About the S M L XL Ship classification business

[Vandragorax]

They seem to be sticking with the XR format of
S/M/L/XL
...
far more intuitive

But not equivalent in function. If you look on the map and see an icon for "hostile medium ship" you don't know if you should command your AI transporter to turn and flee or continue it's path towards it. Is that XL ship in the next sector a destroyer or a super large transport ship?

If you look on the XR map, not only will you actually know all that stuff from the icon, you'll also know the direction of travel of ships due to icon orientation (indicating the possible intent of the hostile).

If you only have SMLXL classification you can't know at a glance.

Whilst that would strictly be true, that isn't all you know in XR so isn't really relevant to RodentofDoom's point.

I have to agree here with the detail being in the minimap icon itself rather than relying on reading what military class each ship is in a list. Not only the icon itself but the status of the icon too. (does it flash when something is directly trying to attack you as opposed to just being red as s hostile who isn't paying you attention?)

I, as a player with access to a nice tactical map UI, should be able to tell "at a quick glance" what class of ship every little blip is on the map, its heading, and speed. This does work well in Rebirth, and I do not agree with those saying "But you can have two icons that are the same but one might be an armored freighter and the other one have no guns". That may be an edge case, but that is then where your detailed inspection comes into play. It still gave me enough information "at a glance" to be able to make an informed decision and that is what matters here.

[Killjaeden]

If you look on the XR map, not only will you actually know all that stuff from the icon, you'll also know the direction of travel of ships due to icon orientation (indicating the possible intent of the hostile).

The direction was not a point i was trying to make (and i fully acknowledge that it is good that you can see travel direction directly compared to X3).

See, when somebody says SMLXL is much better (compared to what btw) because it is so simple - yet in the map interface this classification is not used, but a more detailed classification instead (one where you can differentiate between capital sized transport and destroyer-esque ships), it clearly shows that SMLXL is NOT sufficient in of itself. And this is the entire point i was making here since the very beginning of this thread.

So when somebody says SMLXL is enough, but says it's good how it's done in rebirth - then they are just fooling themself. Because wether or not you create a name for the class - a different icon that is used across similar ships IS a classification in of itself. And if these icons do not match exactly to SMLXL classification system, then we are dealing with 2 classification systems at once. I mean sure, you can pretend to ignore them by not giving these icon based classes any names ... Doesn't change the fact that they are there, and you are just making it more difficult for yourself.

When you have many ships plus multiple ships of similar role it is super inefficient and confusing to use a unique icon for every unique ship. X3 would have never gotten away with that due to the amount of ships.

I have to agree here with the detail being in the minimap icon itself rather than relying on reading what military class each ship is in a list.

You are misunderstanding the point. The point is not that military class in list views are better than icons. The point is that you need to know more than just the ships size (SMLXL) to make the information usefull. And by giving detailed icons you are doing exaclty that - giving more informations and providing more detailed classification. Icons are no replacement for class names and vice versa. This is obvious. They need to coexist however, unless you want to describe the look of the icon every time you are referring to the shiptype - "that shiptype with the spiky bits and the two bars on the bottom icon"

[RAVEN.myst]

My opinion: the S/M/L/XL classification is too vague, it does not impart sufficient information - it is descriptive (and in only one dimension - size), rather than placing the subjects within functional categories. I would like to see a more explicit system similar to previous Xs. Yes, some have commented that the old system is something of a mess, lacking in logical sequences - just think of M0, M1, M2, M3, M4, M5, M6, M7, M8 - the size and power of those classes jumps around rather than those numerals representing a spectrum, and this could use an overhaul - I wouldn't be averse to learning a new set of conventions from scratch for the sake of the added functionality - just so long as the new codes are then completely different from the previous ones - one doesn't really want to say "so I was in my TM (umm... that's an X4 TM, not a TC/AP TM) and..." Since so many X-players have been playing for some time, and retrospective references aren't uncommon, such ambiguity should be avoided.

