Cascadia — Digital Board Game

A Python/Tkinter digital recreation of Cascadia

Game Overview

In Cascadia, players compete to build the most harmonious Pacific Northwest ecosystem by drafting hexagonal habitat tiles and placing wildlife tokens in scoring patterns.

Wildlife: Bear 🐻 · Elk 🦌 · Salmon 🐟 · Hawk 🦅 · Fox 🦊
Habitats: Mountain ⛰️ · Forest 🌲 · Prairie 🌾 · Wetland 🌿 · River 💧
Players: 1–4 · Turns per player: 20

🗂️ Project Structure

cascadia/
├── main.py                    # Entry point
├── requirements.txt           # Python dependencies
├── environment.yml            # Conda environment
├── saves/                     # Auto-created: SQLite database
│   └── cascadia.db
└── cascadia/
    ├── __init__.py
    ├── game/
    │   ├── __init__.py
    │   ├── models.py          # Data models (tiles, tokens, environments)
    │   ├── tiles.py           # Full 85-tile deck factory
    │   ├── engine.py          # Game engine (turns, drafting, overpopulation)
    │   └── scoring.py         # All wildlife scoring algorithms (A/B/C/D)
    ├── gui/
    │   ├── __init__.py
    │   └── app.py             # Tkinter GUI application
    ├── storage/
    │   ├── __init__.py
    │   └── database.py        # SQLite persistence (records, saves, leaderboard)
    └── utils/
        ├── __init__.py
        └── helpers.py         # Hex math, colours, formatting

🚀 How to Start

Option A — Default Python

# 1. Default Python
python main.py

Option B — Virtual Environment (pip)

# 1. Clone / download the project folder
cd cascadia

# 2. Create a virtual environment
python -m venv venv

# 3. Activate it
#    Windows:
venv\Scripts\activate
#    macOS/Linux:
source venv/bin/activate

# 4. Install dependencies
pip install -r requirements.txt

# 5. Run the game
python main.py

Option C — Conda Environment

# 1. Create the environment
conda env create -f environment.yml

# 2. Activate it
conda activate cascadia

# 3. Run the game
python main.py

📋 How to Play

Setup

1. Launch the game and click New Game
2. Choose 1–4 players and enter names
3. Each player receives a starter hex tile

Turn Structure

Each turn:

1. Draft: Choose one of 4 tile+token pairs from the draft pool
2. Place Tile: Click a highlighted hex in your environment to place it
3. Place Token: Click a highlighted hex to place the wildlife token (or skip)

Nature Tokens

• Earned by placing the matching wildlife on a Keystone tile (marked ★)
• Spend them to: take any tile+token freely, OR wipe/replace draft tokens
• Worth 1 point each at game end

Overpopulation

• If all 4 draft tokens are the same → auto-wipe and replace
• If 3 are the same → you choose whether to wipe them

Scoring (End of Game)

Category	Points
Wildlife tokens	Per scoring card variant (A/B/C/D)
Habitat corridors	1pt per tile in your largest contiguous group per habitat
Corridor majority	Bonus pts for having the largest corridor of each type
Nature Tokens	1pt each (unused)

Winning

Highest total score wins. Ties broken by most remaining Nature Tokens.

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Data Saving

All data is stored in saves/cascadia.db (SQLite, auto-created):

Table	Purpose
game_records	Completed game results (date, winner, duration)
player_scores	Per-player score breakdown per game
saved_games	In-progress save states (JSON blob)

Access history and leaderboards from the History & Stats button.

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Key Logic

Hex Grid

Uses axial coordinates (q, r) for an infinite flat-top hex grid.

• hex_to_pixel / pixel_to_hex — bidirectional coordinate conversion
• BFS-based contiguous group detection for habitats and wildlife

Wildlife Scoring

Each of the 5 wildlife types has 4 variants (A/B/C/D), each with distinct scoring:

• Bears: Groups of specific sizes (pairs, triples, etc.)
• Elk: Straight lines or contiguous groups
• Salmon: "Runs" (chains where each touches ≤ 2 others)
• Hawks: Isolation + line-of-sight scoring
• Foxes: Adjacency diversity scoring

Overpopulation

Checked at the start of every turn:

• 4 same tokens → automatic wipe + redraw
• 3 same tokens → active player decides

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🛠️ Troubleshooting

Problem	Solution
No module named 'tkinter'	sudo apt install python3-tk (Linux) or reinstall Python with Tk support
Black/blank canvas	Resize the window to trigger a redraw
Game won't start	Ensure Python 3.9+ is installed: python --version

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• This project is for educational purposes only.