Ground Combat UI improvements

[Skitso]

Ok, a flag... yeah, well.. ok. :)The movement path could also use some prettier graphics than those huge green boxes in the first place. Something a bit more subtle maybe?

[a333]

I like those huge green boxes. They are clear and informative.

[GizmoGomez]

I like those huge green boxes. They are clear and informative.

+1

[svidangel]

Would still love it if the morale bar was replaced by an Ammo loaded bar though.

[crusherven]

This might not be *exactly* in the ground combat UI section, but I wish there were a simple way to assign numbers to my troops. I usually break my men into two squads of four, and it would be nice if it were easier to break them up into 1-4 and 5-8.

[GizmoGomez]

This might not be *exactly* in the ground combat UI section, but I wish there were a simple way to assign numbers to my troops. I usually break my men into two squads of four, and it would be nice if it were easier to break them up into 1-4 and 5-8.

+9001

[EchoFourDelta]

Yeah, unit moving speed should be higher or at least changeable in the settings. Also, animation speeds still need adjusting to better reflect moving speed. Units are sliding on the ground when running atm.

Not exactly UI, but the firing animations are similarly desynched for a great many weapons, both for the Xenonauts and the aliens.

[Elydo]

The kneeling SAW gunner is the main Xenonauts one I see, at least on the armours up to wolf.

[Aaron]

All the alien animations (for every action) should now be synchronised correctly - if you do find any that are out of synch please do let me know. I have not done the Xenonaut animations yet, but they will be revised too.

[Tobbzn]

Would it be a lot of work to allow us to rotate non-square weapons in the inventory? It would be very useful for anyone who wants to use a shield.

[Elydo]

Damn fine effort Aaron, you owe yourself a beer per race after that tedium.

[GizmoGomez]

Would it be a lot of work to allow us to rotate non-square weapons in the inventory? It would be very useful for anyone who wants to use a shield.

This'd be really nice. I'd really appreciate it.

Also, is there any way we could reuse an animation or something for melee attacks?

Giving Sebillians especially a melee attack would be really awesome.

[StellarRat]

Would it be a lot of work to allow us to rotate non-square weapons in the inventory? It would be very useful for anyone who wants to use a shield.

That's a great recommendation.

[Jebediah]

That's a great recommendation.

I suppose I didn't play enough Tetris as a child, I didn't think of that until just now.

Could we please have a "hold fire" button for preventing reaction fire that risks friendly fire? At present I have to physically rotate soldiers I think might hit their buddies with stupid shots, and that seems silly. I used to think they'd only fire if I hit the TU reserve button, but I suppose not.

[Aaron]

That behaviour is unintentional - we are going to add a check to prevent troops making reaction shots if there is a risk of hitting a friendly.

[StellarRat]

That behaviour is unintentional - we are going to add a check to prevent troops making reaction shots if there is a risk of hitting a friendly.

Great! I think that is probably the last big piece in the whole shooting missing accuracy puzzle that you've been working on for months.

[GlyphGryph]

I don't suppose we could have kneeling units in front of other units not have a chance to get hit, then? So I can set up a wall of kneelers in front of a bunch of standing gunners in a defensive position?

This might be the way it works now - I haven't noticed people getting hit in this situation, any more than low walls do - but I think it's important the reaction mechanic takes that into account.

[Dranak]

You can safely fire over a soldier if they are kneeling and the one that's doing the shooting is standing and directly adjacent to them.

[Skitso]

How about showing player some additional info about targets when hovering cursor over them? Like rank, health (barely wounded, almost dead, paniced etc) or some other information one could see in real life. Atm there's no way to tell in what condition your target is, even when they are half dead. This could also help inexperienced players in indentifying higher rank aliens.

[GlyphGryph]

Yeah, that's been my experience - I'm just hoping that ability isn't lost if it's changed so units don't reaction fire through friendly squares.

[Aaron]

The way reaction fire blocking will work is as follow - there will be a maximum percentage chance of friendly fire (tweakable in config.xml) beyond which a reaction firing soldier will never take the shot; this will probably be set pretty low, like 10%. This means they should still happily fire over a crouched soldier next to them, because they have 0% chance to hit them.

[lemm]

Is there not going to be an interruption mechanism here? I'm not talking JA2 levels of complexity, but just pausing the game when a reaction fire opportunity presents itself and allowing the player to control the continuance of the alien turn by pressing space and to take a shot by pressing a key would be most welcome.

Additionally, would it be possible to display the observed alien movement from the last turn in a translucent overlay that disappears if the alien is discovered on the next turn? "Movement" could be visualized by a blue-tiled path, similar to the path preview that is displayed for Xenonauts when their movement is being planned.

[Aaron]

I'm afraid it's far too late for us to implement anything like that.

[smoitessier]

Additionally, would it be possible to display the observed alien movement from the last turn in a translucent overlay that disappears if the alien is discovered on the next turn? "Movement" could be visualized by a blue-tiled path, similar to the path preview that is displayed for Xenonauts when their movement is being planned.

I would settle for them just disappearing, if it's too hard to animate that, but that's in the works right? the not seing aliens you had los on last turn?

[Frenchie]

I'll understand if it's too much of a bother for what it would bring, but wouldn't it be preferable if the "reaction fire threshold" wasn't a constant? Let's say you put a moddable modifier in there, but there is also a link between moral and trigger-happiness? If the squadie is stressed, he would fire more often than if he were calm. "My coworker is in the way, but that thing almost killed me! Die!" (Well, maybe "berserker mode" is enough, but this would be a lesser version of it.)