[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

Unless you can make animation and sound display the precise amount of HP/stamina lost, in such a way that past events can also be accessed, and, ideally, also displaying the die rolls/equations that go into the actions, the same things aren't being shown at all. All of this seems Not Bloody Likely. Such design doesn't serve "immersion" either because all one would be doing is to blend the obviously game elements of HP/stamina points into the in-character world of the story itself, as a vague sort of guesswork, rather than keeping the game aspects as clear abstractions.

HP changes are going to be pretty obvious on screen since the UI will have HP bars.

 

Also I know asking is a waste of time, but why does knowing you rolled a 3 on and attack and missed matter?  A miss is a miss, knowing you missed because of RNG doesn't make it any less of a miss.  Nor do you need the log to "detect" RNG.  Missing 15 attacks in a row isn't RNG, it's you are outmatched by your enemy. 

 

I also can't think of even one reason why you would want to know specifically how much HP you lost 5 rounds ago in a quasi real time game with pause.  Either you need to do something to heal... or you don't.  Knowing that 5 rounds ago you took 10 stamina damage from a wizards magic bolt makes no difference.  You could argue you are trying to determine who the bigger threat is but again... three normal looking bandits and one guy in the back with a staff that has flames coming off it... I don't really need a combat log to tell who the biggest threat is.

 

Lastly, I really don't care whose name is in the credit list as long as the game is good and isn't BG 1990 edition with new graphics. 

 

 

I attribute the quantity of responses to the belittling and condescending attitude in the continuation of the post.

I believe the pot is calling the kettle black.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

Let me quote myself.

 

"Edit:  One other thing, while I will turn off the combat log myself if it is optional... I left it visible in every mock up I made for a reason.  People will expect it to be there, it was there in the original mock up, and I expect it to be there in the final game.  Just because I don't want to use, or see it, doesn't mean I don't understand why someone might want to."

 

Where in that statement do you see "Take the combat log out of the game!", "There is no reason to use the combat log!", or "The combat log serves no purpose!"?

 

If you see any of those things in that quote I need you to stop and read it again.  Keep doing that until you actually read what it says, not what you want it to say.  Cause I pretty much said "I expect the combat log to be in game and understand why people use it." 

 

That said, no, it wont be white noise to me, and no, I won't have even a little trouble following a melee with 10 or even 20 mobs.  You can pause after all.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

So if it were up to me there would be no out of dialogue dialogue window at all, much less a combat log.  There is just no need.  It was there originally to appeal to the min/maxer D&D players, but Eternity is not D&D though and a combat log strikes me as being about as immersion breaking as it gets, nor is there a DM to fight with when you think the math is wrong.  The funny thing is many die hard old school IE game fans will tell you immersion is super important to them, but be mad if you do something like remove the combat log.

 

No need to be condescending because some people don't like you(r designs).

 

I just can not tell you how SUPER impressed I will be.

Until then, I'll use the combat log in these common combat situations, so I really hope they will include it. I've never been a fan of a black box approach.

.....

Nice try.

 

As for how can all this be done?  Actually quite easy, sound effects, visual effects, character reactions.  When a guy hits you and your character makes an "oof" sort of sound effect and sort of bends backwards they clearly took a hit.  When your character yells out "ARghhh!" and falls on the ground they clearly took a lot more than "a hit".  Likewise character animations and sound effects can show parries, blocks with shields, your character can call out "My attack is ineffective?!?!" (heh heh), and any number of other cues to let you know what is going on in combat.

 

This is not 1990 anymore.  Graphics have come a very very long way and can show a great range of depth, and good sound design can cover for what graphics can't do.  As for arrows.... not only could your character make a comment like "Hmmmm... out of arrows!" but you also have weapon swap icons, they could just show your arrow count right there.

 

As for IE games.  No, I do not want BG3.  I want a modern 2013-2014 RPG made by the people who made BG that uses modern technology and a fresh design to make something that is in the same spirit and style but progressive and new at the same time.

