Request: UI Mods for Lack of Suck

[Phunked]

So. The default ui in most MMOs isn't going to have what I want. Mythic didn't disappoint in this. I already have pretty much every mod from curse to replace the mechanics ap chat and unit frames. But we still need more.

I'm wondering if there is a mod that reveals the target's career (friendly or hostile). I realize that this is difficult to do with the API, though it is apparently possible. (I'm not nearly good enough at coding to be able to do it myself). I was also wondering if someone had made a decent enemy cast bar mod (again, should technically be possible). Finally I was wondering what sorts of restrictions they have on macros and what the various commands are (googling this was sadly not very effective). Also, is it even possible to bind something to assist target (I know they have assist group 1-5 but for players not grouped). An additional also: target of target window. I know it isn't in currently (no assist function) nor can it be modded in, but does anyone have any word on when this is coming? Because it better be.

Thanks in advance for the help.

Oh and if anyone from Mythic is reading this:

- linkable items in chat is a must
- being able to EASILY identify friendly players by class, and ideally to see their mechanic points is very helpful
- make the health bars larger and toggleable (yes WoW has this, yes this is very good, yes you really should have stolen this)
- assist target, target of target windows should be in. Right now. Hell actually, 2 months ago

[murdoc]

Mythic made every class pretty recognizable and different from what I can tell. Why do you need a mod to tell you what they are? You start to recognize them pretty damn quick imo.

[amiable]

Mythic made every class pretty recognizable and different from what I can tell. Why do you need a mod to tell you what they are? You start to recognize them pretty damn quick imo.

Someitmes it is hard to differentiate squig hunters form shammies, witch elves for sorceresses and the trannies (elves) from each other.

[Phunked]

It is sometimes hard to tell the goblins apart, as well as the chosen and witch elf casters (melee and tanks are pretty easy).

Also, it is very important when you tab target to figure out what class you're tab targetting, if only so that you know that you have the witch elf in front of you selected.

There is no reason NOT to have this, especially for allies.

[murdoc]

I have no reply that doesn't make me sound like I'm pulling a holier than thou, but I'll just say it disappoints me that people want and will get UI mods that tell them everything they want to know in a nice neat text format.

[Phunked]

It's a PvP game. PvPers are known for wanting to get as much info in as concise a method as possible.

I know that l2lookatscreenandcheckarmor is a common reply, but the 2 seconds it takes you to figure it out may well be the difference in a close fight.

What the hell is wrong with text anyways, there's a reason we use that instead of pictographs.

Also, it puts some careers at a massive disadvantage, since they're very easily differentiable.

[jlwilli5]

 
  Goblins; bow, staff. (usually hiding in a bush,bastards!)
  Orcs...uhm Orcs.
  Chaos; armor, screwed up arm, disky, skull/hunched. 
  DE ;long gown, bikini, dual swords.
  Seriously ?
 

[Lum]

Also, there just aren't that many squig herders. 9 times out of 10 if it's a goblin it's a healer.

Dark elves on the other hand are hard to tell. I still can't tell the difference between witch elves and disciples of kaine. All those slutty dark elves look the same to me! This is actually kind of a problem, especially since it's really easy to tell which order class is which.

[tmp]

- assist target, target of target windows should be in. Right now. Hell actually, 2 months ago

Might be conscious decision to limit the usual "everyone pile on that one guy, switch" assist trains, pre-emptive heals based on enemy's target and all the other boring bullshit.

[tmp]

Dark elves on the other hand are hard to tell. I still can't tell the difference between witch elves and disciples of kaine. All those slutty dark elves look the same to me! This is actually kind of a problem, especially since it's really easy to tell which order class is which.

witch elves: skin
disciples: no skin
sorceresses: skin, but also large stick

all three on single pic: http://medias.jeuxonline.info/upload/war/gamesday2008/DSC00691JPG.jpg

[Phunked]

- assist target, target of target windows should be in. Right now. Hell actually, 2 months ago

Might be conscious decision to limit the usual "everyone pile on that one guy, switch" assist trains, pre-emptive heals based on enemy's target and all the other boring bullshit.

It is currently possible to do this using mods, but not in a way that is straightforward and easy. So UI mod = gives people massive advantage. Also, there's an assist playername command, but no assist target command. Ie. they seem divided on this front.

In addition, if they even want to pretend to have pve content, both Tar of target and assisting are absolutely essential.

[tmp]

In addition, if they even want to pretend to have pve content, both Tar of target and assisting are absolutely essential.

Do their PvE content ever evolve from "first a wave of mobs that anyone can solo, then few bigger mobs that any few people can kill, then a single huge mob that everyone just naturally piles on because there's nothing else"? Just haven't seen anything that'd actually require assists there, let alone make them absolutely essential.

[amiable]

In addition, if they even want to pretend to have pve content, both Tar of target and assisting are absolutely essential.

Do their PvE content ever evolve from "first a wave of mobs that anyone can solo, then few bigger mobs that any few people can kill, then a single huge mob that everyone just naturally piles on because there's nothing else"? Just haven't seen anything that'd actually require assists there, let alone make them absolutely essential.

