Quick Slot - Biggest UI fail in the game? Or is there something worse?

Talrenos

daneyulebub17_ESO wrote: »

But, with weapon swapping, those are mostly bugs. If it worked as intended, it would be ok.

But... the quick slots aren't buggy. They're just unbelievably, amazingly ineptly designed.

Seriously, I've seen pro and con arguments for many UI design decisions in this game-- some that I personally think are awful, but others don't agree --- but in the case of Quick Slots, no one defends them. They're just terrible. Really, really bad.

It's like someone intentionally made it to be horrible.

Yes /agree ..... The whole wheel thing only results in a single consumeable on your hot bar. The entire interface is a pointless waste of f***ing time. You can simply bring up inventory, sort by consumeables and drag what you want to the single button. That is MUCH faster than waiting for the pointless radial display to appear. Again this is a product of someones 'vision' of how it should be without any thought into how it would actually work or testing against players to see what they think first.

Xeres14

5 action bar slots. That's worse.

Enodoc

Tabbycat wrote: »

Also changed my Ultimate to 6.

Genius! Why didn't I think of that!
*Immediately changes Ultimate to 6*

I also think the radial select is badly designed for PC, and I use Easy Quick Slots. Is Greymind's Quick Slot the same as Easy Quick Slot if you turn the bar off?

Animal_Mother

Xeres14 wrote: »

5 action bar slots. That's worse.

Easily solved with 5 "quick" action bar slots.

AlnilamE

As someone who's playing a PC game for the first time in forever, I have a question:

How would you have arranged it?

My right hand is on the trackball and for the left hand, the following keys are being used:

` = weapon swap
1-5 = action skills
ASDW = movement
Q = Quick slot
E and R = Activate and pick-up
Z= Sheathe/Unsheathe weapon
X = Synergy
V = 1st/3rd person switch
TAB = Ultimate (rekeyed from R and was the best decision ever!)
Shift = Sprint
Crtl = Crouch
F = Random stuff context based
T = Cycle quest
G = Guild

Some of those can easily be rekeyed (like T, G and Z. Also F depending on how often you interact with players.)

Would you have put various quicklots in Z-B?

Where do people who use the add-on usually put them?

I personally use Healt/Magica/Spell or H/M/Stamina potions depending on character, and use the other slots as an out-of-combat quick access to items I may need, or as an easy way of changing potions (ie, I have 1 level 47 potion left and my level 50 potions are slotted and ready to go as soon as that last one is used).

Zabalah

Rarely use the quick slot function because it is so clunky... very poor design.

daneyulebub17_ESO

AlnilamE wrote: »

As someone who's playing a PC game for the first time in forever, I have a question:

How would you have arranged it?

My right hand is on the trackball and for the left hand, the following keys are being used:

` = weapon swap
1-5 = action skills
ASDW = movement
Q = Quick slot
E and R = Activate and pick-up
Z= Sheathe/Unsheathe weapon
X = Synergy
V = 1st/3rd person switch
TAB = Ultimate (rekeyed from R and was the best decision ever!)
Shift = Sprint
Crtl = Crouch
F = Random stuff context based
T = Cycle quest
G = Guild

Some of those can easily be rekeyed (like T, G and Z. Also F depending on how often you interact with players.)

Would you have put various quicklots in Z-B?

Where do people who use the add-on usually put them?

I personally use Healt/Magica/Spell or H/M/Stamina potions depending on character, and use the other slots as an out-of-combat quick access to items I may need, or as an easy way of changing potions (ie, I have 1 level 47 potion left and my level 50 potions are slotted and ready to go as soon as that last one is used).

Not having a pointer always available does make lots of skills more of a challenge, which is probably why WASD isn't the standard for MMOs, which tend to have a lot of skills/items. Care must be taken not make people have to remember too many keys.

That said--here's a few ideas, any of which would be infinitely better than the current system...

1. Simple keybindings (that not just select, but actually USE the slotted item. This adds to the keys people have to use, granted. But...it would completely viable if the inexplicable inability to use modifier keys in bindings was fixed.

If modifier keys were allowed, setting up your quick slots to be, say, "shifted" versions of your 1,2,3,4,5 skills, for instance, would be possible and not overly onerous to use or remember. <Shift>-1, just used my health pot. <Shift>-3, just used my magica. Easy, quick, and surely trivial to implement on Zeni's part.

or

2. Click Q (a fast click, not long) and a bar (heck, it could even be a radial) pops up immediately while your cursor is freed to simply click any item on it.

Q. Click. Done.

Sort of similar to what you get with a long-q press now, but without the long press, or the choose then click Q again crap.

or

3. A key is bound that when pressed, pops up on screen a row of slots with the last one selected. Release the key, that slot is triggered. But, press the key again (without fully depressing it--just a quick up/down) and the selection goes to Q-slot number 2, press again, number 3, etc. (Rolling over back to slot 1 when you pass the last one).

Keep the key down as long as you like, but whenever you let go entirely the slot you were last on is used.

Key-Key-Release. I just switched to my 2nd slot and used it.
Key-Release. Used it again.
Key-Key-Release. Now I just used my 3rd.
Key-Key-Key-Key-Release. My first again (assuming 5 slots total, which is about the max with this system I think).

It sounds like a lot of presses, but it's the same key, and they're quick, and I'm seeing it traverse the slots via the pop-up on screen so it's fast, accurate, easy and simple to master

---

with the use of just one key.

Those are just a few ideas that might not be perfect--until you put them next to what we have now--at which point they seem spectacular.

daneyulebub17_ESO

Csub wrote: »

I'm not using any quickbar addons, switching only takes 2 seconds, tops (usually less), and I don't do it in the last second so I usually don't die because of it.