[mr.WHO]

S/M/L/XL is NOT A CLASSIFICATION in X-rebirth. It's as you said - size.


You have small freighters (M), medium freighters(L) and huge freighters (XL),
Fighters (S and M size), Corvettes and Bombers (M size), Frigates (L), destroyers and carriers (XL) - this is the actual classification of X-Rebirth, so you can easily differentiate ships of the same size.


You are too fixiated on the letters and miss the actual usage. You just want to have M0, M1...M8 because it's sounds cool....nerd

[RAVEN.myst]

S/M/L/XL is NOT A CLASSIFICATION in X-rebirth. It's as you said - size.

You have small freighters (M), medium freighters(L) and huge freighters (XL),
Fighters (S and M size), Corvettes and Bombers (M size), Frigates (L), destroyers and carriers (XL) - this is the actual classification of X-Rebirth, so you can easily differentiate ships of the same size.

You are too fixiated on the letters and miss the actual usage. You just want to have M0, M1...M8 because it's sounds cool....nerd

Actually, if as you say the size distinctions aren't a classification (and I don't disagree), then there is effectively NO classification, and ABSOLUTELY no abbreviated classification, which is useful in some situations. However, this is also in part due to lack of variety and distinctiveness in the ships: "fighters" - well, in previous games we had scout fighter (M5), interceptor/light fighter (M4), medium fighter (M3), heavy fighter (M3+) - these designations are NOT frivolous or gratuitous, they are in fact VERY useful - but only because there are ships of various roles to discriminate between. Now, in XR, we have "fighter" - whoop-de-****ing-do! ES can do better than that!

And as for the larger (capital-grade ships), how do we even distinguish between ship classes, seeing as there's very little of categories in the first place? There are too few ships to even really comprise actual ship classes. There's ONE missile frigate - does it get its own ship class? So what's a Stromvok? A "non-missile" frigate? What about the Suls? Oh right, those are supposedly light and medium "carriers", yet there is nothing for them to carry that can't be hosted by any other capital ship, and the same applies to the full-size "carrier". So the ship line-up in Rebirth is too weak to merit ship classes.

Where are these "corvettes" and "bombers" you speak of? Do you refer to Katanas and Drostans, respectively, perhaps? Well, the latter perhaps can be thought of as "bombers", but certainly I haven't found anything that can reasonably be thought of as a "corvette" - the Katanas are nothing more than slightly tougher and easier-to-hit fighters.

The codified designations may appear "nerdy" and "cool sounding" (really? I personally don't think they sound cool at all, so guess again; to me they simply fulfil a function of brevity and communicative efficiency - different strokes for different folks, I guess ) (That being said, though based entirely on a spurious and unsubstantiated assumption, your guess of "nerd" IS bang-on, heheheh!) Furthermore, they enabled a VERY useful function in terms of sorting the property list by ship class - Rebirth's property list is... ahem... "not excellent" (to put it VERY mildly!), and I think that a properly functional replacement for it (in X4) would require a more formalised ship classification system.

Your post has drawn my attention to something: in Rebirth, there are not enough ship types to justify a structured system of ship and ship class nomenclature, so perhaps the problem actually lies there, rather. I would be very disappointed to see even as little as triple Rebirth's ship selection in X4 (disappointed because then I shan't be buying and playing the game) - and I don't mean only in terms of ship models, but in ship *types*. "Fighter", for example, is for me much too broad and vague a category, far too lacking in subtlety and nuances. THAT is what I'm after, not allegedly "cool" alphanumeric codes.

Lastly: OK, so S/M/L/XL is all about size - but even here the "system" is "rather broken" - the "gap" between M and L is simply too great, there is no smooth transition. Maybe you think that a smooth transition is not required, but I do. The jump from piloted boats to crewed ships is too abrupt - in fact, to refer back above somewhat, there is a hole shaped much like a corvette from "classic Xs". (Functionally, the Skunk appears to be the closest to filling that hole - but that ship is listed as being SMALL! So, we can add "inconsistent" to the adjectives for this "system".)

