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Merc skills on the websites - WORKING NOW![message #314281]

Wed, 16 January 2013 05:12

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Does anybody have an idea how we could have the merc skills on the websites? Now that we have several old/new mercs and new skills it would be a handy feature.
Would it be possible to put the skills in the bio text? With the gearkits there, there does not seem to be much place left... In the MERC site I think it would be okay, aren't there sliders when there is a lot of text?

Maybe a tooltip could be added similar to the personnel file? When you browse above the stats or the bio perhaps?

Brainstorming here... Any thoughts, advice?

[Updated on: Wed, 23 January 2013 00:42] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314283]

Wed, 16 January 2013 07:47

JAsmine is currently offline

Messages:306
Registered:May 2011

I can understand why you would like to ser the skills before you buy. But in vanilla it was the same: you had to 'guess' a mercs' skill after readind his bio, which usually contained clues about his skills.
So what I would vote for is to adapt the mercs' bios a bit so they can reflect the new traits like they did with the old ones.

[Updated on: Wed, 16 January 2013 07:48] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314286]

Wed, 16 January 2013 10:03

JMich is currently offline

Messages:543
Registered:January 2011
Location: Greece

Thor

In the MERC site I think it would be okay, aren't there sliders when there is a lot of text?

As I recall, when I tried to add the gearkit options for M.E.R.C. I assumed we may want to have more than 2 pages per merc, thus the toggle button should be able to handle "Bio/Inventory/Skills" as page toggles. Same idea could probably work on the AIM website as well, but not really sure, since I hate arranging graphics in JA2. As for sliders, they are also a pain in the butt to do properly.

Hopefully, someone will take an interesting to this and add it.

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First Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314296]

Wed, 16 January 2013 20:19

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Well JAsmine, I don't like the guessing, although some people seem to like it. It takes too much time and you're often wrong. Well, when you're wrong, it sucks... and save/reload is not the intention.
I would even go as far as to like to filter on skills... If you want a scout, a squad leader or a marksman, that they are the only ones listed. But that's still a long way to go...

As for the bios, how would you guess Raven's skills, for example? I would expect her to be a marksman as she's mentioned to be a sharpshooter, but no, she's a scout and an auto-weapons specialist... Only the night-ops are obvious in the "Additional info: Raven shines during night operations". Well that's as directly put there as "Skills: Night operations".

But I think I have a solution! I could add a add a symbol (e.g. a star). It wouldn't take a lot of place and it would work the same way as the skills in the personnel file. When you browse over them, you get tooltip info which sums up the skills and if you don't like to use this, you turn off the feature in the ini-editor or you simply don't browse over the symbol.
We could have this same feature in tactical screen as well...

Anybody here who can do some coding? I'll provide the symbols...

[Updated on: Wed, 16 January 2013 20:43] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314297]

Wed, 16 January 2013 21:10

JAsmine is currently offline

Messages:306
Registered:May 2011

Thor

Well JAsmine, I don't like the guessing, although some people seem to like it. It takes too much time and you're often wrong. Well, when you're wrong, it sucks... and save/reload is not the intention.
I would even go as far as to like to filter on skills... If you want a scout, a squad leader or a marksman, that they are the only ones listed. But that's still a long way to go...

Well, what can I say - I like surprises because if you don't have any surprises, the game becomes too predictable - and if I can predict everything, it becomes boring. This is true for every aspect in the game and includes the personnel.
Apart from that, I tend to pick my squad based on the personalities rather than on skills.

Thor

As for the bios, how would you guess Raven's skills, for example? I would expect her to be a marksman as she's mentioned to be a sharpshooter, but no, she's a scout and an auto-weapons specialist... Only the night-ops are obvious in the "Additional info: Raven shines during night operations".

Thor, the bios in v1.13 are the same as in Vanilla JA2. STOMP didn't exist back then and there wasn't a real marksman skill. Furthermore, the new traits can not recreate the original trait combos in a scale of 1:1, because a lot of traits have changed drastically or were merged in one way or another.
The bios simply aren't up-to-date.
So, even if we could have the skills to somehow show within the AIM/MERC site as you would like to, it might still be a good thing to update the bios for STOMP.

Thor

Well that's as directly put there as "Skills: Night operations".

Isn't this a good solution for the time being? Just add the skills to the .edt files and they'll show without any coding...

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314298]

Wed, 16 January 2013 21:59

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

There was "Rooftop sniping". Think Raven had it even in Unfinished Business... Or was it some mod... anyway... really confusing sometimes.

