Story frames -- Latest update made them worse?

[Vlademar]

Not sure if this is a me thing, but after the latest update, between my last session (this last weekend, 8/10/24) and this upcoming weekend (8/17/24), the story frames in all of my previous stories and new ones are just god awful compared to what they were before.

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Is this.. intentional? I don't have any other themes, aside from the legacy -- leather one selected, because it's the only thing that doesn't look like garbage. If this is intentional -- dear god why? It's worse in every way.

[Jiminimonka]

Explain what is worse about them - because from those screenshots I don't see it. They are slightly different.

[Jiminimonka]

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Your picture shows a frame that is not in this frame list.

[Vlademar]

You might need to get your eyes checked, my friend, if you're classifying the above examples as "slightly different."

It gives an entirely different feeling to the entire story page. One has actual life, artistic flair, it's bold and stands out from the page. The new version is dull, blocky and simplistic. It's light grey, like all of the UI changes (which is just awful, FYI. Whoever thought of that, go back to design school. Light grey on light red/yellow backgrounds? Good job). If this is intentional, why did they REMOVE the previous frames, and not just ADD more, to give people who want a more simplistic frame in their story pages the CHOICE to have it?

Yes, everything is subjective. Hence why you should always give more choices, not remove them. To me, this is an awful change, and made transcribing my D&D prep for tomorrow's session a lot less of an enjoyable experience.

[Vlademar]

61603
Your picture shows a frame that is not in this frame list.

Because they removed the frames from the game... and added these new awful ones. Unless I had access to something that I did not have enabled previously, because I haven't enabled any new modules for many, many months in this campaign.

[Jiminimonka]

EDIT: Posts crossed in the night

[Jiminimonka]

They removed one frame? Replaced it with the dark background one it looks like.

[Zacchaeus]

It does look like one of the frames (I'm assuming that you mean the ones above and below the header frame in your images) has changed; although I'm not certain since I don't use the ones in your image. I'm not sure if it's intentional or not. I've moved this thread to the House of Healing so that the devs have a better chance of seeing it and responding.

[Vlademar]

No... I don't think you're really looking at the screenshots at all. The Header, SESSION START, has been changed to have the edges no longer flare outside of the box, but rather be contained within it. All of the filigree within the box has been removed.

And, man, if you don't think that the changes to the normal text frames is objectively worse, I don't think we need to continue this discussion.

EDIT: @ Zacchaeus, Thanks. I don't think people used these ostentatious frames very often, at least that is the feeling I'm getting based off of the two responses I've gotten thus far. But wow, to people who care about such things, this is just objectively worse in every way.

The UI changes in the combat tracker are awful too. The gears within character sheets are now very, very light grey/yellow, instead of the old darker grey magnifying glasses. I don't know why these changes were made, but it's just going to create eye strain for people trying to use this software. It needs to be rolled back ASAP, IMO.

[Zacchaeus]

OK, so someone on Discord posted an image of the frames from before the last update and it does look like a few of them have changed. So we'll need to wait for the devs to throw in a comment. I agree that the new definitions are not as good as they were from the looks of it.

[BadEye]

No... I don't think you're really looking at the screenshots at all. The Header, SESSION START, has been changed to have the edges no longer flare outside of the box, but rather be contained within it. All of the filigree within the box has been removed.

And, man, if you don't think that the changes to the normal text frames is objectively worse, I don't think we need to continue this discussion.

Thanks for sharing feedback with your opinions - we haven't seen anything else similar, but we'll monitor overall feedback and make adjustments if we need to.

The reactions to the updates have been strongly positive, so we'll be sticking with the general direction. To provide some additional context, some of the UI elements for the Core RPG "base" theme have been simplified where they would be more evergreen in a wider variety of games and genres where they are used. So in the case of the specific frame you are referencing, the removal of a few of those lines was in service to that approach. Several ruleset themes provide additional frame options that might give you what you want, and we can certainly look into adding more to the Core RPG theme in the future if we see demand for it.

Also as a note, the insults and declarations of cutting off the discussion aren't very conducive to the spirit of said discussion.

[Vlademar]

Thanks for sharing feedback with your opinions - we haven't seen anything else similar, but we'll monitor overall feedback and make adjustments if we need to.

The reactions to the updates have been strongly positive, so we'll be sticking with the general direction. To provide some additional context, some of the UI elements for the Core RPG "base" theme have been simplified where they would be more evergreen in a wider variety of games and genres where they are used. So in the case of the specific frame you are referencing, the removal of a few of those lines was in service to that approach. Several ruleset themes provide additional frame options that might give you what you want, and we can certainly look into adding more to the Core RPG theme in the future if we see demand for it.

Also as a note, the insults and declarations of cutting off the discussion aren't very conducive to the spirit of said discussion.

Sorry for coming off strong, but I don't know how anyone could look at the posted screenshots and say that the new is superior to the old. I won't go into all of the UI changes, as I've already stated my opinions in earlier commentary on them.

