while there are little problems here and there, i think TA:S is doing great at where it is right now.
the right click did bug me the first game but after 2 games, i was used to it. now i'm messed up when i play left clicking games. its just something that takes getting used to. it's not that the dev's are trying to get people not to like it, it's that there are more pressing things in development, like the new GUI(if it ever comes out).
about your gf self-Ding her comm, that was her fault. even if you press ctrl+d, the message board relays whats going on. if the keys bother you, there is a log in the spring folder that can change the order.
pathfinding is bad but not terrible. having played TA way back, i remember when there'd be 150+ units, pathfinding was nonexistent. units would just drive forward and run into anything they could. it would be minutes before they would move. also, when moving groups of units, they'd start the do semi-circle turns and end up running into each other. units do have bad pathfinding in spring but it doesn't bother me most of the time.
the problem with units not obeying commands does happen but rarely. i lost 15 brawlers because they refused to attack a mobile AA tank. the best thing to do is move them to the area where you want them to attack and then tell them to attack. haven't had a problem since.
GUI is too cluttered? i find it less cluttered then most GUI's. if you don't like the position of a certain bar, you can move it anywhere.
the minimap does annoy me as well. you can't order units somewhere on it but i'm used to it by now. i just use it to get to a map quickly.
the thrid person view is great when a unit gets stuck. i don't know how many times i've had a unit stuck in trees, on buildings, or land in general. i took control of him and got him out of there with ease.
as for the shift+esc not getting a prompt, when was the last time you saw a game with that as the escape? if you press esc, it tells you to press shift+esc to exit the game. i have never found it to be a problem.
you make great points about it not being newb friendly but many games come to mind, esp earth 2150. have you played that game? its a nightmare for new users. i spent days getting used to it. it only takes a few games to get used to spring. i don't think there is a game out there that is really newb friendly. while it would be nice, we'd probably be dealing with a childs game then.
when you play the game with others online, usually we can all answer a question you have. i never had a problem with someone not knowing what something does or what you need to press to do something. they'd ask and me or someone else would tell them.
Review of TA Spring 0.70b3
Moderator: Moderators
As many have pointed in one or several ways, you need to actually play the game, not just watch it 5 minutes.
Your gunships stopped moving because the unit they were about to attack died, and so their command did too. And your proposed solution is questionable, as it will give the units orders which they didnt have in the first place, not consistent.
Also this happened even in ota days, fyi.
"If you select 30 mobile units and accidentally include one building, you cannot move the group"
If you press M key, then your units of building or wtv will effectively move.
The interface needs work. but is it has not changed so far.. you know, why?
It is because it fullfills the basic (and more) needs for this rts game.
Its not a cool looking interface.. but i thank aswell not having stupid bmp borders that interfere with the view or unnecesary stuff there.
About the right mouse button, well that is almost like talking about politics. BUT .... as explained many times.. rmb interface "saves" you plenty of clicks or keystrokes (my mouse thanks).
About the LAN game in default install, well you are mistaken as there is a server just dld it from this site.
And .. there used to be a prompt for an ip adress to join, just by executing spring.exe. (dunno how to get it now).
About "Getting stuck in first-person mode" well you are the first person who reports this, if you feel usefull, go make the bug report or ask in the forums.
But i can guess what happened to you there. You pressed ENTER so you where chatting instead of issuing the enter/leave fps mode command.
"What does "nickj 6% 1" at the bottom of the screen mean"
Look at the faq and stop making null points.
Clutter??? 1-6 lines of text??? i wonder what you think about warcraft interface then.
Besides this is not enabled by default iirc, so you must type it to activate.
"Units sometimes get stuck"
true, a workaround is needed.
"Upon issuing a ctrl-D command, the console should have said: "Commander Self-Destruct countdown" "
??? what you talking about? it DOES print selfdestruct message.
And what did you expect from pressing all end every key?
Try the same in ANY game and you will get terrible results. Specially contol+key.
"Game needs a PDF key reference"
use this. Pdf is dead.
"Cannot jump out of a game to change settings"
you cant do that in doom 4 either, yeah.. i wish you could.
"Left-hand unit action window looks transparent, but it is not transparent to actions"
Cool eh? i bet you didnt think of this yourself.
"Should indicate when units have been selected for attack"
Press Shift.
"Tooltip area should pass-through clicks, like the console"
"Define two tooltips"
"Minor polish things"
^ minor details.
My conclusion of your "review" is that the reviewer didnt take the time to really test the game/interface functionality.
Most of the refered "issues" are due to poor testing and lack of rts common sense from reviewer.
Where is any talking about gameplay?
Where is anything about the really innovative stuff in the UI?
Your review is LACKING all and every single detail and feature that makes this game what it is.
I could make a list for you, but dont like to make other ppls job.
I wont make a list of real bugs annoys, you are missing either.
I hope you dont find this comment offensive, but your review job is lacking much work to make it worh.
Your gunships stopped moving because the unit they were about to attack died, and so their command did too. And your proposed solution is questionable, as it will give the units orders which they didnt have in the first place, not consistent.
Also this happened even in ota days, fyi.
"If you select 30 mobile units and accidentally include one building, you cannot move the group"
If you press M key, then your units of building or wtv will effectively move.
The interface needs work. but is it has not changed so far.. you know, why?
