Rainbow VFX / Other VFX from recent siege footage - Feedback Thread

Surprising probably no one who knows me, after reviewing the siege footage, I am very pro rainbow.

1. The rainbow effect is on the 'top' in field of view. It's not going to distort the view of combatants except maybe at the edges, but if you need to see in the edges you are probably close enough to see the enemy vs friend icon anyway and IS has specifically said silhouettes are important to their design philosophy. So lack of clarity from that range would mean silhouettes need tuning in this case given the rainbow is fairly translucent.
2. Rainbows can be easily tied to 'positive' effects. The purpose here is obviously a cleric spell. It's obviously benefiting SOMEONE in the bubble.
3. It'd be really easy to change the gold part of the effect to be a reddish brown/purpleish black, without changing the rainbow part that signifies it as a clear 'positive' spell type, making it subtly tell you who benefits from entering this aoe.
4. You want positive aoe spells to be visible to players BECAUSE it can get chaotic in a siege. Rainbows with a clear marker, and a shimmering enemy vs friend effect is in my opinion subtle while still being clear. And you definitely want this type of thing to be seen in the sky rather than on the much more chaotic ground (where a lot of mage spells have 'harming' aoe particle effects.) I don't think the gold shimmer would be as clear a marker in the heat of combat or low frame rate situations.
5. Obviously rainbows look freakin cool.

I'm breaking my team's 'only one of us posts in any given discussion thread' rule to jump on this as well.

I don't think I'd change the gold shimmer, but rather, the central skyline beacon, that's currently reddish. This way, there's less confusion when two different opposing Clerics put the skill in the exact same spot. You can immediately look for the 'upwards shaft of light' and move toward 'ally colored' light, away from 'enemy colored' light, and still be able to tell if the two are in almost the same space due to how thin the light column is.

I don't have a strong opinion on the amount of rainbow shown, but I do like the prismatic effect itself and would hope it stays. I can't see how to lessen it and it look good still, either.

So that's my suggestion part. Maybe have those red lines be green or gold for allies, purple/red for enemy.

The colorblind factor is definitely important to take into consideration, but I don't see how it effects a rainbow in particular. I would expect a rainbow is more likely to be translatable than any given color. Taking away the rainbow and focusing on the whispy 'aura' field would make it more likely to be difficult for colorblind players, not less as it is more of a shimmer than a solid color by necessity . Bands of different 'shades' is more distinct than a singular whispy aura with a color that may or may not blend into the background of battle for them. I'm not colorblind however. I'd love to here from colorblind users.

Removing the rainbow to make the enemies look less 'friendly' misses the nuance of needing to denote something as a positive effect. An aoe positive effect needs to indicate two things: 1. that it is a benefiting area 2. who it is benefiting.

The current design can easily shift to this. If you take away the rainbow corona and focus on the 'shimmering aura' you lose a. the visibility aspect I discussed in my own first point b. a clear indicator that the bubble is having a positive effect. Sure a golden sphere looks positive for you, but when your trying to differentiate for the enemy a glowing red bubble for the enemy makes it much less clear that it's a spell that is benefiting the enemy not harming you. You could just go 'fine both are gold but use the pillar to differentiate'. Could work but in the heat of battle finding that thin light pillar is slightly harder. If any other effect also uses the light pillar now you are relying solely on the golden corona and then 'checking it has the right pillar'. That's an extra processing step.

I strongly disagree with you that it is difficult to tell what is going on. It doesn't look cluttered to me. I don't say this because I think your opinion is invalid here. It is very relevant for the devs to know that you think it's cluttered. It's just also relevant that it is very informational and not cluttered to me. I'm sure they'll get some statistical focus testing for that.

Lastly obviously 5. is subjective. But so is you thinking of rainbows as girly. If you wanna be a cleric bandit that strikes the fear into others, that's on your play ability and sense of theatrics. For me it would not detract from your 'manly intimidation' if you are trying to rob my stuff. I'd be too busy thinking about some dastardly fiend trying to rob me of my stuff, not your particle effects.

