Template talk:Cardpage

Latest revision as of 20:29, 5 November 2013

You're right, I see how those parsers are working. I do have thoughts:

1. Consider info on the left and graphic on the right. Not sure if it's all that desirable. It's just that most text on the wiki defaults to left alignment and the eye kind of jumps over there to start reading.
2. Rename "tier" and "type" to make it more clear to the user that color values are expected. May I suggest titlebar="color" and cardcolor#="color"
3. Possibly Add some cell borders, not everywhere, but enclosing logical groups, for instance 1st effect, 1st duration, 1st chance are all info on the same thing.
4. Possibly make the card name bigger and bolder. It's important!
5. There's nowhere for a list of items that give this card. That's something we'll likely want on the Card page eventually even if we can't complete it when first making a page. Probably most such lists will be too long for the table.

--mightymushroom (talk) 13:02, 22 October 2012 (PDT)

1. Done !!!
2. Done !!!
3. Tested borders, yucky ! Changed to segregation via cell background. See below, hope it helps.
4. Done !!!
5. This requires cross referencing which requires tables/databases. Reason why I asked Farbs, and he committed to templates. :( I hope this is not OUR job. Because in order to do cross referencing, he'll have to give me one :P

-PL

I propose rearranging the template to better reflect relationships between pieces of info (and avoid some unnecessary repeating lines):

1. "Card Info" section comprises all information about the card as a card: Name, Tier, Class (Color), Sub-Class (Melee, Magic, Crushing, Holy, etc.)
2. "Instructions" comprises the text box(es) at the bottom:
   1. On Play: = what the card does when you play it. Logically, there's no more than one instant box per card (you'd have conflicting instructions). Merge the "Damage" category into this line. Background color.
      1. Range - only OnPlay needs a range, reactions and attachments happen at the character's location.
      2. OnPlay_Chance
      3. (??) OnPlay_Return - I doubt any cards do this, but I'm not 100% sure
   2. Reaction1: = the first reaction. (Ideally a reaction in the first box, though I won't get fussy over it.) New background.
      1. Reaction1_Chance
      2. Reaction1_Return
   3. Reaction2: = second reaction. New background
      1. Reaction2_Chance
      2. Reaction2_Return
   4. Attach: = what the card does as an attachment. Logically, not more than one (conflicting instructions again). New background.
      1. Duration - as far as I know, only attachments have more than instant duration.
      2. Attach_Return - though I don't know whether any attachments actually do this

This matches the explanation I hope to write soon for Cards/Parts of a Card general knowledge. --mightymushroom (talk) 14:21, 29 October 2012 (PDT)

erm, I'm getting confused :P Let's see:

1. No issue for me to make a new column and label it Card Info and have it rowspan to cover name, tier, class and subclass (is the official label 'subclass' from Blue Manchu ? They might call it something else, subclass sounds weird imo...).
2. Again, no issue to make a new column and label it Instructions and have it span the rest of the cards (excluding flavor text).
3. No issue for On Play to substitute for effect. I haven't seen any cards with more than 1 on play effect but I suspect this could be an intentional design for future expansion. Can Jon/devs confirm ?
4. Reaction1: the first reaction. I cannot concur as the nomenclature indicates reaction chains. For eg: crushing gauntlets contain 2 reactions. Which is the first reaction ? Also there are reactions that have durations. I can't recall the exact card tho...
5. Attach: = what the card does as an attachment. This conflicts with On Play. Check out Martyr Blessing from http://www.cardhunter.com/2012/05/lazy-card-hunter/. Unless you mean to have on_play empty and attach filled ?...that would confuse readers. hmm...
6. It might be better if you highlight which are the unnecessary lines that the template throws up and I can make those dynamic as well. As it is, we really need to get into beta to be able to improve it. card effects are straightforward, its the reactions engine that can foul stuff up and make the template really ugly. :(

-PL

Guess my ideas are not as lucid as I would wish. :)

• On your 1 & 2: I didn't intend to explicitly label "Card Info" or "Instructions" in the template. I was trying to make the case for listing Damage and Range per effect instead of above the effects as if they apply to all uses (they do not!). Looking back, I can see why I was unclear.
• On your 3 & 5: "On Play" was an attempt to find something better than "Instant Effect" to describe an action that takes place 1) when you choose to play the card, rather than as a reaction; 2) not as part of something the card does by being attached. I hesitate to use Instant because any number of reactions can happen between the time it is played and the time the action finishes resolving. I believe there is (can be) a rules distinction between the instant and duration components even within one box. So yes, for a card like Martyr Blessing I would leave "On Play" blank, or put the word "Attach" in the line to clue the reader to look for an attachment. And if I found a reaction with a duration, I would expect that the duration was part of the card being attached rather than part of the card reacting: Martyr Blessing is a case in point, where the attachment lasts 2 rounds and the reaction instant effect while attached is to draw a card. I thus define three categories of effects: On Play (instant), Reaction (also instant), and Attachment (duration).
• However, I concede that there is a simple perceptive distinction between light and dark text boxes, i.e. Play Effects and Reaction Effects. This is the system we have now. I am willing to be overruled on the necesssity of splitting instant and attachment.
• On your 4: Oops, you're right. We definitely want to avoid implying chains where there are none.
• On your 6: If I ever edit the template, it's a fair bet that every line will become optional. As it is, I get errors if I fail to include the four lines each time I have an effect1 or reaction2 or whatever. Not all instructions use all lines.
• Circling back to your 3: As a matter of logic, I believe that a card will not have more than one Play Effect or more than one Attachment. If it did, that would require interrogating the player as to which Play Effect should be used; it's a complication that we have not seen and that I believe the dev team will be leery of employing. No, I have no confirmation that it will never happen in the future. But I just don't see a need now, and future editors can add it in if it arises. Attachments are even less likely to be doubled, because the card sits there explaining its effect and how would you know which explanation is in play?
• Circling back to your 1: Both "Class" and "Sub-Class" are my words. The most official term I've heard for color is probably "color" and I don't think they've talked about the "Melee, Crushing" part at all. I am waffling between using (Sub-)Class or (Sub-)Type or something else entirely as the preferred terms on the wiki. Suggestions welcome.

