Is there a way to offset a piece placed within a rectangular grid?

Module Design
#1

Hi Vassal Jedi Masters,

I’m a VASSAL beginner who is already in love with this tool. Why didn’t I discover it years ago? Gah!

Technical question: In my game, my main board is a Rectangular Grid. Its a conquest game, so players battle to control key rectangles. I’ve noticed that when I put game pieces on the board, the pieces are automatically placed in the center of their respective rectangle. That’s great for most of my pieces.

But I also have a small Control Marker piece to indicate which player controls which rectangle. When I drop the Control Marker onto a grid rectangle, its so much smaller than the other units, and looks funny.

Is there a way to specify that this Control Marker piece should always be placed to the upper left or lower right of a rectangle (not placed in the center by default) ?

Or - going for broke here - can someone advise on a better way to indicate which player controls a rectangle? Like, each player could have a signature color (Red/Blue/Green/Orange/etc.) When a player captures a rectangle, could they click on that rectangle and toggle it to a hue that matches their color? I’m open to any advice.

Thank you!

#2

You could design your Control Marker piece image so that the actual piece occupies the upper left corner of an otherwise transparent image matching the dimensions of your grid rectangles.

#3

@JoelCFC25

Ahhhhhhhhh… You are wise, sensei. I will try immediately…

#4

Note that you will also need the Non-rectangular trait if you don’t want the transparent portion of the Control Marker piece to be clickable (which would interfere with manipulating any pieces that fall below it). Also/instead, you can use Game Piece Layers to ensure the Marker is always below other pieces.