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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design

 
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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/17/2008 3:04:43 PM   
Neilster


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quote:

ORIGINAL: KERENSKY

Fair call :)

I found why the current 3D button looks weird for me : They have the heavy border top and left in place of bottom and right, like I am used for them to be... Make them look like they are encrusted into the windows while the button you cant punch are at the windows surface...

Effect is emplified because the windows and units have the standard border shades...

Looking at the submarine big picture with the 2 buttons under in the last pic make my brain go all round and round trying to figure what is up and what is down...

Definitely unimportant...

Actually, I think this is an important point. I couldn't work out why it didn't look quite right. Any chance of fixing this?

Cheers, Neilster


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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/17/2008 8:22:57 PM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Neilster


quote:

ORIGINAL: KERENSKY

Fair call :)

I found why the current 3D button looks weird for me : They have the heavy border top and left in place of bottom and right, like I am used for them to be... Make them look like they are encrusted into the windows while the button you cant punch are at the windows surface...

Effect is emplified because the windows and units have the standard border shades...

Looking at the submarine big picture with the 2 buttons under in the last pic make my brain go all round and round trying to figure what is up and what is down...

Definitely unimportant...

Actually, I think this is an important point. I couldn't work out why it didn't look quite right. Any chance of fixing this?

Cheers, Neilster



It took me a long time to even figure out what was being discussed here.

The graphics artist designed the button images using Theme Engine. I am not sure if the option to reposition shadows exists within Theme Engine. And since no one else has commented on this for 18 months, I am reluctant to go back and ask him to make changes.

Personally, I consider this minor cosmetics, and not worth the bother of changing.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/18/2008 11:54:09 AM   
oscar72se

 

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Does MWIF have a function for viewing hexes that are supplied? It would be really neat if MWIF could highlight hexes that are supplied(with a red border for example). I think that this would be really helpful when moving HQs or identifying vulnerable enemy units. What do you think?

Best regards,
Oscar

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/18/2008 12:19:13 PM   
marcuswatney

 

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Yes, that would be really brilliant, if toggled.  A classic example of how a computer can relieve the player of game chores.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/18/2008 12:59:48 PM   
Froonp


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quote:

ORIGINAL: oscar72se

Does MWIF have a function for viewing hexes that are supplied? It would be really neat if MWIF could highlight hexes that are supplied(with a red border for example). I think that this would be really helpful when moving HQs or identifying vulnerable enemy units. What do you think?

Yes, I agree.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/18/2008 7:49:47 PM   
Norman42


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Indeed, that would be a most welcome feature.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/18/2008 8:23:41 PM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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This wouldn't be too hard to code, but I would want it to be very heavy handed so the player doesn't leave it on all the time. That is because it would have to be recalculated every time a unit moves - throughout the entire world map. And each recalculation would take a long time.

For example, cutting a rail line can cut supply to a port, which then cuts supply to a sea area, ...
And a naval unit can likewise cut supply to units that are overseas.
When playing multiplayer, other players can change your supply situation when making their moves.

So I envision this as a large green circle for in supply, a yellow X for out of supply, and a red X for isolated. Note that this would have to be for 1 major power at a time - not for both sides, nor even for all major powers on one side.

The player would have to toggle it on, and could do nothing (move no units) until he has toggled it off.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/19/2008 1:35:40 AM   
Taxman66


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But you wouldn't have to do it for the whole world, only for the immediately viewable map, though that might take longer to code.

BTW, I'm new posting here... but I've been following this forum for month and I've played WiF since... we'll lets just say I know what a HS and LS are.  Though I admit I haven't played a game in recent years nor have the most recent packages (Convoys in Flames, Cruisers in Flames, Penguins in Flames (with the antartica map)... ;))

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/19/2008 2:23:45 AM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Taxman66

But you wouldn't have to do it for the whole world, only for the immediately viewable map, though that might take longer to code.

BTW, I'm new posting here... but I've been following this forum for month and I've played WiF since... we'll lets just say I know what a HS and LS are.  Though I admit I haven't played a game in recent years nor have the most recent packages (Convoys in Flames, Cruisers in Flames, Penguins in Flames (with the antartica map)... ;))

No, you pretty much have to do the entire map.

The algorithm for determining supply (which I have redesigned but not yet coded) works by finding primary supply sources (they may not be visible on screen) followed by finding secondary supply sources. As part of that process the links between the secondarys to primarys (and tertiarys to tertiarys/secondarys) are determined. Once all the supply sources are in place, supply for individual (non-HQ) units can be determined rather quickly - they have to be within ~4 hexes of a supply source.

