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(Message started by: megajester on Feb 14th, 2011, 1:52am)
Title: Abstract set concept
Post by megajester on Feb 14th, 2011, 1:52am
I'm trying to find an easy-and-cheap-yet-cool way of making a set and I'd like to run this concept (http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad104/istanbulluingiliz/abstractarimaapiecesymbols20110212.jpg) past you all...

It's an abstract design using symbols instead of representations of animals. The logic is as follows:

Elephant (tusks and trunk)
Camel (hump)
Horse (profile)
Dog (howling)

and the Cat and Rabbit should be obvious :)

I'd especially like to ask how easy it is to tell the relative strenghts of the pieces at a glance, and if you anticipate this could be a problem if I want to teach the game to a beginner using this set.

Maybe this (http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad104/istanbulluingiliz/abstractarimaaset2010wc.jpg) could give you an idea of what it might look like on a board.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by ginrunner on Feb 14th, 2011, 2:26am
they do this with some chess sets and I have never been impressed with it.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by ChrisB on Feb 14th, 2011, 3:57am

on 02/14/11 at 01:52:48, megajester wrote:
I'd especially like to ask how easy it is to tell the relative strenghts of the pieces at a glance, and if you anticipate this could be a problem if I want to teach the game to a beginner using this set.

I think your approach of varying the size of the pieces based on their strength is a good one.  In your sample, though, it's not immediately obvious to me which is stronger between the dog and cat since both pieces have the same height, even though the dog has the larger base.  To a lesser extent, I have the same problem between the elephant and camel for the same reason.  Therefore, what would work well for me is to make the elephant a little taller and the cat a little shorter.

Yea, like ginrunner, I haven't had much interest in abstract chess sets.  But I think arimaa has more potential for abstract sets since it has a clear hierarchy of pieces.

Good luck!
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by megajester on Feb 14th, 2011, 9:49am
Thank you for your helpful responses so far...

So does anybody actually like the set? I haven't wasted too much time on it, so you can tell me, I can take it. :)
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Fritzlein on Feb 14th, 2011, 9:58am

on 02/14/11 at 09:49:29, megajester wrote:
So does anybody actually like the set?

You haven't yet told us how cheap.  ;)
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by JoeHead on Feb 14th, 2011, 10:23am
Thank you for your idea. I have been waiting for something like this for a long time.
You rule! I find this really abstract looking pieces much better than childish animals.
Keep up a good work. I printed your set.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by SpeedRazor on Feb 14th, 2011, 1:47pm

on 02/14/11 at 01:52:48, megajester wrote:
I'm trying to find an easy-and-cheap-yet-cool way of making a set and I'd like to run this concept (http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad104/istanbulluingiliz/abstractarimaapiecesymbols20110212.jpg) past you all...

It's an abstract design using symbols instead of representations of animals. The logic is as follows:

Elephant (tusks and trunk)
Camel (hump)
Horse (profile)
Dog (howling)

and the Cat and Rabbit should be obvious :)

I'd especially like to ask how easy it is to tell the relative strengths of the pieces at a glance, and if you anticipate this could be a problem if I want to teach the game to a beginner using this set.

Maybe this (http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad104/istanbulluingiliz/abstractarimaaset2010wc.jpg) could give you an idea of what it might look like on a board.



I really like this idea!  I like that the pieces are clear and succinct, and you can tell them apart.

In your representation of the board though, MegaJester, I think that you should also add a comparable, and abstract solution.  Make the playing spaces octagonal!

All of Arimaa is orthogonal, never diagonal.  Eliminate diagonal-thinking by making the board look like a raised path of octagons!  Yummy!  No ambiguity; easy to teach.  "If the spaces touch, you can go there - (or the pieces' powers can effect there).  If the spaces don't touch, you can't go or effect it."

I DO like your idea for the pieces, though    ;D  
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by megajester on Feb 14th, 2011, 2:35pm
Oh wow! I wasn't expecting such a positive response... Thanks guys.

But don't hold back with any constructive criticism :)

I think I might tweak it by shortening the camel so it's both shorter than the elephant but still obviously taller than the horse. I could do something similar with the cat just by shortening the ears a bit...
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by dree12 on Feb 14th, 2011, 5:52pm
If one were to make an abstract set, wouldn't it be efficient to use cylinders? Make the cylinders different in height, and maybe draw a G or something onto the rabbits. This should remain cheap and be very easy to see strength differences.