It is because it fullfills the basic (and more) needs for this rts game.
Its not a cool looking interface.. but i thank aswell not having stupid bmp borders that interfere with the view or unnecesary stuff there.
About the right mouse button, well that is almost like talking about politics. BUT .... as explained many times.. rmb interface "saves" you plenty of clicks or keystrokes (my mouse thanks).
About the LAN game in default install, well you are mistaken as there is a server just dld it from this site.
And .. there used to be a prompt for an ip adress to join, just by executing spring.exe. (dunno how to get it now).
About "Getting stuck in first-person mode" well you are the first person who reports this, if you feel usefull, go make the bug report or ask in the forums.
But i can guess what happened to you there. You pressed ENTER so you where chatting instead of issuing the enter/leave fps mode command.
"What does "nickj 6% 1" at the bottom of the screen mean"
Look at the faq and stop making null points.
Clutter??? 1-6 lines of text??? i wonder what you think about warcraft interface then.
Besides this is not enabled by default iirc, so you must type it to activate.
"Units sometimes get stuck"
true, a workaround is needed.
"Upon issuing a ctrl-D command, the console should have said: "Commander Self-Destruct countdown" "
??? what you talking about? it DOES print selfdestruct message.
And what did you expect from pressing all end every key?
Try the same in ANY game and you will get terrible results. Specially contol+key.
"Game needs a PDF key reference"
use this. Pdf is dead.
"Cannot jump out of a game to change settings"
you cant do that in doom 4 either, yeah.. i wish you could.
"Left-hand unit action window looks transparent, but it is not transparent to actions"
Cool eh? i bet you didnt think of this yourself.
"Should indicate when units have been selected for attack"
Press Shift.
"Tooltip area should pass-through clicks, like the console"
"Define two tooltips"
"Minor polish things"
^ minor details.
My conclusion of your "review" is that the reviewer didnt take the time to really test the game/interface functionality.
Most of the refered "issues" are due to poor testing and lack of rts common sense from reviewer.
Where is any talking about gameplay?
Where is anything about the really innovative stuff in the UI?
Your review is LACKING all and every single detail and feature that makes this game what it is.
I could make a list for you, but dont like to make other ppls job.
I wont make a list of real bugs annoys, you are missing either.
I hope you dont find this comment offensive, but your review job is lacking much work to make it worh.
-
colorblind
- Spring Developer
- Posts: 374
- Joined: 14 Mar 2005, 12:32
It's because your ordered them to attack one specific enemy unit that's already dead (probably by the hands of your tank). No unit = no order to fullfill, and it's dropped. Like it should.Units do not obey you in battle
Units seem to have a mind of their own. I had a group of several gunship aircraft and some tanks. I ordered them to attack an enemy unit. 30 seconds later I see the gunships land, having travelled half way to the battle. Why? Attack means attack that unit. If that unit disappears, it means travel to it's last known location, and then attack any enemy units in the vicinity. Attack means attack.
If you want the behaviour you would like, send you gunships to that area and patrol it. It's really not that difficult.
Furthermore I appreciate the effort you've put into your review, I just don't like the tone of it (like many others here). It has the feel of a noob (no offence), and thus it should be IMHO a whole lot shorter. Just: "spring has too steep a learning curve" :)
Thank you all for your great comments and feedback. I've tried to incorporate as much as possible into the page, and to tighten it up based on what you have said: http://nickj.org/index.php?title=Review ... oldid=1964
Please understand that it's not my intention to nag, or to annoy you, or to use a negative tone. If I came across this way, I sincerely apologize.
I certainly would not have bothered writing the page, unless I saw something that I genuinely liked in TA:Spring.
-----------------------------------
Can I please ask one question about uikeys.txt : I have a LAN weekend coming up, with people who really liked the original TA, but who have not played TA:Spring. I would like them to try TA:Spring, but I want to disable the non-TA camera behaviour. Is there some way to do that via uikeys.txt ? I think the keys I want to change are "c", "Mouse 3", "ctrl+mouse3" and "ctrl-j". Is there some way to do this? In particular, I wanted to disable most of those keys, and make 'c' do capture rather than change the camera. Something like this:
bind 'c' Capture
bind 'j' nothing
bind mouse3 nothing
bind ctrl+mouse3 nothing
... is this type of thing possible?
All the best,
Nick.
Please understand that it's not my intention to nag, or to annoy you, or to use a negative tone. If I came across this way, I sincerely apologize.
I certainly would not have bothered writing the page, unless I saw something that I genuinely liked in TA:Spring.
-----------------------------------
Can I please ask one question about uikeys.txt : I have a LAN weekend coming up, with people who really liked the original TA, but who have not played TA:Spring. I would like them to try TA:Spring, but I want to disable the non-TA camera behaviour. Is there some way to do that via uikeys.txt ? I think the keys I want to change are "c", "Mouse 3", "ctrl+mouse3" and "ctrl-j". Is there some way to do this? In particular, I wanted to disable most of those keys, and make 'c' do capture rather than change the camera. Something like this:
bind 'c' Capture
bind 'j' nothing
bind mouse3 nothing
bind ctrl+mouse3 nothing
... is this type of thing possible?
All the best,
Nick.
well that was not much clear elsewhere.
so added it, but uikeys are pretty self explanatory.