Happy hunting!


In other news, and completely off-topic: 12 hours now without water - "thanks", municipality! Grrrrr!

[mr.WHO]

It seems Egosoft solved this by putting detailed ship icons in the footage that closely resemble X3 icons - see footage from today stream.

They looks very good and clear, maybe except Minotaur icon (hard to tell if this is a corvette, frigate or missile frigate).

[RAVEN.myst]

It seems Egosoft solved this by putting detailed ship icons in the footage that closely resemble X3 icons - see footage from today stream.

They looks very good and clear, maybe except Minotaur icon (hard to tell if this is a corvette, frigate or missile frigate).

Icons may be good (I haven't seen them yet, so I don't know enough - yet), at least they suggest ship distinctions. But as Killjaeden pointed out, they are not a replacement for textual representations of designations, as they are merely the iconic/graphical representations of those designations - icons don't translate well into language (verbal or textual), unless they have textual "synonyms". But, if the distinctions already exist and are visually depicted (thanks for the heads-up on that ) then there is hope. Hell, the icon definitions needn't even be separately and explicitly given: if the ship descriptions in the encyclopaedia list ship type for every entry (and do so accurately and unambiguously), then we can take it from there and match the little pictures to the ship-name words (and those who want can make up their own alphanumeric codes or such.)

[Killjaeden]

S/M/L/XL is NOT A CLASSIFICATION in X-rebirth. It's as you said - size.

Size is also a classification. In any case, i have never been defending the idea of SMLXL - because it doesnt work well ingame, it is insufficient on it's own (but usefull as a part of a more functional classification system), and i have not been saying that it's been used in this fashion in Rebirth. Others did - which is precisely the reason why i do not believe that they fully realize what core concepts they have been dealing with while playing.

You are too fixiated on the letters and miss the actual usage. You just want to have M0, M1...M8 because it's sounds cool....nerd

Not sure if directed at me - i already stated that i'm just asking for a revised - better - system. X2's system worked well enough, with the caveats that no rules for size where fixated. But it left no room for expansion, so everything that was tacked on later became illogical to anyone who hadn't played the previous games.
New classes that are used ingame in form of icons need names so we can call them what they are. For convenience the game should also establish logical abbreviations. Why? Because people will make up their own any way, and since not everyone does the same it can get confusing when communicating.
However - These abbreviations must be chosen in such way that they do not infer or suggest an ordering, so any alphabetical order or numbering is ruled out. Otherwise we're back at square one as soon as soon as some update or expansion introduces a new intermediate class (aka M6 in X3, M7 in TC etc)

[RainerPrem]

It seems Egosoft solved this by putting detailed ship icons in the footage that closely resemble X3 icons - see footage from today stream.

They looks very good and clear, maybe except Minotaur icon (hard to tell if this is a corvette, frigate or missile frigate).

Can you imagine performing a dogfight by clicking on icons? That was really weird seeing only a map instead of a live animation. That's the move from a space simulation to a tabletop cosim.

It a computer game it matters what I can SEE when entering a sector/zone. A bunch of indistinguishable squares all marked with a triangle as in XR or a tactical display showing a clear prioritized identification of combatants and bystanders.

cu
Rainer

[Crellion]

You need a classification code that provides more info than just size.

M0 - M5 system did it.

X-M-L-XL system doesn't cut it.

You could still have a "rebirthy" system if you prefer by using a class letter before the size letter.

Example Small and Medium Fighter could be FS and FM etc etc

This is doable.

But to have a system that imparts too little information is plain wrong. Why? Because its 'designed' so that people have 'less stuff to learn' but it has the result that people in the endgame have 'more stuff to learn' i.e. they need to learn all the vessel names to know something of the capabilities. Which is counter intuitive, wrong and the opposite to what (I think) Ego was trying to achieve.

Now I read people say in the stream (which I have ready-to-play when I get at home) they are using 'icons that mean something' as in the X3 icons that corresponded to M class system.

