Another minimap request (Re: May 3 livestream)

Hey, Uber are busy guys, if some people insist on ignoring posts made by the developers or being lazy and not even looking for said posts when they do give us some information, then there is room for people who insist on reminding them of Developers posts and who have the effort to spare to use the search function to find Developer Posts.

You don't like it? Take it up in a PM.

Or of course you could try reporting me. I'd like to see how well that goes for you.

Or, if you think my posts are entirely "pointless" you could block me, and I could do the same for you. We could both go along ignoring each other without anything of value being lost for both of us

At the last though, a question for you: Are you sure you've read all 1004 of my posts?

Are you equating a minimap to an omni-present view?
Yeah, I guess it is somewhat accurate and I want to be able to access every piece of information that I find useful. Processing large amounts of information is a staple of RTS but limiting the tools for the player to read the gamestate is good in what way?

I think that people in the vein of TA expect that PA further improve control, readability and UI in order to manage combat on a interstellar level. At least I do. You could make a game with planetary combat without strategic zoom and an almost absent unit AI much like the original Command and Conquer. But would it be fun?
Or you could try to push the envelope and try to develop more powerful UI to control even more advanced simulated combat. How much can you expand it?
Where does the fun start and where does it end? It's a matter of human psychology and personal preference.
Is neutrino a good candidate for understanding what is fun for his intended audience? Yes. I don't debate that but I personally seem to have different preferences than him. Voicing ones opinion or even criticizing the developers idea is nothing wrong in a discourse. I'm glad they are having that discussion. Inside everyones head there is already a version of PA playing out their dreams of planetary annihilation. We will just have to wait and see how it matches up to Planetary Annihilation.

Being able to access every piece of information that you find useful with nothing so much as a glance to the bottom left or right of the screen is a 'habit' that minimaps have bred over the years. That doesn't mean it's a good habit, nor a desirable outcome for the style of game that Neutrino has in mind.

I for one welcome the chance to actually go looking for information, rather than it be presented to me without any effort on my part. It's amusing that so many people seem to be running around like headless chickens as soon as anyone tells them they might not have near omniscient awareness of their immediate surroundings at all stages of the game.

Now I'm in a minority here, but I'm seriously interested in what Neutrino has in mind with regards to the minimap. I'm not particularly interested in theorycrafting because it just sets my expectations off in some phantom dream-world. I'm more interested in facts, which is why I'm perfectly happy to reiterate the facts that Neutrino so graciously grants us.

So theorycraft away... but remember the facts. That's all I ask.
Minimaps are not necessary. They are desired, but not needed.

And I'm more interested in what's on the horizon than what's behind me. If Jon says he can kill the minimap... I'm all for watching how he does it. I'll pass judgement on his efforts after I've seen the show, rather than coming here with prejudice and preconceptions.

Well if you can have as many views as you like you can basically have omniscient awareness. Just seems harder to manage.

Maybe that's the intention?

And, if I might add... again, I'd like to actually see what Jon's got in his mind before jumping to conclusions that it won't work or that it's inferior to the minimap.

I'm not saying Jon is a genius and that his plan WILL work. What I am saying is that the man is a visionary and I'd quite like to see his vision over the same old boring trite that's been trotted out year after year.

If he says "You won't need the minimap, I've got a plan"... I'm SUPER interested in the plan and quite willing to ditch the minimap should the plan work. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, or so they say. I want to taste the pudding before everyone tries to tinker with the recipe.

So yes, I'm a man with a megaphone, Telling you to stop talking about pudding recipes until you've at least SEEN the pudding. Hopefully you'll taste it too before you attempt to say what's wrong about it... or why this other pudding with minimap sprinkles is better.

Raising the learning curve with camera micromanagement. Why is that good?

Now we turned multiple view on its head.
Multiple views are good in my mind. It makes it possible to track multiple orbital bodies at whatever zoom level you want.
Obfuscating intel you already have gained using ingame resources making radars and scouts which can be compensated by multiple monitor use sounds like giving ground to unfair advantages to people with many screens...

