PSA - What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG)

Okay, Upfront let me say I'm kinda improvising on this, so expect edits and what not once posted.

So yeah, What You See Is What You Get(henceforth WYSIWYG) is a design concept that Uber is applying to PA.

At it's base level, WYSIWYG is about readability. It's the idea that a player can use visuals to immediately recognize something AND by doing know can accurately know how it will perform based on that.

Before I get to it's usage in PA I want to talk about WYSIWYG's usage somewhere else that is similar, Tabletop Wargames(40K in particular because that's where my experience is).

In 40K you can kit out most things with Options equipment/different equipment sets so it's really important to ensure that those things are properly presented on the models themselves, not just the Army List. So it you want to give your Space Marine Squad a Plasmagun, you have to have a model holding said Plasmagun. This applies to pretty much everything.

But the way/reasoning WYSIWYG is applied in PA is a little different. In 40K it's used to ensure the idea that you can recognize how a unit's abilities are being changed by equipment. In PA it's being applied to make sure that no matter what stage of the game you're in, you'll always know a given units' capabilities.

A Leveler should always be a Leveler, the only thing that should change throughout a game is how many you'll be dealing with on average. Mid-game you might only see 5-10 in a force, but later on you might see armies composed almost entirely of Levelers.

The End goal of the WYSIWYG concept is that you make it easier for the player to know what's going on, if a unit has multiple "states" the player has to keep them all in mind, potentially having to treat each "state" as they would separate units and creating a lot more "mental work" for the player. SupCom2 has serveral easy examples where a WYSIWYG would have made gameplay much easier to handle. For example each Unit Type(Land/Air/Naval/Structure/ACU) had 5 "Veterancy Upgrades", all these did was boost set stats by a percentage, it wasn't that much but on the other hand these could easily turn the tide of an engagement so they had to be considered by the player. In another Example, ACUs could be upgraded with Overcharge, a Very powerful weapon that could easily counter almost any army large enough to kill a Commander, but because it was Research upgrade you had no way of knowing whether or not the enemy ACU had it unless he had seen it being used previously.

Obviously both of those situations would be improved with better visual cues, and while that IS a factor of WYSIWYG, it doesn't solve the root problem of forcing the player to keep all that in mind and only really helps with identification.

There is another factor that is important to keep in mind and that's scale. It's one thing for SupCom2 where the number of units is limited and you don't have as many units generally but PA doesn't really have those limits placed upon and other complications like having separate Bot and Tank Factories means that units having various "states" would be all the more taxing/confusing on players.

Uhh, not sure the best way to end this off but I guess I've hit the main points and what will follow is a bunch of additional explanation so we'll see how it goes.

Mike

I am a huge fan of Uber's WYSIWYG principle. Especially since we're playing at the Strategic Icons level. I can't zoom in and look closely at all 50 incoming units to see if they have the upgraded rocket packs or not. I see a group of incoming strategic icons, I know exactly how much damage they are capable of dealing and exactly how I should respond to it.

Some people could argue that having the uncertainty is a good thing because it adds extra levels of complexity and strategy. And I agree. It is a good thing, for certain games (like RUSE), but not PA.

For the gameplay that PA is going for, WYSIWYG is a very important and helpful principle.

I too like this approach. On the scale of PA, it's important to have units that you can glance at and know what to expect. In a game where micro might be much, much more important, this approach is less viable.

It's not so much about it being less viable as much as it's not as needed, I mean one just needs to look at Starcraft 2to see how a smaller scale gives different options/opportunities. SC2 Uses a large UI to communicate all the unit stats as they change throughout th game but that simply wouldn't be advisable for a game on the scale of PA.

Mike

While I mostly agree, I think something like how Sins of a Solar Empire manages extra information in the pinned sections worked well. I knew more about individual units at a glance (to check on distant battles for example) while keeping the UI clear. I'm not sure how well something like that would work in PA, but there are times I wished for something more than just knowing how many units of each I have in a stack.

Actually I think strategic icons are the way to implement something like veterancy, instead of trying to alter the model. An additional layer of strategic icons, which had tiny chevrons showing veterancy level, that fit well with the normal icons (so either could be set visible, not visible and according to distance as preferred separately), would be good.

This is more relevant in regards to the changing of stats from upgrades and veterancy rather that stuff like a unit's disposition.

Mike

I agree with the principal, and I also agree that WYSIWYG has a huge positive impact on the playability of the game. I do feel that it very often gets completely misinterpreted however.

WYSIWYG is keyed on predictability of unit behaviors and battle outcomes by looking at the army composition and not having to wonder what upgrades they have or wondering what special damage resistances are going to play in. That does NOT mean that you cannot have special attributes or behaviors on units and weapons. For example an armor system, or upgrades. It means that if a player looks at the battle field from any scope (orbital icons to over the shoulder) you should be able to predict the relationships of the units consistently.



Some examples of systems that DO or DO NOT violate WYSIWYG

AA units get a special damage reduction against all damage inflicted by aircraft... violates WYSIWYG
Making bots do 10X damage against buildings but half damage against tanks... violates WYSIWYG
An upgrade for tanks at the factory that doubles their health... violates WYSIWYG

Giving each unit a FLAT damage reduction trait to reduces all incoming damage per shot equally... DOES NOT violate WYSIWYG. If a unit is modeled to show heavy armor, and that units armr behaves the same way against every weapon type its behavior on the field is completely predictable. If you shoot a 9mm at an Abrams tank you don't expect it to do much/any damage. If the use of armor is entirely predictable and consistently applied you are getting what you see.

