Extend list of players on the server

Brainstorm ideas of possible additions to the game. Read this before posting!

Moderator: Forum Moderators

Forum rules
Before posting a new idea, you must read the following:
pl
Posts: 6
Joined: February 19th, 2009, 5:55 pm

Extend list of players on the server

Post by pl »

Hi everyone,

I would like to have few changes in the waiting area (section of players online)

1) I would like to have a category friends. Each Game server supports this and I'm wondering why Battle for Wesnoth does not have the same feature.

2) If it possible I would like to have 3 additional things near the name of the players:

a) If it is possible to have an icon which I can set (races and random). It comes very handy since some players like to play one race and if I see a person with icon specified I know what to expect from the person and maybe I know him/her.

b) If it is possible to have an icon which I can set to Noob, ?, Good player . It is also comes handy. Since if I saw a noob or a prof it is good to be aware about this guy next time I see him/her getting ready for the map which I want to play.

c) If it is possible to have an icon which I can set to 1,2,3,4,5 medals. Sometimes you play with the same person several battles and it is very good and pleasant to remember him/her. And you play with some ppl more than with others, that is why having this scale is handy.


Why do I want it? - Some of us have friends only for 1 login, since it is hard to remember all the nicknames. Everytime I login, it is a shame that I do not remember ppl with whom I played and with some of them I made lots of battles. Also It is irritating when I got into the same noob who just spoils whole game! Then there are really nice players who play one race almost all the time and it is cool to see who is online and waiting.

Advantages - Server can also gather stats who plays which race the most (cuz ppl will set these icons to players) Also ratio of pro / noob players. Also you can gather who is the most war star (has lots of medals = ppl set up 5-4 medals for this player)


Lemme know if it is possible. It would be really cool to have such things, or at least some of them.
User avatar
Turuk
Sithslayer
Posts: 5283
Joined: February 28th, 2007, 8:58 pm
Contact:

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by Turuk »

There is already a friends list in Battle for Wesnoth, to which you can add friends in order to remember people who you enjoyed playing with. It is under Preferences, Multiplayer, Friends list. Your friends are displayed with an exclamation point next to their name (for 1.4).

For 1.5, you can double-click on the player's name in the lobby to bring up an interface that will let you send them a private message and add them as a friend or ignore. They will then be displayed with a red exclamation point like in 1.4.

As far as the idea of ranking players, it has been decided before that there will be no ranking system in Wesnoth. While I know you are partially looking for a more simplified version of Noob/Good player that the user can set themselves, that can be done by just adding those players who you thought were good players to your list of friends.
_pl_ wrote:Also you can gather who is the most war star (has lots of medals = ppl set up 5-4 medals for this player)
The idea of medals is a bad one because you are basically asking players to rate other players, which can be entirely subjective. Not to mention that people can give other players bad ratings just to be malicious. Or at least if this was done by everyone, as you mentioned that it would be user-side as well, but then the wording of the above quote would make it sound as if the player can judge what other people have rated that person.
_pl_ wrote:a) If it is possible to have an icon which I can set (races and random). It comes very handy since some players like to play one race and if I see a person with icon specified I know what to expect from the person and maybe I know him/her.
Eh, I am not really sure if this would work out to any tangible benefit.
Mainline Maintainer: AOI, DM, NR, TB and THoT.
UMC Maintainer: Forward They Cried, A Few Logs, A Few More Logs, Start of the War, and Battle Against Time
User avatar
Lord Ork
Code Contributor
Posts: 300
Joined: January 8th, 2009, 1:51 pm

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by Lord Ork »

I think the OP is talking about a personal rating. That is, you can rate "Lord Ork" as a noob just for you, because you feel far a better player than me. And you can rate "Lord Ork" with 1 medal because you found boring playing with such a bad player. You are only keeping this information for your personal interest.

Having explained that, I don't like the idea of complicating too much the interface. If one thing, the possibility of adding notes about an user, but nothing more.
It is ok to correct me if my English is too bad.

Working on Cunnicula Civil War
Skizzaltix
Posts: 1114
Joined: December 9th, 2005, 2:38 am

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by Skizzaltix »

IIRC Warcraft 3 Battlenet has the race icons implement--I suppose it could be a nice idea, but to avoid cluttering up the interface with loads of 72x72 sprites, you'd need to make a race portrait (Or several) for each mainline faction; if you're willing to give this a go, it could be very cool, but otherwise...
As I said, though, I'm no really sure how much good it would actually do :hmm:
User avatar
Turuk
Sithslayer
Posts: 5283
Joined: February 28th, 2007, 8:58 pm
Contact:

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by Turuk »

Lord Ork wrote:I think the OP is talking about a personal rating
If you read my post, you'll see I address the fact that he switched between a rating done solely by the player and a rating done by all people, given his choice of wording, but yes, I know he is mainly addressing a personal rating. If you are only keeping the information for your personal interest, it stills seems to clutter up the interface as you pointed out. Where would the medals be displayed, to the left of the username? And the race to the right if they have one? Favorite race makes little sense anyways. I could indeed prefer to play with knalgans, but I do not always want to play with them. So if I have a dwarf as my "faction icon" and then get in a game only to have a player get mad at me because I wanted to play Rebels for once? This would mean the player would have to change the icon based on who he felt like playing....
Mainline Maintainer: AOI, DM, NR, TB and THoT.
UMC Maintainer: Forward They Cried, A Few Logs, A Few More Logs, Start of the War, and Battle Against Time
User avatar
Viliam
Translator
Posts: 1341
Joined: January 30th, 2004, 11:07 am
Location: Bratislava, Slovakia
Contact:

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by Viliam »

I think most of the functionality could be provided by adding a text description to each player. Whatever anyone puts in the description, it is their choice.