Update 2: Is there a startup script? (Like quake3 had a ".cfg" file that would run commands on startup to configure your environment the way you like it). If so, then the user could add ".info" to that startup script to always prevent this appearing, without having to do it every game.
Dude what version of spring are you using? .41b?
the .info command is like a switch, it will stay as it was last tiem you quitted the game.
Some bugs on goto source of last message function
Pressing F3 means go to source of last message command, and select that unit. However, the F3 function sometimes doesn't seem to work very well. To see what I mean, select your commander, press Ctrl-D to activate self-destruct, then cancel it with Ctrl-D again. Now press F3. It should stay focussed on your commander, since he was the source of the last message, but instead (for me at least) it flies off to the top left of the map.
Only off screen attack mesages trigger F3 quick marker.
really take like 2 secconds to think on what you write.
and your review still needs a rewrite instead of gazillion update patchwork.
In that wiki edit i added more of what is good in spring than in your hole review.
so added it, but uikeys are pretty self explanatory.
Update 2: Is there a startup script? (Like quake3 had a ".cfg" file that would run commands on startup to configure your environment the way you like it). If so, then the user could add ".info" to that startup script to always prevent this appearing, without having to do it every game.
Dude what version of spring are you using? .41b?
the .info command is like a switch, it will stay as it was last tiem you quitted the game.
Some bugs on goto source of last message function
Pressing F3 means go to source of last message command, and select that unit. However, the F3 function sometimes doesn't seem to work very well. To see what I mean, select your commander, press Ctrl-D to activate self-destruct, then cancel it with Ctrl-D again. Now press F3. It should stay focussed on your commander, since he was the source of the last message, but instead (for me at least) it flies off to the top left of the map.
Only off screen attack mesages trigger F3 quick marker.
really take like 2 secconds to think on what you write.
and your review still needs a rewrite instead of gazillion update patchwork.
In that wiki edit i added more of what is good in spring than in your hole review.
-
SwiftSpear
- Classic Community Lead
- Posts: 7287
- Joined: 12 Aug 2005, 09:29
I'm pretty sure at some point the self-d command is going to be editable at some point, hopefully with, or soon after the new GUI is in place.Sheekel wrote:Its beta...
Anyway, i doubt anyone is going to bother changing a bunch of source because your girlfriend accidentally blew up her commander once. A lot of the thing you listed are all part of the learning process, like the click-interface. After a game or two you get used to it.
nickj: Buddy, this is an open sourced gaming project. It's a little unfair that you reemed out our user interface while the user interface is still a placeholder and the least polished part of the game to date. The new GUI is currently one of the major projects being worked on, and that means a totally new and refinished user interface with lots of new features and awesomeness. It's unfair to expect us to fix little problems in the current functional interface while the interface is in the process of being totally replaced.
[edit] the name ping and cpu usage thing at the bottom of the screen used to be off by default, it was complained about endlessly because in multiplayer games there is no other way to tell what name is attached to what color player, thus it is now on by default. Multiplayer is the primary gamemode for spring and multiplayer features and efficientcy will always be supported over single player. It may be minorly annoying when you're playing bots that you have to see your own cpu and ping specs but it is MASSIVELY annoying when you're playing humans and you can't figure out what color your ally, the really leet player, is.
[edit2] as far as I've been told nearly everything you complain about will be fixed in the new GUI.
I loved that game, bu I will admit that it is VERY hard to learn.wizard8873 wrote:you make great points about it not being newb friendly but many games come to mind, esp earth 2150. have you played that game? its a nightmare for new users. i spent days getting used to it. it only takes a few games to get used to spring. i don't think there is a game out there that is really newb friendly. while it would be nice, we'd probably be dealing with a childs game then.
-
colorblind
- Spring Developer
- Posts: 374
- Joined: 14 Mar 2005, 12:32
Ok, but I don't think you've understood my post. You only addednickj wrote:I've tried to incorporate as much as possible into the page, and to tighten it up based on what you have said
Update 2: It's a bit of a known problem, with gunships in particular.
to "Units do not obey you in battle". This is not what I've said, it's the exact opposite.
I tried to explain that units obey you all of the time, it's just that you don't know how to give the right order. Please, re-read my post and try it in-game, before you update your page with wrong info.
Because this is making me appreciate your effort (of which I am seeing very little) less and less.
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PauloMorfeo
- Posts: 2004
- Joined: 15 Dec 2004, 20:53
I didn't saw any direct annoyance or negativity about it. Howevernickj wrote:...
Please understand that it's not my intention to nag, or to annoy you, or to use a negative tone. If I came across this way, I sincerely apologize.
...
The review is still very bad. The "What's to like" section is tremendously poor. Tremendously. Work harder on that part! There is a huge huge amount of features about Spring that are awesome and that can't be found in almost any other RTS.nickj wrote:Thank you all for your great comments and feedback. I've tried to incorporate as much as possible into the page, and to tighten it up based on what you have said: http://nickj.org/index.php?title=Review ... oldid=1964
...
Just isn't near enough. And:...
It looks like TA. Since Total Annihilation is one of my favourite computer games, this is definitely a good thing!
It behaves like TA in some regards.
...
Is just .. i don't want to say anything unpolite......
Rotating the scroll wheel changes zoom level.
...
