Developers Iteration III of 2023

magge

I have tested most of the new implementations and they are gorgeous. The Distribute Orders and the loading-into-transport stuff is incredible and has a great positive impact with many QoL features.

The mobile factories look very promising, and this is how it should have been done in the first place 20 years ago -> produce while moving IMO. My suggestion would be to add an icon to the "main unit" that hints that you can select the "building-entity" to produce units or even link it directly to it, if possible.

The wiki links in the options menu are fantastic, those short videos and explanations are superb.

I am really used to automatically selecting the building unit when I hover over an empty mex- or power plant spot. Hopefully, I will see this feature again, because having to press an additional key to have it feels odd (to me).

The same goes for the blueprints for the buildings, they are great and are a nice QoL, but when I have only engineers selected, and I hover over a building, it would be nice to see the most used template already selected, instead pressing a key to get the blueprint selected.

Currently, when I select mixed tier 1-2-3 engineers, it only allows T1 buildings, even when T3 or T2 engineer is in the mix.

The Engineer Filter stuff is another good QoL - Would it possible, if I had selected a bunch of mixed tier engineers, to show me the highest available tier in the building menu bar instead the other way?

With this mechanic, when I build a T3 building, the lower tier engs should automatically assist it. I would guess there were some engine related issues to not have it that way which felt much more natural?

@jip said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

he following units lose their mobile factory capabilities:

Megalith (Cybran Megabot)
CZAR (Aeon Experimental Carrier)

We hope to include them in the future. At the moment they are not within reach to be finished any time soon.

What are the obstacles to not finalizing them as well for the incoming patch - Have you encountered different technical obstacles which need to get solved first or because it is simply very time-consuming to code that stuff?

Jip

@magge said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

The mobile factories look very promising, and this is how it should have been done in the first place 20 years ago -> produce while moving IMO. My suggestion would be to add an icon to the "main unit" that hints that you can select the "building-entity" to produce units or even link it directly to it, if possible.

I tried to create a similar toggle / button that the UEF ACUs have with their drones. After spending a few hours I couldn't figure out why that implementation works and I dropped the idea for another time. Ideally this exists, of course.

Similarly that there would be a toggle to allow an aircraft carrier to immediately pump out the unit instead of the unit ending up in the cargo of the carrier. That too was not intuitive to add at a first glance and was dropped for another time too.

@magge said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

I am really used to automatically selecting the building unit when I hover over an empty mex- or power plant spot. Hopefully, I will see this feature again, because having to press an additional key to have it feels odd (to me).

I understand, but I'm afraid it generates a significant amount of (memory) garbage that may negatively impact your framerate. For a UI mod this is fine, and someone can re-implement it as a UI mod. But the base game should be a stable, consistent experience that allows for smooth gameplay. Specifically referring to frame stutters when the garbage collector kicks in. The only way to tackle those is to reduce the amount of garbage that is created, and this specific function was a prime target.

Assigning the alternative to tab feels natural to me. Hover over the mass deposit, hit tab and you're done for a tech 1 extractor A nice bonus is that you can queue a point defense or anti air turret right after by tab'ing the ground.

@magge said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

The same goes for the blueprints for the buildings, they are great and are a nice QoL, but when I have only engineers selected, and I hover over a building, it would be nice to see the most used template already selected, instead pressing a key to get the blueprint selected.

This is not something I thought of. It would be an interesting, alternative way to create some sense of order to the templates. I'll adjust the framework to allow a UI mod to hook in and adjust the order.

The mod could do it through the preference file: just assign a number to each template and you can create an order over time like that.

@magge said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

The Engineer Filter stuff is another good QoL - Would it possible, if I had selected a bunch of mixed tier engineers, to show me the highest available tier in the building menu bar instead the other way?
With this mechanic, when I build a T3 building, the lower tier engs should automatically assist it. I would guess there were some engine related issues to not have it that way which felt much more natural?

The engine doesn't work like that I'm afraid. We have very little control over how the user (e.g., by using the mouse and not through script) assigns order. And what would happen in your example is that the tech 3 engineers would start building the tech 3 power generator while all other (lower tech) engineers remain idle. That is the best situation, the worst is that the game crashes. I've tried toying with this and found it to be unstable. The engine is just not designed for it.

