Several good ideas here. My main problem with the most used items approach is PRIME seems to have smaller community than Zap'M had in its best time. I am not in position to make an informed decision here although I will keep collecting information about the stuff. This is most definitely going to be helpful.
One thing that bothered me in Zap'M are two categories for only single item type: money for buckazoids and energy cells for ... duh, energy cells. Both are constantly displayed in status bar and have top position in inventory. Granted, energy is used for about every other powered item you come across, so it really is important.
Regardless, do not change the hotkeys for specific items. I don't want "m" that was the key for a wand to suddenly change to a scroll. That would be pretty disastrous.
Yeah, see also NetHack problem of zapping wand in slot 'z', drinking potion in slot 'q' and eating stuff in slot 'e' (doubly tragic if you are a metallivore and that armor piece was essential for your ascension kit), applying stuff in 'a' and anything requiring confirmation in slot 'y'. Terrible UI kludge. I will be dropping the automatic item assignment mechanism. Instead, the letters will be assigned ADOM style with some exceptions made if player specifically used the adjust command to bind an item to a letter slot.
Paul, I will be going to have to try this recent or marked items approach but with duplicating entries, as you suggest. Your idea is also great for semi-universal commands like throw. List anything that player knows has an effect when thrown (grenades, volatile canisters, some kinds of tools) and then follow with whole inventory as usual. Finally, I will be rid of the confusing inconsistency of the list behaving differently when you have known "throw-active" items (show only those, with full list on key) or not (go right to full list).
Also, how do you mark an item in WazHack to appear at the top?
What about adding items at the end as the player picks them up (sort them by the pick up time essentially) and letting player to move them around in inventory afterwards?
For games with lots of loot this introduces considerable tedium or has players leaving inventory in a mess which does not help enjoy the game. I cannot go this way. When items are scarce this can be very effective though!
The assumption here seems to be that there is one way to view the inventory: a big list of items. Is it possible to rethink the way that inventory is displayed in a particular game?
Certainly I can, as I am in process of tearing the UI down and replacing it. It bears so many flaws of the old days something had to be done about it.
However I think I am going to stay with the list. In PRIME items tend to interact so you quite often want to see for example ray guns and canisters together, to consider refueling the former with the latter. Tools (computers) + floppies, weapons + ammo (at least those follow each other, although I am considering separating guns from weapons), armor + tools + floppies (looking to improve gear). I fail to imagine anything that would serve all those needs as well as a list does.
For dealing with big list ADOM's filters are nice but insufficient in my opinion. Gotta improve them or find something else to make stuff inspections smoother.
separate bags like in MMOs
Or NetHack. Strangely, I do not remember any other roguelike that also implements them. Has anyone? I wonder if gong this route is going to help inventory management or make it harder. Still, it seems to be good for the game theme. Buckets for the janitor, portable refrigerator, safes, dimensional compressors ...