Gonna have to time myself then as that sounds crazy fast. Just getting the Q slot up takes around 1.5 seconds doesn't it? At least? Then, making a selection with your mouse, letting the radial disappear, and then clicking Q again--all that--in "usually" less than 2 seconds.

Unless you're using a controller, which granted would help, that sounds a bit too fast.

Enodoc

AlnilamE wrote: »

Where do people who use the add-on usually put them?

I have them on F1 through F8 and I moved help to F12.

daneyulebub17_ESO wrote: »

making a selection with your mouse, letting the radial disappear, and then clicking Q again

If you click one of them with the mouse (rather than mouse-over, release, and then Q), doesn't it use it then?

Anastasia

ers101284b14_ESO wrote: »

I like the quickslot

What I hate is R being for ultimate and also for taking all because sometimes I accidentally hit it twice or hadn't hit E to open the bag and waste my ultimate.

---

***WHY do you not go into options/keybindings and re-mem it to a different key???

Anastasia

Obscure wrote: »

It's impressive how terrible it is. Really truly horrible. Giant ugly wheel of stuff in the middle of the god*** screen. It's like trying to play an awful mini game in the middle of a fight...

One gets enough of the "no I don't want mother ***ing Burning Oil! Healing potion you peice of ***! Healing potion!!!" moments, and they just download Graymind's Quick Slot...and thank the blessed womb that birthed that mod author into the world.

That said, if you have a thumb stick controlling a rotatory menu, IE a console controller, it's much easier to manipulate with a quick flick of the thumb. Hence the overt disregard for it being good at all for PC. It's as if at some point the devs just said, "*** it, it's going to console and we're keeping it in the build, and if the PC players don't like it they can *** off or get an add-on. We've got better things to do than complete the UI."

But yeah it's there with a controller in mind, not a mouse. The PC build is largely being treated like a test platform for the console build, and thus has horrible little things like that sitting around being good for nothing... unless you consider getting you killed in a menu whilst trying to go from a wall repair kit to a potion "good for something"...man I sooooo don't miss those days.

---

*Nods at Obscure and grimaces. Seriously - the first few times I tried to utilize the TESO U-I/keys to access pot's I had 'pretend/virtual reality ptsd flashbacks' from my main in EQ - a Cleric. The flippin' spell-book open in my face while medding back my mana probs only took up 30% more of my screen than this Quick-Slot bother. *This wheel thingie and the lack of reasonable thought put into how a PC player could effectively use it is crazy-making.

GnatB

Jennifur_Vultee wrote: »

I can see how console users may love it...
Imagine a console player in an intense fight, oh no he needs to pop a health potion! No problem he presses the left joystick down and the quickslot pops open, he rapidly and efficiently selects the health potion and lets up stick pressure and in 1-2 seconds has used a potion! Its a victory thanks to the quickslot easy selection!

Same situation with a PC player might go like this...
PC player is low on health presses Q and gets magicka potion, oh no! He quickly presses and holds Q to select a health potion, after fumbling with the selection in the heat of battle for 4-5 seconds...PC user is now dead. Gee thanks Zenimax.

To be honest, if potions actually worked like you describe for the console version on the PC version, I'd be fine with it. In fact, the first 5 or so times I attempted to use a potion that's exactly how i assumed it worked. Hold down button, slide the highlight to the potion you want to use, let go, bam, used. I just figured potions didn't heal enough/fast enough to keep me alive. It wasn't until I moved the bear trap you get in that AD group dungeon to the quickslots and tried to use it there that I discovered I hadn't actually been using the potions.

GnatB

AlnilamE wrote: »

As someone who's playing a PC game for the first time in forever, I have a question:

How would you have arranged it?

Would you have put various quicklots in Z-B?

Honestly? I'm not a big fan of the quickslot bars either. As I sort of suggested before, I may be in the minority, but I think the developers were *almost* on the right track.

I'd make the following changes:
1. When putting items into the radial slots, do *not* allow the user to put an item into the bottom slot, but *do* allow them to put an item into a middle slot.
2. When a user presses the quickslot button, the radial menu immediately comes up with the center item highlighted. (possibly a tunable delay in settings, but the delay would be purely visual. The user can give "input" before it's even visible.)
3. The user can then move the highlight to the radial items as he currently does.
4. When the user lets go, the highlighted pot is immediately used.
5. The bottom slot, which can't be used, is cancel.
6. If a user hasn't specified an item in the central quickslot slot from inventory, then the last pot used is there.

So, usage:
Player wants his default pot to be a health pot. He places it in the center. He wants his secondary pot to be Mana pot. He places it on the top. He wants his tertiary pot to be spell power/crit. He places it on the right.

He's in combat. He gets low on health, he taps the Q key to drink his default pot. (the heal potion).

He starts running low on mana, he holds down Q, quickly moves his mouse up, lets go q, drinks the mana potion. Time taken: 0.10 seconds.

Running low on health again, taps that Q button again for another health pot.

Then it's time to really put on the hurt. He holds down q again, quickly moves his mouse right, lets go q, drinks the power/crit potion. Time taken: 0.10 seconds.

Sleep

For me, selecting and using items in quickslot is not a problem. But sometimes putting new items in quickslot is a problem because of the auto scroll up bug.

GnatB

Enodoc wrote: »

If you click one of them with the mouse (rather than mouse-over, release, and then Q), doesn't it use it then?

Hmm, you know, I'm not sure I've actually tried that. Until I discovered otherwise I had assumed that simply letting go of Q would use it.

Ok, yeah. Got home and tried it, there's no cursor visible when the quickslots are up, and clicking doesn't do anything when one is highlighted.