Ask Questions for Letter from the Producer LIVE Part XXVIII! (Lead UI Minagawa)

Greetings, everyone!

We're pleased to announce the next Letter from the Producer LIVE, Part XXVIII! This next Live Letter will take place on Saturday, March 26, 2016 at 3:00 a.m. (PDT) / 10:00 (GMT)!

In this thread we'd like you to pose questions for Lead UI Artist Hiroshi Minagawa.
Please forward questions on the game's UI design and also general questions about him in person.

When submitting your question, we ask that you follow these steps:

• Please post your question(s) as a reply to this thread
• Please limit posts to your question(s) only and do not use this thread for discussion
• If another player already asked a question you had in mind, simply click the "Like!" button instead of re-posting the question
• Please post only one question per reply (of course you are allowed to post several replies!)

* For more information regarding the Letter from the Producer LIVE, please read the following: <a href="http://sqex.to/dWG" target="_blank">NA</a>/<a href="http://sqex.to/4a4" target="_blank">EU</a>
* Please note that once the event is over, we will be closing this thread.

We've seen that additional status icons can be implemented in the game like the new icons for the Mentor System. Would something similar be possible for people who roleplay on FFXIV to denote either a "looking for roleplay" or "in-character for roleplay" status?

Can we get special icons for triple triad npcs even after we have beat them on the mini map?

Would it be possible at all in the future to perhaps have a DPS class that uses twin swords, i understand the Ninja is slightly like that with twin dagger type weapons but being a class wielding dual swords would be pretty amazing to see and become.

Perhaps not in the upcoming updates as i can understand making a new class and balancing their stats is something that will take a while, but perhaps food for thought in the next expansion?

Thank you for your time :D

For Machinist and Bard actions, there's a delay between when the procs for Slug Shot/Clean Shot and Straight Shot are triggered and when that proc buff shows on the Flying Text (+Improved Slug Shot, Straighter Shot, etc). This encourages staring at your hotbar for the highlighted icon or proc buff instead of reacting to the flying text.

Could the flying text be updated so that it's perfectly synced with the hotbar and buff bar?

Speaking of having to stare at your hotbar, could there be some kind of notification for when Bloodletter/Rain of Death's recast is reset?

I don't play BRD, but I'm worried about any future jobs having terribly annoying procs like this. This might be outside the scope of UI design because even though my issue could be solved with something like a 1 second "dummy buff" every time Bloodletter resets, the "gain buff, lose buff" sound effects would get really annoying fast.

Have you considered an option to show select hotbars only while in combat and otherwise hide them while out of combat?

During preliminary development of A Realm Reborn, Yoshida said he directed all of the developers to play other MMORPGs to get a feel for what gameplay designs a modern MMORPG should have.

While playing other MMOs, did you come across a special UI or unique interface feature that really impressed you? If so, is it something you'd like to implement in FFXIV one day?

Can you please let us disable the red error message text that appears on screen or be able to move it in the hud layout ?

Can you make it so we can reposition the flying text ?

Can you give us options to filter out flying text that we don't want to see ?

Speaking of unique UI features and the flying text:

Have you seen World of Warcraft's Spell Alerts? (www.wowhead.com/guide=2536/spell-alert-visuals) Do you think they could be a good fit for the game if more proc-based Job actions are introduced in the future?

They're simple, neat graphics with unique sounds that display around the center of the screen and are designed to show you when a proc or special class effect has happened. They might be nice for Bloodletter and perhaps Improved Slug Shot, Fang and Claw, and Wheeling Thrust.

Can you let us change the way the party list expands so it expands upwards instead of downwards ?

Are there any plans to allow the alliance status/health bars that are used in the 24-man raids and PvP to be usable on the server-side, specifically for Diadem where alliance-forming is very cumbersome and harsh (one player leaving the area disbands the alliance)?

Are there any word on multiple UI layout depending on class or sets that we can change, so we can arrange optimal layouts for different play styles ? (ie, I would like to arrange UI position and sizes so healer have party list and aliance closer to skill bar, tanks with more visible enemy list, etc)

Can you give us options to hide player forenames and surnames entirely instead of displaying initials ?

Can we have an option to export/import our UI layout, skill placement, macros, chat and filter preferences so people that play on multiple platforms or in between alt characters don't have to reconfigure every change? (ie, like how FFXI had an option like that)

And finally, because you are still a human being:

I notice that you like to make long, detailed posts about the human side of things. When you posted about the development of the new recast timer, it gave insight into how many people are involved in the game development process. When you posted about random number generators, it gave insight into human psychology. So I have a somewhat silly question.

Would people who know you say that's typical of you? That is, typical of you to talk a great deal and more about a subject, like a philosopher?

I have a feeling that most of the requests in this thread could be addressed with the release of the long awaited add-on API ... This would take a lot of work load off of the UI-team so why not just release it already ?

Has SE stance on this changed ?

Can you make it so that "flying texts" will display only damage i inflict?

I play on a few different computers depending on location/platform. Are there any tools that would allow me to sync or copy my hotbars, crossbars, UI layout, gearsets and macros across these machines? On the PC version, I've become comfortable with copying the files as needed, but that only works if I remember to make a backup and isn't possible for the console versions of the game.

