New Board UI testing

[Hyperion]

Discord link? Would like to get involved in development down the road. I'm guessing this is a side project for everyone involved.

The colors overall can be textured with gradience for both sea and land. Crusader Kings II or Europa Universalis map texturing comes to mind.

We're missing default bold borders. Example: Portugal's border contrast with Spain.

Color contrast between units (fleet and army) need to be further distinguishable from territories. Frankly speaking, the unit icons are ugly. Additionally, I disagree with the notion of moving away from webdiplomacy's traditional army/fleet look.

Because the unit icons are ugly, the signaling lines look quite rough... Both parts come hand in hand, imho. I'm especially concerned with the unit hold signaling look: Bold black borders. I'm assuming it resulted in this look because of said factors: lack of contrast between unit and territory & lack of distinguishing features for the unit icon.

I'm guessing this is a prototype. My biggest concern is being able to read the board with ease. The traditional board is definitely easier to look at. I don't think there should be a learning curve in being able to read and analyze the board. In the end it's a matter of design. Otherwise, interface controls are succinct. Bravo and well done on the foundational work.

[ben9990]

Hopefully the new design keeps a drop-down menu option for entering orders.

Appreciate that devs are working to improve UI, but, also think the color contrast and icons are a little too blase; sharper contrast makes it easier to instantly see what's going on.

Also, while overhauling UI, will support for intentional illegal misorder be added? That is a substantive part of the game that has long been missing from webdip.

[Trigfea63]

As others have said though I expect it's about what you're used to, since when people who only use other sites always dilike our colors etc.

^^^^^ This. When I first saw the new UI, I didn't like it that much, for the reasons others have given: similar colors, colors too bland, weird icons. After playing 1 bot game, I'm a convert. The color scheme is an improvement. The pastel colors are easy on the eyes. You get used to them pretty quickly, too. The icons could be improved, but it's much easier to tell armies from fleets now.

And the ability to enter orders visually, on the map, together with the auto-updating of the game phase once orders have processed ... well, that's a major, breakthrough improvement. Saves a lot of needless clicks to and from the home page. You can play an entire speed game or bot game without ever leaving the map page.

The only thing I missed was the ability to scroll down and quickly see how many SCs and units each power has.

[Rainfromabove]

Not sure I understand why this was needed as a development in general

Functionality-wise seems much easier to make mistakes when playing on mobile, not very nice to navigate

Also would echo what others have said that being true to the colours and feel of the board game was always a nice feature of webdip

[kestasjk]

As others have said though I expect it's about what you're used to, since when people who only use other sites always dilike our colors etc.

^^^^^ This. When I first saw the new UI, I didn't like it that much, for the reasons others have given: similar colors, colors too bland, weird icons. After playing 1 bot game, I'm a convert. The color scheme is an improvement. The pastel colors are easy on the eyes. You get used to them pretty quickly, too. The icons could be improved, but it's much easier to tell armies from fleets now.

And the ability to enter orders visually, on the map, together with the auto-updating of the game phase once orders have processed ... well, that's a major, breakthrough improvement. Saves a lot of needless clicks to and from the home page. You can play an entire speed game or bot game without ever leaving the map page.

The only thing I missed was the ability to scroll down and quickly see how many SCs and units each power has.

I think something a lot of people are missing is the details widget that you open in the top right, that contains the chat / orders / unit stats / voting.

Interesting feedback all. I am surprised by people saying it's worse on mobile, for me using webDip on mobile was a real pain, scrolling up to see the state of things, scrolling down and finding the unit to enter a move, clicking on a drop-down list, etc. Compared to pinching and panning around, pressing where you want units to go, seeing instant updates including a visual representation of the orders you've entered; to me the mobile experience was the one thing I thought everyone would think was an improvement.

[Flame]

Cool. I like it! I like game-stats very much. So, it will be a real fun to have a territory or SCs diagramme on the game page.

[Yonni]

While you're in the process of a major UI overhaul, would this be a good time to add preferred pronouns for each user in a game? It's a bit of an awkward aspect playing with people you don't know and has an easy fix (at least conceptually, I know nothing of programming).

[kestasjk]

While you're in the process of a major UI overhaul, would this be a good time to add preferred pronouns for each user in a game? It's a bit of an awkward aspect playing with people you don't know and has an easy fix (at least conceptually, I know nothing of programming).

