Kevin Pacey wrote on Wed, Feb 15, 2017 06:46 AM UTC:
I was curious whether the Diagram Designer (or Game Courier) would show a diagram for a 4D Hexagonal variant that would have thirty-seven hex-shaped 2D boards of 37 hexes each, in a way that give reasonable sized hexes (plus any pieces on them) as seen on my laptop screen. The answer seems to be no; I'll post a diagram of the first step one would take in making such a diagram as a final step. The first step involves making a (7x7+6)x (7x7+6) = 55x55 cell vertical hexagonal diagram (the next step would involve cutting thirty-seven 2D hexagonal boards (of 37 cells) out by kind of 'deleting' many cells using the FEN code, in order to make a hexagonal shaped 4D board). Here's the diagram of the first step (I included a 3 colour checkering pattern plus some pieces, to liven the image a bit); I tried scale=300 (about the max. this would produce such a diagram for of these dimensions), and it didn't really help using [ctrl +] a few times, i.e. for enlarging the print on my screen):
[edit: That's strange. When I post the diagram in a comment, the individual hexes and pieces are now reasonably visible. Regardless, one will have to scroll up and down the screen to view the whole image, unless one uses [ctrl -] several times to reduce it, but then one can't see individual cells/pieces clearly. With many cells cut out, so as to make a final diagram of the 4D board, one would still need to do [ctrl -] at least four times to view the diagram all on one screen (mine anyway), but then the individual cells/pieces would still look a bit too small to be really acceptable. P.S.: In a later edit, I changed the diagram's scale to just 23, which would be the largest size able to show on my laptop screen a final 4D diagram (with many cells deleted) without needing to scroll down my screen. Looking at the diagram now, the cells/pieces (not to mention the notation for the board's cells) look almost too small to be really acceptable, but perhaps this is a borderline case?]
Fwiw, here's a page for a CVP entry that seems to use hexes of about the same size, though somehow the pieces (at least when represented by individual letters) seem easier to see:
I was curious whether the Diagram Designer (or Game Courier) would show a diagram for a 4D Hexagonal variant that would have thirty-seven hex-shaped 2D boards of 37 hexes each, in a way that give reasonable sized hexes (plus any pieces on them) as seen on my laptop screen. The answer seems to be no; I'll post a diagram of the first step one would take in making such a diagram as a final step. The first step involves making a (7x7+6)x (7x7+6) = 55x55 cell vertical hexagonal diagram (the next step would involve cutting thirty-seven 2D hexagonal boards (of 37 cells) out by kind of 'deleting' many cells using the FEN code, in order to make a hexagonal shaped 4D board). Here's the diagram of the first step (I included a 3 colour checkering pattern plus some pieces, to liven the image a bit); I tried scale=300 (about the max. this would produce such a diagram for of these dimensions), and it didn't really help using [ctrl +] a few times, i.e. for enlarging the print on my screen):
[edit: That's strange. When I post the diagram in a comment, the individual hexes and pieces are now reasonably visible. Regardless, one will have to scroll up and down the screen to view the whole image, unless one uses [ctrl -] several times to reduce it, but then one can't see individual cells/pieces clearly. With many cells cut out, so as to make a final diagram of the 4D board, one would still need to do [ctrl -] at least four times to view the diagram all on one screen (mine anyway), but then the individual cells/pieces would still look a bit too small to be really acceptable. P.S.: In a later edit, I changed the diagram's scale to just 23, which would be the largest size able to show on my laptop screen a final 4D diagram (with many cells deleted) without needing to scroll down my screen. Looking at the diagram now, the cells/pieces (not to mention the notation for the board's cells) look almost too small to be really acceptable, but perhaps this is a borderline case?]
Fwiw, here's a page for a CVP entry that seems to use hexes of about the same size, though somehow the pieces (at least when represented by individual letters) seem easier to see:
Antarctic Chess