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Is there a preference to a certain Icon showing over the NPC's Contact head?
ex:[img]http://i.imgur.com/Dww5bqG.png[/img]
or maybe...
[img]http://img.finalfantasyxiv.com/t/1e50acf08461e355e3e5d4736391ba3f787720f1_29.png[/img]
or maybe...
[img]http://i.imgur.com/LF7tfoa.png[/img]
or None!?! :)
[img]http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130810205320/lotr/images/thumb/7/71/Great_Eye_of_Sauron.jpg/320px-Great_Eye_of_Sauron.jpg[/img]
Wut?
I wouldn't mind icons for NPCs with missions, those who provide a service (e.g. stores/shopkeepers), and those who may simply have some information for a player (Izzy's first example is common for this, perhaps with a bubble in blue if the information is generic or lore related).
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[font=Pristina][size=18][b]Hail Beard![/b][/size][/font]
Support [url=http://cityoftitans.com/comment/52149#comment-52149]trap clowns[/url] for CoT!
I'd prefer it to be an option in the settings for scaleable/hidden. I want small, inconspicuous labels, and I want them hidden if I'm not clicked on the NPC.
5 OClock Shadow
"The Five", "Old Scruff", "Wolfbrand", "Tashomono"
Your shaving days are numbered...
I want to be able to find contacts, but I can understand how some people don't want a neon blinking sign over the heads of NPCs. Now if we are given directions to a contact, I expect them to be marked on my map and probably have some kind of range meter on the screen to help me find them. As for finding random open contacts on our own, I like the idea of a highlight key, when pressing a button NPCs in the vicinity with information, stuff to sell, or missions to give highlight in some way to differentiate them from the random Titan City citizen.
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I never set anything on fire accidentally!
The Titan Legacy - Defender of the Inner Flame
I also generally prefer less iconic graphics- overhead icons, brackets, outlines, ground highlighting- but some people depend on it. As always, options would be best if possible. Just letting folks turn certain things they don't like off always goes a long way.
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
Guild Wars 1 does this... Guild Wars 2 *doesn't* do this, but then again, it is also open world instead of lobby styled.
Choice/options are best in this case...
What CoX had was fine with me. I feel like I need to have some way of finding a particular contact and being able to identify them from a distance.
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
Like Radiac, I prefer the COH way. If you can't use that method, then the third choice (with the ! over his head) would be my second choice.
I would personally say some sort of "highlight" or "glow," similar to how many games portray interactive [i]objects[/i], to be ideal. A glow is easy to see from a distance, but at the same time, is somewhat more subtle than a giant floating question-mark over someone's head. You could even make the highlight look stylistically similar to the rest of the game's interface in order to decrease the visual disruption that it would cause, making it feel more like your HUD is highlighting someone important as if it were scanning them, as opposed to having a giant cardboard cutout hovering over them.
I'm just a writer! What I say is not law!
[color=#ff0000]Composition Team[/color]
It's always been a knee jerk reaction to click on any NPC I see. So in my target UI, I would see who it is, and if they were a merchant or a contact. I don't need their name or an icon floating over their head as if it was there in the world. But yeah, the option should still be there for people who want icons.
5 OClock Shadow
"The Five", "Old Scruff", "Wolfbrand", "Tashomono"
Your shaving days are numbered...
Something else I was thinking about after my last post. At this point in time you pretty much have to have some kind of visual cue that an NPC is a contact. Not doing so in an MMO these days would be like not putting turn signals on a car. How obnoxious it needs to be is, of course, up for debate. There is nothing wrong with adding the ability to turn off the visual cues, but they should default as on to aid players new to MMOs.
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I never set anything on fire accidentally!
The Titan Legacy - Defender of the Inner Flame
That weird, ugly "crystal arrow" or whatever it was that pointed towards where you were supposed to go in Champions was the worst system I ever experienced. The CoH system was intuitive and relatively non-immersion breaking.
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
Until they broke it by putting missions that could spawn in an underneath part of the map, which had an entrance that was not entirely intuitive....
Sure, it only happened once or twice, but it did happen... and caused me a LOAD of anguish trying to find the entrance.
I was annoyed by this one under the road in Perez Park a few times. By the time I encountered the much better hidden door in Skyway City I'd gotten used to hunting for them.
[IMG]http://i555.photobucket.com/albums/jj477/fuzzygnome01/Hidden_zps8bcd1a71.jpg[/IMG]
Personally it was the Brickstown ones that drove me nuts. Perhaps an up/down arrow when you are right over/under the mission would have helped.
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I never set anything on fire accidentally!
The Titan Legacy - Defender of the Inner Flame
Yeh, forgot about those. Didn't happen often, but when it did I cursed like I'd been cut off in traffic- but for a whole hour till I found it.
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
Just give my contacts my cell number so I don't have to chase em down O.o!
"Gotcha!"
The arrow in CO doesn't always help much for that. Many a time in Lemuria have I hunted for the right cave to reach the instance entrance.
Foradain, Mage of Phoenix Rising.
