Flesh out a 'Path'

[adorsk]

Flesh out a path that guides people from beginning to advanced.

[adorsk]

Here are some initial ideas.

The overview path is what someone would see first. When they click on a belt, they would go into the path for that belt.

[adorsk]

From Ardon's earlier email:

Hey!

I like a lot of what's going on here, but there's something that hasn't quite come together yet for me.

I really like the second screen with the stones – that seems super clear to me. Could the grasshopper be on the stone rather than next to it? Could there be a winding path in the background?

I'm not sure what the arch of the skill challenge represents. This could just be my ignorance. A possible alternative is a board of wood to be broken, with previous challenges and accomplishments visible as satisfyingly broken boards. As the challenges get harder, there would be more boards, and then they could be upgraded to harder material. This naturally creates a clear flavorful hierarchy and can visually show things like "80 bpm, medium precision:"

1 board of pine 2 pine 3 pine

1 oak 2 oak 3 oak

1 brick 2 brick 3 brick

concrete ... steel ... titanium? ... etc.

Does that make sense? This gives a clear sense of progression and breaks up big goals into many smaller goals. I'm not sure how this interacts with the belt system, but perhaps a belt is equivalent to a semester course. So at the end of breaking concrete, you earn the yellow belt. Then you start over again from pine, but in the green belt. This time instead of karate chopping the pine, you're breaking with a kick. Or a flying kick (red belt?) Or with your antennae. (purple belt?) Or with your mind. (black belt?)

So far I see five nested levels of hierarchy, which could dictate the visual design: Path, e.g. "way of the drum" for different musical skills / learning objectives Belt, e.g. yellow belt, for the equivalent of a course Breaking material, e.g. oak, for a skillset, e.g. tapping along with the beat Number of materials to be broken, e.g. 2 planks of oak, for level of difficulty, e.g. "medium precision" Rocks in a path towards the material for different exercises

This implies to me the need for screenshots that let you drill down to each level of hierarchy. So I'd imagine something like: A beautiful full-color scene, perhaps in the woods, where a grasshopper can choose among different objects, representing different paths. We see a drum, (rhythm) a pitched instrument (tone, intervals?) a scroll (notation?) maybe different weapons. Underneath each we can see some indication of the next level of hierarchy and progress so far, perhaps the current belt color, like in your first screenshot. Clicking on the drum, we see a rack of belts. Perhaps underneath we see the next level of hierarchy, i.e. two planks of brick broken, and/or three planks of brick waiting to be broken Clicking on the belt we see all the challenges that have been broken, and the next one waiting to be broken Clicking on the three planks of brick, we see the stone progress screen with the challenge at the end I think some of this is already there, I would just show it a little more visually instead of the text "2 stones completed, 2 stones remain."

I would consider stealing a page from habit RPG in giving the character an avatar that can be visually upgraded and customized. This has proven to be quite motivating – think world of warcraft, for example. The avatar could still start off as a grasshopper. Having a level number could be another dimension in addition to belts, and might be easier to follow – I don't have a clear sense of the color order, other than black is at the end.

Perhaps there could be moments of accomplishment or certificate with this sort of aesthetic?

Those are all my thoughts so far! I really like the flavor here!

Ardon

[adorsk]

[adorsk]

an alternative to stones...w/ exercise frames

[adorsk]

exercise frames seems to framey...too many frames, loses flavor. For now, stones feel better.

Maybe something like 'way of the drum' screenshot, w/ frame.

[zengardon]

todo: collect images to send to ardon

[adorsk]

posted mockup images/resources in google drive

[adorsk]

Another idea too from earlier jam: on dojo home page include links to most recent paths, or direct link to next stone in the path. Then also include a 'more paths...' link that shows user all available paths on paths page.

[adorsk]

For pure 'training' paths (as opposed to story paths), I'm wondering if it makes more sense to just put the stones/progress right on the patch launcher, in the dojo home view.

