[crossfire] HallOfSelection in crossfire 2.0

[Mark Wedel]

Alex Schultz wrote:
> It's not a big thing, just a little detail, but it's a fun thing. I'm
> thinking that the top section of the HallOfSelection that's displayed
> when players are logging in,  should have some cosmetic changes in the
> trunk (2.0 branch). It would be nice if to make it so what was displayed
> there would be something that would make players think something like
> "Ooh, this looks shiny" when they first see it, and when seeing in the
> future, can at the slightest glance be like "Neat, a 2.0 server". I'm
> thinking that it would be neat to use either movers or the cfanim plugin
> to make an interesting animation for it.
> Anyone have any comments on this simple but fun idea? :)

  The way I see/envision things, the hall of selection map will just go away. 
This is because there will be another method of character creation that does not 
involve moving a character around a map to choose race, etc.

  So the question then becomes what should be displayed.  There is the current 
issue now that when you first run the client, nothing at all (or just the 
generic crossfire icon) is displayed - and this is displayed at the metaserver 
selection window, etc.  It'd just be nice to have something better to display 
then, vs just some big black empty area.

  The easiest thing, IMO, is to have some static image of good size (png or the 
like) that is displayed in that window.  Given this doesn't have to be a map, it 
could really be anything, but probably easiest to have some map like form (that 
represents what the game looks like to some extent), maybe with lettering and 
the like overdrawn (Crossfire 2.0 or something).

  The follow up question is then: Should the server provide an updated/different 
image while receiving the player name/password, or just use that one in the client?

  From a practical matter, I don't think there is anything prevent arbitrary 
images from being in the arch directory, and thus served to the client.  so a 
large image could exist in the arch tree, and through some basic negotiation at 
startup, the client could figure out what the image is, download it, and display 
it.  OTOH, I'm not sure the likelihood of different servers going to the work of 
customizing that image, and most players will log in relatively quickly so 
probably wouldn't notice any difference, but who knows.