Who told aliens to use Hexagons?

[Quirel]

Come on. You have to ask this question?

Hex-grids are a priori awesome. They have an innate awesomeness given to them by Settlers of Catan and the most awesome of insects: bees.

Bees. My God.

Wasps. Even better.

Anyhow, a lot of the Hex-grids in shields and stuff dates back to the days of low-poly rendering, when rendering a sphere or whatnot was too consuming. It's largely been retained because of the rule of cool.

Oh, and Geodesic domes: I think they're the only structure to get stronger as they get bigger.

Even funner fact: SkyNet divides up territory and maps it with a fractal hexagonal grid. The hexagons are at least a hundred kilometers in area at the macro scale, and as small as half a meter across in the micro scale. Each hexagon is usually tagged with one or more identifying features via satellite imaging before a campaign against the Resistance commences.

Btw, I can't remember where the hexagones are in halo. All I can think of are the Jackal's shields.

Well, iirc, the reflective pattern on Wraiths, Ghosts, and Banshees is hexagonal, the Bubble Shield uses hexagons, and don't get me started on Forerunner architecture...

We should have two user groups on these forums. Archer's Allies and Archer's Enemies!

Would that be "Team Archer" and "Team Squiddie"?

[Roland]

Civilization V is using hexagons instead of the old grid now, I think it had something to do with how many segments could be fit into a given space, because multiple unit types cannot stack any more, the grid layout is far more important. I guess it would make perfect sense for an advanced civilization to do the same for the sake of efficiency.

EDIT: This is mildly off topic, but noteworthy, I was eating a nature valley Sweet/salty bar while posting here, and I noticed that when you peel off the wrapper it leaves an imprint in the peanut butter. The imprint is, in fact, hundreds of tiny hexagons which can only be seen under the right light! I think it's a conspiracy.

[Nicol Bolas]

Anyhow, a lot of the Hex-grids in shields and stuff dates back to the days of low-poly rendering, when rendering a sphere or whatnot was too consuming.

Really? I don't think so. Mostly since a hex breaks down into a minimum of four co-planar triangles. That's an awful waste of triangles, when they could be better used as non-co-planar triangles in a regular triangular approximation. If I were trying to roughly approximate a sphere with triangles, a hex is really the wrong way to go.

Civilization V is using hexagons instead of the old grid now, I think it had something to do with how many segments could be fit into a given space, because multiple unit types cannot stack any more, the grid layout is far more important. I guess it would make perfect sense for an advanced civilization to do the same for the sake of efficiency.

For Civ V, I think it's more about being able to make a truly spherical world. You can't have equal-sized squares that form a sphere. Whereas you can have equal-sized hexes (with a few heptagons here and there) that form a sphere.

Also, for any board-game, or board-game-like game, it's faster to move diagonally on squares than horizontally and vertically. On hexes, all directions are the same (though there are fewer of them). So it's a bit more direction-agnostic.

[KadajSouba]

Really? I don't think so. Mostly since a hex breaks down into a minimum of four co-planar triangles. That's an awful waste of triangles, when they could be better used as non-co-planar triangles in a regular triangular approximation. If I were trying to roughly approximate a sphere with triangles, a hex is really the wrong way to go.

Hahaha you are fuckin kiddin me...

This thread is the hexagonal shit.

[Pandonetho]

But hornets are the best.

Yeah, that looks like a pretty imbalanced game there.

Or the Protoss vs the Zerg, with the Zerg getting slaughtered.

[ArcherofAiur]

Would that be "Team Archer" and "Team Squiddie"?

Im telling you "Alliance of Aiur" and "Demo Squad"


Than Demo and I can start manipulating the lives of forum members in our eternal battle for dominance. I get the power to heal people and he can turn into a black smoke monster.

[Pandonetho]

And I'll be the Pandonetho Is Super Supportive Of Fleeing Fights organization.

Incidentally, there are health posters in my school advertising to Get Trans Fats Off Campus!

[n00bonicPlague]

^win^

[ArcherofAiur]

Alliance of Aiur is now recruiting if Demo wants to set up his team.

[newcomplex]

Historically, the psycogeometricisms of human idealism have been driven by the notions of the Masculine square, representing order, reason, and Apollonian art, consistent with the themes of the male sexuality, and the Feminine circle, representing fluidity, grace, and Dionysian art. Aesthetics has long strove for a convergence between the conflicting ideals, and harmonious integration of the two forms.

The Alien Hexagon of popular sci-fi is realization of this ideal, representing something entirely alien that if defies the realm of human, it is a the embodiment of sexless carnality, abysmal beauty through mathematical precision, reiterated only in our nature in the profoundly alien Honey Bee and its collective Hive mind, a buzzing clockwork of reproduction and sex, a utterly terrifying notion of a carnal beauty beyond our billinear comprehension, bound through the distinctively disparate sexes. It is in itself, utterly alien to us, terrifying its is profound beauty and splendor, ascribed to Alien races who possess the sexless grace of creation, of contradiction, the apex of wanton beauty that defies classification.

/creepyface.

tl;dr
idfk lol

Sorry just felt like writing that. For a visual aesthetics/sexual philosophy analysis instead of the whole geometric viewpoint. I like it more.

(no Noobonic plague this isn't the excuse to start posting your zeratulxtassadar pics. plzno)