Yes, higher level PQ's vary this theme (not all of them but a few).   For example there is a quite fun PQ in the dwarf lands where you have to protect a line of dwarves from incoming waves of enemy.  The line is quite long and you need to coordinate a divison of your forces to ensure tha the swarves ont he other end don't get killed while you are taking on the mobs at your end. 

[Phunked]

I know I must sound like I'm absolutely terribad at the internets but in terms of the target of target commands, it is sometimes very unclear (especially with any sort of ranged DPS) who exactly enemies, be they players or NPCs are targetting. This ends up being very problematic, because if you see two casters doing something in the backlines, it might be useful to know if they're both about to blast you, the guy to the left of you or two unrelated targets.

Face it, the UI in this game is not up to par and if anything they should just release more API commands so that people can mod the stuff in if they wish.

[Hawkbit]

In addition, if they even want to pretend to have pve content, both Tar of target and assisting are absolutely essential.

Do their PvE content ever evolve from "first a wave of mobs that anyone can solo, then few bigger mobs that any few people can kill, then a single huge mob that everyone just naturally piles on because there's nothing else"? Just haven't seen anything that'd actually require assists there, let alone make them absolutely essential.

Yes, higher level PQ's vary this theme (not all of them but a few).   For example there is a quite fun PQ in the dwarf lands where you have to protect a line of dwarves from incoming waves of enemy.  The line is quite long and you need to coordinate a divison of your forces to ensure tha the swarves ont he other end don't get killed while you are taking on the mobs at your end. 

There's a cool T2 High Elf PQ that is this spiraling mountain of Greenskins and DEs.  I've never seen the third stage because the second stage would require 2-3 organized groups to coordinate.  You have to clear these camps and burn down Orc buildings, but there's no way to do all six of them in one group.  You simply couldn't traverse that distance in the allotted time.

[murdoc]

There's a disasterously mean Troll in one of the Tier 2 Dark Elf PQs too that hit my Black Orc for just over 3k dmg. He seemed like he might need a little more strategy other than 'Charge!'

[Phunked]

Please. DPS him down GOGOGOGGOGGOGO

[Righ]

If your take on the game is that its all a DPS zerg, why would you need better tools?

[murdoc]

Because he doesn't want to DPS zerg, he wants a mod that will do it for him.

[Phunked]

Sarcasm apparently is too much for you. Learn to not be terrible.

I was not serious about DPS zerg. And no, self righteous asshat, I don't want a mod to play the game for me. I want a mod or better yet DEFAULT UI FEATURE to let myself and anyone else who wants it, know such essential things as: who is the runepriest casting a heal on. I mean I know its hard to imagine, but some of us use this thing called strategy. Now I know I can silence him once every 30 sec. So do I want to silence him and burst his tank, or wait until he's healing a DPSer, let that hit and silence him on the next cast. As it currently stands, I have no  idea if I interupt a critical heal or if he misclicked and was healing the wrong target anyways.

As it currently stands, half of the PvP in this game is a guessing game. Do your AMs have enough to insta heal? How much grudge is that ironbreaker going to smash you with? Did those two sorcs prestack DW? You mean you don't know? But so many abilities are reliant on you knowing this stuff, so that you can use your co-ordinated awesome 1337ness to show how good you really are.

Face it, I'm not asking for much. I want to know who my friends are targeting. I want to know who my enemies are targeting. I want to know what class I'm targetting. I want to know how many mechanic points they have. That's pretty much it. Hardly going to play the game for me.

The only reason that I ask them to let us mod it in is because I know that it will be done almost instantly by the modding community, as opposed to in like 6 months by Mythic. I'd much prefer that the default UI had this feature, but they were obviously too busy shoving the game out the door with all the animations working and the servers stable to do something as silly as ui polish. Yes automation and over modding is bad. No I'm not asking for that. All I want is a UI that actually works, instead of the POS we have now.

[Righ]

How much grudge is that ironbreaker going to smash you with?

100. It's always 100.

A fundamental design decision was made to limit UI mods to functionality already present in the existing interface. Its a PvP game at heart, and allowing people programmatic advantages over others isn't something that the developers wanted. You might want to play Scriptarians instead.

[Tarami]

I'm biased because I really like this game, but I think it makes it a little interesting not to have "everything" in the UI. Makes me look more at the actual people instead of numbers. Putting everything in a metagamey UI is just a shitty band-aid anyways. If it's supposed to be discernable, it should be in the world proper and not as bars and shit in an ortographical picture. It de-spreadsheets (I mean de-Access'es it :) it significantly.

[Phunked]

If there were a visual indicator of these things, I would be totally fine with it.

I have no idea why all of you are so okay with playing a game where you know 50% of the information that you should. I really don't buy the "less UI info = more fun because I have to look at the gamescreen now" argument. What I claim is missing is the sort of stuff that one can't gleam from looking at the game screen because it doesn't intuitively lend itself to any other depiction except a number/bar on your screen.

Also, in reply to Righ, in an ideal world this would all be default. I'm not asking for a programatic advantage, although to be fair, assist target mods for co-ordinated groups ALREADY exist and let them smash pugs even worse because in addition to being organized they also come with the ability to quickly assist a target on demand, which the pugs (who are probably not running the same clunky workaround mod) cannot. It seems that this stuff was meant to be in the UI but was cut/underdeveloped due to a lack of time. Not having assists and target windows seems just outright silly.

