Changes incoming!
Rest up because you're most likely going to have a lot of work to do when GU57 hits test server in just over a week! :)
I can't go into a lot of detail right now, but we've made some pretty big UI changes for 57. The default UI is getting a re-skin and many windows have been modified. We'll post more when we can. |
Don't know whether to go YAY or BOO cuz I don't want to see Profit broken but I know the need for LUA is great and fearing thats what this is. Since gm9 no longer writes/maintains Profit I'm sure its gonna need a complete rewrite and will take major work on whoever is doing it. :(
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Yay for me being retired. :nana:
But who said anything about LUA? |
I would hope LUA is incoming but from his announcement it sounds like it won't be quite that major.
Silat PS Profit will work ;) |
Profit better work or I'm firing Silat :D
Oh wait you don't work for me. Dang can't fire you unless I pay you first then I can muuuuuwahhh |
Yay for UI changes (updates?). I feel like the UI has been so neglected these past few months!
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I hope you've got auto-filtering for quest POIs for active quests on that list Rothgar, or I'm gonna have to chase you down at FanFaire ;)
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Oh lord, Another LU 13 where every thing changed and every UI was broke. I hated that time (mostly because I am a lazy bastard). IF real scripting comes with the changes cool if not blah, but cool the UI is getting a much needed revamp. /bow Rothgar for your on going work.
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Thanks for the heads up Rothgar. Can't wait to see whats in store when it hits the test server. :cool:
Lua is already coming to lotro, wouldn't be surprised if it comes to EQ2 in the distant future. |
I'm gonna assume there's more to this than a simple re-skin of the default UI. Least I'd hope SOE wouldn't impose major custom UI breakage just for cosmetic changes.
Looking forward to new cool stuff to play with. As Drum mentioned... not much action on the UI front in months. |
Post it soon! I want to see the changes before I leave for Basic Combat Training on the 27th!
Haha!!! |
Please tell me LUA is incoming. I'd happily break all my existing UIs for LUA. I mean really, right now all we can do pretty much is re-skin.
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Whatever this is, can we PUH-LEASE get some advanced click-casting for healers (ala the 'Clique' addon for that other game) or the ability for UI authors to create such a thing? I'm trying to migrate from such a game and I've been simply horrified at the method of healing. I feel like I've gone back in a time machine to EQ1 (which I did play but never had to heal in). I was thinking about writing a very long post last night but I think I'll hold off after seeing this. I was also thinking about re-rolling DPS just due to this, which is sad. I'm not trying to turn this into another game but I am trying to make my life easier, so that's where this is coming from :D
A few examples of click-casting combos (involving modifier keys + various mouse buttons): Shift+Right button (pushed while the mouse is over someone's health bar) = Heal 1 Alt+Right button (pushed while the mouse is over someone's health bar) = Heal 2 Ctrl+Right button (pushed while the mouse is over someone's health bar) = EmergencyHeal 1 Ctrl+MiddleButton button (pushed while the mouse is over someone's health bar) = Buff 1 Ctrl+Button4 button (pushed while the mouse is over someone's health bar) = Cure 1 The modifier is pushed with the left hand simultaneous to the mouse button being pushed with the right hand and this cuts out the step of targeting (cutting out 1 user action per cast!) and was a huuuuuge advancement in my game, and that of so many healers. It also allowed us to focus our vision on the group health bars, which were at least more center screen than the action bars, which are usually at the bottom, resulting in slightly higher situational awareness. Please? *sobs uncontrollably* EDIT: I know some UI's have a few cast buttons next to health bars but that is just not the same thing (sorry :/). EDIT 2: Oh, and health-bar fading when someone goes out of range. Thanks :D |
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Silat |
It's not about being easier, it's about being able to combine keystrokes for more advanced, and more amounts of, possibilities.
If you can have 1 single button location, but have 10 different key combinations, think about the space you can potentially save if you're a keybind fanatic like some are :) |
I wasn't arguing against it ;). More options is great. Just saying how I could not see it being better/simpler to do that task that way.
Silat |
Right. Plus if we had true custom keybinds, you could always bind keystrokes/mouse+keystrokes to do casts without the need to click on the right part of the screen.
Can be useful in the heat of battle. |
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LUA would so make me wet myself... And i agree, i would HAPPILY have everything break for that
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If it was LUA I would think it would have been stated ;) .... hope I am wrong.
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Doesnt sound like LUA, but man that would be sweet if they do ever make that change.
Love it or hate it, WoW UI modding brings a tremendous amount of flexibility and customization options. I would guess the biggest hurdle is the number of problems this could expose. The UI to client interface might not be as clean as needed to give players direct access. And protecting against mods that "play the game for you" also takes time and energy. If not built properly, LUA enabled mods would quickly be deciding which ability to cast next for maximum DPS, or who to target and heal next, with which heal, etc. WoW struggled with this for a while but eventually overcame it. I know, i built a few mods that exactly these things ;) All that said, I would LOVE to see LUA powered mods for EQ2 in the future. I believe its one of the greatest features of WoW, one that truly makes the experience a notch above any other MMOs. |
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Anyway, this is much less about Profit to me and more about the UI in general. I freely admit I am spoiled by a highly extensible UI/mod framework. I think I can grasp some of the constraints that UI authors are working under in EQ2 and if they ever make things more flexible then hooray :D Quote:
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Unfortunately its not Lua this time. We haven't had time to tackle that project yet and it will take a lot of time to do especially if we try to expose lots of client data to it. So Lua will hopefully be something in the future.
