Focused Feedback: New Player Experience (NPE) Improvements

[Luminara]

26 minutes ago, Lockely said:

I came across a player who unintentionally managed to turn their camera to the side and then couldn't figure out 1) how they did it, and 2) how to fix it so they played through 7 levels of content looking behind them, because the binds are buried in a menu with a billion different options that aren't all intuitive for a modern audience.

 

*has flashbacks of walking everywhere in WoW for two weeks because the Run key binding wasn't obvious*

 

[ScarySai]

Is there an ability to restore the growing power cooldown animation that I missed? I preferred it that way when I oriented the timer to the bottom.

 

That aside, I do quite like the other changes.

Edited February 17 by ScarySai

[Luminara]

5 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

Is there an ability to restore the growing power cooldown animation that I missed? I preferred it that way when I oriented the timer to the bottom.

 

3 hours ago, Jimmy said:

• • Icons of recharging powers no longer shrink when the recharge timer is enabled, to make them easier to see behind the number. Veterans used to the old behavior can override this with /tray_always_shrink 1.

 

[Number Six]

1 hour ago, Fade said:

Characters 1 and 2 had the new quicklook left mouse button features, new mouse movement functionality, new shift+# for the third tray buttons, and the new walking towards a turned camera (free-look) functionality.

 

Confirmed this is an oversight. The game only saves the bindings for individual keys when they're changed, otherwise it falls through to the profile. Which means if you haven't customized the movement keys at all, the changes to the default profile would affect existing characters as well.

 

To avoid any nasty surprises, the current plan is when Page 7 goes live, we'll run a database query to change the profile of all existing characters who are using "Default" to "Classic" instead. That way new characters will be created with the new defaults while leaving existing characters unchanged, as was intended.

[Number Six]

Known issues that will be corrected and don't need to be reported:

• Existing characters using the new key bindings if they haven't previously loaded binds or customized the keys in question.
  This is intended to only affect new characters. We are planning to do a database-side migration of existing characters to the Classic key profile during go-live to avoid this issue.
• Resizing UI windows causing the camera to move and interrupt the resize.

[Lunar Ronin]

1 hour ago, Lockely said:

 

Literally the first thing I have to do with any new player is spend an hour helping them tweak their camera and control settings to unfunk them from the CoH defaults. 

 

I came across a player who unintentionally managed to turn their camera to the side and then couldn't figure out 1) how they did it, and 2) how to fix it so they played through 7 levels of content looking behind them, because the binds are buried in a menu with a billion different options that aren't all intuitive for a modern audience.

 

I'm an old player returning. Even I had to spend time fixing it rather than sticking with the oddity that CoH was even back in the day compared to it's peers.

 

There's an argument to be made for historical preservation but the devs have given a legacy control scheme option for you to do just that. 

 

 

Then, IMO, at character creation there should be a pop-up that asks if you want the new player controls, or the veteran player controls instead of imposing different controls on people who've played the game for over a decade.  Again, just IMO and YMMV.

[BelleSorciere]

8 minutes ago, Lunar Ronin said:

 

 

Then, IMO, at character creation there should be a pop-up that asks if you want the new player controls, or the veteran player controls instead of imposing different controls on people who've played the game for over a decade.  Again, just IMO and YMMV.

This seems reasonable, esp if the two choices are explained enough for context. Modern MMO controls vs Classic CoH.

[Lockely]

13 minutes ago, Lunar Ronin said:

 

 

Then, IMO, at character creation there should be a pop-up that asks if you want the new player controls, or the veteran player controls instead of imposing different controls on people who've played the game for over a decade.  Again, just IMO and YMMV.

 

I think that's a very reasonable compromise! Should also have a "Remember this choice" options too.

Edited February 17 by Lockely

[Cobalt Azurean]

11 minutes ago, Lunar Ronin said:

 

 

Then, IMO, at character creation there should be a pop-up that asks if you want the new player controls, or the veteran player controls instead of imposing different controls on people who've played the game for over a decade.  Again, just IMO and YMMV.

QFMFE.

[Wispur]

I'm liking the updated Peacebringer numbers.
For me personally, these feel pretty accurate to my experience in the game.

[JAMMan0000]

1 hour ago, Number Six said:

Known issues that will be corrected and don't need to be reported:

• Existing characters using the new key bindings if they haven't previously loaded binds or customized the keys in question.
  This is intended to only affect new characters. We are planning to do a database-side migration of existing characters to the Classic key profile during go-live to avoid this issue.
• Resizing UI windows causing the camera to move and interrupt the resize.

The second bullet about resizing windows to be interupted also applies to dragging the slider on the right of the map

[Wispur]

Something else that might greatly improve the New Player experience is fixing how the power selection tabs work.
Currently, the two Power tabs are only clickable in the very upper-left most corner.  The rest of the tab is unclickable.

 

I think it'd make sense if the entire tab were clickable, that's certainly what I personally would expect.
(There's a few other buttons that work this way too, but these two are the most extreme.)

Just in case it's a screen resolution issue with the boxes not properly scaling to account for screen resolution - 
My screen resolution is 3840x2160

Edited February 17 by Wispur

[Number Six]

38 minutes ago, JAMMan0000 said:

The second bullet about resizing windows to be interupted also applies to dragging the slider on the right of the map

 

Just fixed that one internally a few minutes ago. The map slider looks like a scrollbar, but is not and is actually a completely separate control that is only used by the map. Because of course it is.

