Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface

[TheDog]

17 this is fantastic and correct, 7 Factories that can produce 2 units each and 3 Sorcerers that can produce 1 unit each, total 17.

.
A feature request.
The ability to cycle round "Production" capable Units with a CTRL+P or similar, in any phase of the game.
This would be "isFactory" units but might also include "canProduceUnits"?

[butterw]

Improved Production Panel

@thedog

• Does adding <br> to the last entry of your tooltips.properties solve the issue (also check, if you get an empty line with regular triplea) ?

• "currently owned" isn't capitalized because it's helpful for dev to know it was added to the tooltip.

• The MoveHelpMenu ui was added to v2.6-pre. I need to backport my latest version to this build.

• ≤ looks OK.

• There is currently no check on placement restriction (if applicable), so that aspect could still be improved.

• Tabs of the Right-Hand side Panel could fit in a single line if the title is shortened (with the full text in the tooltip).
  

v2.5.31-bu patch with Win10 @100%dpi (custom scaling with font scaling%: 125)
L&F: Nimbus (Font: sansserif-15).
I've shortened the player name from Germans to GER in the map and I'm using a 24x24 pixel player flag

[TheDog]

Putting <br> at the end of the tooltip works, but its not common practice, so all maps with tooltips will need this adding.

Can the currently owned be placed before the tooltips?

[TheDog]

@butterw "There is currently no check on placement restriction"

Im not sure what the above means.

For example, in two of my maps I have placement restriction, an aircraft carrier cannot be placed or move into a river, whereas a Destroyer can.

[TheDog]

@butterw
I dont appear to be able to use the Battle Calculator as I used to, how do I activate it?

Also it does not detect the nations in the fight and default always to the same two.

[butterw]

Battle Calculator

@thedog
Battle Calculator is launched via CTRL+B or Game Menu.

I didn't intentionnally change how it works. But it's unclear what the current ways to use it are (Probably needs to be documented ?)

[butterw]

@thedog said in Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface:

@butterw "There is currently no check on placement restriction"

Im not sure what the above means.

For example, in two of my maps I have placement restriction, an aircraft carrier cannot be placed or move into a river, whereas a Destroyer can.

Ideally, you would get a warning when you attempt to purchase more units than you are currently able to place because of placement restrictions.

[butterw]

@thedog said in Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface:

Putting <br> at the end of the tooltip works, but its not common practice, so all maps with tooltips will need this adding.

Can the currently owned be placed before the tooltips?

• putting it after the main tooltip, but before the appended properties tooltip would not be easy.
  TooltipProperties.java joins the .properties tooltip and the main tooltip defined in UnitAttachment.java by toStringShortAndOnlyImportantDifferences().
• It could be put before the main tooltip, which may be a better solution:

**2** Sorcerer: Type Land

[TheDog]

@butterw
I used to be able to hover over a territory before a battle, press ctrl+b and it would populate the Battle Calculator with the units from the territory, this does not happen now. As mentioned it does not even detect the factions involved.

[TheDog]

@butterw

**2** Sorcerer: Type Land

Yes that would work, as the next best alternative.

[TheDog]

@butterw said in Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface:

@thedog said in Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface:

@butterw "There is currently no check on placement restriction"

Im not sure what the above means.

For example, in two of my maps I have placement restriction, an aircraft carrier cannot be placed or move into a river, whereas a Destroyer can.

Ideally, you would get a warning when you attempt to purchase more units than you are currently able to place because of placement restrictions.

For me, I think thats a very nice to have, not a must have function.

As your time is precious, I would prefer to have the ability to cycle round "Production" capable Units with a hotkey.

[butterw]

As your time is precious, I would prefer to have the ability to cycle round "Production" capable Units with a hotkey.

Probably the unitScroller would be the closest thing, but I haven't looked at the code.
The issue with cycling is that it works best when the list is short (2 or 3 entries)

Alternatively, having a shortlist of favorite territories you can center the map on would be a good new feature

[TheDog]

Yes that is a very good alternative. Its almost the same.

[butterw]

For reference, this is what the sidepanel ui looks like in v2.5 with 125% dpi:

If more than 3 different unit types are involved in a move, it doesn't fit in the sidepanel horizontally.

[butterw]

Populating the Battle Calculator

@thedog said in Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface:

I used to be able to hover over a territory before a battle, press ctrl+b and it would populate the Battle Calculator with the units from the territory, this does not happen now. As mentioned it does not even detect the factions involved.