 

Edit:  One other thing, while I will turn off the combat log myself if it is optional... I left it visible in every mock up I made for a reason.  People will expect it to be there, it was there in the original mock up, and I expect it to be there in the final game.  Just because I don't want to use, or see it, doesn't mean I don't understand why someone might want to.

[Balancing versus realism?]

What is the trinity?  

Better you don't know.  To sum it up though it is a game design crutch used in MMO's mostly to force cooperative play.

 

All classes should be balanced.  That it isn't to say a rogue shouldn't be more useful on a quest to steal the war plans from the generals tent.  Or a fighter shouldn't have the advantage in a close quarters combat inside a pit when your party is trapped.  But things should be balanced out, no one class should always be the better choice for a quest or battle.  In fact no one class should ever be the better choice even 50% of the time.

 

The game and classes need to be designed in such a way that there is no such thing as a "must have" or superior class, and all party make ups could in theory clear the game.  Baring the one exception being the idiot who gimps himself just because he thinks it is funny or you have to be weak to be "roleplaying".

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

I have to say this is the first one I've seen where I wouldn't actually mind playing the game with. Yes some of the others are esthetically pleasing, but this one is balanced, functional, and doesn't distract from the scene. I guess the round circles with the gears are meant to be the control button icons?

It is hard to see but if you pull up the picture full screen you can see that i sort of scratched in some words for them to show what they are supposed to be.

[Balancing versus realism?]

Thanks for the comments folks.  Some elaboration on a few points.  

 

1.  When I talk about realism, I understand that it might seem an oxymoron to use regarding magic.  That said, it stands to reason that magic-users should be more powerful than fighters.  Even if you have the best damned swordsman in the world, he's not going to be able to compete with a fireball, in terms of the real world.  I suppose they have an in-game canon method that swordsmen can use "magic" to be better than that.  But I still think it's a chump move.  

Uh yeah... let me be honest.  Have you ever even met an actual "master swordsman"?  I have seen a guy draw a sword, cut with it, and resheath it so fast all i felt was the wind and saw a blur.  Meanwhile a piece of paper he was cutting fell over, while the bottom half of the paper stayed still.  I also saw the same dude throw a knife over 20 feet and hit a dummy square in the forehead, and he started the throw facing the opposite direction.  Or is your mage too badass to die to something like having 6 inches of steel lodged in his eye socket?

 

Also it sounds like you are arguing in favor of the trinity.... please tell me you aren't doing that?

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

As the combat log / dialogue bar is concerned I think we could scrap it entirely. It could become a tab on the game's menu like the spellbook or the quest journal. When I played Baldur's Gate 1/2 I never searched for old dialogues on the main bar. I just looked at the journal when I didn't remember what I had to do in a quest.

I agree pretty much 100%.  If there is a way to turn the dialog box off in game outside of dialog itself... I am going to do it.  The reason I don't go even further down the rabbit hole on my UI mock ups is because many people on the forums don't want a progressive or new design.  That doesn't go for just the UI either.  They literally want a 1990's Baldur's Gate 3.  So I try to do something different that still retains a lot of the old games elements.

 

So if it were up to me there would be no out of dialogue dialogue window at all, much less a combat log.  There is just no need.  It was there originally to appeal to the min/maxer D&D players, but Eternity is not D&D though and a combat log strikes me as being about as immersion breaking as it gets, nor is there a DM to fight with when you think the math is wrong.  The funny thing is many die hard old school IE game fans will tell you immersion is super important to them, but be mad if you do something like remove the combat log.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

New version, with all the improvements you have asked for. As always don't look at the skins and the graphic. Look at the layout.

Much better than the earlier layouts.  My only advice would be to toss the tiny dialogue box on the bottom.  At that size it serves no point and going through it would be literally a hassle.  Move the portraits to that space instead so there is less "searching" with the mouse from clicking on portrait, to skill, to targeting it.  As for the large dialogue blocks... move them a little higher on the screen, make the portraits smaller, and expand them further right so there is more horizontal room for text.  Once out of dialogue you can have your dialogue window with a record of the conversation and combat log pop up in the bottom left and be much taller so it can be read through.

[another Sketch or painting]

Nice work, he definitely smells something.  Though I am not sure it is heresy or just old sweaty gym socks.

