What should be skinnable?

[Doublestrike]

Looking through the res/images folder, it seems to me all of this stuff could be included in each skin image sprite, so it's customized per skin. I'm talking about mana symbols, quest icons, counters, the whole lot.

What's the general consensus on this?

[moomarc]

Sounds like a good idea in general. My only comment is that certain things like the mana symbols are easier to edit individually, rather than from a row purely for alignment etc. If you could post a photoshop template with guides included or something similar, then that would be perfect. I just found that tweaking the current one, I wasn't sure where the bounds of each element were. (EDIT: Just saw the new sprite gives the grid size. Thanks!)

Then off topic although still related to the UI, are we anywhere near making avatar selection possible?

[Doublestrike]

Avatar selection? Didn't even know it was an option! But yeah, sure, I can put it on the list. The more I think about it, the more I like it! Not in the skin, of course.

Can you elaborate a bit more on what you have in mind?

[moomarc]

I simply thought of being able to change the player icon/avatar from within the settings. Whether its from a text list of names or whether a gallery selection comes up is up to you.

[WompWomp]

Looking through the res/images folder, it seems to me all of this stuff could be included in each skin image sprite, so it's customized per skin. I'm talking about mana symbols, quest icons, counters, the whole lot.

What's the general consensus on this?

I can't see any way it can hurt to make more things easily skin-able. It would probably be a good idea, since a lot of users wont want or be able to edit the images, to keep each grouping on its own sheet so that people can use mana symbols from one skin with counters from another by shuffling a few files.

[silly freak]

I'd "vote" for some sort of default images, e.g. if per-skin mana symbols are not present, the default ones are used.
This would also mean that a avatars could be "skinned" optionally. I'm thinking of the different color templates of the player avatar, the blue one very Jace-like. In some skin, one just might look so much better than the other...

[WompWomp]

I'd "vote" for some sort of default images, e.g. if per-skin mana symbols are not present, the default ones are used.

My recollection is that (not sure if it's implemented yet) skins will/do pull from the default skin if any of their elements are missing.

[Doublestrike]

@WompWomp, @silly freak - that's the concept, but I haven't implemented it yet. Right now the image would just be empty. But making new sprites is pretty easy, one can just copy the default and go from there.

=====

OK, so it looks like I'll try to put everything into one skin, including avatars. Moomarc, does the grid size note on the new sprite clear up the concerns about individual editing? I'll assume so, and start on that soon.

[moomarc]

Yip. The grid note did the trick.

[Doublestrike]

@moomarc, mostly - I've noticed a few comments about image scaling here and there and I'll be at a good time to implement any requests for handling them pretty soon.

What should be happening now:

- Image too large: Panel scales it down to fit either height/width of panel, whichever is smaller, and displays texture/color in the remaining area.

- Image too small: Panel centers it, no scaling, and displays texture/color in the remaining area.

How would you prefer these two cases to be handled?

[moomarc]

@moomarc, mostly - I've noticed a few comments about image scaling here and there and I'll be at a good time to implement any requests for handling them pretty soon.

What should be happening now:

- Image too large: Panel scales it down to fit either height/width of panel, whichever is smaller, and displays texture/color in the remaining area.

- Image too small: Panel centers it, no scaling, and displays texture/color in the remaining area.

How would you prefer these two cases to be handled?

I think the image handling as you've described is perfect. IIRC my comments have generally been to do with the main background image and were more as not-to-self reminders to make higher resolution images so that it would fit larger displays, not as a problem with the current handling. (My design preferences just prefer edge-to-edge graphics, so I tend to design the background so as to interact to some degree with the battlefield layout). So leave as is.

The only scaling issue I have is with the player/phases panel. On my screen when I adjust the panels to suit me the library and mana amounts can't be seen. Two things could help: have tool tips that show the numbers when you hover over them (so where it has "Cards in library" append ":number" , and/or have the phases section of the panel resizable (at the moment I think it's just a percentage of the panel width). Also, if you scale the bottom left panel's height, the font size in the tabs above becomes too big. Is there any way to limit it or link it to another dimension of the panel (or maybe to the font size of the header in the bottom panel)?

[Doublestrike]

@moomarc - great, glad it's working out.

I'll put that stuff on the list and get back to ya.