Grouping the ASCII symbols?

[Etinarg]

I'm wondering how to group the ASCII symbols into "sets" of related symbols, so that players quickly get an idea what a new symbol might be about. I tried to group them, but I'm not entirely pleased with the chosen groups:


Shops?    0123456789
Beings?   abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Beings?   ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
Items?    ?!"§$&/()[]{}=`'^°*~-_|\
Terrain?  .,;:
Features? +´<>#%
Players?  @


I'm not sure if the § is normally used in roguelikes? Also the group of ´`and ' seems odd, maybe use only one of these? The ~ seems to be an item symbol in some roguelikes and a terrain in others?

Are there usable ASCII symbols that I have forgotten in the list?

How do you group the characters in your roguelikes?

[Gravecat]

I tend to lean towards something very similar to the list, with the exception being that I've replaced shops with letters, for clarity -- it's a lot easier to think "where's the blacksmith?" and look for a big blue letter B in a wall, rather than trying to remember if it's number 2 or 3.

I think the items/terrain/features sections tend to be fairly interchangable, though; I personally think there's nothing better than ~ to represent water, for example, though some RLs use that for items. And * is useful for some terrain features, though if I recall correctly it's also used in Angband/ToME (I forget if it's one, the other, or both!) to represent orbs of light, and also in ToME for alchemy essences; not such a big deal though, since the colour chosen usually makes it clear which is which.

So in conclusion, personally I just go for whatever seems appropriate at the time, with a few exceptions set in stone such as # for walls, . for floors, @ for the player (other humanoids are 'p' for person, rather than being confusing with multiple @'s), and so on. As long as things are used in a fairly clear context, then there can easily be some bleed-over between categories without adding confusion.

[Etinarg]

I agree on the ~ water idea. The * is a wall treasure in Angband, I believe, and I seem to remember the essence thing from Tome, too. I assume both the ~ and the * can be color coded to make the use clear (water should be blueish).

The numbers for the shops I found confusing too. Maybe I will rearrange that.

Thanks for the feedback that helps a bit to sort my symbols

[Etinarg]

Tools in Nethack are (.

" is a universal symbol for grass.

" seems to be a good idea for grass. In vanilla Angband (and I think in Moria too) the " were amulets.

What do other roguelikes use for amulets then?

[Krice]

What do other roguelikes use for amulets then?

Nethack has also " for amulet. But they are all wrong. " is grass.

[Etinarg]

I've checked the Angband item types:


, : Food, Mushrooms
| : Edged weapon
\ : Hafted weapon, Shovel, Pick
/ : Polearm
} : Sling, Bow, Crossbow
{ : Ammo
] : Armor
( : Armor
[ : Armor
) : Shield
= : Ring
" : Amulet
? : Scrolls, Books
! : Potions
- : Wands, Rods
_ : Staffs
~ : Junk, Chest, Torch, Bones, Some magic light sources
$ : Treasure
& : Pile of mixed items.

§ : Not used
' : Not used (too similar to ` and ´ maybe?)
° : Not used (Is this 7-Bit ASCII ? Edit: No, and § also isn't)


Also, are there symbols that other roguelikes use better? The Angband symbol use seems a bit strange sometimes, particularly if I look at the things within the armor class that have 3 symbols but I can't figure out the logic of the assignment.

[Krice]

The Angband symbol use seems a bit strange sometimes

Because Angband sucks. In Nethack there actually is some kind of logic, but with ascii you are always in trouble.

[AgingMinotaur]

I'm wondering how to group the ASCII symbols into "sets" of related symbols, so that players quickly get an idea what a new symbol might be about. I tried to group them, but I'm not entirely pleased with the chosen groups:

There's obviously no immutable canon to go by, except maybe that letters represent creatures. This is how thigs are orginized in my game Squirm:
THE HERO is a greek alpha, and CORPSES are greek omega signs.
ORGANISMS are represented by uppercase letters. Letters with long stems (BDEF...) are humanoids, the rest are animals, monsters and vegetation.
TERRAIN/FEATURES are punctuation marks: .:,;!¡?
WEAPONS are left brackets: ([{
ARMOUR are right brackets: )]}
DOORS/PORTALS/OBSTACLES are mathematical operators: +±÷<>=
STUFF is represented by various, leftover signs.

