Did BZ2 designers go overboard on the number of units?

[appel]

I'm analyzing the game objects and input control interface for BZ2 and I'm wondering to myself, "How on earth did these guys approve of themselves having 14 different unit types (ISDF) that the player can control, but only twelve F-keys!?".

And then you have multiplayer where you only have 9 F-keys for those 14 unit types.

What would they have done if they had to support 24 players per game? No AI units? (not likely, but still some games from that era did support that many!)

Perhaps just a trade off for a "simplifier" interface.

[Axeminister]

I would rather have choices on which units to attack with, than a way to have fourteen different ships. I think they left well enough alone.

[Commando]

I still wish they had allowed F1..F12 keys instead of the F1..F10 keys.

[Avatar]

Stra-Ta-Gee!

Then again, it's very difficult walking the line between RTS and FPS...  hard to say what decisions were well thought out and which were just a shot in the dark...

-Av-

[Zero Angel]

Yeah, I think it was to create a simpler interface. I can't imagine how kludgy the control scheme would be if you had to press an extra key in order to select or group a unit.

I still think that the interface could have been improved on by using the F11 and F12 keys to switch between 'Unit Group 1' and 'Unit Group 2', Giving you a total of 20 slots.

[bigbadbogie]

Sheesh... And I once thought that 10 offensive units in BZ1 was too many.

[GSH]

20 slots? When there's a message saying "don't set unit limit more than 30 in MP"? The capability -- 100 units -- would have absolutely crushed systems when BZ2 shipped.

Just because you want to stick your pinky in your mouth and demand one meeeelion units, all commandable, doesn't mean it's a good idea.

-- GSH

[sabrebattletank]

I certainly don't see a purpose for only using F's 1-10 except to limit the number of units.

[Vid]

20 slots? When there's a message saying "don't set unit limit more than 30 in MP"? The capability -- 100 units -- would have absolutely crushed systems when BZ2 shipped.

Just because you want to stick your pinky in your mouth and demand one meeeelion units, all commandable, doesn't mean it's a good idea.

-- GSH

But its fun to bring in 80 APCs into an enemy base.

[technoid]

I remember us discussing this before awhile a few years ago (in private 1.3 beta subforum I think) and basically, as far as the graphic interface was concerned, the artist had to limit his avatar/icon artistry in the minimum screen resolution of 640x480.  Still, you could squish F11 and F12 icon menu spacing in there, by narrowing each avatar width by a few pixels, but I guess that would mess up those [10 maximum] unit bars per icon which are already 2 pixels wide each, I think (haven't tried tweaking them myself).  But yeah, it would've been nice if F11 and F12 would only pop up in online teamplay (MPI, ST, etc), allocated only for hooman players, nothing else.  But as mentioned, it could've brought a more loaded/busier network with the PC systems of that time. 

[AHadley]

I've always thought the position of the base icons (1, 2, 3, and in SRV and MRVP 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9) would have been better positioned down the side as opposed to stacked at the top to avoid getting in the way of my view.

Using F11 and F12 would have been nice, especially if it was for thugs in MP, so you could squeeze those extra units in.