Hmm, hadn't thought of that, we'll add that to the todo list.

FYI we've just merged in a new version with some updates/fixes:
Allow games to specify a shorter phase length for R/B phases and grace periods, vs M phases
Fix handling of civil disorders, pre-game phase, and vote processing in beta UI
Add blinking for unsaved unit orders
Add support for beta UI within the webdiplomacy docker configuration
Fix longstanding bug in old UI in rulebook press, where moderator would broadcast a private message to everyone if they sent a message in a R/B phase

https://github.com/kestasjk/webDiplomacy/pull/802

[umbletheheep]

I think it would be a good idea to add an option to download the map and sandbox from the current season.

[Peregrine Falcon]

Might it be easier to see the board state at a glance if support move orders were also displayed with dashed or dotted lines? It's idiosyncratic to webDip, but one thing I really liked about our old order display was the coloured support move, support hold, and convoy orders display, since it made it easy to differentiate different types of orders from the jumbled mess of lines, thus making translation of the board image into an understanding of board evolution somewhat easier at a glance.

[Kutusov]

Is it just me, or does the press tab pop up automatically after every resolution. Something that I find a bit annoying, especially in bot games. A part from that the other improvements are great.

[Flame]

Also these new icons are too cutesy. The old ones don't need to be kept or anything, but they were a better fit

To my mind new icons are more canonical. I like them. Like in chess - you can draw whatever you like - but there are standard figures icons to note the game.

[V+]

Hey, y'all. Not sure if it's been mentioned already, but one thing I've noticed about the new board is that smallest view of the map seems to be too "tall" for my browser window. That is to say, even when I've zoomed out all the way, I can't see units in EAS and BAR without panning. I suppose it's not that big of a deal, but I do like having the ability to "step back" from the board and take in the whole map in one frame. Is this user error on my part?

(That said, I suppose hitting "command -" and zooming out with the browser is a totally viable workaround...)

Thanks, devs and mods!

[Jamiet99uk]

I have now played several Bot games using the new interface.

The ability to enter orders dynamically in the map itself is a big plus, that works well, I like it.

On the downside, as well as the colours not being great, as previously mentioned, the really big problem for me is the lack of the red and yellow movement and support lines showing the results of the previous turn's movements. That's a really serious drawback.

[Claesar]

Today I played a 5min/turn RulebookPress game on mobile* with the new UI. It worked quite well! I don't think I could've done it on the old interface. One thing: I couldn't see the timer while I was chatting. That was very stressful.

I can imagine the UI isn't supposed to support this lunacy. I was playing on Android S9 Galaxy, if that helps.


*DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME. I'm extremely fast. Start practising 5min/turn Gunboat (without press) first. If you can handle that, try two simultaneously! That's how I started. 5min/turn FP is harder still!

[Claesar]

On my PC, when Playing Beta and waiting for a live game to start, there is no information regarding the game. It would be nice to see a timer and the number of participants.

[Claesar]

The Beta is just great. It works so much better for live games.

It would be nice to have a better reminder that you have orders due. We're all frequently not noticing we have builds/retreats and how many, causing missed turns.

[Trigfea63]

I have now played several Bot games using the new interface.

The ability to enter orders dynamically in the map itself is a big plus, that works well, I like it.

On the downside, as well as the colours not being great, as previously mentioned, the really big problem for me is the lack of the red and yellow movement and support lines showing the results of the previous turn's movements. That's a really serious drawback.

I agree. Even with all the advantages of the beta, I find myself now preferring to play my bot games on the old interface. I think I play better having that snapshot of the last turn's movements as the default view.

[DarthPorg36]

the order system works great, but not being able to see last turn's orders as default or red/yellow/green/blue/pink lines is confusing. I find I prefer to revert to the old interface for this reason.

[kestasjk]

Good feedback all. Move colors are a must I think, an option to display a faded view of the orders from the past turn, and a way to enable classic colors / icons.

The Beta is just great. It works so much better for live games.

It would be nice to have a better reminder that you have orders due. We're all frequently not noticing we have builds/retreats and how many, causing missed turns.

You mean in the other games section, or for the game you're currently viewing?