Hex grid (for 1.2, semi-urgent)

Post by **zookeeper** » December 22nd, 2006, 11:37 am

The hex grid I committed some time ago wasn't liked by some people (apparently using a lower resolution), so I made another semi-sketchy proposal, which was committed a day or two ago.

The latest one, in 1.2.
The previous one, 1.2 r14489.

Obviously, you need to look at them in-game to see how they actually look.

I don't have time to work on these anymore today, and if 1.2 is to be tagged tonight, I wouldn't mind some of our lead artists to at least take a look at these to at least sort of confirm that the current one is ok. If you can tweak it further (the lines are rather aliased, but you shouldn't make them look much thicker either IMO, and the "shading" on the current one might be a bit off), then obviously that would be even better.

Post by **Jetrel** » December 22nd, 2006, 12:37 pm

jJet sez: Ambivalence.

Both are vastly superior to the old one.

Website · Post by **Sapient** » December 22nd, 2006, 1:23 pm

14790 looks like a raised surface, which is a nice improvement. 14489 looks like it has glowing edges, and that does looks crazy/bad on low resolutions.

Post by **Jetrel** » December 22nd, 2006, 5:37 pm

Sapient wrote:14790 looks like a raised surface, which is a nice improvement. 14489 looks like it has glowing edges, and that does looks crazy/bad on low resolutions.

It's the underlined portion that confuses me.

I tested it on wesnoth's lowest rez, it looked fine. Gorgeous, actually.

Post by **turin** » January 2nd, 2007, 6:29 pm

The new hex grid is better done artistically, I agree. However, it is also visually much more intrusive.

The hex grid before was barely noticeable, and yet served its purpose (to make clear where the hex boundaries were). It wasn't particularly pretty, but it got the job done.

Now, I find the hex grid very distracting. I suspect it is because of the new 3-4 pixel wide semi-transparent border. It makes everything look like it is raised up with slanted edges, which really isn't very visually appealing IMHO and doesn't make a lick of sense either.

I would honestly prefer the old grid to the new one. Does anyone else agree with me?

BTW, do people usually play with the hex grid on or off? I suspect that will have an impact on how people view the new grid - people who usually play with it off will say, "yeah, it looks better", but people who usually play with it on will say, "it's distracting".

-> What i might be working on · Post by **Eleazar** » January 2nd, 2007, 8:12 pm

turin wrote:The new hex grid is better done artistically, I agree. However, it is also visually much more intrusive.

The hex grid before was barely noticeable, and yet served its purpose (to make clear where the hex boundaries were). It wasn't particularly pretty, but it got the job done.

Now, I find the hex grid very distracting. I suspect it is because of the new 3-4 pixel wide semi-transparent border. It makes everything look like it is raised up with slanted edges, which really isn't very visually appealing IMHO and doesn't make a lick of sense either.

I would honestly prefer the old grid to the new one. Does anyone else agree with me?

BTW, do people usually play with the hex grid on or off? I suspect that will have an impact on how people view the new grid - people who usually play with it off will say, "yeah, it looks better", but people who usually play with it on will say, "it's distracting".

I agree. It's not necessary to add a huge bevel to distinguish hexes. The point is to make the hexes obvious, not to loudly emphasize the divisions between hexes.

I did a little clean-up of the one i previously did for the trunk. It could be fine-tuned, perhaps the opacity of the white part lowered a little, but this is the basic pattern the grid should follow.

I can't commit to 1.2 since i have already deleted it off my HD and i don't have much time today.

Website · Post by **Sapient** » January 2nd, 2007, 8:36 pm

I agree with turin that the width of zookeeper's edits were distracting, but I didn't feel they were very distracting, so I was willing to accept it on the basis of artistic improvement. As far as "that doesn't make a lick of sense" I couldn't help but laugh. As long as you're showing the hexes, why not let them stand right on top of it like some kind of a pretty quilt? WINR

Eleazar may be headed in the right direction, but that is way too much white for my tastes. It looks good on snow, at least.

Post by **zookeeper** » January 2nd, 2007, 8:43 pm

I think Eleazar's version is simply too narrow/thin. I can't really see anything but thin white lines with a parallel black lines here and there (except on for example snow, of course, where I see only black) unless I start looking really closely.

I do agree that the previous one was tad bit too thick and intrusive, but I think this, in turn, is too much in the opposite end of the spectrum.

Post by **turin** » January 2nd, 2007, 8:50 pm

I like Eleazar's. They don't look too thin to me, though that may be because I'm on an old, about-to-die CRT...

-> What i might be working on · Post by **Eleazar** » January 2nd, 2007, 8:57 pm

zookeeper wrote:I can't really see anything but thin white lines with a parallel black lines here and there (except on for example snow, of course, where I see only black) unless I start looking really closely.

So?
The point is to delineate a boundary, not to make sure that all aspects of the boundary line are equally visible. The black part shows up against light terrain, and visa versa for the white part. Such is the intention.

A valid criticism would be "i can't see any part of the border against terrain X." The borders should be obvious enough to be noticed against any terrain, but no more obvious.

Post by **zookeeper** » January 2nd, 2007, 9:10 pm

Eleazar wrote:
zookeeper wrote:I can't really see anything but thin white lines with a parallel black lines here and there (except on for example snow, of course, where I see only black) unless I start looking really closely.
So?

It doesn't look as nice. Nothing more to it than that, really. And yes, I think that the better-looking the graphics, the better, and that there's no reason to make an exception for the hex grid (since clarity and good looks aren't mutually exclusive).

Post by **allefant** » January 2nd, 2007, 9:50 pm

I think, best would be to have 3 instead of 2 grid settings. The old one was just a visual aid to see the hexes, and that's all I want personally.

On the other hand, zookeeper's version makes the map into real tiles, like you play now on a game board. This gives of course the visual boundaries as well, but also changes much more.

So, I think, there should be "no grid", "grid" and "tiles" as the three choices. I would prefer the "grid" version then, and it could be even less obtrusive than the old one or Eleazar's, probably just the old one but with only 25% opacity instead of 100%.

Post by **freim** » January 2nd, 2007, 10:50 pm

turin wrote:I like Eleazar's. They don't look too thin to me, though that may be because I'm on an old, about-to-die CRT...

Me too. It looks nice and it's not to thin.

Post by **Jetrel** » January 2nd, 2007, 11:42 pm

I think I'm going to kindly decline to take a stance on this issue; other than firmly reiterating that "Options are Bad".

Post by **allefant** » January 3rd, 2007, 9:59 am

Well, the "options are bad" option here would of course be to remove the show/hide grid option altogether