Pimp My UI: The Art of Interface Design - Page 22

TangoDigital · 09/09/08, 5:59 AM

Whenever I heal I just drag grid over to the bottom right side of my character. Since the cursor almost always lingers around the center screen area it makes sense to have it there. Grid really covers all of a healers needs IMO as long as it's configured properly. I'm also keeping it very small to shorten distance between UFs, which makes for faster clicking.

Shinwei · 09/09/08, 10:57 AM

Originally Posted by TangoDigital

Whenever I heal I just drag grid over to the bottom right side of my character. Since the cursor almost always lingers around the center screen area it makes sense to have it there. Grid really covers all of a healers needs IMO as long as it's configured properly. I'm also keeping it very small to shorten distance between UFs, which makes for faster clicking.

I'm not quite convinced that smaller raid frames makes for faster clicking. This is taken from the Resto Druid thread:

Originally Posted by giansm

I thought this was an interesting question so I did some research. If you believe Fitts's law then it actually doesn't matter what size your Grid frames are. It says that the time needed to shift "aim" from one area to another is proportional to this logarithm:

$\log{ \Big(\frac{D}{W} + 1\Big)}$

where D is the distance to be traveled and W is the error allowed in the final destination. The formula appears to be pretty well supported by experiment and is based on the assumption that you will generally move the mouse very quickly at first and then slow down as you reach your target in order to improve your accuracy. The initial speed you move the mouse at is assumed to be based on how far away the target is (farther targets mean faster initial mouse speed). When you reach the target then you have succeeded and you stop moving your mouse.

Both D and W are influenced by your Grid frame size, since with bigger frames you have longer to move and also a larger target to hit. Intuitively you might guess based on this that the Grid frame size doesn't matter, and this is correct if you work out the math (assuming I did it properly).

For simplicity assume Grid is a set of squares sized w by w, and you need to move x squares horizontally and y squares vertically. Then D ends up being:

$D = \sqrt{(wx)^2 + (wy)^2} = w \sqrt{x^2+y^2}$

And W is the long side of a triangle inside your target square (since you might be moving diagonally). This triangle might be flat if you are moving in a straight line.

$W = \frac{w}{\cos{ \arctan{y/x} }} = w \sqrt{1+\Big(\frac{y}{x}\Big)^2}$

So the w's (size of your grid frames) cancel out in the logarithm when D is divided by W, and the travel time ends up being based only on how many squares (not pixels) away your target square is from your current one.

One important thing to note is that this formula does not account for being accustomed to a certain setup, which will certainly improve your performance. That means that since the grid size doesn't matter from a general point of view, the answer to the question "what Grid size gives you the best reaction time?" is simply "the one you're currently using."

Intoxify · 09/09/08, 2:08 PM

I've had the same sort of UI evolution over time as Shinwei has, but from the role of a caster DPS. When I first discovered that there was "life" beyond the default Blizzard UI, I still clung to the generic positioning of "Personal, target, and focus target" in the top left, though granted, I turned mine vertically, rather than continuing across the top of my screen. I also relegated raid frames into a bottom corner, deciding that they weren't important enough to pay attention to, since I played a mage, and T5 content has very little decursing requirements.

This worked fairly well, but I ran into the problem that I habitually developed tunnel vision by watching either my environment, my health, my cooldowns, or Omen, to the exclusion of everything else.

When I starting moving into t6 content, I realized that tunnel vision was swiftly getting me killed, so I reworked my UI completely, to have everything focused along the bottom like many UIs I've seen here on Elitist Jerks. My only problem with that setup however, was that it was extremely cramped, and there was too much information contained in too little space, making it annoying to sort out what I needed to know at the time.

Around this time was when my paladin really started gaining levels quickly as well, so I decided to remake my UI all over again, with a mind to making it usable on my alt. I wound up relying heavily on the Dogtags library to save graphical space, in regards to to my scorch stacks and polymorph and scorch timers, as well as for tracking which Judgement I had active on a target. Overall, I'm fairly happy with it now, since it keeps my eyes mainly in the center (save for glances at Omen).

(tankadin version.)

rotteneye · 09/16/08, 1:08 PM

This UI Compilation is designed to serve Holy Priest, namely, CoH priest in raid only.

The concept of UI design actually comes from Zygar who inspired me how/where should I set up the goal of UI compilation. Thanks vm.

