Weapon Arc Diagram

Blammo · Post by **Blammo** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 12:15 am

I came up with this little diagram to help when playing Federation Commander and especially teaching new people the game.

I wanted to make is snazzier, but it gets the job done.

I hope you find it helpful.

EDIT: Decided to do a colorized version, reduce the margins and the over all size a little bit.

EDIT 2: Higher quality version with thicker lines and more beautification. Also limited colors to same hue. The image here is a JPG, but I have a TIF for those that want a higher quality version.

EDIT 3: More improvements based on feedback from forum.

EDIT 4: Final edit to make it 'pop' and line all the arc diagrams up with each other. Might undo some of the drop shadows, but want to see what people think first.

Wild Card · Post by **Wild Card** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 12:18 am

Be thankful you don't have to fit the Klingon phaser arcs on there too...

Mike · Post by **Mike** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 12:34 am

Just curious. How is this diagram better than the published diagrams?

Blammo · Post by **Blammo** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 1:08 am

Mike wrote:Just curious. How is this diagram better than the published diagrams?

The published ones are in the book and since not everyone has the book I created this card. This way I can just hand the card out and they can learn to understand the arcs by reference without always having to see the book. Also, this puts all the arcs on one sheet so you don't have to look in one place for one thing and another place for something else. Finally, the RRB does not contain a diagram showing FA, RA, FX or RX arcs.

wedge_hammersteel · Post by **wedge_hammersteel** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 2:15 am

I like it

Blammo · Post by **Blammo** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 2:46 am

Update: Decided to do a colorized version, reduce the margins and the over all size a little bit.

Mike · Post by **Mike** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 1:11 pm

Okay, now I can see why. Nice job. The color is really nice, too. Color just always seems to add a lot more. I was mildly annoyed when they decided to only put those black and white diagrams in the Communiques.

On the diagrams I make for actual play, the ship diagram is on one half of the paper and the various weapons charts, hit and run chart, damage repair, etc. are on the other half. That includes a weapons arc diagram. After printing the sheet, fold it in half and the front becomes the side with the ship and the back becomes all the charts the player needs to use with that ship. I'm thinking seriously of starting to use your diagram instead of the other one.

wedge_hammersteel · Post by **wedge_hammersteel** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 3:15 pm

We need a high res image. When I print the one from this topic, it comes out a little fuzzy.

Maybe SVC will let Joel upload it to the website.

Blammo · Post by **Blammo** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 3:31 pm

I can work on producing a higher resolution. The DF and PT charts were created on the size of an 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper and 300 dpi, but was reduced to fit on the page size in the image and the dpi reduced to 100.

I will work on producing a higher quality version.

wedge_hammersteel · Post by **wedge_hammersteel** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 4:10 pm

What program did you use?

Blammo · Post by **Blammo** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 4:18 pm

Visio to create the diagrams and saved out as PDFs, then imported into Photshop to do the layout and beautification.

I am working on a 600 DPI version with fatter lines on the diagrams.

IKerensky · Post by **IKerensky** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 4:54 pm

Too many different colors too bright in a too small area, make me quite dizzy, but that is possibly because I am color blind.

Could be better if the inner core(hex) color and the outer color (circle) are variant of the same color and not different one.

Kang · Post by **Kang** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 5:18 pm

<from behind sunglasses> Nice! I like.

Blammo · Post by **Blammo** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 5:51 pm

Thank you for the feedback. I have updated the diagram again (slow day at work)

wedge_hammersteel · Post by **wedge_hammersteel** » Fri Apr 22, 2011 6:08 pm

Nice progression. On the plasma chart for FA, the two hexes on either side need to be half red.