Operation: Downfall

[Catfish]

Originally posted by Boco
I'm not giving a very clear explanation, here. Maybe someone else can clarify.

It makes sense to me.

To put it another way, are the dimensions of your maps, when viewed in the minimap, proportionally accurate? Do they look squashed widthways?

Take a look at the discussion in this thread at CFC, starting from around post #14. Ideally, you want to get the width to height ratio on the minimap as close as possible to 100% of the same ratio on your reference map. Make sense?

In the case of the Middle-earth map that Boco linked to, it looked horribly distorted at 100% when viewed in the main game map. So for purely aesthetic reasons I reduced the width to about 75%, effectively reducing horizontal distances by 25%.

[McMonkey]

Yes I understand what you mean. I have never had a problem with squashed maps either on the main or mini maps. I don't know if this is through luck or judgement. To be honest I don't really care
I suppose all flat maps are inaccurate anyway as they do not take the worlds curviture (?) into acount. Plus you are upside down!

BTW Catfish do you know a guy called Yanto?

[McMonkey]

Patine

I was just looking through my maps for stuff on Burma when I found this. Bit basic but you may find it useful.

[McMonkey]

@EZ Rhino

The picture you uploaded has just appeared (before it was red cross!). I see what you mean about Mercator's method. It does seem very effective. I will have a go at it when I get the chance. If it is quicker than my method and less hastle then I will probably use it in the future.

[McMonkey]

My posts are like buses, you wait ages for one and then three come at once

I thought this would be useful info for Downfall.

[curtsibling]

Shows how desperate and appalling fanaticism can be...

[McMonkey]

Hey, I resent being called a desperate fanatic!
Wait a minute, your talking about the suicied AT thing aren't you
And yes, it is very hard to understand how someone could end up in that situation!

I have had a ***** of a morning. My PC went belly up and have spent all day so far getting it going again. I have lost some work on my Nam scenario, thank goodness I have not had too much time to work on it this week, and thank god for external hard drives!!!
The most frustrating thing is that I have lost all the work on the Japan map I can get back to the same point fairly quickly but it is very frustrating. I may have a bash at Mercators method now though!

[Boco]

Originally posted by Werd100
I was just looking through my maps for stuff on Burma when I found this.

Here's the explanation I was seeking (found in Catfish's reference, Need Huge (32,000+) European Map. Know of any? by Yoshi). Despite the disreputable pro-wrestling obsessed character of the author, I'll quote it.

Originally posted by Mercator
Making maps look "proportional in-game" really isn't a good idea at all. The reason why maps look "fatter" is because you're looking at the map from a perspective. That is, you see it from a bird's eye view. In contrast, the radar map displays the map correctly, as if you're looking straight down on it.

In the main map window, you should really be treating the map's "squashed" diamonds as if they're proper diamonds (i.e. squares tilted by 45 degrees). They're squashed because you look at the map at an angle.

Now, this is just theory, and you can brush it aside if you want to. But there's one thing you have to keep in mind. In a map that's proportional in the main map window, moving north-south will take twice as much time as moving the same distance east-west.

Then there's a lot of discussion about the aesthetically displeasing appearance of accurately scaled maps. BTW, my interest in this stems from a need to make a new map. Now this is the important part.

Originally posted by Mercator (parentheses by Boco)
As with most other things in Civ2 creation, it's (using horizontal compression) a compromise (between proportional and aesthetic). But people should at least know why they're doing something. Once they know how it works, they can feel free to find a compromise, or ignore it altogether. As long as they know what the consequences are.

[Edit]Sorry to hear about your PC crash, Werd[/Edit]

[McMonkey]

@Boco
I think I would have to go with aesthetics over 100% accuracy every time. I had never considered the concequences this would have on movement and gameplay before. Like the man says, it is a compromise. The way I see it CivII is just a game and should not be taken too seriously. So long as the map/scenario is fun to play then the objective has been acchieved!

[Patine]

I would agree with Werd on this issue. It is a compromise. But ultimately, I myself would prefer playability over aesthetic for a map, though I'll trust Werd's judgement on this matter. BTW, thanks for the invasion zone/IJA division map there. It will be useful.

[Catfish]

Originally posted by Werd100
BTW Catfish do you know a guy called Yanto?

Sorry, never heard of him. Being an unusual name, I googled Yanto + Wollongong. It turns up a musician with the surname Shortis. That name matches the one in your user profile. Cousin? Brother?

[Mercator]

I didn't read this thread earlier... I'm glad to hear others used my map guide.

Originally posted by Werd100
I suppose all flat maps are inaccurate anyway as they do not take the worlds curviture (?) into acount.

Very true. All map projection have to find a compromise between maintaining area, distance and direction accurately.

So that does detract from the things Boco quoted from me. If you use a map projection that doesn't preserve distance anyway, desperately trying to keep that accurate is rather pointless.

Additionally, distances in Civ2 aren't accurate due to the grid system. You can see that in the image attachment. In reality the red circle (using the Civ2 perspective) should mark all points on the map at the same distance from the central blue cross. In Civ2, however, all points on the magenta square are at the same distance away from the blue cross.

If you don't adjust the map perspective, like you did in making your maps, then it's the green circle that represents what equal distance should really be like, while the magenta diamond still represents what Civ2 makes of it.

In other words, accuracy is screwed whatever you do.

Originally posted by Boco
Despite the disreputable pro-wrestling obsessed character of the author (...)

I'm not pro-wrestling obsessed. I found the data for that group by accident!

[McMonkey]

Re: Maps
I was talking to a pal at work today about the map issue and he quite rightly pointed out that the north and south poles on a world map would take as long to circumnavigate as the equator! In reality you could walk around the north pole (if there was an actual pole and it wasn't so bloody cold!) in seconds!!!

Also I have a very interesting map on my wall from New Internationalist magazine that shows the Arno Peters projection of the world that represents countries accurately according to their surface area. Quite odd looking but very interesting.
One example would be Greenland with 2.1 million sq km appears larger than China (on a traditional Mercator map) when in fact China with 9.5 million sq km is more than four times larger.

Other examples include Scandinavia (1.1m sq km) and India (3.3m sq km), North America 19m sq km) and Africa (30m sq km) and also Europe (9.7m sq km) and South America (17.8m sq km).

To be fair I am just taking NI's word for all this but it sounds feasible!

@Catfish
Never mind, I did not know if Wollongong is a small place or not! I used to work with a cobber from Chinchilla which sounded like a one horse town
I don't suppose this Yanto is a close relative as the Shortis' have been in Oz for over 100 years (AFAIK).

The reason I asked is because I recently found my father in Orlando Florida after 25 years of no contact. As a matter of fact it was a million to one chance that I found him after talking to a fellow at CFC who works at the same college! So from that perspective I guess you could say it is a small world

[techumseh]

Rather than think of this in terms of asthetics, it makes more sense to me to think of it in terms of unit movement. Given the "squashed" diagonal shape of the tiles in Civ2, in one turn, a unit can travel twice as far E to W as it can N to S.

To make sure a unit can travel the same real distance in each direction, the E to W axis of the Civ map must be twice the distance as the N to S. While this makes the map seem stretched in the main playing screen, the strategic world view in the upper right corner has the correct dimensions.

Here's an example of the map used by Harlan Thompson in his "Mongols" scenario:

[techumseh]

And here is how it looks in the strategic map window: