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Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 11:33 AM
Is anyone who can tell me how do I find info on a 8 side grid? I mean, "how to" and this sort of thing? I now it exist, but it's realy dificul to found info on it, and it's dificultly a geografic quetion, since here in Brasil (where I live and yes, it is actualy spelled whit an s) there's a enormous comunity when it comes to RPG, but I am having a hard time to find info on this matter, thank's for your time and I apreciate it! :smallcool:
p.s.: if there is another tread about it, I only posted this one because I did not finded thank's for the attention again and see you on some tread around the playground! :smallcool:

Sleet
2008-04-23, 11:37 AM
You mean a map grid using octagons instead of squares or hexagons?

Can't be done, at least not with using regular octagons (all sides the same length, all angles the same). They don't fit together on a flat surface.

Edit: Although, if you say you know they exist, I suspect that I'm not thinking of what you're thinking of. :smallsmile:

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 12:02 PM
You mean a map grid using octagons instead of squares or hexagons?

Can't be done, at least not with using regular octagons (all sides the same length, all angles the same). They don't fit together on a flat surface.

Edit: Although, if you say you know they exist, I suspect that I'm not thinking of what you're thinking of. :smallsmile:
WOW, that was quick... yes, it like an square grid, but whit octagons, i have seen in miniatures game sets and this sort of thing, but old ones that a just dont find anymore. it's an octagonal grid, same side octagons, facing the north, south, east, west, southwestern, northeast, southeastern and the northwest. If anybody have seen this grid, please let me know were, so I can get more data.

nagora
2008-04-23, 12:07 PM
WOW, that was quick... yes, it like an square grid, but whit octagons, i have seen in miniatures game sets and this sort of thing, but old ones that a just dont find anymore

Are you sure you don't mean 6-sided (hexagons)?

Edit: I'm sorry to be so negative - your description was very clear but I have never seen a game played on an octagonal board in 35+ years of gaming.

Studoku
2008-04-23, 12:25 PM
Octagons don't work as a grid. You'd end up with something like this:
http://www.wisegorilla.com/images/tessellations/octagon.gif

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 12:29 PM
Are you sure you don't mean 6-sided (hexagons)?

Edit: I'm sorry to be so negative - your description was very clear but I have never seen a game played on an octagonal board in 35+ years of gaming.

Yes I am sure.

Chronos
2008-04-23, 12:29 PM
Can't be done, at least not with using regular octagons (all sides the same length, all angles the same). They don't fit together on a flat surface.Sure it's possible, if you're playing on a surface of negative (hyperbolic) curvature. But that game would be more likely to be Wormholes and Warpfields, not Dungeons and Dragons.

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 12:33 PM
Sure it's possible, if you're playing on a surface of negative (hyperbolic) curvature. But that game would be more likely to be Wormholes and Warpfields, not Dungeons and Dragons.

Am I nuts, or every body understood it too?

Fhaolan
2008-04-23, 12:35 PM
I have vague memories of seeing a game that tried octogons (with little squares inbetween on the diagonals.) But it really didn't work that well. Hexagons work far better.

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 12:39 PM
Sure it's possible, if you're playing on a surface of negative (hyperbolic) curvature. But that game would be more likely to be Wormholes and Warpfields, not Dungeons and Dragons.

Jokes a side :smallbiggrin:it's a gird for irregular superficies, like, mountains, hills, inner casttles (reavenloft) and forests, towns, that sort of thing

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 12:42 PM
I have vague memories of seeing a game that tried octogons (with little squares inbetween on the diagonals.) But it really didn't work that well. Hexagons work far better.

That must explain it, but personaly I prefer squares than hexagons, but never tried octagons and really looked foward to

Illiterate Scribe
2008-04-23, 12:43 PM
I always wanted to play DnD on a non-Euclidean grid. :smallfrown:

fendrin
2008-04-23, 12:46 PM
I once made up rules for using a octagonal map (it looked like stu42's picture but rotated 45 degrees). It didn't really work out well. It essentially worked like D&D's square grid except you couldn't attack diagonally.

It was easier to keep track of diagonal movement, though. The squares (which I filled in black) counted as a half-'step', so it was easy enough to add as you were going along.

Eventually I went back to squares because that was what everybody was used to.


Sure it's possible, if you're playing on a surface of negative (hyperbolic) curvature. But that game would be more likely to be Wormholes and Warpfields, not Dungeons and Dragons.

Ooh, I'd love to get my hands on a copy of the W&W PHB!

