Mac idea (with picture)
JimBob_UK
Join Date: 2010-04-09 Member: 71233Members
Join Date: 2010-04-09 Member: 71233Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Easy way to manage Mac's</div>Quick idea for MAC's. Selecting wouldn't move he camera to them and you can easily keep an eye on what they are doing as it tells you there status. Also if there being attacked they could show as red. there's 11 here, so that could represent a limit to restrict spamming? I'm unsure if anything else goes in that space I assume it does (like chat text, this could be moved) so you could reduce the amount of icons to allow other things to go next to them. Please post your comments thank's.
<img src="http://img13.imageshack.us/img13/5039/macidea.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
<img src="http://img13.imageshack.us/img13/5039/macidea.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
Comments
Put MAC icon like it currently is on the right above of the build box.
You click that ALL those bots you have above the bar show up in the selection box below with what they are doing. You don't need the NOT BUILT but I understand its a placeholder type of thing so we understand the concept.
An "idle worker" alert would be great.
As far as macs go though, you are right.
I suggest the icons be in a scrollable window and instead of showing unbuilt macs, to simply have a [ + ] button to add new ones. Also dock that [ + ] button to the right edge so people don't have to waste time looking for it.
[ < ] [ mac_1 ] [ mac_2 ] [ mac_3 ]`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`[ > ] [+]
The [ < ] and [ > ] buttons are for scrolling, although its possible to not have these buttons by making this area mouse-drag scrollable (the trick is to determine if a mouse click involved a lot of distance between the mouse down and mouse up locations -> drag, or if the mouse down and mouse up occurred "near" [compare distance with a hard-coded tolerance value] to each other -> click). Then just have some progress bar that becomes temporarily opaque to show your progress, for situations where you have more macs available then can be viewed at once.
So the more optimized container would be:
[ mac_1 ] [ mac_2 ] [ mac_3 ]`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`,`[+]
The [ + ] button may be unnecessary because i think the current button for making macs may be better? Sorry i forgot how the coms interface permits mac creation.
I can't think of a time where i would be like.. oh i need to know what all my MAC's are doing.
I would though need to know where they currently are.
Currently the MAC icon shows MAC's that are not doing anything. But say i needed to switch a mac from building a expansion armory to fixing turrets. I would need a quick way to find one and move him.
In my UI mock i had map filters for certain things, a MAC filter could potentially have use.
I can't think of a time where i would be like.. oh i need to know what all my MAC's are doing.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The thing is when you click the mac button it goes to it position. So if your at another location on the map you will have to move the camera back to were you want to build. My idea was to have buttons for each mac you had built, with its current action visible. Simply clicking the button would then select that mac without moving the camera to its position allowing faster and less irritating creation of structures. Plus if one were under attack, it would turn red allow the button to lets say be double clicked and then it would move the camera to its position as it does now allowing the mac to be moved away from danger.
<!--quoteo(post=1809959:date=Nov 24 2010, 10:06 PM:name=FocusedWolf)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (FocusedWolf @ Nov 24 2010, 10:06 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1809959"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->The [ + ] button may be unnecessary because i think the current button for making macs may be better? Sorry i forgot how the coms interface permits mac creation.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The command station must be selected to create macs so a "add mac button" would be a better. And in reply to your idea that's exactly the idea I tried to explain in my second post. I think maybe that would be better but my original idea would be much faster. As speed and ease of use are the key to commanding, I think the first idea would be better, with a little refining.
If you had some version of your first idea, where you could see all these MAC's and what they are doing, here are some things to think about.
Problems:
Remembering or knowing what MAC is where; if you chose one that is doing nothing it could be across the map and you sent it to build at the first base.
MAC's being attacked is something your going to have to prevent not react to, they won't live long enough for you to move them.
Possible Solutions: 1 MAC button
Left click will take you to the location of the MAC, right clicking will cycle through selecting each one. Some sort of mini map function would ping or highlight them as u cycle.