[TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

This forum provides information on obtaining access to Public Beta versions of X4: Foundations allowing people running those versions to provide feedback on their experiences.

Moderator: DevNet Public Moderators

DocAce
EGOSOFT
EGOSOFT
Posts: 638
Joined: Sun, 22. Feb 04, 16:26
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by DocAce » Fri, 30. Jul 21, 15:19

Imuniser wrote:
Fri, 30. Jul 21, 14:05
Yes, so that it will easily snap to connectors without having to reposition the camera for special axis rotations. Usually one builds more than one module in a row and would speed up the process if you rotate one and then have the subsequent one keeping the same rotation.
If you're placing multiple of the same module you should use the copy function from the right-click menu. That makes a copy with an identical orientation.

Imuniser
Posts: 251
Joined: Sat, 9. Jun 12, 09:30
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Imuniser » Fri, 30. Jul 21, 16:44

DocAce wrote:
Fri, 30. Jul 21, 15:19
If you're placing multiple of the same module you should use the copy function from the right-click menu. That makes a copy with an identical orientation.
Indeed, however I was thinking more along the line of module-connector-module process.

Eyeklops
Posts: 329
Joined: Tue, 23. Mar 21, 17:58
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Eyeklops » Fri, 30. Jul 21, 16:49

So having spent a few hours in the new station editor here is my feedback:

1. I liked the way the legacy (4.10 beta 4 & earlier) camera rotated around a point in front of the camera better than the camera being the rotation point. What the original lacked was the ability for the rotation center to be freely moved up/down. Adding the WASDZX movement to the legacy camera rotation point is what I am asking for.

2. I'd prefer the movement speed of the camera to be linear instead of ramping up. An option to change the movement speed via a menu slider or faster/slower keybinds would be nice.

3. I miss being able to zoom in and out with my mouse-wheel. Maybe I don't have something set correctly because it doesn't work anymore. That said, the legacy camera zoom scrolling wasn't perfect either and sometimes had much larger "steps" that expected. Frequently one step of the mousewheel would zoom past the object I wanted to get a closer look at.

4. The legacy camera had a bug (quirk?) that is not present in the new camera (Yey!). Selecting a module from the right information panel with the legacy camera snapped the rotation point to that module. If an attempt was made to move that module the camera rotation point would quickly snap back to the original origin point. Typically this would end up with the module being dragged well away from where I was working in the editor forcing me to start over. I would think the camera origin point should have remained static in this scenario.

I think I just want the legacy camera with the ability to freely move the rotation center (especially up/down) and a more refined mouse wheel zoom. It could very well be that I am not using the new camera correctly.

User avatar
steph_m37
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed, 25. Mar 20, 17:12
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by steph_m37 » Fri, 30. Jul 21, 16:51

hi!

I just try again so you must align the view in the axis of rotation of the module to turn? (I'm right!)

If you watch my video, I place the module in front of the dock so to perform my rotation (as indicated in the video), I should have oriented the view to the top

it's just my opinion but why touch the view to perform a rotation, while keeping the view
And by having the possibility to choose the axes (nodes of the module) by choosing them by with two keys of the keyboard
The axis selected in progress would be highlighted and active and here we turn around the chosen axis.
This is my opinion, but the view of the station should not interfere with the placement of the modules.

(someone can make a clear explainer video with the actual beta thk!)

Steph
- ROG STRIX Z390 I9-9900k- ROG STRIX White OC 24 GB RTX 3090 - 64 GB DDR 3600  -  SSD Nvme  1to, SSD EVOplus NVme 2T, DD 3To - SoundBlaster AE-9 - Monitor ASUS Swift PG32UQX & Alienware AW2721D - AIO Corsair H100i PRO - WARTHOG + T-RUDDER + MFD WINWING

Eyeklops
Posts: 329
Joined: Tue, 23. Mar 21, 17:58
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Eyeklops » Fri, 30. Jul 21, 17:25

I forgot to mention I do design for a living and spend many hours a day rotating 3D models in CAD. I've used a few different CAD packages and probably the most intuitive interface I've used selects a point on the first surface under the mouse pointer and rotates the model at that point. If there is no surface under the mouse pointer rotate the model at the geometry bounding box center. I understand there is a fundamental difference between rotating the camera around a point and rotating the model (station) around a point and that the engine X4 is built on may not easily handle this.

