Combat Medic Archive

I'm nothing more than a Novice Medic, but I try to do my part, when grouped, to heal an injured (or even an incapped) comrade during battle as much as the next guy, so I was thinking that these two ideas would help in that regards. I wanted to post them here though, to get some of your opinions on these ideas.

Please comment. If the ideas get support, then I'll take the ideas to the Development Board, where hopefully everyone can really support them and get them implemented. Thanks.

1) First, and more useful of the two ideas (I think), would be the numbering of group mates. When you form a group, you can currently quick-select one of your group mates by pressing CTRL+# (where the number symbol is replaced by the position their name is placed in order from the top to the bottom of the upper left portion of your screen). There is already a program mechanic in place that knows that when you push CTRL+1 it selects you, when you push CTRL+2 it selects the group leader (who is ALWAYS in the number 2 position), etc..all the way down the list, so it shouldn't be much more code necessary to simply have that numbered position shown just before the individual's name (like the "(L)" is shown now for the group leader). This would make selecting and healing group members a little quicker, I think. In groups of three or four, it's not as important, but when you are in groups of 18-20, it gets a bit difficult sometimes to target that many guys running around everywhere, and you can't count from the bottom up to get to person #13 or #14 unless you are certain of whether you have 18, 19, or 20 people from the beginning.

2) Secondly, in order to find incapped group members more quickly, how about the dot on the radar screen flashing or becoming a bit larger or a different color or something, because the blue box around a selected individualisn't so easy to see sometimes when there's a crowd around. Also, if a group member is selected, perhaps their name text (in the main screen) should also flash or something, because once the group is clumped up, it's hard to know where the individual is sometimes.

Both of these ideas would probably help doctors raise the dead as well.

Just a couple of thoughts to make combat healing a little quicker, what do you guys think?

Malborka

Tarquinas Server

I agree that we need a more useful or complete way to toggle through the group to highlight/target our ownteammates. I like the idea of a color-coded radarindicator for incapped players, but I would also like to see a visual notification in the main game screen. It is somtimes difficult to locate fallen teammates in the dark (especially out in the wild). When mere seconds are the difference between an incap and a deathblow, I'd like to see a giant billboard (something like that rotating blue "i" over certain NPC's)marking the location of those in need of aid.

Along those same lines, I would even extend this to showing one distinct spinning overhead marker for an incappedteammate and another for a dead-but-not-yet-cloned teammate so you can find them quickly in order to apply a rez pack.

It's easy enough for me to just click on the group list of whomever I want to heal, because i'm already looking at their bars to begin with. It would actually slow you down to stop to hit a key combo than it would to just click their name.

When I play, I usually am just watching my instruments in battle, not the actual view. I have everything I need between the group bar, radar, and target bar to know who needs healing, where they are, and how far away they are.

Maybe I'm missing something here, but by insisting that the group list is easier to use that a keyboard shortcut don't you get hung up on pressing ALT totoggle mouse modes? Call me a rebel, but I like to stay in "targeting" mode while in combat. Constantly switching back & forth to "cursor" mode to use the group list, and to clear the combat queue window in order to apply a heal is a significant pain-in-the-ass. Please enlighten me.

I think it's probably more of a personal preference thing. For instance, I always open those special windows (Inventory, Character, Community, etc) using keyboard shortcuts. I'm pretty sure there are those that prefer to use the buttons on the bottom row of the screen. The biggest trick to useing the keyboard shutcuts (try of almost any program), is remembering which shortcut you want to use to accomplish your immediate goal.

I also click the names to select people. This far quicker than using the ctrl-# shortcuts. However, I use the EQ style of keyboard commands. I hate controlling my movement with the mouse. I use A, S, D, W, Z, and Cfor controlling my movement while my mouse is used to select players and initiate heals.

I've used the EQ style because I used to play AC a lot. I find them much easier than the whole ALT to switch mode thing. And I find the movement using the mouse very cumbersome.

Cathail

First, thanks for the Ctrl + # trick.. I knew that Ctrl + 1 was self-select, but I didn't know that Ctrl + 2 selected the group leader. I do have a question, though... how do you select player 11 (I assume 10 is Ctrl + 0).

Second, I think these are both good ideas. The numbers next the the names maight even help people like me realize that this feature exists . I think it would be nice if incapped players appeared different on the radar regardless if they were in your group or not. Bonus points if you can still tell the difference between those who are in your group/faction and those who aren't.

hmm if you use adsw... doesnt that interfere with chat?

Nope, it does not interfere with chat. You press Enter to begin chat, then Enter to send the message. It is actually very convenient.