A Proposition for Improving Combat Interface Feedback

[Karkarov]

Remember that JPEG screenshots also distort the image, they are clearer in the video. They could possibly be a bit dark I'd have to compare them against the IE games.

In my experience the IE games had much darker backgrounds in general, and since there was no dithering grass to help obscure the circles even more...  That said I have found tons of places in the recent IWD:EE where the circles are near impossible to see due to the snow.

[Sensuki]

Yeah I have mentioned that before as well. The floors in IE games were most of the time usually pretty dark, and grass was pretty much always dark green, because it contrasts better with characters/selection circles, particularly green ones. Obsidian have ignored this and done grass with has baked sunlight on top of it as well.

 

I have never had an issue seeing selection circles in IWD, but I play IWD on a CRT monitor which was waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better contrast and color depth than pretty much all LCD screens ever

[Karkarov]

I have never had an issue seeing selection circles in IWD, but I play IWD on a CRT monitor which was waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better contrast and color depth than pretty much all LCD screens ever

Right back at you!

 

Seriously try looking at a light gray circle on bright white snow, or even a crazy bright green circle.  It isn't easy.  And the reason your CRT has better contrast is because it has less color depth and larger pixels.

[Sensuki]

Do you have a TN panel ? Since they are only 6-bit, they can only re-produce ~262,000 colors accurately, and dither the rest.

Most IPS/VA panels are either 8-bit or 10-bit so they can do 16.7 Million+ natural colors.

 

IPS and VA panels with better contrast ratios don't suffer as much from those problems. TN panels also can't do several bright colors properly (such as orange/red).

Edited November 2, 2014 by Sensuki

[Karkarov]

Do you have a TN panel ? Since they are only 6-bit, they can only re-produce ~262,000 colors accurately, and dither the rest.

Most IPS/VA panels are either 8-bit or 10-bit so they can do 16.7 Million+ natural colors.

 

IPS and VA panels with better contrast ratios don't suffer as much from those problems. TN panels also can't do several bright colors properly (such as orange/red).

Mine can do colors fine, it isn't a monitor problem.  I likely just have my saturation too high as I like that look.  SUE MEH  Outside of the white bright snow I have no issue with the circles, I can still see them even then, it is just hard.

[Sensuki]

Ah right, I always try and tune my monitor to 2.2 Gamma / Natural colors.

[archangel979]

Right well anyway, I did a full playthrough of IWD recently and I didn't need actions over portraits

 

I won't play the Enhanced Editions because I don't find them to be "Enhanced" at all. 

You should for study sake. Too see how its UI was improved so you can see how that would work for PoE as well. 

Actions on portraits work extremely well once you get used to it. It makes reading combat much easier and faster.

[Sensuki]

I don't like those, and they have improved the stat displays in the inventory. However since pretty much everything else about the EE's are worse, I play the originals.

Edited November 2, 2014 by Sensuki

[Karkarov]

I don't like those, and they have improved the stat displays in the inventory. However since pretty much everything else about the EE's are worse, I play the originals.

That's just not true dude, the EE's are fine and already incorporate most of the best mods.  They even add in tons of other improvements and enhancements.  I agree the UI upscaling sucks, but the UI itself is overall vastly better than the original UI's or most of the modders takes.

[Sensuki]

Reasons to not play BG1:EE - it was a bad EE overall, new UI is bad, it converts the game to the BG2 engine. BG1 had better avatars, and the game was balanced around the stock classes, weapon proficiencies and spells. Screws up the spawning system. Bunch of other minor reasons, but those are the main ones. Oh, new characters and mod are pointless/terrible.

 

Reasons to not play BG2:EE - I already have a perfectly good modded BG2. Do not want to spend $20 on something that I already have.

 

Reasons not to play IWD:EE - converts the game to BG2 engine, once again messes with balance/systems. Uses BG2 avatars, when 1PP mod for IWD1 ports back in the much better BG1/IWD1 avatars. UI is see through and not full screen.

 

Oh yeah, zooming in below source resolution on 2D art is retarded.

