Diablo III

Posted by Bashiok on US forums, http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/3657284291#1

I'm ok with most of it, having short and succinct explanations is a good thing. What is completely and utterly dumb though is this part:

<<<<< Some of you have been discussing tooltip complexity and more than a few times the World of Warcraft solution of having two different sets of tooltips (simplified and normal) has of course not escaped us. It’s a solution we’d like to explore, but if we did it’s extremely likely that our “normal” tooltips would be the toned-down versions we’re working toward now, and the “simplified” would be even more basic, giving game intent advice in place of any numbers. >>>>>

You "could" have an even more simplified version - though imo you underestimate the intelligence of your gamers by a wide margin when thinking that you need that. Still, you could - but something that would surely add a lot more value to the ingame experience for most of us would be to have more detailed tooltips on an in-game easily accessible but separate tome of pages.

Pls uprate if you agree, and/or request sticky... Not needed at release, but gd, at least don't waste time going in the opposite direction...

08/12/2011 19:16Posted by Tamanrasset

You "could" have an even more simplified version - though imo you underestimate the intelligence of your gamers by a wide margin when thinking that you need that.

You really shouldn't underestimate the amount of super-casual gamers. People like you and me never really come into contact with them because they don't tend to play online but they are still likely a majority of the sales of a given game. They're obviously not stupid but they just don't have the mindset or the experience of a hardcore gamer. Super simplified tooltips with some extra help-information (ie tips on what the skill is good for) might be a great idea for these people.

For people like us it won't really matter if the information is ingame or on this site because we tend to visit this site regularly anyway and interact with the community. Personally I think the extra time and effort it would take them to put the information in an ingame library as opposed to this site wouldn't be worth it. I'd rather they spend that time on more important matters.

08/12/2011 19:16Posted by Tamanrasset

but something that would surely add a lot more value to the ingame experience for most of us would be to have more detailed tooltips on an in-game easily accessible but separate tome of pages.

This so much. Just so very very much.

When they where talking about reason for the RMAH, one of them was that quiting the game/alt tabbing was a bad player experience. Going to 3rd party sites was a bad experience.

Now i am wel aware that they plan on putting everything up on the main site. But lets be honest, that is not enough. All the info should be available ingame. In some sort of "tome/book/manual". It should contain everything and explain everything. From how skills work to how damage mods stacks to how weapon damage is calculated to what every stat does etc. It could also be used to have easy acces to patch notes and a bug report feature.

Now what we will probably get is some ingame link to the website that closes/minimizes your game just like some of the links found on starcraft II. And those are bad. I would defenitly not want those. minimizing/closing the game takes time while opening an itergrated ingame "manual" is way faster. Links would also mean you cant get to them when playing the game, resulting in you having to quit your current session so you can click to link wait for the minimization and then re-open the game and start a new session. Thats a bad experience....

Honestly, when i saw bashiok post that link i was cheering a little as i thought he would anounce this feature. Instead i got to read something that conflicts with there own design philosopies that they aplied to the most debated feature of DIII, the RMAH. I am disapointed :(

skill tooltips. SKILL toolltips. No that big of a deal! Don't go insane for the damn skill tooltips!!

Kaju pretty much sums it up nicely.

skill tooltips. SKILL toolltips. No that big of a deal! Don't go insane for the damn skill tooltips!!

Kaju pretty much sums it up nicely.

If instead of trolling you would actually read the OP and my post you would see we are talking about an additional feature that gives all information one could need, while having these simple skill tooltips.

It might not interest you, thats fine. Just dont go around trolling, TY.

The in-game reference guide/book idea for skill and game information has a number of UI issues, but as a player of the game it's not a great solution because:

1. You're not always in-game. More often than not when you're dissecting a skill at a massive level of detail you're on a website/forum discussing things, or you've got an excel spreadsheet open. Or you're getting in some extra Diablo time while at a friend's place. Or you're at work on your lunch break.

2. A web page lets us present far more organized detail than an in-game book would allow (without ceasing to look like a web browser embedded in a book which would just look silly). You want tick rates, scaling formulas, proc interactoins, etc.

