how not to get lost on atcs - minimal minimap for everyone

[+ OPTIMUS +]

knowing the maps are essential at tremulous games, be it a public game or a scrim. the gameplay is very different when experienced people are playing, knowing locations, knowing what rooms to secure, where to attack from, good builders know what distances can turrrets, repeaters and reactors, eggs and boosters cover, they know funny places to settle down by. etc.

check the official server when some tough figures are around (you), building at crazy places, calling teammates to defend, pull back or rush, gathering squads and organising ambushes.
compare it to 'alone in the white' games (idn who's joke was this), where people have no clue about anything, bases and attacks are totally random, and you can choose to build a sane base while others are feeding or keep up with the rythm (=feeding as well) and leave your base... prone to a basi/blaster rape.

i think helping people to navigate more easily on maps would add to the gameplay quite much. not only for new people, but all of us.

efforts has been made in this matter, like the brand new naming of certain areas of maps and showing teammates positions, nicely covering half of the screen. i personally dont remember any name of any area right now, and i guess i never will (apart from "human base" and "alien base", which is quite paradox after a move). i dont want to lose more reputation than necessary, but i also dont know maps' names, i mix niveus with nexus, arachnid with karith, et cetera, however i've been playing them for more than 5 years, trough thousands of battles.
yesterday someone called for "RC moved to Hall, defend" on a well known map (i mix their names so idn which one was that), and it took me 5 minutes to find it, as there were dozens of areas on that map that i could consider "hall", not to mention that the area name code was totally different.
etcetcetc.

SO i think a very basic MINIMAP of some kind would be fruitful for trem 1.2, and as we talked about it on irc, it's not really complicated to make one.
oldschool things like Doom and stuff (or Diablo for younger folks) had this simple feature, saving us valuable time what would otherwise be spent wandering on the map being totally lost. if any of you ever played Wolfeinstein 3D, you should know what i'm talking about.

the heritage is simple:


theese kind of maps were spread in magazines for games that didnt have this feature, so you went to your friends to play with a torn out page of a pc mag and trying to rotate it to the correct actual position after all the nazis or demons were killed..

this kind of stuff makes life way more easy on new maps, without revealing enemy or buildable positions, what the helmet and alien radar is meant to complete.
i beleive that it would improve teamplay, especially if players could mark certain areas to draw attention.
this kind of thing is also already on its way on 1.2: voice commands... for several years.

i see voice commands too complicated, yet some kind of area marking would be very useful for "defend this" "attack from here", "gather here" or "avoid that" purposes.
for a start, i beleive that if the taunts would be marked, that would be just enough information to start with, what could be completed with teamchat.
that would also help if we dont even show the map, only the direction what others marked.

how would it work in trem...?



like this, maybe. you could achieve this view by pressing tab, and the usual stats could be at the top of this screen.

how complicated it should be?
i think it should be as minimal as possible.
at the start i've been thinking about showing stairs, doors, elevators, teleports and so on... but i think these are just confusing.
this layout was made with a very simple top view export from radiant and thats all. it doesnt have to zoom or flash or dance.
it could have many features ofc, like fog of war, showing directions outside the shown area, and so on, but we could try somthing like this for a start.
note that its not a radar like helmet or alien brain.

if any new map is made, the creator would provide this top view or it would be automatically captured somehow from the map file.

so, this is what i had in mind, feel free to comment, or to make experiments how this feature could be implemented (as someone already is).

[Conzul]

2nd image

gosh. how do you get your lights to glow like that...is it a special build or something? Mine just look like someone took a whiteout marker and drew on the walls.

[Volt]

[Plague Bringer]

Minimaps worked best on DOOM era (I was playing that the other day) games because of the simple architecture and general lack of overlapping areas. With incredible amounts of detail in some maps, "mini"maps would end up looking like cluttered messes. The work required to recreate the maps in the way that Volt demonstrated is far too much to expect from mappers, and is certainly not something that anyone will volunteer to do.

[UniqPhoeniX]

How about just giving mappers the *option* of adding a minimap image? No one is forced to make a minimap for all existing maps...

[Volt]

The work required to recreate the maps in the way that Volt demonstrated is far too much to expect from mappers, and is certainly not something that anyone will volunteer to do.

Actually playing around with map layouts in photoshop, you can get a fully detailed backdrop of a map done in about 45seconds, shit I'd be willing to do it for all the maps out now. But the question is what information should be displayed on mini map?