Edited November 2, 2014 by Sensuki

[Karkarov]

Reasons to not play BG1:EE - it was a bad EE overall, new UI is bad, it converts the game to the BG2 engine. BG1 had better avatars, and the game was balanced around the stock classes, weapon proficiencies and spells. Screws up the spawning system. Bunch of other minor reasons, but those are the main ones. Oh, new characters and mod are pointless/terrible.

 

Reasons to not play BG2:EE - I already have a perfectly good modded BG2. Do not want to spend $20 on something that I already have.

 

Reasons not to play IWD:EE - converts the game to BG2 engine, once again messes with balance/systems. Uses BG2 avatars, when 1PP mod for IWD1 ports back in the much better BG1/IWD1 avatars. UI is see through and not full screen.

 

Oh yeah, zooming in below source resolution on 2D art is retarded.

Uh no, it uses the IWD1 avatars actually....  I agree the zooming in super close is dumb, but the zooming super far out is nice.  The UI not being full screen is hardly a bad thing, not that there is a ton of dead space, just two tiny bits at the bottom.  The BG2 engine is also better than the IWD1 engine and some of the options (like rogue sneak attacks) you don't like from BG2 can actually be disabled.

[Sensuki]

Nah it uses the HoW/BG2 ones. It can't use the IWD1 ones because they do not support dual wielding. IWD:HoW doesn't have dual wield so the BG1 avatars work. My IWD playthrough had BG1 avatars.

 

IWD:HoW was built off the BG2 engine anyway, so Sneak Attack works in HoW.

Edited November 2, 2014 by Sensuki

[Guest 4ward]

i’m hoping for IE influence

• Have small icons on the portraits showing effects on the party members (IE) + have additionally (from EE) action icon on the portraits showing that the command has been acknowledged, which action the char is performing and that the char is not idle (should there ever be a PoE version for mobile devices this is a necessity anyway)
• Have (more) voice sets for chars (IE) as input for the player regarding weapon effective/ineffective/not so effective + voice sets for critical hit/miss (IE)
• Have character animation for idle state (IE/Sensuki)
• Have combat log display effects on the enemy + actions of the enemy (that is what the combat log should be for 90% of that combat log info)
• Have additional information on the enemy (remaining health) be available on mouse over the enemy
• Get rid of animation bars on the action screen, have only floating damage numbers over the heads though

Edited November 3, 2014 by 4ward

[Sensuki]

Well floating damage numbers wouldn't be necessary either if it wasn't for ****ty combat log design
 

[Gairnulf]

I agree floating numbers damage numbers are useless. And they kind of negate the principle of not displaying the total health of enemies. When your party is stronger and you can kill an enemy with a few blows, it would be easy to estimate his total health.

[Cubiq]

oops wrong thread

Edited November 3, 2014 by Cubiq

[Moirnelithe]

*snip*

A more radical solution to the problem would have been to provide all the information needed by the player, for any hovered character, in the center bottom of the screen instead of in a halo, doing away with the frankly redundant set of buttons there. I may make the argument for such a change in a future post⁶. 

 

Thank you and let me know what you think.

*snip*

 

I'd like to chime in that although you might think that set of buttons is redundant, others such as myself vehemently disagree. I use them and I would rather not want to see them gone.

[Gairnulf]

 

*snip*

A more radical solution to the problem would have been to provide all the information needed by the player, for any hovered character, in the center bottom of the screen instead of in a halo, doing away with the frankly redundant set of buttons there. I may make the argument for such a change in a future post⁶. 

 

Thank you and let me know what you think.

*snip*

 

 

I'd like to chime in that although you might think that set of buttons is redundant, others such as myself vehemently disagree. I use them and I would rather not want to see them gone.

When I wrote that I was imagining something like Arcanum's center bottom part of the HUD, a place to display information about the hovered character regardless of whether or not you are in combat, but I changed my mind about that pretty soon afterwards.

 

What would you say about a HUD where the message log is on the bottom left, then the portraits in the center, and the buttons in the bottom right corner (but minus the clock)?