The hotkey exists as an alternative that works the way the engine wants it. I removed it previous patch because I thought people weren't using it, but then I got a few messages so it was re-introduced again.

@magge said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

What are the obstacles to not finalizing them as well for the incoming patch - Have you encountered different technical obstacles which need to get solved first or because it is simply very time-consuming to code that stuff?

The idea of the factory modules is that they are consistent towards the user. Therefore all the factories are at and beyond the 'back side' of the unit. In the case of a CZAR this is difficult: the unit doesn't have a natural 'back side'. The unit doesn't even appear to orientate to where it is moving, like other units do.

In order to help players understand where to click we'd need to adjust the model of the CZAR. It being an iconic unit makes this difficult and time consuming. On top of that I don't have the skillset to do it, so I rely on others that I ask for help.

The Megalith is special in another way. Unlike the other units the Megalith doesn't have a build site but it creates or drops eggs. I like the way that the Superior FAF Experience mod does it, but when asking I wasn't allowed to integrate that approach. So we need to create it from scratch. This is again model and animation work and that is not in my skillset.

@ftxcommando said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

Honestly I’d rather just convert the mega into having the ability to reclaim over building, extremely dumb to have to lay eggs one at a time as it walks across a line (which 9/10 times would be perpendicular to the direction you actually want mega to face) and the reclaim was the real use of it anyway. Also don’t really like ideas about units just dumping out of it, just a copy of fatboy when that’s already the t4 it most associates with.

I honestly didn't know that people used the Megalith to reclaim wrecks. I've never seen it happen, but it surely works. To jump into your suggestion, giving the Megalith a reclaim ability is possible and we can add the effects or an animation to make it look more 'believable'. I'm fine either way.

veteranashe

@azath0th said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

I'm not being hostile. I'm being criticizing. You are giving us an incomplete and uncomfortable to use feature for one that was working. And you also remove it from units because it haven't fit your code vision. Megalith will not be able to reclaim battlefield and czar won't be able to produce support air forces until you decide to complete it.

Jip has done more for faf that anyone I have personally seen and possibly more than anyone has done, I trust the dude to do it in a timely manner.

Ctrl-K

@veteranashe It doesnt mean he is allowed to do whatever he wants without agreement

veteranashe

Well that's a very interesting statement because if I recall correctly mobile factories have been talked about quite a bit over the years and recently so I would guess behind the scenes, I don't go on discord, it was planned to do something. If we restrict on what devs do the game would be the same as it was in 2007.

Someone has to make changes in the game.

Ctrl-K

I like the changes @Jip done to this game. I really appreciate his efforts. But this one is raw and must be reiterated imho. It is not user friendly.

Paralon

Very important and interesting changes, thank you for the work done. But I would like to clarify what is the need to update the work of mobile factories in parts, while temporarily removing them from the game for czar and mega. If you don't want to break user experience then why not just wait till everything is ready. I guess this is absolutely wrong approach, you can’t do changes like this because of development status, this is completely players experience breaking. You need to prove your point and make some voting among the players

FtXCommando

@jip said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

I honestly didn't know that people used the Megalith to reclaim wrecks. I've never seen it happen, but it surely works. To jump into your suggestion, giving the Megalith a reclaim ability is possible and we can add the effects or an animation to make it look more 'believable'. I'm fine either way.

It specifically got nerfed in BP because it used to reclaim a GC in like 5 seconds. Reclaim fields were nonexistent with megas. This was like a 2017 change, though.

veteranashe

Voting among the players would be the worst option

snoog

Sometimes I think Jip should just stop posting any news at all bc of all the shitposting he gets in return.

People have been asking for years for the mobile factories to be fixed, he's doing it. And two of the them aren't ready yet. What the fuck is the problem with you guys? So much entitlement.