[Update #55: Vertical Slice Update]

Very excited to hear what the new updated UI will look like and very hyped to learn how far along development is.  Cant wait to get a hold of this game! 

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

Thank you for your replies. I couldn't dissolve the left obsidian field because its in the same layer as the background. For that I would've had to start anew. Although I didn't want to erase it completely. I think flattened it would make a good frame.

 

If I make the portraits tinier, there would be new place to fill, which would be against my concept. There is a lot space still left over. (but I also want the obsidian to shine through.)

I hope most of your ideas for buttons/the frames/ where the buttons should be are solved. (see, they are even less shiny)

Definitely a step in the right direction.  You have a reason for why it is there but I am going to go ahead and say it anyway...   You still need to get rid of those large black obsidian art panels.  I would still advise finding a way to make the quickbar buttons bigger, they are still the smallest thing in your ui and yet are the most likely thing to be clicked throughout the game.  They just need to be bigger.  Assuming the extra obsidian was gone I would kick the dialog box over to the left corner and trim down the obsidian "flow" over the quickbar so that it was smaller and slid off right past the buttons.  Beyond that.... definitely the best side panel UI mock up in this thread.

 

However we are now to that time.  With their most recent update and UI related commentary I am reasonably happy they are going for a more compact UI.  We will have to see what they have in mind later.  I had already been working on a final "version" of what I made earlier just to satisfy some people so I will post it now.

 

 

It still needs more work primarily in the little menu wheel which could be better done.  Either way you get the idea... it is a more "artistic" take on my earlier UI.  Again it is mostly just to show that you can in fact do something artistic, while staying minimal, and functional.  You do not have to be one or the other.

 

So I decided to leave out the red text this time... whats all this represent?  The gravestone portrait is pretty self explanatory...  the greyed out portrait represents someone who is alive but knocked out due to loss of stamina, and the statue portrait represents a sixth party slot where you have not yet recruited anyone.  This is why the final slot has no "selection" gem in the corner, health bars, or the helmet/demonic skull things. 

 

That said what's up with the helmet/demonic skull things anyway?  They represent buffs and debuffs.  Ideally (can't really do it here) the eyes would light up red or blue depending on which it is, and a little glowy aura or flame would come in behind them.  The helmet lighting up indicates you have buffs, the skull... well it is pretty obvious.  While you could go with a different colors connotate different status approach I think it would be just as easy to simply relegate it all to a mouse over.  When mouse overed a simple tool tip pops up showing what buffs or debuffs are active.  Fairly straight forward but a more... artsy way of tracking them.

 

The gold highlight on the one button would indicate a ability that is "channeled" and on.  Such as a 3rd edition warrior using Combat Expertise to increase his AC or a rogues hide in shadows.  The light blue indicates a selected ability that you have clicked on or activated and are targeting, such as a heal spell, or a special bow shot.  The two larger buttons would still be for weapon swapping and opening the skill/spell menu like on my earlier mock up I just didn't go through changing the icons.

 

So lastly all other stuff would be same.... select all would turn the weapon swap and skill/spell menu buttons into "set 1" "set 2" buttons forcing a weapon swap on all characters to the specified set.  The other ten buttons would become the formation selection buttons.  If you picked less than your whole party it is still the same, only the formation buttons grey out since the whole party isn't selected.  I did redo the pet status a little but it is basically the same concept.  Also the dialog window would still fade out when not in combat or dialogue, and it would still be possible to disable it entirely in combat if you wanted to.  I know I would, I mean... it is nice knowing I hit the goblin with 21 damage and what all the modifiers were.  The thing is... this isn't an mmo, I don't need to min/max, and ultimately all that actually matters is the goblin died, not that I had +4 to hit, +3 damage from strength, and the goblin had -1 to ac due to a debuff.  I just don't need the math, it isn't like there is a DM I can call out and get a reroll because he miss added my bonuses.  Basically the combat log actually breaks immersion in the worst way and doesn't even tell you anything on screen visual and audio cues don't.  It is something only the die hard min maxer gamer needs.