So that a path launcher might look something like this (pardon my graphic design sins, I know not what I do)

The idea here is to:

• make it clear what the next 'quest' is (complete two more stones!)
• make it clear what the reward is ('earn the next belt')
• make it easy to get there without looking around (just click 'train' and it takes where you're supposed to go)

If everything is in the launcher, then we wouldn't need any of the overworld views above for pure training paths. We would likely still want them for story paths though.

I'm going to play around with this a little more.

[adorsk]

Here's another idea for the flow of paths, that can incorporate ideas from #17 .

Step 1: Learner starts at dojo home.

Step 2: Learner clicks on a path launcher, and enters training page

The training page displays the current level, as well as the suggested next action ('complete two more milestones', or 'test for belt'. The option to test for belt is always available, if people want to try to test out early. Another option is coaching option, where the learner can get tips.

Here is some more info about the options.

Step 3a: Train or Belt Test

Clicking 'train', or 'test for belt' leads to a training deck like http://one-hand-clapping.musikata.com/

Step 3b: Coaching

If the learner clicks the 'coaching' option, they go to a coaching page. This is where ideas from #17 could come in. The coaching page might look something like this:

Pros/Cons

Some pros of a flow like this are:

• The training page makes it clear what the next action is ('train' or 'test for belt')
• The training page shows the current level, so that learners see they are making progress
• The coaching page is available if people want to access it.
• The coaching page can be implemented in steps or modules, so that it doesn't have to be fully developed all at once.

Some cons:

• Might too much choice on the training page? Perhaps there should just be one default action, and less info.
• Confusion about the coaching page, perhaps it should be developed as a separate story module, accessible from the dojo home?

[adorsk]

Another idea would be to eliminate a screen and combine the training page/deck views onto one page. So that the learner doesn't have to think about what to do; the recommend choice is already loaded.

Like this (but w/ good layout):

[adorsk]

Here's a somewhat different flow, which I think could be more fun and effective.

The idea here is to:

• reduce choice when getting started
• create a sense of 'powering up' as you go
• reduce interface clutter
• make targets clearer

The flow would be like this:

1. User clicks launcher from dojo home.
2. The image above appears. Health bar starts w/ some points, and it remembers how many boards have been broken since last time.
3. User does a challenge and... 4a. passes it: power bar animates out to the right. 4b. fails it: power bar animates to the left ...
4. When power bar is all the way to the right, a board gets broken with an animation and the power bar resets.
5. When all three boards are broken, the level indicator at the left moves to the next belt.

Another idea here is if a learner loses all their health, we can suggest an intervention in the body of the window. This could be a way to link into the story paths.

[adorsk]

I'm calling the 'board breaks' milestones. They represent little steps of progress along the training.

One idea to break things up, is to treat the milestones like save points. When the learner completes the milestone, we offer h(im|er) the choice to keep training or go back to the dojo. This can encourage gradual training over time, rather than binge training.

[zengardon]

Hey! I have a good amount of work this week so I may not be as responsive as usual, but I wanted to weigh in with some thoughts.

First of all, I love the idea of an "on fire" mode with a heated power bar. That's a great way to get to that mode of "but I can't stop now! I'm on fire!"

I also like the concept of the powerbar representing small progress, breaking board being medium, and you can always see your progress in both. This generates a lot of quickly achievable goals. Logically, it might make sense to have the belt (large progress) to the right of the boards. (edit: when I played with this, it felt right to keep it on the left as a "here's where you are now" marker)

One thing I would consider is to make the power bar 3 units so it's more achievable. I don't know if that will play well with gaining more at a time, but the power bar is the real opportunity for that "just a little bit more" feeling. That moment where you just reset and see a long empty progress bar stretching out in front of you is demotivating, and a good stopping point. I would rather have it always start with 1/3 bars – that generates a sense of incompletion, coupled with "almost there." Power mode could gain 2 bars per completion.

