Inventory Changes - Expanding the Game

  • @MikeTheMutinous

    Here's the big issue with the new UI on PC:

    This removes mouse control of the character, and can lead to the player inadvertently minimizing the screen or exiting the game.

    Whatever fix you guys do for the UI make sure this is part of it, please. As I've said before, I've already minimized my screen on more than one occasion with this update and many times I'm losing mouse control of the character.

  • @personalc0ffee My bad was just stating as a whole.

  • @mikethemutinous said in Inventory Changes - Expanding the Game:

    Thank you for all the thoughts and feedback. Just wanted to let you know that I'm reading these responses, both on this forum and elsewhere.

    I just wanted to post a reply I made to one of our players outside of this forum regarding some of the serious bugs introduced with the latest update, as well as some of the core reasoning behind the inventory change. Just some more detail:

    "We've strived to make an immersive experience and I specifically wanted to assure you on your comments regarding consciously feeling like you're in the world. I love the way you've articulated this point, but its actually the very thing that's at the center of all of our design decisions. I imagine it would be difficult to be a designer on a game like this and not picture it as a real place that you get to visit. Sea Of Thieves is our second home and all of our decisions, right from the early days of prototyping, have been around how we make you feel like you're in this world, with this leading to all the physical, tangible interactions that players have in the game, decisions around what's vulnerable to loss in the world and also the kind of content we want to add in the future. Though its a big change to the flow of the game, the barrel interactions follow this logic in that if you were really there, you would look inside the barrel and take out what you want, with barrels themselves just being wooden holders for a multitude of items that players and other characters have stored inside. The only reason to not keep this entirely physical is to cut down on excessive friction of how it would inevitably feel if you physically placed items inside. In this way, the UI is just a short hand for what would really be happening. Running past a barrel and taking out a single item results in with less clutter on screen, but I'd argue against it feeling immersive, at least not immersive in the sense of the barrel being a real object.

    Immersion is not just making a game more vibrant and realistic. I do not think people are asking for the ability to pry open barrels and actually reach inside to pull out the contents. Immersion also means the ability to stay engaged and involved in the game you are playing. It is also the feeling of absorbing the world around you when you are in that game.

    A screen wide inventory menu they greys out the game is not necessary to accomplish the management of new inventory. The new menu system disengages the player. It removes the feel of staying in the game world you are in every time it is popped up. It completely stops everything and disengages the player from the world they have been playing in up to this time.

    Why is there a need for a big full screen menu? Why is there a need to see what is going into your inventory in a split box container screen as you are collecting it. That truly cannot be Rare's version of adding and enhancing immersion.

    Is something smaller that does not take over the entire screen and flow of gameplay not possible? What about radial menus like you mentioned that is going to be added to the cannons? Or keep one small inventory box like in the new menu that pops up just to the side of the barrel or container.

    If the main item in a barrel is bananas, could we not have a quick take option to take that item like before. Then also have a second option to open up the barrel and grab the other things in it if you want to. That would be when the radial button or an small inventory box pops up. Then you could still grab things you need on the fly that you spot around you, keeping the feel and gameplay that everyone enjoys.

    Use as few button presses as possible. Keep the buttons flowing smoothly like the same button completely opens and closes a container for example. Button options stay consistent according to the same type of thing you are interacting with. Taking damage should not stop you from quick collecting items or when swimming around floating barrels like the new menu closes continuously on now. You already said that the empty state is going to be added back which is great.

    Just some thoughts on how to achieve preserving the SoT gameplay that came before which players really love, what drawn us all to SoT, and still allow the game to grow. Thank you for your continuing feedback. Thank you for all the time you must be taking to read through and endure everyone's opinions and thoughts.

  • I can't help but feel that Rare dropped the ball on this issue. Cursed cannonballs were announced months ago and unless there was supposed to just just be a small variety it was to be expected for them to cause issues with the current inventory system.

    I dunno how Rare works internally, if there really wasn't a way to get a team working on this earlier, since it's one of the core pieces of the game, but on the other hand I have faith in them to improve this new system until it's up to par.