With Patch 3.2, we saw that there were some UI adjustments for players with high-resolution (4K) monitors. Are there any additional graphics updates planned such as better anti-aliasing or higher-resolution textures?

Are Viera still being considered for 4.0?

Any hints on what the next new jobs will be? A lot of people are saying samurai and blue mage might be options. I'd be cool with red mage.

I would like to see class specific key bindings. I prefer to use Obey as a I play SCH/SMN, but I have to set up a keybind for most pet skills separately, or macro them. The reason is because if I use a key bind on the pet hotbar, it removes the possibility for me to use that keybind on other classes that don't utilize the pet hotbar. Can class specific key bindings be implemented?

Thank you for your thoughts! :)

Oh yeah, macro questions!

Why are macros still unable to be queued like most other actions? Isn't the excuse of, "It would make macros feel mandatory," outdated by now?

Can potions please be able to be used in macros? Like /item "item name"?

Related, though I know this goes outside UI design: At the very least, can't potions be made queueable like most other actions and to not have an awkwardly long delay after use?

Can Limit Break for casters be made to work with <t> in a macro like other ground-targeted actons?

Lastly, would it be possible to develop a way to assign a macro to a hotbar through a macro command?

For example: /chotbar set "Macro #1" or /hotbar macro #1

There are a lot of pop-up notifications that still can not be moved/turned off and I really wish they would add options for the following;

The huge QUEST COMPLETE pop-up (It blocks so much of my screen and it pops up so often that it kind of takes away from immersion. It also blocks Leve quest explanations/rewards causing me to have to wait till it fades away before I can read the next leve explanation)

The huge FATE JOINED pop-up is also something that should be able to be turned off (I can see the fate area marked on my mini-map and I can see the special FATE mob icons. I don't need a big pop-up notification to tell me I'm in a FATE area. And when I'm just passing by, it's a bit annoying to have my screen blocked by such a big pop-up)

The Blue/white text pop-up when something on your retainer sells or when you mine/harvest something up and it is added to your inventory (this information is already in the chat log so it is a redundant pop-up text)

The pop-up asking if you want to teleport back to the levemate when you complete a levequest (this causes a moment where you can not control your character and has caused me to get aggro from mobs near me)

The small area name pop-up (when running around my home city that I know by heart it's an unnecessary pop-up. I would like to turn it off or be able to move it next to my mini-map)

Thank you for reading ^_^

http://o.aolcdn.com/hss/storage/fss/...xt+options.PNG

Under Character Configuration --> Log Text color --> Battle, could we have the additional options "Damage taken", "Actions Initiated by self" and "Actions initiated by Enemies"

As it is now all Actions are the same color regardless of if they are initiated by myself or my enemy which results in a hard to read at a glance battle chat log. See in the above picture that "The lightning sprite casts Thunder" and "You use Skull Sunder" are the same color text. What I would like see is "The lightning sprite casts Thunder" and "You use Skull Sunder" Because an action being used against me is bad(Red text) and me initiating an action against my enemy is good(green text)

Also the same goes for Damage taken. Damage I sustain is bad and I would like to have it displayed as a different color than damage I have inflicted on an enemy. For example as seen in the above picture; I would like the log entries "The lightning sprite takes 168 damage. You hit the lightning sprite for 126 damage." to be a different color than "You take 753 damage."

The same goes for Enhancing Effects and Enfeebling Effects, there should be different text color options for self and enemies.

I hope the SE Dev. team will consider this QoL improvement.

As you can see in my screen shot above, I have separated my battle text between 2 chat logs as a temporary fix, but I would really love to just have all my battle text on one chat log.

Thank you for reading.

Please can we have option to display the class/job of players in the Feast above their heads instead of player names, like it is in Frontlines.

Is it possible to have an option that lets us make the dialogue box bigger when talking to NPCs?

Can we please remove the new ugly white circle cool down timer implemented recently? I'd prefer to revert to the old design or simply grey out the skill with a numerical timer overlay in the center.

Can we have the option to turn off <FCName> over other players. It clutters the screen and I usually don't care what FC people are in.

Can we have a opacity slider for AoE indicators? I would like to make it more transparent for myself, I find them to be too bright as they are now.

When doing older content many times synced is too easy because of our current gear, but many people do not want to do it at a minimum ilvl. Is it possible to have a feature where we can designate the ilvl?

I'm not sure if inventory issues is considered UI but I'll ask anyway..

Could we have Items like Alexaderite, Unidentified Tomb stones, Atmas, Gobtwine (basically any rare/ex currency we trade in for upgrades/gear) be stored in the Key Items inventory rather than our regular inventory?

Since the game is designed to meet the specifications of users interacting via a controller, the PC user interface tends to be clunky and frustrating. Is there any way we could see UI improvements that remedy this?

For example, planting seeds takes eight mouse clicks per seed where a streamlined UI could have dropdown boxes for selection for each open seedbed and all seeds could be planted at once.

Or, with inventory, a spreadsheet view of items could be implemented where columns along the top for specific item properties could be used for sorting.

Thank you for your input.

Is there any way detrimental status effect icons that can be healed with Esuna/Leeches/Exalted Detriment be made distinct from those that cannot be removed by those spells?

What's the progress on the updated controller UI which was supposed to allow for more action slots with different button combinations?