A modder wishlist and questions...

Just to say, rather glad to see how the direction has gone for universe creation after the changes earlier in the year.

I noticed there's already more script actions in the xml's  (marker, etc) than in the dialog tool distributed, so some of this may already exist (I'm still burrowing through the files), but no way to know at the moment, so here's my full list of "if anything were possible" wishlisting... 

Request: Font/UI Scaling
Priority: High
Rationale: I know this one usually strikes terror into the hearts of developers since it's often "non-trivial", but I've found it makes a significant impact on my own play/purchases and that of others I know. And especially so for those of us who are likely to be relying heavily on text like modders (versus having everything voiced). Even if the text is legible in a general sense, being able to scale the font (even if not the UI) means there's a lot less strain to read, especially for long periods of time.
Update: Or actually, playing around in the files some more, it seems this is already implemented through "ContextDialog.xml" in Assets/UI. So, yay for that! (I tested it by playing around with the menu font size, in case anyone wondered). So, I guess the request just becomes to expose that in the options menu for players, please and thank you, and you're awesome for already having this!


Request: Increased Alien/Background flexibility
Priority: High
Rationale: Not sure if there was only a single "layer" of png/video planned for the dialog screen, but I'd like to request there be at least 2, but preferably more (I noticed that background and alien models, etc, were separated in the xml in scenes in the files, so this may already be possible?). My ideal would be at least 3 if it allowed png background, video, and then png foreground (with video have alpha transparency, I noticed you're using the webm format, so this may function for transparency?). Or four pngs layers if png/video could not be mixed. Basically in the ideal I'd be hoping to use static elements for background/atmosphere and then sprite animation to give some life to the aliens (Result would be like SC2 dialog, or most visual novels). This is mostly so there will be the ability to maintain more interest visually, since again, unlikely that there would be voicing possible.
Note: Happy to see there's positioning coordinates.


Request: Dynamic change to dialog elements
Priority: Medium
Rationale: Might be already part of planned features considering the "setmood" instruction? But, not sure if/how that would carry over to modders and to what degree, so thought to include it. If the previous ideal were implemented, being able to change the png background/foreground layers would be enough I'd think to change the visuals strikingly enough for mood/atmosphere changes. Again, for an element to maintain interest.


Request: Set an integer variable value through dialog scripting
Priority: Low
Rationale: Instead of a straight boolean flag, was hoping to also be able to have value increments, effectively "faction points" possible. E.g. "For every 100 RU you transfer to this faction, you improve their favorable view of you by 1, for every ship you destroy it gives -3, etc" and then being able to set flags based on that variable. Gives the ability to make things a bit more open in some ways. I can think of ways around this using just flags, but this would make things a lot easier, if possible. 


Request: Set dialog/events for time passed/stardate/random range within these
Priority: Medium
Rationale: Not entirely sure how dialogs are initiating at the moment (It seemed liked it was coordinate/marker based? With ties to an orbit object? Didn't see any other kind), but wondered if it would be possible to initiate dialog screens more free form. Similar to how SC2 had changes occur over time to give a more living galaxy feel. But, also in that this would allow for sort of more "internal" events, like interactions with crew of the main starship. As well as "incoming transmission" sort of events. 


Request: Hot key for Undo/Redo in Editor (Ctrl-Z/Ctrl-Y)
Priority: Low
Rationale: I actually didn't realise there was an undo and re-verified my install to fix my playing around, because I assumed there wasn't one if the hot key didn't work hehe 


Random questions/notes:
FBX compatibility: Noticed that different models are using different versions of FBX for export, which can make it impossible to open them in things that are the not-latest-version of Autodesk software (seems it's usually Maya that defaults to this). Might be a thing to standardise for final and be backwards compatible, I think most select the 2015 version if I recall correctly (so modders can edit things if need be in future).

Melee Difficulty Set after dialog: It seems like this is possible with the script "Scene.InsertAfterCurrentMeleeConfig()" but, just wanted to confirm?


I'll stop there for now, since this is already long enough. Things are looking great so far though, really exciting!