    Also I'm quite happy to see them make rather drastic changes where needed in order to not limit themselves and the game. It's a brave step forward and the game will be better because of it.

  • I just wanted to say cheers for the transparency. It has taken some getting used to but after about ten game hours I've found that adapting to the new system hasn't actually been that problematic (at first I was not a fan but adjusted quickly). This QoL improvements will go a long way though toward helping with tense situations (I like the ammo radial idea when using a cannon).

  • Ah ok... feel a little silly for a couple of my recent posts so I am happy some of this is being resolved.

  • Every single issue i had with the new update seems to be adressed here and are going to be resolved. Great jobs guys for listening to us.

  • @MikeTheMutinous
    Thank you so much for your transparency and honesty, we appreciate that so much.
    I love the possibilities that the new inventory system will bring to SoT.
    HOWEVER, please consider combat with this new system.
    Without a quick loot option of BASIC supplies(banana, plank, cannon ball), combat is incredibly clunky, not fluid, and very frustrating.
    We all want, no, NEED to be able to quickly loot bananas in the heat of battle.
    We all NEED to be able to quickly get more planks as our water level rises to 90%.
    We all NEED to be able to quickly get cannon balls in an intense ship battle.

    We need a quick loot for basic supplies.
    Combat will forever be ruined without it.

    We all hope you make the right decision, @Rare-Ltd

  • @mikethemutinous These changes are a good start, it's great to see you guys are taking things seriously. A couple of things in your plans I feel could use improvement:

    1. Rather than having to open the barrel interface/inventory to be able to use "Take All" and "Store All", these functions should be usable outside the interface when just targeting the barrel. Only one button press needed for each, no tedious opening the menu first. As many items as one can carry (within the given limit) of each type present should be added to the inventory when pressing the "Take All" button. It will be a lot more user friendly this way. One should still have the option to open the barrel interface/inventory manually and take out things individually, of course.

    2. In addition to the 'Empty' tag to the barrels, it might be a good idea to also add a 'Full' tag if there is no more room in the barrel (all slots inside it are taken and full).

    3. In regards to the QOL equipment filtering, would it be possible to add a filtering option for clothing/equipment in the all tab to group items by set (or name, since sets usually start with the same name anyhow)? Or maybe even add an option to just highlight one item and then have a click for "Equip all items in this set", which would equip all the items of the set you own, including clothing, weapons and other items.

    4. Talking about Quality of Life, you guys should really start looking into an option to invite friends/party members on a different ship to the same server you're on so you can sail together in an alliance (or even just fight each other). Finding alliances with strangers can be almost impossible at times (not to mention that you must be lucky if they have progressed as far as you in multi-crew content as you do or even know how things work - explaining everything to every crew that joins an alliance is tedious!) and it's incredibly frustrating that you have more than 4 friends or party members online and you can't all play and sail together, which has sadly caused many of my friends to quit the game already (although most will be back if such a feature is added).

    Keep up the great work!

  • Just add a secondary wheel like you guys did with the quest maps. The secondary wheel has the cursed cannonballs in it. Put the empty tag back and that's it. Still no reason to ever rush pushing out content just because people are complaining. Rather a great content release be pushed out that makes sense and flows with the game mechanics than putting out garbage have the garbage back rip open then just slap duct tape on it and call it a day. Basic mechanics that worked on release day should be resolved before any of these horrible UI ideas were pushed out.

  • There are 3 types of Barrels, Ammo, Planks, and Food. Don't mix the items in barrels. Keep them separate but tell us what category the barrel is and if it's empty.
    A cannon ball barrel can contain as many Ammo choices as developed. Same for Food. What was a Banana barrel it can now contain coconuts and Conchs whatever but it's still a food barrel.
    Give us fast access to Pirate essential "Bananas". In PVE PVP, the Banana is critical. We should be able to grab it fast and decisively.
    Mixing 3 different categories into 1 barrel was a bad idea. Keeping Ammo, planks, and food separate and labeled solves the issues. Mixing them in each barrel complicates everything.
    Beyond the 3 basics of Bananas, planks and cannonballs, You can add other items in the Plank barrel. Maps and other messages in a bottle etc, put those in Plank barrels. They are none critical.
    Store all is a bad idea. In a panic moment of PVP, you may store everything instead of taking things. Store all is only useful if diving off a ship to get more resources, or stocking on an island or outpost prior to setting sail
    Cannon ball Quick menu is a bad idea. Just use a hot key on cannonballs, allows you to cycle through your cannonball choice, you don't need a quick wheel. DPAD left or right. I've assigned my D-PAD right to cannonball cycling, and Keyboad #4 is same thing. NO QUICK Wheel! Quick wheel is an oxymoron.

