Vinnart Posted July 10, 2012 Author Share Posted July 10, 2012 Good to know --- but any chance of a Passenger/Floor/Buttoned info word in the UI ? I know it's "more in the UI", but it is/would be extremely helpful info to have available at a glance. Thanks Steve for the feedback. As you see I am not alone in this request. I am not going to critique this new section change in the new GUI further till I see, and use the product personally. I agree, and never thought the terrain would work in the GUI for the same reasons you said. In not seeing how the 6 boxes would be laid out I thought the terrain thing would be thrown in as a perhaps there would be space to fill if the bottom six boxes were left at the current size. My main hope was that a new line of text was being incorporated to fit on the bottom stating what floor on/passenger/and open status. Surely, that information being shown for practical reasons would reduce camera management when knowing that info is precarious from certain camera angles. I hope you find a way to incorporate it in the future. One more line of text will not make the GUI seem more cluttered, and knowing this without having to re-orientate the camera is a good thing. If I thought I was wrong in this I could not produce many camera angle screen shots that no one could tell this info for sure without having to move the camera. I still think the easiest place space management wise to incorporate this is by minimizing the experience level into the un-used modifier box which is currently waisted space similar to this here shown with a letter, but a number system would work too: The floor status ect… was in CMx1, and was useful. Again, as a customer/player I hope you see the reasoning for this request. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vinnart Posted July 10, 2012 Author Share Posted July 10, 2012 Here also, would be a good, and actually more logical place for this information text as shown with the portrait. Since the text is only pertinent to certain status such as floor/passenger/open it would only appear when necessary. Not sure if this text box could be made to appear only when necessary, or would need to be there permanent. Either way it is more useful to the player than the portrait itself. Text is already covering parts of the weapon silhouettes, but that can be improved by simply flipping the graphic to point right instead of left. In the way I am showing it it fits in nicely not to cover much. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vinnart Posted July 10, 2012 Author Share Posted July 10, 2012 Yes, I think the last illustration is best in solving the where to put it in regard to the available space? It looks right there. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Emrys Posted July 10, 2012 Share Posted July 10, 2012 Question: How can Charlie Company be in the 2nd. Battalion? Michael 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted July 10, 2012 Share Posted July 10, 2012 Not going to happen Guys, going at the UI piecemeal, hap-hazard "this can be crammed here if we do this, this and that" is the best way to wind up with a UI nobody is happy with. Changing the experience level to a modifier is absolutely a terrible idea (sorry, it is). Sticking the location of the unit in with a unit's inherent qualities is non-sensical (sorry, it is). Jamming the floor text in the same width as the portrait means squinting to see it and probably lots of abbreviations for things other than floor and/or different languages. So that's not a good idea either. So while suggestions are appreciated, it is best to leave this to us to do when we have time to do them properly. And yes, there is already a comprehensive UI overhaul planned which addresses these particular issues and MANY more over time. Most should be in by Version 3. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Canada Guy Posted July 10, 2012 Share Posted July 10, 2012 You could shorten the suppression meter to a single wide horizontal line and the saved space could then be used to include the passenger/4th Floor//Unbuttoned information line. The green dots for amount of ammo (Green/Yellow/Red) are very useful and this would be nice to have as would mouse-overs for the modifiers (I still do not know what they are for as they are not like the CMx1 days when a star meant one thing and a squared star meant another). I would also like to see mouse-overs for the weapons to show what type of ammo each uses. I sometimes grab the wrong ammo and then cannot give it back and it is useless and have to grab some more. Hopefully a soldier knows that he should grab x ammo and not y (unlike me ;-)) I think we realize that you will not get to this as soon as we like but the good news is that you are at least thinking about it. V3 will be here sooner than we expected and you seem to indicate that some items may even make it into v2.5 (if such a beast exists). Great. No better way to keep this hobby alive but through continuous improvements. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vinnart Posted July 10, 2012 Author Share Posted July 10, 2012 Not going to happen Guys, going at the UI piecemeal, hap-hazard "this can be crammed here if we do this, this and that" is the best way to wind up with a UI nobody is happy with. Changing the experience level to a modifier is absolutely a terrible idea (sorry, it is). Sticking the location of the unit in with a unit's inherent qualities is non-sensical (sorry, it is). Jamming the floor text in the same width as the portrait means squinting to see it and probably lots of abbreviations for things other than floor and/or different languages. So that's not a good idea either. So while suggestions are appreciated, it is best to leave this to us to do when we have time to do them properly. And yes, there is already a comprehensive UI overhaul planned which addresses these particular issues and MANY more over time. Most should be in by Version 3. Steve I disagree one would be squinting anymore to read text there under the portrait than reading any of the other text in the GUI. As far as info there it really is just three words, and not a major overhaul. The words fit there fine in that font size, which is the same current used. # Floor Passenger Open That is cool though. As long as you see the reasoning for a reasonable request such as having this info, which you have since you say you plan it in the future I am satisfied, and look forward to sensible incorporation in future builds. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
