Fight interface: transition to mobile

[Momonar]

New Feature Request: Scout Terrain button on the fight dialog which opens a window showing the terrain and enemy troop deployment. This button could be at the dialog which chooses between fight or negotiate, or it could be in the troop selection dialog.

If this feature were added to both desktop and mobile, it might start to bridge the lack of fighting interface on mobile. Certainly knowing the terrain would vastly improve the auto-fight outcomes of all the people who are stuck on mobile with only the auto-fight option.

Second step: Show the auto-fight video on mobile platform.

Last step: Figure out manual fight interface on mobile (but presumably this would leverage the display work done in the first 2 steps).

 

[Iamaita]

Short answer: no thank you.

long answer:
One reason I play mobile is that it’s fast. I don’t have time to check terrain and watch a video for every encounter. I like autofight as it is and would prefer not to clutter it up with extra stuff. In addition to personal preference, lag time on cellular is a factor to consider. I would hate to be unable to finish a tournament because a video wouldn’t load if I’m somewhere without good coverage. Sometimes it struggles to even load fellowship chat if I’m away from wifi. I think there is a significant risk that this would make portions of the game virtually unplayable in many circumstances. That to me outweighs any benefits. But if other people do want the option to see this, please at least make sure that it is also optional not to see it. Maybe there could be a settings selection to either enable or disable any videos or terrain. Or maybe they could just really really dumb it down so that there is just a little icon that shows grass or trees or rocks or whatever to give you an idea if ranged or melee will have an advantage.

Edit to add: I also don’t know that the improvement would be vast. I think it would be minor at best for me. Does anyone have any data for how their performance actually improves using the browser autofight with the extra data instead of the mobile autofight?

 

[Myne]

I wonder at the load all those graphics would put on your device, I don't know if it would work without hanging and glitching. That would take away from the speed of play for sure. Especially with a weak connection.

 

[samidodamage]

Maybe it's time for someone to revive this idea:
Improve troop selection for auto-fight
It was forwarded to the devs under the old system for sending in ideas/suggestions in March 2020. Received info in June 2020 that they really liked the idea and put it on their *no ETA, but we like it and will plan to do it at some point* list. It's been awhile and might get a better reception if CMs from all markets agree it is a good idea. It has never gone through the process of going to the CMs for a vote first, so it might need some polishing to get it there. But, it seems it would be a much simpler plan and should use less resources on mobile, similar to @Iamaita's 'dumb it down' suggestion.

 

[Myne]

I like that idea and it's not graphics heavy to slow play.

 

[BrinDarby]

ppl confuse mobile to mean on a phone.
Tablets are mobile too, and PCs can even extend to tablet mode.
Some tablets are advertized as desktop replacements, they have "poop".....

 

[Raccon]

Short answer: no thank you.

long answer:
One reason I play mobile is that it’s fast. I don’t have time to check terrain and watch a video for every encounter. I like autofight as it is and would prefer not to clutter it up with extra stuff. In addition to personal preference, lag time on cellular is a factor to consider. I would hate to be unable to finish a tournament because a video wouldn’t load if I’m somewhere without good coverage. Sometimes it struggles to even load fellowship chat if I’m away from wifi. I think there is a significant risk that this would make portions of the game virtually unplayable in many circumstances. That to me outweighs any benefits. But if other people do want the option to see this, please at least make sure that it is also optional not to see it. Maybe there could be a settings selection to either enable or disable any videos or terrain. Or maybe they could just really really dumb it down so that there is just a little icon that shows grass or trees or rocks or whatever to give you an idea if ranged or melee will have an advantage.

Edit to add: I also don’t know that the improvement would be vast. I think it would be minor at best for me. Does anyone have any data for how their performance actually improves using the browser autofight with the extra data instead of the mobile autofight?

This is a suggestion for an added option, you still have a choice to either use it or choose to stick to your favorit game play . Just like the resolution option, you can choose higher resolution in the game or lower resolution in exchange for better speed.
I don't think he is suggesting to take away something in favor of another!
The only trouble I can see here is for the Devs for the requeiered coding effort.

 

[crackie]

Edit to add: I also don’t know that the improvement would be vast. I think it would be minor at best for me. Does anyone have any data for how their performance actually improves using the browser autofight with the extra data instead of the mobile autofight?

My guess is people on browser probably aren't autofighting in battlefield view mode. You can just select troops, click autofight, and be done with it on browser without watching it play out, like on mobile. If you try to "scout" the terrain, you'd have to enter the battlefield, surrender, then restart the battle picking army again. It's a lot of extra clicking. Maybe some people out there do it, but I don't think the majority do. Plus, if there are any devilspawn mist walkers in sight, you'd have to take a potshot just to see the terrain. Therefore, terrain preview at army selection would benefit both mobile and browser.

I'm normally not a proponent of turning Elvenar into Forge of Empire, but you can already manual fight on the mobile app in FoE. It also doesn’t take 1hr+ to manual fight 30 encounters. It feels light and quick. Neither the app nor browser gets bogged down at all, unlike Elvenar, which makes me think there is plenty of room for improvement on the Elvenar battle engine.

they have "poop".....