    In the current gathering of resources process you have to switch squares to select the item you want even after you depleted the current selected square... why not simple move automatically to the next item? I'm full on planks, why offer plank, yet i can click it at infinium. When picking up cannonballs, give us a max each time. If there's 6 cannonballs in the barrel and we need 4, give us 4 in 1 click. Has anyone every said, no I only need 8 cannonballs in my inventory? No they Haven't.
    Mike, The Critical mistake you made is you released an Inventory system that is really on it's second draft and not ready for prime time. Telling us is irrelevant. You're the owner of the Game, Change comes but it should be good change, not half baked.

  • On the Cycling of Cannonballs instead of a Quick Wheel:, please, I play with a controller. Y button selects my weapon, press it twice and I get my second weapon.
    If I select cannonballs, give me an option to cycle them. The B button puts away your selected item. If I quick wheel to cannonballs, and then hit B button, I should be able to cycle through my choice of balls.
    The B button "putting things away" is not really relevant, other than presenting yourself as none threatening by putting your weapon away, and fast digging. Redefine how that button works. Use it to cycle through items in hand. If you hold food, B button to cycle, If you hold Cannonball, B button to cycle.
    I currently assigned D-PAD right for hot key to cannonballs and repeated presses cycles the choice of cannonballs.

  • @personalc0ffee I am glad you pointed that out!

  • This helps! Great 👌👍superb! @mikethemutinous !

    Yet another suggestion that hopefully helps. When selecting a barrel it freezes you in place. Why not if you move your character it takes you out of the barrel selection interface and not freeze your character at all. This would be a quality of life improvement or quality of game experience in my opinion. Some may argue it would make people exit the barrel menu when they don't want to but I think there are ways you can implement not leaving the barrel too easy. For example having to run versus walk because you have to press more buttons to run than walk.
    Anyways just an idea...
    It stinks to limit mobility in a game that the environment is so free 🙂

  • As the game grows I think it's obvious that the inner and outer works of the ship will grow as well. It was teased that greater ship customization would be coming yes? Would this also include interior sets to choose from where we may have access to store items in more than the initial 3 barrel types?

    But these changes that are coming are welcome. I think it solves a lot of the current issues. I look forwards to helping to improve these future changes to enrich Sea of Thieves.

  • @bran-the-ent sounds actually like a great idea.
    I'm totally with you on that one because since the Reapers mark update it's been a real hustle if you try to get some new cannonballs. For example when you are in a fight as a sloop against a galleon it's an essential to get your cannonballs fast to be able to survive or even win but the take all function should fix that problem

  • @kylemccarley sagte in Inventory Changes - Expanding the Game:

    These changes are certainly a start to fixing what wasn't broken before this update, but shouldn't they have been thought about before the update was pushed to everybody? Clearly the development team was eager to get these cursed cannonballs into player hands, but if you weren't ready for it, why'd you rush it? This system is clunky, and even once everything listed in the OP is implemented, it's still gonna be clunky. I appreciate the fact that Rare wants to keep the game fresh by adding new stuff on a regular basis, but please, don't add it just for the sake of adding something. Make sure it's ready first, don't beta test in the live build.

    yeah true and in my opinion it's better to let us wait for functions or mechanics that have been tested enough instead of rushing these updates out to us.
    Arrrr sail on ;)

  • @kamashie The "take all" option has a downside with regard to boarders. In the old version, they had to stop and mash to get all your cannonballs. With a "take all" button, a boarder could take 10 of your cannons and all of your stored CCs with one tap of a button. Not a good idea. This will lead to people simply carrying all of their CCs on their body - at which point, why have a new barrel inventory system?