This is what I had in mind... (imagine the cursor browsing over the star symbol)

Tactical screen: When browsing in the highlighted spot, the skills appear
MERC and AIM would work the same way (possibly a different symbol)

http://img811.imageshack.us/img811/9392/exampleskillsintactical.jpg

http://img545.imageshack.us/img545/9217/exampleskillsinmerc.jpg

http://img526.imageshack.us/img526/2899/exampleskillsinaim.jpg

Uploaded with ImageShack.us
Edit: okay, now you can actually see the images

[Updated on: Wed, 16 January 2013 23:30] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314299]

Wed, 16 January 2013 22:11

JAsmine is currently offline

Messages:306
Registered:May 2011

Yeah, there was this "rooftop" thingie. Only Reaper and Slay had it in JA2. It never felt like a real sniper skill but more like an individual skill like shadow's camuoflage skill.
Actually, there wasn't a real sniper skill in vanilla JA2 for all the real snipers like Scope or Lynx.
Raven had Night ops and auto weapons in vanilla JA2. I'm not sure about UB, but there were quite some changes there... maybe she had it. Am too lazy to look it up now.

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314300]

Wed, 16 January 2013 22:21

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Yeah, of course. No sweat, me too. Just mean that it's always a surprise indeed, or a habit... But that's not the way it should work in my opinion... or let me put it differently, the option to show/know the skills would be interesting in a modder's perspective.

Either the bio should be changed and clear(especially for the new old mercs) and this is a LOOT of work and possibly updated, or this "simple" solution which I showed above could do the trick. Is it hard to implement such a feature? Considering the things that have been implemented already...

Edit: again, if you wouldn't browse the star symbol (as shown in the images above), no tooltip will appear and you could play on as before. If you can toggle the option off in the ini-editor or game option screen, it would even be better.

[Updated on: Fri, 18 January 2013 10:16] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314303]

Thu, 17 January 2013 01:09

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

@JMich: What do you think of this idea? Easy to do? Think it's less complex than the idea of adding buttons and adjusting text files all the time, right?

[Updated on: Thu, 17 January 2013 01:11] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314312]

Thu, 17 January 2013 10:04

JMich is currently offline

Messages:543
Registered:January 2011
Location: Greece

I think it would be easier, since it would need 1 mouseregion (the tooltip) and it could probably use the function the personnel files use to display the skills. Now you just need to find a coder, since I am unfortunately swamped atm :/

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First Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314325]

Thu, 17 January 2013 19:15

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Aha, thanks for the info, JMich... I have been thinking of the personnel files myself.

Myeah, finding a coder... that's the worst part, haha. Razz

Razz

So how do I do that? Very Happy

Very Happy

Coder wanted: Alive... Show some skill^^

[Updated on: Thu, 17 January 2013 19:18] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314327]

Thu, 17 January 2013 19:59

Messages:1960
Registered:March 2009
Location: Middle of Germany

Judging by his other coding projects, i could imagine that this is something Buggler may want to do ... :whistle:

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Sergeant Major

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314346]

Fri, 18 January 2013 02:13

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Interesting... Thanks! who the hell is that? Never heard of the guy... (I've been a few years less active, maybe that's why) ;)Ah, and where's the hEll of fame here?

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314348]

Fri, 18 January 2013 02:36

Messages:1960
Registered:March 2009
Location: Middle of Germany

E.g. http://www.ja-galaxy-forum.com/board/ubbthreads.php/topics/311379/LLP_Easy.html

He did things like: more sorting options on AIM site, more info at BRs site, gear kits for MERC.
So presenting traits on AIM site seems to fit into his prey pattern, IMHO. Wink

Wink

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Sergeant Major

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314355]

Fri, 18 January 2013 09:37

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Thanks, Sam Hotte, just checked out your link. Seems like some interesting stuff there and I think indeed that it fits in his prey pattern as well... If he wants to do it... I'll send him a link Smile

Smile

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314356]

Fri, 18 January 2013 11:10

smeagol is currently offline

Messages:2704
Registered:June 2008
Location: Bremen, Germany

Even though it totally ruins the vanilla feeling of hiring people with unknown skills, I'm all for this (of course with an ini setting, to satisfy the vanilla purists who can simply turn it off).

Otherwise it's just some tedious "hire all the mercs" routine until you figure out which skills they have or use an external tool/look directly into the xml files.

