During the planning stage of playing a game, along the right side of the game window for a scenario is a sidebar containing a variety of data relevant to the scenario being played. An example image is shown in the following graphic:
At the top of the sidebar is an image which is a pictorial representation of the weather for the present turn phase. If it is a day turn then there shall be a blue sky and sun image, whereas for a night turn the image will be a dark gray with a representation of the moon state. The following table contains all the possible day and night combinations images with a short description.
Image: | Description: | Day/Night: |
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Other than day or night, the sidebar graphic will also represent the weather. The following table shows all the possible graphics that are overlaid over the previous day/night images.
Image: | Description: |
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After the sidebar graphic, there are a series of yellow titles, followed in white by the value of that title.
The first title is Time which is the time of the present planning stage and represents the time at which the game will begin its next execution phase. In the Joy Of Hex game each execution phase is 4 hours long, which means that a planning turn will only occur at 6:00am, 10:00am, 2:00pm, 6:00pm, 10:00pm, and 2:00am. 6:00am is always the start of a new day and will always be the first day turn of a day; after this, there then can follow 2-4 day turns (including the first day turn) depending on the climate and present position within the year.
The next title is Date and is a short string representing the calender date for the present simulated 24 hour block. Since each execution phase is meant to represent 4 hours, this means that every 6 turns the date will move onto the next day in the calender. Notice, in the following table that a shorthand is used for the month:
Abreviation: | Full String: |
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The next title is Temperature and is meant to represent the present air temperature for the present turn. The units of measurement are in degrees Celsius, which means that below 0 degrees water freezes and instead of rain one has snow.
The next title is Water Level which is only relevant in certain climate types. The units of measurement are in centimeters, and represent the amount of water that lies above the ground surface. If there is little ice and lots of water then the terrain can turn into mud which is difficult to move about on. The map graphic changes to represent this change in the landscape.
The next title is Ice Level which is only relevant in certain climate types. The units of measurement are in centimeters, and represent the amount of ice/snow that lies above the ground surface. Ice always takes priority over water, and if there is enough ice then it can become a light but firm layer of snow. If there is a lot more ice then the terrain will become covered in thick snow, which is difficult to move about on. The map graphic changes to represent this change in the landscape.
The next title is Climate. Since the climate type can have a serious effect on the sort of landscape that you can expect through the duration of a game then it is important to have a short piece of text noting just which climate the scenario that you're playing is based on. At the moment there are 4 climates: Europe1, Europe2, Russia1 and Desert1.
The next title is Difficulty. This is the setting at which the present player is playing at. There are five possible difficulty levels: Very Hard, Hard, Even, Easy and Very Easy.
The next title is Opponent. This who the present player is playing against. There are three possible opponents: the computer, a local human on the same computer, and another human via email.
The next title is Present Player. The name of the present player is the name of the side that the scenario designer gave for the side that is presently being planned. Since there are two sides, there is obviously two names, but only one is shown at a time as only one side can plan at a time.
The next title is Present Turn. This takes the form of a number, a slash mark and another number. The first number represents the present turn, whereas the number after the slash is the number of turns that one can play the before the scenario is over. Actually the scenario doesn't really finish once you pass the number of turns that make up a scenario - if you want to keep playing the scenario after the final turn phase is over then you are perfectly welcome to keep going, it is just that once the number of turns that make up a scenario are used up then a dialog with the score will appear stating which side has won, otherwise the game can be still played on.