10 ft reach, 15 ft diagonals

[Caliban]

Nice solution, Caliban.

But why not just use hexes?

In fact, UI think that could be a topic in and of itself...

Bits of the combat rules and spells are planned out around squares instead of hexes.

With squares you can have 8 people surrounding one medium target. With hexes, it's only 6.

The spell diagrams in the DMG use squares.

Hexes have some of the same issues with going in a straight line as squares do with going in a diagonal line. (I.e. if you try to leave a hex along one of the 6 "corners", you end up zig-zagging between hexes, instead of actually going in a straight line.)

It's much easier to draw buildings with squares rather than hexes.

I already have a square battlemat.

 

[Pielorinho]

So we have a similar question that came up in last week's game; we were unable to find the answer in the DMG's AoE descriptions.

Frances, anticipating trouble, has cast Magic Circle Against Law on himself right before attacking the city guard. His friend Paolo flanks the guard on the diagonal:

PXX
XGX
XXF

Is Paolo covered by the Magic Circle? He certainly would be if the flanking was like

XPX
XGX
XFX

Since Magic Circle can't be centered on the intersection of squares, figuring its AoO becomes difficult for my poor tired brain.

Daniel

 

[KarinsDad]

Bits of the combat rules and spells are planned out around squares instead of hexes.

Err, so? The combat movement rules for diagonal movement are not even spelled out in 3E. At least with hexes, people wouldn’t keep asking the same question here on the boards.

With squares you can have 8 people surrounding one medium target. With hexes, it's only 6.

Which is preferable. In hockey, how many guys are actually standing there beating up on one guy? It’s more like 3 or 4 than 8. 6 is more realistic than 8 (although it too is high).

The spell diagrams in the DMG use squares.

The spell diagrams in the DMG are not very good. Some of them are non-intuitive and also non-consistent.

Look at the straight ahead Detect Evil area of effect diagram in the DMG. Some people might not be able to figure that out on their own within the game without looking at it (i.e. non-intuitive). You actually have to measure out the two sides and the middle and then estimate a curve. And, in fact, it only goes out 50 feet, not the 60 feet of the spell. Doh!

Look at Burning Hands. The caster is not even in a square. With the straight ahead Detect Evil, he is in a square, but the spell affects 10 feet to the left of the caster (i.e. non-consistent).

These examples of how it is supposed to work actually illustrate that hexes are preferable. With hexes, it is easy to immediately know which hexes are affected and which are not based on the area description of the spell. But, there is a trick. With hexes, you do not count the center hex for things like bursts, cylinders, and spreads. So, for a 20 foot fireball, you go 4 hexes out in all directions from the center hex.

Hexes have some of the same issues with going in a straight line as squares do with going in a diagonal line. (I.e. if you try to leave a hex along one of the 6 "corners", you end up zig-zagging between hexes, instead of actually going in a straight line.)

The zig-zagging, though, does not involve counting different distances based on how many diagonal moves that have been made so far. So, you count 5 10 15 20 25, not 5d 15d 20d 25 35d (where d here is a diagonal move and the move at 25 is not diagonal).

It's much easier to draw buildings with squares rather than hexes.

That depends. Do the rooms of your buildings always have rectangular shapes with dimensions of 5 feet increments? If so, then I can do the exact same drawing with hexes, although it will not have the perfect rectangular shape, just size. If not, then you have not gained anything since the room shapes and sizes are irregular.

I already have a square battlemat.

Your loss.

 

[Virago]

As posted on other thread, I solve this IMC by the rule that when you move diagonally, you are counted as moving through an adjactent square. For example:

@A
BX

Our hero, @, wishes to move to X diagonally, then she has to move through either A or B. If A is a wall, and B is an enemy, obviously some tumbling or an overrun will be needed. If A and B are both pits, a jump is needed.

There may have been a problem with this but I don't remember it.

KD said:
The zig-zagging, though, does not involve counting different distances based on how many diagonal moves that have been made so far

So what? No one thinks that alternating counting 5/10/5 is difficult.

Do the rooms of your buildings always have rectangular shapes with dimensions of 5 feet increments? If so, then I can do the exact same drawing with hexes, although it will not have the perfect rectangular shape, just size

Actually the dimension that goes "against the grain" will be distorted and shrunk, and I'm not sure how you will get the shape right either, since a 10x10 room will "actually" be shaped like four hexes, or maybe two hexes and 4 half-hexes?

I'm remembering our discussion on this before, where you allow people to stand on the line between two hexes, which really amounts to using an oddly-shaped grid, anyway.