[url=https://cityoftitans.com/forum/foradains-character-conclave]Foradain's Character Conclave[/url]
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Avatar courtesy of [s]Satellite9[/s] [url=https://www.instagram.com/irezoomie/]Irezoomie[/url]
If they want to idiot-proof the experience, they could provide an option to turn on the kind of guide available in Neverwinter, which places a line on the ground that leads the player to the correct location. There were three or four occasions on which I was very annoyed in CoH (Perez Park and Faultline spring to mind), but for some reason Neverwinter's level of 'follow the yellow brick road' hand-holding cheapens the experience for me.
I suppose I am a fan of being trusted to get to the dot on the map (or whatever) on my own, within reason. If the NPC tells me there is a tunnel/cave entrance somewhere, to get to the door, that's perfect. And preferably no random, inexplicable barriers such as impenetrable foliage.
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[font=Pristina][size=18][b]Hail Beard![/b][/size][/font]
Support [url=http://cityoftitans.com/comment/52149#comment-52149]trap clowns[/url] for CoT!
What if you can use your Stipend to buy a Yellow Brick Road temp power that reveals the path... Ahh.. like that Map Reveal Temp power in Mishes? :) So, those that want it.. can get it. ;)
Its why I actually (bizarrely) enjoy the Quest tracker in Wildstar...
Now you have to remember that it is an *open world* MMO (unlike the high amounts of instancing that City of Heroes was).
On the full screen zone map, you can view where mission areas *should be* (mouse over it on the map), or if you click the quest in your quest tracker, it will show an arrow pointing to the *nearest* section to you. Oh, and yes, it can also point directly down as well... which can be confusing until you realise that there is actually a quest chain in an abandoned mine that you are standing on top of.
I am hoping for a more 'open world' experience in CoT, allowing for the fact that it will be a primarily urban setting.
The urban setting does have the advantage that it is, by its nature, organized. So long as the contacts and mission summaries include addresses, or at least point to an area of several blocks, a player could choose not to use any kind of mission marker. They could use the basic map (and perhaps street signs) to find their way, and may eventually know exactly where they need to go to get to Park Reed Road without looking at the map. Of course this presumes a city where all the streets and houses have names and numbers.
Naturally being able to click on the address to get a marker should still be an option, 'cause GPS is everywhere these days.
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[font=Pristina][size=18][b]Hail Beard![/b][/size][/font]
Support [url=http://cityoftitans.com/comment/52149#comment-52149]trap clowns[/url] for CoT!
Re: icons above contacts' heads -- while I would like to support the desires of the people who want these, I'd like to strenuously echo the request to be able to turn these off. Likewise with the "ground halo" below their feet -- though it would be nice if these were separate options, because the latter was not nearly so in-your-face. And please have /screenshotui (there will be a /screenshotui, won't there?) suppress these indicators.
I never objected to hard-to-find mission doors. Well, once or twice I got a bit upset, and then chided myself for being childish and reapplied my intellect to the task. Personally, I like having to do a bit of work to find things -- as long as the percentage of these is a small one in the grand scheme. I especially like Darth Fez's idea of locating some things in the city using the cues one would normally use in a city. Also, the ground ribbon Darth mentions (also used to good effect in Dead Space) seems like a good option that doesn't lead you unless you want to be led.
Spurn all ye kindle.
Given a choice, I prefer ground glow to overhead icon. Indeed, if dealing with a "I've got something for you!" NPC handing out missions, I'd prefer a slow pulsing ground glow (slow as in a 10 second on/off cycle) to having an animated [b]![/b] bouncing around over their head. The ground glow for Contacts in City of Heroes was decidedly preferable.
[center][img=44x100]https://i.imgur.com/sMUQ928.gif[/img]
[i]Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.[/i][/center]
*sits in his corner of Old-School RPGs*
Back in my day, we had no clue who had quests or not cause there weren't no newfangled Question Mark over them. We had to talk to everyone and find all the quests and info for quests and so on, not to mention there was no indicator telling where to go. AND WE LIKED IT!
[B]Revenge is motivation enough. At least it's honest...[/B]
Roleplayer; Esteemed Villain
[img]http://www.nodiatis.com/pub/5.jpg[/img]
You had people to talk to? Luxury! We had to root through a pile of hot gravel for our missions.
Spurn all ye kindle.
I used to have to go around Hailing the NPCs and actually reading what they said in response! Then you had to guess which word in their spiel was the hot-button that would trigger the next piece of information. Sometimes you'd have to walk through their conversation tree several times, to find all of the clues.
"Hail ." "What about the rabbits?" "It's holy?" "Whose blood?" "Why did they scream?" "I will get rabbits."
Be Well!
Fireheart
If it's in town and has an address or whatever, the glowing path would work fine. Kinda likes trip mapping app on your phone. If its a cave or some hidden place in the woods, you could get directions to the area and when you are close enough, the door or whatever could start to glow to help you find it.
Phoenix Rising's Model Citizen
hmm.. what if you had the Reveal Power and for just a few missions the path was something like Blood Splatter that you can only see with UltraViolet Reveal power... or partial FootSteps Reveal power? :)
Instead of a soling green line for the Path to Destination, you can select what it looks like... Foot Steps, or other... RP'ers might like that too.