3. A web site allows us to provide the most timely information. If questions come up on the forums, we make a hotfix, we find errors, or come across more information we'd like to pass along, we can get that information out to players immediately. If it was in-game it would require a patch.

1. There is no reason you cannot have both. Besides if an in-game version exists it would automaticly be copy pasted to fan sites. (wich it will annyway). I see no reason why this is an issue.

2. I see no problem with it looking like a web browser. The idea is that you can easely acces all the information you need so you dont HAVE to go to the forums to theory craft but can simply look it up ingame when you encounter the stat/ability thats new to you.

3. The auction house can be updated by seeing what items are in there, it pull its data from a database no? So apply the same idea to the book. Pull everything from the ability databases. I am sure its not an "easy to do" thing. Wich probably is the real reason Blizzard doesnt seem to like the idea. It would require time to make it wich they would rather spend on something else. Honestly i am OK with that, BUT then i do want an option for very detailed tooltips. I dont want to have to exit the game to know how something works. I can understand that for the casual audiance that isnt needed. But for anny serious gamer they need that infromation. And its seriously lame to tell them "yeah go to the website". If i cannot understand how to play by playing to game then IMO thats not good design. Forcing me to go to a website is bad design. IMO.

I also feel silly for trying to be part of a discussion without actually being part of it as i am talking in a different discussions thats trying to be part of the discussion :S

I would also realy like it if i was actually able to atleast cross quote things without having to mannually copy paste things that screw up the layout >.>

I want numbers for my skills, that's where I pull my own builds without having to check guide, far easier to see, far easier to understand, and for others like me, ppl who use the power of math to check their breakpoints and balance, we all want those numbers in the tooltips.

It could be tagged as "Normal" (Default) and "Advanced" which we could tick for extra data. Of course casual gamers won't be checking numbers because they only want to run the game through and then leave, but I seek a further and deeper experience.

I don't know what they mean by "simplifying" because they are already as simple as you can get, but if they remove all numbers and just say what skill does then this will be the biggest BS i've ever seen.

The only reason Im able to find for you to be reducing the information witheld in the tooltips, it seems to me it would be for it to work in consoles since these work on a lower resolution than PCs.
And to solve the problem you tell us its better for us.
Honestly I expected something else from Blizzard, but, as nowadays everyone believes, Blizzard isnt what it used to be.
First it was the rare item color, then the graphics, now the tooltips.
You're drawing the game so more and more people play, and you dont care for your fans anymore.

13/12/2011 16:00Posted by ALPINA

I don't know what they mean by "simplifying" because they are already as simple as you can get, but if they remove all numbers and just say what skill does then this will be the biggest BS i've ever seen.

Indeed, couldn't have said it better meself.

13/12/2011 15:36Posted by Abaddon

I want numbers for my skills, that's where I pull my own builds without having to check guide, far easier to see, far easier to understand, and for others like me, ppl who use the power of math to check their breakpoints and balance, we all want those numbers in the tooltips.

Exactly.

What Bash says in his arguments is just plain stupid (thanks Skyq for quoting them for us). Going from extremely simplified tooltips (and then, mby, as an add-on, even more extremely simplified ones...) straight to "dissecting skills at a massive level of detail" is a huge jump - where's the middle road?

With nrs but not with every detail there is to know. Those can, imo, be left for the web, but let us stay ingame and look at skills and be able to contemplate and work out what we want from "enough" info - not too much with every detail, but not too little with extremely simplified tooltips either.

We don't - or at least I don't - need to be able to try to work out the "perfect" build - as has been stated so many times, this isn't a game for optimal builds, but for viable. But give us enough info, with percentages etc, that we can work out fun, viable builds on our own, ingame.

Not everyone is either analphabetic or a hardcore "optimal builder" that wants to build spreadsheets or spend a lot of time on gamesites out of game. I would actually think that a very large nr of buyers are inbetween those two extremes, wanting to enjoy a full experience ingame but not actually spending the rest of their time awake, out of game, browsing the web for info down to the smallest detail.

