UI Discussion: Notifications

While Uber has mentioned this will happen in some form or another,
I think the Community really needs to start dreaming about what it wants.
Then we can focus and distill those dreams into something a little more concrete.

It should give Uber a better feel for what we want to see.

1. How should notifications happen? What does the player see? What does he hear?
   
   
2. What information is notified?
   
   
3. How long will a notification last? (Persistence)
   Is it permanent? Or does it fade after 10 seconds.
   
   
4. Is there some sort of "log" that the player can access?
   Is the log some sort of floating panel?
   
   
5. How does the player interact with the notifications?
   Is it a 2-way interaction?
   Will we get a camera jump? Will it be the main window or pop-up in a new window?
   
   
6. Is it possible to work with the ChronoCam somehow? Instant replay on "special unit has been destroyed"?
   
   
7. How customizable can they be?
   Custom loaded set for early game, then swap to late game?
   Saved to a config file for out-of-game customizing and sharing among the community?
   Can we add units/buildings to be "flagged" for notifications on-the-fly?
   
   
8. Do we need feedback from Uber on the technical limitation on Notifications?
   Or do you guys know what we can get from the server/client setup already?
   Will a client-side mod suffice? Or will there have to be something special from the server?

Discuss away!!!!!!

Mock-ups, screenshots and getting ideas from other programs and games is highly encouraged!

I've noticed that apparently repairing your commander counts as attacking him, notification-wise.

Other than that, perhaps a "units under attack" notification?

What information is notified? Nukes being finished would be a start (not the silo, the missile). Also, any time that more than 5 units appear out of the edge of "fog of war". Also, whenever an enemy is first scouted.

How long will a notification last? If there is a log, and there should be, it is fine now.

Is there some sort of "log" that the player can access? Would be nice if there was a better chat box, and the chat box had notifications in a unique color/bold/whatever, and there was buttons below the chat box showing who's chat you saw, the players, the games, both, neither... as well as a chat toggle where you can "whisper" and it only shows to teammates or instead type aloud.

How does the player interact with the notifications? Would be nice if clicking the text notification snapped to the location.

Is it possible to work with the ChronoCam somehow? Instant replay on "special unit has been destroyed"? It would be interesting if not for most of the occurances being obviously via the stampede of enemy units or the signature of artillery shelling, unless you caught the notification entirely really late, in which case an independent window with chronocam in the corner would be nice but again not usually necessary.

How customizable can they be? They should have a config, where you can add or remove what causes notifications, based on "unit" and "action". Such as when something is destroyed, or something is seen for first time, or when something gets into combat, and things like air units, ground units, naval units (warns you if enemy has those units first), t2 at all (warns you enemy has t2), nukes, orbital, artillery, commander, combat unit masses larger than x amount, ect.

Do we need feedback from Uber on the technical limitation on Notifications? The players can sort this out themselves. If something isn't possible, it simply needs to be made by a player, and even at that point considered by a dev to include in vanilla game once it "exists". However, so far it appears they do a good job on this. There was a discussion on whether or not one will be able to query for information that the server doesn't default transmit, and if a player can customize every detail of what he does or doesn't receive. That is important here, but it can honestly be ironed out in time.

These are some of my ideas

1 I´m in favor of one different noise for each action like building construction,unit under attack,asteroid incoming,nuke,etc it will display a small icon different for every action and once the player mouse goes over it it says what´s happening

2. Planet, Status, time that this notification has apeared on the screen, if it has been read or not in case of unit killed what unit in what place

3. it´s permanet only the player can decide to get rid of then trought the delete buttom that apears once you hover over it

4. a hotkey can be used to open the log allowing no screen polution and the log can be semi transparent and the words black

5. there is an option to jump the camera to it but a window only opens once you click it(the option will be there)

6.i suggest yes but it wont pause the game for that soo you sure can watch a replay just keep your eyes open the option is in the new window that opens once you click in it as well as the delete and move the camera to there options

7. you can customize the sound they make using your own sounds the image they use using your own image you can change on the fly what buildings will be notified and what not as well you can change on the fly the music and image

8.Uber can upload a notification on the start of the game warning of everything they may judge is necessary like bug,crashes,etc

Well these are my ideas hope you find it good

Another good, thought-provoking thread Culver. Your focus on GUI elements is not unfounded; it is something that could be improved greatly even in games that are as evolved as Starcraft 2.