Zloth2
Posts: 385
Joined: Sat, 7. Jul 18, 17:16
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Zloth2 » Fri, 30. Jul 21, 18:54

DocAce wrote:
Fri, 30. Jul 21, 15:19
Imuniser wrote:
Fri, 30. Jul 21, 14:05
Yes, so that it will easily snap to connectors without having to reposition the camera for special axis rotations. Usually one builds more than one module in a row and would speed up the process if you rotate one and then have the subsequent one keeping the same rotation.
If you're placing multiple of the same module you should use the copy function from the right-click menu. That makes a copy with an identical orientation.
Because right-click also does rotation, this often results in the module rotating as well as showing the menu item. Control-z undoes the rotate, so it isn't too bad if you know about control-z, but I don't think many people know that trick.
"If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home
and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here! It's wondrous, with
treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross, but it's not for the
timid." ---- Q

User avatar
X2-Eliah
Posts: 4369
Joined: Thu, 12. Oct 06, 16:30
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by X2-Eliah » Fri, 30. Jul 21, 19:35

Some notes on the controls for station builder / editor...

The increased amount of rotation is neat, but honestly making (simple) stations is more frustrating now than it was before the change.

1st problem: How can I distinguish between "right click on module to rotate" and "right click on module to open the mini menu with "remove selection" etc. options"? Because jeez is it frustrating as hell when i try to get that menu to open and the module just spins around. And - idk if its down to framerate, or needing to keep the mouse perfectly still (won't happen with a high dpi / sensitivity mouse), but almost every time I want to bring up that right-click-menu on a module, it just rotates instead.

2nd problem: How can I lock the rotation around one of the axes (x, y, z) instead of the module seemingly selecting a random axis to rotate around? It's nice to have the ability for free rotation, sure, but from the interface I have no clue how to properly control that rotation. Looking at notes, there is supposed to be some auto-selection of the nearest axis? Well.. whichever axis gets selected, often does not coincide with the global axes of the sector.
Ideally a transform widget - like you have in Blender, Maya etc. - would be best, or *at least* being able to toggle a rotation (and translation) axis-lock. With the station builder I don't feel like I ever have control of all 3 dimensions when I'm moving things around.

Incinerator
Posts: 132
Joined: Thu, 27. Jul 06, 13:56
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Incinerator » Fri, 30. Jul 21, 22:52

G315t wrote:
Fri, 30. Jul 21, 15:01
Seems the sector view is not loaded correctly here.

Image
Yup something similar happened, I was designing station in another sector, while on autopilot and my ship being in another sector elsewhere entered a highway, and boy did it mess up the designer view.

G315t
Posts: 113
Joined: Sun, 16. Jun 19, 17:43
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by G315t » Fri, 30. Jul 21, 23:26

Incinerator wrote:
Fri, 30. Jul 21, 22:52

Yup something similar happened, I was designing station in another sector, while on autopilot and my ship being in another sector elsewhere entered a highway, and boy did it mess up the designer view.
I was also not in this sector but standing on the bridge of my destroyer in another sector.

Zloth2
Posts: 385
Joined: Sat, 7. Jul 18, 17:16
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Zloth2 » Sat, 31. Jul 21, 01:48

Everything rotates around the center of the object, even when connected. It does not rotate around the connection. Furthermore, if the object is symmetrical, rotating still breaks the connection! For instance, attach a Protein Paste to a Teladi L Storage. Rotate the camera around so you are looking straight through the center of the PP module to the connection. Rotate the PP module 90 degrees so it's on its side. Rotate back around and you will see the connection arrows are back between the storage and the module.

This causes quite a few disconnects in large stations if you don't rotate first then attach. When you click on the very first module, only some of the station gets highlighted because attachments are broken.

I finally turned on the free camera. Not being able to use the mouse wheel is a pain but, if that's the price of the accelerating move speed, I'll take it. The free camera is far, far better at zooming into tight spots than the mouse wheel.

Any chance we could do the chunky rotate by default and hold shift down to do the free rotation? I find I almost always want the chunky rotate.
"If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home
and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here! It's wondrous, with
treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross, but it's not for the
timid." ---- Q

User avatar
steph_m37
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed, 25. Mar 20, 17:12
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by steph_m37 » Sat, 31. Jul 21, 08:17

Hi !
  1. it's better after some training and testing!
    (I too use Blender, inventor, SolidWorks, and Catia too, and rotate an object is simpler in these programs, we must leave it aside with x4)

    [ external image ]
    .
  2. and more difficult because the axis are not corresponding with the x y z view.

