[Suggestion] Arrows indicating which soldier hasn't get experience yet

[MasterBLB]

Guys,

I'd like to propose an extension to CTRL+E shortcut - not only messagebox with names will show up, but also arrows, preferably of different than these from motion sensor and face direction indicator, will show up over heads of these mentioned soldiers till a soldier will be selected. What do you think? Currently it's a bit annoying to search the name among squad on the battlefield.

[MasterBLB]

How do you find the idea @Meridian?

[Meridian]

I'm indifferent about it.

[Rubber Cannonball]

Well since ctrl E is all about supporting experience farming, why not just make it easier and have ctrl E just select the next soldier needing experience so that the farmer player doesn't have to manually select the soldier before making the unit do something.  If every experience gaining unit has gained experience, don't change which unit is selected and display message: "Experience farming complete!"   

PS I'm only half joking.

[MasterBLB]

Well Meridian, imagine in this situation:
https://youtu.be/CYXawgVeDyo?list=PLe0K-GUDQkNLczQ0axbqrpXuDuUYFRYOn&t=1271
after the messagebox disappear aquanauts without experience would have arrows above their head. You wouldn't say "it's hard".

[Meridian]

Agreed.

[MasterBLB]

Now technical question - how hard would be to add another arrow type, with different color than yellow (selection/sensor indicator) and green (face indicator), and some kind of flag gotExperience, initialized to false, and set to true when the soldier got an experience?

[Meridian]

Not too hard.

[MasterBLB]

Hey mates, any news about the feature?

[Meridian]

Still indifferent about it.

[MasterBLB]

Pls correct me if I got it wrong Meridian - the feature (non-yellow, non-green arrows over heads) is not technically difficult to add, the flag who lacks experience is already in game (alt+e works after all) as well as code which displays arrows over heads, you had issues with finding listed in the info window soldiers on battlefield, yet you're indifferent about such big QoL improvement?

[Meridian]

Correct, I don't find it a big QoL improvement.
I find even the ctrl+E feature a marginal thing at best.

I have nothing against it, but I also don't have any reason to spend my time on it.

[MasterBLB]

I see. Well, at least could you write some hints what source files/functions/etc. should be changed in case I'd like to implement the change mysefl?

[Meridian]

Ctrl+E functionality for inspiration can be found here: https://github.com/MeridianOXC/OpenXcom/blob/oxce-plus/src/Battlescape/BattlescapeState.cpp#L2431

Similar arrow drawing (used for motion scanner indicator) can be found here: https://github.com/MeridianOXC/OpenXcom/blob/oxce-plus/src/Battlescape/Map.cpp#L1557

For arrow recoloring, you can use blitNShade function directly, no need to create new sprites.