Adam's thoughts

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Polk5440

Quote from: AdamH on 13 December 2016, 09:22:43 PM
Click efficiency is not the highest priority for a product that's just starting out, accessibility and intuitive controls are.

This is so important to remember.

ehunt

oh man, I really like the click one of 6 instead of 2 of 4 and confirm; on goko i often avoided pawn just because the annoying clicking outweighs the benefits.

dscarpac

I agree on checkboxes -- it takes a lot longer to read through all of the possible permutations. Sure I'd get used to it but it does not seem intuitive.

Thankfully since we have great developers, why not make both options available? I think the default should be checkboxes, but hey, I doubt this is a difficult thing to program and the more flexibility in the interface the more likely more people will be happy!

LaLight

Quote from: dscarpac on 14 December 2016, 02:40:53 AM
Thankfully since we have great developers, why not make both options available? I think the default should be checkboxes, but hey, I doubt this is a difficult thing to program and the more flexibility in the interface the more likely more people will be happy!

This. I personally don't know what is better. At first I though 1/6 is terrible, then I really got used to it. So i'd play with both implementations and checked one in the personal settings that would be more convenient.

Jacob Marley

I'm with Adam on this one.  (Note that I have not played the new client yet)

AdamH

Is there a way to play a game in such a way that it cannot be spectated?

I ask this because it would be nice to playtest some kingdoms I'm designing for my IRL tournament with people not from my area, and I don't want people to be able to see what kingdoms I'm playing.

LaLight

Quote from: AdamH on 14 December 2016, 11:35:56 PM
Is there a way to play a game in such a way that it cannot be spectated?

I ask this because it would be nice to playtest some kingdoms I'm designing for my IRL tournament with people not from my area, and I don't want people to be able to see what kingdoms I'm playing.

I'm afraid not now... Stef is redoing lobby in a major way, maybe that would be possible then.

Psyduck

Quote from: LaLight on 14 December 2016, 06:38:30 AM
Quote from: dscarpac on 14 December 2016, 02:40:53 AM
Thankfully since we have great developers, why not make both options available? I think the default should be checkboxes, but hey, I doubt this is a difficult thing to program and the more flexibility in the interface the more likely more people will be happy!

This. I personally don't know what is better. At first I though 1/6 is terrible, then I really got used to it. So i'd play with both implementations and checked one in the personal settings that would be more convenient.

One thing to keep in mind about buttons is that they don't scale. At the moment, the highest number of options on a card is 4. But imagine having a card with 5 or even 6 options. And maybe you can select 3 or 4 of these. It's unreasonable to try to display any combination then.
Checkboxes do scale, though.

Also, I would recommend to keep the amount of personalization by configuration small. Having many configuration options makes it harder to maintain the software because of the number of available combinations and may become confusing for the users as well. Sometimes it's better to decide on one solution and then stick to it.

limetime


I am not seeing Donald doing 5 or more options on a card.

Donald X.

Quote from: limetime on 16 December 2016, 07:37:33 AM

I am not seeing Donald doing 5 or more options on a card.
That's Donald X. to you.

It doesn't sound so likely, but I prefer checkboxes anyway.

Hertz Doughnut

Quote from: dscarpac on 14 December 2016, 02:40:53 AM
Thankfully since we have great developers, why not make both options available? I think the default should be checkboxes, but hey, I doubt this is a difficult thing to program and the more flexibility in the interface the more likely more people will be happy!

This is precisely the point of my thread:

http://forum.shuffleit.nl/index.php?topic=732.0


Whenever possible, accommodate EVERYONE. Ideally the interface should feel natural to everyone, but we all have different habits and expectations. There's nothing wrong with having multiple methods for accomplishing function x.

yed

It is always harder for the developers to manage more options.

Hertz Doughnut

Quote from: yed on 17 December 2016, 03:11:17 PM
It is always harder for the developers to manage more options.

No, not "always".

Yes, I agree that it is cumbersome to add user preferences. Like keeping track of which background each user wants or whether they want the Auto-Buy functionality.

However, most interface options could simply be programmed as two or three ways to do X. These aren't too hard to program.  e.g. Four hypothetical ways to play treasures: (1) left-click each treasure, (2) left-click "Play Treasures", (3) press spacebar to play all treasures, (4) say "Play treasures" into a microphone.

Even if I never use (4), it doesn't hurt me that it's there. If it's natural to someone else, that's a win for the game. I mean think about all keyboard shortcuts in Microsoft Excel or Adobe Photoshop that casual users don't know about. It doesn't inconvenience them one bit having those options there, and then when one day when they learn about shift-drag (in Excel) they are suddenly 20% more productive. :)

yed

You can't compare this with keyboard shortcuts because they can work at the same time.

If you have too much user preference options designing screens and reproducing and fixing bugs and becomes harder to do. The code is not as much more complicated, the stuff around it is.

Hertz Doughnut

Quote from: yed on 17 December 2016, 04:39:19 PM
You can't compare this with keyboard shortcuts because they can work at the same time.

If you have too much user preference options designing screens and reproducing and fixing bugs and becomes harder to do. The code is not as much more complicated, the stuff around it is.

Completely agree. User-preference-type interface options are relatively difficult. Keyboard-shortcut-type interface options (aka multiple-methods-for-doing-X) are relatively easy.

Overall the goal has to be to make the game feel natural to as many people as possible... and user-preference options are unavoidable for some things (e.g. sound level), but should be used as rarely as possible.

For the widget in question, it could be programmed both ways without a user preference. A dialog box pops up, and on the left side are the MF style checkboxes; on the right side the SI style buttons. The player can use either one. Is that more confusing for new players? Perhaps. Is it worth implementing a user preference? Probably not.

UI is hard. Making everyone happy is hard.