[Freeciv-Dev] Re: Borders?

[Tony Stuckey <stuckey@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sun, Nov 25, 2001 at 06:52:05PM -0300, Adam Gregory wrote:
> How should the borders be calculated, does anyone have any ideas for the 
> algorithm?

        There are several reasonable ways to do this.
        The easiest in Civ2 is to simply use existing city map radii.
This is easy to understand, implement, etc.  This also has a direct
parallel in Civ2, where you would get warned for trying to move onto a
worked tile within a city radius.
        Something like you describe later is the SMAC way, with a base
distance of 7 tiles, as I recall.  IMHO, that's far too large.

        A more subtle way would be to have an explict (map size / nplayers)
calculation, and have the AI "claim" some amorphous set of tiles to fill
that quota.  Initially "claimed" tiles might be ceded if other tiles are
available, otherwise, this could be taken as an insult.

> Should the borders be coloured like in Alpha Centauri, and if so where 
> would the national colours be found?

        Probably.

> Is this already done (I saw borders.jpg in the incoming FTP)?
> 
> My own thoughts on calculating the borders would be that each nation has a 
> particular level of claim on each square, which is based on its proximity 
> to cities (within a certain range, say 10 squares), and the nation with 
> the highest claim to the square owns it. I have an idea of how to do this, 
> but it's difficult for me to put into words (I tried, it wasn't pretty :)).

-- 
Anthony J. Stuckey                              stuckey@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"And they said work hard, and die suddenly, because it's fun."
        -Robyn Hitchcock.