Mudlet Mapper
Re: Mudlet Mapper
Hehe, to get out of there you need to do quests and get tokens to give to the ferryman, I believe. HELP DEATH should help. Screenshots look really pretty though!
Re: Mudlet Mapper
Looks cool, though..
One of the biggest issues that I see is that everything sort of blends together - you can't just tell at a glance where you are, where things are in relation to you, and so on..you've got to look at it for a while and try and un-jumble all the boxes and lines..and even then, I can only do that for the Mhaldor one because I know the basic layout of the city already.
Wyd
One of the biggest issues that I see is that everything sort of blends together - you can't just tell at a glance where you are, where things are in relation to you, and so on..you've got to look at it for a while and try and un-jumble all the boxes and lines..and even then, I can only do that for the Mhaldor one because I know the basic layout of the city already.
Wyd
Re: Mudlet Mapper
about this... it will be possible to zoom in and just see a few connecting rooms instead of the whole area, right?Wyd wrote:Looks cool, though..
One of the biggest issues that I see is that everything sort of blends together - you can't just tell at a glance where you are, where things are in relation to you, and so on..you've got to look at it for a while and try and un-jumble all the boxes and lines..and even then, I can only do that for the Mhaldor one because I know the basic layout of the city already.
Wyd
Re: Mudlet Mapper
Even without the transparency, you could get used to it and see what is where - I think that with transparency it'll look much easier and discernible.
Re: Mudlet Mapper
Not to mention that it can be viewed in 2d, right?
Re: Mudlet Mapper
No, but you can have the camera look at it straight down and it'll emulate that.
Re: Mudlet Mapper
Just a few random ideas. The examples are going to be highly Lusternia specific but other muds might have similar wish-lists.
Idea 1: It would be nice to have the option to enable/disable a link or room via a left mouse click. In many muds aggressive mobs reset in the same rooms all the time. Also sometimes aggressive mobs may wander an area such as the gravediggers in the Blasted Land. In this and the case of enemy territory you want to avoid routing through that area if possible. Finally there are any number of player abilities that set up traps to hinder and obstruct. This could be a locked door, ice wall, firewall, pits, etc. A path that is usually valid has become temporarily unavailable. (or there will be negative consequences)
How might this work? The first click selects a room or link and subsequent click(s) toggle to enable/disable it. Double clicking would still be reserved for speedwalking. Disabling a room disables all the links that are directly attached to the node. You might disable an entire room if you know a deathtrap await but just a single link in the case of a locked door. (the link could become a dotted line, a box greyed out)
Idea 2: The link leading to the previous room you came from could be highlighted. This is often good to know because sometimes you want to run away, are involuntarily moved, and wish to backtrack.
Idea 3: Kind of surprised that this was not mentioned anywhere or more likely I just missed it. Points of interest, or landmarks would be infinitely more common/useful than searching for a specific room name. It'd be easier to just search 'bank' or 'Rowena', than 'The green meadow near the pond with the mosquitoes'. All rooms are not born equal; some are more interesting than others because of NPCs, loot, special portals, etc. Maybe right-clicking a room would allow for "bookmarking" a room, adding notes, and other useful options.
Idea 4: Now I'm just getting down to details, but players (individuals or groups) could be represented as points/dots in a cube. To reveal the specific names you might hover your mouse over the cube representing the room. A legend would be nice as well but it might take a lot of room on the screen. Skills like scent could locate all players in the area, collect all the room names and append to the points of interest. This might be useful for tracking players down and speedwalking to a target.
Idea 5: A number of graphics/colors/textures to represent special rooms/environments have been presented but here's something that might work. The color of the "uppermost" face of a cube could represent the environment. The remaining five faces would share a common color and denote rooms in a common area. You might color the edges of the cube for rooms that have a temporary effect/condition such as a mage meld, fire, trap, etc. Special rooms like shops could have an object (flag, ladder, $, manhole, etc.) floating above the cube.
Idea 6: I prefer to use the mouse for all mapping commands because it's simple and keeps things consistent. Rotation would use a click and drag virtual-trackball interface. Translation would be single mouse clicks that do not select a room or link. (there's no need for "W,A,S,D") So clicking on any part of the background would would center your map around that particular point. Zooming could be the job of the mouse/scroll wheel. Right clicking will bring up context-specific menus which contain less commonly used options/actions after selecting a room, link, or backdrop.
Idea 7: Exploded diagrams. This is analogous to folding/collapsing code blocks except you do something similar for areas/subareas. For example a city might be represented as a huge map. If you're not interested in all the detail you might hide the group of rooms that and replace it with the simple label "Shopping area". To manipulate the map, the user could drag a rectangle over areas of the map and in combination with the shift and ctrl keys select all the rooms they are interested in a manner similar to the way you would highlight/select files in a directory. (try a file manager like Thunar) Then you right click, select "group", name your group, and manually place a label somewhere convenient. A small rectangular box with a "+/-" sign would allow you to fold and unfold. Now you can have area commands where you re-enable all rooms in a group (see Idea 1).
