UI Request: Ability Icons with HO Indicators

Tannier · #1 11-30-2004, 10:38 AM

What I'd love to see is a replacement set of Ability Icons with the HO Indicator icons displayed in the lower right corner of the ability icon.

Sure then flash when they could be used, but having them all clearly marked would help folks plan for them better.

I do a lot of graphic work and would be happy to do the icon overlays if someone has them all pulled out into a usable format and I can find the list associating each ability with it's HO icon.

mortis42 · #2 11-30-2004, 11:32 AM

Here is a start. They have started matching spells/skills to Ho icons. Though the actual spell/skill icon is not shown. Most of the info sites I have looked at do not have current spell/skill icons, so you may have to gather that information yourself.

zmalltank · #3 11-30-2004, 12:19 PM

If we can get a solid list/screenshots of these going i'd love to take a crack at it as well.

Agathorn · #4 11-30-2004, 01:29 PM

I could do this but I dont know how it would turn out. As far as I know, the gamde is hardcoded in what .dds file it pulls the skill/spell icon from AND WHAT SIZE, which is the problem. That means while yes you can easily modify the variuous skill and spell images to add your overlay, you couldn't make them any bigger than they are now, making them kinda hard to see. I guess in the UI you could probably stretch them, but i'm not sure how much that would help hurt either.

For the hell of it though i'll throw a sample together and see what it looks like.

After I get some caffeine in me. Just woke up

Agathorn · #5 11-30-2004, 02:40 PM

Welp my first attempt didint' come out very good. Maybe someone better with graphics could do it though. For some reason my transparencys were all screwed, but thats no suprise since I know nothing about the graphics side.

If you look at the screenshot carefully, First hotkey, the "-" hotkey. Half of the overlay is missing for some reason.

Tannier · #6 11-30-2004, 03:21 PM

I guess I was thinking more of a brute force approach...

Just pull out the graphics for the ability icons and then edit them and embed the HO icons onto them and replace them where they were.

I added two to your screen shot as a concept.

#6 on the first row
#4 on the second row

So I guess my questions are:

1) Can the icon graphics be pulled out and into a usable format?
2) How much info do we have on what HO icon goes with which?
3) After modifying the original ability icons, can we stick them back in so they get used?

Agathorn · #7 11-30-2004, 03:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tannier

I guess I was thinking more of a brute force approach...

Just pull out the graphics for the ability icons and then edit them and embed the HO icons onto them and replace them where they were.

Thats exactly what I did

insomniac · #8 11-30-2004, 03:33 PM

uh not to discourage you guys or anything, but those icons are prolly used a million times between now and level 50. i mean right now you can associate the level 2 heal spell with a heroic opp symbol but the level 30 heal spell could use the same icon but not have the same heroic opp thingy.

Tannier · #9 11-30-2004, 03:42 PM

Modified my above post and attached a sample.

As for them changing a lot..

Does a given ability icon really get used for a different ability that has a different HO proprerty?

If so that'll make it nigh impossible. The only recourse left would be to actually build a UI ability bar that overlayed the HO icon as appropriate which does seem a daunting task.

Deathbane27 · #10 11-30-2004, 05:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tannier

Modified my above post and attached a sample.

As for them changing a lot..

Does a given ability icon really get used for a different ability that has a different HO proprerty?

If so that'll make it nigh impossible. The only recourse left would be to actually build a UI ability bar that overlayed the HO icon as appropriate which does seem a daunting task.

Yes. The Predator's "Hunter's Instinct" ability uses the same icon as one of the Druid spells, and naturally they don't share HO abilities.

**Landiin** · #11 11-30-2004, 08:27 PM

You really can't match the HO icon graphic with the spell/skill on your hotbar. The reason is the HO uses the base of the spell/skill. For example the horn icon on the HO wheel. The horn icon is the base for taunt, so any spell/skill that has a taunt related to it can be use to activate that part of the HO. So Taunt,shout,hold the line ect can be use to advance the HO but none of these skills have the same icon but they do taunt the mob(s) so they can be used.

Tannier · #12 12-02-2004, 12:27 PM

So... if I were to create a set of mini-icons for the HO skills, is it possible for someone to use these an an overlay (or in any way) display them in the toolbar on top of the spell icons (which would of course require mapping them appropriately).

Not looking for voulenteers to do a ton of work yet heh. More just wondering if it's doable.

cesea · #13 12-09-2004, 05:27 PM

being a bard i have many different "coin" abilities that dont always flash when i can use them. if they could be overlaid with the base icon for the ability make my life so much easier. i would be more then happy to help with info about my abilities. although i dont know squat about programing. i would love to be kept up on this type of mod.

Vivax · #14 01-07-2005, 02:59 PM

Quote:

Yes. The Predator's "Hunter's Instinct" ability uses the same icon as one of the Druid spells, and naturally they don't share HO abilities.

But there are only four base classes, and predators and druids are from different bases. So is it possible that there only need to be four sets of these icons, one for each base, to avoid conflicts?

As it is, I use a second hotkey bar with symbols representing HO symbols, above the hotkey bar with corresponding attacks/abilities. But having those HO symbols embedding into the attacks/abilities symbols would save a lot of hotbar space!

