Empire Borders Overlay

[nweismuller]

OK, the new empire borders overlay just looks nice. And the extra information it conveys, so you know where other empires have spread even without an open borders treaty, is useful and logical that you'd be able to know. Perhaps it's a minor thing, but I really like this update! Keep up the good work, you two.

[Arioch]

Glad you like it!

[zolobolo]

Agreed, the new border system is generally a welcome additional but is also quite smooth in its implementation like everything else. The whole UI is one of the strongest aspect of the game.

I agree that it makes sense to see the borders of other empires (if for nothing else, the implementation of partial borders would be nightmare) - the only alternative that might be used is to only reveal Border of those empires that the player has diplomatic connection with

Is it possible to use the border calculation formula to dish out some border tension diplomacy penalty to empires?

Lots of changes rolling in... thanks guys Really appreciate the hard work you are putting into the game

[Supermint]

My version for some reason doesn't have empire borders. Is this feature on the test versions.

[Arioch]

My version for some reason doesn't have empire borders. Is this feature on the test versions.

It's just on the test build at the moment. You can opt into the Steam beta version if you want to check it out; the code is "alphatesting".

[Supermint]

Thanks. I'll give it a try. PS. I am still working on the race-specific stations. I do have a few designs on paper.

[zolobolo]

So the empire border layout is displayed once contact/embassy has been established (don''t know which as I alwas do both right of the bat = make embasies cost more?)

This is great - works like a charm

Already posted a proposal of marking contested systems

Regarding border colors: Tinker an Yoral green are wery close - the empire Icon is a huge help here
Stellaris has faced the same issue until v2, and this is one thing they seem to have fixed for sure: by using two colors for territory display+ borders of neighbourous empires are both visible.

What I mean is: the border line for both empires is rendered, this way the border of a specific empire is more visible as it is a continuous line and not broken. If there are no neighbours, there is only one line. Don't know how feasable this double line border concept would be for this engine...

Otherwise, the system works realy well. Jumping into an existing save is confusing at first (as you have memorized locations based on the star constellations) but when beginning a new game it grows organically (great work on the randomisation) and also provides a nice visual representation of empire territory for compariosn with other.

Will these borders eventually get slightly rouned corners? Not sure if it would look better per say, but maybe more fitting with the GUI style

[sven]

Regarding border colors: Tinker an Yoral green are wery close - the empire Icon is a huge help here
Stellaris has faced the same issue until v2, and this is one thing they seem to have fixed for sure: by using two colors for territory display+ borders of neighbourous empires are both visible.

What I mean is: the border line for both empires is rendered, this way the border of a specific empire is more visible as it is a continuous line and not broken. If there are no neighbours, there is only one line. Don't know how feasable this double line border concept would be for this engine...

It's not a super-easy feature to turn on. There might be a clever way to hack it together using the current engine, but, if there is... I haven't figured it out yet

Will these borders eventually get slightly rouned corners? Not sure if it would look better per say, but maybe more fitting with the GUI style

Given the way things are working under the hood, adding this feature would be a pretty serious project. So "probably not".

[zolobolo]

No worries - I also like the current borders as is

Just looking at the current game, expansion got a really cool feeling of progression and various remote systems are also easily recognizable

Looking at this map without the new feature would take quite a lot of processing time to see what is going on

[sven]

What I mean is: the border line for both empires is rendered, this way the border of a specific empire is more visible as it is a continuous line and not broken. If there are no neighbours, there is only one line. Don't know how feasable this double line border concept would be for this engine...

It's not a super-easy feature to turn on. There might be a clever way to hack it together using the current engine, but, if there is... I haven't figured it out yet

Hah! Arioch and I did a little more brainstorming yesterday, and I think we've figured out a nice way of getting a doubled-border concept to work inside the constraints of the engine. Should be up on the test builds as of r22007.

[zolobolo]

Hah! Arioch and I did a little more brainstorming yesterday, and I think we've figured out a nice way of getting a doubled-border concept to work inside the constraints of the engine. Should be up on the test builds as of r22007.

I see what you have done there Very sneaky

Ownership of contested systems are of course perfectly visible right now

The obvious drawback of this concept are:
1. There is more noise on the map: double border in areas where it is not needed (no neighbor)
2. Overall increase of border significance when looking on the map. This is done by the empty space between the two borders
3. The randomness of the border shape if lessened a bit. My guess is that you have been intentionally avoiding the hexagonal border shape of Galciv with the randomized geometry of the lines. I find the idea great as it did look awkwardly symmetrical there, the funny thing is that the continuous parallel borders do harken back to that feel (the lessen the randomized nature of the geometry)

Did you try this concept with the empty space being half or even 0 between the two borders?
The later would still result in a stronger border stroke that is halved when meeting neighbors but could lessen the above effects

At this point, it is more taste then anything else. The information is clearly visible, and the question is how you would like the style to be
More emphasized borders are also not necessarily a bad thing if you are going to give them a meaningful mechanic: like relationship penalty based on the percentage of common border / total border, or based on colonies within other empires borders

[zolobolo]

Here is an a screen where I tried to break the border algorithm:
- 130 Stars
- Sparse stars (to see what happens when drawn close to each other)
- 12 AI empires (to see the colors)

There is an obvious hit to performance though not a considerable one, here other findings marked red on the screenshot:
1. Systems with inhospitable planets seem to be gobbled up in the Border of the nearest colonized system see system: "Drak"
2. The drawback of the empty space between the two border lines is emphasize here of course and visible on the second marking: there is only a tiny border part left where there is no one on the other side but a small snippet still needs to be rendered
3. Empire Banners are not displayed - this is probably due to the close proximity of the systems - which hinders the further distinguished of various empires on the map

If possible, I would try to have 0 space between the two lines and see if it is better that way

The segregation of various "sectors" is clearly visible though with the new borders, which is a very good thing

[sven]

1. Systems with inhospitable planets seem to be gobbled up in the Border of the nearest colonized system see system: "Drak"

Would you upload this game? (Or email me the save.) It think you may have found a bug.

[zolobolo]

Would you upload this game? (Or email me the save.) It think you may have found a bug.

Game save has been uploaded - you can also observe the behaviour for systems: Veneke and Akaras

Haven't seen this for normal star density maps yet so might be due to the close proximity

[sven]

Did you try this concept with the empty space being half or even 0 between the two borders?
The later would still result in a stronger border stroke that is halved when meeting neighbors but could lessen the above effects

We have. If you go into Lua state\Drawers\Effects\triangle_line_doubled.cg, and play with the value on line 41, you can see a few different variations for yourself. For example, changing the .25 to a .125 gives you borders that are significantly closer together:

Code: Select all

	d-=w*.125;

Use a value much smaller than .125, and you'll start to notice aliasing artifacts around the joins.

I think the smaller values sometimes look pretty good when you're zoomed way in, but the larger ones certainly work better on zoom out. I might tweak the zoomed in values a little... Though it would be a pretty minor adjustment...