That is very good as an indication they are fixing the useless XR map but also its good as an indication that they realize the problems with the arcade-y S-M-L-XL system and are maybe thinking of fixing them.

I pray that they do. The stream looked like a better game than X:R to be honest.

[Crellion]

It seems Egosoft solved this by putting detailed ship icons in the footage that closely resemble X3 icons - see footage from today stream.

They looks very good and clear, maybe except Minotaur icon (hard to tell if this is a corvette, frigate or missile frigate).

Can you imagine performing a dogfight by clicking on icons? That was really weird seeing only a map instead of a live animation. That's the move from a space simulation to a tabletop cosim.

It a computer game it matters what I can SEE when entering a sector/zone. A bunch of indistinguishable squares all marked with a triangle as in XR or a tactical display showing a clear prioritized identification of combatants and bystanders.

cu
Rainer

Slow clap!

[mr.WHO]

<facepalm>

Will you be able to read the ship registry ID in dogfigth more swift that to look at icon?

These are map icons in X4 and just like in X3 the are VISIBLE OUTSIDE THE MAP TOO (so in dogfight too just like in X3):
https://imgur.com/a/D9rRV

You can see various size fighters, carrier and fraighter - all have diffrent icons.

Watch the 2nd stream for better quality and see this in dynamic situation.

The whole point that M1, M2... letters are easier to use in combat than icons is invalid
The S/M/L/LX classification issue is also invalid due to the icons in X4.

[Killjaeden]

The whole point that M1, M2... letters are easier to use in combat than icons is invalid

It is indeed, i'm not sure who is arguing that letters could be a replacement of icons ?

[Nanook]

<facepalm>

Will you be able to read the ship registry ID in dogfigth more swift that to look at icon?...

In short, yes. I found it very easy and informative to be able to see that designation in the Hud in past X games. There was no confusion such as we will likely get when trying to quickly distinguish some tiny icon on the screen. Large icons aren't good because they will clutter up the screen when there are multiple ships in view. Small icons are ok for designating ships on a map or in the hud. But when you target a specific ship, the letter designation is much more informative. A good system uses both.

[RAVEN.myst]

A good system uses both.

+1 million! (pardon the hyperbole, but that's really how strongly I agree )
The textual and visual descriptors are both useful, but one is more useful in some situations/contexts, while the other more in others - neither on its own can fulfill all requirements - they complement each other.

The fundamental problem with the size-only-based designations/classifications (Rebirth) is that they impart information about the gross dimension of size, but too little information about function, and in most cases the latter is far more important. In Rebirth, there are *some* distinctions made by the icons, but they are rather too vague: the same icon is used for a Strommie and a Taranis, and yet functionally the two are vastly different. However, it works adequately in that game because of its very limited roster of ships, compared to previous (and hopefully subsequent!) titles in the series.

So far, I'm daring to be optimistic about all this getting worked out by release, as what I'm reading and seeing certainly suggests movement in a desirable direction.

[Crellion]

The whole point that M1, M2... letters are easier to use in combat than icons is invalid

It is indeed, i'm not sure who is arguing that letters could be a replacement of icons ?

What he said & the whole point is quite the opposite, mr.WHO. I.e. changing the letters rationale from a size only approach to a size and function approach walks hand in hand with having a visual representation imparting function as well as size. Indeed to the extent that the last vid seems to suggest the latter I would expect it to also somewhat suggest the former.

[dctrjons]

Feel free to ignore the drive by commenters who obviously haven't read the thread.

Ok going to come at this with my experience...pulling from time in the USAF, mechanical design, retail, and a little computer science mix.

XS-XL is very mass market retail friendly way of categorizing. In a environment where volume is king. Pushing product out in a way that is quick and simple, yet requires (by design) the interested party to invest their time to figure out the details....ie browse and hopefully buy more. It is very simplistic for linear sorting, however not inclusive of function. Men get inches for measurements, women get crazy wierd numbers...because well, reasons. But retail is a psyc game .... that uses codes too in a somewhat devious way...not getting onto that, that would be a doctoral thesis.

