Unit in Sidebar instead of City

[BaronGreystone]

Description: You right-click on a city that has no garrison, but the sidebar still shows something else, in my example the unrelated last unit I "touched."

Expected behavior: I expect the sidebar to say "Farm" or whatever I just right-clicked on.

Actual behavior: The sidebar shows something other than the city I'm examining, someplace else. In this case, the last unit I "touched."

Game version: EFS B5 with Rebalanced Unit.dat, solo game as Hawkwood with default traits, human on easiest difficulty, AI's on hardest. Random universe, Uni Warehouse, Plague and Consume Food are ON.

Steps to reproduce:

Build a City. Don't move any units there. Right-click some unit somewhere, then right-click the city.

Additional information:

[Matt-Caspermeyer]

Not sure what to say here - this is default game behavior and is a popup that appears over everything else. I've never had an issue with it as it allows you to quickly build something in an empty city and then get back to what you were doing.

What do other people think?

[HDIAndrew]

Since the unit is still selected, I recommend leaving as is.

[BaronGreystone]

My feeling is that this behavior falls under the umbrella of making player focus be all about units, instead of location. One result of that behavior is how the player's session is "hijacked" as the program whisks you away to whatever unit that IT decides should demand your attention next. And that behavior drives me crazy, as I've said many times.

When I play a game I want time to think and consider alternatives and carefully move units around, in one AREA at a time. And I want to be the one to choose which areas to look at, in whatever order I decide works best for me. This is why I've said that that I'd prefer a button labeled "next unit" for units that don't have orders this turn, INSTEAD of dragging my attention around repeatedly, against my will.

Now all that being said, why in THIS particular example do you have an exception, and KEEP my focus on a unit that I've left behind? That unit was not the next one in the program's proprietary order, because (as I recall) that process was already finished and I was just going back and looking into things. Fine tuning as it were. So I looked at that unit, so what? And now I'm looking at a city. Why display a unit I'm done with? Again, it's the "unit-centric" thinking that is causing this. I am not comfortable with a "unit-centric" POV. A city is a valid "target" for my attention; it's something I built that I can do things with later. I'm looking at a city, not the (hypothetical) units within. The sidebar should display the city, not a unit, especially not one I'm finished considering.

Take it one step further. If I right-click on a hex that doesn't even have a city built there, how about showing THAT on the sidebar, too? With whatever data there is about the hex, including its correct location on the little map window up above? But maybe that's too much to consider for this stage of development. Fine, but not the city issue.

For Matt to remark that this behavior "allows you to...get back to what you were doing" made me spit up my coffee. If that's the thinking, then this is the ONLY case where the program is so very kind as to allow that. Nothing in this game allows me to get back to what I was doing. It's the biggest complaint I have. And in this case, it makes no sense even with good intention, because I am done with that unit, I don't need to be back there when I close this screen, I should sit at this city's location until I decide to go elsewhere.

And this conversation also begs me to bring up another issue I have. When you build a city with your Engineer you are immediately whisked away to move other units. That's incredibly annoying. Because the first thing you want to consider after you build a city, is what to build within that city. Which is what I was doing to spark this whole example situation. For pete's sake, if I build a city my next screen should give me the opportunity to designate what to build within that city, even if my choice is "none." Again, a glaring example of the "unit-centric" thinking that whisks me away somewhere else.

[Matt-Caspermeyer]

Added the "wonf fix" label - unless a lot of people come back here and disagree with this, this will probably be how this is.