Just my 2 sovereigns and some food for thought. What you have so far looks awesome; keep up the great work!
EDIT: Added 7th idea. Edited for grammar because I wrote this fairly late.
Idea 1: It would be nice to have the option to enable/disable a link or room via a left mouse click. In many muds aggressive mobs reset in the same rooms all the time. Also sometimes aggressive mobs may wander an area such as the gravediggers in the Blasted Land. In this and the case of enemy territory you want to avoid routing through that area if possible. Finally there are any number of player abilities that set up traps to hinder and obstruct. This could be a locked door, ice wall, firewall, pits, etc. A path that is usually valid has become temporarily unavailable. (or there will be negative consequences)
How might this work? The first click selects a room or link and subsequent click(s) toggle to enable/disable it. Double clicking would still be reserved for speedwalking. Disabling a room disables all the links that are directly attached to the node. You might disable an entire room if you know a deathtrap await but just a single link in the case of a locked door. (the link could become a dotted line, a box greyed out)
Idea 2: The link leading to the previous room you came from could be highlighted. This is often good to know because sometimes you want to run away, are involuntarily moved, and wish to backtrack.
Idea 3: Kind of surprised that this was not mentioned anywhere or more likely I just missed it. Points of interest, or landmarks would be infinitely more common/useful than searching for a specific room name. It'd be easier to just search 'bank' or 'Rowena', than 'The green meadow near the pond with the mosquitoes'. All rooms are not born equal; some are more interesting than others because of NPCs, loot, special portals, etc. Maybe right-clicking a room would allow for "bookmarking" a room, adding notes, and other useful options.
Idea 4: Now I'm just getting down to details, but players (individuals or groups) could be represented as points/dots in a cube. To reveal the specific names you might hover your mouse over the cube representing the room. A legend would be nice as well but it might take a lot of room on the screen. Skills like scent could locate all players in the area, collect all the room names and append to the points of interest. This might be useful for tracking players down and speedwalking to a target.
Idea 5: A number of graphics/colors/textures to represent special rooms/environments have been presented but here's something that might work. The color of the "uppermost" face of a cube could represent the environment. The remaining five faces would share a common color and denote rooms in a common area. You might color the edges of the cube for rooms that have a temporary effect/condition such as a mage meld, fire, trap, etc. Special rooms like shops could have an object (flag, ladder, $, manhole, etc.) floating above the cube.
Idea 6: I prefer to use the mouse for all mapping commands because it's simple and keeps things consistent. Rotation would use a click and drag virtual-trackball interface. Translation would be single mouse clicks that do not select a room or link. (there's no need for "W,A,S,D") So clicking on any part of the background would would center your map around that particular point. Zooming could be the job of the mouse/scroll wheel. Right clicking will bring up context-specific menus which contain less commonly used options/actions after selecting a room, link, or backdrop.
Idea 7: Exploded diagrams. This is analogous to folding/collapsing code blocks except you do something similar for areas/subareas. For example a city might be represented as a huge map. If you're not interested in all the detail you might hide the group of rooms that and replace it with the simple label "Shopping area". To manipulate the map, the user could drag a rectangle over areas of the map and in combination with the shift and ctrl keys select all the rooms they are interested in a manner similar to the way you would highlight/select files in a directory. (try a file manager like Thunar) Then you right click, select "group", name your group, and manually place a label somewhere convenient. A small rectangular box with a "+/-" sign would allow you to fold and unfold. Now you can have area commands where you re-enable all rooms in a group (see Idea 1).
Just my 2 sovereigns and some food for thought. What you have so far looks awesome; keep up the great work!
EDIT: Added 7th idea. Edited for grammar because I wrote this fairly late.
Last edited by vinc456 on Thu Apr 22, 2010 2:21 pm, edited 3 times in total.
Re: Mudlet Mapper
I think room control commands should be more consistent than that... two single-clicks to disable a room is something that can be done too frequently. Perhaps a right-click menu on a room, or some room controls elsewhere + keybinding.
Re: Mudlet Mapper
as long as they can be re-enabled the same way I think two single clicks is good. I disable scripts by accident all the time, but it's worth it for the ease with which they are enabled/disabled when I want them to be. The room would be greyed out a bit if disabled, right?Vadi wrote:I think room control commands should be more consistent than that... two single-clicks to disable a room is something that can be done too frequently. Perhaps a right-click menu on a room, or some room controls elsewhere + keybinding.
Re: Mudlet Mapper
I just don't think room disabling will be that frequent to do to make it use the very easy option of double-clicking like that.
imho, double-click should mean go to, single-click selection. just like files in a file browser.
imho, double-click should mean go to, single-click selection. just like files in a file browser.