. higher salary) and expose you to the kinds of tasks that are important.  I'm sure Steve would agree that those skills are as important as graphics manipulation skills when it comes to game programming.
 
I have received an education reading Steve's monthly status reports.  He is, no doubt, the most organized programmer I have ever seen.
 
Good Luck!  Keep after it!!
 
Remember, the only difference between dreams and goals is the application of effort.
 
Dean
 

ORIGINAL: SamuraiProgrammer

Ubercat,

A good 9-5 job working for business programming in a small independent consulting firm will give you a wonderful education on all aspects of programming except, perhaps, DirectX.  Try to find someone that will mentor you in high level design.  It will make you more valuable (i.e. higher salary) and expose you to the kinds of tasks that are important.  I'm sure Steve would agree that those skills are as important as graphics manipulation skills when it comes to game programming.

I have received an education reading Steve's monthly status reports.  He is, no doubt, the most organized programmer I have ever seen.

Good Luck!  Keep after it!!

Remember, the only difference between dreams and goals is the application of effort.

Dean

Thanks for the advice and encouragement! -Ubercat

Programming, like many other jobs has specialists and generalists. If you specialize, you can be very valuable ($) as long as the demand exceeds the supply for that specialty.

The highest risk in programming is to specialize is some area that later becomes obsolete. Then no one wants to hire you, much less pay you the salary you were used to when your specialty was all the rage. Specialized skills are also pretty much useless unless you are part of a team, so you better have good interpersonal skills.

Most importantly, the knowledge required in the field of programming grows every year - with detris falling off and forming a wake behind (pun intended). "Adapt or die." Or as Dylan said: "He who is not busy being born, is busy dying." The net is extraordinary growth in the requisite knowledge base if you want to be all things to all people. To do so, you would spend all your time learning and have no time left for doing. Hence, inevitably there are going to be areas where you have to rely on specialists. They can do tasks in their field of specialty at least an order of magnitude faster then generalists. Think in terms of 2 rather boring hours versus 2 weeks of pain and suffering.

I chose to specialize in a few areas, mostly related to mathematical simulation models, artificial intelligence, and graphical user interface. That was feasible in 1980 but the fields have grown so much, I am far from being a specialist in any of them now.

The skill set that serves me best these days are my project management skills (MBA 1976) combined with my predisposition to puzzle solving (from birth apparently - "How do I get out of here? How can I get back in?"). Oh, and writing. Being able to express ideas clearly in the printed word is very valuable almost everywhere. Verbally too, of course. And the ever present need to get along with others.

But I am drifting, time to get back to air mission code.

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

"How do I get out of here? How can I get back in?"

OH MY GOD! BRILLIANT

I think you summed up the meaning of life for most of the male population of the world in two questions.

[&o]

[:D]

ORIGINAL: SamuraiProgrammer

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

"How do I get out of here? How can I get back in?"

OH MY GOD! BRILLIANT

I think you summed up the meaning of life for most of the male population of the world in two questions.

[&o]

[:D]

It's not mine. It's from Gunther Grass' (sp?) The Tin Drum.

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

ORIGINAL: Jaguar


Wow, I just had an idea. I could build a metal cylinder, ten feet high with a seventeen foot circumference, mount the map onto it, put it in the middle of my great room and use magnetic counter clips to play. That would certainly give the concept of a global conflict

Of course, my spousal unit is quite likely to take umbrage with this idea; however, I might be able to bribe her with that new Harley she has been asking about for the past few years. A rather expensive enterprize just to play a game, but what the heck is money for if not to entertain.

Not a 17 foot diameter. A 5.4 foot diameter is all you need to achieve a circumference fo 17 feet.

And thus you would need only a Vespa for your spousal [;)]