With the current free expansion rotations potentially exposing some new players to expansions they've never played before, I think it would be nice if the client could link players to the official rulebooks on the RGG site. Dominion Online just kind of expects players to already understand how to play with all of the cards and what words like "Exile" and "Coffers" and "Debt" mean.
Maybe a new tab called "Rules" on the main menu that has a list of links to the rulebooks? Could say something like "Dominion Online is the official digital implementation of the boardgame Dominion by Donald X Vaccarino and Rio Grande Games. As with all boardgames, you should familiarize yourself with the rules before you play."
Maybe even link to the wiki? I dunno, just something to help people get over that initial hurdle might be nice.
Great idea! It would be a link used *so* often it would be well-worth having a button, as you suggested. (If they could find the real estate, I think it would make sense to have a duplicate button on the game screen...so if there's a card that both players don't know (or if one experienced player will not help out the other player), it would be just one click to get to the rules, and then a quick search for the card at issue.
i like this idea! how about making the cards in the "kingdom" view clickable, and clicking on a card takes you to the wiki-dominion-strategy-forum-page of that card?
What the client really needs is an in-game tutorial that shows you not only the rules of the game, but where to go in-client to find a lot of the information that isn't in obvious places (ideally the client would have everything in obvious places but maybe that isn't possible?). Rulebook links may be a decent reference but honestly I don't think links to rulebooks solve the problem here.
Unfortunately, a tutorial has been on the to-do list since the client launched a few years ago and there have been no whispers at all of any progress on that front. A while ago I did the next best thing and offered a quick video to the devs which shows where things are in the client, but unfortunately the devs didn't even bother to reply to that submission.
So as good of an idea it is to improve the new player experience, and as desperately as the client needs something like a tutorial to help new players, it looks like they are just not interested in improving the client in the one single way that would do the most. Sorry :-(
Quote from: AdamH on 06 April 2020, 01:28:34 PM
A while ago I did the next best thing and offered a quick video to the devs which shows where things are in the client, but unfortunately the devs didn't even bother to reply to that submission.
that tutorial would only have been helpful to players while the gui looked exactly the way it did when you made the tutorial. as soon as any changes were made to the gui, the tutorial would become deprecated.
programming a tutorial that will automagically continue working through changes of the interface is likely non trivial.
Quote from: davogotland on 18 April 2020, 02:47:53 AM
Quote from: AdamH on 06 April 2020, 01:28:34 PM
A while ago I did the next best thing and offered a quick video to the devs which shows where things are in the client, but unfortunately the devs didn't even bother to reply to that submission.
that tutorial would only have been helpful to players while the gui looked exactly the way it did when you made the tutorial. as soon as any changes were made to the gui, the tutorial would become deprecated.
programming a tutorial that will automagically continue working through changes of the interface is likely non trivial.
I offered to update the video whenever needed.
I know it may not be the simplest thing to do, but an in-game tutorial is, in my opinion, the most important improvement that can be made.
Quote from: AdamH on 06 April 2020, 01:28:34 PM
What the client really needs is an in-game tutorial that shows you not only the rules of the game, but where to go in-client to find a lot of the information that isn't in obvious places (ideally the client would have everything in obvious places but maybe that isn't possible?). Rulebook links may be a decent reference but honestly I don't think links to rulebooks solve the problem here.
Unfortunately, a tutorial has been on the to-do list since the client launched a few years ago and there have been no whispers at all of any progress on that front. A while ago I did the next best thing and offered a quick video to the devs which shows where things are in the client, but unfortunately the devs didn't even bother to reply to that submission.
So as good of an idea it is to improve the new player experience, and as desperately as the client needs something like a tutorial to help new players, it looks like they are just not interested in improving the client in the one single way that would do the most. Sorry :-(
If you could post that video on your Youtube channel (even a bit out of date), I'd really appreciate it. I have been considering trying to play online with friends who have only played Dominion a few times, but the un-intuitiveness of the client has stopped me from trying. An interface tutorial video would help.
I PMed you a link