http://eu.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/443014676
If you like the suggestions then please bump or add your own ideas / criticisms!
Also if you like it enough then a someone reposting on the US / Asia battle.net forums would be welcome.
The original post:
Starcraft II is the first RTS game I have picked up in a big way for the first time in my life and in order to ease my learning curve and to pick up efficient, useful techniques and strategies of this game I am watching as many of replays of top players from US, EU and sometimes Asian servers as well as watching and reading as much content from the StarCraft community as I can (you guys are awesome btw!). Replays are great but they aren't perfect and I would like to offer a suggestion in that regard for the next 'Heart of the Swarm' expansion.
When I watch a replay I usually like watch them from the perspective of each player's camera . This is very useful but I feel there is still so much information I am missing. I would like to suggest adding a ghost mouse cursor for each camera perspective of each player (with an option to toggle this and off of course). This way you can see exactly where the players mouse it all times of the game replay. This could also be useful for spectators of live games as a lot of people who are watching / stream casting / creating a game VOD (Video On Demand) will be able to see what the player they are watching is doing *exactly*. I feel this option would offer the detail that I would love more than ever to see, more in terms of the unit micro more than anything else. There is indeed a mouse clicks animation on the game world when a player clicks on it but you miss this when a player clicks on the minimap and the box selection or other place which aren't on the map area the screen is covering at that particular time.
Also as an additional suggestion would be to offer a onscreen keyboard (and possible a mouse too) from the additional information drop down menu in the top left so you'll be able to see which key is being pressed and for how long and when. My thinking would be that each key on the virtual keyboard will light up as each key is pressed in turn. This would be useful to figuring out what shortcut layout the player is using and how is mircoing each of his control units. It would also be a very good alternative way of visually gauging the APM as players like to spam buttons in the early game to either warm themselves up or to try to look good I guess.
I feel these options will help me and other players to figure out how the best players out there play their games with greater ease so we can in turn improve our games and hopefully create new techniques which the community in-turn might be able to more easily figure out.
I hope that replay watchers, spectators, casters, streamers and general gamers of all skill levels will all be in support of this feature as I reckon it is something very useful to the community as a whole and improve on the already impressive features availible.
Thanks for reading, np
tl;dnr: Create the option of seeing the ghost of the players mouse in camera perspective in replays and spectator mode. Also include a on screen keyboard to the information drop down me to see which keys are pressed.
When I watch a replay I usually like watch them from the perspective of each player's camera . This is very useful but I feel there is still so much information I am missing. I would like to suggest adding a ghost mouse cursor for each camera perspective of each player (with an option to toggle this and off of course). This way you can see exactly where the players mouse it all times of the game replay. This could also be useful for spectators of live games as a lot of people who are watching / stream casting / creating a game VOD (Video On Demand) will be able to see what the player they are watching is doing *exactly*. I feel this option would offer the detail that I would love more than ever to see, more in terms of the unit micro more than anything else. There is indeed a mouse clicks animation on the game world when a player clicks on it but you miss this when a player clicks on the minimap and the box selection or other place which aren't on the map area the screen is covering at that particular time.
Also as an additional suggestion would be to offer a onscreen keyboard (and possible a mouse too) from the additional information drop down menu in the top left so you'll be able to see which key is being pressed and for how long and when. My thinking would be that each key on the virtual keyboard will light up as each key is pressed in turn. This would be useful to figuring out what shortcut layout the player is using and how is mircoing each of his control units. It would also be a very good alternative way of visually gauging the APM as players like to spam buttons in the early game to either warm themselves up or to try to look good I guess.
I feel these options will help me and other players to figure out how the best players out there play their games with greater ease so we can in turn improve our games and hopefully create new techniques which the community in-turn might be able to more easily figure out.
I hope that replay watchers, spectators, casters, streamers and general gamers of all skill levels will all be in support of this feature as I reckon it is something very useful to the community as a whole and improve on the already impressive features availible.
Thanks for reading, np
tl;dnr: Create the option of seeing the ghost of the players mouse in camera perspective in replays and spectator mode. Also include a on screen keyboard to the information drop down me to see which keys are pressed.
np.