Re: [Wesnoth-dev] Improving wesnoth ingame-help

[Richard Kettering]

On Feb 20, 2005, at 9:14 AM, address@hidden wrote:
> 1.) We especially disliked, that the unit-descriptions are not really
> coherent. Some units got only a short "good at - bad-at" description 
> while
> others (drakes) got a more epic and rpg like descriptions. We came to 
> the
> conclusion that both have their place in the game. But it should 
> somehow be
> one "style" for the whole system. We came to the conclusion that it 
> would
> make sense to have the short descripions for beginners and beneath a 
> more
> epic one for rpg fans. The short version could be done in few words 
> like
> "good-at:" and "bad-at:". This system would make it more friendly for
> beginners, because they would have such a list for every unit without 
> having
> to search the big bunch of tables.

Personally, I think most of our descriptions are terrible.  I would 
jump at the chance to make really nice, new ones, and could probably 
grab a friend or two from my college to help.
Now, the problem of course, with this, is that this will make a mess of 
our translation status.  However, the upshot is that the old 
translations would be just as good as they are now, so it wouldn't 
"break" anything - retranslation wouldn't have to be done overnight.

I think it would be worth it though.  Our current ones are almost 
infantile, and are often written with incorrect grammar.  I really 
think they mar the quality of the game by quite a bit.
Amusingly enough, they are probably a lot better sounding in the 
translated versions, since a native speaker of the language was 
guaranteed to have written them.

I would like some means of having more generally wesnoth-centric unit 
descriptions, allowing us to add more dimension to our currently rather 
shallow fantasy world.  They would be structured to be useable in 
virtually any time period in wesnoth's history - if someone needed to 
use them in a completely different world, it would be easy enough to 
simply redefine the few ones that would have place-specific references 
(the strange elensefarian practice of thieves dying their hair blue, 
for one example).


I would also like to STRONGLY REITERATE my suggestion of having 
separate character listings in the help section as well.  All of those 
portraits I did for HttT are full-size portraits, and it would be nice 
to use those, it would also solve some problems from other hacks we 
have had - it would be a solution to the reason we currently do not 
show any portraits in help, because they would be used by all units of 
the type, not just main characters (for example - in TEI, all white 
mages would currently use dacyn's picture).

Not to mention this, but we could it to separate out special character 
units, such as Konrad and Lisar, and Delfador, keeping them out of the 
regular unit lists.

> 2.)

Yep.

> 3.)

Yep.  I'd like to help with the racial descriptions, too.

> 4.)

*shrugs*  I don't really care either way.

> 5.)

Yep.

> 6.)

Yes - we should provide generalized descriptions of each terrain's 
effect on different classes of units.  For example, we should, in the 
forest terrain, state that elves move and defend very well in forest, 
and that other units find themselves slowed by it. (actually, a much 
more in depth description covering all of the races, but this was a 
short example).

> 7.)

Yep.