Task board fix: When?

[Froyo_K_Baggins]

Last year, when the atrocious change to the housing tasks boards was released, we were told it was a mistake and would be quickly remedied? Quickly in geological time?

We need the housing boards fixed, both to make them easier to use and to make sure all the tasks in Middle Earth are actually there.

What's the story?

[WeirdJedi]

There are two threads that stood out to me. The first was about the conversion of the line of task boards into just a few. The suggestion of putting them all into a list on an NPC wouldn't work so well:

There are A LOT of task quests out there, and putting them all on a single NPC/Paper is cumbersome and risky. That is why there are a variety of them per level range, and a variety of turn-in boxes as well. We do not want to over burden any single one NPC with the sheer number of quests that would be on it.

The second thread pointed out some more more obvious problems - one regarding how a single or all three task boards were invisible, some with their papers floating in mid-air. After fixing that along with the font, they also added some better categorization with how the quests were titled and listed with level ranges:

Housing has become my passion feature over the last couple of years, and I'm dedicated to doing what I can to help improve the system within the boundaries that we have for it. The task boards were, for me, a cumbersome system that ate up a lot of real estate in the neighborhoods - what's live now helps some of that, and I am going to continue polishing it as I discover ways to help address some of its usability issues.

I don't think they ever planned to do more than what they did. I don't even know how they would make it any different than what we have. One person stated that the boards are near-perfect if you approach them in 1st-person perspective.

[Froyo_K_Baggins]

I don't think they ever planned to do more than what they did. I don't even know how they would make it any different than what we have. One person stated that the boards are near-perfect if you approach them in 1st-person perspective.

They openly stated that the current housing system was premature, that it wasn't what they intended, and that they would fix it. There was space in the previous setup, at least in the Shire, to just add more boards. They could have a size in between that and the current, tiny format, that would be a significant improvement.

[auximenes]

Other than missing a few Tasks the current housing neighbourhood Task board situation I think is about as good as it will get. The boards do make it obvious how bloated the existing Tasks are, and there needs to be some clean-up on the relationship between some Task items' 'level' and the level band which they are turned in at. Like the item will say it's level 35 but it's not with the level 35 Tasks it's with the level 45 Tasks.

[maartena]

It works OK, but I think the boards are too small. They basically stuffed five level ranges onto one board, and I often mis-click and get another level range than the one I got task items for. For some reason I always mis-click between the 51-60 range (Moria) one and the 81-90 one (Eorlingas). I think they need to make the boards bigger.

Alternatively, have ONE task board, and when you click it a new window opens with a pull down menu at the top (or tabs, similar to deeds) where you select your level range. On the other hand, LOCALIZED task boards really should only have the tasks of the region you are in......

Certainly some more optimization can be and should be done.

[Bothketbog]

It works OK, but I think the boards are too small. They basically stuffed five level ranges onto one board, and I often mis-click and get another level range than the one I got task items for. For some reason I always mis-click between the 51-60 range (Moria) one and the 81-90 one (Eorlingas). I think they need to make the boards bigger.

Alternatively, have ONE task board, and when you click it a new window opens with a pull down menu at the top (or tabs, similar to deeds) where you select your level range. On the other hand, LOCALIZED task boards really should only have the tasks of the region you are in......

Certainly some more optimization can be and should be done.

I sometimes find it handy to turn off floating names; makes it a bit easier to see each target.

[Froyo_K_Baggins]

I sometimes find it handy to turn off floating names; makes it a bit easier to see each target.

Sometimes? I almost always do, once I find the right list. They should be much larger.

There's also the annoyance that the chest levels don't match the boards they are under.

It shouldn't be difficult to fix the task boards. It would really help the gaming experience. However, they can't figure out a way to monetize it, so it remains this poor.

[DoRonRon]

Hover over the required one and create a tooltip with H key. Then you can click on the tooltip to select the same for each hand in, without fail. Beats running up and down the old platform going from task board to collection box.

I'd take adding any missing tasks and adding an other board and collection box to spread it out a little more.

[Froyo_K_Baggins]

Hover over the required one and create a tooltip with H key. Then you can click on the tooltip to select the same for each hand in, without fail. Beats running up and down the old platform going from task board to collection box.

I'd take adding any missing tasks and adding an other board and collection box to spread it out a little more.

Nope, that's a workaround for bad design. The older boards were far easier to use except for the chests not being near the middle boards.

[Curuer_Bauglir]

I use the task boards nearly every day and don’t mind them. They could be made bigger, but the task pages do fit on the current board size just fine. Turning off floating names does help, but I normally don’t. I do use first person view when not in combat, so that probably helps too. I’m not against changes to the task boards, I just have zero faith in any software designer/developer/insert title to fix a problem without creating another one in the process. Since the boards work just fine for me now, I don’t want to see them become accidentally unusable.