-mm

ok, I think I've gotten your drift. I've summarized and raised a few other issues largely because of some new developments.

1. The first issue here is from http://www.cardhunter.com/2012/10/card-rarities-2/. To-do list for template is updated right below.
2. I'll make the change for effect type to subtype. No idea what the devs are calling it either. This is just a 2s cosmetic change. :P Card info becomes a static module per card. Included in to-do list.
3. You want to put Damage, Range into an On Play dynamic module. Do you want to seperate movement range from spell range ? damage from heal ? I'd reckon that fixed integers go into these entries. And a dynamic text entry for on play effect. How does that sound ?
4. On Play (instant), Reaction (also instant), and Attachment (duration). ok, understood. 3 sets of dynamic modules...
5. 'As it is, I get errors if I fail to include the four lines each time I have an effect1 or reaction2 or whatever.' Aha, this is what I need...hmm, I need to make some more templates :P
6. 'I believe that a card will not have more than one Play Effect or more than one Attachment' Not too difficult for devs to make an On Play effect be conditional upon the game state. Eg: If 1 enemy is in range, do A. If 1 ally in range, do B.
7. To-do list:

• Change 'tier' to 'quality'
• Include Rarity (I think this should be in Card Info)
• Change Type to Subtype.
• Make 3 dynamic templates (On Play, Reaction and Attachment)

PS: won't be doing anything until rosh gets the server protection up, we can bulk up the to-dos until then. :)

-PL

1. So I've been thinking it over, and I changed my mind. I no longer think it's so important to separate instant and duration in the card template. Because there's certainly a difference in terms of game logic, but there is too often not an obvious difference in the instruction text. I think it'll be easier to understand input-wise if it just asks for what's in the boxes. Suggested lines:

<!-- Card Information -->

Name: name

Quality: title bar color

Rarity: rarity

Color Class: color(s), outputs Attack etc. -- "Color Class" to tie what we call class to card colors

Card Type: from info box -- I know "Type" isn't official either but it seems the best option currently

<!-- On Play Instructions (light text box) -->

Play Effect 1: when the card Plays -- including damage, healing, movement, attachment

Play1 Range: integer (if 0, line is optional)

Play1 Duration: integer (or delete line)

Play1 Self Target: yes (or delete line)

Play1 Chance: integer+ (or delete line)

Play1 Keep: yes (or delete line) -- Keep appears to be the new/current word for return to hand

Play Effect 2: -- I'm still not convinced this exists, but if you want it, copy all the stuff from Play1

...

<!-- Reaction Instructions (dark text box) -->

Reaction Effect 1: when the card reacts

Reaction1 Range: integer (or delete line)

Reaction1 Duration: integer (or delete line) -- if the Reaction creates an attachment

Reaction1 Self Target: yes (or delete line) -- is this necessary? not sure with small sample size

Reaction1 Chance: integer+ (or delete line)

Reaction1 Keep: yes (or delete line)

Reaction Effect 2: same stuff again

...

Flavor Text: flavor text

How's that look?

2. Add to To Do list:

• Add Categories to template output. I'm thinking just categories by Class, so this can be tucked into the color->class sub-template to assign automatically.
• Consider adding list of acceptable colors to 'titlebar' and 'cardcolor' instructions -- will reduce chance of unanticipated response

-- mm

Changelog:

1. Updated Color Class (to review after beta release)
2. Updated Type, damtype and effect type (to review after beta release)
3. Updated Play effect. Range, duration, self target, chance and keep are dynamic, delete entries if not required. Ditto for reactions.
4. Updated categories in Cards category. (Still considering other proper categories, we might need more than just class/types)
5. Updated template help text for contributors, including acceptable card quality and card color entries.
6. Updated all cards as per reflected in forum
7. Bug fix: flavor text fouling up column widths

Remarks: Due to dynamic row entries in table, background color looks weird (cf Bash). I might consider other presentation alternatives when free.

-PL

[edit] More categories?

It would add a lot to usability if the template would generate more categories. I'd go ahead and do it myself but the template is locked (for a good reason).

The major ones I'd like to have are:

• By quality: Category: Gold Quality Card etc.
• By rarity: Category: Common Card, Category: Uncommon Card, Category: Rare Card
• By attack types: Category: Melee Attack Card, Category: Magic Attack Card,
• By damage type: Category: Lightning Attack Card
• By attack rider effect: Category: Step Attack Card, Category: Penetrating Attack Card, Category: Bash Attack Card, Category: Chop Attack Card
• Game elements: Category: Trait Card

Quality, rarity, attack and damage can be added automatically quite easily. Step attacks etc. may require some string filtering.

This would help a lot for deck building and comparing items as well as suggesting new cards and items.

--Corvantes (talk) 20:29, 5 November 2013 (PST)