My dreamtome? Couple of lines of lore connected to the skill at top, anecdotal or likewise, followed by something reminiscent to todays tooltips as shown in the skill descriptions, although somewhat more detailed - as in for example how far does the knockback throw your enemies. And of c with correct info (today Rend for example reads 70% wpn dmg every sec for 3 secs - that's a detailed enough description if correct, but I know I've seen a post saying that DoTs tick faster with faster wpns - and of c if that's true then the info is completely misleading, as today it's saying that a 2-h wpn would give way superior dmg output for that skill).

13/12/2011 22:35Posted by Tamanrasset

My dreamtome? Couple of lines of lore connected to the skill at top, anecdotal or likewise, followed by something reminiscent to todays tooltips as shown in the skill descriptions, although somewhat more detailed - as in for example how far does the knockback throw your enemies. And of c with correct info (today Rend for example reads 70% wpn dmg every sec for 3 secs - that's a detailed enough description if correct, but I know I've seen a post saying that DoTs tick faster with faster wpns - and of c if that's true then the info is completely misleading, as today it's saying that a 2-h wpn would give way superior dmg output for that skill).

Yeah this.

My rend tooltip should state atleast the following: Does x% weapon damage over y time in a z radius. Tick time increased by haste.

That way i know exactle what it does and its still only 1 line of texts.

Bash for example would state this: Does x% weapon damage with a 20% chance for a y yard knockback.

Also 1 line that gives everything needed.

Now i know certain skills that wouldnt be so easy, for example the barbarians leap. The tooltip in line with this would be: Jump upto x yards dealing y% weapon damage in a z radius while also increasing armor by A for Bs. This is quite long and does quite alot(could be redesigned to do less! Why arent ability's simply designed simple instead of making the tooltips simple?). Worst part is, its not complete. Because it doesnt tell you travel time. Does it take .5s to travel that distance? or 2s? Does a short jump happen faster then a long jump? So there would still be a need for an even more detailed explanation somewhere. (this isnt the most important thing for the leap skill, but certain monk skills for example have quite long animations that might get in the way of stacking haste).

Sounds like the start of dumbing down the game to me...

Just saw the new tooltips and i got to say im shocked. Not because they where added. Not because they are default. But because your alianating the hardcore players by expecting us to press a buton.

To make things worse, the "advanced" tooltips still have alot of needles text in it that doesnt clearly explain what it does. Just adds "flavor".

I gues what i want is checkboxes for our tooltips wich one we want. And i want technical tooltips. Tooltips that give all technical information and no flavor text. To quote myself on some examples:

13/12/2011 23:09Posted by Skyqula

My rend tooltip should state atleast the following: Does x% weapon damage over y time in a z radius. Tick time increased by haste.

13/12/2011 23:09Posted by Skyqula

Bash for example would state this: Does x% weapon damage with a 20% chance for a y yard knockback.

They may add a checkbox, so there's no point in necro-ing an old thread, with old Bashiok quotes that people will read, assume they're recent, and get pissed. Here is all that was said by the blues on the tooltips thing after the recent patch:

http://www.d3sanc.com/blue-tracker/2180-tooltips-what-happened/

25/01/2012 11:23Posted by Skyqula

But because your alianating the hardcore players by expecting us to press a buton.

Thanks for the chuckle.

But as Tzekelkan said, someone asked for a checkbox and Bashiok said he'll put it to the devs. To be honest, I'd like to see this too. I'm also interested in a full description of my spells rather than a hugely simplified version.

25/01/2012 11:41Posted by Tzekelkan

They made add a checkbox, so there's no point in necro-ing an old thread

they didnt make one, they said they will look at it though. And this realy isnt a necro, its a continuation of the same discussion.

You're right, I meant "may", not "made".

While I may agree with reasoning behind implementing simplified tooltips, I would like to get advanced tooltips trully advanced. Currently I can't tell the difference between those two. An advanced tooltop should contain every possible information about a skill that we would like to know - damage, duration, area of effect type, area of effect size, additional effects, etc.