 

Lastly, yes, I did make this mock up at 1920x1080.  The reason being is because the statistical majority of players will probably be on this resolution, and I wanted to show just how fast the game screen opens up when you don't use the brick UI and aren't confined to 1280x720.  It also gave me the ability to work with higher res art to make a cleaner image.  I still choose to reuse some of the original UI elements that needed some scaling  (the statue...) but it came out with a more attractive UI, with more curves which people seem to like, while still being mostly minimal, sticking with the games general vibe, using the colors obsidian wanted, larger portraits, being totally functional, AND way more minimal and compact that most other mock ups including the original.

 

Sorry for the wall of text :[

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

anything to the c-shape to the right?

Personally I would resize/reposition it so that the portraits were just straight vertically arranged above the "menu" in the bottom right with no curve.  If you wanted you could still leave some curve to it for aesthetic reasons but I just don't feel like you "need" to since the portraits would already  be ovals.  The quickbar would need to be enlarged but it is fine leaving it stacked like that.  Move it maybe a bit more right so it is closer to the portraits and other wise it is okay.  Maybe do like I did in my second ui mock up and dedicate one button to weapon swap and one to skill ui for click and dragging to the quickbar.

 

Chat box just break it off everything else and move it to the center.  You could throw in a slider to make it taller or shorter for whatever the player preferred and I would still encourage the idea of fading when not in use.  As a result the bottom half the of the screen really opens up if you just take out the left art piece.

 

Add in a small sub portrait to the bottom left of the main portraits as a bit of an overlay to cover the animal companion HP/Status and you will be in good shape.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

I hope someone of you like it. It's not supposed to be 100% functional.

I like the design and where you went with it artistically but in all honesty I would not want to use it as an actual game UI.  Too much dead space, I really just don't understand why so many posters think looking at a pretty but totally functionless piece of UI art is better than... I don't know... seeing the actual game screen?

 

The portraits, pause, menu, and "inventory etc" buttons are wayyyyy too big.  With a pause button that massive just throw the "options" button on the outer ring of it, or vice versa.  In fact .... at that size you could easily fit all the "main menu" buttons on the pause wheel.  Like most other mock ups you also completely ignored animal companions and didn't address how their status would be shown.  As far as the blue bar... it's a stamina meter.  Stamina is actually your primary hp in this game and the red bar being your wounds meter reflects how much more "life" you have before real death.  I think this is why they did not want to show progressive damage on the portrait since you sort of have two health bars in a way.  As an aside there is no "mana" in game from what has been released up to this point though some skills might use stamina.

 

The UI doesn't suck and appearance wise I think it is better than every other mock up in the thread, possibly better than the original too.  But it is too much design over function.  Function needs to be the key factor of a UI, and again I am really mystified why so many in the thread seem to think the opposite is true.

[Instant Death]

 

You're not describing the flaws of 'Save-or-die' here. You're describing crappy game balance, or silly encounter design. Huge difference.

 

Except that all instant death mechanics are silly/bad encounter design.

 

As for your comments trying to insinuate I don't want death in game I will say the same thing to you I did to someone complaining about character switching in forced dialogue.

 

Tactics and planning should determine who wins combat.  Does it suck this guy got his rogue and main character position swapped due to a forced dialogue.  Yes it does.  Is that even maybe bad encounter design?  I feel safe in saying... yeah it kind of is.  But he didn't lose the fight and get a reload because of that bad design.  It happened because he had sent his rogue literally 5 rooms ahead of his party and his party had no chance to get anywhere near the fight in time to save the main character.  That was his poor tactical planning, not the games bad design.  Even if the character swap hadn't happened he still would have lost a party member regardless.  He made a bad tactical choice by separating his party, he deserved to lose the encounter.

 

Just like a guy who enters a room, doesn't check for traps and sets off an explosion, doesn't check for stealthers and gets ambushed, and didn't bother using their melee to defend their ranged deserves to lose party members or whole combats too.  Bad play and weak tactics should lead to game over.

 

Instant death mechanics boil the entire combat action down to a yes/no dice roll logic check however.  Target have buff X (yes/no), no, random number gen (1-20), 7, target dies.

