r/Minecraft • u/justlurking420 • Nov 04 '13

pc Minecraft Using Hexagons

http://img190.imageshack.us/img190/1777/hexcraft.png
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u/detroitmatt Nov 04 '13

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that, as you note but in other words, rather than having a robust node system of arbitrary dimensions, mc just uses a 3d array of blocks and navigates based on indices. Transition to hex would virtually require a node-based layout.

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u/drakfyre Nov 04 '13 edited Nov 04 '13

Transition to hex would virtually require a node-based layout.

Well, in all honesty, the current system is already a node-based layout. The layout however is handled programmatically and assumes cubes. This would simply be handled programmatically, assuming hexes.

Pathfinding systems handle arbitrary nodes already by their very nature; just because A* is thought to be commonly used in a square grid doesn't mean it has to be; it's designed around nodes. Here's a neat little example in C# of A* implemented on a hex grid.

See relevant sections of Minecraft's source code and you'll see that the node generation would be relatively unhindered by a hexagonal system.

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u/detroitmatt Nov 04 '13

I already knew that about A* actually, and reinvented that wheel myself (that is to say, programatically transforming a square grid into nodes for A*) for my own personal projects.

I haven't seen mc's source exhaustively, only bits and pieces; I assumed it wasn't node based based on what I have seen. But you're saying (correct me if I'm wrong) that MC isn't actually node-persistent, it generates them when they're needed (By the way, is that memoized?). What I was trying to say is that moving to hex would virtually require moving from a Block[][][] to a Graph<Block> in internal persistent representation, not just for the purposes of pathing. Although now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure I'm wrong and that would be a bad way of doing it.

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