Made a thread for UI improvements, need your support ;)

[Tarien]

Okay I wrote another thread for Trion on the official forums, find it here. I think that many of the changes in the thread are important ones that Trion really need to hear, so please post in that thread, keep it alive until we get a Dev post acknowledging it. Even if you only support or like one of the suggestions please support it! I don't think that any of the changes would harm the game, and I think they would all make great additions to the already great UI!

As before, here is the complete text for discussion:

I'm a fairly active poster on the MMO-Champion RIFT subforum and over the last year I've seen a lot of requests from players for the same things over and over with respect to RIFTs UI. Don't get me wrong it is probably the greatest UI out-of-the-box in any MMO I've played, and while addon development seems to be a little slow due to API limitations ZorbaTHut is doing a great job with managing the Addon forums and helping new addon developers.

But, I think there are a few features that need to be implemented or can be improved on, and as I said these are things many players really want (well okay, a couple were my ideas :P). Right now the Addon API doesn't give us these things so I figured I should write it up for Trion and see what they can offer. So here goes.

Oh, and please forgive the use of certain WoW addons as examples, I simply wish to demonstrate some good examples of UI improvements made by players that I feel Trion could use here in RIFT.

Nameplates:
Currently the number one feature I see requested from players, new and veteran alike, is nameplates. We (desperately) want the ability to be able to display nameplates on enemies, there is nothing worse than having a large number of mobs on the tank and having to waste valuable seconds tabbing to the target you want to DPS, or in PvP doing the same. Where there is a large group it is nigh impossible to use your mouse to click the required target, people/enemies move about too quickly.

Some good examples of how Nameplates can be done well are the World of Warcraft addons Tidy Plates and Aloft, although I would expect something more tasteful and less 'neon lights' from Trion

Nameplates should:

• Be selectable with your mouse.
• Be large enough to click, and possibly scalable in the UI settings.
• Should not overlap or obscure each other.
• Show a mobs current health, name, and level as a minimum of information.
• Show number of combo points for Rogues.

Nameplates could also:

• Health bar color reflects class, ie yellow for rogues, purple for mages etc. Mobs, bosses etc are always red.
• Show enemy cast bars as a smaller bar beneath the health bar.
• Show enemy resources (toggle in UI settings?).
• Show your debuffs/DoTs (possibly with timers, toggle in UI settings?).
• Glow yellow/red when you are about to pull threat / have aggro.

Tab Targeting:
Tabbing through targets in it's current form is risky business. It feels clunky and inconsistent, you often end up targeting a mob currently not in combat with you, or mobs on a different level (hello, Deepstrike Mine). I've drawn up a rule set that could be used to make tab targeting more reliable.

• Target must be in range
• Target must be in line of sight
• Start with targets that are closer and work outwards
• Prefer new targets over old targets (to make DoTing multiple targets easier)
• Prefer players over pets in PvP
• Prefer hostile enemies over neutral (I know there is an option for this in PvP, would be nice if it was also in PvE and on by default)
• If in combat with mobs, you can only tab to mobs in combat, if you want to target another mob (to pull more for instance), you must select it with your mouse. Possibly this last item is something to toggle in the settings

Bags:
There is also a very large demand for the option of all bags to be combined into a single backpack, an example of this is Onebag or Bagnon. This larger bag could possibly be scalable using the current UI editing system. As an added bonus, certain bags could be designated for certain professions so that materials gathered would automatically be sent to that bag (this would be nice with or without a combined bag feature).


Gear Manager:
Currently we can use command lines to create gear sets and swap them, I propose you go one step further and create a tab in the character screen to manage gear sets. A drop down box to select the gear set (being able to name each set would be nice!), possibly with a tick box to activate 'editing mode' where you can add, change or remove pieces of gear from the set, and the system makes a note of the changes and updates the gear set once you untick the box and leave editing mode.

You're so close to this anyway I think that it would be a fairly easy thing to implement in the GUI.

Mail:
Increase the number of items we can send at a time. The cost for 12 items sent in one mail is no different to the cost of 12 items sent in two mails, so why not just let us send more items? 20 items sounds like a good number! It's a small change but quality of life changes are always nice and this one should be easy!


Inspect Player:
Please give us the option to view a players costume when we /inspect them. A simple check box to switch view would be sufficient, or a tab to the side of the screen. Whatever is easiest for you. I cannot tell you the number of times I have admired what a player is wearing but have no idea what it is! And that ties in nicely with...


Dyes:
Firstly, please can Dye colors appear in the item description. Make it toggle on and off in the UI settings maybe, not everyone will care, but a great many want to know exactly what shade of blood red you are using on that plate chest piece, or ocean blue on your mage robe.

Secondly, and much more importantly, please make Dyed items more vibrant. Currently items that are dyed often end up with a very dirty colour, nothing like what the dye looks like in our bags. Many items that would look amazing in white often end up grey, I've seen yellow's turn items light brown and sky blue's that look more like a dark teal. Color is important to us! We care how we look and it ties us to our characters much more.


Threat:
Possibly the nameplate changes above would be enough, but it would still be nice for threat figures to be available, either to the addon API so that someone can write an addon for it, or even in the combat log so it can be parsed.

The first might be preferable. If you were able to release threat formulae to us, possibly as a library for the API perhaps, an addon could be written that parses the combat log for your groups attacks and calculates everyone's threat based on their actions and what the library says each action should cause in terms of threat, and displays this.


The End!
That's everything I have right now. Please discuss in a constructive and civil manner, and remember that what you want might not be what everyone else wants. Feel free to make changes to suggestions or your own suggestions, I am sure Trion is always looking for more feedback and ideas!

[Slipmat]

All looks good to me, we see how fast Trion can respond to suggestions or even surprise us by just dropping 'goodies' out of the blue, like the "mercenary" change coming, who'd have seen that

Possibly, they might be waiting on some player led mods to address some of those wants, then again, if they're limiting their API a bit, maybe not...might as well copy and paste this reply onto the Rift forum and join the campaign

[Fencers]

Trion promised like 3 times to fix tab targeting. Twice stated on a podcast and once on the forums.

I asked Daglar about it 2 months ago and he said it was WiP. Yet I am still tabbing to mob behind me 2 months later or the skeleton archers in the left wing of Hammerknell on the way to Rune King. >.>

[Deleted]

I'd like to add something to the inspect part. When you ctrl click and item off someones inspect window, you can only see what one item would look like on you, insteead of a whole set like when you view it at a vendor. It's nothing major, but it would just be nice.

I like to inspect people in cool armour sets, and see what it looks like on my race, but I'm unable to.