[Lockely]

39 minutes ago, Wispur said:

Something else that might greatly improve the New Player experience is fixing how the power selection tabs work.
Currently, the two Power tabs are only clickable in the very upper-left most corner.  The rest of the tab is unclickable.

 

I think it'd make sense if the entire tab were clickable, that's certainly what I personally would expect.
(There's a few other buttons that work this way too, but these two are the most extreme.)

Just in case it's a screen resolution issue with the boxes not properly scaling to account for screen resolution - 
My screen resolution is 3840x2160

 

This is definitely a UI scaling problem. I play 1920x1080 and I can click within any of the green sections on my tabs.

Edited February 17 by Lockely

[Gorgar]

Is there a way to disable the camera snapback for Quick Look and the new default run forward behavior?  As I get older, I find things like that induce a bit of vertigo.  Playing the game is now unpleasant for me because of this.

 

I hope there is a way to turn it off, preferably globally, as I don't want to have to load screens of characters to get rid of this.

[Doc_Scorpion]

6 hours ago, Jimmy said:

The power tray timer defaults to shown for powers with an estimated recharge of longer than 5 seconds. This can be changed in the options menu, or a custom value may be set using the /recharge_timer_threshold command.

I just tested this and combined with animations on (for powers not displaying a timer) it's a thing of absolute beauty.  @Number Six, or whoever added this option, if you're ever out in the Seattle area...  I'll buy you a beer.  (Or a latte, or a bubble tea, or whatever reasonably priced beverage warms your heart.)

[Wavicle]

Another thing that came up recently for a friend of mine, re: new player experience.

There is nothing for the Pet summoning classes that tells them +/- Recharge doesn't work on pets, and that would be useful information to have when choosing a secondary.

 

There could be other similar things, but that stood at as one that should probably be easier to figure out.

Edited February 18 by Wavicle

[electric_emu]

3 hours ago, Wispur said:

Something else that might greatly improve the New Player experience is fixing how the power selection tabs work.
Currently, the two Power tabs are only clickable in the very upper-left most corner.  The rest of the tab is unclickable.

 

I think it'd make sense if the entire tab were clickable, that's certainly what I personally would expect.
(There's a few other buttons that work this way too, but these two are the most extreme.)

Just in case it's a screen resolution issue with the boxes not properly scaling to account for screen resolution - 
My screen resolution is 3840x2160

 

I think this is a resolution/scaling issue.  I just got a new monitor (using the same resolution as you, 3840x2160) and suddenly have this problem as well.

[Blackbird71]

8 hours ago, Jimmy said:

 

• The default bindings for the top tray (Alt2) changed from Control+# to Shift+# for reduced finger strain on commonly used combinations.
• The pop-up server tray now has default key bindings of Control+#.

 

This is going to mess with all kinds of shortcuts that have already been set.  And making it work differently for old characters vs. new is going to create complications.

I think it would be better to keep the way it has been for 20+ years as the default, and then make the new settings a selectable option, rather than vice versa.

[Lunar Ronin]

So, I got onto Brainstorm to check these new controls out.  I was told that you can just select "Classic" profile under the Keymapping Options.  Except there are no profiles to select from.

 

 

 

[Blackbird71]

5 hours ago, Number Six said:

To avoid any nasty surprises, the current plan is when Page 7 goes live, we'll run a database query to change the profile of all existing characters who are using "Default" to "Classic" instead. That way new characters will be created with the new defaults while leaving existing characters unchanged, as was intended.

 

Old players make new characters.  If you're going to go through with making these new settings the default, then it would be nice if the "classic" settings could be chosen as default account-wide so that you don't have to remember to change it with each new character made.

[Number Six]

15 minutes ago, Blackbird71 said:

Old players make new characters.  If you're going to go through with making these new settings the default, then it would be nice if the "classic" settings could be chosen as default account-wide so that you don't have to remember to change it with each new character made.

 

Click Classic. Click Save to default file. That takes 5 seconds and you never have to think about it again.

[Blackbird71]

2 hours ago, Number Six said:

 

Click Classic. Click Save to default file. That takes 5 seconds and you never have to think about it again.

Your previous statements indicated that even if you already had "classic" settings on your characters, new characters on the account would have the new "default."

[Number Six]

2 minutes ago, Blackbird71 said:

Your previous statements indicated that even if you already had "classic" settings on your characters, new characters on the account would have the new "default."

 

• These changes only apply to new characters, and overridden by customized bindings that were previously saved.

The keybinds.txt file created by clicking the button to save bindings has always taken precedence over the defaults for new characters.

[Number Six]

11 hours ago, Fade said:

I've tested the control scheme changes with:

1. Characters that existed on the Beta server before Release Candidate 3
2. A character that I transferred from Live to Beta after the Release Candidate 3 update
3. A brand-new character created after the Release Candidate 3 update

Characters 1 and 2 had the new quicklook left mouse button features, new mouse movement functionality, new shift+# for the third tray buttons, and the new walking towards a turned camera (free-look) functionality.

Character 3 inherited my default saved keybinds when I created it and had none of these new changes except for quicklook, which seems to be bound to a new "LeftDragWorld" keybind rather than "LBUTTON" like I would have first expected. (EDIT: I think this part is a good thing and I like it.)

 

If you don't mind, could you re-test on RC3.5? Copied characters from live should now default to "Classic", while newly created characters get "Modern" unless you've overriden it by saving default key bindings.