Shannon V. OKeets
Posts: 22095
Joined: 5/19/2005 From: Honolulu, Hawaii Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: amwild quote:
ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets It is trivial to add. It does take up some space. For example, BB Massachusetts would just barely fit (I guess). I would advise against using CVL, and instead, just use CV for both CV's and CVL's. Now I wonder how many people I outraged with that comment? - But I make it seriously, because I begrudge using the extra space required for the 'L'. As it is, I am going to have to abbreviated the "Franklin Delano Roosevelt" to just "F. D. Roosevelt". I do not like using two lines for the names here. It is just so much cleaner with one line of text under the ship's graphic. The ship graphics are wide but not high, leaving quite a bit of space. You could put the unit type BB/BC/CV/CVL etc. into the area just above the graphic on the left, for example, rather than appending it to the unit name. As someone without much experience with WiF, and without any experience at all with a version of WiF which has named units, I had to go by the graphics to determine the type of ship, and only then figured out that some of the shapes upon which some of the numbers are printed give a clue to unit type. Even so, I don't know if some of the non-carriers are BBs, BCs, CAs, CLs, DDs, FFs or whatever, just by looking at their names. While I understand (mostly) what the unit types mean, other WiF newcomers may not, but they will learn faster what units are what with the unit types than without them. As a related side issue, I would suggest that the help files include a definition of the unit type letter code, and any unit description have both the letter code and its meaning. Yes, I thought about placing the BB et al somewhere else, but I just like the "CV Coral Sea" and BB New Jersey". If you learn to say carrier when you see CV and battleship when you see BB, then these become "the carrier Coral Sea and the battleship New Jersey were engaged with the Japanese fleet ..." Separating the BB loses a little something. Perhaps I am being overly senstitive? Oooh, how about placing the BB above left (as you suggested) but only if the name is so long it wouldn't fit in front of the name? Two different styles for the same item (always incorrect for design work), but a possible compromise. Yes, not translating all abbreviations is a pet peeve of mine. Though I find it is really hard to remember to define them when you use them. The help system has to include translations for CA et al.
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Steve Perfection is an elusive goal.
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