AKA_Bait
2008-04-23, 12:47 PM
If you really want to use one that bad, you can create one somewhat easily using adobe and the image from http://www.wisegorilla.com/images/tessellations/octagon.gif that Stu42 above pasted in. I've created hex maps out of regular floor plans/maps that way.

nagora
2008-04-23, 12:52 PM
Jokes a side :smallbiggrin:it's a gird for irregular superficies, like, mountains, hills, inner casttles (reavenloft) and forests, towns, that sort of thing

Ah ha! Ravenloft triggers a memory: how about this:

http://mathforum.org/workshops/sum98/participants/sanders/isomgrid.gif

Isometric grid, which is what the original Raveloft map was based on, I think.

Edit: Try this page for an example of how the above was used in Raveloft (http://www.jsr.com/~fitz/roleplay/props/mapping.html)

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 01:12 PM
Ah ha! Ravenloft triggers a memory: how about this:

http://mathforum.org/workshops/sum98/participants/sanders/isomgrid.gif

Isometric grid, which is what the original Raveloft map was based on, I think.

Edit: Try this page for an example of how the above was used in Raveloft (http://www.jsr.com/~fitz/roleplay/props/mapping.html)

Yes, it does help, it's pretty much something like that, a little more clean, is more like AKA_Bait sayed, but whitout the squares.

valadil
2008-04-23, 01:35 PM
Could you maybe draw out what this grid looked like? I'm with the math people who say a grid based on octagons just doesn't work.

Here's a hex (http://softexpressions.com/images/reviews/sym/grid6.gif) option. Something with octagons would like like what Stu posted or one of these (http://www.incompetech.com/graphpaper/octagon/thumbnail.gif). The spaces between octagons won't fit another octagon. At all. Ever.

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 01:44 PM
Actuali I am trying to draw it nopw, but I am relay bad at it, draw maps it ok, because cartografi is more like geometric graphics then drawning itself, but gridsthis grud is a hcallenge, and a well put challenge. a am gonna try to hand drowm it , , if i take long to reply, is because I am doing math

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 01:48 PM
Could you maybe draw out what this grid looked like? I'm with the math people who say a grid based on octagons just doesn't work.

Here's a hex (http://softexpressions.com/images/reviews/sym/grid6.gif) option. Something with octagons would like like what Stu posted or one of these (http://www.incompetech.com/graphpaper/octagon/thumbnail.gif). The spaces between octagons won't fit another octagon. At all. Ever.
That's the one, the second is the one I am looking for, the grid was made for maping I guess, the holes actually are squares, if you look in certain angle.

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 01:51 PM
Sorry AKA_Bait, you ware right, I confused the grid you show. must be the math, Math makes head hurt...

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 01:58 PM
Sorry AKA_Bait, you ware right, I confused the grid you show. must be the math, Math makes head hurt...

It explain the avatar...

Nerd-o-rama
2008-04-23, 02:18 PM
I guess the question's been answered, but seriously, when you want to say more than one thing in a row, use the http://www.giantitp.com/forums/images/buttons/edit.gif button. Quadruple-posting makes the board server (and other users) cry.

Also, yay math. Isn't it true that you can only make regular grid patterns out of 3, 4, and 6-sided figures? Or is there another exception I'm forgetting?

Lapak
2008-04-23, 02:27 PM
That's the one, the second is the one I am looking for, the grid was made for maping I guess, the holes actually are squares, if you look in certain angle.Unless you're using the gaps for something, that kind of map is just a fancier-looking square, functionally.

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 02:29 PM
I guess the question's been answered, but seriously, when you want to say more than one thing in a row, use the http://www.giantitp.com/forums/images/buttons/edit.gif button. Quadruple-posting makes the board server (and other users) cry.

Also, yay math. Isn't it true that you can only make regular grid patterns out of 3, 4, and 6-sided figures? Or is there another exception I'm forgetting?

sorry abaout that, firefox is making my life miserable on this forum, don know why but it does not work well on this site.
about been a fancy square, as the math guy has sayd it, in a esfere it would work, only it would work

SilverClawShift
2008-04-23, 02:33 PM
Yes, it does help, it's pretty much something like that, a little more clean, is more like AKA_Bait sayed, but whitout the squares.

Actually, I think the map is okay. It's the complete lack of reference that makes it look like a mess. Here:

http://i186.photobucket.com/albums/x284/SilverClawShift/battlemap.jpg

You're the green guy. That's you moving 30 feet on your turn, with a little bit of a curved flourish (getting into position to flank?)
The blue is an ally. The lighter blue is what it would look like if they took a 5 foot step.
The red is an enemy ogre, large sized and ready to smash.

Toss in some trees, a stream, and it's not a bad grid.

