Widgets in competitive games

Actual forum thread for continuing discussion about widgets in modern Zero-K. Long discussions on battle replays are not user friendly.

Reference replays:
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Googlefrog reply
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Based on replays I assume this is more of an issue in 1v1 (which I do not play often), but I would be curious what people would think about the following idea: append any non-default widgets used during the game to the replay, and display what is used during the replay (to easily understand what the opponent used).

The way I see it everybody that plays the game makes an effort to learn what is possible and not (ex: units, stats, strategies, default widget configurations, etc.). For me this is a continuous process, and if with some effort you can learn/use something your opponent has used, I do not see a huge issue if you loose a couple of games. This would be similar to Godde beating you without any special widgets and you watching the replay to try to understand how he does that (unit order, strategy, etc.). The fact that you should check if he uses any widgets/configs is just one more aspect to take into account.

Even currently, sometimes I wonder "from the huge list of default widget, who uses what? how do they configure them?"

Restating my opinion for this thread - personal custom widgets that automate unit behavior in inhuman ways are harmful to the 1vs1 matchmaking environment. Everyone should have access to all of the same tools in the competitive mode. If a widget tests well and fits into the zero-k ecosystem, I'm okay with it being added to the list of selectable widgets everyone can use and being folded into the matchmaking ecosystem. There are probably some kinds of widgets that could ruin the fun of playing for me, but that's separate.

Custom or casual games are an acceptable place for such widgets to be tested or used, though I think it would be in poor taste to not inform people you're playing with about it.

Bakuhatsu puts it really well, for me.

I'm interested to ask that if this opinion becomes concensus, what means do we have available to impose a stricter reality upon ranked games?

>One from a couple of years ago was a kodachi pre-fire widget, basically increasing the range of the unit - a previously chosen range that was set to be balanced and fair. Sure everyone could apply this widget, and Googlefrog nerf the range of Kodachi to re-balance the game, but then what has been achieved?

One feature/design paradigm I particularly like about zero-k is that it arrives to have a "physics based combat model"; projectiles obey laws of physics, units don't have hidden bonus damages or armor types, and balance is achieved through tweaking these physical properties rather than artificially handicapping units. The prefire widget was a natural use of in-game physics to improve unit performance, and a physically accurate one at that. I would argue that the net result of the widget and rebalance is that the game is a more accurate combat simulation, which is something I value. The net result in terms of gameplay may be the same but there is value in staying true to the principles of the game's design.

It's probably to the benefit of Zero-K to balance a situation where widgets don't *in practise* provide a huge advantage, vs giving widget developers some space to play in. And I think it does a pretty good job of this, albeit gradually having to reduce the scope of what widget developers can do.

If I could wish for one change now it would be to improve reporting on which widgets a player is using - drawing attention to anything non-bundled in particular - and potentially attach any non-bundled widget lua to the replay.

Been avoiding reading the other thread or too much here for mental health reasons. My £0.02:


I like people being able to customize the game and add improvements to it. This is much more easily done (psychologically) if there's no need to worry about your work being made useless because the gatekeeper (@GoogleFrog) doesn't like the code quality. Being able to design and test your setup and commands for your own style gives a freedom not found elsewhere.

The other reason I like widgets is because it's a push to automate away trivial tasks and annoyances (the kind I wish most people in office jobs would automate away). I was one of the best at using micro to abuse Kodachi's persistent AoE vs chasing units, but I'm still glad it's gone. The game gradually improves over time as more and more trivial timewasters are automated and UX and UI improve.

There are a long list of widgets I'd like to add when I have the energy. For example a circle (F)ollow command like the circle (G)uard command but that doesn't have all my entire Flee screen running away to try and chase down that Emissary that just hit my detriment. Or a Scatter command that tells my units to spread out a bit while continuing their current orders (whether that's moving or attacking or whatever). Or a "even distribution" line move command that means that when I line move there's no risk of my aegis all ending up at one end of the line.
As it currently stands I'm likely to end up implementing something that's not quite polished enough for GoogleFrog to accept as a standard widget, but my hope is that others will try them, like them and then push for me (or someone else like GoogleFrog) to polish them up enough for inclusion.


My ideal world would have a list of other people's enabled widgets available at the end (and start?) of a match so that you can just grab whichever you like the look of. Allowing a rapid evolution of widgets as people share the good ones and improve/tweak them over time.

Those you suggest Dyth are all great quality of life improvements which I'm all for and have no issue with, different from those widget's that don't add value but make the users units OP.

quote: Whilst we're at it, can we add an offensive circling command for raiders too? I would absolutely love to have my glaives circle a crab / grizzly / whatever at a pre-specified radius (though this might make halberd aoe-baiting more problematic in some cases).

Draw circle, move formation with alt. Not exactly what you want, but quite close to it. Just to shorten the time for you until that command comes out.

quote: Hot take: all allowed widgets should be publically available and the wiki should inform what they are and how to get them.

For me this is not sound as good enough. I want to know what widgets and how are they configured in a particular game, otherwise seems that what we will end up with is a very long list of half-baked, not great widgets, out of which a couple are amazing - but hard to find. Not to mention the whole mess that might be keeping a wiki list up to date with latest versions of ZK (remove useless/inefficient ones). Competitive people will do that for their local install because they want to win.