If there is not enough place for this description on screen, just display it as a tooltip for a player. Near player's name only put a very small "pencil" icon, meaning "this player has some description". Somehow (double click? right-click menu item?) provide the ability to edit description, including the possibility to remove the description, for example by providing an empty string.
pl
Posts: 6
Joined: February 19th, 2009, 5:55 pm

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by pl »

Yes I totally agree with Viliam.

I could do all my notes just in text assigned for a player.
For example you could add a little icon near the name and whenever you push it or put a cursor over, it will show a popup with your writing. (it can be similar to labels which you can make during the game)
User avatar
JW
Posts: 5046
Joined: November 10th, 2005, 7:06 am
Location: Chicago-ish, Illinois

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by JW »

I'm just wondering if you actually play the game before you post your oh so wise suggestions.

This is the second thread where you've suggested things that are already in the game.

ps, rating systems are FPI.
halifix
Posts: 28
Joined: April 11th, 2008, 11:50 am

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by halifix »

I initially didn't notice the Friends list until someone told me about it. I just never bothered looking through the preferences which I hadn't used in 1.3. But yes, you can make a friends list.

I would like the ability to leave descriptions for myself to read, tho. Either that, or also make an ignore list.
User avatar
Lord Ork
Code Contributor
Posts: 300
Joined: January 8th, 2009, 1:51 pm

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by Lord Ork »

Skizzaltix wrote:IIRC Warcraft 3 Battlenet has the race icons implement
As far as I recall (may years have passed), the icon was not related to race, but to ranking on battlenet. If you were a noob, you had an orc peon. Having the race icon would have the same problem as in Wesnoth: that even if you have a favourite race, you don't always play with it.
It is ok to correct me if my English is too bad.

Working on Cunnicula Civil War
tsr
Posts: 790
Joined: May 24th, 2006, 1:05 pm

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by tsr »

A thought that's been floating around in my head for a while is to have a more flexible interface for marking players.

I think that 3 types of players are too few and the 'magic' number lies more around 5 (especially since one type is reserved for the neutrals).

I would also love to see user-definable icons and order. This would mean that we use something like

Code: Select all

[mp_users]
  [group]
    name=me
    order=3
    icon=images/icons/ego.png
    members=tsr, tsr2, tsr3, tsr4, tsr5
  [/group]
  [group]
    ...    
In the prefs-file and something like

Code: Select all

/createlist me 3 'images/icons/ego.png'
/listadd tsr me
/listadd tsr2 me
/listadd tsr3 me
/listadd tsr4 me
/listadd tsr6 me
/listremove tsr6
/listadd tsr5 me
/deletelist me
For the cli.

I've intentionally used createlist and deletelist instead of listcreate and listdelete so that we don't get too confused...

As for the GUI I assume that can be worked out later.

The order is an integer in the range -10...0...10 where the default is 0 (used for the fifth neutral group that every one is defaultet into). User of different groups that share the same order-value are listed alfabetically. The higher the value the closer to the top (so the current implementation would have ignore(order=-10), neutral(order=0) and friend(order=10).

That's it for now, break is over ;)

/tsr
User avatar
Turuk
Sithslayer
Posts: 5283
Joined: February 28th, 2007, 8:58 pm
Contact:

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by Turuk »

halifix wrote:I initially didn't notice the Friends list until someone told me about it. I just never bothered looking through the preferences which I hadn't used in 1.3. But yes, you can make a friends list.

I would like the ability to leave descriptions for myself to read, tho. Either that, or also make an ignore list.
...You can already make an ignore list. This feature is present on both 1.4 and 1.5x. In 1.5x it is even easier to do since you can double-click on a player's name and hit add friend or add ignore.
Mainline Maintainer: AOI, DM, NR, TB and THoT.
UMC Maintainer: Forward They Cried, A Few Logs, A Few More Logs, Start of the War, and Battle Against Time
pl
Posts: 6
Joined: February 19th, 2009, 5:55 pm

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by pl »

I think that when ppl qualify other players it brings more sense of community to the players. Yes it is subjective but when more ppl assessed you, this value becomes more real.
+ gathering stats about any person or general stats will give exactly an idea of what ppl think, which is always interesting.
+ I think, it would be smth good to have


I have been playing this game for 4 years now... And as it was before and it is still right now, this forum as always very rude to users.
User avatar
Turuk
Sithslayer
Posts: 5283
Joined: February 28th, 2007, 8:58 pm
Contact:

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by Turuk »

_pl_ wrote:I think that when ppl qualify other players it brings more sense of community to the players. Yes it is subjective but when more ppl assessed you, this value becomes more real.
+ gathering stats about any person or general stats will give exactly an idea of what ppl think, which is always interesting.
+ I think, it would be smth good to have
There are so many ways for that to be abused that it is not worth listing them, and as already mentioned, the ability for players to rate each other will not be adopted into the game.
_pl_ wrote:And as it was before and it is still right now, this forum as always very rude to users
Who has been overtly rude to you?
Mainline Maintainer: AOI, DM, NR, TB and THoT.
UMC Maintainer: Forward They Cried, A Few Logs, A Few More Logs, Start of the War, and Battle Against Time
User avatar
JW
Posts: 5046
Joined: November 10th, 2005, 7:06 am
Location: Chicago-ish, Illinois

Re: Extend list of players on the server

Post by JW »

_pl_ wrote:I think that when ppl qualify other players it brings more sense of community to the players.
I have been playing this game for 4 years now... And as it was before and it is still right now, this forum as always very rude to users.
Perhaps you're being qualified as a poster.
Post Reply