Any review that starts with "What's to like" and has only 6 line in that section, one of them beeing that, it can't be taken seriously.
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Guessmyname
- Posts: 3301
- Joined: 28 Apr 2005, 21:07
Units push other units when they walk into them. If something is in a tree or something it has been pushed in there (units being pushed seem to ingore collision spheres). You can get it out again by controlling it (found out by accident)Units sometimes get stuck
Units that can't reach their destination. Examples are "Anaconda: Can't reach destination!". An Anaconda is a hovercraft (I think), so it should be able to get most places. Another example is Kbots on the "small divide" map will get stuck in the trees, and give the same "Can't reach destination!" error message. If they were able to get into that location, and the path in has not been altered, then surely they should be able to get back out again?
EDIT: I have, inadvertantly, ended up with several bulldogs stuck inside a vulcan. The bulldogs could fire out from inside the vulcan but enemy fire hit the vulcan instead of them.
Another strange thing with FPS mode is that units refuse to fire to the right (or left, can't remember which). This is a big problem
Yes, there is a cfg somewhereUpdate 2: Is there a startup script? (Like quake3 had a ".cfg" file that would run commands on startup to configure your environment the way you like it). If so, then the user could add ".info" to that startup script to always prevent this appearing, without having to do it every game.
Another thing: We need an ingame tutorial sort of thing that teaches new guys all the stuff like how the repeat commands work and creating formations and area attack/reclaim etc
> so added it, but uikeys are pretty self explanatory.
The part that I didn't find self-explanatory was how to combine meta keys + letter or mouse + letter (thanks to your additions I now understand you can't), and I couldn't see a list of the possible actions. I've taken a rough cut of the possible actions from the rts\Game\Game.cpp file, and added them to your changes. For example, if "Capture" were a possible action, then "c" could be rebound from "change control" to "Capture", but it's not - so it's helpful to get a list of what the possible actions that can be bound are, which is what I've tried to add.
> Only off screen attack messages trigger F3 quick marker.
Personally, I don't agree that this is the best behaviour (I think it should always jump to the last message source, as this is simple, elegant, easy to understand, and not context-dependent). Furthermore, irrespective of what I think, even the Spring readme says F3 means "Jump to last message location". It does not say "Jump to last message location if the last message location is not currently on the screen, else jump to previous off-screen message location, else jump to top left of the map".
> the .info command is like a switch, it will stay as it was last item you quitted the game.
Ah, I was wrong on this point too. When I'm wrong, I'm perfectly happy to say so.
I'll get this item deleted, and add one line to the keys section about how the "Tab" key should perhaps be like typing ".info", since in the Original TA pressing Tab toggled displaying multiplayer information, with is kind of what ".info" is already doing.
> It's a little unfair that you reemed out our user interface while the user interface
> is still a placeholder and the least polished part of the game to date. The new GUI
> is currently one of the major projects being worked on, and that means a totally new
> and refinished user interface with lots of new features and awesomeness. It's unfair
> to expect us to fix little problems in the current functional interface while the
> interface is in the process of being totally replaced.
It's not my intention to 'reem' anyone. I can only form an impression based on the software that I can run and see and use, which at least for the time being is the old placeholder GUI. But definitely effort should be directed towards the new UI, which sounds very good, particularly if it will resolve many of these things.
> I don't think there is a game out there that is really newb friendly.
> while it would be nice, we'd probably be dealing with a child's game then.
I honestly don't think any of the changes I've suggested would make it any more like a child's game, but they definitely would make it far more newbie friendly (I.e. they would make it easier to pick up), and they also would reduce user error (perhaps even for more experienced players) without subtracting from gameplay.
> This is not what I've said, it's the exact opposite.
I added that based on what patmo98 said, not what you said.
However, I've removed that update so that we can discuss here what the problem is some more.
> I tried to explain that units obey you all of the time, it's just
> that you don't know how to give the right order.
You're saying use the patrol order, rather than attack, yes?
Essentially the problem is: If you order an attack on an enemy unit, and that enemy unit is destroyed, then your units that are still travelling to attack the enemy unit will immediately stop.
(If I have misunderstood you here, please correct me.)
What I'm saying is: I do not recall experiencing this problem in other RTS games, even the original TA (although it has been a while since I last played it, so I can't be certain on this point).
In other games, I give an attack order, and even if that specific enemy unit dies, my units will still keep moving, and will still engage in the battle. They will attack the specified enemy unit first, and when that unit dies they will attack the enemy units next to it. There is no stopping en route to the battle after an attack order is given, even if the specific enemy unit I said to attack has died.
This I think is definitely the better behaviour, because it's what users usually mean by "attack", and it what other RTS games do, so it is what users are going to expect to happen - and that is why people get annoyed by the current behaviour. That is why I have listed it as something that I disliked. The current interpretation of "attack" seems excessively narrow and legalistic to me. If the answer is to "patrol", then perhaps issuing an "attack" order should (internally to the game engine) instead issue an attack order followed by a shift-patrol order, or an area attack.
> The "What's to like" section is tremendously poor. Tremendously.
> Work harder on that part!
I agree with you. I have now improved and expanded this section. Feel free to tell me extra things that I have missed that should be included.