I got it! Uber is getting money from TV and Screen producers and nanolathe is in on the whole deal.



But seriously I think there isn't much left to discuss and I would just like to wait and try it out in the alpha and the beta. Easy to use multiple viewports and chronocam just sounds too damn awesome.

Busted... Damn...

You can only turn your head so fast to see multiple minimaps anyway. Again, hotkeying a camera angle would replace turning your eyes with pressing a key. You press a key, you are looking at a different angle of the same planet overhead or a new planet entirely. You can do this to one window, changing the overhead map, while leaving your window that you are clicking in alone.

fair concern, i trust it won't be a problem but we'll see

If there is a tutorial, I hope it suggests to the player to keep a small window or two open, set zoomed out to see the entire overhead action, and hotkeyed across planets. This way, you move your clicking screen my your own control, and look through the small zoomed out windows at the wide-view of all the action like it was a galactic security camera.

If not, I hope they make it a preset option to auto-load for you a "minimap" that is nothing more than an option that automatically opens a smaller window zoomed out to show an entire planet face and pre-hotkeyed to all the planets for you to scroll through. That way, it doesn't take learning to do the "smart thing", as there is an option that gives it to you without any work.

Hyperbole aside (by 'near omniscient' I assume you mean restricted to unit LOS) I think we are fully justified in assuming that Neutrino wants an efficient summary of the information available to players.

A lot of reasonable assumptions are made about PA when it is advertised as an RTS. Map awareness is important in RTS and all recent RTS have supported player attempts to gain map awareness. PA has extra points in it's favour:

• PA is from the TA family of RTS games which aim to have more powerful UIs than other games. Your ability to see what is going on is part of the UI.
• Supcom has the powerful map awareness tool of strategic zoom. The creators of Supcom cared about map awareness and strategic zoom is in PA.
• The multiple viewport system should improve map awareness.

It has only been stated that there will be no minimap. Not that there will be limitations on how much information the UI will make available.

Indeed, and this stance was even reversed in the most recent livestream. Uber doesn't have an aversion to sphere projections but rather is confident they will be unnecessary. Ultimately they will do whatever they think conveys strategic information most efficiently.

Very good observations and a whole lot of foresight being pumped into this topic, excellent ideas. I look forward to seeing UBER's solution to this endeavor, for it is a very new and different challange than with any of it's predecessors. (Any of them... you can start with C&C or Populace or whatever suits you...)

For those of whom dont understand the issue with the minimaps, allow me to spend a moment to bring forth a few of the challenges that UBER is facing.
First and foremeost, PlanetaryAnnihilation is based on globes (spheres). These globes do not conform to traditional 10x10 flat battlefields. If you were to unwrap these battlefields onto a flat-map view, it doesnt always read well especially for people that are not geographically aware. By this, i mean that its hard to read. This map, for instance, is a sphere which is represented on a flat image:

This cutout is a rough minimap of Earth. Now, imagine for a moment you were trying to track a blip on the map and approximate the time of travel of said blip between any two points on the map. Unless this path runs along the equator, it could be difficult to gauge its ETA because of the gaps within the lines of latitude.

i may have gotten too technical... but this is going to be a tough learning curve for all of us. This map does not follow our traditional rules when it comes to 2D gameplay. It may even be too impossible or too demanding on the system to make something like this even possible (i wouldnt know). Hence Mavor's statement "i dont believe the traditional minimap is our best solution" (may have paraphrased, please forgive me) I agree with Mavor and his followers, but i think we all agree that there must be a way to retrieve the info we desire. There may be alternate possibilities that we have yet to bring forth. One such possibility is a 3D map. i realize this is awefully close to a splitscreen, but with a transarancy twist on it.

something similar to this 3D rendering of a globe (with radar imaging reminiscent of TA or SC) might give the user the ability to view the map in its entirety as well as provide the information that they desire.

Our beloved game has evolved, perhaps our tools should evolve as well.
Any Thoughts?