Ground Combat UI improvements

[blubberdiblub]

It would be better though if there was a setting to only clear the shroud but not spot enemies.

I think pre-spotting enemies is out of discussion. I don't think it's even possible engine-wise, since the aliens are covered by the Fog of War, which is independent from unveiling the map.

Apart from that, it would be pretty illogical, since there's quite some time involved from having an overview over the battle scene in the air to actually landing (think dust being churn up), preparing, opening the hatch and getting out. The enemies can use that time to form up in pretty much any way they like, so you cannot know where they are, even if you have previously seen them.

Edited June 13, 2013 by blubberdiblub

[Sathra]

I think pre-spotting enemies is out of discussion. I don't think it's even possible engine-wise, since the aliens are covered by the Fog of War, which is independent from unveiling the map.

Not exactly. Flares do this exact same behaviour. You can't actually see units in the pool of light unless you've got a unit that can see that far (they use daytime sight range for this check). Had some nasty surprises with this.

[Aaron]

I really doubt we are going to be changing how terrain is revealed at mission start; this thread is not the place for discussion of it either way.

[Ol' Stinky]

Sometimes you just want to aim for the floor. Unfortunately, there happens to be a prop in the way - a control console in a UFO, a box in a warehouse, whatever - and you cannot target the floor tile you want for the life of you, even using CTRL. So maybe if you hold down ALT while in target mode it could target floor tiles, and only floor tiles?

[Sathra]

Having the damage pop-up numbers be a different colour for different damage types (one for each type, or just a different one for stun) would be nice to have.

[Ol' Stinky]

Having the damage pop-up numbers be a different colour for different damage types (one for each type, or just a different one for stun) would be nice to have.

Yeah, for sure. Also not having the damage numbers vanish until they've been on-screen for a certain amount of time. When using a sniper rifle it's not terribly uncommon for a bullet to go for miles and miles, and by the time I get back to the alien, the damage number's gone.

Maybe put a little icon near the red targeting reticule when a target's going to be affected by suppression. Sometimes it's a little hard to tell in borderline cases whether you're one square too far to suppress, or whether the little yellow square beneath the alien is actually due to light cover.

A button (a keybind, on the interface, or both) that makes any of my soldiers glow red if they're within sight range of a visible alien would be nice. Maybe if you right-click on one of the yellow/red "alien spotted" circles that appear on the right hand side of the screen you could check specific aliens' line of sight. I don't like having to count out whether my sniper is more than 18 squares away from that grey, and I especially don't like having to alt-tab to aiprops.xml to make sure that it's 18 squares in the first place. It'd also be nice for breaching UFOs, as then I could see whether this or that corner is blocking the alien's line of sight or not.

[Sathra]

You can change the time the damage number is present in config.xml. Its called DamageText.

[Ol' Stinky]

Oh, cool. Thanks for the heads-up.

Edit: Since you're around and all - any idea what regenerationPercent in the Suppression tag in config.xml does? It's at 25 at the moment.

Edited June 15, 2013 by Ol' Stinky

[Sathra]

I actually have no idea. My guess is that either suppression regen is hardcoded, or if the percent does anything its how much AP gets regained, and suppression is variable after the icon shows up.

[Gauddlike]

I thought that was how much of the suppression was removed at the start of your turn.

[svidangel]

Suspect so, since once you suppress an alien, it often takes only spitting at it to re-suppress it. Guessing there must be some sort of removal/gain system.

[Aaron]

Coloured damage numbers (plus indications of stun/healing damage) are something I wanted to do too - will have a look at getting it implemented.

[Sathra]

Healing numbers! So want!

[Ol' Stinky]

I thought that was how much of the suppression was removed at the start of your turn.

I think you're right, although setting it to 0 caused some weird stuff to happen, such as shots landing well outside of their suppression radius still causing suppression. I guess simply being fired at causes a minimal amount of suppression that wouldn't be detectable in a normal game...?

As far as the topic goes, could we please get a bit of warning as to the cone of fire? It can be hard to gauge just how wide a shot can go.

Here's a mockup to show what I mean, and a couple of suggestions.