What if you want to center an area effect on someone standing on the line between two hexes, as they would be if they were going down a corridor "against the grain". It's not too simple and easy to calculate area effects then.

What I imagine you do is sort of step back from the grid, and imagine the circle, or semi-estimate it with the hexes, and then make judgement calls about what is and is not included, which works for any grid system.

 

[KarinsDad]

As posted on other thread, I solve this IMC by the rule that when you move diagonally, you are counted as moving through an adjactent square. For example:

@A
BX

Our hero, @, wishes to move to X diagonally, then she has to move through either A or B. If A is a wall, and B is an enemy, obviously some tumbling or an overrun will be needed. If A and B are both pits, a jump is needed.

There may have been a problem with this but I don't remember it.

The thing is that you should not have to solve the problem. It shouldn’t exist.

Also, your solution does have a problem. In the non-diagonal case, both opponents get an AoO. In your diagonal case, one opponent gets an AoO, not both.

So, the inconsistency is still there. Either both should get an AoO or neither should in both cases.

And, why should someone have to jump in the diagonal case? Imagine a chess board where you do not want to step on the black squares. You should easily be able to walk on the white squares all you want without jumping or tumbling.

KD said:
The zig-zagging, though, does not involve counting different distances based on how many diagonal moves that have been made so far

So what? No one thinks that alternating counting 5/10/5 is difficult.

It is not difficult.

However, late in a game when people are tired, I bet that using that system, mistakes are made more easily. In other words, someone moves diagonally and says “5 15 20 25 30 40” and someone else says “Hey, you skipped one, start again” more often than with the “5 10 15 20 25” of hexes.

Why bother with a slightly klunky movement, reach, and area of effect system when you do not have to?

Do the rooms of your buildings always have rectangular shapes with dimensions of 5 feet increments? If so, then I can do the exact same drawing with hexes, although it will not have the perfect rectangular shape, just size

Actually the dimension that goes "against the grain" will be distorted and shrunk, and I'm not sure how you will get the shape right either, since a 10x10 room will "actually" be shaped like four hexes, or maybe two hexes and 4 half-hexes?

As I stated, it will not have the perfect rectangular shape, just the size.

Usually, in this case you have 2 hexes along the x-axis (for example) and 1 hex and 2 half hexes along the y-axis. This results in 3 full hexes and 2 half hexes in the room. Yes, occasionally someone wants to be in two half-hexes, but that really isn’t a big deal.

And, as the room gets larger, the percentage of full hexes increase. For example, the majority of the spaces in a 20x20 room are full hexes (14 out of 16), so the half-hex issue is not really a big problem.

But, the point is that squares have this exact same problem on every other non-rectangular shaped room you can think of. In fact, squares have this exact same problem with rectangular shaped rooms or corridors if the direction of a room edge does not match the 0, 90, 180, or 270 degree edge of the grid.

Take a 45 degree 10 foot wide corridor out of a square room and the squares fall apart big time. The vast majority of the squares are partial and only the diagonal line of squares in the middle is full squares.

I'm remembering our discussion on this before, where you allow people to stand on the line between two hexes, which really amounts to using an oddly-shaped grid, anyway.

Exactly. Hexes can emulate rectangular rooms if you do not mind a slight distortion in the actual shape. Squares, however, have a difficult time emulating oval, circular, triangular, 45 degree 10 foot wide corridor out of a square room, etc.

And, none of the players I have ever played with using hexes have had a problem that a 10x10 room has a shape ratio of 6 to 5.

What if you want to center an area effect on someone standing on the line between two hexes, as they would be if they were going down a corridor "against the grain". It's not too simple and easy to calculate area effects then.

It’s simple. In the against the grain direction, you ignore the center hex. In other directions, you count from the line. So, say you had a 5 foot radius effect (for simplicity). It would result in the four hexes around that line.

What if you want to center an area effect in the square grid system on a character standing in the middle of a square?

Same problem. Similar solution.

What I imagine you do is sort of step back from the grid, and imagine the circle, or semi-estimate it with the hexes, and then make judgement calls about what is and is not included, which works for any grid system.

It really is not an estimate. It is a set of rules that works the same way each time.

And granted, you could do something similar with squares. If on the intersection (like the DMG), count out the squares. If on a line, ignore the center space for one direction, but count out from the line in the other. In centered on a square, ignore the center square.

It works the same. The difference is that most area of effects are bursts, spreads, or cylinders, hence, the circular nature of hexes corresponds better. It is easier and quicker to figure out.

