Visual Display of ZoC

xtifr · Post by **xtifr** » March 18th, 2006, 2:03 am

While I agree with Eleazar's coments, I have to say that it does look better than I expected. But I'd still like to see more of the tricky cases, where it's mostly likely to cause a problem. For example, on water next to grassland (blue+yellow=green). Or on snow or ice next to sand. Will it even show up on sand, especially if there's only a single hex of sand?

And the all-important question: are we just going to be inviting jokes about "yellow snow?"

-> What i might be working on · Post by **Eleazar** » March 18th, 2006, 3:35 am

Here's how non-ZoC units should be indicated. (if you play without ellipses you're probably hard-core and don't need this reminder). I want to play with the graphics a little, but will provide them when somebody's ready to code.

thus the ZoC hexes can be indicated with red which will show up OK on any terrain. (except maybe lava)

Disto · Post by **Disto** » March 18th, 2006, 10:25 am

Eleazar wrote:Here's how non-ZoC units should be indicated. (if you play without ellipses you're probably hard-core and don't need this reminder). I want to play with the graphics a little, but will provide them when somebody's ready to code.

thus the ZoC hexes can be indicated with red which will show up OK on any terrain. (except maybe lava)

But then I'll want units without ZOC because that does look infinetly cooler that way

Post by **Noyga** » March 18th, 2006, 9:11 pm

With the terrain (in mountains for example) it would be possible a part of the ellipse is hidden so we cannot see the difference of the non zoc version.
Perharps another shape (for example hexagonal ellipse) ?

Post by **Viliam** » March 18th, 2006, 10:40 pm

Eleazar wrote:Do we really need to highlight units that can be attacked?

If the same highlighting works for opponent units, then player can check if his wounded unit is safe from enemy attacks in next turn. IMHO useful for newbies who may not be completely sure how ZOC works.

Eleazar wrote:i suppose when you select an enemy unit you see the ZoC of you and your allies? Or when you select a skirmisher you don't see any?

Yes; and this would be a good reminder that some enemy unit is a skirmisher.

-> What i might be working on · Post by **Eleazar** » March 19th, 2006, 1:30 am

Noyga wrote:With the terrain (in mountains for example) it would be possible a part of the ellipse is hidden so we cannot see the difference of the non zoc version.
Perharps another shape (for example hexagonal ellipse) ?

Yes that is possible, but a hexagon could also be obscured.
It will be visible 95+% of the time which should be sufficient (since a unit ZoC ability (or lack thereof) does not change, we don't need to see it every moment.
I believe a broken ellipse is more evocative of of the concept than a hexagon (or another shape). I will commit the graphics.

Post by **turin** » March 19th, 2006, 2:12 am

Could we get code support for this?

Post by **Darth Fool** » March 19th, 2006, 2:18 am

turin wrote:Could we get code support for this?

For which proposal exactly do you want code support??

Post by **turin** » March 19th, 2006, 2:27 am

Darth Fool wrote:
turin wrote:Could we get code support for this?
For which proposal exactly do you want code support??

The one we have art for - variable elipses based on whether the unit has a ZoC or not.

Post by **Darth Fool** » March 19th, 2006, 1:01 pm

I have added a new tag for the units that allows you to choose the ellipse graphics. Note that this is not quite what has been asked for, as it does not auto detect the zone of control of the unit. However, it should mostly have the desired effect. As an example of how to use it I have committed a change to the goblin-spearman:

Code: Select all

[unit]
	id=Goblin Spearman
	name= _ "Goblin Spearman"
	race=goblin
	image="units/goblins/spearman.png"
	ellipse="misc/ellipse-nozoc"
	[defend]
...

note that this should allow many of the other requested uses for the ellipse as special campaign units can have their own special ellipses.

As a technical note, I have moved the ellipse graphic names around so that they now are of the form:
ellipse-bottom.png, ellipse-top.png, ellipse-selected-bottom.png, ellipse-selected-top.png

-> What i might be working on · Post by **Eleazar** » March 19th, 2006, 1:50 pm

That works.

I'm glad to see the old ellipses graphics go.

the "generic" ellipse will be used if none is specified, right?

Post by **Darth Fool** » March 19th, 2006, 2:02 pm

Eleazar wrote:That works. I'm glad to see the old ellipses graphics go.

the "generic" ellipse will be used if none is specified, right?

correct.

Post by **quartex** » March 19th, 2006, 2:45 pm

The broken circle is a good way to indicate no ZoC, but I do like the idea of also showing the enemy zones of control when you click on a unit.

Could the difficulty of coloring hexes be solved by making the shading of the ZoC hexes be halfway between the shading of the hexes you can't move to and the shading of the hexes you can move to? Ie: a shading them grey?