Based on Zygar's rules, I managed to set up my idea on User Interface for CoH priest as follows;

A. Take care of raid HP

By placing 'GRID' just below center of the screen, I can handle entire raid's HP whilst sacrificing player / target / ToT / Focus unitframes which should be glanced ocassionally. I really do not want to place unitframes just around 'GRID' since I have a plan to position some Add-ons related to checking cooldowns which would be handled in later part of this article.

B. Survive in entire period during an engagement

I expelled Player / Target / ToT / Focus unitframes from centre and position 'GRID' to concentrate on raid health. But it was really hard for me to glance around scattered unitframes / Maintank List and 'GRID'. The biggest problem is that I can not exactly figure out when I should eat consumables to survive in the combat. It was 'Low Health Warning' to settle down the situation and help me to survive. Finally I was able to be relieved from glancing my own HP.

C. Utilize trinkets / portions / spells every second without idling

I found myself very weak at timely utilizing trinkets / portions / spells. Here is list what i have to improve to become nice healer

.

Case 1)
- Casting 'Inner Focus' just after getting 'Holy Concentration'
- Spamming spells once i get 'Focus' aura from 'Mystical Skyfire Diamond'

By using 'Actioncombat' I was able to be alarmed on certain self-buff events likes 'Holy Concentration' and 'Focus'.

Case 2)
- Casting 'Player of Mending' upon every cooldown
- Consuming 'Super mana potion' every 2 minutes
- Utilizing 'Earring of Soulful Meditation' every 2 minutes

I have tried tons of Add-on tracking cooldowns and finally found that 'Forte Warlock' exactly suits my necessity.

Case 3)
- Keep 'renew' on Maintank / my target during whole engagement

'SpellReminder' is the best Add-on ever to track any buff I placed on target.

and Here is my result

I'm really happy the above result is really what i meant to be. I would like to hear from you about my placement for further improvement.

Zedd · 09/17/08, 6:20 AM

I just wonder how you can live with the Very unbalanced UI in solo play.

TangoDigital · 09/21/08, 9:38 PM

Originally Posted by Shinwei

I'm not quite convinced that smaller raid frames makes for faster clicking. This is taken from the Resto Druid thread:

Interesting read. Might actually be true. Although I like to keep it small because I believe blocking off center screen with UI-Elements is a huge mistake in and of itself. So whatever goes there should be absolutely vital and as small as possible.

Sovereignty · 09/22/08, 2:44 PM

Originally Posted by TangoDigital

Interesting read. Might actually be true. Although I like to keep it small because I believe blocking off center screen with UI-Elements is a huge mistake in and of itself. So whatever goes there should be absolutely vital and as small as possible.

I think the most important implication of that post is that the most efficient set-up of any raid target frame will by a 5x5 grid, at least for the purposes of mouse gestures.

Of course, using the size v. response time question as the sole determining factor in raid frame size considerations is fundamentally flawed. The question treats grid-frame size in a vacuum, but screen real estate is zero-sum. The smallest possible frames, that do not reduce the functionality of said frames to the user, are always necessarily the best choice.

Edit: Clarification as per gianism.

• giansm · 09/22/08, 3:13 PM

I don't really think the question and response are flawed, since they were supposed to be purely about reaction time (i.e. is it easier to target player X using a larger grid or a smaller grid) and not about the general best size, which would take other effects into account. I do think it was useful to consider reaction time separately from other effects just to see how it shook out. Anyway, if you believe the theory, reaction time is a non-factor and so the "other effects" are really all that's important. And for that reason, like you I subscribe to the idea of making grid as small as possible while still providing the necessary information, which for me is somewhat larger than the default since I add a few bells and whistles (side icons and extra center texts).

Shinwei · 09/22/08, 3:23 PM

There are still other factors in play here as well. Primarily the one I am going to talk about is eyesight and the necessity to avoid squinting in order to read the information displayed on one's raid frames. In order to satisfy this factor, I am going to say that the best raid frames are the largest raid frames you can have without blocking essential areas of your screen so you can see environmental hazards and whatnot.

Also, going back to the position of the raid frames themselves, I want to re-iterate that mid-center below one's character are still the best (for a healer). The reason being that a healer's eye focus is almost always targeted towards the raid frames. The closer your character is to your eye focus, the easier it is to see environmental hazards.