 

If you think anything about that logic check is tactical.... well I would love to play you in a 100 dollar stakes game of poker, winner takes all.  You better pray for dumb random luck to hand you a straight flush though.

 

Also some friendly advice, when you start a reply post with a weak personal insult it is sort of a clear indicator that it is actually you who has the losing argument and no salient points to make.

[Instant Death]

 

My question to Sawyer: What's wrong with Good Luck/Bad Luck in a game? Is it not a HUGE, and driving element in D&D --- a game system you spent much of your life playing and DM-ing? Is it not an existing factor even in real life combat?

 

Maybe you should re read the post.

 

This isn't D&D, it is a single player game with a save load feature.  95% of players who have truly bad luck reload their game.  Instant death nonsense does nothing but promote save scumming and meaningless busywork of prebuffs.

 

There is nothing fun or tactical about casting death ward before every fight, or not doing that then making a arbitrary dice roll and either passing or failing.  Casting "power word kill" takes no skill, no planning, no tactics.  It is just a cheap, boring, and uninspired mechanic.

 

PS: I did mention this before but....  D&D 4th edition removed all "save or die" mechanics from the game too.  So I wouldn't hold D&D up as your champion.

[Bold idea: No UI at all]

Actually to any long term user of keybinds this is normally how you like to play.  All I will actually "need" for eternity is party hp/stamina bars, buff/debuff tracking, and maybe a single 10 block action bar.  The statues, gears, escape menu, and other crap are just for people who haven't learned how to use a keyboard.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

 

I'll repeat that this sort of UI is absolutely fine for a 3D game that can be rotated. PE is not one of them so various considerations need to made.

 

Or you could just make the area transition the entire southern side of the map?  You are using the proverbial  cannon to swat a fly solution. 

 

Meanwhile I would not make the same false assumption most of the other die hards are.... that the brick ui is overlayed on a viewported map.  It isn't.  It still blocks the area transition too, you still have to sometimes move your screen around a little to see things.  No matter what UI they design this is going to happen sooner or later.  There is no such thing as a ui that covers up "nothing" at least in this type of game.  So the idea is you make something that works but covers as little as possible. 

 

The brick ui covers a large portion of the screen, 16.3% at 720p to be exact.  To be more specific the ui mock ups I make actually progressively cover less and less of the screen the higher resolution you go, even factoring in increasing their scale by say... 20% in 1080p versus it's size in 720p.  It may "look" like the screen stops at the edge of the UI on the brick mock up, but it doesn't, there is still map there, the UI just blocks the whole bottom 16% so you can't tell.  Meanwhile when you play at 1920x1200 my mock up is now far enough left your area transition (even the small one you started with) is perfectly visible.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

Thirdly, the text window is right aligned. If this is where all of the game's dialogue and writing is going to appear, I very much feel it needs to be centralised. If I'll have 500k words to read across my playing of PE, I don't want to be constantly looking off to the bottom corner when the focus of the scene will be centred. I want to just be able to glance down.

I like what you have to say and mostly agree.  As far as the text goes I think the corner is fine due to one caveat....  When you actually enter a dialogue it is easy just to fade out the other UI elements and have an otherwise hidden larger central chat window show up for the duration of the conversation.  When it ends it just drops back to the corner chat box with a record of the conversation while the "in conversation" larger central chat just goes away until you are in conversation again.

 

Even still doing it this way does feel dated.  The only reason he mock ups I have posted don't go really out there is because the forum users will be totally opposed (in general) to anything actually progressive in UI design and I think the devs themselves want to stick to a more dated UI systems for whatever reason.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

It seems to me you're framing an idiosyncratic preference in universal terms here.

Not really.  A few asides, first...  LoL and Dota are not strategy RPG's.  They are Moba games, which is a dumb name for Multiplayer Action Game.  They are designed to be fast and brutal, not slow and tactical.  Screen space as a result is less important, but their UI's are still crap anyway and anyone who understands design can give you a laundry list as to why.