This already happens.

I think Sins notifications are the best I have ever seen.

Why post so long after the update that included them? (Not that it matters, just a curiosity.)

One of the biggest flaws right now is not knowing where the actions are happening, like if it is on a moon, the planet you're looking at or somewhere far, far away. They should add some sort of identifier for which planet/moon it is on, but hopefully it won't take up much space.

Orbital units, not including fighters, for the sake of not overwhelming the player, should also have notifications for when they are made, and especially when they arrive at another planet. Many people have hurt their game play because they forgot to check on an astreaus that they sent to another moon.

It could also be useful, though perhaps as an option, to notify whenever fabbers have become idle, so that we can use them more efficiently. This could also be the same for the commander.

you can click on the notifications to snap to the spot, if that helps.

Would it be possible to tie a ping system into the notification?

What I mean is, one player pings a location, which brings up a notification that their partner can click on to snap their camera to that location?

Though I suppose such a feature would have to be carefully designed to not be easily abused.

I don't see a way how it could be abused at the moment...

I would like the whole notification system fully customizable. I wanna be told a dox is being killed before the 7 minute mark but don really care after that.

I want to customize wether I snap to or select the unit. I don't need to snap to a finished factory. Let me start queuing up.

When a dox is being attack have a retreat button, that send him and all his buddies within a radius 180 degrees if wanted.

I know not the right place but can't find your ui thread on my phone. Was thinking that it could be nice to create a when I have x units move here waypoints.

http://nl.tinypic.com/m/hwbol0/4

Every catagory should be custumizable. Maybe a few options to only show T2 notifications or only notifications of certain types of buildings.

Example: Production
Early game 0-10min
All notifications
Mid game 10-20min
No T1 building notifications (No more "Ant production completed")
Late game >20min
Only notifications of important buildings(nuke, anti nuke, orbital launcher)

Buttons/info with notification:
Time stamp
Chronocam (maybe with a miniscreen)
View location (maybe with a miniscreen)
Location
Type of unit/building
What happend, under attack, building completed, movement done/unit idle. (Enemy nuke launcher spotted)

I still really want to see them change this behavior slightly so that the camera smoothly "flies" over to the new location instead of jumps. It would really help with staying oriented and keeping track of the layout of the world/system if the camera never jumps directly from one place to another.

I could support that (as long we jump still exists).
I like fast and snappy.

Yeah, the transition would need to be very fast. Our brains are pretty impressive, though. If the camera flies between locations quickly, we can still track our location and remember where we came from. With the camera jumps, there's really no easy way to understand where you are and what you are looking at than to zoom back out. I would like to see the same change made to jumps between saved camera locations, too. When moving to another planet, the camera should quickly zoom out, reposition itself, and then zoom back in. In addition to being useful to players that struggle with orientation, it would have the added bonus of looking pretty cinematic. Hopefully we could get a slider in the settings to control the speed of it all.

Yeah, I'd be happy for a slider. (you know, for context and all that jazz).
I'd have it set pretty low at first, and as I get better, keep pushing lower still.
It's what I do with my phone keyboard, increase the sensitivity as I get more skilled.

There definitely needs to be scouting notifications, and not just for the first time scouting your opponent.

If you have patrolling fighters circling the outskirts of your base and tanks start rolling in through the backside, there needs to be a notification for that as well.

I think notifications aren't too useful now without map pings. As an alternate to snapping to a notification, I think having a mouseover show a ping or a line/arrow from where you're looking to where the notification is happening would be very useful.

you can just click on them to have your camera go to that position.