Of course, this has the "easy-and-cheap" but lacks the "cool".
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by megajester on Feb 15th, 2011, 3:05am

on 02/14/11 at 17:52:08, dree12 wrote:
If one were to make an abstract set, wouldn't it be efficient to use cylinders? Make the cylinders different in height, and maybe draw a G or something onto the rabbits. This should remain cheap and be very easy to see strength differences.

Of course, this has the "easy-and-cheap" but lacks the "cool".

OK I'm thinking I could make the set with a table saw like this guy (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXW55S4X9zo). Either that or with modelling clay, just taking a slab of that and cutting out the pieces.

Making cylinders sounds more difficult :)
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by ocmiente on Feb 15th, 2011, 10:28am
I like the idea of an abstract set very much.  I still haven't found a good way to represent the animals abstractly.  Your design appears to be on the right track.

My first shot at an abstract set doesn't focus on the animal characteristics, but once you know why these look the way they do, it's easy to tell what the pieces are, regardless of size.  It still needs some work on the proportions, I think:

http://yppxqq.bay.livefilestore.com/y1pooAsvKzQq8P49eo4g2QNryCVTZHOOPYTffLJgHZE9p76qaunsN7wdNHpTxalnDbKiU42RitfezVYI3MtTt_pAJwnG9YevrlK/AbstractArimaaPieces.png?psid=1

These could be represented in 2D easily, and turned on a lathe (I think) pretty easily too.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by megajester on Feb 15th, 2011, 11:13am

on 02/15/11 at 10:28:48, ocmiente wrote:
I like the idea of an abstract set very much.  I still haven't found a good way to represent the animals abstractly.  Your design appears to be on the right track.

My first shot at an abstract set doesn't focus on the animal characteristics, but once you know why these look the way they do, it's easy to tell what the pieces are, regardless of size.  It still needs some work on the proportions, I think:

http://yppxqq.bay.livefilestore.com/y1pooAsvKzQq8P49eo4g2QNryCVTZHOOPYTffLJgHZE9p76qaunsN7wdNHpTxalnDbKiU42RitfezVYI3MtTt_pAJwnG9YevrlK/AbstractArimaaPieces.png?psid=1

These could be represented in 2D easily, and turned on a lathe (I think) pretty easily too.

They do look nice!

So what is the logic behind their shapes?
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by ocmiente on Feb 15th, 2011, 11:40am

on 02/15/11 at 11:13:02, megajester wrote:
So what is the logic behind their shapes?


It's based on various rotations of English letters.  The biggest piece is a rotated 'E'.  The second largest is an 'M' turned sideways and rotated.  The third is an 'H', kind of, more or less using the negative space, The fourth is a 'd' tilted at an angle, rotated, and again taking the negative space.  The fifth is a 'c' from the top down, with the middle filled in, and the last is a rotated 'R'.

So, this probably won't make as much sense if you read and write in a language other than English.  You could easily come up with different set designs this way in Chinese, or Russian, etc.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Fritzlein on Feb 15th, 2011, 11:48am

on 02/14/11 at 17:52:08, dree12 wrote:
If one were to make an abstract set, wouldn't it be efficient to use cylinders?

Yes, for an abstract set you need only variations in size.  My wife was looking at assembling a set from spheres or doorknobs of various size, and I would happily have played with such a set, but the components from craft stores or hardware stores turned out not to be super-cheap after all.  Cylinders is a better (i.e. cheaper) idea, because if you can find dowels of appropriate radii, all you have to do is cut them to length.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by megajester on Feb 15th, 2011, 11:56am

on 02/15/11 at 11:40:59, ocmiente wrote:
It's based on various rotations of English letters.  The biggest piece is a rotated 'E'.  The second largest is an 'M' turned sideways and rotated.  The third is an 'H', kind of, more or less using the negative space, The fourth is a 'd' tilted at an angle, rotated, and again taking the negative space.  The fifth is a 'c' from the top down, with the middle filled in, and the last is a rotated 'R'.


Oh wow I'd never have guessed that! Nice job.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by DarkAngelCryo on Feb 16th, 2011, 9:43pm
I like it.

Abstract strategy games is getting to be an expensive hobby
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by omar on Feb 17th, 2011, 10:37am

on 02/15/11 at 11:48:14, Fritzlein wrote:
My wife was looking at assembling a set from spheres or doorknobs of various size, and I would happily have played with such a set, but the components from craft stores or hardware stores turned out not to be super-cheap after all.


