Re: boards o' hexes and pp extentions

["david_bruce_cousins" <david.cousins@...>]

James wrote:
>    Since the piecepack is public domain, I encourage anyone 
> interested in modifying it or expanding it to do so.  

Here here! 

A couple 
> considerations of interest:
> 1) original piecepack won't scare or confuse my granny
> 2) original piecepack uses standard parts and costs half as much as 
> an Icehouse set

There there! NO really, I agree totally with (1), However for the 
overloaded pawns I did push ideas a bit far. I 
think the  direction mark, and allowing for a pawn to flip are two 
good things that don't confuse/complicate if you don't play a game 
that uses them.  I have run out of parts in some designs and have put 
pawns on their sides. Having at least one flat side keeps them from 
rolling. Going to 4 or six sides was just logical.

About (2), Well, standard parts, I sort of agree to that up to a 
limit. 
Without insulting anyone, I think that being backwardly compatable is 
a must, but worrying the issue of non-standard parts is only 
problematic, not a gating factor for new creative ideas. 
Maybe those interested in extending the game set can find out where 
more overloaded parts can come from or what it costs to make them. I 
never got into Icehouse because of the high price.


>    Anyway, hexes were considered during the original design and 
> chucked because they are not needed... make yourself some rows of 
> tiles (face-up probably), then take every other row and push it to 
> the right by half a tile.  You get essentially the same thing as 
> hexes.  This is a little trick I picked up from studying old 
wargames.

True James, I have a design for fighting giant robots that has been 
sitting here, where I use exactly that board. The colors represent 
terrain (grass, water, fire, darkness) and the number represented 
height. 

In defence of what looks like a neat idea --
the smaller hex proposals are intriguing! I would have stuck with one 
hex per 
tile, using the technique of column sliding, but hexes the same size 
as the little squares are neat! The last set flying by would even 
support the 1/2 tile slide of a column. It would not break my game.   
I think the real problem is, that once you add this kind of stuff, it 
is harder to make a set by hand. The hex grid would have to be done 
right, so that you could look "past" it if you weren't using it.

On the other hand,
I tend to make my different boards more interesting by either spacing 
tiles further apart or leaving blank spaces etc. So do we really need 
hexes?

I liked the dot in the center of each square tile. Here is another 
extension to that: instead of a dot, but a Triangle of the same size 
with the apex pointing along one line. Then one can 
utilize them for 'directional boards'!


This is getting long, let me close:

I do notice alot of extention discussions can get bogged down! Let me 
play Cassandra here. In my business have a term called second spec 
bloat. With alot of software specs I've seen, V1.0 is really slick, 
and leaves you with alot of 'gee WIBNI it had this?' and then everyone 
gets together and does V2.0, sticks all the bells and whistles in, 
have pissing contests whern their bell won't go in, and then no one 
implements the spec because it is WAY to big and bloated!

Does anyone really want a pp that looks like a copy of 'Roads and 
Boats'?

All in all, man! Did I get excited to see more pp traffic this past 
few days than ever!  

Dave