Sovereignty · 09/22/08, 4:55 PM

Originally Posted by Shinwei

There are still other factors in play here as well. Primarily the one I am going to talk about is eyesight and the necessity to avoid squinting in order to read the information displayed on one's raid frames. In order to satisfy this factor, I am going to say that the best raid frames are the largest raid frames you can have without blocking essential areas of your screen so you can see environmental hazards and whatnot.

Also, going back to the position of the raid frames themselves, I want to re-iterate that mid-center below one's character are still the best (for a healer). The reason being that a healer's eye focus is almost always targeted towards the raid frames. The closer your character is to your eye focus, the easier it is to see environmental hazards.

Your constraints on size v. space are exactly the same as mine, just coming from the other direction. If you used either your constraints or mine, you should theoretically arrive at the same result

As to positioning, I think the key element is establishing linkage between like-elements. Unit frames should be kept together, to minimize movement and maximize detailed information gathering. The best positioning I've found is to be right under the feet of the character, since that gives space for things that creep up from behind (like a doomfire) to be visible while maintaining a wide field of view for the rest of the playing field.

Quaunaut · 09/22/08, 6:05 PM

Before earlier this year, I heavily modified my UI regularly almost every 2 months, and much smaller modifications in between. I chronicled this earlier in the thread, but I've arrived at a point that I haven't moved from in 6 months or more(I can't remember when I adopted it).

My idea for the longest time is detailed on the right side. One mentioned earlier in the thread, how can you go with such an imbalance during solo play?

I offer the idea that the imbalance is what perfects the UI, as long as you don't overload it.

That idea on the right side is what I call the "Key"('cause it looks like an old style key). It puts all of my most pertinent information in the smallest area possible(which is even smaller when I'm not a Shaman, as I lose my totem bar). I've done my best to take everything I can off of it, and reduce the rest of my UI down from even what it is- and I've found, I can do no more with current addons.

However, I've been wondering lately how to make it so there is even less- however, many of these ideas, while revolving around the key, would require entirely new mod ideas that I'm not even sure are possible.

For example, we have finally become able to modify the model-based bars, ingame. But I've begun to think- what if we change those bars themselves? We know who it is we are targetting via their name and health information, but what if we could show their healthbar above their head just as long as an even has happend with it? Perhaps with some quickinfo next to their name, like HP%, and new buffs/durations of debuffs. Furthermore, what if instead of having a traditional attack bar, we could have context-sensitive bars, depending on the target?

For example, as an Enhancement Shaman, my bar could be made up of 4 small buttons. As I'm running up to my enemy, I can see 3 of my shocks, and either Purge or Lightning Bolt(mayhaps both, on a 5th button). Once I am in melee range, Stormstrike takes the position of the first button. If I'm in a raid environment, my shocks would not have Frost Shock there- instead, perhaps healing wave, or Heroism.

It would be constantly monitoring dozens of things- both my own health and party member's health(to put a healing button there), my own mana(for shamanistic rage), the status of my elemental shield(so I always have at least Water Shield up, if not Lightning Shield if I have the Static Shock talent), Wind Shock if I have gone over the 80% mark in Omen, Lightning Bolt or Lava Burst or Chain Lightning if Maelstrom Weapon is up, Lava Lash if all my other cooldowns are up for awhile- dozens of opportunities to get rid of your action bars, target health or personal health bars- tons of things.

Imagine an addon that took away the entire reasoning behind the minimap- when you see ore, or an herb, or a questgiver, it gives you a small waypoint in a circle around your screen, not unlike EvE or any other space flight-sim. Or a damage meter, that instead of being a constant meter, showed who was in first, who was in front of you, where you are, and who was nearing you behind you- expanding when you moused over it for more information?

Or a chat addon that could tell the difference between what was important to me- tells, guild talk, party chat, raid chat- without forcing me to mute channels and never see what was said in them at that time(as in, why can't I mute, but not ignore?).

This is the part where someone says "Why don't you code it?" Well, I'll get right on that. But does anyone else think these ideas would be useful at all? Any of them? Or any criticisms of them?

Nephthys · 09/22/08, 7:46 PM

Originally Posted by Quaunaut

Furthermore, what if instead of having a traditional attack bar, we could have context-sensitive bars, depending on the target? . . . It would be constantly monitoring dozens of things- both my own health and party member's health(to put a healing button there), my own mana(for shamanistic rage), [etc.]