 

As for complaints about why a 16.3% brick covering the screen is no different than the 5-8% of floating icons in a strategy RPG... well all I gotta say is uh..... if you think it doesn't make a difference I doubt you have ever actually played a strategy RPG.  Because you definitely need to see as much of the screen as possible.

 

For the haters who still think you need some retarded brick of graphics to do this UI right here comes Kark mark up 2.

 

 

So what do we have here?  Well the party window is pixel for pixel the EXACT same size as the original mock up.  There are 12 buttons, exactly like the original mock up.  The useless brick of buttons I personally will never use is still there just flipped on it's side and repositioned to take up less space.  It is literally the same exact UI as the mock up, just all the useless nonsense like statue graphics is removed, the chat box is bigger, and the chat box fades out when not in use.  That's it, everything else is the same just repositioned.  I didn't even change the size of the clock/pause button.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

 

Yes a large portion of the "audience" is going to be crazy hard core niche people and if you design the game around their tastes you are going to hurt your game.

You and i disagree almost completely in what is good game design. From my perpective it's the people who want a "modern"( whatever that means) game will hurt the game. I don't believe either of us is wrong, but at the same time is almost imposible to make a game that'll please both of us. That's why i said that in divisive matters like that they should follow as close to IE as they can. And i don't consider myself "hardcore" either. I have seen people who consider IE games "casual" and wanted a more oldschool hardcore experience like Realms of Arcania. I disagree with them as well.

As Avellone said, what matters is that the backers are happy with what we get. If the game has more broad appeal, great,we all hope for that. But the backers come first. And the only thing we have in common is love for the IE games. Sure, there were parts we didn't like, but that parts are different for each of us.

Well .... yes and no again. There is no uh.... how should I say it "options" when it comes to UI design. Your UI is either easy to use, functional, and enhances your experience without getting in the games way.... or it doesn't meet those criteria. I promise you if they go to production with the current UI mock up as the basis over half or more of professional reviews are going to comment on it and mention that the UI is bad, because it is. There is no other way to say it.

 

Lets look at modern UI designs in strategy RPG's. Like .... the game X-Com: Enemy Unknown. I know a lot of major review sites gave it game of the year. Almost everyone gave it PC game of the Year. Much like the IE games it has a top down isometric view even if it is fully 3d. Here is a link to a screen shot of the pc version during combat: http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/featured/2kgames/xcom/enemyunknown/insideufo.jpg

 

Obviously I am not suggesting this UI.

 

That said... I want you to notice that every bit of info you could possibly want about the situation at hand is shown. I see my units hp and remaining action points, I see what skills and abilities my selected unit has, I see what he is aiming at, I can tell what my units name, rank, class, and buffs vs his target are, I can even tell how much ammo he has and what guns he has available. It is all right there at a glance. What else does this UI do? It doesn't block hardly any of the actual game screen. It is there, it is fully functional, it is easy to use, I have access to everything I would need to know or use on a regular basis, and my view is barely obstructed. That's a good UI.

 

So this is a turn based strategy RPG that won PC Game of the Year pretty much no contest, and there is one key take away here. The only time reviewers mentioned the UI that I saw... was to say the out of combat in base UI was clunky. By comparison to the project eternity mock up the in base UI in Xcom was sleek as all hell.

 

What scares me is the current posted mock up already blocks 16.3% (to be specific) of the screen at 720p and Sawyer said it was actually the smallest most compact UI mock up they had. Who knows how clunky and huge the other mock ups are. The statues are really neat looking and pretty, straight up, but they serve no function. Function is the core concept of the UI. I don't care how pretty and nice to look at the UI is, if it isn't functional, easy to use, all without obstructing or (distracting you from) the gameplay, then it is a bad UI. There is really no agree or disagree on that.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

 

Heh, a hundred postings, a hundred different opinions.

That's why i always prefer when the devs don't take our opinions seriously. Trying to please your audience is backwards. You should be making the game YOU as a dev wants to make, and have the audience form around that game, not the game formed around the audience preference since there isn't a consencous of what makes a good game among people.