When a (non-HQ) unit is moved, I have to check if that messes up an existing supply link, or enables a new link that did not exist previously. Very messy to do, but possible to accomplish in real time (as the player moves the cursor) since only one unit is involved.

To do that calculation for all visible hexes (remember the player has the ability to zoom out so there are hundreds of visible hexes) could take way too long. What fraction of a second would you be willing to wait? If you are like me, you would find 3 seconds unacceptable, since it would happen every time you moved a unit.

In my opinion, it's better to just exert parental authority and deny the player the ability to become annoyed with a slow response rate.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/19/2008 3:33:26 AM   
Taxman66


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Yeah I understand.  I thought maybe the problem was painting the supply situation onto every hex in the world when you only needed to do it for the visible map.

For veterns of the game it's probably not much of an issue.  But it can be a harsh learning curve when newbie moves a unit into a OOS situation, or worse moves an OOS unit that could have been put back in supply by moving a different unit first, without realizing it.  Some kind of warning would be useful.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/19/2008 11:28:58 AM   
Neilster


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quote:

ORIGINAL: Taxman66

Yeah I understand. I thought maybe the problem was painting the supply situation onto every hex in the world when you only needed to do it for the visible map.

For veterns of the game it's probably not much of an issue. But it can be a harsh learning curve when newbie moves a unit into a OOS situation, or worse moves an OOS unit that could have been put back in supply by moving a different unit first, without realizing it. Some kind of warning would be useful.

Won't the unit indicators change in these situations? Even new players will soon learn to keep a close watch on these.

Cheers, Neilster

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/19/2008 11:55:01 AM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Neilster


quote:

ORIGINAL: Taxman66

Yeah I understand. I thought maybe the problem was painting the supply situation onto every hex in the world when you only needed to do it for the visible map.

For veterns of the game it's probably not much of an issue. But it can be a harsh learning curve when newbie moves a unit into a OOS situation, or worse moves an OOS unit that could have been put back in supply by moving a different unit first, without realizing it. Some kind of warning would be useful.

Won't the unit indicators change in these situations? Even new players will soon learn to keep a close watch on these.

Cheers, Neilster

Yes. Dynamically with the placement of each unit in a new hex.

--

The complexity of determining supply is intrinsic with the rules. Yes, it is hard to learn and hard to anticipate when moving units.

Letting players toggle "show supply for every hex" on and off is what I am proposing. I just do not want to have it enabled as "always show the supply status of every hex" while pushing units around on the map.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/19/2008 12:53:06 PM   
oscar72se

 

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I believe it would be sufficient to be able to "show the current supply status" for a particular major power (and momentarily not being able to move units). This would probably be a great aid for the players anyway. Thanks for a rapid reply!
Happy Easter everyone!
Oscar

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/20/2008 8:24:26 PM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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Here is my latest pass on the Naval Review Details form. I trimmed the number of visible units in each column to 8 (for those whose monitor has a vertical resolution of 768). As shown here I have resized the form vertically, since I have 1024 pixels available vertically.




Attachment (1)

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/20/2008 8:29:36 PM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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2nd and last in series.

By removing one unit in each column, I was able to spread things out better, so the form doesn't look like a tightly packed suitcase. Most importantly, the name of the hex/sea area location is now prominent and legible.

By clicking on Next (Ports) to change to Gibraltar and then clicking on Map, I brought up this view. The reason all these units are isolated is that no convoys have been placed on the map yet, so no supply is reaching Gibraltar.




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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 12:39:11 AM   
Froonp


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quote:

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

2nd and last in series.

By removing one unit in each column, I was able to spread things out better, so the form doesn't look like a tightly packed suitcase. Most importantly, the name of the hex/sea area location is now prominent and legible.

By clicking on Next (Ports) to change to Gibraltar and then clicking on Map, I brought up this view. The reason all these units are isolated is that no convoys have been placed on the map yet, so no supply is reaching Gibraltar.

Any chance that the CVP loaded on a carrier appear beside the carrier ? If 2 CVP are loaded, then it creates a blank in the CV column, between CVs. Not a problem IMO.
And same with Cargo loaded.

Also, in the "Transport" Column, I understand your will to make non naval units appear, in case the player wants to load them, but there should be a mean to visualy see what is loaded onboard ships and what is not. If I understood correctly previous explanations, if the V British INF Corp was loaded, its transporting naval unit would appear beside it, on its left, but is it enough ?

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 1:15:33 AM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Froonp

quote:

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

2nd and last in series.

By removing one unit in each column, I was able to spread things out better, so the form doesn't look like a tightly packed suitcase. Most importantly, the name of the hex/sea area location is now prominent and legible.

