Modification to the base ui - possible? (Speifically the group box)

rabb1t_ESO · August 2018

It doesn't look like this forum is used a lot, but hopefully I can get an answer.

I'm looking for just a bit of additional information on the group box; CP level, HP, physical and spell resists. (Ideally even set that info line up to fade when in combat, as it's really only something I'd like to verify/check now and then.) I've tried a couple of the current addons that show HP, however, I find that they all seem to show HP and % of HP in the health bar itself, which I find really distracting.

Question; Is it possible to modify the base UI, but mostly leave it intact?

The reason I ask is I really like the default look of the base group UI. I'd like this information to be added to it WITHOUT removing the base look of it. The two addons I've tried, and others I've seen, all seem to fully replace the default UI. So, is it not possible to retain the base UI look? Does the addon code 'erase' the base UI code for the group box and you must start from scratch?

If it is possible, is there anywhere I can see the base code? I'm pretty terrible at coding (got As in the early couple of programming classes, but after getting Ds in intermediate dropped the attempts), but usually if I can 'see the language' I can understand enough of it to maybe hopefully tweak these things in I'd like to have.

rabb1t_ESO · August 2018

Picture for additional clarity.

Left side - original unmodified UI look

Middle - non-combat desired state with additional information

Right - in-combat desired state (additional info fades to a default 20% with the option to not fade, or fade completely to 0%.)

SlippyCheeze · August 2018

rabb1t_ESO wrote: »

I'm looking for just a bit of additional information on the group box; CP level, HP, physical and spell resists. (Ideally even set that info line up to fade when in combat, as it's really only something I'd like to verify/check now and then.) I've tried a couple of the current addons that show HP, however, I find that they all seem to show HP and % of HP in the health bar itself, which I find really distracting.

Question; Is it possible to modify the base UI, but mostly leave it intact?

Yes, this is possible. Check http://www.esoui.com/ to see if this exists, which I think it may, but if not, you absolutely can make those changes from an addon.

rabb1t_ESO · August 2018

That's where I got the 2 I tried and 2 others I looked at.

Again, ALL of them completely replace the default UI. Are you sure it can be made so it DOESN'T completely replace the look?

SlippyCheeze · August 2018

rabb1t_ESO wrote: »

That's where I got the 2 I tried and 2 others I looked at.

Again, ALL of them completely replace the default UI. Are you sure it can be made so it DOESN'T completely replace the look?

Yes. If none of the existing addons do what you want, write your own.

rabb1t_ESO · August 2018

Yeah but that's not really the question. The question is; if I do so CAN the EXISTING UI be added to, or MUST it 'start from scratch'. Because I've seen none that do what I am looking for, implying that it can't be done and they all MUST start from scratch.

TFPAcer · August 2018

You can just add it to the existing group frame without creating another one.

rabb1t_ESO · August 2018

Yay.

But is there a place to see the base code to know what I'd need to add too? Or do I have to get others that are similar and look at their code to get an idea what the base code might be?

I'm apparently super bad at programing, but if I can see the original I should be able to discern what needs to go where. When I went to the wiki they were like 'here are the one million possible variables for all the things', and I was like… uh... I need to know like 6 of those.

idk · August 2018

CP can be gleamed from the grouping window uo to the point of the current cap. A running total isn’t needed full time or even even out of combat. Can it be added? Yes.

As for resistance, that info is not available via the API. Zos determines long ago they didn’t want our stats shared and closed off anything that shared stats. Before the game was launched we could see max stats and remaining stats for magicka and stam. Something that offered a tactical advantage but clearly information our character should not be expected to know.

Edit: in other words a player would have to opt in to share information for an add on to obtain it.

rabb1t_ESO · August 2018

Hum, so really could just get max hp and true CP... which both are of limited value... will have to ponder it more. For whatever reason my brain really doesn't like the altered UIs which currently show that info from what I've found.

Drummerx04 · August 2018

rabb1t_ESO wrote: »

It doesn't look like this forum is used a lot, but hopefully I can get an answer.

Question; Is it possible to modify the base UI, but mostly leave it intact?

If it is possible, is there anywhere I can see the base code? I'm pretty terrible at coding (got As in the early couple of programming classes, but after getting Ds in intermediate dropped the attempts), but usually if I can 'see the language' I can understand enough of it to maybe hopefully tweak these things in I'd like to have.

You can absolutely modify almost everything about the base game UI, and this is most easily done by writing an addon that simply references the UI elements within the global namespace. This process gets more complicated when dealing with generated UI elements such as group frames because they don't have a set global binding, so you'll need to tie into a global container that generates the element in question and modify that instead.

The code for ESO's client UI is available for the public to view for reference when making addons.

As a fair warning, the codebase is pretty large and confusing for a casual programmer to look through. Given Lua uses dynamic types it can be difficult to tell even what type each argument is expected to have, and explanatory comments are few and far between.

To get you started, the bits you are interested in appear to be found in ./esoui/ingame/unitframes.(lua|xml)

rabb1t_ESO · August 2018

Hum, yeah that's probably too complex. I was thinking the code for that would be much much smaller. If I had to manage all that that probably would be too much for the little thing I want.

I guess I'll either have to do without or force my brain to get used to existing ones.