Changes since last week, including the above and other things from this message are at: http://nickj.org/index.php?title=Review ... oldid=1988
> one of them being that [mouse wheel = zoom]
I wasn't trying to "damn with faint praise", I just don't think that the original TA had this. I wasn't trying to be silly. It really is a useful addition.
> an in-game tutorial sort of thing that teaches new guys all the stuff like how
> the repeat commands work and creating formations and area attack/reclaim etc
That would be helpful. I'll add it to the end of the list as something that could help people new to the game.
> Another strange thing with FPS mode is that units refuse to fire to the right
> (or left, can't remember which). This is a big problem
I personally was not able to reproduce this problem - e.g. took control of commander with "c", moved mouse/keys left/right, tried firing, all seemed to work OK. Any steps on how to reproduce this problem?
All the best,
Nick.
The part that I didn't find self-explanatory was how to combine meta keys + letter or mouse + letter (thanks to your additions I now understand you can't), and I couldn't see a list of the possible actions. I've taken a rough cut of the possible actions from the rts\Game\Game.cpp file, and added them to your changes. For example, if "Capture" were a possible action, then "c" could be rebound from "change control" to "Capture", but it's not - so it's helpful to get a list of what the possible actions that can be bound are, which is what I've tried to add.
> Only off screen attack messages trigger F3 quick marker.
Personally, I don't agree that this is the best behaviour (I think it should always jump to the last message source, as this is simple, elegant, easy to understand, and not context-dependent). Furthermore, irrespective of what I think, even the Spring readme says F3 means "Jump to last message location". It does not say "Jump to last message location if the last message location is not currently on the screen, else jump to previous off-screen message location, else jump to top left of the map".
> the .info command is like a switch, it will stay as it was last item you quitted the game.
Ah, I was wrong on this point too. When I'm wrong, I'm perfectly happy to say so.
I'll get this item deleted, and add one line to the keys section about how the "Tab" key should perhaps be like typing ".info", since in the Original TA pressing Tab toggled displaying multiplayer information, with is kind of what ".info" is already doing.
> It's a little unfair that you reemed out our user interface while the user interface
> is still a placeholder and the least polished part of the game to date. The new GUI
> is currently one of the major projects being worked on, and that means a totally new
> and refinished user interface with lots of new features and awesomeness. It's unfair
> to expect us to fix little problems in the current functional interface while the
> interface is in the process of being totally replaced.
It's not my intention to 'reem' anyone. I can only form an impression based on the software that I can run and see and use, which at least for the time being is the old placeholder GUI. But definitely effort should be directed towards the new UI, which sounds very good, particularly if it will resolve many of these things.
> I don't think there is a game out there that is really newb friendly.
> while it would be nice, we'd probably be dealing with a child's game then.
I honestly don't think any of the changes I've suggested would make it any more like a child's game, but they definitely would make it far more newbie friendly (I.e. they would make it easier to pick up), and they also would reduce user error (perhaps even for more experienced players) without subtracting from gameplay.
> This is not what I've said, it's the exact opposite.
I added that based on what patmo98 said, not what you said.
However, I've removed that update so that we can discuss here what the problem is some more.
> I tried to explain that units obey you all of the time, it's just
> that you don't know how to give the right order.
You're saying use the patrol order, rather than attack, yes?
Essentially the problem is: If you order an attack on an enemy unit, and that enemy unit is destroyed, then your units that are still travelling to attack the enemy unit will immediately stop.
(If I have misunderstood you here, please correct me.)
What I'm saying is: I do not recall experiencing this problem in other RTS games, even the original TA (although it has been a while since I last played it, so I can't be certain on this point).
In other games, I give an attack order, and even if that specific enemy unit dies, my units will still keep moving, and will still engage in the battle. They will attack the specified enemy unit first, and when that unit dies they will attack the enemy units next to it. There is no stopping en route to the battle after an attack order is given, even if the specific enemy unit I said to attack has died.
This I think is definitely the better behaviour, because it's what users usually mean by "attack", and it what other RTS games do, so it is what users are going to expect to happen - and that is why people get annoyed by the current behaviour. That is why I have listed it as something that I disliked. The current interpretation of "attack" seems excessively narrow and legalistic to me. If the answer is to "patrol", then perhaps issuing an "attack" order should (internally to the game engine) instead issue an attack order followed by a shift-patrol order, or an area attack.
> The "What's to like" section is tremendously poor. Tremendously.
> Work harder on that part!
I agree with you. I have now improved and expanded this section. Feel free to tell me extra things that I have missed that should be included.
Changes since last week, including the above and other things from this message are at: http://nickj.org/index.php?title=Review ... oldid=1988
> one of them being that [mouse wheel = zoom]
I wasn't trying to "damn with faint praise", I just don't think that the original TA had this. I wasn't trying to be silly. It really is a useful addition.
> an in-game tutorial sort of thing that teaches new guys all the stuff like how
> the repeat commands work and creating formations and area attack/reclaim etc
That would be helpful. I'll add it to the end of the list as something that could help people new to the game.
> Another strange thing with FPS mode is that units refuse to fire to the right
> (or left, can't remember which). This is a big problem
I personally was not able to reproduce this problem - e.g. took control of commander with "c", moved mouse/keys left/right, tried firing, all seemed to work OK. Any steps on how to reproduce this problem?
All the best,
Nick.