Paralon

@veteranashe so it might be a certain group of players

Paralon

@snaggs did u ever play equilibrium? There was just the same solution but no one wanted to implement it in the game. The problem is that you can't release a product that isn't fully ready imho

Jip

@paralon said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

Very important and interesting changes, thank you for the work done. But I would like to clarify what is the need to update the work of mobile factories in parts, while temporarily removing them from the game for czar and mega. If you don't want to break user experience then why not just wait till everything is ready. I guess this is absolutely wrong approach, you can’t do changes like this because of development status, this is completely players experience breaking. You need to prove your point and make some voting among the players

Have you tried the new implementation? I'd love to see the replay id where you did.

Yesterday I did five sessions with five different people. You can find them on the vault:

Of course, people need to get used to the fact that the factory module is now a separate unit. But we can't get around that, it is just how the engine works. Once they realized that it was fine, and it worked the way they expected it to work. To sum it up:

You can (manually) select the factory module by clicking behind the out, outside of the unit. See also the screenshot
You can do what you can do with a normal factory: queue units, issue rally points, pause it, etc
Opponents or observers can not select or target the factory module, to them there is just a Fatboy / Tempest / etc
You can use any existing hotkey that interacts with factories to select / manage the factory modules
Pausing the main unit will also pause the factory module
The progress bar of the main unit is updated as units are built

As I mentioned here in response to @magge the solution is of course not perfect yet. I'd love for it to be more complete, but it is not at this time. But calling it 'raw' is far from the truth.

Paralon

@jip yep this is still very impressive improvement of the game. Perhaps not quite accurately expressed, I meant maybe we can wait with release new features before mega and czar will be ready? My point is this is wrong to remove some game mechanics for a while

Jip

@Paralon The balance team happened to have a meeting and I asked their opinion. We've re-instated the Megalith the way it was, it can build but not move at the same time, like the current behavior in the release branch. Also adds in the standard Cybran drone fx for building. See also:

https://github.com/FAForever/fa/pull/5367

With regards to the CZAR, the balance team agreed to wait with re-introducing the mobile factory aspect until the implementation is finished. It can still be used as a carrier.

I hope this settles it for you too @Ninrai .

And I agree with what @BlackYps wrote. Specifically the forums are often toxic towards contributors that do their best to improve the experience as they see fit. I too am here to improve the FAForever experience. I do that for more hours each week then I'd like to admit to. I've been doing that for more than two years now. I'm open to suggestions and discussions. But please, keep it civil and constructive. I'll respond in kind. Assumptions are the death of any discussion.

Paralon

@jip thank you for response, never wanted to devalue your work at all. I would suggest edit those lines, because its kinda confusing:
The following units lose their mobile factory capabilities:
Megalith (Cybran Megabot)

Jip

Adjusted it , I forgot about it

veteranashe

I believe, at least with the Fatboy, once built you will set a repeat queue of units and leave that part alone, you will just have to move around the rally point.

Xanoxis

@jip When I look at those pictures of new shaders, they look gorgeous, but like with all games that use repeating textures, I wonder if it's possible to improve the look of them on the zoom out? Are there any plans for making textures less visibly repeating, at least mostly for the ground?

Something like those methods - https://blog.unity.com/technology/procedural-stochastic-texturing-in-unity

Implementing some sort of 'noise' for those textures would not be costly, but improve the look of game a lot in the long run.

Jip

Yes, there is an experimental shader written by @BlackYps that explores the possibilities to 'hide' the repetition. It is not production ready, but we hope to start a test trial later this year. I have no screenshots at the moment to show the results so far.

Other possibilities (outside of the shader) is to toy with mip maps and reduce the 'repeating' factors as you load in smaller and smaller mip maps. This is what Supreme Commander does with a lot of the stratum textures that ship with the game.

@xanoxis said in Developers Iteration III of 2023:

Implementing some sort of 'noise' for those textures would not be costly, but improve the look of game a lot in the long run.

We're limited by the old shader model (2.0) that the game uses, including an instruction (256) and texture read (16, I think) limit. That is why working on the shaders can be a struggle, all the modern and limitless shaders are out of our reach.

You sound like you have experience with shaders. Would you like to contribute? We could always use more help

Developers Iteration III of 2023

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