Forums » Suggestions
Station interface improvements
I've checked the stickied list of suggestions and did not see these included; although there are several suggestion threads for the station interface, they are all nine to twelve years old, and as far as I can tell none of the suggestions were implemented. Some of the suggestions in those threads were extravagant or unnecessary, but I'm hoping others will find these actually useful.
1) In the Commerce/Welcome screen, the small window displaying hull damage and cargo is too small. Column heads are truncated or hidden (example: regardless which Vulture mark you're flying, there is only room to display "Vulture Mk I") and credit values are also misleading because several digits are routinely cut off for larger figures. I've lost count of the number of times I expected a hull repair to be inexpensive, only to find that the actual value was 10 or 100 times larger than the figure I could see. The only way to see what you'll really get from the station for your cargo is to use the Jettison screen. Please make this window wider to that the information does not get truncated, or implement the ability to show/hide columns, or to change the widths of columns. Maybe smaller font sizes would help. If the display of this window is resolution-dependent, it's not working with all resolutions allowed in the graphics settings. A radical alternative (since I consider this broken as-is) would be to eliminate the window and use the screen real estate for something else (ship repair and rearm is already available from the Ships/Manage/Select_Ship screen, and there is already a Sell button in the PDA/Inventory screen).
2) In the Commerce/Load-Unload, the Ships/Manage/Configure_Ship, and the PDA/Inventory screens, the right pane (displaying the contents of your storage on the current station) is not sortable, requiring you to hunt through the whole thing to find a needed item. In the PDA/Inventory screen, the left panel (displaying everything you own anywhere) is sortable by Location or by Type. Why can we not have similar functionality for the right pane? Because all the items are in THIS location, we would only need sorting by type. Thus, Ships, Equipment, Ore, Trade Goods, and Manufacturing Components would nicely subdivide the list, making everything much easier to find (although I'd like to see Equipment further subdivided, perhaps into Weapons/Mining/Powercells or Small Port/Large Port/Other). An alternative might be to simply list all the items alphabetically, although I think that's less useful. The currently displayed order appears to be random; if there is any organization there, it's not clear what the sort criteria are.
3) In the Ships/Manage/Configure_Ship screen, there is a line of text at the top of the equipment pane that reads something like, "Double click an item to load it into the currently selected port." If this functionality ever existed, it doesn't work now. Please remove this line of text, because double clicking an item does nothing, whether you've got a port selected or not.
If any of these have been suggested recently, my apologies, I didn't find them in a search, and just consider me seconding those requests. I know these are only quality of life issues, but hopefully the devs can find time to consider them.
1) In the Commerce/Welcome screen, the small window displaying hull damage and cargo is too small. Column heads are truncated or hidden (example: regardless which Vulture mark you're flying, there is only room to display "Vulture Mk I") and credit values are also misleading because several digits are routinely cut off for larger figures. I've lost count of the number of times I expected a hull repair to be inexpensive, only to find that the actual value was 10 or 100 times larger than the figure I could see. The only way to see what you'll really get from the station for your cargo is to use the Jettison screen. Please make this window wider to that the information does not get truncated, or implement the ability to show/hide columns, or to change the widths of columns. Maybe smaller font sizes would help. If the display of this window is resolution-dependent, it's not working with all resolutions allowed in the graphics settings. A radical alternative (since I consider this broken as-is) would be to eliminate the window and use the screen real estate for something else (ship repair and rearm is already available from the Ships/Manage/Select_Ship screen, and there is already a Sell button in the PDA/Inventory screen).
2) In the Commerce/Load-Unload, the Ships/Manage/Configure_Ship, and the PDA/Inventory screens, the right pane (displaying the contents of your storage on the current station) is not sortable, requiring you to hunt through the whole thing to find a needed item. In the PDA/Inventory screen, the left panel (displaying everything you own anywhere) is sortable by Location or by Type. Why can we not have similar functionality for the right pane? Because all the items are in THIS location, we would only need sorting by type. Thus, Ships, Equipment, Ore, Trade Goods, and Manufacturing Components would nicely subdivide the list, making everything much easier to find (although I'd like to see Equipment further subdivided, perhaps into Weapons/Mining/Powercells or Small Port/Large Port/Other). An alternative might be to simply list all the items alphabetically, although I think that's less useful. The currently displayed order appears to be random; if there is any organization there, it's not clear what the sort criteria are.
3) In the Ships/Manage/Configure_Ship screen, there is a line of text at the top of the equipment pane that reads something like, "Double click an item to load it into the currently selected port." If this functionality ever existed, it doesn't work now. Please remove this line of text, because double clicking an item does nothing, whether you've got a port selected or not.
If any of these have been suggested recently, my apologies, I didn't find them in a search, and just consider me seconding those requests. I know these are only quality of life issues, but hopefully the devs can find time to consider them.
Welcome to the forums. It's always good to see people interested in improving the game. That said, it's always better to write separate posts for different suggestions. That way they're easier for the devs to track, and discussion doesn't get confusing.
Items 1 and 3 sound more like bugs and should be reported in the Bugs forum. If the game doesn't behave as it should or if things are unreadable, then that's a bug. Before reporting a bug, it's important to first remove all plugins you might have installed and verify the problem is still happening. The devs don't support the client when plugins are installed and will ask you to check without them.
If there is a display issue, it's also important to indicate what device and/or resolution you're playing on.
As for Item 2, I'm also not sure at the moment what criteria is uses for sorting in those lists. It might be using the sorting method that you can set in Options, but I'm not sure.
Items 1 and 3 sound more like bugs and should be reported in the Bugs forum. If the game doesn't behave as it should or if things are unreadable, then that's a bug. Before reporting a bug, it's important to first remove all plugins you might have installed and verify the problem is still happening. The devs don't support the client when plugins are installed and will ask you to check without them.
If there is a display issue, it's also important to indicate what device and/or resolution you're playing on.
As for Item 2, I'm also not sure at the moment what criteria is uses for sorting in those lists. It might be using the sorting method that you can set in Options, but I'm not sure.