We start with this:

Now, we know the selected LMG guy has a good chance of having shots go wide and hitting the two almost directly in front of him. But what about A or B? If we move the two unmarked soldiers right in front of the LMG guy, is it possible at all to hit A and B by accident? I can't say for sure.

Maybe we could get a warning that wild shots could hit friendlies. I've used the green circles, but perhaps yellow ones would work better since generally speaking, we associate amber with a light warning (both in the game and in real life). This one looks better than the other two suggestions below. The downside is that it's also less informative than they are.

Here's a version where we instead see little squares marking the widest misshot possible.

Or even both together. Now, though, it might look a bit too crowded: information overload!

[ThunderGr]

When a soldier's health has reached the battlefield max, after he is wounded, you can still waste medpak points(and action points) trying to heal him. A notification that the soldier is at max health and prevention to waste the points would be very nice.

[smoitessier]

Here's a version where we instead see little squares marking the widest misshot possible.

looks nice!

[smoitessier]

I would like the burst fire icon to be dimmed and automatically swapped to use single fire if lacking enough TU's

[GizmoGomez]

I disagree. If single shot was the default when switching to a soldier I'd say go for that (as whenever you select the LMG every other soldier suddenly switches to burst fire), but not switching when you have too little TUs. It's only a simple click away from switching it.

[Gauddlike]

I think you're right' date=' although setting it to 0 caused some weird stuff to happen, such as shots landing well outside of their suppression radius still causing suppression. I guess simply being fired at causes a minimal amount of suppression that wouldn't be detectable in a normal game...?[/quote']

The shots don't matter.

To use your top picture as an example if you aimed at the person in the middle with an assault rifle burst but two shots hit soldier A and the third hits the ground by soldier B then the guy in the middle would be suppressed while A and B would take no suppression.

The suppression effect is centred where you aim and is unrelated to the actual projectiles.

It is only really noticeable where the shots go very wide but I still find it annoying

[Ol' Stinky]

The shots don't matter.

To use your top picture as an example if you aimed at the person in the middle with an assault rifle burst but two shots hit soldier A and the third hits the ground by soldier B then the guy in the middle would be suppressed while A and B would take no suppression.

The suppression effect is centred where you aim and is unrelated to the actual projectiles.

It is only really noticeable where the shots go very wide but I still find it annoying

Huh! I didn't know that. Weird. I guess the target is simply really freaked out that anybody would want to fire at him at all.

[WalrusJones]

I would love to see UI for firearms that would be more modder friendly, in respects to allowing for multiple ammo types...

I didn't go through all the pages of this, So I assume it has been suggested.

But: A scrollbar in the equipment screen for weapons that allows you to move side-side for alternate ammos of a given weapon (To allow for alot of them if a modder so chose to do so,) and a toggle button in the actual fights:

It simply toggles what kind of ammo you reload next.

If the ammo is different from the current ammo, you may opt to reload with a full magazine.

As an ambitious modder who has already spent a great deal of time learning your games XML-Base..... I would love to see this.

[smoitessier]

I disagree. If single shot was the default when switching to a soldier I'd say go for that (as whenever you select the LMG every other soldier suddenly switches to burst fire), but not switching when you have too little TUs. It's only a simple click away from switching it.

Chris has already said elsewhere that when you select a soldier the aim/burst selector will revert to that soldier's previous setting and not be overridden by the next soldier, my suggestion is in addition to that, just to eliminate constant needless clicking where possible. i.e your soldier in the last turn was set to burst, now in the present turn you want to burst again, but don't want to have to move the mouse again and manually select single shot just because your stuck in burst mode. It's a tiny detail but think it's attention to little things that makes for a more enjoyable gameplay.

Come to think of it why do we have to have two buttons, why can't burst and single shot be merged and be chosen by right clicking the aim cross hair?

Edited June 18, 2013 by smoitessier

[Sathra]

Because that changes aim level, and not every mouse has a scrollwheel.

[smoitessier]

So people with no scroll wheels can't select aims? must be a keyboard shortcut then i hope!

[ThunderGr]

must be a keyboard shortcut then i hope!

That. I agree. PCs have keyboards and we are grateful for that .