Re: XconqGIS Reply Summary (Ironically Long)

[Eric McDonald <mcdonald@phy.cmich.edu>]

D. Cooper Stevenson wrote:

> By documenting what I do, I hope that we can "can" the solution
> (within the limits Matthew hinted at) for the creation of other theaters
> by pulling together the information we need to "feed to" Xconq. 

Good. This is the best direction to head in, I think.

> need to be modified (or a new, separate terrain library be written from
> scratch) to accept the data you describe.
> 
>   Agreed. I am divided on this. On one hand, writing a GIS library to
> interface with the Xconq kernel will be no small task. Also, Matthew
> seems to have written a coordinate system that may just do the trick. 

If you have not alrady read this:
   http://sources.redhat.com/xconq/manual/xcdesign_33.html#SEC145
then you might find it helpful. Actually, it is probably a good idea to 
start reading from:
   http://sources.redhat.com/xconq/manual/xcdesign_33.html#SEC142

As a caveat, since you are new to the list, it often occurs that Xconq 
documentation was not updated by other developers when they added, 
changed, or removed features, and so, almost any part of the 
documentation should be read with a grain of salt.

>>Lincoln Peters: There are a few technical difficulties involved with
> 
> such a project that I can see already. One thing that comes to mind is
> its representation of rivers.
> 
>   You got me here. I'm an Xconq map newbie. I will be documenting things
> as I learn...

Rivers, vegetation, elevation, etc... all apply to different aspects of 
the game. It would seem likely that when one was analyzing the data for 
each hex region in the hex grid overlay that not only would the hex be 
binned according to elevation, but to these other categories as well. 
And so, each hex <--> terrain type would end up belonging to multiple 
bins, one in each category (elevation, vegetation, etc...).

Elevation speaks to the movement rules (and possibly things such as 
vision range modifiers). Vegetation speaks to visibility, and possibly 
to materials storage/production. Rivers are interesting; the way to 
approach them might be to restrict water unit movement rules according 
to how riverine the terrain is and the size of the units (boats vs. 
ships, essentially).

One thing to keep in mind is that if each hex on the map corresponds to 
an unique terrain type (so as to have an unique terrain image), that 
Xconq presently only supports up to 32767 terrain types. Probably this 
is not a big worry since even a 100x100 map (10,000 hexes) is 
decently-sized. It looks like you get up to a 181x181 map with a 1:1 
correspondence between terrain type and hex; that it quite large given 
typical unit mobilities in most Xconq games.

   Also, before you read the following, note that I am a _die_hard_
> optimist. I think the following could be done with a lot of work. I
> suspect that some of you have thought too along these lines:

Yes. One of the problems with this project is that we have too few 
developers and too many ideas that have accrued. Nothing wrong with 
ideas, including ambitious ones, but it actually takes development 
effort to make them come into being....

Eric