I'm not sure if the § is normally used in roguelikes?

In most games, S are snakes. Thus, § should represent copulating snakes.

As always,
Minotauros

[Etinarg]

I see. I expected minor differences in the characters, but since all the roguelikes evolved from one source, I thought there would be more similarities there.

So, thanks for showing the big diversity

[Darren Grey]

I personally like ADOM's symbol set best, since it simplifies a lot of groups (only one symbol for all armours for instance) whilst using generally recognisable symbols for most items.  It also uses colour well to make it fairly obvious if something is terrain or an item.  The importance of good colour choices should never be underestimated (otherwise you'll end up with something ugly like Dwarf Fortress).

[Ex]

Because Angband sucks.

Hey, I like Angband more than Nethack

[Etinarg]

I personally like ADOM's symbol set best, [...] It also uses colour well to make it fairly obvious if something is terrain or an item.  The importance of good colour choices should never be underestimated [...]

I'll see if I can find documentation about the symbols in ADOM. I never played it so far.

Colors are quite important to me. I'm not sure if I'm good at choosing colors, but it's something I'll care about for sure. Particularly with such abstract aesthetics like ASCII.

[Darren Grey]

ADOMs itemset:

 [  Armor, shields, cloaks, boots, girdles, gauntlets and helmets
 *  Gems and rocks
 ]  Tools (keys, writing sets, elemental orbs, and various other things)
 '  Necklaces
 (  Melee weapons (all of them)
 }  Missile weapons (bows, crossbows, slings)
 /  Missiles (arrows, quarrels, etc)
 =  Rings
 \  Wands
 !  Potions
 ?  Scrolls
 ~  Bracers
 %  Food (inc corpses and herbs)
 $  Gold
 {  Musical Instruments
  "  Books

Most items have certain colour sets to represent certain types (wooden weapons are brown for instance), whilst artifacts tend to be particularly identifiable based on their colour.

Monsters are almost all represented by upper or lower case letters.  Important NPCs (including shopkeepers) tend to be @, whilst demons are usually &.  The letter/monster grouping is a bit odd but functional - various races are generally grouped into a letter type, with colour distinguishing between individual types.  For instance many small humanoids are h, whilst giants are H.  Lesser undead are z, and more powerful undead Z.

Terrain is mostly . and # with different colours for terrain type.  Also used are T for trees and = for water.  The world map also uses various symbols like ^ for mountains and ~ for hills.

There's various faults I'd raise with it too (like arrows and open doors looking the same), but it's mostly very functional, and importantly I think the aesthetics of the colour and symbol choices work very well.

[Etinarg]

Thanks for the overview, this is quite helpful

How many colors does ADOM use? It seems there is a traditional limit of 16 colors, since many terminals used 16 (fixed?) colors, but I could imagine that more modern roguelikes expanded beyond that.

At the moment I have 14 colors defined, but I might go and rework that list.

[Darren Grey]

ADOM uses the standard 16, though some colours (like the cyans and magentas) see very little use.  It never uses different background colours - always black.

Going beyond the normal terminal colours means using a different display library than the standard and easily portable curses.  A popular choice is libtcod (which has a large number of other extras).  Haing more colours is very nice since terminal colours are horribly restrictive.  One problem though is when games go colour mad and try using the full palette with lots of shading etc - can produce some very ugly games.  On the other end of things some developers spend more time creating immensely pretty settings, but ultimately don't spend enough time on basic gameplay and features, never getting a real game released.  It's easy to get stuck in the 'tinkering with colours' trap.  Personally I think keeping it simple is best, both for development ease and player interpretation.  Too much detail can be bad.