configure thumbs/green dots

[sandbagr]

We all know the 'thumbs up' and the green dots on the map are terrible indicators of what is really an upgrade, so houw about making it user-configurable towards what you are looking for.
We could set our own standards of what is green and then during survival we will not have to rapidly fill our item boxes with junk, persevere through, then end up not gettign anything we need.

Thanks

[Shak]

I would love this function

[senzation54]

I guess the problem with this would be implementing it. For instance we can set the indicator to look for DPS items that have 120+ hero health and damage, 100+ hero cast rate and 100+ upgrades. But what about all the awesome tower items that you could use on your builder?

Or if you want the items to have 100+ THP, 150+ TDMG, 100+ TSPD and 50+ TRange. What if an item drops with 300 to all stats except range, does the filter ignore that and show green anyway?

I'm sure there is some sort of solution to this, I'm just trying to illustrate that it wouldn't be easy.

[prostheus]

I think that the equipment you have on should have a base value, and when a new item drops, a value is also "assigned" to this item. The value would take into account its current stats, and how many upgrades, and if the value is bigger than what you have on (even if the equipment you have on is upgraded) it will give a green thumbs up/dot/etc. This way you will be able to tell whether an item is possibly an upgrade, even though your equipment may be 200^ and all upped.

[\/4n!114 ][c3]

they could design a configuration tool that would allow that sen. it would be probably the most intricate aspect of this game (UI-wise), but it would be done.

they could design a tool that would allow players to set parameters for what the loot indicator should show. it could have 4 indicators for tower stats that players could assign a value to, 4 for hero stats, and 2 for ability stats., and 4 for resist stats. it would be involved, but it would give a great deal of control to the player for finding what they need. the same could be done for weapons.

anything that meets the minimum parameters set by the player would receive the green arrows during a mission.

i just cant stand those things now, because they seriously highlight the absolute worst armor that lays about on the ground. there is no way possible that a piece of armor with 3 resistances, 2 of which are negative, 100 hero speed, -48 cast speed, -51 call to arms, +9 joust, +11 tower health, +98 tower damage, -30 tower range, +34 tower attack speed, and 1/1 upgrade levels is better than a piece of armor that has 30% to all resistances, 30-50 hero HP, attack, and cast speed, and 80-130 to tower health/damage/range/speed.

i hate the green arrows, and they only serve as a focal point of anger to me.

[nilmot13]

I guess the problem with this would be implementing it. For instance we can set the indicator to look for DPS items that have 120+ hero health and damage, 100+ hero cast rate and 100+ upgrades. But what about all the awesome tower items that you could use on your builder?

Or if you want the items to have 100+ THP, 150+ TDMG, 100+ TSPD and 50+ TRange. What if an item drops with 300 to all stats except range, does the filter ignore that and show green anyway?

I'm sure there is some sort of solution to this, I'm just trying to illustrate that it wouldn't be easy.

This problem can be easy solved the IF function or OR function, in programming language terms. I would imagine configuring green dot is still a "guide" for loot quality, therefore they'll be able to code it in a way, some loots with negatives still pass the filter.

If you think about it, it's very much like the DungeonDefender Online Store filter function, isn't that the same principle?

[Tastic]

I guess the problem with this would be implementing it. For instance we can set the indicator to look for DPS items that have 120+ hero health and damage, 100+ hero cast rate and 100+ upgrades. But what about all the awesome tower items that you could use on your builder?


I would take some filtering over none at all. Sure it would ignore the tower gear, but finding it wouldn't be any more difficult than finding it already is. Or vice versa if you filtered for tower.

[prostheus]

I don't care about having filter options, if the green thumbs up actually has a much higher chance of being better. Trendy should either implement the filtering idea (which they'd need to add interface options, coding etc) or my idea (make the green thumb more accurate)

IMHO my idea would be easier, but the filter option would be ideal :)

[sandbagr]

Yeah, I assumed it would not be an easy addition and it could possibly be the most intricate part of the UI, or not, depending on how in depth they made it.
Each drop is already assigned a 'score' to compare it to what you wear, the score is just ineffable and useless. This would assign control of it to the user.
Yes, its a tough idea to add to the game, but very very useful.