Currently i'm thinking, not everyone appears on mini map using the squad code from tremx we could have it so only people you mark with squad cvar would show up on mini map. Or should we follow what teamoverlay does and only show the # of people who appear on team overlay?

Additionally when it comes to the actual information on minimap should a brief bit of the text they type be shown, should a aurora be placed where they put a Repeater or started building? and then make aurora less transparent as more things are built? should it show when they're taking damage or under attack?

Give me some ideas guys after i get concepts done I'll start coding it.  

Other stuff like in the blip that shows their location should their weapon icon+upgrade go there? should mini map have a delay like radar does, hehe i'm not too good at this balancing or "thats too much information it's cheating" so you guys let me know.

[Asvarox]

There were plenty of threads about it, but nobody really got to code it (although IIRC there was a patch with minimap, but again IIRC it was poorly written). There is a way to generate such minimaps for all the maps, minimaps of atcs were floating around in "map repository site" thread quite a while ago. Sure it can be messy with multi-level maps, but it's better than nothing. I don't think minimaps images themselves are the main problem.

As for the info avaiable - my small draft:
Humans

• Stage 1
  
  • Buildings within RC range only
• Stage 2
  
  • Buildings within the map
  • For helmets: Teammates, beacons
• Stage 3
  • For battlesuits: Teammates, beacons
  • For helmets and battlesuits with DCC: Ability to see enemies withing range of defensive buildings that are under the range of DCC.

Aliens

• Stage 1
  
  • Buildings within OM range only
  • Beacons
• Stage 2
  
  • Buildings within the map
  • Teammates, beacons
• Stage 3
  
  • Spotted (with aliens radar) enemy buildings get marked on the mini map and slowly fading away until spotted again or killed.

I wanted to add something cool for each team at s3, I hope that some of you guys have better ideas. For those who don't know what beacons are - it's a mark that you can place on the minimap with message like "group here and attack", "defend this place", "enemy's base is here". Now I don't see the need of showing what each player has (equipment, class). I think the only classes that need special marking are builders and lisks.

[Volt]

As for the info avaiable - my small draft:
Humans

• Stage 1
  
  • Buildings within RC range only
• Stage 2
  
  • Buildings within the map
  • For helmets: Teammates, beacons
• Stage 3
  • For battlesuits: Teammates, beacons
  • For helmets and battlesuits with DCC: Ability to see enemies withing range of defensive buildings that are under the range of DCC.

Aliens

• Stage 1
  
  • Buildings within OM range only
  • Beacons
• Stage 2
  
  • Buildings within the map
  • Teammates, beacons
• Stage 3
  
  • Spotted (with aliens radar) enemy buildings get marked on the mini map and slowly fading away until spotted again or killed.

I wanted to add something cool for each team at s3, I hope that some of you guys have better ideas. For those who don't know what beacons are - it's a mark that you can place on the minimap with message like "group here and attack", "defend this place", "enemy's base is here". Now I don't see the need of showing what each player has (equipment, class). I think the only classes that need special marking are builders and lisks.

Yea this is starting to get cool, I'm playing around with code but this was the last concept I made that I'm going to try and implement. The only thing i need to figure out is what to make the scale based on, Nano being the smallest map, and something like pulse or prycon as the base for large maps?

Eitherway I think i got the general idea that Optimus wanted made, so now after about 3-4 concepts I get to get right down into actually coding this.

Also if any of you mappers could send me overhead shots of the maps like superpie did for Nano+Pulse+Prycon It would help me a lot in figuring out boundary boxes and scales thanks!  I'm also thinking of mixing together teamscores menu with minimap I think that's the best place for it anyways will update with more screenshots later when i start getting stuff ingame.


#EDITED to continue, had more questions#

So after talking to a few people on IRC there seems to be a small problem. That being that with minimap there needs to be a way to tell what level of the map the player is on, height wise example on tremor they could be in the basement and you wouldn't know if they were above ground or under.

So a few quick solutions and i'm eager to hear what anyone else has to say.

1.Solution #1 do what the radar does and give a tail to the blips to show height
2.Soultion #2 under the playername on minimap put the map location that they're at
3.Color code each layer of the map, basement red, regular level white, anything higher different shades of hud color?

or do all three together, interested in hearing different ideas so let the ideas flow!

