Oh umm..

For the actual units, the role is likely more important than its position, but preferably the core roles of a fac would all always be in exactly the same position, with any variation being sort of left over. In your example, I'd prefer the dirtbag being at the end of the build menu out of the way, and to have bandit on 'w'.

But it's no biggie, I don't actually use hotkeys for building units in ZK, due to this issue, and I'm doing fine.

Having the core roles all in the same place every time allows me to adjust easier, but I don't expect any changes made to accommodate me. I don't know many people that share this mental configuration.

I think there is too much variation in factory loadout for roles to always line up.

Some factories lack a skirmisher, does that mean they have an empty space? Is Flea a raider? Does that mean both Puppy and Pyro are raiders? Surely Scythe, Glaive, Kodiachi and Panther are all raiders. So we need two raider slots. What about Skeeter, Typhoon and Snake? Or is Typhoon a riot, to conflict with Hunter. Are Wolverine and Impaler both artiller? How about Hammer and Sniper? Half the factories don't have a crawling bomb.

Role variation is so diverse that we would probably need at least 20 slots to cover all factories. Then the grid would be too large and also full of holes.

quote: Do you explicitly need the menu icon to always be in the proper place, or is it alright as long as the same hotkey corresponds to the same unit class?

Half the point of a grid hotkey setup is the visual connection between buttons and keyboard, making it easier for your fingers to hit the correct key while keeping your focus on the screen. So, yes, it's important for the menu icon to have a consistent position as much as a consistent hotkey.

Consistency is the keyword.

quote: Role variation is so diverse that we would probably need at least 20 slots to cover all factories. Then the grid would be too large and also full of holes.

You seem to have chosen the number 20 rather arbitrarily, and integral menu is already 18 slots. You could definitely whittle down the number of roles to 18, and it wouldn't be any larger or have any more holes than it does already.

quote: I see no reason not to use the spare hotkey for redundancy if there's no better unit for it.

Too confusing. It violates expectations; new players won't understand it. Much better to leave a hole if you absolutely can't find another unit to go there rather than have the same unit in two different places. But even better to put something in the hole, even if it's not a perfect fit.

I don't see any reason not to, for example, have R always be a skirmisher if there is a skirmisher and something else if there isn't a skirmisher. The alternative is to have the units listed more-or-less in order of weight as they are now, but what value is there in that?

quote: Integral menu has 12 slots for factory unit production.

Why are factories not allowed the third (otherwise empty) menu row?

Haha, oh wow. I'm dreadfully split on how to react because

1. That's a pretty good feature

2. I had already thought integral was perhaps the worst case of UI design sins ever

a. It tries to do too much

b. Many behaviours don't make sense

3. Despite 1., this manages to cover both 2a and 2b

While Integral commits design sins─particularly in the orders tab having no set structure, and transport/retreat zones not being in a separate widget─how is it the worst? Tabular menu navigation is loads more compact and easier to navigate than the crap TA had, especially since with hotkeys every building is just two keystrokes away. The only UI design I think would handle the amount of construction options better is something like how Rise of Nations did it[?].

I guess build queue could be in the selection widget, since that's the only other widget which is dependent on local selection, and build queues should probably only be shown when selected. If people want to see all build queues, there's FacPanel for that, but that's just one more bit of noise for newer players. Great for spectating and I guess teams to see all players'/allies' queues at once, but when playing it's a lot of data you probably already know or are too overwhelmed with the rest of the UI to care about, since you already hit the buttons to build the units. Most players use infinite queue so their composition isn't going to change without them changing it.

quote: design sins [..] the orders tab having no set structure, and transport/retreat zones not being in a separate widget

I agree that those are design flaws.

A set structure for the orders panel (you know, like we've been suggesting that the factory build panel should have) would be very good, but very hard to do given how many orders there are. Someone once pointed out that under an artificial and unlikely scenario it's actually possible for a unit to have more orders available to it than there are slots on the order panel. However, like the factory build panel, it would be possible to have fixed positions for the most important commands and allow the others to be more fluid. That would be an improvement over what we have now, which is having all the commands be fluid.

I completely agree that the commands which are always available to the player even when no unit is selected should somehow be separated from the commands which require a unit to execute them. I don't know if a separate widget / separate panel is the right solution; maybe make the command panel bigger and have an internal visual separator.

But again, even with these two flaws I think Integral is pretty good.