My cousin had suggested marbles of different sized glued to a flat base. Marbles are inexpensive, but finding the right sizes in two colors could be a little difficult.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by megajester on Feb 17th, 2011, 10:49am
Part of the reason I added a board diagram (albeit a crude one) was that you need to be able to scan the board and tell which piece is which without even thinking.

Using the same shape for each piece, such as cylinders or spheres, means you have to rely on size alone to tell them apart, and to be able to "scan the board" as I've just said you'd need quite a large difference in piece sizes. Otherwise you'd get a headache looking at a phalanx of dogs, cats and rabbits, or trying to remember whether that lone piece up there in the corner is a dog or a horse. Even with the Z-Man set which uses animal heads, you can't help them all looking somewhat alike from behind, so there too relative size is an important factor.

So, among other things, I tried to aim for a design where all the pieces were so radically different from each other you could never get them mixed up. I hope I will have achieved this after I shorten the camel a bit and round off the cat's ears.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by ocmiente on Feb 17th, 2011, 11:22am
You might consider making your 2D pieces 3D, as someone did with this chess set (http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2009/08/plywood-chess-set.html).
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by thief2000 on Feb 21st, 2011, 6:10pm
:D Well i read all your post, im working in 2 ideas, one serious is change the pieces by numbers in wood or dices, and the second and more funny is a set not abstract but more funny / evil. Tomorrow i show you some pics of them
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Eltripas on Feb 21st, 2011, 7:59pm
I really like the idea of pyramids. I made some models (I know they suck is the first time I do something like that):

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i198/eltripas/Arimaa.png

Original idea: Omar Syed.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Hippo on Feb 22nd, 2011, 5:20am

on 02/15/11 at 10:28:48, ocmiente wrote:
I like the idea of an abstract set very much.  I still haven't found a good way to represent the animals abstractly.  Your design appears to be on the right track.

My first shot at an abstract set doesn't focus on the animal characteristics, but once you know why these look the way they do, it's easy to tell what the pieces are, regardless of size.  It still needs some work on the proportions, I think:

http://yppxqq.bay.livefilestore.com/y1pooAsvKzQq8P49eo4g2QNryCVTZHOOPYTffLJgHZE9p76qaunsN7wdNHpTxalnDbKiU42RitfezVYI3MtTt_pAJwnG9YevrlK/AbstractArimaaPieces.png?psid=1

These could be represented in 2D easily, and turned on a lathe (I think) pretty easily too.


They look great ... I would like standing M for camel, H for horse, and standing A for cat more with standing d for dog. In all cases standing letters should be bound by enclosing triangle (say 4 times higher than letter) rather than box.

Hmm, I am still not sure with cat. What about t?

Actually we could use D and C as well, just rotate in the "middle". I am not sure everybody would find C and D there, but it could look well.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by UruramTururam on Feb 22nd, 2011, 5:55am
A nice and very abstract set spotted on BGG:
http://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic536351_md.jpg

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/536351/arimaa?size=original
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by thief2000 on Feb 23rd, 2011, 11:55am
Ill show some of my concept, working now in dimensions and the other pieces.... evil look

http://i367.photobucket.com/albums/oo111/thief2000/Cat.jpg

http://i367.photobucket.com/albums/oo111/thief2000/Rabbit.jpg
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Fritzlein on Feb 23rd, 2011, 12:32pm
Heh, cute cat and rabbit.  I would guess, though, that in a fight between the two, the rabbit is going to come out on top.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Fritzlein on Feb 23rd, 2011, 12:40pm

on 02/21/11 at 19:59:33, Eltripas wrote:
I really like the idea of pyramids

It seems to me that these pyramidal pieces are plenty easy to tell apart, despite being abstract.  Although (so I have been told) if they have steps they should be called ziggurats.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Eltripas on Feb 23rd, 2011, 5:43pm

on 02/23/11 at 12:40:47, Fritzlein wrote:
It seems to me that these pyramidal pieces are plenty easy to tell apart, despite being abstract.  Although (so I have been told) if they have steps they should be called ziggurats.


According to wikipedia these pyramids are called "Step pyramids", the Ziggurats are slightly different structures.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by leo on Feb 26th, 2011, 4:44am
Haha, I like the variety that keeps popping out of the imaginative minds :D
There seems to be a recurrent problem with dog-cat size contrast though.

