Originally Posted by
Dhalin
I'm going to post a small collection and tweak suggestions to make our in-game life better/easier.
When I say better/easier, I am not talking about gameplay challenge, I'm talking about UI interaction, and similar things. I'm not trying to make enemies easier to kill, nor crafting easier to level, I'm trying to remove some of the tedium, annoyances, and 'why don't we have that?' things having to do with UI and similar things.
Hotkeys
Hotkeys are an important UI element, and if we're talking about UI changes, the Hotkey system is the first thing that could use a little boost. Here are a couple little things I'd like to see done:
1). Allow us to keybind additional hotkey banks. I was looking through the keybinds and I've only seen Hotkeys 1-10 and Switch to Banks 1-10. How about this: Give us a way to keybind an additional 3 banks. IMO, I'd use Shift+1, Shift+2, Ctrl+1, Ctrl+2, Alt+1, Alt+2 etc to hotkey up to 4 banks and display all 4 of those banks on my screen. That way, I have access to 40 different hotkeys and abilities with a single keypress (well, 2 keys simultaneously).
2). Give us an option to make it so that switching hotkey banks does not duplicate hotkey banks already on-screen. Example: If I display the first 4 banks on screen, Banks 1, 2, 3 and 4, and I have 1 as being the active hotkey bank, and I do Shift+2, the first bank switches to bank #2. Now I have 2, 2, 3, 4 on my screen. Instead, is there a way we could make it so that when I hit Shift+2, it switches focus to the 2nd hotkey bank instead so that I still have 1, 2, 3, 4 on my screen?
3). Give us an additional 2 hotkeys per bank -- make them default to "-" and "=". I think "=" is already keybound to something else, so we'd have to switch that or leave the default blank so that the user could pick a key for this.
o yeah - all of this for sure. more hotkeys on more banks, you bet!!! vel ran out long ago.....
Map
Another very important UI element that could use a little sprucing up. There is currently a very nice map mod that allows you to display crafting tools, machines, etc, so I'm not going to ask for those. However, I would like to ask for...
1). I have already made this suggestion before, but it fits in with this post, so I'll duplicate it here. Allow us to do one of two things: A). Allow us to choose a "Simple Mode" for the Map Window that removes all of the UI elements around the map, so that the map has nothing but a little frame around it, so that we can resize it and move it to our desired location and leave it on-screen full-time.
Or, B). Make a new UI element called a 'Mini Map' which does the same thing. With the thick black border around it, the current Map Window does not make a very good mini-map, it takes up too much space on the screen and the game limits you to how small you can resize it.
2). Is it possible to have our own white dot turned into a triangle so that we can know which direction we are facing when we open the map (or use a minimap by either my suggestions above)? I know we have a compass, but every so often I catch myself reversing East and West and getting disoriented, as I'm so used to the player's marker being a triangle/arrow/etc in other games.
3). Updates. Could we update the map to reflect changes made to Istaria in the past couple years? For example, the area between the Spiritous Swamp and the Eastern Deadlands is still shown as a non-blighted area in which you could take a road down to get to Draak. Such has not been the case since my dragon ascended to adulthood nearly two years ago. That entire area is blighted with Lv110+ Kwellen, and has been for a long time, yet the map *still* doesn't show it.
well, i am very used to the current map. i certainly am against any changes to the ability to personalize mark the map. i have no prob resizing my map and find the compass enough for me to use to get around. i can get with the changing the white dot for a pointer type marker. it is convenient to be able to see which direction you are heading without the extra glance at the compass. very very much behind #3, the map def needs to be upgraded to fit with all the new changes.
Inventory/Looting
1). Could we get some sort of "Sort" function for our inventory, or maybe an auto-sort? Sometimes when I am adventuring, especially if I am slaying undead, I pick up a lot of loot. A Sort, or especially auto-sort, would work wonders here. Maybe the Sort could even be customized in the Options window or something, and by default, it'd alphabetize item types, and then place items in alphabetical order, or something?
2). Could we fix the bug that places items off-screen when there is room on-screen? I can't count the number of times I took an extra tool with me to craft, because for some odd reason, the game dumped a tool a mile off-screen and I didn't notice the scrollbar in my inventory window and wound up wasting 10 bulk of my inventory carrying that extra tool around (not to mention the time it took for me to find that tool and the horror of 'omg, where's my smithing hammer!? Did I accidentally delete/decon it!?').
3). Could we get a Right-Click, Loot-All feature? Right now, when you kill something and Right-Click the corpse, you get "Loot Mobname" and "Gather Resources from Mobname". Add a third: "Loot Everything from Mobname". Now that mobs don't drop resources, there's very few instances in which I don't grab everything a mob drops. Also, could we add a /lootall command, and allow us to keybind /loot and /lootall?
4). Could we shift/control-click/highlight multiple items at once, for trading/vault/storage structure/PB/Consigner interaction? This is doubly so for Storage Structures, when the game makes you wait a minimum of 5 seconds between items, it can be a real chore to move 10-20 items when you have to wait 5-10 seconds between each move. How about allowing us to highlight several items at once, and drag them all at once, to dump them into the structure, pawn broker, consigner, vault, or trade window? This would work just like Windows Explorer does with files -- click the first item, and then shift+click the last item, and everything in between gets highlighted. Maybe this would only work in List Mode, if the different size items would get in the way?
you mean different from the auto arrange function (that's what i use to cure both #1 and #2)? i wouldn't mind a sort function at all, altho the list view function does list your things by alphebetical order. however, i am one of those who uses grid view like 98% of the time. totally behind #2 - i hate when mi inventory dumps stuff underneath the viewing area when you have plenty of viewable area. vel has a hotkey for auto loot - granted it only brings up window, but it is easy enough to hit take all. i am one of those who like to look at the loot in case i don't want it, but i gots no prob if others would like a loot all link like gather or loot. well, i can do something like choose all, by holding down the shift key while cliking on items i want to mass add. i would def love a 'hilite all between' function, however.....
