Strategic Zoom Mockup

This idea is excellent! I'd love to see something like this added. It seems very functional, yet without the clutter associated with having hundreds of icons that the devs want to avoid.

I like it, it gives the user an easy to read understanding of the armies makeup, works when zoomed out a fair way, and adds no added clutter at all.

I don't think it is going to go in though. The zoom-out in the Beta seemed smaller to me than even in the pre-Alpha. Probably because of the shrinking of the units and buildings. But it makes me think they have settled on the close-up gameplay for now. Both Homeworld and Act of aggression switch to a different view when zooming out past a certain point and at best we might get something like that? Not sure we will get that either but it would be a big improvement over what we have now.

Anyways, cool stuff man, such a neat solution! (in both senses of the word)

Thank you guys, it took me a few weeks to do that and now I am free to go back to make some maps and play AOTS

Yes you are right, Stardock want to give it a try on the Closeup nameplate first and then after release v1.0 try something new, but I really wanted to do that Mockup, show you guys and the Dev's another better (another) way to of how it may look like AOTS when zoomed out without Icons.

I did play the New Homeworld, never got my hands on Act Of Aggression, If you ask me I do prefer a streamlined zoom-out Using the same map and just adding maybe a new UI to it when you get to 300% more Zoom or something like that.

Again I happy to know that you guys liked it, now i will love for the rest of the Community to see those Mockups, maybe I will put them out in the General Forums after release, for now they are only for the Founders and Dev's to look at them and give your opinions and ideas.

Thx Again.

Great idea. But it stil could lead to icon-wars (which I understood the devs were worried about).

I was hoping the mockup would actually be for the strategic map, which the devs are going with, instead of extreme zoom, which they are not. But I do appreciate that you spent lots of time on this. My concern with your idea is that colors for different players may clash. Your mockup has various shades of blue to purple representing units on the same team, but what if another player's color is purple? That could be confusing. It's the main reason I think the whole color heat map idea is flawed.

The game has two critical conceptual disconnects with regard to strategy and the map. I'd have hoped to have seen some kind effort be made for these, but so far nothing:

1. For a game that touts the importance of terrain to strategy, the lack of terrain features on the strategic map is jarring. The main map zoom level is sufficient to let you understand the terrain, but the main map is not good at showing the strategic value or dimensions of each region. The reverse is true for the strategic map. No single view in this game helps you formulate a complete strategy with regard to the map state, so strategy feels disconnected.

2. For a game that touts the importance of army composition, the lack of detailed useful composition information on either map is jarring. Units on the main map cannot be instantly recognized, and even if they could they are not arranged in a manner that allows easy ratio estimation. The empire tree is of no help because the icons are so generic and are in random order. On the strategic map, army composition info is nonexistent. The lack of quick and precise army composition information makes that element of strategic play feel disconnected.

To be clear, I am setting my expectations appropriately. The game is five weeks from release and neither of these things are on the current roadmap to being addressed in that time (though in earlier stages of development they were). These are conceptual concerns that are probably not on the radar for newcomers to the game. And these concerns are not game breaking either. All I'm saying is that for what are advertised to be key strategic elements of the game, the state of the game unfortunately does not do a good job of organizing the information on the screen so the player can make good strategic decisions based upon those key elements. The player is limited to thinking tactically one to two moves ahead (this region then that region, I need more archers) instead of strategically (this group of regions, with a forward base here, for taking and holding that Turinium node, the army in this location should have a 1:2:1 ratio of brutes to archers to Artemis, with two sentinels and two Falcon AAs). I hope my concerns can eventually be addressed, but in the mean time I'll try to enjoy just playing this like a slower-paced real-time-tactical game.

If I recall the devs right I think they want to force us (with good intentions) to see the units when we play. If we are alowed to zoom out too much (to the point where we cant see the units but need other visuals like icons or colours) then some of us will stay in max-zoom all the time. I respect this view even if I do not agree. My point though is that this colour-dot-suggestion does not adress the "icon-wars-problem".

Ok as I explained in the picture, the colors can be changed to colors that the Dev's will think that will not mix with the players color, Right now there is a Total of 6 Colors for the Players to choose from, in the Future the Dev's hope to have up to 18 colors or more. That's fine, so go ahead and think what are the Colors that may work to differentiate the Units.

I am with you on that too, and I know that the problem may be in the map editor, I wrote about this in a different Post a while ago, I Even Asked the Dev's about it.
I asked, Are we gonna get more height Variations for the maps?