By clicking on Next (Ports) to change to Gibraltar and then clicking on Map, I brought up this view. The reason all these units are isolated is that no convoys have been placed on the map yet, so no supply is reaching Gibraltar.

Any chance that the CVP loaded on a carrier appear beside the carrier ? If 2 CVP are loaded, then it creates a blank in the CV column, between CVs. Not a problem IMO.
And same with Cargo loaded.

Also, in the "Transport" Column, I understand your will to make non naval units appear, in case the player wants to load them, but there should be a mean to visualy see what is loaded onboard ships and what is not. If I understood correctly previous explanations, if the V British INF Corp was loaded, its transporting naval unit would appear beside it, on its left, but is it enough ?

I am screwing up my courage to place the units that are transported alongside of the units transporting them. Every so often I come up with an improvement for how to code this - so it is less work. The reinforces the wisdom of my previous decisions to procrastinate this task.

When a port is shown, non-carrier air units cannot be transported (that's in the rules). So, I intend to simply place the non-naval units in a port at the top of the right-most column.

The last missing piece of the design for coding this is how to implement scrolling, so cargo moves up and down at the same time as their transports.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 1:31:00 AM   
Froonp


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quote:

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
When a port is shown, non-carrier air units cannot be transported (that's in the rules). So, I intend to simply place the non-naval units in a port at the top of the right-most column.

Well, lets imagine that all units are in port, and 2 land units and 2 air units are also there.
You decide to load 1 land unit and 1 air unit in TRS during the naval movement step, to move the TRS immediately next as a TF to somewhere else.
Won't 1 air unit and 1 land unit be "transported" by the TRS during the short lapse of time between the moment I load the 1st unit, and the moment I move the TRS ?
Also, I might decide to cycle through all my ports (still during the naval movement step), to load all desirable units in TRS so that I forgot none and I load the right ones to have a "balanced" transported army, and then move all the TRS.
It's true that land and air units in ports are not loaded in TRS that are in the same port, but at some moment the player will want to transport those units, and it is convinient, during the naval movement step, to load all desirable units, and then proceed with all the naval move.

You can do similar things during the Paradrop and air transport steps, where you will like to load all desirable units onboard planes, and then move the planes on their respective missions, some of them maybe to the same target, so flying together.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 1:56:23 AM   
lomyrin


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I also find it very important to be able to see at a glance what is loaded and what is not loaded in a given port hex. CWiF's treatment of this issue in the Units in Hex display does this very clearly with the ties to the carrying ships shown.  I do like the naval review details screen and particularly the visibility of the ships names there, it just needs to have the missing links fixed.

Lars

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 2:14:28 AM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: lomyrin

I also find it very important to be able to see at a glance what is loaded and what is not loaded in a given port hex. CWiF's treatment of this issue in the Units in Hex display does this very clearly with the ties to the carrying ships shown.  I do like the naval review details screen and particularly the visibility of the ships names there, it just needs to have the missing links fixed.

Lars

I'm working on the links stuff today. I want to get both Naval Review Details and Summary done this month. And their companion pieces Task Force Details and Summary started.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 2:14:57 AM   
marcuswatney

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Neilster
Won't the unit indicators change in these situations? Even new players will soon learn to keep a close watch on these.


For me, the important thing would be to show the supply status of hexes not units. I'd like to see a supply 'front-line', which means illuminated hexsides depicting the forward edge of supply, rather than big crosses on every unit or hex.

I'd also like to see some shading (left and bottom?) around units that are stacked, thickness proportional to size of stack, to give a visual cue to the number of units in the stack. I find the numerals atop the unit do not stand out, especially when there are mountains nearby (e.g. the unit in Gibraltar).

Can a player personalise stacking priorities? For instance, in all games, I automatically stack aircraft on top, then land-units then navy. Indeed, I also prefer to stack naval units on the nearest hex-dot. Yes, of course the ships are in the port, but doing this lets you sense at a glance whether your fleet dispositions are sensible. A customising facility like this would be welcome.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 2:19:21 AM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Froonp

quote:

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
When a port is shown, non-carrier air units cannot be transported (that's in the rules). So, I intend to simply place the non-naval units in a port at the top of the right-most column.

Well, lets imagine that all units are in port, and 2 land units and 2 air units are also there.
You decide to load 1 land unit and 1 air unit in TRS during the naval movement step, to move the TRS immediately next as a TF to somewhere else.
Won't 1 air unit and 1 land unit be "transported" by the TRS during the short lapse of time between the moment I load the 1st unit, and the moment I move the TRS ?
Also, I might decide to cycle through all my ports (still during the naval movement step), to load all desirable units in TRS so that I forgot none and I load the right ones to have a "balanced" transported army, and then move all the TRS.
It's true that land and air units in ports are not loaded in TRS that are in the same port, but at some moment the player will want to transport those units, and it is convinient, during the naval movement step, to load all desirable units, and then proceed with all the naval move.