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Lieutenant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314359]

Fri, 18 January 2013 12:43

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

That's what I think as well. I'm currently playing games in window mode with the profile editor opened... Think that's not the intention. Smile

Smile

Well, concerning the ini... if you don't browse over the star, there would no tooltip coming up... I wonder how long frosted vanilla-players could resist that temptation^^ But I agree, I prefer optional stuff as well (if possible)

Anyway, it wouldn't make the bios redundant as they say a lot about the person's personality and I wouldn't put that in a tooltip

[Updated on: Fri, 18 January 2013 12:48] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314362]

Fri, 18 January 2013 13:18

Messages:1960
Registered:March 2009
Location: Middle of Germany

I 2nd this. Smile

Smile

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Sergeant Major

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314363]

Fri, 18 January 2013 13:33

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Thanks, 2nding right back Smile

Smile

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314365]

Fri, 18 January 2013 14:21

Messages:1960
Registered:March 2009
Location: Middle of Germany

On a side note, although all that also applies to the likes & dislikes of chars, i'm feeling these should not be displayed on the hiring website.

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Sergeant Major

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314398]

Sat, 19 January 2013 13:19

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Uhu, does anybody have an idea of other info they want to see in a tooltip or pop-up of one of the merc sites?

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314603]

Tue, 22 January 2013 19:20

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Okay, so thanks to Buggler, who did all the coding, we have the option now - thanks, mate:

Buggler

All committed in r5802/1598.

Toggle SHOW_SKILLS_IN_HIRE_SCREEN is in 'Ja2_Options.INI' under 'Recruitment Settings'.

and...

Buggler

We also have more info about the gear on the websites now as I figured you can't see the attachments, damage, APs etc.

Images often speak better than words... and I rather have it said by the right person Razz

Razz

[Updated on: Tue, 22 January 2013 19:26] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314605]

Tue, 22 January 2013 19:41

Messages:1960
Registered:March 2009
Location: Middle of Germany

Great! :super:

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Sergeant Major

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314606]

Tue, 22 January 2013 19:49

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Think so too! Thanks for recommending him...
Btw, I'm curious to see it, of course, any other place apart from DepressivesBrot where you can find the newest revisions?

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314607]

Tue, 22 January 2013 19:54

Messages:1960
Registered:March 2009
Location: Middle of Germany

Don't know of any other source as quick and reliable as Depri's place.
Of course one could update game data and stuff via SVN, but that doesn't provide new .exe.

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Sergeant Major

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314608]

Tue, 22 January 2013 19:56

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Uhu, it's the .exe indeed. Well, no sweat, thanks. Wink

Wink

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314627]

Wed, 23 January 2013 00:39

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

Alright, the option is fully working in r5803, but for now you can't turn it on in the ini-editor yet.
Just "find" it in the JA2_options.ini of which game you want to play (Data folder or Data-1.13, etc.) and turn the FALSE to TRUE!

Cheers!

[Updated on: Wed, 23 January 2013 00:43] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314656]

Wed, 23 January 2013 22:58

Parkan is currently offline

Messages:432
Registered:April 2010
Location: Russia,Sevastopol

The pics are awesome.Really a good feature.Thanks to Thor and Buggler.=)

I don't know is a right place or not.But if you can maybe you can additional tooltips to characterstics of mercs?For example show how much Ap give current skill of agility,how much percent of dodge or something like that give dexterity and etc.=)

[Updated on: Wed, 23 January 2013 23:03] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314657]

Wed, 23 January 2013 23:01

Uriens is currently offline

Messages:344
Registered:July 2006

I love this. Wanted to get that type of info for a long time, just was too lazy to propose it.

Thanks for doing this. :cheers:

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314661]

Thu, 24 January 2013 00:59

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

@ Parkan:
You can find this info in the IMP website and once the encyclopedia is working, we should have it there, maybe. Once you've hired a merc, you can see it in the personnel file browsing over the skills

@ Uriens:
It's actually the second time I propose something like this. Smile

Smile

Last time I even made around 20 patches (graphical icons which represented the skills)... Was about 5 years ago, 2007, I think. Had a lot of work on it, but there was no coder and we still only had the old skills alone.

I settled with the idea that we only had about 50 mercs and that everybody alreasy had an idea about the qualities of the mercs. But things changed. I like it as well: clean and simple, doesn't take any space and because of that we can have it easily in tactical and even in the strategical screen.

[Updated on: Thu, 24 January 2013 00:59] by Moderator

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314671]

Thu, 24 January 2013 02:57

Parkan is currently offline

Messages:432
Registered:April 2010
Location: Russia,Sevastopol

No, i mean for example.in strategic view player move cursor to charateristic of merc for example to agility and tooltip show how much agility give AP to merc for example without heavy loaded gear on merc and something like this.So add to each charateritic-tooltip\help.

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Master Sergeant

Re: Merc skills on the websites[message #314672]

Thu, 24 January 2013 04:32

Thor is currently offline

Messages:420
Registered:February 2007
Location: Belgium

No idea if this is possible... Sounds interesting, though. For a few things, at least. But things that depend on the enemy (e.g. dodging) don't seem possible to me... But I'm not a coder.

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Master Sergeant

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