Giving a weapon the special ability to bypass armor of that specific tank... violates WYSIWYG.

If that same armor piercing weapon bypassed all armor values consistently and predictably... if the unit description and the weapons art FX appropriately convey an armor piercing effect, then you are getting what you see.

If Dox have an upgrade that doubles their damage... violates WYSIWYG

If Dox have an upgrade that replaces their pea shooters with plasma guns... IF that upgrade changes both the model and the strategic icon, and the unit continues to behave in a predictable fashion, then you are getting what you see.

Making bots more viable by adding a mechanic that tanks arbitrarily miss 70% of all shots against bot type units... violates WYSIWYG

Making bots more viable by reducing the base accuracy of the Ant's cannon and other anti-tank weapons so that they have a little scatter and then allowing the natural collision detection in the game determine if it is a hit or miss. You are getting what you see.

I've thought about that before. But that still means I have to look close at each of the icons of the 100-300 units that are coming my way. Not really possible when I'm managing 3 different planets and 4 battles on 2 of them.

That really depends on how clear the icon change is and how significant the performance with veterancy upgrade is. The larger the improvement, the more clear the icon change needs to be.

If the performance shifts as far as the difference between a Dox and Vanguard then the Icon should be as different as between a Dox and a Vanguard. We're OK with having 200 Dox icons moving toward you when 5 of them might be Vanguards, so why would it be different if they were elite Dox instead?

I'm actually not fine at all with the current balance and how way over powered T2 units are, like the Vanguard.

Having T2 units that are so powerful that a single unit can take out an army of 100+ T1 units is not good gameplay balance IMO.

Sure, but now we're getting into a debate about unit balance rather than the UI feedback or WYSIWYG. I'm OK with a T2 unit being that strong, but it should also have a cost to accurately reflect that strength, and even more importantly it should not be balanced in such a way that it makes the "lesser" units obsolete. If a Vanguard is designed to be a mega Dox killer, OK, but don't let it also do the job that Dox would have done. A true mega Dox killer should suck balls engaging towers or tanks.

This is how I see the super/mega/experimental unit debate. I'm OK with giant units, just don't let them replace everything smaller because they do everything better.

I think this still is tied into UI feedback as well as unit balance.

Even so. Currently, T2 units invalidate basic units because they are so so much better than T1 units. I'm predicting the meta game is going to shift back towards rushing T2.

There is one caveat though - if you rush T2 too hard, you risk getting sniped by 30-40 Bumblebees.

But when one player does get to T2, the other player is screwed.

The meta game revolves around getting to T2 before your opponent.

And when I do get to T2, my opponent then has to get to T2 very very quickly, or they're screwed.

PA was supposed to be a game built around not invalidating other units. But when T2 metal for metal is way more effective than T1, then T1 units are invalidated.

Rushing Advanced is impossible in this build, sure. But it's not unfeasible. I'm sure on a 600 radius planet with a water start I could EASILY go heavy air, rush T2 air, and just start ripping through the enemy base within ten minutes. AA is so weak now, all you need is a massive fighter screen. I've done it mildly against 3 Uber AIs, it worked pretty well to discourage their attacks until I decided to kill them.

Right now, energy is a seriously limiting factor early game, and mex are a seriously limiting factor late game.

Go figure.

And I can prove brian's point here rather easily, by saying one word.

Vanguards.

Even then. "Rushing" is relative.

Players will slowly figure out the ideal time to start building T2. That's what happened during beta. Then again in Gamma. And it'll happen again in Galactic.

Whoever gets to T2 first, generally wins.

I like and apply WYSIWYG but dislike how it is applied to automation in PA. For example an objection to build priorities was that state toggles violate WYSIWYG. I would agree if the state in question changes the mechanics of the unit, ie what the unit can do. A state toggle such as one that armours a unit (proportional reduction of all incoming damage) at the expense making it unable to fire should have an obvious visual indication. Changes to a unit should be visible in the game world, this is the basic idea of WYSIWYG.

The difference between armour and priorities is that priorities do not affect what the unit can do. Its capabilities are unchanged. Instead priorities tell the unit how to use the abilities that it already has. You can emulate build priorities by micromanaging your economy whereas no amount of micromanagement will give your units an armour bonus. So automation based state toggles are standing order, not mechanics changes. Your opponents can't see your order queues so why would they be able to see your other standing orders? Of course it is good to display the standing order to the player who controls the units but it can afford to be done in a more gamey way because your opponent will not notice.

I made a very long post describing how people are too quick to label something as violating WYSIWYG. I agree there's nothing even remotely related to WYSIWYG when it comes to managing factory production. To argue against priorities with WYSIWYG would also mean that looped production ques should be removed too... and I've not seen anyone argue in favor of that.


I really like the idea of having a production priorities toggle, but I'm going to play devil's advocate for a minute. The concern that I see would be that we're adding further UI and that it may not be obvious which factories are at max priority, vs which are at low priority. Unless the system includes a way to quickly mass manage all of your factories, radar, defenses, etc it could very quickly become a gaggle trying to flip/flop priorities when a major game changer happens.

Maybe the strategic icons could change the normal white border color to a red or something to show upgrades. Won't happen in vanilla but it would be a way of solving what you're talking about.