Simplify Polygon - How to determine the best Max Allowed Offset?

[JesseHopkins]

Hello,

I have a few geographies that I am generalizing using the Simplify Polygon method, and I would like to know if you all have any suggestions on how to determine the best Maximum Allowed Offset for a feature class that will be used within a particular scale range. 
For example, I have a layer showing the county boundaries of the United States.  It will only be used from the scale range of 10,000,000 to 2,000,000.  With this, what would be the best Maximum Allowed Offset, or how would one go about finding this?  Thanks!

[RobertBorchert · Accepted solution]

There is no answer.  You just need to work with trial and error.  You need to determine how much distortion you are happy with from the original polygon.

Perhaps you could have two copies of the polygon up at one time.  (from different sources) generalize one of them starting with small numbers.  if the amount of distortion is acceptable ctrl-z and try with a larger number.

A lot of it has to do with how complex your polygon layer is. 

Hello,

I have a few geographies that I am generalizing using the Simplify Polygon method, and I would like to know if you all have any suggestions on how to determine the best Maximum Allowed Offset for a feature class that will be used within a particular scale range. 
For example, I have a layer showing the county boundaries of the United States.  It will only be used from the scale range of 10,000,000 to 2,000,000.  With this, what would be the best Maximum Allowed Offset, or how would one go about finding this?  Thanks!

[JesseHopkins]

Yeah I was thinking that was the case...just hoping it wasn't.  Thanks for your quick response!