Taroven · #15 01-13-2005, 02:11 AM

Tell you guys what... I'll undertake the rather gruesome task of adding HO indicators (using the indicator-in-corner idea) to every icon in the game.
I really don't mind doing it - I use Photoshop an average of 18 hours a week, so this'll give me an excuse to do something over than photomanipulations.

I'll need a few things to start though:
1) Need someone to dig up the icon files and send them to me with instructions on how to use them, either on this thread or PM me and I'll give you my email address. I wouldn't have a clue as to where to start looking.
2) A reliable list of what icons are used by what classes. EDIT: This is mainly to fill in the gaps that will inevitably occur in #3, and could actually make #3 a semi-moot point with enough information.
3) (The hard one) A list of what icons are associated with what HO indicators, for every class. I can handle Scout through Assassin (up to lvl 24) and Priest through Cleric (up to lvl 18, maybe a few levels more by next week), but I'll need EVERYTHING else. If anyone has a lvl 24+ Assassin that knows of any new icons that show up after 24, PLEASE let me know.

Graphics for the HO indicators won't be necessary, a previous link handled that.

The way I'm thinking of doing it, there will be no need to swap icon sets for different classes, and hopefully the indicators won't obscure the icons. It will probably be a total conversion of the icon sets.
And yes, I'll make sure that this will look good with 3/4-size hotbars.

If this is a possible undertaking, my plans for a complete alternate icon set may very well come into action.

tonyis3l33t · #16 01-13-2005, 07:51 PM

spell icons are found in
C:\Program Files\Sony\EverQuest II\UI\Default\images\icons

they are files
icon_ss1.dss through icon_ss14.dds

to intsert an icon copy paste this into xml (or copy paste image ImageFrame)

and change source to images\icons\icon_ss14.dds
change sourcerect to the pixel coordinates at top left of desired icon, then bottom right

topleftX,topleftY,bottomrightX,bottomrightY
so to get the top left icon it would have a sourcerect of 0,0,40,40 roughly

here is the XML if you want to copy paste using it.

Code:

<ImageFrame Name="imageFrame" Source="images/icons/icon_ss14.dds" SourceRect="0,0,40,40"/>
</ImageStyle>

________
LIVE SEX

taco-man · #17 01-13-2005, 10:31 PM

i am almost positive oh a semi-fix for this at least until taroven makes his, if i get a chance to test it out and it works ill post it (probably either friday or sunday) unless taroven is already done by then.

taco-man · #18 01-14-2005, 10:17 PM

lets hope taroven gets it done because the way i was doing it would be inconvenient for most people(unless you never log off)

Taroven · #19 01-15-2005, 03:06 AM

Taking a look at it now...

K, what I gather: Shouldn't be too hard, just tedious. Need to know a few things about DDS files though, seeing as I've never worked with them before. Just barely got the DDS plugin for Photoshop installed, haven't had time to mess with it yes.

1) How is transparency handled in these files? From what I've seen so far, many icons are done in 2 layers: Background and the icon itself. The background layers are in icon_ss9.dds (green, blue, purple, red, orange, and yellow, most anyone who's read up on skills should know what most of those mean) along the bottom row. For the icons themselves, it looks like pure black is transparent. Hoping for a little bit of information so that I don't add an indicator to 50 icons only to find out later that I have to change every one of them.
Best way I can think of to check that is to put a pure black slash across a single icon that already uses transparency, and another black slash across a "solid" icon (one without the colored backgrounds).

2) The icon files are sorted into groups with exponentially smaller copies of the icons. I'm assuming that the only set I need to worry about is the largest set in each file, which should hopefully be the hotbutton and spellbook icons. Since I'm going to edit first and test later, could I have someone confirm that this is the only set I need to edit?
Should be easy, can do it at the same time as #1. Slash the largest version of an icon that you use with something visible. If I'm lucky (which I'm probably not), it will affect both the spellbook and the hotbar. If it doesn't affect the hotbar, it's going to be a pain and a half to do this.

Should take all of 5 minutes to check both - I'm starting work on the project now, I'll be checking the thread for updates every few minutes.

taco-man · #20 01-15-2005, 09:57 AM

in response to #1:
transparency is handled by the alpha channel, you use photoshop alot so im sure you know what that is.

in response to #2:
when you first open the image and it asks if you want to display mip maps, choose no and it wont show you all the smaller images you mentioned since you dont need to see them.

Taroven · #21 01-15-2005, 10:34 AM

Ah, that makes more sense now.
Starting on this when I wake up in a few hours... Had to get some grouping in before my wife gets back.

Taroven · #22 01-29-2005, 02:39 AM

Unfortunately no progress has been made on this project... I just haven't had the time, too much stuff going on in real life.

FenixStryk4 · #23 01-29-2005, 01:30 PM

I know this is a mod many of my guildies need, so I thought I'd post a solution for icons being used more than once for different classes.

For Fighters, put the HO icon in the up left corner.
For Scouts, put the HO icon in the up right corner.
For Priests, put the HO icon in the bottom left corner.
For Mages, put the HO icon in the bottom right corner.

That way, should an icon actually be used by two totally different classes, the classes that use the same icon can figure out which HO icon it really is depending on what they are. It might look awkward, but would solve confusion should one icon be used by two totally different classes, thus two totally different HO icons it may correspond to.

Other than that, good job all on you for the feedback and kudos for Taroven undertaking such a challenging mod.