One thing I don't like is anything where you feel like you're dropping in level – that feels like punishment, and discourages taking risks or exploring. I also don't like the idea of switching belts – once you earn your green belt, you're a green belt. I don't want to take it away from you. I would say you just don't gain experience until you reach a certain level.

I also don't like the flow of directing people to storyline iff they don't do well in kata. That makes the story seem like punishment, remedial tutoring. I'd rather reward participation and learning. What if you get experience from the story, but if you want to level up faster, you can just do exercises to grind XP as well?

I think this requires a good brainstorming and sketching session in a room full of whiteboards. Until then, here's a sketch:

[zengardon]

when the cricket has something to say:

[adorsk]

Ha! Awesome! I really like the avatar & the fist on the end of the 'power bar'! Mad creativity, love it!

Roger that on nixing level drops, that makes a lot of sense to me. Definitely don't want to discourage folks.

I think your point about not having the story feel like remediation is a good one too. I hadn't thought about that.

The 'gain XP from the story or from grinding' is an interesting idea too! Hmm.

No worries about this week, I'm going to be a bit slow myself. Doing a lot of Boston-Portland ping-pong this week, and then to NYC for memorial day weekend.

[adorsk]

Re: XP from story or kata

It may make sense to have two types of XP:

1: Global XP, that any activity contributes (story, kata, real-life activities) 2: Activity specific XP, that track progress in a specific activity (e.g. a specific kata)

The reason: finer tracking resolution.

The activity-specific XP lets us do things like:

• show people how much they have trained in a specific kata
• have kata-specific leaderboards

The Global XP would be used to pimp out avatars and the such, a la HabitRPG.

[adorsk]

I'm thinking about how to manage the flow for level tests.

I imagine the flow as something like this:

• start at level x
• fill up the spirit bar n times to get n breaks
• after the nth break, we go to a level test. Kind of like a boss level.
• in the level test we don't use a spirit bar; instead we use hearts; you have to pass the level test without missing more than y hearts. The reason for this is that the level test should test competency, rather than repetition. If we only used the spirit bar in level tests, it would be possible to get the next level through sheer repetition and getting lucky, without actually having learned competency.
• Optionally, people can opt to go directly to level tests if they already have some competency.

[zengardon]

I like this a lot, especially the balance between competency and repetition. What causes you to gain and lose spirit?

~ Ardon

On Wed, Jun 4, 2014 at 7:10 AM, Alex D. notifications@github.com wrote:

I'm thinking about how to manage the flow for level tests.

I imagine the flow as something like this:

• start at level x
• fill up the spirit bar n times to get n breaks
• after the nth break, we go to a level test. Kind of like a boss level.
• in the level test we don't use a spirit bar; instead we use hearts; you have to pass the level test without missing more than y hearts. The reason for this is that the level test should test competency, rather than repetition. If we only used the spirit bar in level tests, it would be possible to get the next level through sheer repetition and getting lucky, without actually having learned competency.
• Optionally, people can opt to go directly to level tests if they already have some competency.

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/musikata/musikata.tracker/issues/10#issuecomment-45077996 .

[adorsk]

Cool, glad it jibes!

The 'spirit bar' is the same thing as the power bar above, I just renamed it. So when you successfully complete a mini-exercise, the spirit bar goes up. When it maxes out, the fist lights up and you are rewarded with a board break.

[zengardon]

Ah right. I remember wanting it not to go down so we don't punish trying different things. Sounds good!

~ Ardon

On Tue, Jun 10, 2014 at 6:44 AM, Alex D. notifications@github.com wrote:

Cool, glad it jibes!

The 'spirit bar' is the same thing as the power bar above, I just renamed it. So when you successfully complete a mini-exercise, the spirit bar goes up. When it maxes out, the fist lights up and you are rewarded with a board break.

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/musikata/musikata.tracker/issues/10#issuecomment-45598513 .