51 replies to this topic

[The Packrat]

Absolutely yes. "My left arm has half of its armor left" is far more useful to me than "my left arm has kind of a reddish hue".

[light487]

I honestly think it should have been a hybrid.. so you have your paper doll but rather than just colours changing, there are bars that decrease in size as it gets damaged AND changes colour.

[Hive Rat]

light487, on 16 July 2012 - 06:09 PM, said:

Ok other it is hehe

And for the record.. I think that HTAL does look better.. just not as intuitve.

For those that don't know it's (H)ead, (T)orso, (A)rms, (L)egs

Thanks, wasn't sure what HTAL was

[Whip]

In todays age of graphics, what is to stop one ffrom having a 50/50 split showing both readouts for both your mech and enemy under the crosshair, with the option of going one or the other readout or both

i.e

Left hand lower side is enemy mech readout, Right hand side lower is your mech readout. Centre is Mini map/ radar, Centre centre is HUD/Crosshairs. Upper left is defensive modules, Upper right is weapon modules and ammo counters. Upper center is mech heading / torso direction.

Hmmmmm that sounds vaugley familar don't it?.....Why change the wheel?

It's been going fine these last 4000+ years. All you can do is improve on it but you can not change the original design.

Edited by Whip, 16 July 2012 - 11:29 PM.

[Gray Carlyle]

i prefer HTAL

[William Petersen]

I voted HTAL because I assume you mean it as an option, since wireframe is already in.

[Affront692]

I used HTAL in previous mech games because the doll would be difficult to see in some situations(if there is terrrain in the background same colour as the doll)

If we can have both options it would be nice.....

[MustrumRidcully]

Eddy Hawkins, on 16 July 2012 - 06:23 PM, said:

MW4 alowd you to swap between doll and bars on the fly, no reason they cant do that in MWO, but i perfer the doll readout

I seem to remember even MW1 being able to do that, but maybe I am making this up, e.g. using the holes in my memory instead of the memory itself.

[Wintersprite]

I prefer HTAL for the accuracy it provides. With some getting used to it's even as easy to read as the paperdoll, at least in my opinion.

[100mile]

"Paper doll shows me which side of my torso is damaged and how bad...giving me the option to try and keep that part of my mech away from the enemy...HTAL just tells me my torso is damaged..

[Grey Weasel]

I personally prefer the paper doll. Quick and dirty. However, I like the idea of a hybrid of both. (I've never seen MWLL, and never will.) Something like putting up the paper doll, but having the color inside drain away like a bar instead of just changing color. I think that would satisfy both camps.

[fire moth]

Durant Carlyle, on 16 July 2012 - 07:43 PM, said:

I hope they have an HTAL display option simply because the generic doll they use doesn't actually look like the 'Mech you're piloting. I can already tell it's going to annoy the hell out of me. If they made the doll 'Mech-specific, then it would be fine.

unless you were playing mechwarrior 2! the paper dolls were an accurate representation of the mech you were piloting. superior to the later releases with the generic doll.

[StainlessSR]

I just took another look at the frozen city game play, not only does the damage display change color (which in the older games was hard for me to discern some of the shades due to r/g colorblindness) but the sections get smaller also. So while I would like HTAL being an option, it isn't going to be essential for me.

[ElcomeSoft]

I voted "Yes" because I quite like the HTAL system but I would honestly say that we should have a customisable HUd so that we can select from several options of how we would like the information to be displayed and where we would like it to be displayed on our screens.

I would be interested in UI Mods like people have made for World of Tanks, however if some of the better user-designed ones were integrated into MWO then I'd be much happier (Mod system in MWO is okay but can be a pain when they patch stuff and it's not very modular or easy to swap on the fly).

I could have probably explained myself a bit better but words escape me this lunch time.

[bpphantom]

Well right now it's paper doll, but the option to switch between them would be nice. From what I can see in the GDC 2012 gameplay video I like the paper doll method and locations on the HUD.

[Schtirlitz]

Hope there will be a HTAL visualization option.

[grimzod]

Rather have the doll. HTAL is not , at a glance, as easy to pick out a weak spot with peripheral vision for me.

Edited by grimzod, 17 July 2012 - 06:49 AM.

[Durant Carlyle]

100mile, on 17 July 2012 - 02:55 AM, said:

"Paper doll shows me which side of my torso is damaged and how bad...giving me the option to try and keep that part of my mech away from the enemy...HTAL just tells me my torso is damaged..

Incorrect. The HTAL display gives one bar for Center Torso, one for Center Torso Rear, one for Left Torso, one for Left Torso Rear, one for Right Torso, and one for Right Torso Rear. Each bar goes from Full to Empty, showing exactly how much damage your 'Mech has taken in each section. I'd much rather have that instead of "Is that section light red or dark red?" type of guessing games. I suppose I'll be able to get used to it, but being paranoid about how much damage you can take tends to make people less effective as a warrior.

[ElcomeSoft]

Just a thought.... overlay HTAL onto the Paperdoll.

So we have a picture of a left arm with a colour indicating the current armour level as well as a HTAL-style bar showing how much armour is left. Satisfies both Paperdoll and HTAL users in the same box.

[Necrodemus]

I'd like to see selectable readouts, but if stuck with one I'd prefer the "paper doll" showing where the bad 'Mech touched me.

Regarding the doll's appearance... While I'd like to see one specific to my 'Mech I can see two reasons for not getting that.
- The first would be dev time spent customizing the HUD for each 'Mech. Also, if they had a specific doll for the 'Mech you're piloting then eventually someone is going to ask for a custom doll for the target 'Mech once you know its variant.
- Second, it makes sense that 'Mech manufacturers would eventually settle on a unified standard for various pilot interfaces. Doing so minimizes the risk of misinterpretation during combat... and it's cheaper for the manufacturer.

Edit: Voted 'Other' as I would like to see the option to select "Doll" or HTAL assuming the HTAL implementation wouldn't eat too much dev time.

Edited by Necrodemus, 17 July 2012 - 08:31 AM.