I'll go through each UI and give my thoughts, good and bad, since making a forum post for every single one would quickly grow out of scope
#General Thoughts on UI
fluid flare
fluid flare
World Map UI
Good: it's clean, nice to look at, nothing stands out like a sore thumb. The quests are shown in a very logical location, the side bar is a good take on giving the most important things. Empire abilities as shown per example with the Tahuk are very clear and obvious. Being able to look up past notifications is a godssent.
Bad: Gods my eyes have to look at the status of my abilities to my dust and then to the diplomacy button. it's all too spread out especially on larger screens. Move Diplomacy and Heroe management to the side bar, move dust and influence to the lefthand side as well and use it's space for that turn's notifications, and the strategic resources. The side bar could also use more contrasting colors, the buttons can look kinda samey
some ideas on what to move where unfortunately drawn using a trackpad
flat girder
Yes exactly! I think it does make sense Diplomacy and Heroes to the left.
It would help If I can micro-shortcut keys to almost everything displayed as an icon.
I also prefer just using the full horizontal bar at the top than always scouting your eyes all around.
The notification toolbar I barely use because of its poor design. ''Old World'' has a more simpler design, despite its full complex tool management, It was much faster to navigate.
I like the ''Yield'' and ''Grid'' to the left but wish it had some subtle colour they just look like white lines or white symbols, Its because I keybind them I remember which is which.
The ''notification'' and ''remainder'' is strange to be split in half one above and the other below, I think it should merge together on the same toolbar. Not sure where to place it though.
fluid flare
City UI
Good: the most important info is fairly apparent and I can quickly see if my city is being affected by modifiers instead of having to look at the FIDSI breakdown. Functions and meaning of buttons and symbols is clear, overall it gives you the information you need
Bad: The botttom bar feels overpopulated with options. Remove the population from there and have it expand from the vocation break down at the top, allowing you to view improvement/district/unit build menus and the population management at the same time
Additionally, the militia button seems.. out of place.. either militia management is a planned feature or it shouldn't be a greyed out button
Empire Summary
Good: It's pretty, it gives me the information I want
Bad: Empire traits section could be expanded downwards to avoid scrolling, Council button seems redundant since in theory this screen could fulfil all functions of that screen as well. The end turn wheel is wholly superfluous here
flat girder
Agree it should come down I always wondered with that. It feels boxed in reading the traits, constricted!
fluid flare
skipping over the victory screen for now
Quest Journal UI
Good: it's visually nice and does its job to give me the quest infos
Bad: Again the end turn wheel is unnecesary and takes up space that could be useful to see more deeds, honestly it's easy to miss that you can scroll the deeds. Dust and influence also aren't required in this screen
Cites and Camps UI
Good: all the information I could use is there, with more information being presented when I expand the individual cities and camps
Questionable: I don't understand why this is the only side bar screen that doesn't open a new page, instead opening a window in the world map ui
Bad: Honestly, can't complain
Protectorates UI
Good: All the information is there
Bad: Needing two pages for 4 protectorates seems kinda silly
Suggestion: I wanna drag and drop the cards into the slots so badly pleasepleasepleaseplease
skipping heroes for now since that's multiple screens
Tech UI
Good: It looks very nice
Bad: Names are missing, making techs less recognizable. The Era bonuses can become invisible being more white on blue surrounded by the fancy colors. Hovering over the tech and over the icons below up gives different details on information, escalating tooltips making the icons redundant, could be replaced with a singular symbol, turn wheeeeeels
drawing this in paint is difficult, era bonuses need to pop out more
narrow wharf
drawing this in pain is difficult
I assume this is a typo and should say paint, because otherwise you should go rest.
Anyway, thanks for the feedback. For the main HUD and the city screen, Derek is already working on a post about the plans for a big rework we've been discussing, and that should be posted later this week
narrow wharf
I did not expect you to be done.