[+ OPTIMUS +]

very nicely done job :-)

i still think that the minimap should only show a very basic map and no buildings/persons at all, only 'pinged' (taunt/voice command) areas.

what i was originally thinking about was a "subjective" map. the one Volt made is an "objective" one. the difference is that if the map is rotating around a fixed point, or the player icon is turning(if any) on the fixed map.
i dont really know which one is the better, i think i could use a subjective map more, not necessarily seeing the full map at a time.

[Demolution]

1.Solution #1 do what the radar does and give a tail to the blips to show height
2.Soultion #2 under the playername on minimap put the map location that they're at
3.Color code each layer of the map, basement red, regular level white, anything higher different shades of hud color?

1. As you are looking from the top down, how would this make sense?
2. This might help people learn map locations and pick up on the whole layout quicker when playing for the first time.
3. Kills the simplicity of the map. (opinion) After all, ease of use is what we're going for, no?

[Lecavalier]

1. As you are looking from the top down, how would this make sense?

The same as helmet radar works now, except with a wee map there. I assume

[CorSair]

With the ideas Volt and others have brought on here, made me think bit...

I think this feature should be both as a pop-up and a sort of RTS mode. In RTS mode, you can check map entirely, by zooming, moving and rotating and even more what you can think.

What this would achieve?
If someone would be appointed to be some sort leader, or would be veteran player, he could coordinate attacks and building new outposts or relocate base.

Or does someone have better ideas?

[Demolution]

1. As you are looking from the top down, how would this make sense?

The same as helmet radar works now, except with a wee map there. I assume

But isn't this assuming that you can view the map from the side? Otherwise you're just looking at it from above and showing what height a player is, relative to you, seems to be the difficult part.

[+ OPTIMUS +]

@CorsAir: this could happen at the beginning of each scrim. if the entire team can see te map, there could be a short discussion of the strategy at the beginning of each game, e.g. rapid base moves or outposts. in this case people could mark places on the entire map as being still spectators.

too much freedom on this issue could lead to abuse, so lets keep it minimal. if only like... 3 kind of taunts would be possible (OFF, DEF, CONST) and only at the player's actual location, thats - i think - more than enough.

i dont think minimap should handle height levels at all. i know what Plague Bringer said at the beginning, that old school games didnt have overlapping areas, but this way maps could also keep some of their secrets, what is fun. also, you can still see suspicious lines on the map to explore.

[swamp-cecil]

I was thinking to bring up minimap, you press Tab twice, and it pops up. pressing tab again releases the minimap.
What I was thinking is that when a player achieves a certain height (height determined by mapper in the worldspawn), a new minimap pops up  showing the higher/lower areas.
Human minimaps should be blue, and alien minimaps, red.
All structures should be marked on map by a  ,  ,  etc. players should also be shown as the white icon that appears on the scoreboard or item classes (found in data1-1-0/icons0*) and their name below their icon. Players under attack should be shown as red, players attacking should be shown orange, and players who died should turn black and their icons fades out. Any strcture that takes damage will glow red and flash red lines around it. Destroyed structures, will turn black and fade and attacking sturctures will just turn orange. Each player acts also as a beacon. Any unidentified enemy structures/players will glow green. Buildings in construction, no matter which team, will glow purple. Everything on a different height level will be the same colour, but it will be a lot more transparent. (Possibly) players who talk will have their name removed with whatever they just said for a while. When humans drop grenades, they can all see it with a timer below it and it will emit red circles to show its blast radius. However aliens will put their crosshair on it for a bit to make it reveal, making it more useful than spamming "grenade spotted!", for players have no clue where it is.

Now an interesting concept: what if when the player is on spectator and they double click tab? Heres my idea:
the player gets a top down view of the map, however is complete wireframe, and they see all buildables/players with the normal model they would in game. The spectator could shift around the map, zoom in/out and (somehow, this is coders job) the hall of mirrors will be replaced with a steady black.
We need tremhelper now to think of ideas for killstreaks that dirupt the minimap.
(If you don't know what any of my sentences mean, I am willing to further explain.)

[Vape]

Who gets lost on ATCS?

[Plague Bringer]

My suggestions for the minimap in no particular order:

- NO BUILDINGS should be visible.
- Enemies should never be visible.
- Teammates should always be visible.
- Height can be displayed by an up or down facing carrot next to the player blip if that player is X units above yours.
- Dead teammates should disappear immediately.
- Low health teammates should flash red. Health should be measured in %.
- $ symbol can be displayed next to player blip if their loadout is worth Y+ money.
- Alternative to that^, the player blip could display either the alien class or human weapon (ONLY).
- Your ATCS concept is upside down.

