Poll: Group window
Hi everyone!
I’m back from vacations (unfortunately… it was awesome). So let’s talk OCTGN!
I have added a new window to see the contents of a group of cards. E.g. to see your complete graveyard. It is very similar to the existing window in OCTGN 1.x.
But I’m facing a choice. Should this be a real detached window, or should it be a fake “window” inside the main one. Let me explain the differences:
- Currently the drag-and-drop system (for cards) only work inside the main window. Creating a new top-level window for the group would require rewriting this system in a non-trivial way (but it’s possible if it’s worth the effort).
- Having a top-level window prevents some effects. I would like to make the window semi-transparent when the mouse is not over it, to show what’s behind (the table basically). If I do that with a top-level window hardware acceleration for the rendering will be disabled, which is not a very good thing considering the many cards and animations which can be in the window.
- So far I have only listed drawbacks of the top-window solution. I can see one positive aspect, though. Considering most (all?) of you will run OCTGN full screen, top-window or “window in the main window” will make no usability difference at all. But if you have 2 screens (or if you don’t run OCTGN full-screen) you can keep the top-level window open on your second screen, without overlaying it with the table. That’s cool and useful.
So, the real question is: how many of you have 2+ screens? Who would like to (and can) keep the list of cards in a group open most of the time side-by-side with the OCTGN table?
Writing this post, I realise that the best option is maybe to go for the fake window inside the main one, and to add the possibility to “detach” it to a real window if some user wants to (typically the 2 monitors guys). Although the “detach” option is something I’d probably do in a 2.1 release if I get enough requests.
What do you think of this?
Explore posts in the same categories: OCTGN.net
OCTGN.net development 
August 12, 2007 at 10:59 pm
Off topic because I can’t find any contact info to you:
First of, I’ve posted this message and/or versions of it a million times, and never once seen it published among the comments. I take it for granted that Akismet or whatever spamfilter you use has eaten it. so once more:
Please post links in the sidebar to CCG:s that will/do support octgn 2.0, and if your fond of the idea, add our game >> subversiva dot com …thanks.
August 12, 2007 at 11:02 pm
Off topic:
I’ve posted this a million times but it never passes your spamfilter. Please add links to projects that support OCTGN2… and if so, add our site s u b v e r s i v a (dot) o r g
August 13, 2007 at 3:24 am
I’m glad you had a nice vacation. Nice to get out and relax once in a while.
As to the question, I’m going to say to go for the fake window and then eventually create the detach function for the butterfly screen folks, as in your conclusion.
I’m *guessing* the 2 screen setup is in the minority, but I could be wrong.
August 13, 2007 at 4:28 am
Also, I had a question. The new GUI looks great.
But the various Blue/Black/Green/etc icons for the mana pool… would it be feasible to create an easy way to exchange them with custom images via the preferences/option menu? It would help other CCGs look less mismatched.
I’m relatively unskilled with programming, so I don’t know how much of a headache it’d be.
Thanks, and keep up the great work.
August 13, 2007 at 2:54 pm
Although I have 2 monitors, I believe I am in the minority. I think we should just leave it as a fake window for now for 2 reasons: 1. It works fine now. 2. There are probably more important things to be worked on. I like the idea of adding the “Detachable Window” into a later patch. Thus, we see 2.0 Sooner and we will still get additional features at a later date.
So far, it’s looking very good. Keep it up!
-~Mike
August 14, 2007 at 2:08 pm
@Kirb:
the counters are in fact defined by the game. The number of counters, their name, their initial value, and their picture… everything dictated by the game definition.
If you go waaaay back in the blog, you should find screenshots of the .NET 2.0 version, testing a game called Blue Moon. You would notice that the counters are very different.
Thanks for the comments,
jods
August 14, 2007 at 2:24 pm
@eyerouge:
sorry about the akismet antispam. I have little control over it but it seems to be very aggressive with any comment containing a link to a website.
(And I do get a lot of spam on this blog)
Your site has been added, hoping to see the game ship with the first official octgn 2.0 release.
August 16, 2007 at 3:54 pm
I would say the window isn’t really a big deal. Inside is fine, which ever gets this in gamers hands the quickest.
August 16, 2007 at 8:06 pm
I have two monitors, and while I agree people with two is probably a minority, it’s probably irrelevant as to whether that should be a reason to put such a feature into the program. People running the program in windowed mode can get just as much use out of it as us folks with two monitors.
Firstly, I always think it’s the mark of a good program when anything you could need when using it is contained within it. But secondly, offering a multitude of useful options is also the hallmark of a great program, because it lets the users customize how they use it.
I’ll agree with you and the other posters. For now a ‘fake’ window is just fine (and if implemented in an innovative and intuitive way would really be the best), and allowing the window to be detached is something to add as an option! 🙂
August 18, 2007 at 12:18 am
I must agree with the previous posters, a fake window will do just fine for now.
