Improving the UI: lowering the learning curve

Hey folks,

I think we can agree on the point that the space between the mini map and the command buttons is used in a bad way now (some text about the unit). IMO it would help to lower the learning curve of this game and make it more accessible, if the most basic stats would be given there.

For inf I think it should be:

HP
DPS near/mid/far (without all modifieres)
DPS near/mid/far (without all modifieres except moving acc)
Accuracy near/mid/far (instead of DPS for AT guns, including a tool tip explaining the chance to hit)
Range near/mid/far
Received accuracy
Armor
AP value (everything bigger than small arms)
AoE damage near/mid/far (only AoE weapons)
AoE near/mid/far (only AoE weapons)



For vehicles it should be:

Armor front/back
HP
Damage
Penetration near/mid/far
Range near/mid/far
Accuracy near/mid/far (including a tool tip explaining the chance to hit)
Moving accuracy near/mid/far (including a tool tip explaining the chance to hit)
Speed forward/reverse
Acceleration
Target size (including a tool tip explaining the chance to hit)

If they added some tooltips that say a sentence or two about each of these stats, they could help people unfamiliar with these things understanding the stats. Stats like AoE damage and AoE range could also be added to tooltips of grenades.

What do you think?
And did I forget anything important?

@mods: Could you please change the title to "Improving the UI: lowering the learning curve"? Thx

Interesting ideas bambabam. In my view, this is all very useful information to have. I also think it's information that really shouldn't be in the UI.

I'm all for having these stats readily available in tutorial/testing modes. But if all that information was displayed during normal games, the screen clutter would be immense. There is already a bit of redundancy in the Coh2 UI in my opinion as the tactical map is cluttered by the resource-count for points, values that can be learned before even starting a game.

In the same way, constantly being bombarded with unit stats while trying to micro your units would not make the game any easier to play, especially for new players. Just my view.

The idea of lowering the learning curve for new players is a quite good one, netherless I dont see a change of UI, aspecially in terms of showing unit stats, will do that well.

A aspect of a good player is that he knows the units he is playing with and can use them in/on the right way/range.

So if you give this to all players, build in the UI, there is no need to know your units.

Maybe relic should show the unit stats in a different way(special menue, etc.), but not ingame.

I agree with this conditionally. While having a plethora of stats available in-game at hand would be great, it would add a lot of clutter. I have changed my opinion that the game should include an encyclopedic info section which will list all the nitty-gritty stats, and then have simplified stats in the unit description when a unit is selected.

Something probably like this, and listing its weapons loadout:

Grenadier
80 HP x 4 men, 1 armor, 1 received accuracy
4 x Kar98 best used at long ranges.

(or if upgraded with MG42)
3 x Kar98, good anti-infantry at long range.
1 x Light MG42, best anti-infantry at medium to long ranges. Cannot fire on the move.

Tiger I Ausf. E
1080 HP, 300 Front Armor, 180 Rear Armor
4.7 Speed, 1.5 Acceleration
Target Size 26

1 x 88mm KwK36, good against all units.
1 x MG42 Coaxial, moderate anti-infantry damage at short-medium ranges.
1 x MG42 Hull, light anti-infantry damage at short range.

This will allow most players to understand the most important stuff at hand, such as which units/weapons are good at what range, how much armor/received accuracy they have, and what they are good against. Things like cooldown/reload/readyaimtime isn't easily digestible in a short amount of time. DPS numbers vary largely depending on RNG.

You've got a point there, maybe it would be overkill for beginners. But maybe use the "reduced" info layout as the standard option but give us an option to switch to a "advanced" mode that shows more stats. This way, everybody could benefit from it. I'd definitely go for the advanced info screen

You know what, I like the idea. My younger cousin is trying to get into the game... and the learning curve is just huge, even with me helping him he's have a hard time.

I think that is far too much information. If you want to help people to learn the game you want to display the most important information and not flood them with tons. If you display all you said people would most likely ignore it.

DPS - Requires explanation as unit ingame do not use "DPS", it's just a value to estimate the performance of a unit at a range. Many people new to RTS do not know this value.
DPS*Moving Acc - First of all, why would you only factor in moving accuracy? There is a whole set of values that get changed when a unit is moving, accuracy is just one of them. Second again each of those would require an explanation if presented like this. Third - why not just "DPS on the move"?.
Accuracy - Accuracy is just one important value for ATGs. How about scatter values?
[...]


I could list you potential problems with each of those values. I tried to explain them to other people often and you always run into a lot of problems. The CoH2 weapon system is a really complex one, that is easy to understand once you know all the values. It's really one of those "Look at all the pieces, then you'll understand the whole system" things, just grabbing one value and trying to explain that is hard.

To show you a bit how complex it is:
- Moving Accuracy is as I said earlier just one of many factors that change the moving behavior. What about weapons that do not fire on the move (LMG42)?
- For vehicles (and ATGs), scatter values.
- For vehicles, artillery and other explosive weapons - AoE penetration (the penetration of the explosion is different from the penetration of the shot).


Besides that you would always have to try to solve questions like how would you display squads with mixed weapons? A Grenadier squad with 3 KAR98-k and one LMG42 or a Panther Squad with the Main gun and it's 2(3) MGs? How would you display the DPS and ranges for that?.

I think what you describe is not really feasible. An Encyclopedic section as tengen said and a simplistic UI is better. There is just too much information.

You've got a point there, maybe it would be overkill for beginners. But maybe use the "reduced" info layout as the standard option but give us an option to switch to a "advanced" mode that shows more stats. This way, everybody could benefit from it. I'd definitely go for the advanced info screen

Yeah a lot of people would like a toggle to remove that part of the UI completely, so if they ever get around to implementing that they could add a stat panel at the same time as a third option. Default would still be the current text panel.

Don't count on the info still being correct after a couple of patches though

Throwing stats at newbies wont help them. It will scare them away.

What is the moving accuracy penalty or how do we find its value in coh stats?

Bombardment of numbers to players is always bad. The unit descriptions i believe fit accurately, e.g. grenadiers are good at long range vs infantry.

However numbers should be available to players who want to see them. It is best if this was done in a seperate stats site/page in game. I think Relic have wanted to do something like a stats site but it must be fairly low on their list of priorities at this stage.