In the background of retail though, 2-3 digit codes rule...for speedy filtering, to see where which products go to which dept. And this is how all other logistical operation works from chemical processing, waste management, mechanical hardware designations...

So the question is what is the point of the designation, if it's to do a linear sort, you use the sizing method, if it's to provide functional information you need a code. That's just how the rest of the world does it. The question is for the developer's then...who is the target for this information... who is their target demographic?

Can argue about how confusing X3s designations were, but the idea was sound and learnable, with room for improvement (M6 corv, M7 frig, M8 bomber????). Symbols / icons are the essentially the same thing...but aren't used often because they don't translate to text. Great for a graphical game, but that's where the code equivalent comes in.

So, yeah I'm baised. Lol, well quite frankly because every job I've had uses letter codes to identify the properties of similar type "things" for at a glance information. If that isn't how craft are going to be designated...then that tells me that that information is not deemed important to the target player base...which means Im not part of the target player base...which concerns me. Especially how much focus is on this new interface.

For the sake of argument, hoping for the best. Designations such as CSC, CF, FS, XT....and such are not ideal. They can get visually mixed and depending on how you assign them...make a muddled list. Meaning you could be finding military, commercial, civilian craft of all sorts and shapes appearing in somewhat random order. The Mx, Tx was somewhat elegant in it put the more "important" ships at the top if you just did a simple alphanumeric sort. And the + symbol was a very recognizable addition to point out outliers.

I'd love to think tank a better system that improves the X3 format to be more accessible, but if XS-XL is going to be the goal...then I can already see the marketing aspect taking priority.

[RAVEN.myst]

an insightful analysis

Well, at least that's what I think.

[adeine]

Object IDs like in X3 are incredibly useful, neatly sort into a list in sector maps and give you all the important information straight away:

1) Faction
2) Type of ship
3) Unique identifier (useful to keep track of your own ships if you have unnamed duplicates not to mention AI ships)

I know sector maps/layout aren't final but just look at this comparison for a second:

https://i.imgur.com/OteoErR.png

YTLOU-71 vs AAI-427

I'm assuming one of the A's is for Argon(?) but it's player property, so that's already confusing. Then AI-427? AO-761? I know I haven't played X:R so may be missing things here but the fact that I can't even begin to guess what any of it means isn't promising (if the unique ID is only the number, it makes it difficult to memorise vs. the XX-## identifier of X3).

Whereas YTLOU-71 immediately tells me: Ok, this is a ship of mine, it's a TL, and alongside OU-71 is unique enough with the letters and number that it will stand out to me in a list. It also helps that AI ships that form part of the same thing are close together in IDs (look at the pirate wing and Jonferco escort on the list) - immediately recognisable which ships "belong together". This carries over to the naming scheme as well, where AI ships are [Faction] [Role] [Class] [Subclass], which helps to process the list at a glance. The icons are helpful but not as helpful as the text.

It's also important to note how the IDs are all vertically aligned in X3, which parses well just by skimming the list, whereas the dev screenshot in X4 has them following the name in parentheses, which given disparate name lengths will be all over the place, making it hard to find what you're looking for.

Not saying the M# classification system is the best option, but something similar should be implemented, with recognisable and actually descriptive ship IDs.


{Images posted directly to the forums should not be greater than 640x480 or 100kb, oversize image now linked - Terre}

[Sandalpocalypse]

well for one thing you are comparing the property list with 2 ships on it (hardly enough to make any determinations) to a sector list.

XR, and from what i've seen x4 have a more hierarchal and collapsable focus. so a given task group will show up as one object (i.e. Pirate Riot Squad, or HoA Freedom Frigate). X4 will also focus more on looking at the actual map than looking at a list as the map will be much more useable on several dimensions; you'll be able to view a greater gameplay area since it is split up less than both X3 and XR, and what you see will be vastly more informative.