mattcolville
February 28th, 2011, 01:55
As some of you know, I've been muddling through the process of learning FG2 for the past several months. I now have about 12 players using FG2 in groups and solo and ramping up to more every week.
I still have a lot to learn, but I wanted to put down my notes on what I and my players would like to see.
Every player so far is impressed with how FG2 handles D&D4. Everyone agrees the experience of playing online, via FG2, is in many ways equal, and in some ways superior to playing in-person.
But the process of *getting* to the point where people can "just play" is extremely painful and that's what I want to address.
I'm going to stick with just the highest-level issues because this isn't a bug problem.
1. Conform to Windows interface standards.
When I say this, people imagine I'm saying "it should look like a Windows program." Nono, that's ridiculous. Starcraft doesn't look like a Windows program. But it conforms to Windows interface standards.
When you have a context-menu up, pressing escape should close it. When you click in a text field, the cursor should arrive there and start blinking. I mean *every time* you do it, not just sometimes, here and there. The scroll wheel should always scroll. Page up and page down should always work. There should be some indication which window you have "in focus," and when in focus all the normal navigation keys should work. All windows should be resizable and there should be some way to minimize a window without having to right-click on it. If you have a search-box, control-F should bring it up.
I'm sure there was some reason for making FG2 work differently from every other Windows program, but I feel that whatever that reason was, it's not as important as "New users automatically know how to navigate your software."
2. Better UI
The #1 complaint I hear from my players...and it is a very, very loud complaint, the #1 thing they *refuse* to accept any explanation for, is "why is the interface so awful?"
They don't mean how it *looks*, they mean how it behaves. Simple, simple, simple stuff like...one player tries to log into the Server. He enters the IP address and pressed "start." Nothing happens. He doesn't know why. He gets no error. He gets no response. Just...nothing.
He realizes he has to enter a username. Ok. That he had to enter a username is not the problem. That he got *zero* feedback is the problem. FG2 almost never understands what it is the user is trying to do, almost never gives any feedback of any sort. It's up to the user to sit there and stare at the screen and try to figure out what he did wrong. This is the kind of thing that drives people mad.
I makes it difficult for those of us promoting the software, saying "it's cool, it's fun, it works, trust me," when the users are having such a bad time just getting the basic stuff to work. Getting into the game, making a character. It's painful. It's not something they want to *learn*, it's something they expect to just work.
3. Simpler Parsing of Compendium data.
This is a 4E specific problem, this is not *directly* related to FG2, but the parser is a critical element of using this software whether we like it or not.
One big issue we had is synching everyone to the same set of data. One of the common complaints I get is people not knowing where FG2 stores its data. For my Mac user friends, who are in many cases booting into Windows for the first time, it's a nightmare. Depending on their version of Windows, sometimes the AppData folder is a *hidden* folder. They just want to play D&D.
Now, the nice thing about the Parser is...it knows where the AppData folder is! It puts the data where it belongs automatically! Problem solved.
But the larger problem, and I feel an important one, is the fact that the players have no idea where their abilities, their powers and feats, come from. Nor, I feel, should they be expected to know. WotC's character builder flattens all that data. Going and finding where each power or feat comes from, and expecting the *players* to manage modules, which ones they have on their PC and whether or not they're the same ones the GM has, is too much. Players want to play D&D. They don't want to check and make sure their modules are properly parsed and synched.
Yeah, there's the catalog function, but that's adding another step in the process. And the catalog doesn't, like...tell you what it's cataloging. It's not easy to figure out "what modules does this catalog index?"
So what I suggest is the Parser, or some other tool like it, that has a "simple parse" button. Simple, meaning "one button." One button so I could just link my players to the Parser, they run it once, they have all the modules they need in the right place, up to date.
Maybe a Simple Player parse and a Simple GM parse. The Player Parse would scrape the compendium and output four files;
Powers
Feats
Items
Everything Else
The GM Simple Parse would just add "NPCs and Traps" to this. Sure, the files would be big, but that's what the regular parser is for if people have a problem and want to dig down and manage it themselves. But these are just *text*. Right now all my player data is only 23mb! Parse it all to *one* file for players and a larger one for GMs! RAM is cheap!
Usability is about lowering friction. Letting players quickly and easily get into the software and use it. I'm not saying the parser needs *fewer* options and that people who are happy with it are somehow wrong, I'm saying an one-button option for Normal People would make a lot of people happy.
4. Character Builder importing.
Making a dude is not trivial, even using the Character Builder. Especially if your character is not 1st level.
Having to then do it again is too much work. A simple program that accepted the output from the Online Builder and brought their mans into FG2 would be huge. Tremendous amount of friction, reduced.
Of course, this tool wouldn't know what modules you have! Impossible for it to automatically link everything. Unless it presumed you were using the Parser and the Simple Parse option, in which case everything would always live in preset, known, places.
My players were under the impression that I had to build their magic items for them and this is nonsense. I didn't have to log into their DDI account and give their characters in the *Builder* the items, why do I have to do it in FG2?
That's it. I have no real understanding of how this software is developed. I cherish my ignorance on the subject. It's not free, it's not open source, it's commercial Windows software I paid for and with that comes certain expectations. I'm not posting this as a fan, I'm posting as a customer.
