First Impressions & Issues

Glitches, AI & UI

So I had my first go at AotS, and it was a real mixed bag. I know to expect rough edges, so this is intended as a report of what I saw.

[Issues]

(1) The AI (apparently improved?), when left on the default setting, was a combination of utterly stupid and almost totally inactive. It made no attempt to attack me outside of directly defending it self, even when I stole resource points away from it. When I finally got bored of trying out all my buildings, I built some units and wondered around until I found the AI base, which I crushed with ease. It made a very vague attempt to protect its base, I think, it may have just been passive defence.

(2) Build queues for buildings seem really hit-and-miss. A fair few times a builder unit would refuse to queue a building, yet would build a single instance. However a different builder unit would be happy to queue up buildings in exactly the same place.

(3) UI in general is sorely lacking - though I assume that really is a WIP.

(4) Explosions, apparently improved? I saw *very* few of these. Nearly everything I killed simply faded out. Not very exciting!

[Suggestions]

(5) Range indicators on group selection need to be merged into a single range outline for the group - perhaps a merged outline per unit type. Having 50 bright blue circles makes for a really ugly gaming experience.

(6) The build grid... my word... do I hate that build grid. Please make it less spaced... or free-form placement, or standard squares, or something that's not whatever that is.

(7) AI didn't use tech upgrades past the first x1 or so. The end of match stats showed I was about 14 tech things ahead. So I guess, make the AI focus on upgrading more?

4,434 views 7 replies
Reply #1 Top

Default AI is beginner I think which is meant to be brain dead so it is not going to be upgrading itself.

I agree there can be some problems with building placement. Some buildings let you overlap a bit, though it is not obvious. It lets you queue it up but the engineer will not build it.

You can hit Alt to turn off the range circles, you'd be mad to have them all on as it is now, but yeah your idea is good to sort of combine them. Does it do this when they are in Army mode/group? I don't know.

I think the units fading out is going to be around for some time. Until they put in unit wrecks I'd think, which is post-release.

Reply #2 Top

(3) UI in general is sorely lacking - though I assume that really is a WIP.

What UI changes would you like to see?

Reply #3 Top

Now that I know it won't be released till "spring", I am giving a sigh of relief.

 

 

 

Reply #4 Top

Quoting PurplePaladin, reply 3

Now that I know it won't be released till "spring", I am giving a sigh of relief.

 

 

 

We don't have to release it until we're ready to release it (within reason).

I still think it'll get launched later this Month but it depends on how things are going.

But I don't agree that it has "bad UI".  But UI is a very subjective discussion.

Reply #5 Top

@Frogboy

Regarding UI issues, some of it is subjective I agree, for example I personally feel its not very attractive and looks dated.

Specifics though for UI, Controls and Graphics in general:

(1) "M" doesn't toggle the bigger map (seems kinda obvious since almost every game in existence with a map uses M)

(2) The building placement hologram moves up and down on the spot and is not anchored to the ground level it will actually build on (see screenshot). This looks pretty ugly. (See: http://imgur.com/XRdVxhY)

(3) Pressing "Print Screen" caused the game to instantly crash to desktop (This in on Windows 10 running with DirectX 12). Error did not happen in non-DX12 mode.

(4) The pinky/blue edge of map dots flicker all the time they are visible. (See: http://imgur.com/rBlTgUR - though in screen shots it seems it is supposed to be animated, in action it just seems to flicker like crazy)

(5) Zooming in and out (and sometimes when not zooming at all) over buildings seems to cause their LOD to flicker between states. This seemed to happen mainly with animated buildings. Static buildings didn't seem to do this from what I could see. (See: http://imgur.com/i47GceX  and  http://imgur.com/valN2Ff  -  flick between them to see the issue)

(6) Some of the on-screen text is very very hard to read. (See: http://imgur.com/WBKdwd6)

(7) Telling builders to assist another builder doesn't do anything at all - where the expected outcome is for them to assist with anything that builder does.

(8) The "Destroy Building / Vehicle" yellow dot is terrible UI design. It has no meaning. There are any number of better icons that convey meaning: A red X. A red circle with a line through it. A small mushroom cloud. A tiny skull and crossbones. A small text button that says "Disband" or "Destroy" based on context. (See: http://imgur.com/BCxaFFE)

(9) Clicking destroy when you have a multi unit selection only destroys the unit that is displayed in the info panel.

(10) There is no UI element that displays the number of each type of unit in a selection, a pretty standard thing for games with large armies. I want to know if I have any air-defence units left in this army? I have to eyeball the damn swarm of units to work out it.

(11) Building queue lets you queue building too close to each other so some do no build. (See: http://imgur.com/jff0AIM)

(12) Building queue with a selection of engineers causes one engineer to do the building while the others wonder off and become idle. (See: http://imgur.com/q1b4ccl)

(13) No UI element to indicate what a unit/group/army is currently targeting. I would expect a red-line or some such joining your unit/units to the target unit/army.

(14) Vehicles often flip upside down when moving around in groups. (See: http://imgur.com/LrsuQDn)

(15) If I have multiple of the same building selected (Factory for example) and tell it to build something, only one of them will build anything, the others remain idle. I would expect all of them to build the unit I had selected. Instead, repeated clicking results in the building of units to be spread between them. This is a case of the UI ignoring the "I know what I'm doing" factor. If I have three buildings selected, I have one thing in mind: Building a unit three times or more in parallel. Making you click three time or actually "for as many of the building you have selected x the number of units you want them all to produce" seems a really poor choice. That is a bit "In My Opinion" but I'd be surprised of others disagree.

(16) Unit queue doesn't show progress on current unit in the queue it self, which is where I'd expect it.

 

I'm sure I could have more, but I need to do *some* work this afternoon at least!

Reply #6 Top

Quoting Ticktoc, reply 1

Default AI is beginner I think which is meant to be brain dead so it is not going to be upgrading itself.

Ah! Quite right. I thought it had defaulted to normal the whole time. My bad I guess, should have checked better.