Good! wierd formatting! heh, but not bad.I've taken a rough cut of the possible actions from the rts\Game\Game.cpp file, and added them to your changes.
Maybe it can all go in separated page? what you think?
You ever played TA? ever pressed f5-f8? before making any markup?... also complaining about that is pointless, as the f3 function must be initilized at some point, and its probably set to 0,0 coordinates.Personally, I don't agree that this is the best behaviour (I think it should always jump to the last message source, as this is simple, elegant, easy to understand, and not context-dependent). Furthermore, irrespective of what I think, even the Spring readme says F3 means "Jump to last message location". It does not say "Jump to last message location if the last message location is not currently on the screen, else jump to previous off-screen message location, else jump to top left of the map".
about the attack order getting replaced by a move order, its not big deal.
What you are really missing, and is is effectively missing, is the attack zone command of warcraft, this was an addition of warcraft, or was later changed in some patch.
Issuing attack to a ground target automatically got transformed to move and attack (is that the name?).
on the workarund, for spring and ta.
Using move->patroll command, emulates/fixes this issue...
but im tired of pressing "p" key every time.
a replacement could be usefull, but in what form? enable area attack for non bombber units?... its not as easy, as area attack for bombers has wierd behaviour.
mapping the patroll command to a modifier key? but what key? almost all used up.. but i like this aproach, as you only make 1 clickm then hold modifier.
not rmb click, then press p, then hold down shift, then issue rest of clicks..
e: actually is almost the same.. but "p" is so far! i must move my hand to press it. agh. p must move closer to wasd.
intrincated. but worth solving.
How about a seccond review now that we have helped you with some basics?
and how was that lanparty game? did the server work?
The "units-stopping-on-way-to-battle" is not that bad I think, here is how I usually do it:
When sending some "short range"/melee units like normal tanks, just click them somewhere near the battle. They usually start fighting on their own.
When sending artillery, you usually want it to shoot from a specific position, for example from a hill. Send it to this position and if it does not attack on its own then move it a little closer or give an attack order.
When sending some "short range"/melee units like normal tanks, just click them somewhere near the battle. They usually start fighting on their own.
When sending artillery, you usually want it to shoot from a specific position, for example from a hill. Send it to this position and if it does not attack on its own then move it a little closer or give an attack order.
> Maybe it can all go in separated page? what you think?
Sorry to take so long to get back to you on this, and the current formatting, with the table off to this side looks great, so stick with that I reckon.
> What you are really missing, and is effectively missing, is the attack zone
Yep - I think so.
> How about a second review now that we have helped you with some basics?
It was pretty hard work making this one :-( I'd prefer to incrementally update it (which is IMHO the best way to grow and improve most things).
I've made some updates based on the LAN party (described below).
> and how was that lanparty game? did the server work?
(I wanted to hold off on answering this because it was held over the weekend that has just passed, not the one before).
Playing TA Spring at the LAN party was quite interesting. We had about 10 people at any one time (it's all friends and friends-of-friends, rather than a public event), and apart from myself and one other person, nobody had played TA:Spring before. We played TA:Spring roughly 50% of the time, all on a local LAN server. We played room versus room (2 teams), and good players by themselves versus bad players grouped together (4 teams). We were using version 0.71b1.
In terms of people's reactions, I'd say that some people liked the game, and others hated it. Some people that liked it like it a lot, and some people that disliked it really disliked it a lot.
The people that liked it, overall liked that it was a macro level RTS game (no micromanagement). I.e. Long queuing of orders via Shift, deep tech trees (3 levels deep), varied strategy, area / line / circular buildings of units, "repeat on" for indefinite behaviour.
For the people that disliked it, when asked why, they either disliked RTS games in general (I'm discounting those), or they disliked the UI. For the people that disliked the UI, that was more interesting to me, because they liked RTS in general, they just disliked this game.
I asked both the likers and the dislikers, exactly WHAT they disliked, and showed them the list from my review - some items they said "YES!!! EXACTLY!!" to, and others they were ambivalent to. So the stuff that people were ambivalent to I have moved off to the a separate "minor quibbles" page, because that seems to be me just being fussy. The stuff that remains had general consensus.
Also some of the weird error messages from 0.70b3 didn't happen, so I think that those have been fixed. So basically I removed 9 of the "what's to dislike" items from the main review, which I think has tightened it up a lot.
However, we added two items that came up in the LAN party. The first one, which was really annoying was "Sync errors". This happened twice, to different players, in two long-running LAN games, and it lead to people playing multiple different games, steadily diverging from each other, which was very frustrating. That error was really annoying, and people took to saying "Well, I'm winning **my** game!" as a bit of a running joke :-)
The second was an item that I had listed previously about prompting on pressing Shift-Escape. Someone here had a go at me for saying that (complained excessive prompting), but after the LAN game I'm now sure that I was right. Reason is we were just getting to the interesting bit in a game, and someone using a laptop in a darkened room wanted to press Ctrl-1 to specify a unit grouping. However, they were on a laptop (so they keyboard is all together not like a normal keyboard), and they were darkened room in the middle of a battle - and their hand was one key off - so instead of pressing Ctrl-1, they actually pressed Shift-Escape. Result: They were immediately thrown out of the game, much to their annoyance. Having seen that first-hand, I'm absolutely certain now that a prompt on Shift-Escape is a good thing (even if it's an option that's on by default, but which can be turned off).