 

[Legildur]

Neither of the 2 groups I play in complain about the 5'/10' diagonal move rules fix.

For those of you concerned about reaching someone (either naturally or with a polearm etc) two diagonals away, just apply your Pythagoras Theorem:

2 diagonals is 14'2" away (centre of square to centre of square) - and you only have 10' reach - you can't hit it. Even 2 squares away (with one diagonal) is 11'2" - a bit of a stretch using the rules verbatim.

I think you just have to accept the 'rounding error' using squares as an abstraction of reality.

Don't forget, your opponents face the same problems, and I bet a lot more of them have, on average, more reach than the party does.

 

[Christian]

You think it's the players complaining, Legildur?

If I were playing with either of your groups, I'd be having a field day. Everyone else is getting whacked with attacks of opportunity charging the ogres, but not me, because I'd be charging on the diagonal. They can't launch an AoO for my entering their threatened area, and since the square two diagonals away is too far away for their 10' reach to threaten ... Takes away one of the top advantages of a reach weapon, not to mention messing with the suspension of disbelief. (What do you mean, it gets an AoO if I charge in parallel or orthorgonal to the imaginary grid, but not if I charge in obliquely?!)

If your group hasn't had a problem with it, it's not because the problem doesn't exist. Unlike KarinsDad, I prefer to use squares; but to claim that the 5'/10' rule solves all of the problems with the square grid is to stick one's head in the sand. There are problems with that solution, and they need to be worked out to prevent horrendous metagaming.

 

[dcollins]

Number one, the 5'/10' rule is a house rule. You won't find it in the PH or DMG anywhere. So by the official 3rd Edition rules this doesn't come up.

Well... it's not in the text. However, if you very closely analyze the spell diagrams on DMG p. 68-69, you will see that they've been drawn in compliance with the 5/10 rule, and not a true arithmetic measurement of the distances in question.

I also had a go-round with my play group over this thread's main topic. I, too, mandated that 10 foot reach must extend 2 diagonals away. In addition to all the preceding reasons why, here is another: without it, a normal PC with a reach weapon would not be able to make any attacks on a diagonal whatsoever.

 

[KarinsDad]

Takes away one of the top advantages of a reach weapon, not to mention messing with the suspension of disbelief. (What do you mean, it gets an AoO if I charge in parallel or orthorgonal to the imaginary grid, but not if I charge in obliquely?!)

If your group hasn't had a problem with it, it's not because the problem doesn't exist. Unlike KarinsDad, I prefer to use squares; but to claim that the 5'/10' rule solves all of the problems with the square grid is to stick one's head in the sand. There are problems with that solution, and they need to be worked out to prevent horrendous metagaming.

Yup. The problems with squares just keep cropping up.

And, half of them revolve around the diagonal problems and the other half revolve around the same problems that hexes have: partial spaces in shaped areas for which the given grid system (either of the two) is inferior.

So, since hexes do not have any diagonal movement, reach, or spell coverage problems (how about all of those posts about the Shield spell covering half of the battlefield and whether you should put a straight line totally in front of the caster, or also cover one side?) and work better for burst, spread, and cylinder spells, I prefer to ignore the slight shape problems for rectangular shaped rooms and the slight distance problem against the grain. Those are not worth worrying about.

But with the square diagonal problems, you have to come up with a bunch of house rules to handle those situations. For hexes, I basically have two house rules:

1) Area effect spells do not include the center hex. This is also needed for certain spells using squares such as Magic Circle spells. Btw, if you use the intersection point of hexes as a center point like using the intersection point of squares, then this rule is not needed. However, I find it easier to quickly draw areas of effect that are hex shaped as opposed to triangular shaped.

2) A half hex and half of a full hex can be used as a full hex in rooms where there are few full hexes. A rule similar to this is also needed for squares in irregular shaped or direction rooms.

So, both of these rules are basically useful for squares as well, but squares also need AoO rules for diagonals, reach rules for diagonals, etc.

Squares are more complex, not simpler in reality. They just appear to be simpler.

 

[IceBear]

I use squares and could care less what anyone else uses. There are problems with grids, and there are problems with hexes (maybe there are fewer according to KD, but there are still problems).

The only way you aren't going to have any issues is to use a measuring tape.

For me, I'd rather have the convenience of drawing a room so that it looks normal than anything else. I'll use the 5/10/5 for movement and a rule similar to Caliban's for reach.

Seriously, both have their flaws and as long as the group is willing to deal with them, who cares what someone else is using?

IceBear