If they implement it will users be glad of an added month delay to the 3rd Shard?
:)
I would!

[sandbagr]

Ok, got me thinking on it and now that I am in the phase of the game where I am learning that true hybrid high level gear is pretty much impossible to find and that characters need to specialize, this is how I think the bulk of the "thumb filter" should work to make it truely useful and intuitive. I think I patterned this after how my brain works as I scan for decent gear now..
I think we can agree that there are 8 stats that matter.
Each one could get a user-defined setting for base stat and finished stat(stat + upgrade levels), and a checkbox for each, base and/or funished to include it in the filter.
That way, one could ensure that the stat they desired to upgrade would get high enough while none of the other stats important to them would be too low.
Of course it would probably also need a 'minimum level' setting, but I would keep that as a separate checkbox.

[HKN]

I they can program a entire game, they can implement the customizable green mark.

[Zaltais]

I agree that we should have a way to configure what items gets a green thump
Should be possible to set min for combined hero/tower stats and resists

we should be able to create multiple sets of conditions, so that we can have one for our hero and one for tower.

Being able to name our condition sets so that we could have an easy way to enable and disable them would also be nice

set 1: tower
Tower health 120+
Tower damage 120+
Combined tower stats 400+
Upgrades 120+

set 2: hero
Hero health 100+
Hero damage 140+
Combined hero stats 400+
Combined hero resist 30+
Upgrades 120+

Items with green thumps should also be considered separate from the other items, so they don't despawn unless they exceed a preset maximum of items

[FruitLord]

The implementation of this function is more important than more content and even bug fixes. It would allow groups to easily find the loot they desire amongst the trash pile that heaps up wave after wave. Please, implement something like this!

[x-president]

Yea I would love a type of filter system for locating loot.

[prostheus]

I would love if the loot would consistently get better with what wave/map you're on. If the loot improved, and there were much less drops, we'd still get lots of mana in for the stuff that's still laying about which isn't an upgrade, rather than a map swamped with 1000 crap items and 3 upgrades (if we're lucky).

[GrimSkellington]

The easiest and most intuitive way I can think of implementing something like this is as follows:

-All hero stats and tower stats for an item in your inventory BEFORE UPGRADES were applied are added up into their own number. Say you have the following stats on a chestplate. (Unrealistic, but just meant as an example):

100/200/100/200
------
200/200/200/200

The number for hero stats would be 600.
the number for tower stats would be 800.

-The game gets those numbers and selects the highest number of those two. In this case it would pick the tower stat number because the character most likely has on tower stat armor.

-When an item drops, it checks both the hero and tower stats compared to the higher of the two numbers, in the example, it would be checking all the chestplates. If EITHER hero or tower stats is above that higher number (In this case, 800) it is green thumbed. If it is within, say, 50, it is yellow thumbed.

-Finally, it must be within 20 or higher upgrades to be considered for green thumb, otherwise it can only be yellow thumbed if it fits all the other criteria.

So, as a summary, the game would add all the hero stats into a number and tower stats into a number for each of your equipped items, select which of those stats is higher for a given armor type and save that number. It then checks all dropped armor and compares the hero number and tower number against the higher number of your equipped armor. If it is higher, it is green thumbed, if it is close, it is yellow thumbed. If the upgrades are marginally lower, the green thumb is turned into a yellow thumb, if it is significantly lower, it is red thumbed.