While we're at it, how about designing an Arimaa font (pieces, arrows, etc) for writing notations in the chatroom and elsewhere?
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_symbols_in_Unicode
A few weeks ago aaaa suggested in the chatroom that we could use more abstract piece designs for use in compact diagrams, and it seems to me unicode characters would be best.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by megajester on Nov 15th, 2011, 5:43am

on 02/26/11 at 04:44:10, leo wrote:
Haha, I like the variety that keeps popping out of the imaginative minds :D
There seems to be a recurrent problem with dog-cat size contrast though.

While we're at it, how about designing an Arimaa font (pieces, arrows, etc) for writing notations in the chatroom and elsewhere?
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_symbols_in_Unicode
A few weeks ago aaaa suggested in the chatroom that we could use more abstract piece designs for use in compact diagrams, and it seems to me unicode characters would be best.

How's this for a concept?
http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad104/istanbulluingiliz/arimaasymbolsv2.jpg
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by rbarreira on Nov 15th, 2011, 7:56am

on 11/15/11 at 05:43:08, megajester wrote:
How's this for a concept?


The elephant, cat and rabbit are great! I'm not sure I understand the other ones though :) (in fact I was confused by the horse, thinking it was the dog at first).
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by megajester on Nov 15th, 2011, 8:15am
I suppose the horse could be solved by just making it a bit more "horsey" like a chess knight. The camel is supposed to be a bactrian camel's double hump, and the dog is supposed to be howling. I'm just having trouble coming up with distinctive, abstract, yet logical symbols.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Eggman on Nov 15th, 2011, 5:35pm
Here's my stab...for my own purposes, I was trying for something that could scale very small (probably need more separation in the rabbit ears for that, though).

http://i42.tinypic.com/28iqezk.png
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Fritzlein on Nov 15th, 2011, 5:58pm
I like them!  Especially the sheep and the satan...  ;)

Seriously, for small-scale portrayal we need much caricature and little detail, as all of these designs are achieving.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by aaaa on Nov 15th, 2011, 5:59pm

on 11/15/11 at 17:58:24, Fritzlein wrote:
I like them!  Especially the sheep and the satan...  ;)

No opinion about the bomb?
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by ocmiente on Nov 15th, 2011, 11:58pm
Princess Leia?
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Eggman on Nov 24th, 2011, 1:20pm
Alright wise-guys. Here's another try along with an alternate set featuring a Harry Potter camel and a Rabbit of Caerbannog.

http://i39.tinypic.com/dgpizb.png
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Hippo on Nov 24th, 2011, 3:19pm
When I was thinking with paper and pencil during my last postal, I was using ABDEFG abdefg to denote the Gold/Silver pieces. (Actually I have not used Gg as the camels were already captured). Actually it was much easier for me to think in alphabet rather than translating from letters to animals and to their relative power ...
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by leo on Dec 9th, 2011, 4:12am
Thinking about mixing Megajester's "font" with Eggman's glowing eyes...

Ha, I don't think I ever mentioned it except on the chatroom but here's my very old take at abstraction, it's from 2002:

http://img836.imageshack.us/img836/1769/arimaa.jpg
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by minderbinder on Apr 26th, 2012, 3:50am

on 12/09/11 at 04:12:27, leo wrote:
Thinking about mixing Megajester's "font" with Eggman's glowing eyes...

Ha, I don't think I ever mentioned it except on the chatroom but here's my very old take at abstraction, it's from 2002:

http://img836.imageshack.us/img836/1769/arimaa.jpg


I like it! Maybe it's just my preference for simple and abstract over thematic, but there's a certain elegant simplicity about it. In particular I've never felt that a game like Arimaa needed a theme (with apologies to the BGG people, I feel that the sumo-theme is a bit ridiculous... as far as I'm concerned, the theme of Arimaa is "this is a fascinating and deep abstract strategy game"). I might try to make my own abstract set based on this idea - with flat circular pieces (I've never been good at craft, so I'm gonna stick with simple and easy)
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Katsunami on Apr 26th, 2012, 9:39am
It can even be said that such an abstract appearance of the game could actually add to it's mystique. Look at Go: it looks so very simple, but it's so very difficult.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by omar on Apr 28th, 2012, 1:22pm
That's pretty cool Leo. I also considered using shapes, but I thought the animals would be more appealing to kids. With shapes I used a triangle for the weakest piece. This also helped to emphasis that it could only move forward left and right and show which side they are moving towards. The size of the triangle was smaller than any other shape. The next stronger piece was a square, slightly larger than the triangle, then a slightly larger pentagon and so on with the strongest piece being a big circle. I think I also considered some other shape variations also, I don't remember the details right now.