Let me explain this eviator, If you have tried the Map Editor you can see that the game just use 3 different height Variations (usable) +2 more (not usable) and they are very low Variations, I mean that they are not high height, (they just go up a few meters per variation) and That not Enough.

This game need much more height Variations and make them higher and bigger so you can see the difference of Heights per Variation, so Being zoomed in or all the way out you see where you have a mountain and where not. by doing that you may get a way better understanding on the Terrain, and by having a better understanding you can create better Strategies.

I did do a Mockup idea about the Empire Tree a while back, did you see it? if you connect that mockup to this one, it may get way better by knowing really what do you have when you click on a group I think, its just my personal opinion.

I am 100% with you here too, and the Dev's know that, that why we are here, that why we got to be founders, not to just say that but to also give some ideas to make that better, The Dev's will see what ideas from us will take and use, the cannot use everything, they cannot do whatever we want, but at least we are here to show them some new things that may work or may not.

That's not bad, but yes the game need more strategic value and better dimensions of understanding better each region, I still have to repeat that again, AOTS maps needs way more height Variations to understand better the terrain.

This game is not a slow paced real time tactical game at all. try to play it at a slower pace against another player or a hard AI, there is no way you can do it if you want to win, To be clear AOTS is not a Tactical game, Tactical games are the games that you manage a maximum of maybe 6-10 units in a map.

Thank you snierke, I am not trying to address the Icons war problem here, I was just giving an example of an another way for people to recognize units at a high lvl zoom without any icons on top of the Units, you still need the Empire tree on the side of the screen to know the quantity of each kind of unit that you have in each Meta Unit.

And Remember something this game will change a lot in the coming months after release for the better by adding a lot more into AOTS.

You are right in a "I have a rabbit on my nose. I can replace it with a cat. Have I adressed my rabbit problem? Yes I have. I have no rabbit one my nose."- way

They are not icons. Icons can overlap and can generally look messy. The way suggest above is a much more muted approach. Anyway, no point in getting too heated over it.

Couple of people talking about needing more height variation and I agree, and a Dev has said they will add a third tier of height at some point down the line. But for now I think what is more important is to show the player that your units gain a range and sight advantage from being placed higher up. I have seen numerous people on Steam complain that the height makes no difference. Perhaps one way is to show two rings around a units which is on a higher position. One is the range it would have were it on flat ground and the other is the new range it has. I dunno, but I think it needs to be made more obvious somehow. The other way is to make the difference that much greater so that it is impossible not to notice, but gameplay wise that could be questionable. Just thinking out loud.

Edit. Generally, I would think the PHC have much more to gain on the height advantage mechanic, with all their artillery and ballistic weapon systems.

You are both right, this solution is a more soft/muted aproach then overlapping icons. And I really ment when I said its a great idea. I still am afraid it is not a good enought work around for the devs though.

For my own case I would be very happy if we can only have an option to turn of the zoom limit. I can nothing about making games but I cant imagine it beeing a lot of work making this optional. And if I understood the devs correct they concider making this optional in one or another way. 

Are the units ment to be highlighted every time you select them, regardless of zoom level? This is a concern. I think even to day (with the turquoise cirkles highlighting the units) have a negative effect on the look of the game. I want to see the battle going as clean as possible. I realize we have to have an highlight option though, and I understand that you can deselect the units to get this view. Anyway, this concern would be a even bigger concern with the solution represented in the OP. Maybe an option could be to make the colours very weak when zoomed in, and fade them in more strongly when you zoom out. 

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This is really cool looking!  I wish I had the photoshop-fu for mockups that you do ASADDF.

No, The Glowing colors should appear only when you are zoomed out and you cannot distinguish what kind of units you have, and when you zoom back in then the glowing colors will disappear automatically. i think that's the best way to recognize the units at max lvl zoom without icons.

Again this is just my personal opinion and not of the Dev's, this idea may never come to be part of the game or be real, maybe in the future by some good modders hehehe, and I am not one of them.

Yup glowing colors sounds an interesting way to help recognition at high zoom.

Really, really good stuff.

I can't believe i have to display this large pseudo strategic view (using space) in order to have a strategic perspective and at the same time hide the combat zone (there's a little bit of transparency but the black background is hidding everything).

If at least we could have an overlay with smooth transitionning, but no .... we're obviously going to deal with this counter intuitive and disgracious big minimap which hide everything.

Devs have always interpreted the request for a strategic as "give us a supcom strategic zoom with icons so that we can directly play with icons". Well no, that's not what we meant. But it seems like difficult to to be understood.

I feel especially disapointed when seeing all this brilliant stuff (the game) running on my machine. Next Gen game with Old gen interface ....