    [ external image ]
To turn a module that is no longer oriented with X,Y,Z views, well it's really not practical at all, to achieve this alignment
it took me a lot of tests and it is necessary to proceed in stages in the rotations.

We have these beautiful nodes, with the X, Y, Z axes, represented on the module, why not use them! Directly to turn the module by selecting them.
Two keys on the keyboard to browse the nodes of the module, with highlighting to find your way around.
and on the selected node a right click on X, Y or Z and turn your module or you want exactly, without worrying with the main view.

The way X4 works may not allow what I said before, it is certainly explained somewhere on the forum :oops:, Everything is in English hard to find.

Steph
- ROG STRIX Z390 I9-9900k- ROG STRIX White OC 24 GB RTX 3090 - 64 GB DDR 3600  -  SSD Nvme  1to, SSD EVOplus NVme 2T, DD 3To - SoundBlaster AE-9 - Monitor ASUS Swift PG32UQX & Alienware AW2721D - AIO Corsair H100i PRO - WARTHOG + T-RUDDER + MFD WINWING

G315t
Posts: 113
Joined: Sun, 16. Jun 19, 17:43
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by G315t » Sat, 31. Jul 21, 14:03

The problem here is, that players, that have no experience to work in 3D Modeling space or CAD software will probaply be even more lost with the controls of the station editor than we are right now. I can see people give up on the feature very fast if they can not get easy access to the controls. If I weren't so stubborn and stress-resistant, I certainly wouldn't want to deal with it.
I spent almost 35 minutes yesterday aligning 5 modules. Especially the rotation of the TER 3 E Docks has driven me crazy because it changed its position again and again when "snapping" to the connector (which was due to the fact that the construction area was not wide enough, but I noticed that much too late).

Withidread
Posts: 34
Joined: Sat, 14. Feb 04, 19:18
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Withidread » Sat, 31. Jul 21, 15:40

The new rotation, for me, is completely unusable. I'm bordering on 2k hours in x4, but this would force me to put down the whole game. I can't even build a simple station from scratch, let alone the huge complexes I'm used to building.

Being able to see the rest of the sector in the background is a nice feature, and really useful for things like editing loadouts on defense modules, but I'd rather it be a toggle.

Zloth2
Posts: 385
Joined: Sat, 7. Jul 18, 17:16
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Zloth2 » Sat, 31. Jul 21, 17:28

When doing the loadouts, we really need something for the fonts for the turrets/shields. If you're working with Terran station parts, the white text is being drawn over the white station parts background.

Also, the station architect start is being done with Mars hanging around (at least for me, might be different if I didn't have Cradle of Humanity). Orange'ish production station parts against the red of mars is visible, but a bit difficult.


Withidread, I've got no experience in CAD software at all. If you keep the camera floating above (or below) most of the time, the rotation will be just like always. Here's some tips:
  • Control-Z to undo! If you right click to pop up a menu and the module rotates on you, just do a control-z before selecting the menu option you want. If you try to rotate something and it doesn't work out the way you want, control-z puts it back. If you decide the placement you did a few minutes ago was bad, control-z a few times to undo what you've done until it undoes the bad thing. The key is hugely handy.
  • Rotate before placement. Just drop your new module in empty space, then do your rotations, then attach. Remember, you can only rotate around X, Y, and Z. If you're silicon wafer factory is already at a diagonal, you aren't going to be able to spin it around its own long axis.
  • Hold the shift key down when rotating so it jumps at 30 degree angles.
  • Just like in 4, when you first try to place a new module, the item will often appear WAY far away or even behind your camera! To work around this, keep a cross section module a little ways away from your station. If your new module piece doesn't want to behave, place it on the cross section first.
  • If you do find you need to spin a piece that's already placed, the piece will get unattached after spinning. You'll need to pull it away then place it back on its anchor again.
  • Hover over your initial module from time to time to make sure the entire station is getting highlighted. Deal with any portions that aren't highlighting.
  • Save often! I don't mean saving the game, I mean saving a template. Crashes happen. Undo lists normally have some sort of limit, too, and you don't want to find out what that limit is the hard way.
  • The 'creative' start will let you start with any station you have a template for. You can use that to see how your station looks and double-check how many modules you have as you go without having to wait for the whole build process to happen.
  • The free camera option is good for fine control, but you lose the ability to zoom with the mouse wheel. If you want to make a big station, you're going to need that fine control. If you're just doing a quick station, the old way is more convenient and works well enough.
Many of these are likely to change with upcoming betas.
"If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home
and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here! It's wondrous, with
treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross, but it's not for the
timid." ---- Q

