Use mouse to walk

[mezzoforte]

I don't know how to delete the poll, lol.  By the way, did Craig write the code for this forum?

[Ertxiem]

You may edit the pool, reset the count to 0 and ask if the people around here think that the movement could also be done with the mouse. The options of the pool could be:
Yes, always;
Only in battles;
Only exploring (outside of the battles);
Never;
Not sure.

If you want, I can do it for you (but you may have other ideas about the question and the options).

Craig installed this forum in his server. Take a look at the links below all pages for more info about the Simple Machines Forums.

[mezzoforte]

okay, thanks.  I didn't want to at first because I kept seeing posts saying that it was a bad idea with no merit.

I added a line in the first post about battle.  That was a good idea, so thank you again.

[Ertxiem]

Yay! I was the 1st voter! :)
I think that being able to move with the mouse in the battles and exploring would be a nice feature to have, but not a priority one.

[cyso]

I clicked not sure, but after thinking about it some, I think it would be nice in battles (even if it would be a lot of work for Craig).

[Duskling]

I clicked not sure, but after thinking about it some, I think it would be nice in battles (even if it would be a lot of work for Craig).

Welcome back, yogc! Been a long time since your last post. Now, more on topic, I think moving with the mouse would be a rather annoying feature, how exactly would you run?

[Cypher]

You should have the ability to change your vote, in case you change your mind.

[Ertxiem]

Duvalier (or the character we're controlling) would chase the mouse pointer while exploring.
You could run by default and walk (move slowly) with the left mouse button pressed or the other way around.

In battles there could be 4 arrows next to the character (near the border of the square he/she is in) to our next step or, even better for us (and more trouble for Craig), each possible final location could be clickable. This would give a maximum of sq=2n(n+1) possible squares for a character that moves n squares each turn (see table below).

n	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
sq	0	4	12	24	40	60	84	112	144	180

I couldn't make the table formatting as I wanted...

[bugfartboy]

Now that would be nice. No more sticking keys to make you overshoot.

[mezzoforte]

You should have the ability to change your vote, in case you change your mind.

There's a "remove vote" button.

I think moving with the mouse would be a rather annoying feature, how exactly would you run?

I'm not sure if it was rhetorical, but to answer you, what I thought was like this:

If you just click, you walk there.
If you double-click, you run there.
If you click and hold, then after a moment, you start to chase the cursor, walking (like steering him).
If you double-click, holding the second time, you start to chase the cursor, running.


I had another idea, but this might take away from the game.... you can click an arrow at the end of the screen (or the cursor becomes an arrow) to move to the next scene.  I don't want to ruin the game though.

Duskling, what do you think about being able to click to your destination in battle?

Duvalier (or the character we're controlling) would chase the mouse pointer while exploring.
You could run by default and walk (move slowly) with the left mouse button pressed or the other way around.

I really like that!!  Perhaps he could just chase the cursor without having to hold a mouse button... and maybe the right mouse button activates that mode (we don't even use it!!).  I dunno.... but I like where this is going!

I couldn't make the table formatting as I wanted...

It's okay.  No one understood it anyway.  ;)  Yea, it might seem tricky to code that, but I have an idea how to do it if needed.
I guess it's hard for us to know when something would be hard to add to the code, and when it isn't....  It depends on how modular the code is.

[SmartyPants]

You should have the ability to change your vote, in case you change your mind.

There's a "remove vote" button.

No there isn't.  That option was left out when the poll was created.

[mezzoforte]

You should have the ability to change your vote, in case you change your mind.

There's a "remove vote" button.

No there isn't.  That option was left out when the poll was created.

Oh, you're right.  It's sort of a bug.  You don't get that option when you add a poll to a topic.  You do get it when you post a new poll (and not a topic).

[Ertxiem]

I made the table above thinking how the battles work. The table shows the maximum number of final (destination) squares sq as a function of the speed of the character n. Looking at the last column of the table, we can see that a character with speed 9 would have a maximum of 180 squares where he can finish his move. This means that Craig would have to be able to code 180 new clickable places in the battle map (that could possibly be done with two for loops, or something like that).
Furthermore, the code would require a path finding algorithm for movements up to speed 9 and the animation would have to flow nicely when the character is moving through the path.

I'm only describing it and it seems too much trouble...
It would be much easier to have 4 small arrows in the sides of the square the character is standing that when clicked would have their action mapped to the arrow keys.

(Sometimes I ramble...)

About the table formatting, I know how to format the table in html, but with bbcode I don't know how to show the cell borders and have the text in each cell with centre alignment.

mezzoforte: You can edit the pool and check "Allow user to change vote", if you want.

[mezzoforte]

Yeah, coding-wise, just the arrow-clicking thing is pretty smart.  My main idea was to have the option to play mouse-only.  As well, clicking one space at a time is already what we do with the keyboard, isn't it?!!

For the other way, I agree.  The bottleneck is finding all the destinations and respective paths.  So use a (recursive, linked-list) shortest path algorithm that gives you the path for each of the (2n+1)(2n+1) spots (NULL if it's impossible).  (No point in writing it out here.)  I think that it would be solved virtually instantanously, given that the depth is at most 9 (or however fast these guys can go).

P.S. It would be important to write in the 3 OTHER possible "directions" for Arman Leaping or Malis Shadowporting.  But if the algorithm is written recursively, that's an easy thing to add (after coding what was said before!).  That makes it O(6^(n^2)), I believe.

(Sometimes I ramble...)

I do too.  :-[

mezzoforte: You can edit the pool and check "Allow user to change vote", if you want.

No.  :)  Try to make a dummy topic, and add a poll to it.  Compare the options you get if you "post a new poll".

[mezzoforte]

I reset the poll, cause I didn't like the results. <<Hides from Duskling>> :P  And edited the first post...