I repeat, this stuff SHOULD have been in the default UI, but ISN'T and the fastest way to get it in would be modding, so that the Mythic developers can focus on doing other stuff, like optimizing the game client and fixing the teleport right through my tank bugs.

[Nonentity]

Fixing the 'teleporting' tanks just requires more real-time collision updates, and less client-side prediction. What happens is that your client thinks all is well, and he's running against you, then the server goes 'by the by, you totally didn't stop him' and corrects him accordingly.

They just need to make that go away.

[Righ]

I repeat, this stuff SHOULD have been in the default UI, but ISN'T and the fastest way to get it in would be modding, so that the Mythic developers can focus on doing other stuff, like optimizing the game client and fixing the teleport right through my tank bugs.

Why keep repeating it? Browbeating us with your ideal game design isn't going to make it happen. You'll just end up sounding like HRose.

[murdoc]

Sarcasm apparently is too much for you. Learn to not be terrible.

Face it, I'm not asking for much. I want to know who my friends are targeting. I want to know who my enemies are targeting. I want to know what class I'm targetting. I want to know how many mechanic points they have. That's pretty much it. Hardly going to play the game for me.

Apparently sarcasm is too much for you as well.

Target of target is nice, but hardly necessary. The rest is pretty easy to tell imo. Maybe because I play Destro, but I have no trouble telling what class is which on the Order side.

I like the information the default UI provides. There could be tweaks here and there, but you shouldn't need it to tell you every single goddamn detail of the other side when you're engaged in PvP. Once you are in enough of it, you'll start to learn who does what and when they do it without needing to be told in a LCD manner.

 

[Lum]

Fixing the 'teleporting' tanks just requires more real-time collision updates, and less client-side prediction. What happens is that your client thinks all is well, and he's running against you, then the server goes 'by the by, you totally didn't stop him' and corrects him accordingly.

They just need to make that go away.

You'd then exchange the occasional "oh wait, you're actually over here now" for constant small delays as your client waits on the server for positional updates.

[Abelian75]

You'd then exchange the occasional "oh wait, you're actually over here now" for constant small delays as your client waits on the server for positional updates.

Yeah, it's going to be a problem in any case.  The best solution I can think of is to not simulate other characters colliding against you while you are moving.  If you're standing still, then they will almost certainly actually be colliding with you on the server, so it's probably safe to simulate it.  Of course, that'd be weird as hell too, since you'd see dudes running through you, while you wouldn't be able to run through them.  So fuck it, it's probably the best it's going to get right now.

Good ol' collision detection.

[Phunked]

I repeat, this stuff SHOULD have been in the default UI, but ISN'T and the fastest way to get it in would be modding, so that the Mythic developers can focus on doing other stuff, like optimizing the game client and fixing the teleport right through my tank bugs.

Why keep repeating it? Browbeating us with your ideal game design isn't going to make it happen. You'll just end up sounding like HRose.

Fine. I'll give you a UI that shows nothing except your health, enemy health and your ap/mechanics points.

Anything else is too much, and goes against the Mythic philosophy of failing to rip WoW off properly.

It would appear that you're too devoted in fanboyism and devotion to really accept that the game has flaws and that if they want to have people stick around they might want to fix these flaws. A lot of people are coming from a WoW UI, and the lack of info in this one is going to frustrate them (it frustrates my friends who haven't been around the block in terms of playing shittier MMOs). 

[Phunked]

 The rest is pretty easy to tell imo. Maybe because I play Destro, but I have no trouble telling what class is which on the Order side.

I like the information the default UI provides. There could be tweaks here and there, but you shouldn't need it to tell you every single goddamn detail of the other side when you're engaged in PvP. Once you are in enough of it, you'll start to learn who does what and when they do it without needing to be told in a LCD manner.

 

If there's a way to tell allied/enemy mechanic points please do tell. The thing is the game is zergy enough to the point that so much is going on to keep track off (I typically have 20+ debuffs on my screen in a scenario), that the more the streamline, the easier it becomes to actually think during combat.

[amiable]

[Draegan]

Just wait for addons to come out and you'll have all the info you want.  What's the big deal.

[tmp]

Fine. I'll give you a UI that shows nothing except your health, enemy health and your ap/mechanics points.

While i realize it'll fall under the "it's different genre, MMOs are different and so we must have it" counter-argument... the UI you describe works pretty well for purely PvP games that are multiplayer FPS. It doesn't stop medics from healing their damage dealing companions, the enemies shooting said medics (and being able who is being healed and when) etc.

Heck, the Planetside UI was hardly more than that, wasn't it? I really can't remember.

[Numtini]

Well I've just seen that there's not one but two "grid" clones available for War, complete with HP warnings and click heal. My UI life is pretty much complete.

[rattran]

Enemy mechanic points are one of the things I think people SHOULDN'T know. And besides, unless you're surprising them in a gank, they'll be at max, unless that WE/WH just dumped them into you.