Off-topic:
I have a few questions if that’s ok.
One thing in OCTGN 1.x that I never really understood was how card patches worked. For example, why are pictures put in LargeJPG, then loaded into OCTGN and copied to another folder were they are given a different name?
Wouldn’t it be easier to just load cards straight from the LargeJPG folder and then just using the .jpg as the card_id? Will this work work differently in 2.x or is it roughly the same deal?
——————————–
Will OCTGN 2.x include a default deckbuilder that’s better than the original one?
——————————–
Will cards/spoilers created for OCTGN 1.x still work with 2.x?
If not, would it be possible to include some sort of “converter”?
——————————–
Will creating card patches still be copy-pasting stuff into a .txt or are you adding something in OCTGN 2.x to speed up the process? Maybe allowing you to import spreadsheets?
——————————-
Sorry if all of this is answered in old posts but I can’t remember reading anything about it. Keep up the good work!
August 18, 2007 at 12:23 am
Sorry for the double post – just a feature I’d love to have:
Lets say you target something with Mouse 3, you play the spell ‘Fireball’ and you target a creature.
In OCTGN 1.x that’s just a white border around the target and a green one around the source. What if you could have an arrow going from the source to the target instead? Kinda like in Magic Workstation.
Holding down shift and selecting a target creates a red arrow that symbolizes an attack.
Ctrl, green, ‘effect’/’spell’
Alt, white, whatever
Is something like that already implemented? I loved that feature in MWS and I’d love to have it in OCTGN 2.x
August 18, 2007 at 12:51 pm
Hey Wihl, thanks for the suggestions!
About the patch/pictures system, it’s different in 2.0.
Deckbuilder: there will be a new one. But could you tell me more about that ? In which way can it be better ? The 2.0 deckbuilder is a tricky issue because it should work for any game. On the other hand, there will be a possibility to use specific deck builders for specific game through the use of add-ins. Also, the 2.0 format is open and very accessible, so you could build and use 3rd party deck-builders, too.
Card spoiler: they will be in a completely new format. So 1.x spoilers won’t work. I suppose building a converter should be possible, but it’s not our first priority currently.
Creating card patches: I’d like to provide a tool. Importing from spreadsheets would be a nice addition, indeed. I’ll try to work with the game creators during the first alpha releases.
Target: I want to add “arrow” targetting, Ã la MWS. For the other highlights, it would be nice if I find a simple way to change the color. Shift/Ctrl/Alt is not a very user friendly system, but we’ll see what we can come up with.
August 18, 2007 at 1:30 pm
thanks for the fast reply! 🙂
Well, a few things that I’d like to see in a deckbuilder:
It should be easy to have an overview of your deck. For example (I don’t know how OCTGN 2.x is gonna work so some of this might not work) I’d like the see the list of cards in a spreadsheet in one window, and then another spreadsheet in a window below it that contains the cards i’ve added to the deck.
It should be easy to sort by cost, type and so on.
I made a patch for a game called The Spoils (Tenacious Games said it was ok :p) and a member of the wcradio.com community created a Deckbuilder for OCTGN/MWS. This is what it looked like:
It was very light-weight, easy to get a good overview (I kinda messed up the tabs and stuff in that screenshot but meh :p) and it was easy to hide/show/sort the different tabs.
To make the deckbuilder work for all games, lets say that you in the patch the creator has to make a list of all the different card types. These would then be displayed at the bottom (“Characters” / “Tactics” etc). That would make it easy to have statistics available for all different card games without you having to do anything.
I’d also like to have the option to import cards from text. For example, you click a button and you copy-paste a list that looks similar to this:
x4 Card X
x3 Card Y
x1 Card Z
and it automatically creates a deck that’s identical to it.
Also, lets say that I’ve created a patch for the WoW TCG, that game has heroes, the heroes have different classes and specializations. This also means that the player can only use certain cards in their deck (A mage can’t use ‘Garrote’ for example because that’s a rogue abilitity).
Would it be possible to create patches for the deckbuilder too? That specify what cards that can be used with each other.
Or maybe if you can specify that in the game patch?
Card Name: Corki’s Ransom
Useable By: Rogue, Warrior
Cost: 1
Card Text: stuffstuffstuff
and then you have an option in the deckbuilder that allows you to sort by ‘Warrior’, ‘Rogue’ and so on.
So… Did any of that make sense? 🙂 I’m just coming up with stuff as I go and I guess some of it might not be doable. Sorry for the long post.
August 19, 2007 at 6:22 pm
I would be perfectly fine with a fake window.
(I can’t wait for 2.x to come out because I’ve been around since… before it was called OCTGN.)