Ascension
2008-04-23, 02:41 PM
What isometric is really good for, though, is drawing in three dimensions. You could really have some fun with an all-Raptoran party and an isometric grid mapped out in such a way that you could keep track of altitude.

Dr Bwaa
2008-04-23, 02:44 PM
Also, yay math. Isn't it true that you can only make regular grid patterns out of 3, 4, and 6-sided figures? Or is there another exception I'm forgetting?

You forgot 2- and 1-sided figures! :smallbiggrin:
But no, other than those no (regular) n-gon can be made into a grid (some irregular ones can, though):
http://gwydir.demon.co.uk/jo/tess/pent1.gif (http://gwydir.demon.co.uk/jo/tess/pent.htm)

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 02:49 PM
What isometric is really good for, though, is drawing in three dimensions. You could really have some fun with an all-Raptoran party and an isometric grid mapped out in such a way that you could keep track of altitude.

Truth iiin fact. But a real octagonal grid is a soccer ball. :smallbiggrin:

Ascension
2008-04-23, 02:51 PM
Truth iiin fact. But a real octagonal grid is a soccer ball. :smallbiggrin:

Not really. Only some of the patches on a soccer ball are octagons. IIRC there are pentagons between them, but they may be hexagons.

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 02:54 PM
Not really. Only some of the patches on a soccer ball are octagons. IIRC there are pentagons between them, but they may be hexagons.

Yes, there is more than one kind of soccer ball

Chronos
2008-04-23, 02:55 PM
Also, yay math. Isn't it true that you can only make regular grid patterns out of 3, 4, and 6-sided figures? Or is there another exception I'm forgetting?There's also a type of equilateral (but not equiangular) pentagon that makes for a pretty nifty grid, though I'm not sure it's well-suited for use as a battle map. Example:
http://physics.montana.edu/students/bambeck/pentarep.gif

EDIT: I see I got ninjaed on the pentagonal grid (though I drew mine myself; does that count for anything?), but I can correct the soccer balls. A soccer ball has no octagons. It's twenty regular hexagons and twelve regular pentagons. Take a d20 and cut off all of the vertices, so the triangles get turned into hexagons: That's the shape of a soccer ball (and also the shape of a buckminsterfullerene molecule), also called a truncated icosahedron.

Ranis
2008-04-23, 03:02 PM
Octagons don't work as a grid, they don't fit together unless they're oblong, and I don't think your players want to get into imaginary numbers just to play D&D.

Warler, Darūk
2008-04-23, 03:13 PM
i just will go whit the fancy squares, at least there is diagonals....

Rad
2008-04-23, 04:08 PM
I might add that you cannot cover a ball using only (a finite number of) 8-sided patches, regular or otherwise. It HAS to include at least a triangle, a square and a pentagon and if it only uses pentagons to satisfy this they have to be at least 12. If you want to do that only with pentagons and hexagons the pentagons have to be exactly 12 (e.g. the d12 has 0 hexagons, 12 pentagons and no other polygons; the soccer ball has 20 hexagons and 12 pentagons; many other combinations are possible).

Just a math trivia...

Cruiser1
2008-04-23, 04:39 PM
For pictures (and even animations) of the truncated icosahedron (d20) composed of hexagons and pentagons, along with a couple polyhedrons that actually do make use of octagons and other shapes, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedean_solid

Chronos
2008-04-23, 05:05 PM
I might add that you cannot cover a ball using only (a finite number of) 8-sided patches, regular or otherwise.You probably also need to stipulate that the octagons are convex. I can cover a ball using any even number (greater than 4) of identical octagons, but they're concave.

Rad
2008-04-29, 05:11 AM
You probably also need to stipulate that the octagons are convex. I can cover a ball using any even number (greater than 4) of identical octagons, but they're concave.

Not really. But I assumed that the octagons are distinct enough i.e. for each octagon that you consider, its 8 vertexes are distinct, its 8 sides are distinct and on each vertex of the grid there are at least 3 octagons having a vertex there. Concavity should not matter.

Mr. Friendly
2008-04-29, 06:22 AM
I always wanted to play DnD on a non-Euclidean grid. :smallfrown:

I came in here to say just this!

Octagonal grids are all the rage in R'lyeh, the Witch House of Arkham and the Plateau of Leng.

Chronos
2008-04-29, 10:46 AM
But I assumed that the octagons are distinct enough i.e. for each octagon that you consider, its 8 vertexes are distinct, its 8 sides are distinct and on each vertex of the grid there are at least 3 octagons having a vertex there.OK, that's the part that rules out the tiling I was thinking of. I was picturing a sphere with a sawtooth cut around the equator, and each hemisphere being divided into wedges. With that stipulation, I think you're correct.