 

[Sprite1313]

I'm normally not a proponent of turning Elvenar into Forge of Empire, but you can already manual fight on the mobile app in FoE. It also doesn’t take 1hr+ to manual fight 30 encounters. It feels light and quick. Neither the app nor browser gets bogged down at all, unlike Elvenar, which makes me think there is plenty of room for improvement on the Elvenar battle engine.

Is it really the battle engine, or just the amazing graphics on Elvenar? I am not a techie, but I would think those would require significant memory and/or bandwidth.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

I'm normally not a proponent of turning Elvenar into Forge of Empire, but you can already manual fight on the mobile app in FoE. It also doesn’t take 1hr+ to manual fight 30 encounters. It feels light and quick. Neither the app nor browser gets bogged down at all, unlike Elvenar, which makes me think there is plenty of room for improvement on the Elvenar battle engine.

Back in the my early days of playing, 4 or 5 years ago, the manual fight option was pretty quick, and then Inno did some sort of update or made some changes they did not tell us much about, and suddenly those same manual fights were taking 3 or 4 times longer to do. That was the last time I used manual fighting because I just did not have all that extra time for the fights. I have been auto-fight only since then and if they removed manual fighting completely, I would be fine with it.

 

[Myne]

Maybe it's time for someone to revive this idea:
Improve troop selection for auto-fight
It was forwarded to the devs under the old system for sending in ideas/suggestions in March 2020. Received info in June 2020 that they really liked the idea and put it on their *no ETA, but we like it and will plan to do it at some point* list. It's been awhile and might get a better reception if CMs from all markets agree it is a good idea. It has never gone through the process of going to the CMs for a vote first, so it might need some polishing to get it there. But, it seems it would be a much simpler plan and should use less resources on mobile, similar to @Iamaita's 'dumb it down' suggestion.

But could that thread be revived given there is already a poll on it? If so, that would probably be best. If not, I guess it could be linked in an original post regarding the suggestion? Btw, I was impressed with 100% on the vote.

 

[samidodamage]

@Myne
I don't think the original thread can be revived, but I could be wrong. It is in the 'Forwarded Ideas' section for one thing and I get one of the 'you have insufficient privileges to post here' thingies at the bottom right of all the pages.
I was thinking along the lines of someone (with the time/energy to do so) submitting a new idea formatted correctly under the current guidelines and linking to the original thread. This would start a new discussion that we might be able to get to a new vote. The process for getting the ideas to the developers isn't the only thing that's changed in the past ~2yrs; I would assume there's been both player and staff turnover during that time as well as other game changes.

 

[Myne]

@Myne
I don't think the original thread can be revived, but I could be wrong. It is in the 'Forwarded Ideas' section for one thing and I get one of the 'you have insufficient privileges to post here' thingies at the bottom right of all the pages.
I was thinking along the lines of someone (with the time/energy to do so) submitting a new idea formatted correctly under the current guidelines and linking to the original thread. This would start a new discussion that we might be able to get to a new vote. The process for getting the ideas to the developers isn't the only thing that's changed in the past ~2yrs; I would assume there's been both player and staff turnover during that time as well as other game changes.

Ok, but I know there is a lot in the pipeline right now. @helya Do you think our chances of getting this back in front of the devs would be improved by waiting just a bit before starting the process again?

 

[crackie]

Is it really the battle engine, or just the amazing graphics on Elvenar? I am not a techie, but I would think those would require significant memory and/or bandwidth.

I dunno, but it ain't a FPS battle that needs jaw dropping refresh rates. It's a slow moving game of chess! In the battlefield view, there's also no fancy atmospheric effects, crazy amounts of ambient occlusion, or anisotropic filtering happening. It shouldn't be a gigantic RAM hog to render. I can do like 30 encounters on FoE in 10-15 mins. It will take me over an hour in Elvenar. Each unit in FoE has its own animated sprite too that shows it moving, attacking, defending, or dying. They are smaller and they don’t have Treants taking 2 minutes to walk 2 tiles, but clearly, it’s possible they can keep their larger graphics and still make it speedy, esp going by what @Enevhar Aldarion said. I know it’s possible bc the existing code lets you pick 3 speeds of animation. Just add even quicker speed variables on those darn sprite playbacks!

 

[Zoof]

I'm not too much into the manual fighting myself, but I know just enough about it that if I was able to see what the battlefield looks like ahead of time, that'd influence my decision to back off and throw goods at the problem instead.

Even a simple hexgrid full of solid colors representing the field and stuffed away in a corner or other unobtrusive spot of the troop selection screen would be more than enough, I think.

 

[Myne]

Waiting to hear from @helya so we can decide how to proceed.

 

[helya]

Waiting to hear from @helya so we can decide how to proceed.

I feel like we forwarded this already and I couldn't get it past the other CMs, but I'm happy to try again.

 

[Myne]

Need input on how yall want to proceed