Also, I was able to find the exact buildings that when selected stuff up the group move orders (see the "Group move does not work when certain buildings are selected" section of the review) - it's the "Arm Juno Anti-Radar / Jammer Weapon", and the "Advanced Fusion Reactor Enhanced Energy Output / Storage".
Lastly, I added a screenshot. Only one I'm afraid - I meant to take more, but I forgot :-(
Changes since a week ago are here.
All the best,
Nick.
Sorry to take so long to get back to you on this, and the current formatting, with the table off to this side looks great, so stick with that I reckon.
> What you are really missing, and is effectively missing, is the attack zone
Yep - I think so.
> How about a second review now that we have helped you with some basics?
It was pretty hard work making this one :-( I'd prefer to incrementally update it (which is IMHO the best way to grow and improve most things).
I've made some updates based on the LAN party (described below).
> and how was that lanparty game? did the server work?
(I wanted to hold off on answering this because it was held over the weekend that has just passed, not the one before).
Playing TA Spring at the LAN party was quite interesting. We had about 10 people at any one time (it's all friends and friends-of-friends, rather than a public event), and apart from myself and one other person, nobody had played TA:Spring before. We played TA:Spring roughly 50% of the time, all on a local LAN server. We played room versus room (2 teams), and good players by themselves versus bad players grouped together (4 teams). We were using version 0.71b1.
In terms of people's reactions, I'd say that some people liked the game, and others hated it. Some people that liked it like it a lot, and some people that disliked it really disliked it a lot.
The people that liked it, overall liked that it was a macro level RTS game (no micromanagement). I.e. Long queuing of orders via Shift, deep tech trees (3 levels deep), varied strategy, area / line / circular buildings of units, "repeat on" for indefinite behaviour.
For the people that disliked it, when asked why, they either disliked RTS games in general (I'm discounting those), or they disliked the UI. For the people that disliked the UI, that was more interesting to me, because they liked RTS in general, they just disliked this game.
I asked both the likers and the dislikers, exactly WHAT they disliked, and showed them the list from my review - some items they said "YES!!! EXACTLY!!" to, and others they were ambivalent to. So the stuff that people were ambivalent to I have moved off to the a separate "minor quibbles" page, because that seems to be me just being fussy. The stuff that remains had general consensus.
Also some of the weird error messages from 0.70b3 didn't happen, so I think that those have been fixed. So basically I removed 9 of the "what's to dislike" items from the main review, which I think has tightened it up a lot.
However, we added two items that came up in the LAN party. The first one, which was really annoying was "Sync errors". This happened twice, to different players, in two long-running LAN games, and it lead to people playing multiple different games, steadily diverging from each other, which was very frustrating. That error was really annoying, and people took to saying "Well, I'm winning **my** game!" as a bit of a running joke :-)
The second was an item that I had listed previously about prompting on pressing Shift-Escape. Someone here had a go at me for saying that (complained excessive prompting), but after the LAN game I'm now sure that I was right. Reason is we were just getting to the interesting bit in a game, and someone using a laptop in a darkened room wanted to press Ctrl-1 to specify a unit grouping. However, they were on a laptop (so they keyboard is all together not like a normal keyboard), and they were darkened room in the middle of a battle - and their hand was one key off - so instead of pressing Ctrl-1, they actually pressed Shift-Escape. Result: They were immediately thrown out of the game, much to their annoyance. Having seen that first-hand, I'm absolutely certain now that a prompt on Shift-Escape is a good thing (even if it's an option that's on by default, but which can be turned off).
Also, I was able to find the exact buildings that when selected stuff up the group move orders (see the "Group move does not work when certain buildings are selected" section of the review) - it's the "Arm Juno Anti-Radar / Jammer Weapon", and the "Advanced Fusion Reactor Enhanced Energy Output / Storage".
Lastly, I added a screenshot. Only one I'm afraid - I meant to take more, but I forgot :-(
Changes since a week ago are here.
All the best,
Nick.
heh, i guess you had installed, or figured out, that you need java re to get the server going.
Its.. strange you didnt metion this, as you "found" and wrote about many of the usual "things" or details to get spring going on, but you falied to mention this.. (wonder why, sincerely, but not important).
Good you liked the cahnge on the wiki, i made some additions, but should add more. Thank aswell egardwaen as he is spell cheking the wiki with me too.
On your lan.
Many of the points noted as "pros" by the players, are inherited from TA, but some others are new.
Im really confident, as they keep learning and improving, they will find out the other tools/features introduced by spring to the gameplay. (which is not minor).
The same will happen with the "micro" part of the game. Although the how you micro and what you micro differs from mod to mod. (imo).
But in general, you can gain strategical advantage by doing micro on specific situations (oh! im a genius! how did i find that out?).
Ah.. the synchs....
That aint in any wiki eiter iirc..
but as you experienced, that is exactly what happens.
Once the syncs (er.. not the soft synchs..) appear, the player getting them, will get a totally different game, than on-synch players.
Solution? the guy who got the synchs, must leave and wish luck to his team.
(that will relief the msg window aswell).
Happens.. but not very often. (in my games).
On your seccond issue. Happened to me when hosting, a very interesting game. Sad, very.
But there is a workaround!, in the biddings, change the quit key.
last.. about buildings and move.
