Animated turn counter

[irrevenant]

A number of people have requested that a visible turn counter be added to Wesnoth - completely missing the one located up in the top left-hand corner.

To draw a bit more attention to the turn counter, how about we do something like this?



Players would not have to wait for the animation - they could take action while it's occuring.

Thoughts?

[zookeeper]

Good idea.

[Ken_Oh]

Sweetness.

[Eleazar]

I would make the flag-flash and number-rolling happen at the same time, but otherwise it's a great idea.

[Blarumyrran]

that flash is also great because its a reminder that turn has changed. i hope this gets made ready.

[Frobozz]

Wouldn't it make more sense to just put the numbers on the actual end turn button?

[irrevenant]

that flash is also great because its a reminder that turn has changed. i hope this gets made ready.

Just a clarification: The flash does not denote that the turn has changed, it denotes that the player has changed - it's the flag transitioning from one colour to another.

Wouldn't it make more sense to just put the numbers on the actual end turn button?

My first thought was "Why didn't he suggest that before I spent over an hour cobbling that animation together!?" .

But unfortunately no, for the same reason as the clarification above. In Wesnoth the word "turn" actually denotes two different things:
1. "one player's set of moves" eg. "Irrevenant's Turn"; and
2. "one go for each player" eg. "The time of day changes at the end of the turn".

#1 is what the "End Turn" button refers to and #2 is what the turn counter refers to.

I would make the flag-flash and number-rolling happen at the same time

Sounds like a good idea to me.

[Imp]

I don't see how that makes putting the turn counter next to the end turn button a bad idea, Irrevenant.

[irrevenant]

I don't see how that makes putting the turn counter next to the end turn button a bad idea, Irrevenant.

Frobozz said on the turn button, which I interpreted as being something like: [ End Turn #14/50 ].

If he meant what you said, that seems fine to me.

[Leo]

In Wesnoth the word "turn" actually denotes two different things:

In chess AI's theory this problem solved to use word half-turn for turn of only one player.

[zookeeper]

Turn and round.

The problem with that is that the people would never learn to speak of a round when that's what they mean, leading to annoying confusion.

[irrevenant]

Turn and round.
The problem with that is that the people would never learn to speak of a round when that's what they mean, leading to annoying confusion.

IMO, they would if it were clearly labelled in the game itself. People think of 'my go' as a 'turn' because they hit an 'end turn' button every time they finish their go.

When you mouse-over the 'turn counter' it doesn't say anything - and even if it did say something, hardly anyone mouses over it anyway. If it were displayed prominently somewhere, IMO people would pick it up. (Adding it to the mouseover is the absolute minimum that could be done).

P.S. It adds to the confusion that, in campaign at least, as player 1 the start of your turn is also the start of the round.

P.P.S. I considered the word 'round' myself and didn't really find it clear enough - it's not intuitive which is larger out of a 'turn' and a 'round'. That said, I failed to come up with a better alternative. Annoyingly, thesaurus.com seems to lack this definition of both turn and round.

[Ken_Oh]

Turn and round are pretty clear to me.

A turn is specific to a person. "It's my turn" or "It's your turn." You don't say "It's my round."

On the other hand, round is exactly what it means in the sense of a circle. Imagine poker players sitting around a table. A round is when every player has their turn around (again, a-round) the table once. The shape is even round, especially if the table is round.

[Gus]

Then again, in D&D, a turn used to be X rounds, i think... It seems to have changed since recent editions, but i'm unsure (i'm not into RPGs too much). Hence why some raised concerns about confusion.

[Ken_Oh]

Ah, yes. It's been a long time since I've played D&D (stopped way before 3rd Edition came out) but I do vaguely remember the round vs turn thing in there being rather confusing/[censored].