Showing defense ratings on units.
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I think he's saying that because your bars have an absolutely chronic case of the jaggies.zookeeper wrote:Based on what?Cuyo Quiz wrote:It seems there is not enough resolutoin on the bars to have them look like well rounded dials.
Anyway, I think it could work. Getting the bars out off the units would be nice.
I really don't like the idea of forcing some kind of eclipse to show leaders etc. Don't know about other people, but I would delete the image files just to get rid of it.
- Eleazar
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Sorry,
i don't think any of these bar ideas are good, though some are worse than others.
i don't think any of these bar ideas are good, though some are worse than others.
Feel free to PM me if you start a new terrain oriented thread. It's easy for me to miss them among all the other art threads.
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This response is just hilarious.Eleazar wrote:Sorry,
i don't think any of these bar ideas are good, though some are worse than others.
BTW, I agree with Eleazar.
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- Simons Mith
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@Eleazar Cruel, but accurate. For myself, I'd tolerate a non-vertical bar, as long as it was at least straight. Having seen the various bendy bars, they're a good attempt to get round a UI problem, but, as you say, nothing so far has been good enough to replace what we currently have.
Here's an idea, although one that just moves the problem. Ditch the hit point bar, have a damage bar instead. This means an undamaged unit with no XPs and no damage would need NO indicator bars at all. That would reduce the clutter a bit - after all, most of the time one tries to keep units intact, and heal them when they're hurt. So rather than having a unit with a full HP bar being unhurt, we'd have a unit with a full damage bar being (one point off) dead.
[Edit] From a UI persepective, it means that any full bars mean 'watch this unit'; XP bar nearly full means it's close to levelling, damage bar full means it's close to dying. The downside is, you can't tell if a unit has extra hit points from resilience until it's already badly hurt enough to kill a non-resilient version of the same unit.
Here's an idea, although one that just moves the problem. Ditch the hit point bar, have a damage bar instead. This means an undamaged unit with no XPs and no damage would need NO indicator bars at all. That would reduce the clutter a bit - after all, most of the time one tries to keep units intact, and heal them when they're hurt. So rather than having a unit with a full HP bar being unhurt, we'd have a unit with a full damage bar being (one point off) dead.
[Edit] From a UI persepective, it means that any full bars mean 'watch this unit'; XP bar nearly full means it's close to levelling, damage bar full means it's close to dying. The downside is, you can't tell if a unit has extra hit points from resilience until it's already badly hurt enough to kill a non-resilient version of the same unit.
- Elvish_Pillager
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Not so; the bar would appear in its entirety, empty, first, and fill up as the unit was damaged more.Simons Mith wrote:The downside is, you can't tell if a unit has extra hit points from resilience until it's already badly hurt enough to kill a non-resilient version of the same unit.
It's all fun and games until someone loses a lawsuit. Oh, and by the way, sending me private messages won't work. :/ If you must contact me, there's an e-mail address listed on the website in my profile.
- Simons Mith
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Only if HP (and XP) bars with contrasting backgrounds are implemented. Even then, a decision could be made not to display damage bars at all unless a unit is damaged - after all, Intelligent units are not (currently) displayed with their shorter XP bars until they have actually gained some XPs. Damage bars would be slightly more consistent than the current arrangement, (and you could argue the toss on that), so overall there's really not much to choose between the two options.Elvish Pillager wrote:Not so; the bar would appear in its entirety, empty, first, and fill up as the unit was damaged more.Simons Mith wrote:The downside is, you can't tell if a unit has extra hit points from resilience until it's already badly hurt enough to kill a non-resilient version of the same unit.
- Eleazar
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I'm not trying to be cruel, or to mock anyone's attempt. I was just trying to simply state my opinion.Simons Mith wrote:@Eleazar Cruel, but accurate.
Great idea! Damaged-ness not Healthyness is the most critical thing that our on-unit UI needs to express. With this idea, low HP becomes much more visually arresting nearly a whole red bar rather than a few red pixels. When a unit is damaged, the whole length of the bar should appear, otherwise it's impossible to gague how damaged a unit is. I really see no significant negative in hiding the bar when a unit is fully healthy, that too is a useful way to communicate full health. Not to mention it allows a less cluttered battlefield.Simons Mith wrote:Here's an idea, although one that just moves the problem. Ditch the hit point bar, have a damage bar instead. This means an undamaged unit with no XPs and no damage would need NO indicator bars at all. That would reduce the clutter a bit - after all, most of the time one tries to keep units intact, and heal them when they're hurt. So rather than having a unit with a full HP bar being unhurt, we'd have a unit with a full damage bar being (one point off) dead.
[Edit] From a UI persepective, it means that any full bars mean 'watch this unit'; XP bar nearly full means it's close to levelling, damage bar full means it's close to dying. The downside is, you can't tell if a unit has extra hit points from resilience until it's already badly hurt enough to kill a non-resilient version of the same unit.
This should be adopted no matter what other changes do or do not get commited.
Feel free to PM me if you start a new terrain oriented thread. It's easy for me to miss them among all the other art threads.
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If we're still on repositioning the HP/XP/damage or whatever bars. they could go above the unit, near the top of the hex, where most units don't have anything. Obstructs units less, if that's you're worry.
I mean, they're okay where they are, I suppose. But I'm just throwing in my repositioning idea: Straight, horizontal bars, above a unit's head.
I mean, they're okay where they are, I suppose. But I'm just throwing in my repositioning idea: Straight, horizontal bars, above a unit's head.
- Eleazar
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I'm annoyed enough at hearing bad ideas from other thread being repeated, to do a demonstration of how bad this idea is.Flametrooper wrote:If we're still on repositioning the HP/XP/damage or whatever bars. they could go above the unit, near the top of the hex, where most units don't have anything. Obstructs units less, if that's you're worry.
1) the bars have a much shorter maximum length, because of the narrow space at the top of the hex.
2) Once the bars come on, they will always chop off the head of tall units.
3) In a crowded battle-field any bars on the very edge of the hex- will be nearly half-way between 2 units, making it much less obvious which bar belongs to which unit.
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Feel free to PM me if you start a new terrain oriented thread. It's easy for me to miss them among all the other art threads.
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- Simons Mith
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Further minor refinement
If we are going to have disappearing damage bars, I would also suggest swapping over the positions of the XP and HP bars, and placing the orbs above the XP bar. Reason being, the XP bar, once it appears, is more 'persistent' than the damage bar. You can have a fully-healed unit with any number of XP, (so the XP bar would be visible, the damage bar not) but it's harder to contrive a damaged unit without XP as well. After all, an attack even by a level-1 unit does guarantee 1XP, but doesn't necessarily cause any damage. Attacks by level-0s do muck up the system slightly, I admit.