UI overhaul

[Aquohn]

OK, so a whole bunch of ideas that are too small to each merit a Mantis report, and closely related enough for me to put them all in a forum post.

1: I still get confused whose turn it is now and then. I propose we change the colour scheme for the menus and tooltips whenever the turn changes (e.g. blue background and silver text/borders when it's blue's turn, red and gold respectively for red, instead of just black and grey throughout). Also a little bar thing announcing Red's turn or Blue's turn when the turn changes (like the "Game Over" bar from Valley 2, except not permanent) and maybe a sound effect to signify the turn change. Also the camera snapping to an appropriate town when the turn changes would be nice.

2: The raw resources are global, so it seems pretty dumb to me to put them in a tooltip. Perhaps we could use the space at the bottom of the screen to put two resource bars (like you find in normal RTSs, like Starcraft) there, one for red, one for blue (and the one on top can be the one whose turn it is currently). Instead, the tooltips for the towns should show which city buildings are already there (how many barracks, whether you have a smelter etc.) because I'm already getting overwhelmed without building any extra towns.

Another note: why is the smelter on the upper row, rather than the lower one? It's an "on-demand" production facility, right?

[nas1m]

2: The raw resources are global, so it seems pretty dumb to me to put them in a tooltip. Perhaps we could use the space at the bottom of the screen to put two resource bars (like you find in normal RTSs, like Starcraft) there, one for red, one for blue (and the one on top can be the one whose turn it is currently). Instead, the tooltips for the towns should show which city buildings are already there (how many barracks, whether you have a smelter etc.) because I'm already getting overwhelmed without building any extra towns.

Seconded.

[SRombauts]

1: the camera snapping to an appropriate town when the turn changes would be nice.

Yes, this was asked here with other improvements, but only partly fixed:
http://www.arcengames.com/mantisbt/view.php?id=11119: More Noticeable Turn Changes.
so I created a knew dedicated ticket here:
http://www.arcengames.com/mantisbt/view.php?id=11376: [UI] Start of Turn: jumping to a Town Center of the civ would be helpful

2: The raw resources are global, so [...] we could use the space at the bottom of the screen to put [a] resource bar

Yes, but I think only showing the resource bar for the current faction would be more meaningful, and will also support 1:

[Misery]

2: The raw resources are global, so it seems pretty dumb to me to put them in a tooltip. Perhaps we could use the space at the bottom of the screen to put two resource bars (like you find in normal RTSs, like Starcraft) there, one for red, one for blue (and the one on top can be the one whose turn it is currently). Instead, the tooltips for the towns should show which city buildings are already there (how many barracks, whether you have a smelter etc.) because I'm already getting overwhelmed without building any extra towns.

Seconded.

Thirded.


The current ways you have to get at that info is probably the most obnoxious (and time wasting) thing about the UI right now.  That status bar would help, as would the building lists in the central city buildings.


And I'd mentioned it in another topic, but I'll mention it again here:

At the top of the screen, have an info bar that tells me 5 things about each side:  How many city buildings they have, how many resource buildings they have, how many military units they have, how many mythological units they have, and how many civilian units they have.   This'd be super helpful when trying to gauge strength, instead of having to stare at the landscape and count things, and would just be helpful in general.

[Aquohn]

stare at the landscape and count things

Yes, the parts where you have to do this are probably the biggest thorns in my side the game has given me so far.

[chemical_art]

The ui was partly why i needed a tutorial so much.

For me.the buildings need to be.grouped by.tiers so i can tell at a glance what buildinga do. a toolbar of some sort so i can tell what resources of town is at.a.glance

[Aquohn]

Alright, update to 0.805

Turn confusion is not so big an issue now, though I'm not sure if that's due to the buttons or my familiarity with the game. I'll test it out on my brother later, but I was hoping to let him play through the new tutorial too. In theory turn confusion should be mostly solved, so I think I can save my brother's inexperience with the game for testing the tutorial, which is more important.

Point 2 has not really been addressed; the UI still makes checking your resources etc. unnecessarily difficult. I'll spell it out again: display the global resources at all times, and keep the local-to-town information in each town centre's pop-up.

[Misery]

Alright, update to 0.805

Turn confusion is not so big an issue now, though I'm not sure if that's due to the buttons or my familiarity with the game. I'll test it out on my brother later, but I was hoping to let him play through the new tutorial too. In theory turn confusion should be mostly solved, so I think I can save my brother's inexperience with the game for testing the tutorial, which is more important.

Point 2 has not really been addressed; the UI still makes checking your resources etc. unnecessarily difficult. I'll spell it out again: display the global resources at all times, and keep the local-to-town information in each town centre's pop-up.

Aye, this.


Other than that, the bit I mentioned earlier in this thread, that for me still stands as of .805.   Still one of the things I want to see most (other than the resource info and such).

[PokerChen]

A quick shortlist of populat topics that I'm aware of.

User Interface list:

- Action Replay 'Clutters' and 'Stutters'.
- - Main discussion here, and in the 0.805 patch notes.
In for 0.806 - -Auto-follow modifications

- Local/Global resource confusion due to unclear arrangement and disambiguation.
- - Majority of players. Some known Suggestions:
- - In building placement, sort primary resource building at the middle row and manufactured resource building on bottom row (Smelter-Steel!) chemical_art says so.
- - Building highlight on the main map. probably less important when town-center hovertext is fixed. Two options: while placing bakeries, highlight duplicate buildings (other bakeries in town), or dependent buildings (wheat farms). Highlight either graphically or with text.
- - Wording clarification in tutorial and UI.

- Spotting gaps in the resource chain. Current global resource stockpile hidden at town-center hover-text.
- - About half the players.
- - Move global resource stockpile display from town-center to a universal location.
In for 0.806 - - On the main screen itself. This is preferred by many members and is the most important, IMO. For both factions.
- - Resource flow screen for deeper analysis. This is the second option that is older. Accessed by hotkey, shows + and - .

- The Towncenter hovertext
- - Some players, Misery, I, others, etc. This hovertext doesn't give the needed information.
- - Local information to that town center required. Existence and number of all buildings would be nice, but most importantly
- - Must know at a glance the production capability so that, e.g., I see a woodcutter is missing from this town!
- - Global information shunted off elsewhere.

- Clear Game Objectives
- - Something needs to be on the main screen with details accessible via a hotkey.
- - i.e. list of challenges taken and main edicts.
- - numerical information, i.e. 22 of 40 bandits killed.

- Quick navigation between town centers.
- - Via keyboard or minimap. 4 members, iirc.

General Gameplay list:
- Snap-to the town centre of the other faction when you press end turn
- - greywolf22, hearteater, and a few others.

- Unit AI, some illogical here fore there like horsemen charging pikemen and ranged units expending their movement points in lieu of attacking a close target.
- - (many players) orzelek, Mick, etc.


- Some method of map randomisation.
In for 0.808- - Mick, Pepisolo, greywolf22, Misery, and myself.

[Shumbok]

The new Strategic Gameplay in 805 is pretty awesome, like it really much i personali would support the following three things for a press release:


- - Building highlight on the main map. probably less important when town-center hovertext is fixed. Two options: while placing bakeries, highlight duplicate buildings (other bakeries in town), or dependent buildings (wheat farms). Highlight either graphically or with text.
- - numerical information, i.e. 22 of 40 bandits killed.

-- clear Objectives and Edicts (Or Challenges and Propositions)

Additional, or as improvement to the last point a bigger screen of Ingame Stats.