The sumo theme was actually added recently; maybe about a year ago. The animal theme helped to make it easier to see the strength hierarchy. In fact even using just words and not figures it is sufficient. You wouldn't know that a triangle is weaker than a square without seeing the figure. The sumo theme helps to remove the abstraction from the rules and makes them more intuitive and easier to visualize; and even makes it more believable. It was also done in a way that kept is backwards compatible with the original animal theme. With the sumo theme we can still talk about elephants taking camels hostage. Everything that we've said and done using the animal theme is not negated by adding the sumo layer. Also the sumo theme was added after I had played hundreds of games and thought that Arimaa did feel a lot like wrestling. Chess to me feels a lot like a sword fight and the medieval army theme fits it just right.

It's true that abstract games don't really need a theme, but if the theme helps to make the rules more intuitive then why not use it.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Laci on May 13th, 2013, 4:13pm
I myself really like the idea of 'more appealing to kids'. I was teaching my (currently 6 years old) sister playing chess and checkers, but usually although I think she was eager to learn them in the beginning she didn't like it during the process.
When it came to Arimaa though, I printed the animal pieces of Marcus Morgan in order to make the game more exciting, and I believe it did make a change. It's true Arimaa's rules are also easier than of chess, and she is also older than the time I was teaching her chess so there are other reasons for making a better progress, but nonetheless I think by the eagerness of her wanting to play games that the idea of animals pushing and pulling each other into traps is indeed interesting to kids.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by omar on May 17th, 2013, 8:31am
Wow, that's great. Thanks for sharing that with us.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by mattj256 on May 20th, 2013, 1:34am

on 05/13/13 at 16:13:59, Laci wrote:
the idea of animals pushing and pulling each other into traps is indeed interesting to kids.

I think that in written materials (books and online) there is room for a more abstract representation of the pieces.  And I could imagine adults enjoying a physical abstract set, but I agree with Laci that a real-animal physical set is best for kids.

One issue with the real-animal pieces is that in written materials they don't shrink well.  The Wikipedia page on Chess has diagrams that are much smaller than ours, and they can do that because the chess pieces are really icons.
http://i.imgur.com/5dKyRN3.pnghttp://i.imgur.com/1IcsNjv.png
These are some images I found for the board game Stratego.  As you can see, one representation is with all pieces except for bombs represented as numbers.  The actual playing pieces have both a picture and a small number.  Either of these could be done for written Arimaa material.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/05/Stratego.png/250px-Stratego.png

http://www.samstoybox.com/toypics/StrategoPieces.jpg
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by odin73 on May 20th, 2013, 4:41am
A colleague (he introduced me into Arimaa) produced a home-made set of small spheres of different size and number per piece. That set is very playable, IŽll try to take and post a photo in the next time.

A big big plus for the animal theme has a simple reason: How to talk about a game when the pieces consist of abstract symbols? How would you talk about rabbit pulling, elephant-horse attack, camel hostage, horse for dog trade? I donŽt think that "small triangle", "big bright square" vs. "medium dark square" etc. would be very funny for a discussion about a position. ???
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Marty on May 20th, 2013, 5:05pm

on 05/20/13 at 01:34:50, mattj256 wrote:
I think that in written materials (books and online) there is room for a more abstract representation of the pieces.  And I could imagine adults enjoying a physical abstract set, but I agree with Laci that a real-animal physical set is best for kids.

One issue with the real-animal pieces is that in written materials they don't shrink well.  The Wikipedia page on Chess has diagrams that are much smaller than ours, and they can do that because the chess pieces are really icons.

i strongly agree that more abstract pieces are desirable. in my opinion they would be preferable even for online play. consider pieces about as far from real life animals as chess pieces are from their real life counterparts.

