Are you suggesting using a stereographic projection? That seems like a bad idea. You wouldn’t want your projection to depend on the coordinate system. Am I missing a reason why you wouldn’t use proper, nonsingular spherical coordinates?
I have no game dev experience but I have a math and software background. I’m just curious about what “it gets weird at the poles” means. If I wanted to (abstractly) generate tiny square chunks of a large sphere, I would generate them as (proper) squares and then pass them through an explicit diffeomorphism to the associated region of the sphere, relying on the relative smallness to guarantee that the diffeomorphism doesn’t change things too much. From a game dev perspective, what approach do you take that causes issues at the poles?
Assuming you mean a boss at the end of act 2 / beginning of act 3, Balthazar
I got pushed off the ledge a few times. What worked for me was, while the first character was stuck in dialogue, the rest of my party would sneak in and position advantageously before starting the fight mid-dialogue on my own terms. It was indeed bullshit, but not nearly as bullshit as me reloading for 20 mins convincing a boss to kill themselves, so I think the game and I can call it even.
I also completed a few tough early fights with 2 mage hands and a cliff, so really, I’m pro-shoving all the way.