However, as I've also stated previously, why were things *removed*. Why were things not just added. Give people *choices* as to what they *want*. Not make assumptions, or force what you *think* will be more serviceable to people.

Hunt Showdown just did a massive UI overhaul to their entire game for their new 1896 update, and, well, I don't think I need to go into detail as to the backlash they've received over their changes. UI is incredibly important for your game, and removing things will almost never go over well.

[BadEye]

Technically, no frames were removed - they were updated / modified. There is a default set of frame types in the Core RPG theming, and that defined set saw some updates. But I can certainly see how the end result feels like the old frame style was removed from your point of view.

Adding additional frame "slots" would be a broader development effort that touches several other places, and something we weren't going to tackle at this time, so keeping the old frame style and adding another wasn't a possibility. As I shared, the existing frames were changed to make the styles fit a bit more broadly into the overall ecosystem of games we support at the baseline level.

And I appreciate your recent example of a UI overhaul creating backlash, but I'll reiterate that across all our various feedback channels, reactions to this initial visual update for Fantasy Grounds has been on the opposite end of that spectrum. We'll never account for every individual preference, but we've very pleased with the response and have confidence that we're headed in the right direction. We'll always keep an eye on feedback and adjust course as we need to going forward as well.

Having said all of that, one of the wonderful things with Fantasy Grounds is that it is very simple to customize the look and feel through themes if your preference doesn't align with the default theming. We'll also provide updates if we ever increase the number of available frames (and I'll keep the extra-flourishy old style you've mentioned in mind if we do it).


Thanks!

[Thelgor]

Thanks for sharing feedback with your opinions - we haven't seen anything else similar, but we'll monitor overall feedback and make adjustments if we need to.

Wanted to register my feedback that I too am disappointed that the frame edges and filigree have been removed. As someone who creates and runs in a few rulesets outside of 5e (2e, WoD, CoC, Traveller, M&M, MCC, Fate, and Starfinder) I found them to help build a story and mood within my campaigns and modules. I haven't had a chance to review my old creations as I've been working on a conversion that is bigger than I expected, but I'm not looking forward to reviewing them to see how they changed. I make an effort, well received or not, to use those frames in my work in thematic ways. I hope that this decision to remove them can be reversed.

*** Edit: I see there was further conversation conducted while I was writing up my post. I see there are other variables at play here but will leave my original post unedited to reflect my desire to see those frames reverted ***

[BadEye]

I had a few minutes before I start my weekend, so I threw together a simple extension that will change all the reference block frames back to what they were before the most recent update to back up what I meant with the easy customization. Those frames won't look great with the new dark theme (that was part of why they were updated in the first place), but they should work great for anything you've been using.

Simply unzip the folder into your /extensions folder. If we see some others want these, we might place it on the Forge at some point, but it really shouldn't matter since this is a snapshot that won't really have updates.



Have a good weekend, thanks!

[Thelgor]

Thank you, BadEye. I truly appreciate it. I'll take a look at the files and see if it's time to put my artistic hat back on for a bit and see if I can create something I like that meshes well with the new theme (which I do like). Hope your weekend goes well.

[damned]

I very much prefer the inclusion/retention of the two fancy frames that were removed. I do like the new one also but will miss the others.
The one that should be replaced is refblock_text1 - this was one of the original ones Ian and I made when testing the whole reference manual thing and it should never have survived this long - I dont think Ive ever seen it used!

[Vlademar]

I had a few minutes before I start my weekend, so I threw together a simple extension that will change all the reference block frames back to what they were before the most recent update to back up what I meant with the easy customization. Those frames won't look great with the new dark theme (that was part of why they were updated in the first place), but they should work great for anything you've been using.

Simply unzip the folder into your /extensions folder. If we see some others want these, we might place it on the Forge at some point, but it really shouldn't matter since this is a snapshot that won't really have updates.

Have a good weekend, thanks!

Outstanding. Thanks for your effort, hope you have a lovely weekend. If I had the knowledge to do it myself, I'd have done it and not bothered making a post. Something I'll have to learn in the future.

EDIT: Almost fixed, anyways. Since the frames were limited to a box, the edges of the "SESSION START", that I linked in my original post, are now scrunched within said box. See the following:

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Not sure if that's a limitation of the new frames or what have you, as the outside area of said frame has been made smaller.

[BadEye]

Yeah, that could be a conflict with another extension - I see it fine on my end:

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Which theme / ruleset are you using? Does it look right with the Core theme(s)?

[Vlademar]

Yeah, that could be a conflict with another extension - I see it fine on my end:

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Which theme / ruleset are you using? Does it look right with the Core theme(s)?

Very curious. The Legacy - Leather theme, by Smiteworks.

EDIT: It works appropriately for normal "Text Block" entries, but not "Header Block" entries.

[BadEye]

Ah yeah, I see that. It looks like that would have been off at some point a while, while back too.

New version attached. Remove the last folder and replace with this one and it should be good to go.

Have a good weekend!