[dwalend]

Originally Posted by ericthered

I think that's as extreme a view for making city hex status as one is going to get.

I've been basically looking at the density of the houses. I've been reading the great benefit for INF in cities as cover. Nothing offers hiding places quite like buildings, and the 360 degree cover of a building is much better than a forest. But I've still been longing for something that differentiates suburb from city. I'd certainly consider much of pheonix to be city hex even under such conditions though.

I stand by it. Given Ogre's background I don't think anything in Phoenix would provide cover or hinder movement. Keep in mind that defensive cover has to either hide position from sophisticated sensor suites, or protect from very close _overhead_ nuclear bursts. Phoenix doesn't have basements at all. Most buildings were built in the last 40 years - all stick frames, one and two stories, with tile roofs. Sitting in the pool won't help from above. Retail there is even softer. There are a few dozen large trees at the zoo and arboretum. Nothing is tall enough to fall down and block those wide avenues - no rubble. All the utilities are buried - GEV pilots don't even have to dodge telephone poles. For some of the reservation land I might even recommend the "hard desert" terrain from one of the Assault Packs. (Contemporary conventional weapons is a different story - a real nightmare. A sniper moving in South Mountain Park would be nearly unstoppable, and those garden walls would make a maze of hard cover.)

The other hard part is that not all suburb or even forest is created equal. Some housing is particularly flimsy being little more than a wooden frame with insulation and sheet-rock draped on, and some makes liberal use of brick, concrete, and basements. That's effected by history, culture, economics, and zoning.

I agree. It's worth looking at a place, then thinking about what it would be like in Ogre; with tactical nukes popping just overhead. Google Street View might be a good place to start, but you'd want to characterize the majority of a hex, not just the view from the streets.

Ogre town hexes have to be pretty tough, and quite dense. Towns hinder movement of everything except INF, but they do have surface streets. (They break down into rubble - enough to get stuck there - when the streets get blocked.) They provide cover from accurate nuclear overhead bursts, even to huge tanks, and remarkably good protection for INF. From that I suggest that the INF are actually under nuclear-hard cover - they're able to move through multiple concrete parking garages and buildings as they traverse the hex, and can operate from under cover. Towns I think are primarily concrete, 4-5 stories at a minimum - for the whole hex. I think that translates from 2X - side cover and places to duck for tanks - and 3X - concrete overhead much of the time for INF.

Forests vary too. Some forests are thick with underbrush strewn throughout them, while others can be freely run and seen through.

Forests provide cover for INF, but not for anything else. I'll suggest INF are able to move between places with good side-cover - big rocks or basements if not actual trees. The trees also provide a bit of soft cover from sensors, so the nukes might sometimes just be too far away, but it isn't top cover - 2X defense. Forest hexes hinder movement much the way town hexes do. They also break down into rubble, so vehicles are relying on surface streets that get blocked. That to me sounds like most suburbs.

I've started the initial layout, and It does look like a decent map location. Thanks for the pointers on notable locations. I still need to go back on several of the maps and mark interesting features. But I think this is the first time a military installation has been included.

Albuquerque and San Antonio might be other good choices, with much bigger bases. I'm not sure how interesting the rest of the map would be, didn't spend enough time there. (A lot of US military bases are far from major cities.)

The islands are most inconvenient size, I will note.

I wouldn't worry too much about that. Drop in a scenario rule that says there's a rock with a HWZ on it in a water hex. Or the little ones could be grouped into a swamp hex. Or take advantage of Massachusetts' habit of making or growing an island every few years - one big hex-shaped clear island in the harbor isn't unreasonable. So much of Boston is built on landfill. (The streets in Boston were either parallel or perpendicular to the water at some point.)