 

I do and don't agree.  Yes a large portion of the "audience" is going to be crazy hard core niche people and if you design the game around their tastes you are going to hurt your game.  That said there are plenty of people with sane ideas and suggestions that will work, be functional, and stick to the design concepts Sawyer himself said they were going for.  Not every fan is someone who doesn't understand game design, you have to pick and choose.  As the Dev you should make a game you like and want, but you should never ignore a good idea just because it didn't come from a Dev.

[UI Style Preference]

You guys can keep the crap that was the old IE UI's.  Functionality is the key element of a UI, not being pretty.  The IE UI's look pretty (I guess), but they aren't very functional and when you have a person who bothers learning and using hotkeys you don't even need 75% of the buttons on them.  The game that taught me how valuable hot keys was actually Baldurs Gate 1.  Cause I literally got tired of moving my mouse from one side of the screen to the other for basic things constantly.  Also those "L" ui's cut off huge parts of the screen.  Did you honestly think they repositioned or scaled it in some way so you saw the "whole screen", they didn't.  The UI just covered up part of it.  The fact that some of you think a small, non intrusive, floating portrait, blocks more screen space than a giant brick of buttons I will probably never use is beyond me.

 

So I voted for "something else" since I prefer some immersive elements in a UI as long as it is still presented in a minimalist way that works with the game aesthetic yet remaining functional first and keeping the most screen real estate visible as possible.

[Hard bind keys to specific characters abilities]

I like your idea but just to throw this out there...

 

In BG and the other IE games you just had to plan ahead.  Had 3 characters with heal pots?  Just put them all in slot one.  Had multiple mages with magic missle?  Bind them all to slot 3.  Etc etc.

 

Either way like I said nice idea.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

I personally like having buttons readily available IE-style rather than opening up in menus, and, going by the poll in the technical forum, most posters here have the same preference,

Easily fixed just by adding a central "brick" of buttons at the top middle.  The clock for pause (spacebar), the outer ring of the clock for options (escape).  Two buttons aligned to the top on the left the first select all (f12) or formation (F) as you prefer, the second being inventory (I).  To the right in the same alignment you would get your questlog or journal (J), and your map (M).  On the map screen you also getting a button for resting and or camping whatever you want to call it ®.

 

The reason I am including buttons is just to make a simple point.  The reason so many UI's today are minimalist is because 90% of basic common commands are easier to perform with a keystroke than with a mouse click.

[Update #54: Art Update - Work IS in Progress!]

Well my opinions, like usual, will likely not be well received on this forum.  Mostly because I realize the current more minimalist design of UI's has been gravitated to because well... they are better.  I can see a half dozen useless buttons at a glance on the mock up.  An options button?  Or I could just press "escape" like in every PC game on the market.  I know some people on this forum haven't played a game since planescape torment but this can be done.... a lot better. 

 

First off in any tactical RPG screen real estate is the most important thing in the game.  You need to be able to see what you are doing, so the fewer UI elements on the screen the better.  Quick bars and short cuts simply don't need to always be on screen, and if you want them to be on screen all the time they should be as small as humanly possible while there.

Anyway like everyone else with nothing better to do I created a mock up concept myself.  Obviously it lacks a few details but it is fairly complete.  You probably won't notice but the portraits are even slightly larger.  So here we go...

 

 

It is mostly self explanatory but just shows the basic idea.  Point is you can get all the same info on screen without taking up 15% of the screen.  While they are shorter the HP bars pictured are actually wider than the mock up by a decent amount, and the portraits like I said are a tiny smidge bigger.  Where is all the other stuff?  Like the image states, press one of three buttons and everything else would open up.  I was going to make some stuff up for that too but I only got so much time in the day.  While the pet stuff is really small at least I got it in there, most mock ups I have seen pretend pets aren't there at all and just ignore it entirely.

 

Lastly one key feature any modern UI worth anything has to have... UI scale.  The people who want it to be bigger should be able to make it bigger.  But the people like me who realize small is in many ways better when it comes to UI (and understand that having a inventory button is pointless with an I button existing on the keyboard) can get it small too.  For the record this is made at 720 obviously like the original mock up, on a higher res monitor it would only make sense that it was... bigger on screen.