Runechat Feedback Thread

[bobbahbrown]

Hello,

Runechat has been merged, and I hope you are all enjoying it. Please leave any feedback about the feature here, or use this thread as a place for short discussions regarding the feature.

The PR itself can be found here.

Best,
Bobbah

---

FAQ -- Read these if I've sent you here!
Can I change my color?: Currently no, it is random and is generated each round.
Can I turn it off?: Yes, there is a preference in game preferences (in the OOC tab)
How does it work?: ANY message you can HEAR (it appears in your goonchat) typically will be shown to you.
Can people see me whispering?: The messages shown are client-specific, if they can hear you whispering normally they will see it. If they can't, they wont'.
Why can I see messages when people walk towards me from off-screen?: If they said the message on radio and you heard it, the message is drawn. If you didn't hear it (they didn't talk on a radio you can hear for example) it wouldn't have been drawn.

[Farquaar]

I'm really looking forward to this.

[CDranzer]

I have concerns about visual clutter but honestly we need this and have needed this for years.

[Nabski]

It looks like if a long message is posted it trails off with ... at the end? I'm assuming that from the Lorum Ipsum example.

I don't suppose you'd be willing to make an exception for woodies got wood so that if someone pastes it it's a horrible attack on your face.

[bobbahbrown]

I have concerns about visual clutter but honestly we need this and have needed this for years.

Please check out the most recent post on the PR, I have added some exponential message decay to help prevent visual clutter. Once play testing begins (hopefully today if I can get a maintainer on-board) then I would like to gauge if the maximum message length needs to be modified, or if the fonts need to be tweaked to reduce overall height. Both of these are questions that I am very interested in, and they are both prevalent on my survey that I will ask people to give their opinions on after a round ends with Runechat enabled.

[CDranzer]

Filled out the survey. First experiences were good, spam isn't much of an issue, and when it is, it's no more of an issue than it already was.

[bobbahbrown]

As an update to anyone who may comment on this, the radio delay issue should be fixed following this round on Sybil.

The other bits of feedback that I've recieved from the survey and in-game thusfar that I am fixing now:
- Messages appearing under wielded plants, need to reconsider the layer it is currently appearing on
- Holopads appending 'Says "' to text, this is related to the message pipeline. I know it comes from when messages are encoded, holopad must do it in a special manner.

[trollbreeder]

please keep the toggle indefinitely for the gamers who dont want text appearing all over the place and prefer to look at goonchat instead

[bobbahbrown]

Another bit of feedback I have recieved: deaf/crit people can see text even though they can't hear it directly.

Should be fixed shortly along with the stuff above

[BeeSting12]

please keep the toggle indefinitely for the gamers who dont want text appearing all over the place and prefer to look at goonchat instead

they're not keep the toggle forever so if you dont like this then you better say something now.

[The_Silver_Nuke]

I'm personally not a fan. I appreciate the effort that went into it but like what was mentioned above there's just too much visual clutter with it on screen.

[Tlaltecuhtli]

where is it testmerged?

[bobbahbrown]

I'm personally not a fan. I appreciate the effort that went into it but like what was mentioned above there's just too much visual clutter with it on screen.

Hello,

I encourage you to fill out my survey if you haven't already. It helps to understand about what you feel is too cluttered.

Thank you,
Bobbah

------

where is it testmerged?

Good morning tlal,

I hope you are doing well.

It is test merged on sybil, bagil, and manuel.

Thanks again,
bobbahbrown

[bobbahbrown]

Copying this over from GitHub:

Today's changes:

• Added icons for radio messages to make it more clear as to when someone is speaking on radio
• All non-mob speech is smaller, this seemed to be a common ask
• Italicized font use was discontinued, whispering is now smaller and slightly darker to compensate.
• Fixed the reported bug with hallucinated text not being shown

Also the maintainers have asked that I remove the modification to the preferences save file, so the change to your preference from enabled -> disabled will not be saved WHILE TESTMERGED. Once it is fully merged (possibly tonight) then you will be able to save preferences as you would expect.

A note to explain this is below the preference itself.

[bobbahbrown]

i tried to get the testmerge updated today but the keyholders didn't respond so ill try tomorrow i guess

my apologies to those of you who would have liked to see those updates i listed above sooner

best,
bobbahbrown

[PKPenguin321]

i tried to get the testmerge updated today but the keyholders didn't respond so ill try tomorrow i guess

my apologies to those of you who would have liked to see those updates i listed above sooner

best,
bobbahbrown

an apology wont cut it. im going to need $20 BTC.
wallet code: cdsafsd92390fjdksjafojds9iafnmoikwaejf893w2fjieow

[Tlaltecuhtli]

can you test it on real servers ? aka terry

[Flatulent]

can you test it on real servers ? aka terry

[Jack7D1]

[bobbahbrown]

Hello Mr Bee,
Thank you for this PR, I really enjoy it. Manuel is the perfect place to test it as it makes discussion a lot easier and it's harder to miss someone trying to talk to you. It would also be nice if the color was controlled by things like your average sprite color or hair color.

