Spring RTS Engine

I think it is about time we started actually documenting BA for newbies, especially if there's going to be a BA installer eventually. The suggested format is HTML based, which means a /help directory under mods and a shortcut to the index file on the Start menu. Table of contents should probably include a "Basics" which explains the mod concepts, "Interface / shortcuts" which explain the Lua widgets and tell people about the keyboard hotkeys, "Unit guide" which explains the role and capabilities of units, and maybe a "strategies" section or unit stats.

I'm wondering if the best way to get started would be a BA wiki we could just export to "flat" HTML files. Anyone else have some good collaboration tools?

Rather than working on a separate guide, please start by filling out the basics on the wiki page: http://springrts.com/wiki/Balanced_Annihilation

This has the advantage of being much easier to collaboratively edit. Hell, we might want to keep all documentation there in sub pages.

no one ever wants to read a manual before they start playing a game. no one.

this effort is best focused on an ingame tutorial that explains all the basic commands, since they aren't intuitive (eg, right click means move with units selected, but means cancel when building stuff).

Yeah, that. A while ago I talked with TheFat and we had a decent idea for a way to make BA a little more user-friendly - do _complete_ unit info as the tooltip in the build-menu. Instead of "assault unit" or some vague stats, give a complete run-down of everything you could possibly want to know about the unit (ie the Guardian has low/high trajectory modes, low-traj is more accurate and better in defense, high is more powerful and better for bombarding slow/static targets, gets damage bonus vs. navy, superceded in every way by level-2 counterpart). The point is that, when you're selecting a unit to build is exactly the time to clutter the screen with the information, rather than waiting until _after_ the unit is built when the player is scrambling to make use of it and needs to see the screen. After all, if you're mousing around in teh build menu, you're probably not looking at the screen but the build-menu.

Really, though, people learn by doing. And since learning by doing in multiplayer will just teach you how to get raped by raiders, you need active single-player tutorials.

Pxtl wrote:Yeah, that. A while ago I talked with TheFat and we had a decent idea for a way to make BA a little more user-friendly - do _complete_ unit info as the tooltip in the build-menu. Instead of "assault unit" or some vague stats, give a complete run-down of everything you could possibly want to know about the unit (ie the Guardian has low/high trajectory modes, low-traj is more accurate and better in defense, high is more powerful and better for bombarding slow/static targets, gets damage bonus vs. navy, superceded in every way by level-2 counterpart). The point is that, when you're selecting a unit to build is exactly the time to clutter the screen with the information, rather than waiting until _after_ the unit is built when the player is scrambling to make use of it and needs to see the screen. After all, if you're mousing around in teh build menu, you're probably not looking at the screen but the build-menu.

Really, though, people learn by doing. And since learning by doing in multiplayer will just teach you how to get raped by raiders, you need active single-player tutorials.

I hadn't forgotten this it's just going to take some work, hopefully for BA 7.00 (which needs a few things like this to make it more milestoney).

hunterw wrote:this effort is best focused on an ingame tutorial that explains all the basic commands, since they aren't intuitive (eg, right click means move with units selected, but means cancel when building stuff).

I agree that an in game tutorial map would be good, especially since there's a more or less complete single player framework now right?

Enhanced tooltips would also help too.

YokoZar wrote:http://springrts.com/wiki/Balanced_Annihilation

I forgot to mention that I didn't know if we should use the current wiki since it generally isn't maintained well, or linked from the top anymore, and on a more personal level won't let me edit it at all probably because my username has a _ in it. Is that a fairly up to date wiki package anyway?

I thought this is what guides.springinfo.info was for?

Forboding Angel wrote:I thought this is what guides.springinfo.info was for?

By the way, I haven't updated it in awhile, sorry. I just haven't been playing Spring as much. When I start playing again, I'll continue to make guides. Don't get rid of it though, if you do have to, gimmie some warning so I can make a backup and put it on a freehost instead or something.

hunterw wrote:no one ever wants to read a manual before they start playing a game. no one.

this effort is best focused on an ingame tutorial that explains all the basic commands, since they aren't intuitive (eg, right click means move with units selected, but means cancel when building stuff).

I guess I'm "no one"...

Pxtl wrote:Yeah, that. A while ago I talked with TheFat and we had a decent idea for a way to make BA a little more user-friendly - do _complete_ unit info as the tooltip in the build-menu. Instead of "assault unit" or some vague stats, give a complete run-down of everything you could possibly want to know about the unit (ie the Guardian has low/high trajectory modes, low-traj is more accurate and better in defense, high is more powerful and better for bombarding slow/static targets, gets damage bonus vs. navy, superceded in every way by level-2 counterpart). The point is that, when you're selecting a unit to build is exactly the time to clutter the screen with the information, rather than waiting until _after_ the unit is built when the player is scrambling to make use of it and needs to see the screen. After all, if you're mousing around in teh build menu, you're probably not looking at the screen but the build-menu.

Really, though, people learn by doing. And since learning by doing in multiplayer will just teach you how to get raped by raiders, you need active single-player tutorials.

Some things that SHOULD be added to tool tips is the base amount of damage a unit does per shot + the rate of fire + the range...

A default range of building/unit hotkeys would help too...

Pxtl wrote:Yeah, that. A while ago I talked with TheFat and we had a decent idea for a way to make BA a little more user-friendly - do _complete_ unit info as the tooltip in the build-menu. Instead of "assault unit" or some vague stats, give a complete run-down of everything you could possibly want to know about the unit (ie the Guardian has low/high trajectory modes, low-traj is more accurate and better in defense, high is more powerful and better for bombarding slow/static targets, gets damage bonus vs. navy, superceded in every way by level-2 counterpart). The point is that, when you're selecting a unit to build is exactly the time to clutter the screen with the information, rather than waiting until _after_ the unit is built when the player is scrambling to make use of it and needs to see the screen. After all, if you're mousing around in teh build menu, you're probably not looking at the screen but the build-menu.

Really, though, people learn by doing. And since learning by doing in multiplayer will just teach you how to get raped by raiders, you need active single-player tutorials.

This is a nice idea but the best idea IMO is how CA started implementing it.
An ingame multiplayer tutorial that actively responds to events in the game..
It will be a hard work to write it since there will be tons of triggers but slowly it can become wholesome..
It detects your rank from the lobby,and based on it it activates parts of the dynamic tutorial with the most complicated and niche issues saved for above star users..
It should react to certain stuff happening in game..
Like a Jeffy attacking one of your mexes.
This triggers the tutorial and a small pop up comes up explaining a bit about this and any relevant info in a nice and summed up way...
This can be slowly applied to everything and to many of the common situations and problematic issues new players face.

This way has a clear advantage.
Nobody needs to go and look and read tutorials which will be confusing anyway,no matter how good they are written.

Gota wrote:This is a nice idea but the best idea IMO is how CA started implementing it.
An ingame multiplayer tutorial that actively responds to events in the game..
It will be a hard work to write it since there will be tons of triggers but slowly it can become wholesome..

I really like this idea.