womble Posted July 10, 2012 Share Posted July 10, 2012 ...modifiers (I still do not know what they are for as they are not like the CMx1 days when a star meant one thing and a squared star meant another). You're probably overthinking it a bit. The numbers don't reflect anything you'll see directly, it's just "Higher positive numbers are better" and are in a range -2 to +2. You've got the Leadership top left; fitness (which only has 0 and negatives, I think) top right, Experience bottom left and morale status, with Motivation modifier bottom right. Beyond relative quality, the numbers don't have any meaning. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted July 10, 2012 Share Posted July 10, 2012 Trust me, there probably isn't a single UI request you guys have made that I am not aware of The difficulty is it is easy to justify including this or that bit of information, it's much harder to manage all those requests so they don't crush each other or make the UI seem like a spreadsheet. "But my one suggestion doesn't do that" assumes that we don't have other suggestions or requirements to take into consideration. Not to mention limited development time. UI improvements are actually one of the primary reasons we moved to the Upgrade strategy. CMBB/AK had tons of improvements over CMBO's interface. But it wasn't as simple as moving the UI over because the UI revolved around new features. We had no mechanism to get the features back to CMBO and that meant the UI couldn't be easily moved over either. We had the same problem with CMBN and CMSF. We won't have that problem going forward. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steiner14 Posted July 10, 2012 Share Posted July 10, 2012 Having some sort of "mouse over" helper is problematic too since there can be upwards of 6 or more elements to a single Action Spot. Steve, I don't understand, if there are six or more elements involved, why can't they be named? I would be thankful for additional information from the game. I guess it would also help, to develop a finer sense of the terrain's quality. Regarding the wish of us to show passanger/button status: Since this a status for the whole unit, how about an additional status text above the text describing the individual soldiers task? "Passanger" or simple "P" for vehicles or units would be self explanatory from the context. To display button up/down ↓ or ↑ could be used. Open vehicle with passengers: ↑ P Driver: Driving Gunner: Spotting 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vinnart Posted July 10, 2012 Author Share Posted July 10, 2012 Steve, I don't understand, if there are six or more elements involved, why can't they be named? I think that would be a lot of text. Would you really want an entire sentence around the cursor.? From what is sounds like they are aware of our request, and plan to implement in the future in a way they have planned. As long as they are aware, and planning to improve, which it sounds like they are, then I am happy I only hope they do not fix things in the UI that are not broken. I think it is very good as is now in many ways, but just lacking a few things here, and there as finishing touches such as the floor info ect... I mean it when I think it is good overall. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vinnart Posted July 10, 2012 Author Share Posted July 10, 2012 I also agree Steve, that in the first design the floor ectt… does not fit in there contextually, but was more in an effort to find space for the text. I honestly don’t think under the portrait is that bad of a spot though considering it is no more difficult to read text there than any of the other text in the UI. It feels more correct there considering the available space, and it is away from the other modifiers. Like I said though I am just glad there are plans for it in the future no matter how you plan to incorporate. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lt Belenko Posted July 10, 2012 Share Posted July 10, 2012 Trust me, there probably isn't a single UI request you guys have made that I am not aware of ... Steve And that is why we keep coming back. HUGE shout out for customer awareness. I really like the folderization of scenarios/game files. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vinnart Posted July 10, 2012 Author Share Posted July 10, 2012 The text needed just a tad more negative space around it to read easier which I changed. This reads easier at 100 %, and does not feel as crammed. 11 characters can fit there, with minimal cropping to the portrait. I know they have a plan, and am not insisting here, but I just wanted to show this not as bad compositionally as originally thought with the fix. Now if the words in other languages are so much longer than 11 characters then perhaps a problem there, but that reads as easy as any of the other text now that I fixed it. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steiner14 Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 While looking at the pic of Vinnart with the thought of avoiding a crammed interface, i felt, that the supression meter could be quite a waste of space, if it would be possible, to create the same feeling for the player, without using that much space. Judge for yourself, but the longer i look at this alternative version, the more natural it feels, if this kind of "emotional" information about the unit comes from the portrait. I don't know how much work this would be, but to spin this thought even further, maybe even the portrait-image itself could be used to give the player the feedback about the units status (e.g. different images of faces from relaxed over focused to highly thrilled to panicked or broken), so that not only the supression meter, but maybe even the status-field of the unit's morale could be saved with an intuitive graphical representation in the portrait? Wouldn't such a "living portrait" feedback system be an improvement? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kanonier Reichmann Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 I would recommend that shots from Monty Python & The Holy Grail when the knights faced the killer bunny would be appropriate for depicting the various soldier states, commencing with calmness through to sheer terror! Regards KR 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mord Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 Wouldn't such a "living portrait" feedback system be an improvement? You just gave me nightmares! Mord. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 The planned redo changes many things. The problem with so much to show, and so little space to show it in, is when we change one thing it causes a cascading effect. Same thing happens when we want to introduce a new feature that requires UI space. We are fortunate enough to have a couple of improvements now instead of having to wait for everything until another day. Also, better to not change something with v2.0 that we know we're going to change again for v3.0. Vinart's concern about us not tossing out what works is definitely a concern. It's one reason why we don't rush changes into the UI. Best to see what things really don't work and which things people continually request. Then think long and hard about how to make both work together with the stuff nobody is complaining about. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
womble Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 While looking at the pic of Vinnart with the thought of avoiding a crammed interface, i felt, that the supression meter could be quite a waste of space, if it would be possible, to create the same feeling for the player, without using that much space. Judge for yourself, but the longer i look at this alternative version, the more natural it feels, if this kind of "emotional" information about the unit comes from the portrait. What? What changed? Oh, you put a border round the portrait. A coloured border. With red and green to distinguish states. How useful. Using colour alone to distinguish anything is not going to be optimally helpful to any of the 10% or so of this game's playerbase that is colour vision deficient. Please bear that in mind. ...maybe even the portrait-image itself could be used to give the player the feedback about the units status (e.g. different images of faces from relaxed over focused to highly thrilled to panicked or broken), so that not only the supression meter, but maybe even the status-field of the unit's morale could be saved with an intuitive graphical representation in the portrait? It would give the portrait a purpose, but would make it much more difficult to mod. Also, how would the face represent the various combinations of suppression and morale state? I suspect a Pinned face looks pretty much the same whether the pinnee is Paniced or Cautious, and while we're, as a species, good at reading emotional states off real people, the specific status types of CM would have to be translated to specific expressions, and those would be as intuitive as the terrain (i.e. most useful when compared to other terrain). Wouldn't such a "living portrait" feedback system be an improvement? It's a nice idea, but I don't think it would improve anything, and might lead to horrid confustication. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Emrys Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 It's a nice idea, but I don't think it would improve anything, and might lead to horrid confustication. Especially for the RT players who might easily miss a subtle variation in expression in the heat of play. Even a WEGO player might not pick up on something. In any event, I think information overload is already a problem with this game. Trying to get the player to process even more each turn does not sound like a good idea to me. Michael 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonS Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 I think information overload is already a problem with this game. Trying to get the player to process even more each turn does not sound like a good idea to me. Especially when it's made worse by being presented in a variety of different ways. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
womble Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 ...I think information overload is already a problem with this game... I can't agree. I think some of the ways information is presented and some of the mechanisms for displaying it need work, but too much info? No. Some of the wrong kind of info, yes (like info re: enemy squads), and some opaque info. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steiner14 Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 Using colour alone to distinguish anything is not going to be optimally helpful to any of the 10% or so of this game's playerbase that is colour vision deficient. Please bear that in mind. The intention was to show, that the portrait could be the more natural place to show it while freeing up LOTS of space. The problem with colour vision deficient people could easily be solved like it is solved now: that the colored frame could also be built up from segments from the bottom to the top, where the maximum suppression results in a closed frame. Instead of your pseudo arguments it would be more honest to say: i don't LIKE new ideas and ignorance is a bliss. Also, how would the face represent the various combinations of suppression and morale state? I suspect a Pinned face looks pretty much the same whether the pinnee is Paniced or Cautious, and while we're, as a species, good at reading emotional states off real people, the specific status types of CM would have to be translated to specific expressions, and those would be as intuitive as the terrain (i.e. most useful when compared to other terrain). Not necessarily combinations. The supression meter would stay but be transformed in a portrait's frame (or parts of it). If we now can read PANICKED, and don't find this counterintuitive, why should we find it counterintuitive to judge a natural expression on a face or a silhuette? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dieseltaylor Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 The portrait is wasted space big time. It conveys probably the least information per pixel. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mord Posted July 11, 2012 Share Posted July 11, 2012 The portrait is wasted space big time. It conveys probably the least information per pixel. Not anymore. Quit trying to put me out of business! Mord. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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