Status Bar improved GUI

[JW]

JW,
lets not forget Wesnoth is multi-lingual. "N" wouldn't connect to neutral in most languages, and i don't doubt it would be too long a word in others. Suggestions made of pixels probably work best here.

::curse self for being monoligual::

How about the bulb with a hole in the center idea? (An "O"?)

[scott]

Scott,
i don't think the player cares if neutrality takes clever coding or not. He just needs to know if that unit is going to try to kill him or not.

But there's no way for the game to know this. There's no [ai] or [side] setting for "don't try to kill the player" except for "team_name".

I can simulate neutrality by
1. using the idle ai for the side
2. making the side afraid of the player by jacking the [ai] settings
3. placing items that look like units combined with moveto events
4. zeroing out the movement of the ai units at the start of their turns so they can't be aggressive
5. creating only guardian units

and so on.

So, maybe I'm having a brain fart about what the game considers to be a neutral unit, but I honestly don't think there is such a thing. If you just indicated allied units with an icon and left everyone else alone, that would probably be enough.

[Eleazar]

Scott,
i don't think the player cares if neutrality takes clever coding or not. He just needs to know if that unit is going to try to kill him or not.

But there's no way for the game to know this. There's no [ai] or [side] setting for "don't try to kill the player" except for "team_name".

I understand what you are saying now. Perhaps the game should be "taught" what neutral is. (but that's a different topic) An icon could easily be created when such a time comes.

[JW]

But there's no way for the game to know this. There's no [ai] or [side] setting for "don't try to kill the player" except for "team_name".

I understand what you are saying now. Perhaps the game should be "taught" what neutral is. (but that's a different topic) An icon could easily be created when such a time comes.

I think what he's trying to say is that a computer is either an ally or a foe by the side it is on. You can immobilize a friend or foe through settings in various fashions to appear to be a neutral side. This is only an appearance however as the units can still fight and will interpret the situation based on which forces are allied with them through team settings.

/translation

[Artis]

Except for dark backgrounds... What about having the ouline in the same color as the bar, but darkened and the unfilled part black with 30% or 40% trans?

I don't see how making the inside semi-transparent would help against dark backgrounds. Besides, 30% black over random background could be hard to distinguish from the bars color.
Rather, the unfilled part should be a dark grey, instead of black.

It wouldn't, that's what the outline would be for. Making the inside semi-transparent would make it stand out less on light backgrounds.

[Yogin]

After trying out 1.1, I have a couple comments:

* Before the unit has gathered any xp, the orb looks really weird because there's no xp bar, so it's floating off-center off the hp bar.

* the crown is really big. the base covers 3 times the width of one of the bars. Also, it suffers from the same off-centering problem as the orbs.

* I think I would prefer if the new xp bar goes to opaque when the bar goes white. It calls more attention to it, which is a good thing, I think. I'm 50/50 about these, I think.

Besides those nitpicks, however, I really like the new xp bar.

[Eleazar]

After trying out 1.1, I have a couple comments:

* Before the unit has gathered any xp, the orb looks really weird because there's no xp bar, so it's floating off-center off the hp bar.

* the crown is really big. the base covers 3 times the width of one of the bars. Also, it suffers from the same off-centering problem as the orbs.

the crown isn't really supposed to belong with the new bars, it just hasn't changed yet.

* I think I would prefer if the new xp bar goes to opaque when the bar goes white. It calls more attention to it, which is a good thing, I think. I'm 50/50 about these, I think.

That may be a good idea. Coders, is that tricky?

[Dave]

Also i've played with the new HP colors in the trunk. I like the use of the yellowish-green for not-quite-full health, but i'm not sure adding the orange was a good idea. comments?

I agree with this. The idea of the colors isn't to scale smoothly. The hitpoint bar does that. The colors show you when you've reached certain 'trigger' points.

Yellowish-green for 'not quite full health' is a nice addition, because it shows the player information which might not be completely obvious from the bar. Orange doesn't add any new information, and so I don't think it should be used.

Think of it in terms of what you can describe in words: "Four of my five units are red-lined". "All of my units are full health". "None of my units had green health anymore".

As we move toward continuous coloring, we lose the ability to make definite descriptions like this.

David

[Jetrel]

* the crown is really big. the base covers 3 times the width of one of the bars. Also, it suffers from the same off-centering problem as the orbs.

the crown isn't really supposed to belong with the new bars, it just hasn't changed yet.

The suggested replacement of putting the crown replacement as a star over to the middle-side of the hex is bad, IMO.

However, here are some other ideas that I don't think are so bad:

1] The obvious "smaller crown" that now would fit.
2] A star that fits perfectly behind the gem, with all of it's "points" beginning at a greater radius that that of the gem.

3] Because we'd be replacing the ground circle with a single, team-color version, it might be possible to have more than one ground circle, that is, to have special ones for special units.

[Eleazar]

Please remember we need to work within the hex boundry. --At least with the current engine. I'd be very happy if this was not so, but i'm given to understand it's not likely to change.

* A smaller crown would not fit, without moving the bars more onto the unit, which IMHO is worth some trouble to avoid.

* The ground halo have always been optional - which will be even more viable when TColors get applied everywhere. I don't think making them neccessary is the way to go.

[JW]

Hey, why don't you put the hp bar on the right and the xp bar on the left?

[Darth Fool]

Hey, why don't you put the hp bar on the right and the xp bar on the left?

With the current mode, different halves of the unit are blocked by the bars depending upon which way the unit is facing. If the bars were symmetric, this would not be the case.

[JW]

I meant in respect to each other on the left side of the hex. I think that would solve the centering problem of the bulb.

[appleide]

Complaint: There seems to be many more orbs to remember. It will be even harder for comepletely new players to join the game. The orbs currently are : green-> full moves left, yellow -> some moves left, red-> no moves left, Blue-> ally. Simple.

But now, it seems it will be increased to 6 orbs, an increase of 50%. Now, one needs to remember the "whats the difference between red triangle, and red circle?"

A new player would look at this, get turned off, and leave, even though it actually isn't that complex at all.

Also.... If all the units are scaled smaller (is that possible easily?), then you'd have room to do whatever you want with the hp and xp bars... The only problem is if you use a small monitor, where everything becomes too small.

[Eleazar]

JW's idea about swapping XP and HP bars may be the best plan. But we have a few years of conditioning to see the HP bar on the left. I have an idea that may unannoy those who see it as lopsided without the XP bar. More on that later.

Complaint: There seems to be many more orbs to remember. It will be even harder for comepletely new players to join the game. The orbs currently are : green-> full moves left, yellow -> some moves left, red-> no moves left, Blue-> ally. Simple.

But now, it seems it will be increased to 6 orbs, an increase of 50%. Now, one needs to remember the "whats the difference between red triangle, and red circle?"

A new player would look at this, get turned off, and leave, even though it actually isn't that complex at all.

Did you read any of the posts? My original proposal added 2 orbs but since the game engine distinguish between "netural" and "enemy" the enemy orb is dropped. So there's one additional orb. The player is not required to learn anything new. Both new red orbs still mean, "the unit can't move", just as the red orb did before. I'm just proposing that the shape change when the unit may still attack. Really there's just 3 orbs, the green, red, and blue, with the red and green each having 2 varieties to indicate slightly different things.

I believe this setup will be easier for new players because the meaning of the icon is indicated by shape as well as color.

Also.... If all the units are scaled smaller (is that possible easily?), then you'd have room to do whatever you want with the hp and xp bars... The only problem is if you use a small monitor, where everything becomes too small.

If we wanted to make our units look like blurred junk, yes we could shrink them. That's a rather backwards solution.