production and research UI screen

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drek
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#46 Post by drek »

Does he? If i'm short on food, i'm going to build a Megafarm somewhere. So i would like going to Production UI and chose a planet to build on. This seems to be the more natural way, rather than going through the systems and find an planet which can handle a MegaFarm. (Even if there is a local area effect, the ui could make some suggestions)
Yes, I believe. Build projects are things you really need micromange and think about, at least in the current conception of the game. Difference between current conception of FO and moo2 is your microing on a empire scale instead of planet scale.

Effects generally don't stack, so you'd want the MegaFarm far away from other MegaFarms. Buildings generally have negative qualities. If the MegaFarm futzes with Mining, then you wouldn't want it within (say) a starlane hop of a Mining outpost. (course a MegaFarm probably wouldn't futz with anything--but most buildings probably will.)

As described on the Cliff Notes thread, the player is responsible for making "clusters" of buildings that support each other. The player would want to specifically dump a Farming building in a farming cluster, where most of the surrounding worlds are set to Farming foci--and try hard to avoid buildings with negatives that interact with the Farming foci or MegaFarm.

Course, there could be a button or something on the build screen that populates the sidebar with the AI's suggestions for where to place a structure. (assuming we use the sidebar as Tyreth described.)


Wouldn't that make more sense as a tab on the planet info screen (plus, perhaps, a list box on the sidebar)?
Ok, might be. maybe displayed on planet view!?

But at least we need some way of displaying/canceling ongoing projects at a central place.[/quote]

The dialog you get when you click a planet currently displays the ongoing project. That tab is where I'd dump building projects (on-going and completed.)

The central place to display and cancel ongoing projects is the Global Build Queue itself. (or the Research Queue in the case of research projects.) I've got two scrapped designs for that sitting on my harddrive, working on a much simpler third. (first version you've probably seen on my fileshare....the orginal tetris queue.)

LaplaceOperator
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#47 Post by LaplaceOperator »

As I'm going to work on the research-screen i have some questions:

Is this still the most actual version of the research-screen?

http://home.earthlink.net/~drekmonger/B ... search.png

And if yes: what should the topleft researchbutton on the mapscreen do?
just open the researchscreen?

i read something about a drop-downlist of the researchpriority queue. should this be opened with this button?
And if yes: How should this be used to change the priorities?
I just need some clarification on that.

How should the techs in the research-screen be inserted into the queue? is drag'n'drop the only possibility?
EDIT: Should all techs in a category always be visible? or only the ones that can be researched? or some more that can't be researched yet?

Tyreth
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#48 Post by Tyreth »

LaplaceOperator wrote: Is this still the most actual version of the research-screen?
Don't build any research UI expecting it to be the final version. The graphics team has not yet got around to providing the official designs for 0.3. Work off the link you provided for now, but be prepared for the fact that it will probably be changed.
i read something about a drop-downlist of the researchpriority queue. should this be opened with this button?
And if yes: How should this be used to change the priorities?
I just need some clarification on that.
Just leave it basic for now and get the operation going until the art team provides us with further details. A functional prototype should be sufficient for the meantime :)
How should the techs in the research-screen be inserted into the queue? is drag'n'drop the only possibility?
Another option is to have an arrow on each available tech which when clicked puts it at the bottom priority. Or an up and down arrow to put it in the queue under top or bottom priority. You could put this arrow button just below the name of the type of tech in that mockup (theory, applied). Again though, this may change in the future.
EDIT: Should all techs in a category always be visible? or only the ones that can be researched? or some more that can't be researched yet?
Yes, all techs should always be visible. Of course, have them greyed out or something so it's obvious they're unavailable yet.

LaplaceOperator
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#49 Post by LaplaceOperator »

Tyreth wrote:
EDIT: Should all techs in a category always be visible? or only the ones that can be researched? or some more that can't be researched yet?
Yes, all techs should always be visible. Of course, have them greyed out or something so it's obvious they're unavailable yet.
End even those techs, that will only be researchable like in 200 turns?
Just everything?
In Moo for example you don't see the whole techtree from the beginning, and i kinda liked this idea, so I have already implemented the functionality to support this.

