Let's see moves as they are being done

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MCP
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Re: Let's see moves as they are being done

Post by MCP »

Displaying my undo's on an opponent's display would be revealing my thought process.

That's the whole point of deciding whether or not to delay shroud update. It's a tactical decision on my part whether to scout or to check odds with my current see-able area.

Without fog, well people have covered that. Less confusion.
gabba
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Re: Let's see moves as they are being done

Post by gabba »

My primary reason for proposing this is still to show your moves and thought process to your allies. And discuss moves on-the-fly. And for that, showing undos is mostly beneficial.

Since several people don't like showing undoable moves to opponents, that can be off by default for every game, but I think I'd turn it on for casual games, or when I'm teaching the game to a new player and I want to take a handicap - or show him how I think.

(Showing all moves could also be used as a tie-breaker, to find who's the better player. If using undo is penalized by making it public, then presumably players who don't even need undo to plan their moves will come out on top. That could be an interesting new challenge, when it seems that skills are roughly matched and that luck plays a big part.)
Des wrote:[...] it’s less confusing and more efficient to only see permanent moves. Imagine seeing your opponent’s units moving back and forth from undos all the time. At least now, a move on the screen has a finality to it—it cannot ever be taken back. In this way, it keeps the game more fresh than if we saw all the moves; including each undo, to the point when we don’t know a real move from an undo.
Well, when it's your turn, how do you manage to remember which units have moved, and which haven't? You have visual clues, such as the green ball that turns red when movement is exhausted, and you can see the remaining movement range of units.

If we had access to that same information about the current player's units (instead of just seeing a blue ball for allies, and nothing for enemies), much of the confusion would go away. We just need different colors for the ball, such as yellow for "movement remaining", and purple for "movement exhausted". Then, if the little ball was purple and turns yellow during the move, you know right away that it's an undo because the unit has just recovered it's movement.

On top of that, I think that a visual clue would be necessary to signal undos, such as a red UNDO word that floats up from the unit just like healing digits, or a slight flash to a different tone around the unit... or else, draw the footsteps of the move that's being undone in red, and have the unit "swallow them up" as it moves back.

Just to make sure nobody gets confused: I'm only proposing to show this move information when Hide undoable moves from enemies is off.
Last edited by gabba on July 23rd, 2009, 3:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Pentarctagon
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Re: Let's see moves as they are being done

Post by Pentarctagon »

gabba wrote:If we had access to that same information about the current player's units (instead of just seeing a blue ball for allies, and nothing for enemies), much of the confusion would go away.
actually, you do. if you click on an enemy unit, the game will show you where that unit can go from there and how many mp it has left in the unit box.
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Turuk
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Re: Let's see moves as they are being done

Post by Turuk »

Pentarctagon wrote:actually, you do. if you click on an enemy unit, the game will show you where that unit can go from there and how many mp it has left in the unit box.
Also, control+v will allow you to see the limits of all enemy moves.
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gabba
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Re: Let's see moves as they are being done

Post by gabba »

Pentarctagon wrote:actually, you do. if you click on an enemy unit, the game will show you where that unit can go from there and how many mp it has left in the unit box.
Uh, who doesn't know that? But if you want to see the status of all units at a glance, having to click each one is not exactly efficient.
Turuk wrote: Also, control+v will allow you to see the limits of all enemy moves.
That I didn't know. Thanks Turuk, it'll be very handy. However I assume it doesn't show the individual status of each unit?
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Turuk
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Re: Let's see moves as they are being done

Post by Turuk »

gabba wrote:That I didn't know. Thanks Turuk, it'll be very handy. However I assume it doesn't show the individual status of each unit?
Ah, well then, a few more details.

Control + v is Show Enemy Moves, which will highlight all the hexes the enemy can move to, as well as putting a number in each hex that tells you the number of enemy units that can move there.

Control + b is Best Possible Enemy Moves, which is how far the units could move if your units were not in the way. This is useful if you are worried about one of your units dying and you want to see if the enemy is capable of reaching your squishier units.
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Re: Let's see moves as they are being done

Post by gabba »

So, I gather that most people like the "show undoable moves to allies" idea? (Let's forget about showing them to enemies for now.)

Is some experienced developer interested in looking into this? I'd like to give it a go myself, actually, unless someone thinks he can do that in a very short time with minimal effort.
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