Bester and/or
Sensuki - is modding something like this in going to actually be practical? Or are we just living in fantasy land anyway?
It's doable with the modding framework, yes. Most elements are easy - they're just background images or buttons placed at different coordinates. Things like spells being scrollable horizontally - this would require some work.
As for whether it would be practical...
I like
ushas UI layout, but I'm not a big fan of the graphical components squeezed in by someone else - the wooden columns' repetitive nature, the horizontal arrows, the general feel of "throw stuff in, doesn't matter if it's not the same style or it's not even good to begin with"... I see a lot of people like this UI, but to me it just looks like shit (not anyone's fault, none of us is a UI designer, simple as that), and I just can't imagine finding shit on the street and then "configuring" it to become a sweet candy. I know a great freelancer UI artist from eastern europe, and we could theoretically kick in a few bucks and get the amount needed, but I don't believe there's enough people interested and I've never heard of the gaming community paying anyone for a custom UI, so anything unprecedented is most likely impossible.
Anyway, if a cool UI came to be, I'd make a mod for it.
P.s. I think at least a part of those who say they like this ui - it's more of a manifestation of their desire to have a BG-style UI (which also makes them intentionally overlook its flaws, cause "as long as it's like in bg...
"), and not their love of this particular UI. For example, if Obsidians made this - those people would be shocked and appalled.
Adam (iirc) said in a post on the OE forums that the programming required to implement such a UI would take "weeks"
Cool story. With access to the sources, a matter of 2-3 hours in reality.