Tyreth
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#50 Post by Tyreth »

LaplaceOperator wrote: End even those techs, that will only be researchable like in 200 turns?
Just everything?
In Moo for example you don't see the whole techtree from the beginning, and i kinda liked this idea, so I have already implemented the functionality to support this.
You need to be able to see everything in the tech tree - either in the research screen or in the in-game encyclopedia. If it's going to be a UI design issue causing clutter then we can look at other options later to display it in a neat way.

The player needs to have some way of viewing the entire tree. If it's a big problem for now perhaps you could implement a toggle button to hide/show all unavailable techs?

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utilae
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#51 Post by utilae »

Tyreth wrote:
LaplaceOperator wrote: End even those techs, that will only be researchable like in 200 turns?
Just everything?
In Moo for example you don't see the whole techtree from the beginning, and i kinda liked this idea, so I have already implemented the functionality to support this.
You need to be able to see everything in the tech tree - either in the research screen or in the in-game encyclopedia. If it's going to be a UI design issue causing clutter then we can look at other options later to display it in a neat way.
Yeah, I don't think we should bother hiding the tech tree from the player, cause in Moo2 you could just look in the book to see it, so it might as well be visible. I think Moo2 didn't show the whole tech tree because the user interface couldn't convey that kind of information so well. Though I am sure you could jump ahead and still look at future techs in Moo2.

noelte
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#52 Post by noelte »

but even if we don't hide anything at the moment, the UI should be designed to allow hiding. Some tech from the tech tree might not be researchable too
Press any key to continue or any other key to cancel.
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MisterMerf
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#53 Post by MisterMerf »

noelte wrote:but even if we don't hide anything at the moment, the UI should be designed to allow hiding. Some tech from the tech tree might not be researchable too
Just what I would have said. Was it decided at any point that all players will have all tech available to them? (Hint: that was not a rhetorical question for me...)

BreadMan
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#54 Post by BreadMan »

Ok, took a crack at a research screen tonight. Actually it ended up looking a lot like drek's mockup, but there's a few ideas I had.

I was talking with Tyreth and the subject of how to show inter-dependent pre-reqs came up. First thing that came to mind was to have everything set up like modular nodes in a graphics program with vector arrows showing dependencies, which is why I started with a modular design. I actually think drek's system of window's explorer-style expandable trees is better, but still need some way to show inter-dependencies, so my idea is this: have a specific color or icon (or both) for each category, then make stuff relevant to that category that color, like so.

Image

Also incase it's not clear, the size of each block in the queue is, like drek's, reflective of the RP needed each turn, and the number of progress boxes represent the number of turns at 100% funding.
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Geoff the Medio
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#55 Post by Geoff the Medio »

I'm a bit reluctant to rely on colour exclusively to represent anything important, out of consideration for the colourblind, and because uncluttered spatial relationships or indications with symbols are generally, IMO, easier to discern quickly. (uncluttered being the perhaps limiting factor...)

For prerequisites for a given tech, in addition to colour, I'd suggest having them listed in a format like Name (Category):

Prereqs:
Bananas (Growth)
Mobile Retailers (Economics)

or perhaps:

Bananad (G)
Mobile Retailers (E)

or some icons, if they can be made clear, in place of letters / category names.

Also indicating whether the prerequisites have been researched yet with a check icon, or by greying out the unresearched ones, might be good.

In general though, I'm not really getting the idea behing this mockup. The vertical relationship between techs isn't readily clear... Is a tech under another tech related in any way? If not, some more ... imposing separation between the applieds and theories would be good. If so, why are there purple applications under the green theories in the red category?

I'd also suggest reducing the size of research compelte techs. If you've used gmail, consider how older messages are reduced to just a single line of names in a tab. If you want to read the message, you click on the tab to expand the message box. This removes a lot of clutter from the screen, allowing more space to show info the player needs, such as the various benefits of the different techs that haven't been researched yet (or contents of new messages in gmail).