You can do similar things during the Paradrop and air transport steps, where you will like to load all desirable units onboard planes, and then move the planes on their respective missions, some of them maybe to the same target, so flying together.

Not a problem.

Air transport is another matter, since that is not intended to be part of the Naval Review Details.
---
I decided on a single scroll bar for all the columns. I'll place it in the middle, next to the battleships. When the single scroll bar is moved, all the columns scroll simultaneously. How to code that is still an open question though.

The only other open issue is when a TRS is carrying 2 divisional units.

I think I'll work on scrolling first, for one potential solution for that could also solve the 2nd problem.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 2:28:48 AM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: marcuswatney


quote:

ORIGINAL: Neilster
Won't the unit indicators change in these situations? Even new players will soon learn to keep a close watch on these.


For me, the important thing would be to show the supply status of hexes not units. I'd like to see a supply 'front-line', which means illuminated hexsides depicting the forward edge of supply, rather than big crosses on every unit or hex.

I'd also like to see some shading (left and bottom?) around units that are stacked, thickness proportional to size of stack, to give a visual cue to the number of units in the stack. I find the numerals atop the unit do not stand out, especially when there are mountains nearby (e.g. the unit in Gibraltar).

Can a player personalise stacking priorities? For instance, in all games, I automatically stack aircraft on top, then land-units then navy. Indeed, I also prefer to stack naval units on the nearest hex-dot. Yes, of course the ships are in the port, but doing this lets you sense at a glance whether your fleet dispositions are sensible. A customising facility like this would be welcome.


Displaying a supply frontline would be a lot of new code. In particular, it would require determining which way is 'front'. Usually easy for a person to do using his eyes, but imagine having to figure it out with your eyes closed using only your fingertips - for the whole map. That is how the computer works it out.

The status indicators for units cover a lot of other stuff, like whether they are disorganized, providing secondary supply, merely out of supply or isolated, "in flight" over a hex, and so on. These are discrete and simply not shown if everything is honky-dory. That is, the absence of indictators means all is well.

I played around quite a bit with thickness of the shading to show # of units in a hex. There simply isn't any room within a hex for doing that.

Stacks can be sorted. It can be done individually, by stack, or for all the stacks on the map. There are a variety of choices [I have never looked at the code for this, it was part of CWIF when I strted work on MWIF].

EDIT: I forgot to mention, placing units around on the map where ever you like isn't going to happen. Far too much code depends on the counter/unit's map location - think in terms of 10,000's of line of code.

< Message edited by Shannon V. OKeets -- 3/21/2008 2:30:28 AM >


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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 3:43:39 AM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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Here is a quick revision, where the transported units are alongside their transports.

I threw in the unit writeup while I was at it. There's a missing blank in the first paragraph, which is why the '.He' got changed in to a new paragraph. The period should have followed 1938 with the paragraph continuing "Her hull". I'll fix.




Attachment (1)

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 5:04:04 AM   
hakon

 

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I think supply would be best handled as an overlay. For instance, hexes out of supply for the current player could be shadeded a bit darker (with switch to turn this overlay on/off, like weather). I think that would speed up the game a bit, especially for those who haven't spent thoursands of hours playing the board game.

Not a major issue, though, and could easily be a "product #2 feature".

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 5:43:41 AM   
brian brian

 

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the form doesn't seem to leave room for each piece's indicators...so how do you know which pieces can still move, and which might have already returned-to-base at that port in a previous impulse (or didn't have enough fuel at the end of the previous turn)?

'units available this phase' is mentioned...so this is showing pieces still 'active'; the form could also show all the ships in the port, 'active' or 'disorganized', at the same time?

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 6:05:33 AM   
Norman42


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quote:

For me, the important thing would be to show the supply status of hexes not units. I'd like to see a supply 'front-line', which means illuminated hexsides depicting the forward edge of supply, rather than big crosses on every unit or hex.


Yes, I was thinking of something similar, though not hexsides.

Having the supply status shown on the unit is not what I was thinking of, but showing which *hexes* are currently in supply(or not). Like Hakon mentioned, some kind of overlay you can turn on to check your supply radius at a glance, then turn it back off. Something like the weather overlays. Unsupplied hexes for Major Power XXX could be shaded darker when you turn on the toggle.