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There is a lot to unpack here. So let's get right into it.

The primary thing I feel you seem to be missing is the 'why' of the current format. When critiquing a professional designers work you must start with 'why did they do it this way.' Without doing this it's harder to give proper feed back because you might be trying to solve a different problem than the designer in question or you may have a valid critique but won't be able to 'reach' them because they don't know they are trying to solve the 'wrong problem'.

In this case the why of the design for the cleric spell in question is fairly clear and I have already alluded the main points in my original post so I'll be brief. 1. it must convey that the effect is an aoe buff (and is therefore of vital strategic importance) to people gathering. 2. It must cut through the clutter of war while simultaneously 3. it must not disrupt close quarter and midrange combat 4. it must somehow indicate it is friendly or foe 5. it must feel cohesive with the clerics other spells.

These are the problems the current iteration are trying to solve all at once. It's current only short coming from that list is that it lacks a clear indicator of friendly or foe. I do think IS needs to consider accessibility and add it to the list above if it isn't already. Unless you are personally colorblind, let's not get into an argument about whether or not a rainbow would even need an accessibility shift from that direction as it's not something inside of our domain so to speak. If you are, I sincerely apologize if you have been trying to explain to me that 'yes rainbows are hard to see in a dynamic environment as a person with colorblindeness'. It wasn't clear to me and I hope IS hear's your opinion on the matter.

Your proposed solutions fail to answer at least one of these questions.

A solid transparent dome has a higher chance of obscuring from a distance for example(1 and 3). You would need to increase the width of the current dome to make it more obvious to see in a crowd (a game balance issue.) The current effect serves as an artificial outline allowing it to look bigger than it is. It could also make different gear color harder to balance in a way that allows for good twitch movement tracking if you want to make it visible enough in a clash from a distance. The shimmer was a compromise between visibility, not obscuring too much, and making it clear where the effect starts from at midrange.

Making the enemies sphere a singular color addresses quick judgement of if it benefits you or not but it fails to tell you at a glance if it benefits the enemy you may be thinking of approaching (4). Relying on seeing numbers or symbols also fails to answer (1) especially in a crowded environment.

Particle effect design is a complicated task, isn't it?

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I don't see how a rainbow is confusing as 'positive for your side' when there is a clear pillar of light that could easily be colored to indicate that it's not on your side. Is there another way you can think of that would clearly indicate both 'this is a buff area' at a distance as well as 'this is an enemies/friends'. I certainly can't. It doesn't have to be a rainbow, but a rainbow certainly fits in with a cleric's 'light based' thematic over all. A pale corona of whitish yellow maybe if statistics are really on the side of not liking the rainbow. That'd be a lot of asset rework given rainbows are used in a lot of cleric particle effects though.

JustVine wrote: »

Lastly obviously 5. is subjective. But so is you thinking of rainbows as girly. If you wanna be a cleric bandit that strikes the fear into others, that's on your play ability and sense of theatrics. For me it would not detract from your 'manly intimidation' if you are trying to rob my stuff. I'd be too busy thinking about some dastardly fiend trying to rob me of my stuff, not your particle effects.

I will say that I never called rainbows 'girly'. So don't put words in my mouth as the saying goes.
All I meant was that speaking from my perspective "as a guy that wants to play a Cleric" they do not appeal to me.
And that rainbows are not scary are they? (This was a joke hence the "haha").
This part is fully subjective - however I tend to focus more on the functionality of VFX anyway.[/quote]

In one legend a rainbow was literally the sign of 'God feeling satisfied/slightly bad for smiting everyone but one dude's family in a boat'. I personally don't have a connotation for rainbows being scary or not so your joke was lost on me. Pale yellow light on the other hand, would definitely be way less scary to me yeah.