  • @bran-the-ent yeah you've got a point there but if you have to get into an interface where you have to move the mouse to the take all button it gives you a real big disadvantage when trying to for example just get some bananas so you don't just die. I prefered the button smashing over needing to get into an interface because often you die there because you are getting killed while in the interface.
    Arrrr sail on ;)

  • @kamashie Currently, I get into the interface, hit Q or E and then hold F while swiping the mouse over each item and it quickly takes them all. If it weren't for the bugs and inconsistency, I could get in and out fairly quickly. My problem with the interface is the bugs, the inconsistency of the UI, the unnecessary amount of keystrokes, and the seemingly unnecessary change from months of muscle memory when it come to which button takes and which stores. If we're going to have multiple items in barrels, it makes sense to have to move over them to select them. The ability to open the UI, take all, and sort out what you took later just feels a bit OP.

  • @bran-the-ent Thanks for the tip i will try that on friday when i get back home
    Arrrr sail on ;)

  • Responses like this and the recent developer update video are what I think is most important.

    There will always be issues but communication between the developers & community is key. The longer time goes by without word is when doubt creeps in.

    Thanks to everyone who works on Sea of Thieves. It's an amazing game & keep up the good work.

    Cheers

  • @atrus-nero sagte in Inventory Changes - Expanding the Game:

    Responses like this and the recent developer update video are what I think is most important.

    There will always be issues but communication between the developers & community is key. The longer time goes by without word is when doubt creeps in.

    Thanks to everyone who works on Sea of Thieves. It's an amazing game & keep up the good work.

    Cheers

    Yeah that's the most important thing in my opinion.
    But the second one for me is transperancy with the community.
    Thats why i don't mind if they delay the updates for a day or even a week as long as they tell us.
    Arrrr sail on ;)

  • @vgtrooper said in Inventory Changes - Expanding the Game:

    I will add that I would be ok with previous mentioned ideas of having quicker actions for the barrel interaction.

    • Hold F (on keyboard) or hold X (on controller) = enter UI
    • press F (on keyboard) or press X (on controller) = quick grab of 1 item at a time of the default item (regular cannonball, plank, banana)
    • R (on keyboard) or Y (on controller) = quick store, 1 at a time, of the item in your hand. So if you are holding a banana at the food barrel, pressing R/Y would store that item 1 at a time (meaning 1 item per press)

    This needs to happen
    and also with the merchant crates too

  • with the game it could do with another common type of enemy as to keep fighting skeletons is kind of dull also a ship with two floors of cannons would be better also more types of food would be better

  • @mikethemutinous Hi Mike, thank you for the feedback. I feel you are missing one critical component of this game that these changes, and your proposed fixes, do not address whatsoever. I play on PC and consider myself an overly serious borderline semi-pro and I absolutely adore the smoothness, sense of speed and agility, crystal clear pvp and just the generally silky smooth experience of EVERYTHING.

    Jumping off the crow's nest and grabbing the ladder at the last second, firing your weapon and switching to sword, grabbing the ladder of a fast moving enemy galleon, dropping the explosive barrel on their bottom deck only to have their NINJA think smart and fast enough to pick it up and defuse it instead of letting me shoot it or fight me, boarding the recent DLC's skeleton galleons and killing their repair skellies and eating their bananas, shooting yourself on to on island with a cannon and seamlessly transitioning to combat and back to exploration, etc... These are all incredibly fast, smooth and fun experiences.

    You know what's not fun? Cumbersome. Cumbersome is not fun. Boarding a brigantine that sailed at us and finding out we are fighting kids who are standing at their banana barrel just trying to supply up is not fun. Boarding an enemy vessel and standing at their resource containers is not fun. Running desperately from the TOO MANY SKELETONS THAT SPAWN WITH GUNPOWDER EVERY 45 SECONDS and trying to get bananas out of a f*****g crate is not fun. It's stressful.

    I believe both systems can co-exist. I should be able to mash F and R to pick up and deposit the basic resources and a new button be assigned to open the interface. Your choice whether secondary resources can be auto-looted like this or require interface interaction.