This is something that will be handy for both the veteran WiFer and the newbie who is trying to make sense of the supply nightmare. I envision turning it on at turn start to see any supply 'holes' you have(Oops, looks like my 7 factor Stuka is OOS better be sure to fix that), then turning it off, doing your movement with the supply grid invisioned, then maybe toggle it back on after HQs etc have moved to see if you missed anything important.

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RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 6:27:07 AM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: brian brian

the form doesn't seem to leave room for each piece's indicators...so how do you know which pieces can still move, and which might have already returned-to-base at that port in a previous impulse (or didn't have enough fuel at the end of the previous turn)?

'units available this phase' is mentioned...so this is showing pieces still 'active'; the form could also show all the ships in the port, 'active' or 'disorganized', at the same time?

I agree that knowing which units are still eligible to move is crucial for this form. I just hadn't thought about it. Thanks.

Not much room remaining - which always seems the case with this form.

I could add another filter check box: 'Avail.' or 'Orgzd.', underneath the Subs check box. The only problem is that the other filters are cumulative. Checking this one would exclude units rather than include them. Maybe that's only a small point. I would want the default to be to show all units in the hex/sea area.

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Post #: 1018
RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 5:37:00 PM   
IKerensky

 

Posts: 374
Joined: 6/7/2001
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What about an overlay ? that could grey out thoses non avaliable ? or write their status on them ?

It is hard to design a windows with so much elements/information/manipulation...

(in reply to Shannon V. OKeets)
Post #: 1019
RE: MWIF Game Interface Design - 3/21/2008 9:02:18 PM   
Shannon V. OKeets

 

Posts: 22095
Joined: 5/19/2005
From: Honolulu, Hawaii
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: KERENSKY

What about an overlay ? that could grey out thoses non avaliable ? or write their status on them ?

It is hard to design a windows with so much elements/information/manipulation...

Well, I go back to first principles. What is the purpose of the form? Note that CWIF didn't have this form (or its companion Summary form) at all.

I created this form because I wanted to enhance the play of the naval side of MWIF. When making decsions about land moves and combats, it is easy to see all the units involved on a single map screen. The worst that happens is that there are a half dozen or so units in a crowded hex, which is why CWIF have the "Units in Hex" form and why I have added the Flyouts form - to make examining densely packed frontlines easier.

But for naval units there are two major problems: (1) the unit density often has dozens of units in a hex, and (2) the units that are likely to interact within an impulse are so far apart that they are difficult to see in a single map view.

I have made several changes to address these 2 problems:

a - I reinstated the sea box sections onto the map. CWIF had just a single stack of units for each sea area. Along this line I enhanced the WIF FE solution by splitting the Axis and Allied sea box sections so there are 10 separate unit stacks in each sea area, instead of 5.

b - I set up screen layouts so it would be easy to created multiple detailed maps, each quite small and focused on separate sea areas and ports. The idea here is to be able to have all relevant sea areas and ports visible on screen simultaneously. For instance, you can create a set of ports on the left side of the screen and a set of sea areas on the right. 5 of each fit fairly easily, This way you can look at all the points of interest in the Med from the Red Sea to Cape St. Vincent, including Gibraltar, Malta, Suez, etc..

c - And lastly, I have created Naval Review Details and Summary forms to solve the problem of there being a lot of units in a hex. Here I am considering a sea box section equivalent to a 'hex'. Indeed, internally MWIF stores each sea box section by a column and row number.

So, the purpose of the NRD and NRS forms is to:

d - enable viewing of hexes densely packed with naval units.

e - permit selection of units in a port or sea box section for inclusion in a Task Force. This works both ways, with being able to add and subtract units from a task force.

f - selection of units in ... for naval movement.

g - providing information on the location of naval units (friendly and enemy) for decision making at many different places in the sequence of play.

h - enabling a quick review of all naval units, regardless of where they are on the map, which encompasses the entire world. This is done with both the NRS form and also with the Next and Previous buttons on the NRD form.

I think we are close to complete with this form's design meeting the above goals. However, the complexity of WIF makes it very difficult to show everything. Units that have been selected as Naval Interception units or to Initiate Naval Combat are not marked. Nor is the damage status of units during naval combat. Although you can determine those things by passing the cursor over individual units. Status indicators provide that level of detail, as does the Unit Data panel, which is pretty much universally present on any forms that show a list of units.

Once I get the basics of these two forms working, I plan on making drag and drop work for placing carrier air units on carriers (or rearranging same), and likewise for loading transports et al.

_____________________________

Steve

Perfection is an elusive goal.

(in reply to IKerensky)
Post #: 1020
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