Its not supposed to be a building specifically.
when you select a group of units, one of them is chosen as the "leader".. and his "command gui" is what you get in the UI for all of them, included the abilty to move with rmb click.
The leader unit is chosen randomly. (if nothing has changed much in that part).
Im really happy you made progress and got your lan party going, someone else should share its own experience with us aswell.
Its.. strange you didnt metion this, as you "found" and wrote about many of the usual "things" or details to get spring going on, but you falied to mention this.. (wonder why, sincerely, but not important).
Good you liked the cahnge on the wiki, i made some additions, but should add more. Thank aswell egardwaen as he is spell cheking the wiki with me too.
On your lan.
Many of the points noted as "pros" by the players, are inherited from TA, but some others are new.
Im really confident, as they keep learning and improving, they will find out the other tools/features introduced by spring to the gameplay. (which is not minor).
The same will happen with the "micro" part of the game. Although the how you micro and what you micro differs from mod to mod. (imo).
But in general, you can gain strategical advantage by doing micro on specific situations (oh! im a genius! how did i find that out?).
Ah.. the synchs....
That aint in any wiki eiter iirc..
but as you experienced, that is exactly what happens.
Once the syncs (er.. not the soft synchs..) appear, the player getting them, will get a totally different game, than on-synch players.
Solution? the guy who got the synchs, must leave and wish luck to his team.
(that will relief the msg window aswell).
Happens.. but not very often. (in my games).
On your seccond issue. Happened to me when hosting, a very interesting game. Sad, very.
But there is a workaround!, in the biddings, change the quit key.
last.. about buildings and move.
Its not supposed to be a building specifically.
when you select a group of units, one of them is chosen as the "leader".. and his "command gui" is what you get in the UI for all of them, included the abilty to move with rmb click.
The leader unit is chosen randomly. (if nothing has changed much in that part).
Im really happy you made progress and got your lan party going, someone else should share its own experience with us aswell.
Yep
I find myself agreeing with most of this review. I've been bitten by the "selected units including a building don't move" bug in AA a bazillion times (maybe it's worse for Core, idunno, but it's almost constant). I've also been bitten by the "oops, I pressed one of the esoteric camera keys and am stuck in a mode I don't understand and can't attack with!" bugs. Finally, he's right about the mouse controls. It's left-select, right-dostuff, unless you're executing commands, where it becomes right-cancel, left-dostuff. It worked for StarCraft, but doesn't seem to work as well for Spring.
There's no deselect, except left clicking on no units (I always hit escape to deselect... don't know what RTS I picked up that habit from).
Make this clear - I've got 3 bars on the server, so I play a fair bit. And I agree with much of this review. Plus, I play on 1024x768, so much of the gui is illegible. And I still haven't found the hotkeys for "repeat" or any of the useful selection hotkey - they're just too much to remember while I'm focussing on playing. The only hotkeys I know are the old TA ones (patrol, dgun, repair, reclaim, etc.), much less the area/block commands.
Edit: personal pet peeve: clicking assist/repair on a building under construction that a unit is already assisting/constructing makes them stop assisting and then restart assisting. This is massively annoying because it's the only way to wipe a unit's future build queue without either painstakingly cancelling each future construct or abandoning the current project.
There's no deselect, except left clicking on no units (I always hit escape to deselect... don't know what RTS I picked up that habit from).
Make this clear - I've got 3 bars on the server, so I play a fair bit. And I agree with much of this review. Plus, I play on 1024x768, so much of the gui is illegible. And I still haven't found the hotkeys for "repeat" or any of the useful selection hotkey - they're just too much to remember while I'm focussing on playing. The only hotkeys I know are the old TA ones (patrol, dgun, repair, reclaim, etc.), much less the area/block commands.
Edit: personal pet peeve: clicking assist/repair on a building under construction that a unit is already assisting/constructing makes them stop assisting and then restart assisting. This is massively annoying because it's the only way to wipe a unit's future build queue without either painstakingly cancelling each future construct or abandoning the current project.
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SwiftSpear
- Classic Community Lead
- Posts: 7287
- Joined: 12 Aug 2005, 09:29
I agree with the review mostly. My complaint is more that the things that it attacks mostly definately are problems, but they are well known problems and alot of work is currently being put into fixing them, and doing it well. So therefore who is the review for? It just seems like bad publicity, the spring comunity isn't really learning anything new from reading it. Is it for outsiders? Is it fair to review a WIP game so harshely and put it in the public view?
It's really kind of dumb to do a moment in time review like this without awknowledging the fact that there is alot of work and effort at this moment being put into fixing nearly every area of complaint you have. And if you're attempting to write a review relevent and helpful to the spring developers IMO you should be more reviewing the work that is currently being done then the game in it's current state. If something is missing that isn't being worked on then THAT is a good thing to raise comunity attention to, complaining about well known problems really isn't so much...
It's really kind of dumb to do a moment in time review like this without awknowledging the fact that there is alot of work and effort at this moment being put into fixing nearly every area of complaint you have. And if you're attempting to write a review relevent and helpful to the spring developers IMO you should be more reviewing the work that is currently being done then the game in it's current state. If something is missing that isn't being worked on then THAT is a good thing to raise comunity attention to, complaining about well known problems really isn't so much...