I know there are some players out there that want to master all aspects of the games they play, just to get a sense of completion out of it. Others might just play the game until they get their fill, and might not even explore everything else the game has to offer, mastering only those aspects that are necessary to most directly help them complete the game successfully. Which brings me to my question. A game idea I have involves squad-based combat with all the necessary and typical hotkeys: * Target nearest enemy * Assist friendly (target the same enemy he is targetting) * Assist squad (target the most eligible enemy among the squad's targets) * Cover friendly (target the most eligible enemy targetting him) * Target nearest friendly * Command squad to assist targeted friendly * Command Squad to cover targeted friendly * Command squad to hold formation * Command squad to break and attack a group of targets (they split up their targets effectively among each other) * Acknowlede wingman's request to cover him (automatically targets the most eligible enemy) By most eligible, I mean an enemy that is not already being targeted by your squad. Here's more: * Target nearest enemy not already being targeted by ANYONE hostile to it * Target nearest enemy not already being targeted by any friendly * Target nearest enemy not already being targeted by anyone in your squad * Target nearest enemy not already targeted that is threatening a friendly * Target nearest enemy not already targeted that is threatening a mission critical vehicle And the list can go on and on, whatever I might deem useful in a given situation. * Target nearest utility vehicle targetted by your neighbor's grandmother The Freespace games had a lot of hotkey commands that I really didn't make use of. But the game was fairly easy to complete without even knowing all the commands. And if I discovered another command that I thought was useful, it made the game that much easier. The game idea I have could very well be very hard to complete without strategic selection of targets, and I'm concerned that the hotkeys that a player finds "necessary" might be too varied and overwhelming to keep track of, which would be a big turn off. This would be especially true if a large base of hotkeys are necessary to function effectively even within the first few missions of the game. What was my question? Oh yeah. How do you feel about a boatload of such options being available and how they would affect gameplay, and your enjoyment of learning and playing the game? [edited by - Waverider on December 20, 2002 5:34:18 PM]

When I was playing Ultima Online, I always felt that the keyboard configuration was ace. You could map every key on the keyboard as you wanted with commands and arguments. This however make me feel handicaped when i play other rpgs now, with static keys or with light macro functionality.

UOs macro editor looked something like :

CTRL-S - CastSpell

CTRL-A - 1. CastSpell Healing
2. Wait 2
3. TargetSelf
F1 - Open Inventory
F2 - Open Map
F3 - Say "GIVE ME THE BANANA FOOL! YOU CANT HANDLE THE BANANA!"

and so on. I think the main thing to think about is to not make people with heavy macro usage become too powerful. You should still be able to use the standard keys and have the same functionality as the ones that use 200 lines macros. The "cheat" macros will be done anyway using EZMacro or Macroexpress and so on. But having a good keyboard editor is only a good thing as far as I can see. .

my 2 cents.

I do plan to make the hotkeys configurable. But the sheer quantity of them could also be a handicap in itself.

I'd like thoughts on that aspect, too. Any such experience with existing games that anyone has had, etc. would be appreciated!

Hmm... maybe a player could build their hotkeys.

* Target

* Nearest
* Fastest
* Weakest
* Strongest

* Enemy
* Friendly

* Any
* Not yet threatened by anyone
* Not yet threatened by your squad

that

* N/A
* Is threatening your squad
* Is targetting a mission critical craft

etc. etc.


[edited by - Waverider on December 20, 2002 5:46:41 PM]

the bad thing is when the interface becomes too crowded. Plus it increases learning curve

When there are many many things to tweak like that, I enjoy a general option for "expert mode". So that new players can play through with simple things predetermined for them, while if you really really want to be good, you can turn on expert mode and have access to all these weird gameplay commands and tweaks.


-Run_The_Shadows@excite.com

Basically what Run_The_Shadows said - more options are good, provided you don''t have to know about them. Though having transparent defaults means you have to consider balance issues between untweaked and tweaked users...

Are too many options a bad thing?

YES!

This cannot be stressed enough...QUALITY (how useful they are) over quantity (how many they are).

honestly, a squad-basied combat game with the following hot-key options:

quote:

---

* Target nearest enemy
* Assist friendly (target the same enemy he is targetting)
* Assist squad (target the most eligible enemy among the squad''s targets)
* Cover friendly (target the most eligible enemy targetting him)

---

That is just SCREAMING for better unit AI!!!

Unless you want the player to drown in micromanagement hell...or each option has a SUBSTANTIAL difference ("cover friendly" gives a unit power-ups over "assist friendly", for example) if not that these options would be redundant in many situations (redundant != usefull)..."assist squad" won''t be usefull if there is only a single squad in a particular mission...or if the unit whom is given the order, belongs to the same squad in question.

I had the idea of semi-intelligent units in real-time strategy games, with the possibility to "override" AI in standard situations.

***Click on enemy building: attack this building, return fire if another unit attacks.

***Double-click on enemy building: attack this building, regardless of what happens, until it goes down.

[infantry only]
***If health goes below threshold, go crazy, stop obeying orders and try to survive until no threats are left.

[manned units]
***If health goes below threshold, all units inside begin evacuation.

quote:

---

Original post by MSW

That is just SCREAMING for better unit AI!!!

---

There may, and most likely will be times when you need to actually direct your squad. Yes, I do plan to make them fairly intelligent about target selection and courses of action to take. But I don't think that will necessarily cause to emerge a natural ability to focus resources in the right areas at the right time. Especially when the battle reaches a critical point where the player notices a weakness to punch through that the AI doesn't, or a weakness in your own squad that requires a re-fortification of your teammates.

Plus, I want to give the player SOME control, otherwise the AI plays the whole game when it comes to battles. I think the player should have the feeling that they are somewhat better than the computer in this area, but still challenged.


[edited by - Waverider on December 21, 2002 8:53:44 AM]

quote:

---

But I don''t think that will necessarily cause to emerge a natural ability to focus resources in the right areas at the right time. Especially when the battle reaches a critical point where the player notices a weakness to punch through that the AI doesn''t, or a weakness in your own squad that requires a re-fortification of your teammates.

---

so how would that work with these options:

quote:

---

* Target nearest enemy
* Assist friendly (target the same enemy he is targetting)
* Assist squad (target the most eligible enemy among the squad''s targets)
* Cover friendly (target the most eligible enemy targetting him)

---

If the player can see that enemy-A is the weakpoint, and as such targeting it would prove most prudent...NONE of these options allows for that!...If the "nearest enemy" isn''t enemy-A, then this option is useless for at least some of the players troops..."assist friendly" would only work if the friendly unit is targeting enemy-A..."assist squad" would only prove completely usefull if the entire squad is targeting enemy-A...which leaves "cover friendly" as the only meens of makeing a unit actualy target enemy-A in the first place (and if enemy-A isn''t targeting the player, it makes it hard to actualy get any of your units to target enemy-A in the first place!)...

Doesn''t exactly give the player a lot of direct control when they may need it the most...