I'll give a few more hints on what is coming though, and yes, we'll show you some things at Block Party if you can make it out. First, there's a complete reskin of our textures to freshen up the default interface. If your custom UI is already using its own textures, you'll be fine. We've added some elements to existing textures though, so for some of the new UI elements to work, you'll have to remove your custom texture and rely on the default, or you'll have to update your texture to include our new elements. We've also moved a few elements to other textures in an attempt to start phasing out old UI textures that aren't needed anymore and reduce the memory footprint. However, we've also recooked a lot of our textures to not be compressed. This will eliminate a lot of compression artifacts from the UI. All icon sheets and icon frames have gotten rounded edges which really softens up the UI and looks nice. The inventory window is gone and has been merged with the Persona window. We're now referring to this as the "Character" window because we think its more in line with other games and will make the most sense to incoming players. The XP window has been overhauled and now acts as a navigation bar in addition to displaying XP. It can be snapped to the top or bottom of your screen or can remain floating. We've merged the clock into the mini-map and removed the separate clock window. The map also displays compass directions and the compass window will no longer be visible by default for new users. The hotbar windows have been cleaned up so they now default to the original icon size which makes them look sharper. We've removed 2pixels of padding from around the icons that didn't really have any purpose. The customizable padding value is still there. We've also added a right-hand grab handle which balances with the spinner control on the left and makes it easy to move the hotbar. If you turn off the spinner, the grab handle will hide as well. When you hit F10 to show window frames on all windows, you can now freely move the windows around even if they are locked and click-through. When you hit F10 two more times to return to normal UI mode, they will be locked again. The effects and detriments windows have had their icons shrunk to be the same size as the new maintained window. The maintained window has had text added similar to Profit's maintained window. However, you can right-click the window to disable text if you don't want it. This change is already on test. We dropped the LFG and Friends buttons from the group window and made quite a few small changes like this to clean things up. The bag windows no longer have a dedicated titlebar for the close buttons. Those were moved down to the space where the bag name exists. The tutorial triggers (purple question marks) now display the tooltip next to the icon so you can see what its about. All of the text in these have been shortened and revamped. There's a new tutorial system that shows for new users. It works like the purple question marks by popping when you need to know something, but these new windows are 800x600 and give you more information about what you need to learn. These can be disabled but should be pretty helpful to new players coming in, especially if they are new to MMO's. They explain things like movement, combat, grouping, inventory, broker, etc. There are almost too many little things to mention, but this gives you a good idea of the things we've changed. Hopefully we haven't caused too much headache for you guys, but the overall goal was to freshen the Default UI and make the game more accessible to new players. We've been preaching this strategy for awhile but haven't had the time to get around to the UI yet. There are other bits of functionality that will happen automatically like displaying quest POI's and regions in the mini-map. I hope you guys like this stuff! I'm really excited about it. I still want to implement Lua on the client side for scripting, we just have to see if we can fit that into the schedule soon. Performance is still a big drive for us. We've been doing things here and there in the software to increase performance and we also have some new hardware coming in soon. |
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Hmm, interesting. I like the F10 ability to move locked windows, that's a nice change. A lot of the other stuff I'll have to see to really form an opinion.
I did like having the clock window separate from the mini-map (I generally have the clock up, but the mini-map I do not always use). Inventory being merged into the persona window could be ok, as long as the hotkey for inventory still jumps right to that tab and the persona hotkey to the stats tab -- if that's not the case, then I will not like that change at all (both, inventory especially, are used enough that adding another click is not something I'd like to see). I do like idea of the improved tutorial system, IMHO that's something EQ2's needed for better accessibility to new players for a while now. Oh, and a big /thumbsup for auto-displaying quest POIs and support for regions of interest. Any chance of getting us a sneak-peak on how you're going to do that so we can work on any changes on our backend? |
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The equipment slots and character stats are on the same page in the new Character Window. This will allow you to swap gear around and see how it affects your stats without having to jump around between tabs. However, we did change the window so that you only get 1 column of stats instead of two otherwise the window would have just been too wide. However, I think we made good use of that space.
We also did away with the "Details" tab and moved that data to either the Options tab or the Stats tab. We hope that the mini-map will be useful enough that players will start wanting to have it up all the time. Now that it will display quest POI's and regions, you may want to make this a permanent part of your UI unless you don't do much raiding. The POI and Region information will happen automatically. If the quest is in your Active Quest list, the data will appear on the map. I forgot to mention that the Welcome screen and Marketplace have also seen an overhaul. Here's a little sneak peak of the character window. |
it all sounds and looks good. thanks for keeping us informed.
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I see what you mean with the character window, that's not so bad. Re: the POIs, my question was how will the client know which EQ2MAP POIs go with which quests? |
Are these changes already on test?
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We are shooting for a Test update next Tuesday which will include all of the UI enhancements. |
Will we get a new UIBuilder version update? Also please tell us, is the map window finally circular??!
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Anyway Hotbars and such and the XP window still have me concerned hopefully the custom one I have from EliteUI a few updates ago will still function. Losing the compass/clock since I never run with mini map up will be a change might be able to find a place to put that dreaded minimap up and still keep a good feel for me. Yes I play "them other games" and currently in beta for LOTR which I hate the UI and every custom UI I have found for that game so far. Seems theres this shortcut keys that display when you open inventory and if you drag an item to it you get icons behind your chat box etc. Haven't found a way to move that dang window so its off to my side or something and nobody answers in the game :( So it keeps me from playing. |
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I don't know if anything major changed with ui builder but i can make sure the latest version gets published. |
Any new or changed DynamicData? Is there DynamicData for the effects windows now? :p
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