That is all.

[Aelita]

Who gets lost on ATCS?

I think this every time I see this thread.

Really, this sort of thing is overkill if maps have proper location entities. A few games walking around on a map and memorizing the locations has a far more attractive learning curve than figuring out how to operate a minimap, especially on complicated maps.

[Asvarox]

Really? I don't quite like being lost and have no idea where to go (that's half not that bad when you are an alien - as human you are most likely screwed). I'd rather know the basic map shape, so at least I know here I am. The minimap won't remove everything involved in "learning" a map, it won't tell you where the good spots for bases are, wont show you the way most players go by and many, many others. It will just tell you where you are. If you think that will kill the joy of a new map, fine, don't use the minimap. I know that it would spare me a lot of frustration.

Now since we're at it, how is going the coding, Volt? Have you figured out the scaling problem?

Maybe some newbies get lost on ATCS, you don't know. But if you take Methane as an example - I've played plenty of games on that map, yet I'm still not quite confident when I move around. Minimap would be a god bless there.

[Volt]

Basic functionality is a go, Dev/HumanController gave me some really good ways tackle this. Now i'm working on doing the things Dev/Hc suggested i should do, I'll post screenies after i get some error codes fixed. Scaling isn't as big as a issue as i thought it would be, was pretty simple to solve. 

[ULTRA Random ViruS]

I don't think this is really such a good idea, as tower-like maps can be looking like scribbles. I've looked at Metro-b1-2 (.map file is in its pk3, but the entities have french names), that it my opinion is one giant scribble. Also, what about really massive maps like... umm... hmm... Mission_one_b7 covers a big horizontal area and you'll probably see long hallways and towers and whatever.

Maybe this map should really only detect the brushes along the player's viewheight with like 0 thickness thick, (editable cvar for the server), and should only detect stuff within a 1000/2000 unit range. (1000 unit diameter is about the size of the standard base area in atcs)

[Celestial_Rage]

Perhaps wait and see what Volt does with this before passing judgment? Volt has proven to be good at making visuals and I'm sure he has already thought of this. I for one would be glad to see this as it would help me learn new maps quicker.

[Volt]

Perhaps wait and see what Volt does with this before passing judgment?They always pass judgement on unfished stuff it's just how people are in tremulous Volt has proven to be good at making visuals and I'm sure he has already thought of this.I have and dev/hc has given me some great ideas to tackle this. Also thanks <3 I for one would be glad to see this as it would help me learn new maps quicker.

[vcxzet]

all of the maps are really small compared to real life places.
please stop playing if you need a map to find your way

[Nux]

all of the maps are really small compared to real life places.
please stop playing if you need a map to find your way

I don't think anyone requires this. It's simply helpful and fun to make. Problem?

[vcxzet]

so basically you don't need it.
it is not helpful since you will memorize the map after your third play
unless you have Alzheimer's disease...

how is that fun if no one uses it?
replace it with an automatically updating random meme image, it is more fun.

[ULTRA Random ViruS]

(1)All structures should be marked on map by a  ,  ,  etc. players should also be shown as the white icon that appears on the scoreboard or item classes (found in data1-1-0/icons0*) and their name below their icon. Players under attack should be shown as red, players attacking should be shown orange, and players who died should turn black and their icons fades out. Any strcture that takes damage will glow red and flash red lines around it. Destroyed structures, will turn black and fade and attacking sturctures will just turn orange. Each player acts also as a beacon. Any unidentified enemy structures/players will glow green. Buildings in construction, no matter which team, will glow purple. Everything on a different height level will be the same colour, but it will be a lot more transparent. (Possibly) players who talk will have their name removed with whatever they just said for a while. (2)When humans drop grenades, they can all see it with a timer below it and it will emit red circles to show its blast radius. (3)However aliens will put their crosshair on it for a bit to make it reveal, making it more useful than spamming "grenade spotted!", for players have no clue where it is.

(1)I don't remember any buildable icons there. all i remember is: No Power (buildables) alien (never gets seen), human (not sure about this), weapons (includes upgrades, armour etc.) and alien classes (and their upgrades such as barbs).

(2) That's copying tom somthing's shooting game series. Something explodes, white circles come out of it.

(3) That would just be plain annoying as well.