unfortunately i can't draw myself, but from searching for "[animal] symbol" image (resized and reupped):

http://i.imgur.com/uYvOVqa.pnghttp://i.imgur.com/YcUEPig.png

both elephant and dog are extremely simplistic, drawn with only few basic shapes, yet they are easily recognizable and i dare say their clean shapes are also aesthetically pleasing

it would be possible to draw only heads in the same fashion if it served the purpose better. in that case one could decide between profile and full face view, the latter with an advantage of being symmetric, thus removing the left/right orientation of animals at the board
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Fritzlein on May 20th, 2013, 5:55pm

on 05/20/13 at 17:05:09, Marty wrote:
http://i.imgur.com/uYvOVqa.pnghttp://i.imgur.com/YcUEPig.png

both elephant and dog are extremely simplistic, drawn with only few basic shapes, yet they are easily recognizable and i dare say their clean shapes are also aesthetically pleasing

Yes, this is the kind of cartoony pieces I was looking for when I was writing Beginning Arimaa.  They are easily recognizable even when scaled down, and don't depend on fine detail, which is just what one needs for book diagrams.  Ultimately, one would like to be able to annotate games with figurine notation instead of with letters, like international chess books do.  For example, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_symbols_in_Unicode

If you tried to shrink the current Arimaa pieces enough to put them in-line with text, they would be illegible.  Alas, for now we are stuck with letter-number notation.  Hopefully when the next Arimaa book comes out, we can make this leap forward.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by odin73 on May 21st, 2013, 3:59pm
This is the set a colleague made to play Arimaa. It consists simply of small parts available in a hobby shop.
I like the set since the relative strength of the pieces can be seen very easily by a beginner:

http://25.media.tumblr.com/81e00658fd452d2ae654456b80b26693/tumblr_mn61vzb8c01ss6vvao1_1280.jpg
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by browni3141 on May 21st, 2013, 5:31pm
A set using the five Platonic solids and spheres would be cool. The hierarchy from weakest to strongest would be sphere<tetrahedron<hexahedron<octahedron<dodecahedron<icosahedron.

A flat set (probably better for online) could use
circle<triangle<square<pentagon<hexagon<heptagon

Some people might like plain numbers, but that's not very interesting. Whatever is used the pieces should still be referred to by their animal names.

It would be cool to have different sets available for online use. In fact maybe I'll experiment with swapping out the images (although I do like the current set quite a lot)
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by mattj256 on May 22nd, 2013, 2:35am

on 05/21/13 at 17:31:17, browni3141 wrote:
A set using the five Platonic solids and spheres would be cool.

A flat set (probably better for online) could use
circle<triangle<square<pentagon<hexagon<heptagon
If you're going to do this I think it's important to bring in color as well.  Nobody is going to glance at a 7-sided figure and know immediately that it has more sides than a six-sided figure.  Also I think an Arimaa rabbit should be visually distinct, like a silhouette of a rabbit, and then have everything else follow your preferred abstract pattern.


on 05/20/13 at 17:55:30, Fritzlein wrote:
[Those pieces] are easily recognizable even when scaled down, and don't depend on fine detail, which is just what one needs for book diagrams.
 I wish I had icons like that for my Wikipedia work.


on 05/20/13 at 17:05:09, Marty wrote:
i strongly agree that more abstract pieces are desirable.
For what it's worth, I want to play my online games with animals.  (But they could be icons of animals.)  It would certainly be nice if the Arimaa client gave you the option of which pieces graphics you wanted to use!
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Marty on May 22nd, 2013, 5:44am

on 05/22/13 at 02:35:54, mattj256 wrote:
For what it's worth, I want to play my online games with animals.  (But they could be icons of animals.)  It would certainly be nice if the Arimaa client gave you the option of which pieces graphics you wanted to use!

this is not the rightest thread (named "Abstract", while i mean "simple" or "iconic"/"cartoony" as you/Fritzlein put it), but i think that i showed my idea clearly with the examples posted.

i have a nice chess analogy to ilustrate my point. the current arimaa pieces are pretty detailed, like old chess sets, say Lewis chessmen (almost). browni's idea, odin's image or other images posted earlier are indeed like modern, abstract chess sets. and just as abstract chess sets are not really popular for ordinary play, i am not a fan of such proposals.

what i am looking for is Staunton-like arimaa set. with pieces simple, clear and at the same time enough characteristic, so that you can recognize any single one at a glance. wikipedia chess diagrams are another good example of the right level of abstraction.

at first i considered the idea silly, but responses so far encouraged me to go with it - i offer $5 for an arimaa set design, drawn according to my proposal in this thread

megajester's design (http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad104/istanbulluingiliz/abstractarimaapiecesymbols20110212.jpg) in this thread's OP and The Novice Oof's set (http://thenoviceoof.com/blog/projects/arimaa-icon-set/#pieces) are not far from my requirements, but i still believe something between them would be even better
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by browni3141 on May 22nd, 2013, 9:40am

on 05/22/13 at 02:35:54, mattj256 wrote:
If you're going to do this I think it's important to bring in color as well.  Nobody is going to glance at a 7-sided figure and know immediately that it has more sides than a six-sided figure.  Also I think an Arimaa rabbit should be visually distinct, like a silhouette of a rabbit, and then have everything else follow your preferred abstract pattern.

