</> button improvement


Although the central place for design discussion is ##crawl-dev on freenode, some may find it helpful to discuss requests and suggestions here first.

Lair Larrikin

Posts: 19

Joined: Tuesday, 16th August 2011, 13:57

Post Thursday, 8th September 2011, 10:26

</> button improvement

I kinda wish that if not standing on any stairs, these two buttons would make me go to the nearest one - just as if pressing G and the desired adjacent level, that's all. :roll:
User avatar

Swamp Slogger

Posts: 155

Joined: Tuesday, 22nd February 2011, 18:24

Post Thursday, 8th September 2011, 10:28

Re: </> button improvement

ctrl g then </> does this already, I don't see why it needs changing.
User avatar

Tomb Titivator

Posts: 832

Joined: Saturday, 30th July 2011, 00:58

Post Thursday, 8th September 2011, 10:33

Re: </> button improvement

Extra button clicks. 2 vs. 4. Not a ton, but keep in mind that there might be folks that have difficulty for one reason or another using the shift/ctrl/alt keys regularly. Shift+? is much easier to hit than Ctrl+g. I for one have some trouble using the Ctrl key with any of the left hand letters, its nothing major but it is a minor inconvenience for me. Considering that Shift+? on non-stairs currently does nothing I don't see how it could be a real issue.
KoboldLord wrote:I'm also morbidly curious now as to how Shatter is abusable for 'stealth tricks'. It's about as stealthy as the Kool-Aid Man smashing through the walls and running through the room
User avatar

Dungeon Master

Posts: 4031

Joined: Thursday, 16th December 2010, 20:37

Location: France

Post Thursday, 8th September 2011, 10:43

Re: </> button improvement

You can also use shift+G if ctrl+G is difficult to use for you. You can also remap keys. What you suggest might cause errors and confusion, I don't think it would be an improvement.
<+Grunt> You dereference an invalid pointer! Ouch! That really hurt! The game dies...
User avatar

Tomb Titivator

Posts: 832

Joined: Saturday, 30th July 2011, 00:58

Post Thursday, 8th September 2011, 11:40

Re: </> button improvement

lol.. I've been using Shift+G all along, but didn't even think about it when I read the OP. Only 3 button clicks (hold shift) and it isn't a problem for me at all. Some other things that bug me about the keyboard interface, but without any real solutions to present I'm not going to bring them up. Thanks for the advice galehar, I might consider remapping some key functions to make life easier for me.
KoboldLord wrote:I'm also morbidly curious now as to how Shatter is abusable for 'stealth tricks'. It's about as stealthy as the Kool-Aid Man smashing through the walls and running through the room

Dungeon Master

Posts: 3618

Joined: Thursday, 23rd December 2010, 12:43

Post Thursday, 8th September 2011, 11:51

Re: </> button improvement

Incidentally, Napkin proposed exactly the same a few days ago on ##crawl-dev. I was skeptical at first (like galehar) but I happen to sit at an US keyboard right now, and I see that both < and > require Shift to press. This makes accidental <> pressing quite unlikely, in my opinion. In other words, I could live with the change, although I don't think it is particularly necessary. Also, you can achieve it with macros (tell us if there are edge cases causing problems). We may add it to the list of commented out macros, for example.

Mines Malingerer

Posts: 45

Joined: Tuesday, 21st June 2011, 07:12

Post Thursday, 8th September 2011, 14:10

Re: </> button improvement

On french keyboard both are on the same key, one require Shift and not the other

I often push the wrong key, and i clearly don't want to move away from my stair if i make such mistake :)

Snake Sneak

Posts: 110

Joined: Monday, 20th December 2010, 21:11

Post Saturday, 10th September 2011, 13:01

Re: </> button improvement

Also some stairways/portals are kind of unclear whether you have to go up or down through them. I think a lot of them accept both, but this would be super annoying if you guessed wrong and your guy ran off when all you did was press the wrong direction.

Dungeon Master

Posts: 553

Joined: Wednesday, 22nd December 2010, 10:12

Post Saturday, 10th September 2011, 14:24

Re: </> button improvement

dpeg wrote:Incidentally, Napkin proposed exactly the same a few days ago on ##crawl-dev. I was skeptical at first (like galehar) but I happen to sit at an US keyboard right now, and I see that both < and > require Shift to press. This makes accidental <> pressing quite unlikely, in my opinion. In other words, I could live with the change, although I don't think it is particularly necessary. Also, you can achieve it with macros (tell us if there are edge cases causing problems). We may add it to the list of commented out macros, for example.

How about, if you press < or > when not on the stairs, you get a prompt.

For example, I press > standing on normal ground on d:13: "Do you want to travel do d:14? (y/n)". Maybe pressing > a second time could confirm the prompt as well as pressing y, like how pressing e twice will confirm eating prompts.

Prompts can be a little annoying sometimes but I think it's quite warranted in this case. It would be fairly unintrusive, and there'd be no issue of accidental keypresses. And I do consider such accidents to be a potential worry - quite often, you might have some very nasty stuff waiting for you on another level, and you might not have been smart enough to put a travel excluson or level warning. Accidentally pressing < or > could send you into a pretty bad situation in that case! There are also other situations, like pressing it by accident on vault:7, or pressing < by accident in a portal vault and leaving.

I don't think this is a particularly needed feature, but I do think this would be the best way to go about making it work.

For this message the author evilmike has received thanks:
jejorda2

Return to Game Design Discussion

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 26 guests

Powered by phpBB © 2000, 2002, 2005, 2007 phpBB Group.
Designed by ST Software for PTF.