I like what FG2 can do. I *hate* how long it took to work it out and how weird a piece of software it is.
I still have a lot to learn, but I wanted to put down my notes on what I and my players would like to see.
Every player so far is impressed with how FG2 handles D&D4. Everyone agrees the experience of playing online, via FG2, is in many ways equal, and in some ways superior to playing in-person.
But the process of *getting* to the point where people can "just play" is extremely painful and that's what I want to address.
I'm going to stick with just the highest-level issues because this isn't a bug problem.
1. Conform to Windows interface standards.
When I say this, people imagine I'm saying "it should look like a Windows program." Nono, that's ridiculous. Starcraft doesn't look like a Windows program. But it conforms to Windows interface standards.
When you have a context-menu up, pressing escape should close it. When you click in a text field, the cursor should arrive there and start blinking. I mean *every time* you do it, not just sometimes, here and there. The scroll wheel should always scroll. Page up and page down should always work. There should be some indication which window you have "in focus," and when in focus all the normal navigation keys should work. All windows should be resizable and there should be some way to minimize a window without having to right-click on it. If you have a search-box, control-F should bring it up.
I'm sure there was some reason for making FG2 work differently from every other Windows program, but I feel that whatever that reason was, it's not as important as "New users automatically know how to navigate your software."
2. Better UI
The #1 complaint I hear from my players...and it is a very, very loud complaint, the #1 thing they *refuse* to accept any explanation for, is "why is the interface so awful?"
They don't mean how it *looks*, they mean how it behaves. Simple, simple, simple stuff like...one player tries to log into the Server. He enters the IP address and pressed "start." Nothing happens. He doesn't know why. He gets no error. He gets no response. Just...nothing.
He realizes he has to enter a username. Ok. That he had to enter a username is not the problem. That he got *zero* feedback is the problem. FG2 almost never understands what it is the user is trying to do, almost never gives any feedback of any sort. It's up to the user to sit there and stare at the screen and try to figure out what he did wrong. This is the kind of thing that drives people mad.
I makes it difficult for those of us promoting the software, saying "it's cool, it's fun, it works, trust me," when the users are having such a bad time just getting the basic stuff to work. Getting into the game, making a character. It's painful. It's not something they want to *learn*, it's something they expect to just work.
3. Simpler Parsing of Compendium data.
This is a 4E specific problem, this is not *directly* related to FG2, but the parser is a critical element of using this software whether we like it or not.
One big issue we had is synching everyone to the same set of data. One of the common complaints I get is people not knowing where FG2 stores its data. For my Mac user friends, who are in many cases booting into Windows for the first time, it's a nightmare. Depending on their version of Windows, sometimes the AppData folder is a *hidden* folder. They just want to play D&D.
Now, the nice thing about the Parser is...it knows where the AppData folder is! It puts the data where it belongs automatically! Problem solved.
But the larger problem, and I feel an important one, is the fact that the players have no idea where their abilities, their powers and feats, come from. Nor, I feel, should they be expected to know. WotC's character builder flattens all that data. Going and finding where each power or feat comes from, and expecting the *players* to manage modules, which ones they have on their PC and whether or not they're the same ones the GM has, is too much. Players want to play D&D. They don't want to check and make sure their modules are properly parsed and synched.
Yeah, there's the catalog function, but that's adding another step in the process. And the catalog doesn't, like...tell you what it's cataloging. It's not easy to figure out "what modules does this catalog index?"
So what I suggest is the Parser, or some other tool like it, that has a "simple parse" button. Simple, meaning "one button." One button so I could just link my players to the Parser, they run it once, they have all the modules they need in the right place, up to date.
Maybe a Simple Player parse and a Simple GM parse. The Player Parse would scrape the compendium and output four files;
Powers
Feats
Items
Everything Else
The GM Simple Parse would just add "NPCs and Traps" to this. Sure, the files would be big, but that's what the regular parser is for if people have a problem and want to dig down and manage it themselves. But these are just *text*. Right now all my player data is only 23mb! Parse it all to *one* file for players and a larger one for GMs! RAM is cheap!
Usability is about lowering friction. Letting players quickly and easily get into the software and use it. I'm not saying the parser needs *fewer* options and that people who are happy with it are somehow wrong, I'm saying an one-button option for Normal People would make a lot of people happy.
4. Character Builder importing.
Making a dude is not trivial, even using the Character Builder. Especially if your character is not 1st level.
Having to then do it again is too much work. A simple program that accepted the output from the Online Builder and brought their mans into FG2 would be huge. Tremendous amount of friction, reduced.
Of course, this tool wouldn't know what modules you have! Impossible for it to automatically link everything. Unless it presumed you were using the Parser and the Simple Parse option, in which case everything would always live in preset, known, places.
My players were under the impression that I had to build their magic items for them and this is nonsense. I didn't have to log into their DDI account and give their characters in the *Builder* the items, why do I have to do it in FG2?
That's it. I have no real understanding of how this software is developed. I cherish my ignorance on the subject. It's not free, it's not open source, it's commercial Windows software I paid for and with that comes certain expectations. I'm not posting this as a fan, I'm posting as a customer.
I like what FG2 can do. I *hate* how long it took to work it out and how weird a piece of software it is.