    What doesn't work is making one of the most fluid, fast, and beautiful games on earth CUMBERSOME and dangerous because of UI.

  • The ultimate would be to combine the best of both worlds.
    Return the basic fluidness (is that even a word?) of barrels 1.0 but with the inventory menu option ("Q" on PC) to explore the barrels content (a.k.a. barrels 2.0).

    R (I think it's LT on Xbox) to load barrels from inventory
    F (I think it's RT on Xbox) to load inventory from barrels
    Q (I think it's LB on Xbox) whilst at barrel to activate (and deactivate) the new UI.

    The menu can work in an if/else statement of the "Q" ("LB") keypress, keydown or keyup function.
    If atCBarrel=True then .... open cannon barrel UI
    elseif atCannon=True then .... open cannonball radial
    else ..... open the usual utilities radial
    endif.

    As a programming design you should make it as easy as possible for the consumer, not the programmer.
    Use the same input to open or close everything using if/else statements. Make it user friendly.

  • Thank you Rare for your dedication to this game.

  • @knightx13 said in Inventory Changes - Expanding the Game:

    Thank you for the additional information and clarification @MikeTheMutinous. Really looking forward to what this allows for future content.

    There are multiple points that you did not address however, that have been brought up by community members. They are:

    • The ability to at a glance see which barrels are empty, without the need to open them.
    • The ability to quickly grab a resource from a barrel without opening them (i.e. a banana or plank in an active engagement). For example, press X to Grab, hold X to open, and press Y to store.
    • Not allowing players to "take all" unless the barrel UI is open so that you cannot "take all" on the fly.
    • That when in the barrel UI, you can be kicked out of it due to a wave or ship movement (i.e. trying to grab items from a floating barrel)
    • The ability to stack 99 of each resource in each slot of a barrel, and not having hard resource/slot/barrel limits.

    Could you also speak to these questions/concerns?

    I'll admit I haven't read the entire thread yet, but the take all on the fly is something I would want.

    What I would expect more is that the ship barrels have a standard set 'take stack' option to take a stack of cannonballs or planks or bananas without having to open the inventory. If you are going to hinder us mid combat with an inventory screen for items, you need to give us a way to grab resources during said combat without us dying because of the stupidity of a inventory UI which is flawed. Maybe make 'c' on the keyboard a take stack option and whatever isn't used on the controller 'right d-pad'?

  • @legendary-jerkr The probelm with a "take all" on the fly is that it can be exploited by players just going aboard another ship and quickly stripping them of resources without any real consequence.

    On a related note, strongly suggest that folks give this post a read through:
    https://www.seaofthieves.com/forum/topic/71612/so-they-aren-t-going-to-fix-the-barrels/174
    Really good breakdown and suggestions in there.

  • @knightx13 said in Inventory Changes - Expanding the Game:

    @legendary-jerkr The probelm with a "take all" on the fly is that it can be exploited by players just going aboard another ship and quickly stripping them of resources without any real consequence.

    On a related note, strongly suggest that folks give this post a read through:
    https://www.seaofthieves.com/forum/topic/71612/so-they-aren-t-going-to-fix-the-barrels/174
    Really good breakdown and suggestions in there.

    I already strip people's boats of resources now. The take all feature isn't going to stop it. They need to limit the amount of resources you can carry. I can now take 10 of each cursed canonball. Which is silly. I can easily grab all a boats cc balls quickly without the take all feature, if the barrels aren't bugged and inaccessible...

  • @knightx13 said in Inventory Changes - Expanding the Game:

    @legendary-jerkr The probelm with a "take all" on the fly is that it can be exploited by players just going aboard another ship and quickly stripping them of resources without any real consequence.

    On a related note, strongly suggest that folks give this post a read through:
    https://www.seaofthieves.com/forum/topic/71612/so-they-aren-t-going-to-fix-the-barrels/174
    Really good breakdown and suggestions in there.

    I agree with you on the stripping of resources possibility, I still think we need quick access to our standard resources without having to go into a UI mid battle though.even if they bring back the old take cannonball/banana/plank and had it as an additional option to 'open barrel' so you had the option of UI or quick access.

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