The UI code has been designed by Blizzard to explicitly forbid many of the things you mention. The idea is to have action buttons that can only be as state-dependent as macros are. They're trying to avoid things like the old Decursive where you just pressed one button over and over again and the addon did all the targetting for you.

I do think there is room, however, for an action bar/button mod that allows buttons to display information other than cooldown on the ability they trigger. One example would be a button that showed the stack size and time left on a rogue's Deadly Poison, but when you pressed the button it cast Envenom. Or heal buttons that changed color/alpha depending on how much health the party member is missing. So you could have the most mana-efficient heal ability appear clearly while the others became translucent. That kind of is possible with the current UI code -- displaying information, but not allowing that information to change what the button press does.

Duilliath · 09/23/08, 6:05 AM

While part of that might not be possible, there is a range check (to fade out buttons etc). Could that be used to swap between, say, Lightning Bolt and Stormstrike ?

Even if only half of what Quaunaut posted about could be done, it'd still improve things quite a bit.

Marek · 09/23/08, 7:07 AM

You can only change what a button does while being out of combat. The only way for different actions of a single button in combat are macros with conditionals or predefined cast sequences. The cast sequences are fixed and the conditionals are rather limited. What you can do is perform non-actions like canceling buffs (useful for GCD-safe shifting commands for druids) but everything written in your spellbook is bound by the limitations mentioned above.

Here are some more ideas about UI design:

1. Separation of long term and short term buffs
In combat you are not interested that your MotW or fortitude lasts 32 minutes. You are interested that your trinket lasts for 10 more seconds or Blood Lust for 23. Therefore you would display short term buffs/debuffs next to the unit frame or HUD and long term buffs somewhere out of sight (like the upper right corner). An important feature is that both lists of buffs can be canceled via right click (in case a Paladin "accidentally" gave you Blessing/Hand of Protection

)

2. Enemy Debuffs I care about.
Demon, Smarty ...
The Problem with those addons, is that they usually don't play well with HUD's or unit frames (the places where you display the remaining need-to-know information about a specific unit). With the consolidation of raid debuffs, you can have a unitframe with a fixed number of raid debuff slots with a generic icon texture for each debuff type (since most players don't recognize the icon textures of every class ability out there).

3. Threat display on nameplates or unit frames (useful for tanks and AoE)
Omen/KTM are nice, but usually you don't need that much information. On encounters where a specific target only needs one tank, it is sufficient for the tank and the DPSer to have one bar. For the tank it is sufficient to know the lead to the second person on the threat list, for everyone else it is sufficient to know their threat difference to the tank.
In multi mob scenarios displaying threat lead on nameplates helps both AoEers and tanks to judge which mobs are likely to attack the squishies. Aloft was close to provide such a feature but sadly development came to an end before the combat log changes that allowed identification of different units by ID instead of names.

4. Display mob ability cooldowns as buffs
Usually mobs have very few buffs, so the buff display could also show mob abilities. Since I am a fan of icon spiral display for buffs/debuffs, the ability would be displayed as a shaded icon after it was used and slowly fill until it is ready again. It remains fully drawn until the ability is used again.

exschwizer · 09/23/08, 9:17 AM

Originally Posted by Anwyn

Aloft was close to provide such a feature but sadly development came to an end before the combat log changes that allowed identification of different units by ID instead of names.

I didn't test it myself as my account is currently inactive, but this updated versions of Aloft of september 17th (2008) claims to "[...]provide a full-featured threat indicator capability[...]".

Originally Posted by Anwyn

With the consolidation of raid debuffs, you can have a unitframe with a fixed number of raid debuff slots with a generic icon texture for each debuff type

This should be easy to handle with Zork's rFilter 2. I don't have a link at the moment, as I usually update it via Tortoise. Basically, it allows to create icons which stay transparent, as long as a defined buff/debuff is lacking on a certain mob. As the debuff is applied, the icon is colored.

mhr_78 · 09/23/08, 11:14 AM

Originally Posted by Marek

3. Threat display on nameplates or unit frames (useful for tanks and AoE)
Omen/KTM are nice, but usually you don't need that much information. On encounters where a specific target only needs one tank, it is sufficient for the tank and the DPSer to have one bar. For the tank it is sufficient to know the lead to the second person on the threat list, for everyone else it is sufficient to know their threat difference to the tank.
In multi mob scenarios displaying threat lead on nameplates helps both AoEers and tanks to judge which mobs are likely to attack the squishies. Aloft was close to provide such a feature but sadly development came to an end before the combat log changes that allowed identification of different units by ID instead of names.