Regarding progress indicators, having area of the boxes be proportional to total # of RP per turn, rather than number of boxes (expanded or shrunk to fit on a single line) might be more intuitive, though probably not workable in practice, as there's too much variation in total cost and duration to make things fit...

Impaler
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#56 Post by Impaler »

That looks quite nice BreadMan (and very Green as well). I like the left hand Queue portion a lot, it reminds me of SMAC mineral Box. If the vertical size of the block is directly proportional to RP per turn then could it be possible to draw horizontal lines across say every 5 RP to show that? Also the RP each turn (the right most Block) should be brightened or a differnt color as is Done in SMAC.

On the right hand Side I agree Drek's division of the Catagories ontoo their own pages was a nice idea. I would put an Icon for each tec Catagory up at the top Row to switch between them. Below that you see the current Catagories name in a Box, right clicking on it moves you one catagory rightward, left clicking one catagory leftward, Scroll wheel also scrolls through the catagories.

On each catagories Page you should have a very clear destinction between Aplied and Theoretical Tecnology. Say for example Theory is inside a Circle and Aplications in a Square. Also I would remove "Reserch Completed". Rather we use color and shading changes to indicate "Not yet Reserchable", "Researchable" "Being Reserched/In Queue" and "Done".

When it comes to Aplications and Refinments you see a Roman Numeral for what level of Refinment you have. If you have the ability to Reserch additional Refinment on it then it apears in the "Reserchable" color/shading. If you have hit some kind of Cap on your refinment then you see the "Not yet Reserchable" option.

For Pre-Requisites I would show miniturized symbols for all pre-requisites, other tecs have their Icons show and other conditions have other little sysbols that can be used. For example if you need a Trade Pact with another Alien Race to Reserch "Advanced Trade Practices" then a little Parchment Document, a Quill and a Pile of Gold could be the symbol for a trade agreement. The Pre-Requiste symbols are darkened and Grey if not fuffilled and Bright/colored if fuffiled.

On final Note I think the Tec Tree Should always be show in a Bottum Up fashion with "low" techs at the Bottom and "High" Tec at the top. This is simply to keep the visual consistent with the common expresssions used to refer to tec trees.

Structure of dependencies hasent been fullly resolved but we know it will invole some direct dependencies (Tec A required for Tec B) and be modable. I was thinking that the Skill Charts from Diablo 2 might be a good source of inspiration. (Flip them upside-down ofcorse)

http://www.battle.net/diablo2exp/skills/

Click on the small Red Crosses next to each Catagory to see the small Pop-up window with the Skill Tree. The Tree's in D2 are all a constant width using a similar strategy would eliminate the need for side to side scrolling (Note we could use a width of 4 or 5 tecs and more complex dependency arrows or no arrows if desired). Note also that D2 uses a Characters overall level as both a Pre-Requisite for a skill and as a cap on Skill level which is esentaly analugus to our Refinment level on Aplied Tecnologies. Moo1 also uses a similar Tec Level as the Basis of its Miniturization but it had a seperate level for each field and The level is based on how many Tecs you possess in the Field. A similar consept would act as a powerfull Tec-Tree organizational tool in FreeOrion.
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a_claudiu
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#57 Post by a_claudiu »

Ok, took a crack at a research screen tonight ....
To be honest I don't like it. Looks like SMAC and I didn't like the SMAC research screen either. A lot of schematic cryptic symbols in a table that didn't give me a clue about what are them doing. I will just go for a simple list of available techs with visible subitems about what can you do with them (Civ 2 or Civ 3 like I don't remeber). The list can be suplemented with one level further away technologies (grayed). This will make you able to compare them in the first view.
About spliting them in categories, subcategories I'm not interested. Can be interesting from the application design point of view but not a practical one. If I see that I can receive a gun, a hull or research center .... this is enough for me. That I need to apply physics, chemistry or psychology I don't care (can be later in the details).

BreadMan
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#58 Post by BreadMan »

Don't worry guys, I don't like it either :P I've got a bunch of changes and ideas, just waiting til I have some time to go back and make them.
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