Raptor34
Posts: 2475
Joined: Sat, 12. Jun 10, 04:43
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Raptor34 » Sat, 31. Jul 21, 18:26

G315t wrote:
Thu, 29. Jul 21, 09:51
Raptor34 wrote:
Thu, 29. Jul 21, 09:30
What if I want to build according to the galactic plane? Is it still easy? Or would the new freeform building make it go out of alignment?
It starts in standard orientation so if you just place the first module and then attach more to it it will allways be aligned to the plane.
I'm thinking of if I want to rotate it around.
The new system makes it sound like rotation would be based on camera orientation, which makes it sound easy to rotate wrong, so to speak.

User avatar
ubuntufreakdragon
Posts: 5189
Joined: Thu, 23. Jun 11, 14:57
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by ubuntufreakdragon » Sat, 31. Jul 21, 20:22

X2-Eliah wrote:
Fri, 30. Jul 21, 19:35
1st problem: How can I distinguish between "right click on module to rotate" and "right click on module to open the mini menu with "remove selection" etc. options"? Because jeez is it frustrating as hell when i try to get that menu to open and the module just spins around. And - idk if its down to framerate, or needing to keep the mouse perfectly still (won't happen with a high dpi / sensitivity mouse), but almost every time I want to bring up that right-click-menu on a module, it just rotates instead.
just don't have the module in question selected, than rotate is not an option.
My X3 Mods

XRebirth, things left to patch:
In General; On Firing NPC's; In De Vries; Out Of Zone; And the Antiwishlist

Zetoss
Posts: 395
Joined: Tue, 18. Dec 07, 00:17
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Zetoss » Sat, 31. Jul 21, 21:57

I feel like the station pieces might need a little bit of additional variety to make the rotation feature produce good looking results, specifically the connectors from almost all races are very "thou shalt build thine station in a squaaare!" type, they only provide 90 degree increment angles. Would be nice if just like 2 or 3 "oddball" connections were added, like one that bends 22.5 or 30 degrees and some reskins of the Split 3 way to match other races. Anyone else thinking the same?

Zloth2
Posts: 385
Joined: Sat, 7. Jul 18, 17:16
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Zloth2 » Sun, 1. Aug 21, 00:53

I was thinking some sort of sphere-connector would be nice. It isn't hard to get a lot of nasty angles right now. For instance, place a Paranid disk down then tilt it 30 degrees. Hook a Paranid Y connection to the upper or lower rim. Now try hooking anything to either of the other two arms of the Y. It can be done, but it's rough!

I sphere connection would allow. say, three connections at any angle. That would increase the freedom for pure-Argon or Teladi stations to break out of the box, it would also provide a way for players to quickly deal with those difficult situations. Naturally, such a powerful piece will need something extra in the cost. Perhaps a little nividium?

(No clue if the technology will allow anything like this. To look good, the shape of the sphere-connector would have to morph depending on the angles used.)
"If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home
and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here! It's wondrous, with
treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross, but it's not for the
timid." ---- Q

G315t
Posts: 113
Joined: Sun, 16. Jun 19, 17:43
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by G315t » Sun, 1. Aug 21, 13:49

Wow I never knew the Entry lane of those docking modules was so long!

Image

Withidread
Posts: 34
Joined: Sat, 14. Feb 04, 19:18
x4

Re: [TESTREQUEST] Station Editor

Post by Withidread » Sun, 1. Aug 21, 15:52

Withidread wrote:
Sat, 31. Jul 21, 15:40
The new rotation, for me, is completely unusable. I'm bordering on 2k hours in x4, but this would force me to put down the whole game. I can't even build a simple station from scratch, let alone the huge complexes I'm used to building.

Being able to see the rest of the sector in the background is a nice feature, and really useful for things like editing loadouts on defense modules, but I'd rather it be a toggle.
So, after working with it more, I think I've finally, mostly got it figured out. But this *really* needs a good tutorial, and a recommendation for experienced players to go through it. I still don't see myself actually *using* the new rotation capabilities, but I'm to the point where they aren't hindering me like they were.

Post Reply

Return to “X4: Foundations - Public Beta Feedback”