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[b_sen]

Some roguelikes with more complex identification minigames have both formal identification systems (where the game explicitly tells the player the name of the item after some work) and informal identification systems (where the game does not explicitly tell the player the item name for their work, but the player knows the name or at least under what circumstances to use the item).  These games can allow players to "tag" informally identified items with the player's suspected item name, or other very short notes such as "throw at enemy".  (Without telling them if they're wrong, of course!)

Cogmind by and large works very well with only formal identification, in that the identification tradeoffs are interesting and well-balanced.  (Do you want to risk that prototype being faulty?  Do you want to spend time and matter putting on that unknown item to restore your memory of what it is?  Do you want to spend time and inventory space taking either to a Scanalyzer?)  However, there are a few cases in which sufficiently experienced players will both already know what an item is without formally identifying it and run the risk of confusing it with another item unless they spend resources on a formal identification.

Spoiler: Some examples, which spoil late-game rare items (click to show/hide)

Prototypes where only one item exists with the properties shown before identification do not count; players who have seen them before and have a good idea of the items in the game will be able to re-identify the item as needed by those properties.  The primary place this comes up is in consumable Alien Artifacts, many of which have the exact same such properties and are instead informally identified by the context in which they are acquired (accompanying machines and/or terminal logs).  Since several of these have good reasons not to use them immediately, this is an annoyance.

For example, a player might find a Dimensional Node Initializer in the caves (and recognize it by the accompanying log and the hideaway layout), get the Transdimensional Reconstructor from Zhirov (ditto), and then want to use the Transdimensional Reconstructor to escape a bad situation before they have had an opportunity to reach a Scanalyzer.  Now they are stuck guessing which is which if their inventory has been rearranged at all in the interim, and since they're probably being shot at they run a real risk of winding up at the center of a node explosion!

Another case is when a player finds a Core Reset Matrix in Quarantine and does not want to use it.  They know for a fact what it is by the very distinctive machine layout, but in order to recognize a future one in the same run they must lug it to a Scanalyzer only to drop it (and are likely leaving something else behind to make room).

I understand why art isn't shown for unidentified items, and the costs of identifying do make sense in most cases, but in these instances it makes more sense to me that the Cogmind would be able to tag an item appearance with a short name and recognize that same appearance later, even though that appearance is not itself shown to the player.

I also understand if this would be difficult or impossible to implement, but I thought I'd bring it up.

[DDarkray]

Contains minor spoiler based on AA:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

This topic was discussed a bit last year in the forum, where Kyzrati is thinking of generating random number tag on each of the AA at the start of each run (e.g. AA02, AA11, etc.). The other option is to number the tag based on the order of AA seen (e.g. First AA seen would be AA01, second one seen would be AA02, etc.), though that would require a bit more work to implement.

Even though it doesn't let the user to type in their own tag (which I assume would require a lot of work), the problem seems to exist only for AA. Having a tag numbered like that might be sufficient, but that would require making external note of what each number means. And it would probably look a little weird too, maybe?

[b_sen]

Thanks for reminding me of that thread!  That would indeed be workable but annoying (against the principle that players should not be driven to external tools for optimal play), and AAs are in fact the only place where the problem presents itself (prototypes all either falling under the normal risk-reward system of formal identification or being guaranteed good and thus safe to put on).

Player-assigned tags would definitely be nicer, though may or may not be much harder to implement.  I think it's a new text field attached to each one (directly or indirectly) either way, and the question is the difficulty of letting the player specify its contents, though I'm not sure if that's the case in the underlying architecture.

[Kyzrati]

Yeah this has been discussed several times before (this is the third thread on the forums here alone ), and I have many notes of my own on it as well, including possible solutions, but none of the solutions has seemed great, or worth implementing.

I've played classic roguelikes that have tagging so I'm familiar with that functionality, but in those games there is a strong need for it, whereas in Cogmind it only matters in extremely few cases, suggesting it would be better to find an alternative solution if possible.

Tagging would probably be fairly "easy" to add as far as features go, it just seems like overkill for how rare the need is...

[Kyzrati]

Needed something else showy to fool around with this week, so I added this this evening (complete with silly examples )

[DDarkray]

:OOOOOOOOOOO

*Big Thumbs Up*

[b_sen]

:OOOOOOOOOOO

*Big Thumbs Up*

Seconded!

Thanks for the quick feature add

[Kyzrati]

Well I dunno about "quick," considering this is the third time it's been requested over the years and I've had notes on it sitting low on the priority list, but yeah your thread bumped the idea up much higher than it was! Sometimes little things can get moved up if the time is just right

[Raine]

A slightly related problem is being able to identify prototypes based off leaked information while inspecting them. I can tell what a thing is gonna be before I scan or equip most of the time by just examining it and looking at the mass.l

[Kyzrati]

I mean technically we could remove mass info from the prototype knowledge to deal with that, but it's there for a reason, specifically that it could be extra annoying without it--lots more wasted carries for anyone who doesn't generally ID immediately.

[b_sen]

A slightly related problem is being able to identify prototypes based off leaked information while inspecting them. I can tell what a thing is gonna be before I scan or equip most of the time by just examining it and looking at the mass.l

I see that as you knowing the variety of parts well and having a mostly full gallery, not a problem.