Advantages:
-If done before upgrades, it would tell you if a piece would be stronger than yours after you upgrade it.
-This would green thumb armor that is good, even if it isn't the same as your current armor type (Good hero armor would be green thumbed even if you are wearing tower armor)
-It really would require the armor to be of good quality to be green thumbed.
-No clunking UI requirements, this would just usurp the current system

Disadvantages:
-Hero stats would be harder to account for seeing as speed and casting rate are both lumped in there
--Possible workaround: only account for the hero health and damage, but double the number. Half the stats, but no one cares all that much about the cut stats anyways.
-Doesn't account for special abilities.
--Possible workaround: Assign each class's abilities as either hero or tower oriented and add that number to the hero or tower number. Wouldn't be perfect, and might be better to just leave them out of the equation altogether, but it is a possibility. Suggestions are welcome.

[LJMjollnir]

i really like this last post makes alot of sense and would be easy to add to the game

[draemn]

This is how I'd like to see it:

Checkboxes for all of the following categories, you may select as many as you want. Items not selected will not get a green thumb.
Godly, Mythical, Transcendent, Mail, Leather, Pristine, Plate, Chain, squire weapons, monk weapons, apprentice weapons, huntress weapons,

Fields to input custom values for the following. Items must meet or exceed the value entered to be accepted, -1 as an entered value green thumbs any value (including all negative values).
Hero HP, Hero Speed, Hero Attack, Hero Cast Rate, Ability 1, Ability 2, Tower HP, Tower attack, tower range, tower attack speed, weapon attack, weapon reload speed, projectile speed, ranged attack (i.e. monk weapons have both types of attack), number of upgrades.

And finally a checkbox to say "Let game determine values" for the custom value fields, this will not override the checkboxes for the type of items you're looking for, but will override any custom values entered in the fields.

[NightChime]

If we're going to go so far as menus for changing how the value of different stats are weighed, how about a more specific analysis of the comparison than "yay or nay"? There would still be a green, yellow, or red thumb, but how about a percentage shown next to it to tell you how different the game considers their values to be? Maybe this could make the green dots/arrows bigger, or change their colors or something, too.

On lower levels, it might be handy if you could designate an item beyond your level as one you're "planning to use". Then any item of the same level (or higher if the player hasn't set one of that level) will be compared to the item the player designated, not what's currently equipped.

I imagine an elegant (at least for the player, IDK about programmer) way for the player to alter the "stat preferences" mentioned above. When looking at an item, in addition to "pick up" and "equip", there could be "reject thumb". This would slightly alter these "preference sliders" mentioned above, which I imagine would be especially handy for consoles, where managing menus is a real pain. (I also imagine it might involve some complex algorithms for a single "Like" to change a bunch of different numbers, but hey Facebook and YouTube do it) Or if the player were to hold this button for a bit, it would instead bring up the menu for these preference sliders. That way the player can see the thumb's analysis (most effective if there were %ages, otherwise players would adjust until things are just barely a plus or minus) while they adjust their preferences.

It would also be nice if, when the game shows your equipped item to compare to what you're looking at, below it could show you how your stats would change. Would be particularly helpful if it kept set bonuses in mind.

[Machiavell]

Basic upgrade would be leaving BEST level items on ground >.<
Survival wave ends, there are weapons with 200+ only and armors with 150+ only. You can look them for stats during build phase without crying that your 300 300 300 300 sword is 1/1 atleast...

[JordanBird]

The most simple way I feel would to just use the same UI for weapons without numbers, only icons. In each field you can enter a number. If each factor on the dropped item is higher than the filter then it is green, else it's red and if it meets one of the requirements it is yellow.

I think we should also be able to specify that it should be of a certain quality, enchantment level and type and possibly upgradability.

[sandbagr]

There are lots of different ways to go about this. Some are way more complex for the coders, some are quite simple. The upshot is, ANY of them would be better than what now exists, which is actually a detriment.
In the last couple of months I may have picked up one or two green dot items I needed. Other than that they fill my item box. The more one specializes a character, the more items appear as green but really are not. That's what I mean by a detriment. If the 'configure' option only had level and nothing else, it would still help immensely.
I am glad to see this topic still being bandied about. I hope The Powers That Be take heed.