Doesn't change that "pain" better have been a typo
fluid flare
this raccoon can only store so many thoughts and they need to be vented
Diplo UI 1
Good: It's fine
Bad: Massive downgrade compared to say ES2, I'll come to this in a bit, more unnecessary turn wheels
Diplo UI 2
Good: it's perfectly fine at presenting diplomacy options
The Bad: more colors please... and more unnecessary end turn wheeling taking away important space, as can be seen in 2b and 2c (and 2a if I had more factions in my game)
Diplo UI 2a
Good: It's functional
Bad: Reference to the massive downgrade mentioned in Diplo UI 1, this should be available on the first diplo screen like in ES2
Diplo UI 2b
Good: It works
Bad: the end turn wheel takes up space that could otherwise display information
Diplo UI 2c
Good: The amount of Information in this is honestly great
Bad: End Turn Wheel. Units need to be grouped and sorted by upgrade path, maybe using expandable index tabs?
Heroe UI 1
Good: It's fine
Bad: End Turn Wheel anyone?
Heroe UI 2
Good: Lotsa information
Bad: Jesus take the wheel
Heroe UI 3
Good: DRAG AND DROP GLORY HELL YEAH
Bad: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxGEVIvSFeY
Heroe UI 4
Good: uuuh
Bad: I'll be real making a skill wheel not absolutely cluttered is probably impossible, you already know the other thing
fluid flare
Victory UI 1a
Good: Colors! and all victory conditions are made vaguely clear immediately without giving away exact numbers before the narrative progresses
Bad: Other than some odd phrasing, nothing to complain, wheeeeeeeeel
Victoria UI 1b
Good: More colors!
Bad: Unnecessary scrolling at the victory paths, the wheels on the bus go up and down, up and down, up and down..
Victory UI 2
Good:
Bad: This is just symbols and numbers, barely useful unless you're already knowledgable about the game, very confusing
Victory UI 3
Good: I like that this exists, very good to remind yourself
Bad: Not being able to replay all of the narrative events
ALRIGHT
that should be all gameplay relevant screens
what needs to be added:
- empire summary: a population summary adding all pops together, the one in the victory screen doesn't count as it's only available when the victory paths are
general conclusion:
there's a lot of superfluous or too large UI elements that restrict information behind questionable ui elements like unnecessary scroll bars
while the UI is very nice to look at imo, there needs to be more colors to make certain elements pop out more
some stuff needs to be rearranged to increase density of information
too many wheels, we ain't making a truck
I'll probably add to this in the future after I played some more in a new section, anyone is free to add to this list
While I have referenced #1420341119866109962 in here, I haven't mentioned #1420333007042121779 and #1420334468199223306 explicitely, those are still in my view valid and are meant to be included in taking about their respective screens
I'm excited to see what thoughts y'all came up with for the UI rework and I hope some of my suggestions will be incorporated in some form
fluid flare
I forgot to mention it in the individual screens sometimes, but not every screen needs to have the stockpile dust and influence in it
could be potential space for other stuff
pseudo elk
Hi, very interesting and fun feedback. I will not answer and explain every choice we make to have the current ui and Derek will come with plans for some change please come share your impressions then. But for your biggest nemesis I can explain why we always keep the end turn button in all screens :
In multiplayer, we have a timer that forces the end of the turn. It's displayed on the end turn button. Therefore, it's necessary to always be able to see the countdown. Creating a variation for each screen would be too costly.
So, since we had the end turn, we decided to add access points to important screens to allow easy navigation between them, which is why the wheel takes up so much space.
This is part of the reasoning behind this constraint.
fluid flare
Heya, I've thought as much and it's only a real issue in Diplo 2b, Diplo 2c, Quest Journal and Protectorates.
For the diplo ones, since those are optional tabs that you open separately, they could take priority and overlap on the end turn wheel.
Deeds can surely find space somewhere else or have another way of having it communicated that there is more
As for the protectorates, that can probably be solved with resizing