Crafting
1). Bonus Resources. This has been talked about before, but let us re-iterate it. Bonus Resources are annoying whenever they are the next-tier-up. Now that we have actual T6 resources existing in the game world (even though they can be a little rare), we don't need to rely upon transmutation and mining up scads of t5 in hopes of t6 bonuses. Could we include either an option, or remove entirely, all non-t6 bonus resources of the next tier up? Also, with gems and metal, give us an option to turn off bonus resources of the same tier too. Making Tricuts gets quite annoying when you have to keep splitting and deleting extra gems, for example.
2). Allow us to mark a stack as 'complete' or 'full'. Example: I'm doing Tricuts and I know that my dragon (adult, Dimension Pocket X completed) can hold -exactly- 250 of 3 different gems. I want to mine 250 of each gem, turn them into 250 tricuts, and dump tricuts in disk. If we can't get a tweak to bonus resources, then how about allowing us to 'lock' a stack? Maybe make it as a right-click option, or add a button in the UI, but when clicked/activated, the stack is not permitted to go any higher than what you locked it to. Example, I'd gather 250 uncut garnet, and then "Lock" it. The game would remember for the rest of that session (this should disappear upon logout) that I should never, ever have a stack of "uncut garnet" of more than 250. If I get a bonus resource of 5, it would start a new stack, because I have more than 250. These could easily be deleted, as I don't have to click "Split stack", and tell it to split 5, and THEN delete it.
3). I know I said I wouldn't propose a change to make gameplay easier, but mayhaps this is the only exception to the rule: Could we tighten up the Random Number Generator spread on gathering resources? It seems as though once you get "maxed" out on a gathering skill, you are capable of gathering anything from 1 to 20 resources at a time, and are at complete mercy of the Random Number Generator. It is a bit humiliating and annoying that my craft 100 goes out, whacks a bronze node, and gets 1s and 2s. How about instead of 1-20, we make that spread, 5-15 at maxed skill? Or maybe once you are "maxed" with Tier 2, Tier 1 has a spread of 10-20?
This isn't meant to make crafting "easier", but more removing the tedium/annoyance associated with gathering materials you are far beyond maxed out, so that you can actually enjoy the benefits of spending all of that time leveling your crafting skill.
4). Trading. Could we get a tweak to trading and inventory room? I hate the dreaded "xxxx does not have enough room for this" error when trying to help someone craft. For some odd reason, the game doesn't know to automatically place stuff in a disk. Example, I'm doing obsidian bricks, and I have 1 brick already in my disk. It will not let me trade anything over my personal inventory capacity, so I have to do several trades (which takes a lot of time), instead of the game knowing to automatically dump what I get into the disk, until the disk is full. We could remedy this, by two ways:
A). Give us an option to accept trades that would overburden us. We know the penalty for overburdening: we can't move. Usually, I'm standing beside the crafting machine anyways. Now, I know this COULD be used as an exploit, to allow a person to act as a silo, that's why you couldn't accept a trade if you are already overburdened, so the worst that would happen is that someone would give you disk+inventory full, which is already possible anyways, with a bunch of smaller trade sessions.
B). Make it so that the game is smart enough to dump resources in the disk, if the disk can accept such resources. The Gathering function already knows how to do this, why would it be any different for trading items? You are still receiving items into your inventory, shouldn't the game automatically check your disk to see if it can hold it, first? Make it so that the game only does that with items that have the "Resource" flag, and items that have a bulk greater than 1 (so that the game doesn't start dumping tech comps on a disk.. tho I can't imagine why someone would have a disk out while accepting tech comp trades).
5). Allow us to set an option that says "Do not gather past xxxx% overburdening" somewhere in the options window. If I set it to, say, 10%, then the game would refuse (and automatically delete) any gathering result that would put me over 10% overburdening. My dragon currently has 4500 inventory for example. If I have, say, 1 scroll on me, and I gathered 449 ore (leaving me with 9 bulk left), and I whacked an ore node and got, say, 4 ore, the game would say this:
Speed reduced by 1% due to overburdening.
3 Copper and Tin Ore were discarded.
Inventory is full.
The game threw out 3 copper and tin ore, because those would have put me over 10% overburdening.
I hope some of these UI tweaks are considered, they would make Istarian Life quite a bit less tedious and maybe even make the game seem a little more polished, which is all the better, when trying to get newcomers to give the game a serious look, and help keep some of the older veterans around.
#1 - i like the bonus resources - i just wish they were exclusively resources of the tier currently being crafted - granite should only give granite bonus, steel would give iron and nic, etc.
#2 - got no probs with this, if i understand correctly, sounds like a very handy function.
#3 - hey sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. playing D&D taught me that......
#4 - yeah this sounds like an improvement. trading a lot of something does take forever.......
#5 - is an interesting idea. i would say give a choice of what to delete - i might be more likely to delete the next tier bonus resources rather than the resources i am currently working on.
Collection of "Little" Tweaks to make Istarian Life better.
