[UI] Informative unit attribute icons

from Elemental Forums

In terms of amount of attributes, used to describe a unit, we can distinguish 3 approaches:

  • "Why there were so few attributes in Dominions 3?"
  • Sweet spot
  • Console game

In other words - if someone doesn't like my group naming - we can choose among 2 extremes and 1 optimum. In the beta (version 0.255 and lower), it's clearly noticeable, that the game is leaning towards "Console approach". Many players send their feedback regarding the lack of deepness (considering unit attributes), and Frogboy already stated that units will receive some more love. It's hard to say if it is because of the players, or it was already planned, but never the less a statement is a statement. Basing on Forgboy's response, one can derive that Elemental developers will try to hit the sweet spot. Under this assumption, I would like to suggest to include informative units attribute icons - IUAI.

Why the sweet spot is so important for my idea, you ask? Start up the beta, dear reader. What you see? Health, attack & defense. Neat and clean. You have a shield and a corresponding defense value, and same story for health & attack attributes. In other words - there is no need for icons to give you any more info, as everything is plain simple. Now, try to start Dominions 3, and think how could you describe units using icons (together with integers tied to them) instead of: Hit points, protection, morale, magic resistance, etc. Almost impossible task, as with the added icons for undead, poisonous attack, etc.; especially if you consider that you should be able to represent these icons in some limited space on the screen, so that a player would have easy access to unit's description, without the need to open the unit tab.

Getting to point - let's allow the player to get the as much vital info, as possible, by looking only at the unit attributes. My suggestion tries to avoid forcing player to open a special window, just to see all the info he need to know about the unit. Before I will present a set of exemplary icons, I would like to add that the size and number of icons (in 'my' version of Elemental) will be greater. First, it allows player to clearly see meta data of icon, second - it's a must, if we want to make the game deeper. Unit info screen will get bigger, but as I will soon present, it's quite easy to fit everything onto the screen.

Last, but not the least - icons proposal!

[!Big picture warning!]

Useful icons

You may ask yourself, what is the purpose of it, if I can always:

  • Look at the name of my unit.
  • Check the unit's icon & it's pose.
  • Simply fire up the details screen.

I will answer first two questions, at the same time. While the name & icon/pose thingies are quite cool, they will eventually confuse you, as in the later stages of the game, you will make probably 20-30 types of units (hopefuly, as I don't want this game to be mass one - win all, kinda game). That means that you will have to eventually read through the details screen, to get all the needed details about your unit. The detail screen is yet another extreme - now your are forced to click, click, read, read, find, find, in order to get what you want. Icons are somewhat a sweet spot - they can tell you many things, without forcing you manually read & click all the time.

I understand that with the increase of the attributes related to units, icons' value will diminish, but I firmly believe, that if the game can provide info, in a form as convenient, as possible, then why not?

6,183 views 4 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

I like the modifications of a base icon to convey extra meaning as long as it's also with mouse-over help text if you can't tell what the icon represents.

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

by "regenerate health per turn" I hope you mean strategy turn, instead of combat turn. Regeneration during combat would be soooo broken ... except for Trolls and Dread Knights of course.

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Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

I love the idea Red, and was thinking of something similar along those lines.  However, I'm concerned that should too many icons appear next to units in battles or unit manager screens, there may be far too much clutter.  To remedy this, I think there should be two "levels" of icons, primary and secondary. 

Primary icons will appear everywhere: next to your unit on the battlefield, in unit organizers, and on unit sheets.  These would include attributes that need defining for every single unit, such as weapon type.  On the battlefield, you would only see perhaps 1, 2, or 3 primary icons next to a unit.  Secondary icons, on the other hand, would only appear on unit sheets.  These icons would represent special abilities that you would only expect special units to have, such as regeneration, lifesteal, flier, etc.  There might even be small primary icon that denotes that a unit has secondary icons on its unit sheet.

Because we can expect that most units won't be special monster units or hero units, it should be manageable for a player to mouse over those specific units to understand what special abilities they are up against.    

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

I like the modifications of a base icon to convey extra meaning as long as it's also with mouse-over help text if you can't tell what the icon represents.
End of quote

Of course. I don't expect to force any player to read the manual in and out, before even starting the game. You should be able to hover over the icon to see what does it mean. Optionally, you could obviously fire up the detailed screen.

by "regenerate health per turn" I hope you mean strategy turn, instead of combat turn. Regeneration during combat would be soooo broken ... except for Trolls and Dread Knights of course.
End of quote

Off-topic my friend :). It was just an example, and yes - I referred to strategy turns, not combat turns :).

(...)To remedy this, I think there should be two "levels" of icons, primary and secondary.
End of quote

I know what you mean. The point is that if we put some of those icons into "Details", then they lost most of it's use. I see it this way: there will be many unit attributes:

  • Attack
  • Damage
  • Range
  • Defense
  • Movement (strategy map)
  • Movement (battle map)
  • Sight range (strategy map)
  • Sight range (battle map)
  • HP
  • Upkeep
  • Special abilities
  • ...

It's obvious, it's nearly impossible to present them all the time, because there either won't be enough space (on the screen) or the number of variations of each icon will make a non-hardcore player feel dizzy. What I propose, is something similar to what you are thinking.

Every unit will have two 'subsets' of attributes; one subset will be connected with battle, and the other one with the strategy map. Each subset will be divided into 3 'groups of attributes'. First group will represent attributes that will have be always visible and will be represented by an icon and a number (ex. HP 10). Second group will have their icon, but it will be hidden as a variation of the first group's icon (think of it as what I've already proposed in my topic post). Another feature of 2nd group attributes will be the ability to see more info (not very detailed, but detailed enough - ie. without looong description; just a few short words) by right/left clicking the icon. Finally, the third group will consist of attributes that will be hidden - they will be only visible in the 'Details screen'. As representatives of the third group I would suggest: special abilities & range. These attributes won't be necessary to see all the time, as on the strategy maps they are worthless, and for example range will be present in range units, which range should also easily to check by seeing the range tiles (think about HoMM 3/5).

That's my idea for making icons count, and cluttering the screen with too much info.