Some negative feedback:
You can see people's runetext even when unconscious, perhaps even when deaf. However this may already be fixed.
The text can be a bit unsightly at times, consider making it smaller.
The text is hard to read when in italics, such as whispering and talking on radio.
Please prevent text appearing when I talk on radio.

Fixing the unconscious thing, didn't realize the can_hear() proc doesn't account for being unconscious! :S

Italics have been removed in the latest version, just waiting for keyholders to update the code on the servers. I've pinged them again this morning, so hopefully that will be fruitful.

I've discussed the other two points with you on discord, but I think the above two fixes will be beneficial and hopefully well received.

Best,
Bobbah

[bobbahbrown]

As a followup to the questions regarding font size, these are basically the four font sizes we currently have.



Currently as it stands, the speech is as follows: whisper is 6px, no italics; say is 7px; large text like megaphones is 8px

I would be wary to make whispering the 5px, talking 6px, and the loudtext 7 or 8 as 5px could potentially run the risk of being illegible to some users.

[Ivuchnu]

Please make truncation threshold configurable. The one that kicks in on lorem ipsum RP example image, with "...". Myself I feel like using overhead text is best to identify speaker and location quick, all while I still use old chat as primary way of tracking conversation. Covering multiple tiles at once by speech is silly.

[bobbahbrown]

Please make truncation threshold configurable. The one that kicks in on lorem ipsum RP example image, with "...". Myself I feel like using overhead text is best to identify speaker and location quick, all while I still use old chat as primary way of tracking conversation. Covering multiple tiles at once by speech is silly.

I can add a configurable truncation limit to the config files prior to final merge alongside the re-addition of the pref saving.

Thanks for the suggestion!

[bobbahbrown]

Today's update:
- It's been merged
- Added pref for disabling messages from anything that isn't a mob (like machines!)
- Added pref for tweaking the max message length on client-side (defaults to 110, which is what is has been during all testing)

Thanks for the great testing period and please let me know what you folks think. I look forward to whatever cool PRs follow to add on or modify the system.

All the best,
bobbah "bee" brown

[Istoprocent1]

Visual clutter, too small, too fast, too colorful. Its a cool concept tho.

[Mickyan]

In a few months I'll wonder how I ever managed to play without this

- Added pref for disabling messages from anything that isn't a mob (like machines!)
- Added pref for tweaking the max message length on client-side (defaults to 110, which is what is has been during all testing)

Are these also set to be removed later down the line? I hope not because I personally prefer to have less text on screen and don't mind at all having to read the chatlog for longer messages

I find the immediate visual feedback of who said what to be the most valuable feature from this, rather than trying to make the chat logs obsolete which seems like a very unlikely scenario

[angelstarri]

MAKE IT PLAY SIMS SPEAKING SOUNDS WHEN YOU SPEAK

[Kassori]

please keep the toggle indefinitely for the gamers who dont want text appearing all over the place and prefer to look at goonchat instead

they're not keep the toggle forever so if you dont like this then you better say something now.

Welp, that sucks. I just really dislike how it looks. I think this could be a real deal-breaker for people who're not fond of this since its not something you can really play around or ignore, it's going to constantly be in your face.

[BeeSting12]

please keep the toggle indefinitely for the gamers who dont want text appearing all over the place and prefer to look at goonchat instead

they're not keep the toggle forever so if you dont like this then you better say something now.

Welp, that sucks. I just really dislike how it looks. I think this could be a real deal-breaker for people who're not fond of this since its not something you can really play around or ignore, it's going to constantly be in your face.

Yeah, I agree. I just don't think this style of chat works for a game like ss13. Some people like it and that's great for them, but I don't want text in my face when I'm trying to view the screen. There's already an area to view text, why does it have to show up twice? I can appreciate the work that went into this but not a fan.

[angelstarri]

because we should be really aiming to remove the text box altogether

[Taraiph]

because we should be really aiming to remove the text box altogether

I disagree. The text box of SS13 is perhaps the only thing about the entirety of the game that's even remotely intuitive: click a thing, information shows up there, and then you act on it. There's a reason why any game this complex has long-ass logs that take up a decent chunk of the screen, and that's to make sure that information is presented to the player in an accurate manner. There might be arguments over verbosity and concision, where it should be, and all that, but for the most part these things should be left to player preference. For a game as feedback-barren as this, improving the function and readability of the log should be paramount, not slapping it over the entire screen at random and allow the xenobio to ignore literally everything while he stares at hot slime-on-slime action for three hours because there's no radio.