It works again when I re-add the corresponding button to the territory Panel. It comes down to the territory panel knowing the currentTerritory, and this info is required to be able to populate the panel.

EDIT: Apart from using up space, the issue with the Battle Calculator buttons in the territory panel is that they are also confusing. Using the buttons directly is difficult (you are really meant to use the hotkeys ?). The CTRL-A/D hotkeys only work when the Battle Calculator is open and doesn't have focus, it also not so easy to hover over a territory when the battle calculator fills the screen.

• In the territory panel, it would make more sense to only have 3 short buttons (CTRL+ B, A, D) on a single line with title tooltips.
• CTRL+A/D should be featured in the Battle Calculator rather than the territory panel and should be bound to the tripleaFrame. They should work even if the Battle Calculator has the focus.

The Battle Calculator is a fairly complex tool, am I missing something ?

[General_Zod]

@TheDog , @butterw
A suggestion for a possible space saving feature or just adding real estate efficiently.

It probably was already mentioned previously, but not sure.

The toolbar at the bottom of the screen might be a nice place for tabs that are displayed as a drop down list (bottom left corner) with a down arrow clicker. When clicked on the down arrow to right side of currently displayed tab topic, the list offers more tabs.

Each tab can use the whole toolbar or just a majority of it so other information about current player, step, turn can still be displayed. Or not if the tab requires all space.

Default tab selection could be set in a properties file.

BTW, alot of horizontal space there.

[General_Zod]

@general_zod said in Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface:

@TheDog , @butterw
A suggestion for a possible space saving feature or just adding real estate efficiently.

It probably was already mentioned previously, but not sure.

The toolbar at the bottom of the screen might be a nice place for tabs that are displayed as a drop down list (bottom left corner) with a down arrow clicker. When clicked on the down arrow to right side of currently displayed tab topic, the list offers more tabs.

Each tab can use the whole toolbar or just a majority of it so other information about current player, step, turn can still be displayed. Or not if the tab requires all space.

Default tab selection could be set in a properties file.

BTW, alot of horizontal space there.

@butterw said in Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface:

If more than 3 different unit types are involved in a move, it doesn't fit in the sidepanel horizontally.

[General_Zod]

@butterw @TheDog I found the previous discussion where this idea surfaced with some nice mockups too.

https://forums.triplea-game.org/topic/464/taking-your-suggestions-for-a-new-ui/138?page=7

[TheDog]

@butterw said in Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface:

Populating the Battle Calculator

@thedog said in Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface:

I used to be able to hover over a territory before a battle, press ctrl+b and it would populate the Battle Calculator with the units from the territory, this does not happen now. As mentioned it does not even detect the factions involved.

It works again when I re-add the corresponding button to the territory Panel. It comes down to the territory panel knowing the currentTerritory, and this info is required to be able to populate the panel.

EDIT: Apart from using up space, the issue with the Battle Calculator buttons in the territory panel is that they are also confusing. Using the buttons directly is difficult (you are really meant to use the hotkeys ?). The CTRL-A/D hotkeys only work when the Battle Calculator is open and doesn't have focus, it also not so easy to hover over a territory when the battle calculator fills the screen.

• In the territory panel, it would make more sense to only have 3 short buttons (CTRL+ B, A, D) on a single line with title tooltips.
• CTRL+A/D should be featured in the Battle Calculator rather than the territory panel and should be bound to the tripleaFrame. They should work even if the Battle Calculator has the focus.

The Battle Calculator is a fairly complex tool, am I missing something ?

Yes the Battle Calculator is a complex and has these uses;

1. A new player finds it invaluable to get an idea of if they have a chance of winning or losing a battle.
2. A veteran player will still use it occasionally
3. A map maker will always use it to help balance their units, they are also the ones that will add and subtract units.
4. The Territory add and subtract units is for map makers to help balance their scenario.

The Battle Calculator works well if the variables are simple, ie. just attack and defence values with D6. But is less accurate when you have larger dice, territory effects, supportAttachment like Command, artillery support etc.

To sum up hover over a territory and ctrl+b is its main use, the rest is for the map maker.

Other readers please chime in if have other uses.

[TheDog]

@butterw said in Achievable improvements to the Triplea User Interface:

For reference, this is what the sidepanel ui looks like in v2.5 with 125% dpi:

If more than 3 different unit types are involved in a move, it doesn't fit in the sidepanel horizontally.

Could the side bar units be say halved in size, that way you might get 6 in a row?