Doing hotkey combo [A] > [V] > [D] with a villager to try and build a stone wall makes a Market instead with Cuman. It seems Cumans don’t have stone wall ability, as the icon is blank. However, nothing should happen when I hit [D] then. Instead, a subtle, quiet, pleasant-sounding rejection noise should sound to communicate to the player that that action isn’t available.
[A] brings up the Build menu. [V] turns the page to the next page of build options. [D] would select the stone wall if you were a different civ, like Spanish. Because it’s Cumans, I discover they don’t have such walls. The Market is on the first build menu, not 2nd. So, once we hit [V], the market should no longer be a hotkey option. We should have to get back to the 1st build menu for [D] to make a Market.
This has always been the case. If you are in a multi-page menu, and there is no option for that hotkey on that page, it will select what using that hotkey (if one one does) on the other page of the same menu. Same with goths and huns when trying to make stone gates (leading to TCs) as well as walls.
The same also applies to any civ without the requirements to build a range/stable, the hotkeys will land on your mill/lumbercamp on the other page instead. It’s less a bug more just somewhere where they didn’t add a QoL feature.
Well, what you say is what I was afraid of. I do wonder, though, why do bugs that were obviously bugs in HD that have carried over have to be deemed ‘non-bugs’ for DE and “that’s just the way it has always been, so it’s not a bug”?
As far as I’m concerned, a bug is a bug no matter when it originated.
Otherwise, we could just as easily say that multiplayer restores have always been broken, so that’s not a bug… so why fix it?
I think what differentiates it from a bug, not a feature, is that it’s going an extra mile to give players an option for the hotkey they pressed when they had messed up themselves, not the game messing up their intended play. It also happened in UP 1.5 (where I mostly played) which carried forward things like that from 1.0c, not even discounting 1.0e. Id honestly agree its a “feature” over bug but, Id also like to see things like this left for players to decide and to be fixed.
The expected and predictable result based on what we visually see is for nothing to happen (because the icon is dimmed out), aside from a thud sound to let you know you’re trying to do an action that makes no sense. The icon is dimmed; we shouldn’t have something else happen.
When I click a greyed-out icon in Microsoft Word, like how the “Copy” button is when no text is selected, the program shouldn’t insert a table or do some other action that’s found on a different menu underneath it. It should do nothing because the icon is dimmed. In AoE, if you physically mouse-click the dimmed icon for a stone wall, it doesn’t magically turn your mouse pointer into a Market for you to place; nor should it. Why should hitting A > V > D hotkeys behave any differently thank clicking the dimmed icon?
It is problematic for the player who is used to building things in one civ, who then play a different civ that doesn’t have the same items available to build/make. It is second-nature for me to hit A, V, D for Spanish to build stone walls, and several other hotkeys and hotkey sequences. Why should I, the player, now have an added click of exiting out of the Market building placement just because the game erroneously, non-helpfully, and unpredictably decides to turn my mouse pointer into something on a completely different menu screen (a ghosted market in this case) when I play a different civ?
The devs encourage playing other civs. This is a problematic issue of playing other civs. Bug.
And if/when it gets fixed, make a mod that brings poor UI/UX design back, if you like.
So you’re saying its a bug, but also its part of the design, which is it? Come on, if you’re going to deliberately be obtuse and try and argue against everything someone says because you enjoy arguing, at least provide some actual points to lead to a practical discussion.
No obtuseness there. Neither actual, nor intended. I feel it is a bug as I’ve stated the entire time. Not once (at least not that I know of) have I said its current design is something I like or want.
The only possible unclear part(?) was maybe saying I use A, V, D all the time? If so, to help clarify, I updated my post to say I do that all the time as Spanish in order to build stone walls… which I had already mentioned in my OP, but I edited to repeat it; as well as edited to say the problem for the player is when they use a civ they’re not used to playing.
Does that help? If not, please explain where I went wrong or was being obtuse so I can update/fix/clarify. I don’t enjoy arguing, but I have no problem trying to explain what I mean and providing information so you can better understand why it is important to me or why I feel it makes sense to fix it. Your accusation was unwarranted.
Intentional or not, this is a pretty useful feature. It’s the same if you hold the key, it will go to the other menu. If you can’t be bothered to press escape or just remember that you can’t build stone walls that’s your problem.
So you’ve adapted to poor design. That’s cool. If they fix it, as i hope they do for the millions of new players who will come on-board and haven’t played the game for two decades like you, you’ll have to enjoy modding the game to fix what will then be your problem Stone walls was just one example.
11 if they do “fix” it then sure it’ll be my problem.
I still don’t understand how you think it’s poor design. In standard DE hotkeys Q and W are the two villager build hotkeys. If in dark age I do W+R (siege shop) instead of Q+R (lumbercamp) it’s useful for it to build the lumbercamp. Since Q and W are next to each other, this is a fairly common misclick. More common than when you forget Cumans can’t make stone walls.
Once fixed, they could leave the legacy (broken) UI option available to choose in the menus
It’s poor design because what other program have you used ever where hitting the hotkey for a greyed-out button (or clicking the greyed-out button) actually executes some completely different operation in the program than what it should? As a user of many software programs over my life, I have certain expectations for greyed-out buttons. That expectation is: nothing should happen (or, in the case of games, a ~thud~ sound of some sort to let you know it didn’t do anything because the button is greyed-out). It’s how the world has been trained by developers of every other piece of software made since probably 1975 or before, lol.
Age of Empires 2 is the only program I’ve ever encountered where doing a hotkey for a dimmed-out/greyed-out button actually does something; and that something has nothing to do with what you wanted it to do. How that is not poor design, I’ll never understand. Had it never been made that way, you’d be none the wiser, since every other program you’ve used doesn’t do anything for greyed-out buttons.
When you click or hotkey the following buttons in Word, Outlook, or Edge, do you really expect them to execute an operation for a button that’s underneath them or above them on a different layer of UI?
I didn’t forget anything. It was pretty much the first time I had used Cumans, because as I said, I always play Spanish. There was nothing to forget; I just didn’t know. Don’t try to build Siege Workshops in Dark Age with misclicks and all should be well! The game shouldn’t change long-established rules for UI to cater to misclicks. If all other programs were that way, imagine hitting CTRL+C to Copy text in Word, but it instead Saves your file if you don’t have any text selected to copy. Not cool
Ran into this issue again, but when making farms. Selecting villager and then hitting [A] > [A] made towers instead of Farms because I didn’t yet have a Mill constructed yet. A little bit of an inconvenience
Screenshot attached.
Stone walls was just one example.