I hardly believe anyone is using that. You know even with standard nameplates your best tools is having nameplates visible, grid agro warning and fast reactions to grab up mobs that go after an aoe class. The visual clutter you get from the nameplates, floating combat texts and omen is enough and you can hardly cope with any more meta information in a meaningfull way.

Myself i am trying to reduce mod usage as it is getting more and more annoying keeping your mods up to date, and i notice them all getting more and more bloated.

Nephthys · 09/23/08, 11:29 AM

Originally Posted by Marek

Therefore you would display short term buffs/debuffs next to the unit frame or HUD and long term buffs somewhere out of sight (like the upper right corner).

This is almost exactly what I do. I use CTmod to put all the buffs in the bottom right hand corner, just as icons with timers. And then I use NeedToKnow to show those few buffs and debuffs I do watch in combat (Slice and Dice, Rupture, Blade Flurry) as timer bars immediately underneath my player and target frames, which are in the middle of my screen. I love it.

On encounters where a specific target only needs one tank, it is sufficient for the tank and the DPSer to have one bar. For the tank it is sufficient to know the lead to the second person on the threat list, for everyone else it is sufficient to know their threat difference to the tank.

This is the best UI idea I've heard in a long time. Until I read this, I hadn't even realized how much useless information Omen was spamming. I'll take a look at the new threat API. This might be really really easy to code. I'm thinking most clear would be a bar that fills up as you come closer to gaining aggro. But where would it max out? You pull aggro at 110% threat for melee and 130% for ranged. I suppose this could be an AddOn option, or the bar could display both. Hrm.

My visual philosophy is: if you need to pay attention to or do something, the UI should display something to let you know. It it's all good, the UI should be simple and uncluttered. That's why cooldown bars never made sense to me: they give a lot of information when you can't use an ability, but usually you're looking to know if you can. In that case, you have to look through all the moving bars to make sure the ability you want to use is NOT there. It's all backwards, if you ask me. It makes more sense to me to have an AddOn display an ability's icon if it's usable and have that icon be gone or dark or faded out if it's not. Similar to the mob/boss ability idea mentioned earlier.

And also for buffs and debuffs: you often just want to make sure you have a certain buff or the mob has a certain debuff. If it's there, no problem. The UI should let you be. If it's not and should be, the UI should let you know. I wrote TellMeWhen because I didn't see any other AddOn available that could do these things. It doesn't have timers yet, though, and it doesn't allow you to consolidate different buffs/debuffs into a single place. The consolidation isn't something I've seen any AddOn do just yet.

Duilliath · 09/23/08, 11:45 AM

Originally Posted by Nephthys

This is the best UI idea I've heard in a long time. Until I read this, I hadn't even realized how much useless information Omen was spamming. I'll take a look at the new threat API. This might be really really easy to code. I'm thinking most clear would be a bar that fills up as you come closer to gaining aggro. But where would it max out? You pull aggro at 110% threat for melee and 130% for ranged. I suppose this could be an AddOn option, or the bar could display both. Hrm.

Don't forget that being at 105% threat might not make you pull aggro, but it may well make the tank eligible for "Bad Things (tm)" - e.g. Enfeeble.

• giansm · 09/23/08, 11:48 AM

This mod sounds like what you're looking for, I use it on my rogue alt: MyThreat : WoWInterface Downloads : Ace: Combat. It shows you your threat relative to the current tank as a percentage and as a threat deficit.

Currently it uses Threat-2.0 so it matches Omen. I'm not sure how it will behave in 3.0 or WLK.

Nephthys · 09/23/08, 11:54 AM

Originally Posted by Marek

On encounters where a specific target only needs one tank, it is sufficient for the tank and the DPSer to have one bar. For the tank it is sufficient to know the lead to the second person on the threat list, for everyone else it is sufficient to know their threat difference to the tank.

I just found Simple Threat Meter, which is basically the DPS bar you describe.