[cacogen]

Text is too big and the font sucks but other than that I really like this. Haven't seen it in a crowd yet though. I look forward to advertising my armour trimming services on the shuttle.

[angelstarri]

because we should be really aiming to remove the text box altogether

I disagree. The text box of SS13 is perhaps the only thing about the entirety of the game that's even remotely intuitive: click a thing, information shows up there, and then you act on it. There's a reason why any game this complex has long-ass logs that take up a decent chunk of the screen, and that's to make sure that information is presented to the player in an accurate manner. There might be arguments over verbosity and concision, where it should be, and all that, but for the most part these things should be left to player preference. For a game as feedback-barren as this, improving the function and readability of the log should be paramount, not slapping it over the entire screen at random and allow the xenobio to ignore literally everything while he stares at hot slime-on-slime action for three hours because there's no radio.

ok 2019 player

[BeeSting12]

because we should be really aiming to remove the text box altogether

I disagree. The text box of SS13 is perhaps the only thing about the entirety of the game that's even remotely intuitive: click a thing, information shows up there, and then you act on it. There's a reason why any game this complex has long-ass logs that take up a decent chunk of the screen, and that's to make sure that information is presented to the player in an accurate manner. There might be arguments over verbosity and concision, where it should be, and all that, but for the most part these things should be left to player preference. For a game as feedback-barren as this, improving the function and readability of the log should be paramount, not slapping it over the entire screen at random and allow the xenobio to ignore literally everything while he stares at hot slime-on-slime action for three hours because there's no radio.

ok 2019 player

acknowledge the 2019 player's points though, because he's right.

[Tlaltecuhtli]

2019 player isnt right, this isnt supposed to replace the whole chat or examination, its good for when you are talking with people nearby as you dont have to concentrate your eyes away and then get stunned and killed, only problem i see is that your own text appears without any indication if you spoke in radio or not and i have to check if i added ; at the end because bubble appears on me like if i spoke locally

also problem is people might use the chat as "smokescreen" dont mind the long messages (those are a bug caused by an unrelated thing ) but the text squares of "nigganigganigga", they could cover a whole cult in it

[trollbreeder]

2019 player isnt right, this isnt supposed to replace the whole chat or examination

wrong

[Tlaltecuhtli]

why would you drop the chat

[bobbahbrown]

2019 player isnt right, this isnt supposed to replace the whole chat or examination, its good for when you are talking with people nearby as you dont have to concentrate your eyes away and then get stunned and killed, only problem i see is that your own text appears without any indication if you spoke in radio or not and i have to check if i added ; at the end because bubble appears on me like if i spoke locally

also problem is people might use the chat as "smokescreen" dont mind the long messages (those are a bug caused by an unrelated thing ) but the text squares of "nigganigganigga", they could cover a whole cult in it

tlal is this screenshot from the round that the timers broke thus resulting in chat not being cleared?

[Tlaltecuhtli]

yeah but the big text square DO block 2x3 tiles north

[bobbahbrown]

ok just asking because showing that one in particular is disingenuous given its exceptional circumstance... messages cannot normally stack that high as the expontential decay i created should more or less prevent it...

in terms of message length I would recommend tweaking the message length limit pref it may help to reduce fatigue from longer messages on the screen

[Qustinnus]

also why dont we just ban people who spam like that its kinda cringe ngl

[bandit]

messages also overlap with one another if two+ mobs are on the same square

[bobbahbrown]

messages also overlap with one another if two+ mobs are on the same square

This one is a lot harder to tackle because messages are client-specific so trying to stack multiple people's messages would be very challenging.

I do want to add a quick layer adjustment based on when the message was said (as proposed by Anturke!) so that way more recent messages appear on top of older ones from people around you

[Istoprocent1]

Another issue is that they persist for awhile. Say you are an antag and whisper something in the maintenance, you step out and everybody can read what you whispered.

[cacogen]

As bobbah said somewhere the text is clientside and can only be seen by people who can see what you said in the chatbox

[oranges]

2019 player isnt right, this isnt supposed to replace the whole chat or examination

wrong

you got me wildin

[Tlaltecuhtli]

if an object is talking in your pocket the text appears above your pocket slot, is it intended?

[BONERMASTER]

Dude this is great, I love this! It's what I have been suggesting a few months ago but better! It keeps your eyes on the actual game, and when things get heated, you can instantly see who is saying what, and not have to dig through dozens of different lines of text and check which name is who again, it's so much faster and more convenient!
I even like the style, it looks good on this game.

Got one improvement for ya, when you speak into the headset using loud volume, it displays the text twice, one is the whisper, one is the loud radio voice. Just need one though! Keep at it Bobbah, this rocks!

[cacogen]

i would like to see a court case from this

[Kassori]

I've played with it for 2 days now and I like it, however, how the heck can you call it RUNECHAT if its not YELLOW?