| An introduction to Hexic grid systems |
The Hexic Grid Systems allow you to control the Hexic board so that you can make star flowers and black pearls while minimizing combos. Most of all they allow you to set up a good bomb defense. In this guide we have combined our methods and techniques with images and videos to illustrate how to do star stacking, star walking, set up the grid system, make black pearls, how to restore the grid system after making a black pearl and finally how to make a pooh-bah.
The main focus to this guide is to provide grid information for new Hexic players.
NOTE: The following information will be illustrated using the 4x4 grid but the general idea can also be applied to the Masters Grid.
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| Techniques used to build the grid systems |
Stacking silver stars
First you need an effective method to make silver star. I use a method I refer to as "star stacking". The idea is to make a starflower anywhere other than the bottom of the board, the higher up the better. Then use that first silver star to help you make your next silver star within the same column. It doesn't need to be exactly above the first silver star as long as it's in the same column. Keeping silver stars lined up vertically will increase your chances of making another silver star. If you make a mistake your silver star will land on top of a silver star and your stack will still remain. As you make more silver stars, always make them at the top of the stack, and continue to do so even when you have completed the grid. The top of the board is the best location to make star flowers without disturbing the grid system.
How to move silver stars in place
Once you have a stack of star flowers it's time to move them to form the grid system. There are two methods mentioned in the following, Star Flower Moves 1 & 2 and Star walking. This seems a little tricky but with practice it becomes very easy. I've tried to find the best way to do this for each grid system. Notice how in each video I use stacks of silver stars to rotate pieces into the proper position on the grid. These videos show techniques that can be used over and over to move silver stars in place. With each position on the grid you fill, it becomes a little easier to make star flowers, which makes it easier to create another stack, which provides the extra silver stars you need to fill out the grid and start scoring or making black pearls. The Star Flower Move 1 is the easiest and probably the best way for the 4x4 Grid, I highly recommend it. The video starts with the star stacking technique.
Starwalking
The first thing to notice when you have a star pair is that either star can work as the ‘center' of rotation. When you move the selector over them, you'll see that you have several selection options for the pair of stars and the pieces that surround them. Imagine that the two stars are stacked one on top of the other. If you grab the top star as the center of a seven-piece cluster, you can turn it so that the bottom piece moves upward and three moves later is now the top star. If you then select it as the center, you can do the same thing again—three moves later each star has moved up two spaces in the column.
The above scenario assumes, however, that while making these moves you did not move a normal tile into a combo. If you did make a combo, the stars might be in different positions, depending on how you made the combo, and might not even still be touching. For beginning players, avoiding unwanted combos is one of the hardest things about Hexic. You have no one to blame but yourself, though! For any move you want to make, you have all the information you need to predict what is going to happen. It just takes some time and practice to see the future clearly. Some beginners might say that Hexic is a luck game, but the ONLY time luck is a factor is after you've made a combo and new pieces fall onto the board; that is the only time you aren't in complete control of what happens! With a pair of stars, you could theoretically move around the board indefinitely, without making a single combo, if you were careful enough. Being careful and patient is crucial to success in Hexic.
Once you have two star pairs, making more silver stars gets MUCH easier, because you can walk your star pairs around, picking up whatever colored pieces you want, and using the star pairs to move those pieces to where you're making your next flower.
The far right wall
I know a lot of guys are putting 4 black pearls on the far right wall. I don't recommend having more than two black pearls in a game if your going for scoring, because you want to eliminate every game ending possibility. Having that many black pearls is asking for an accident to happen. Accidental Big Cheese anyone? So what I recommend is very simple: just use star flowers instead. This works great and is much safer. If you make a mistake, all you worry about is a bomb landing instead of an accidental Big Cheese ending your game.
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