Identifying an n-sided figure is pretty easy for a small n. I think you could definitely tell at a glance whether a figure had 3-7 sides (or none). Go ahead and test yourself. All the polygons would be regular and oriented so that the bottom side is flat. It is very easy to distinguish a hexagon from a heptagon this way because with a hexagon the top side will also be flat, but not with a heptagon.

Making the rabbit look like a rabbit kind of defeats the purpose of this type of set, doesn't it? I don't see what is wrong with a circle. A circle is plenty different from the other shapes because it has no sides ;)

I think a set like this or the Platonic solid set might appeal to people that have a problem with the animal theme and want more abstraction.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by mattj256 on May 22nd, 2013, 11:25pm

on 05/22/13 at 09:40:50, browni3141 wrote:
I think you could definitely tell at a glance whether a figure had 3-7 sides (or none). Go ahead and test yourself.


http://i.imgur.com/H9HQB3X.png

http://i.imgur.com/esvw2Ao.png

http://i.imgur.com/f8qOkeq.png

(Heights of the outer image file: 59/30/22 pixels)

The heptagon starts to look like a circle but you're right that the other ones remain visually distinct.  
(I know you said the bottom side should be flat but I was lazy and pulled this off the internet.)
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by browni3141 on May 23rd, 2013, 12:28am

on 05/22/13 at 23:25:58, mattj256 wrote:
http://i.imgur.com/H9HQB3X.png

http://i.imgur.com/esvw2Ao.png

http://i.imgur.com/f8qOkeq.png

(Heights of the outer image file: 59/30/22 pixels)

The heptagon starts to look like a circle but you're right that the other ones remain visually distinct.  
(I know you said the bottom side should be flat but I was lazy and pulled this off the internet.)

I admit it might get difficult with the smaller ones. I didn't think about that.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by ocmiente on May 23rd, 2013, 1:52pm
Segoe UI Symbol font plus some font size changes, text effects, and reversing using a paint program.

http://i.tinyuploads.com/e8kEwg.png

Unicode values:
1F407, 1F408, 1F415, 1F40E, 1F42B and 1F418.

However, the Segoe UI Symbol may require a license from Microsoft to use in an actual product, like a game client.  I think there may be free font alternatives (http://shapecatcher.com/unicode/block/Miscellaneous_Symbols_And_Pictographs.html).  I'm not sure.  
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by aaaa on May 26th, 2013, 7:22pm
Just to make sure everybody is aware of this, we currently do have black-and-white icons of the Arimaa pieces:
http://arimaa.com/arimaa/graphics/bw/svg/
http://arimaa.com/arimaa/graphics/bw/png/

And yes, all these hidden yet relevant pages are underscoring how messy this website has become. Something as simple as a site map could mitigate this.
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by Fritzlein on May 27th, 2013, 11:07am

on 05/26/13 at 19:22:40, aaaa wrote:
Just to make sure everybody is aware of this, we currently do have black-and-white icons of the Arimaa pieces:

Indeed, but omar's icons are not usable in figurine notation because they are too similar at a small scale.  In particular the cat and dog would be nearly indistinguishable.

Ocmiente's UI symbols are where I would start for my next book, although the sizes would have to be equalized for in-line text.  Perhaps that would merely be using the same font size for all animals rather than different font sizes as he did?  For the board diagrams, however, the different sizes could be preferable.  
Title: Re: Abstract set concept
Post by jhoravi on May 27th, 2013, 3:55pm

on 02/22/11 at 05:55:37, UruramTururam wrote:
A nice and very abstract set spotted on BGG:
http://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic536351_md.jpg

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/536351/arimaa?size=original

I was also thinking about Planets as replacement for animals when I was introduced about the game. It's so silly for two Super Grand Masters pushing rabbits, cats and dogs LOL!  Planetary gravity fits the concept of push and pull with trap squares be renamed as Black-Hole.


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