RIP . re WHO

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Urlyth
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RIP . re WHO

#1 Post by Urlyth » Sun Jun 06, 2010 6:54 am

/me looks out of the window and sees a light on across the road ... he is home... pick up phone dial the number...

Is the who really that much different?

My char and in game husband Lachtli have a routine and we have a piece of chalk and a cloth to leave each other a message. Its legal, we know roughly each others routines but not those of other players.

Playing ALONE is not a good way to encourage new players to join and stay when they never see another face on the who and have limited resources to buy tell rings. Remember the plain ring from creation can soon turn to dust if the player has to send a message to every person he ever met for help in the hopes of finding someone friendly to him logged in, he will soon get discouraged and leave.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#2 Post by Olrane » Sun Jun 06, 2010 10:42 am

I may have just been burned too many times, but I see who as a dangerous command.

I know that I'm not the only one to alter my play, consciously or unconsciously, based on who appears on the list. Altered play in any capacity is simply unacceptable, as it is nothing short of clairvoyance on the part of your character. That includes sending tells to people on the list, but it also inevitably leads to things like lingering in town waiting for someone to show up, patrolling areas that you know the person is likely to lurk, etc.

Yes, if you're firing blind you should lose tell ring charges. Newbies have the newbie line, and if they should get in major danger, they have little to lose.

I'm sorry if this makes anyone feel isolated, but it's the only way to play fair. On Forostar, we don't have modern communication, so random meetings and hearsay should tell us who is around.

Edit: I'm an idealist. Naively, I used to keep who on because I expected that it would be respected, but I found that even I couldn't respect its OOC nature. We haven't reached that point yet, so it's practical to be who off.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#3 Post by Mogwai » Sun Jun 06, 2010 11:02 am

Who on/off affects peoples play alot, thats why a number of people have it off.
its just frustrating that there is no possible way for an guildless evil to stay who off and make it worth playing. Even with who on, who really wants to go through a tell ring every week? a guildless evil certainly can't afford continual runic rings and a decent gem costs alot. Easy for people with mind calling to say that. What char really wants to spending all their hard earned coins on replacing tell rings?

Ideally if you are guildless...you could have friends of the evil guild (ex: you can be friends of the tanielite clergy or be friends of the shao-lin or other guilds) and be them a line item.
Maybe there would be pre-requisites like if the char wanted to be friends with the sathonite priests he needs to at least be a follower.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#4 Post by Zehren » Sun Jun 06, 2010 2:29 pm

I will say I agree with Ganon's post on another thread.
If the game would be completely realistic, everyone would be 'existing', logged on, all the time. That is not the case, and timing one's use of tell rings, for instance, to what one sees on the who list seems entirely reasonable to me, as, realistically, they would always be accessible with tell rings.

Even if sleeping, a message inside your head... Would likely wake you up ;)
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Re: RIP . re WHO

#5 Post by Olrane » Sun Jun 06, 2010 2:49 pm

Zehren wrote:I will say I agree with Ganon's post on another thread.
If the game would be completely realistic, everyone would be 'existing', logged on, all the time. That is not the case, and timing one's use of tell rings, for instance, to what one sees on the who list seems entirely reasonable to me, as, realistically, they would always be accessible with tell rings.

Even if sleeping, a message inside your head... Would likely wake you up ;)
The messengers at the entrance to cities are there exactly for the purpose of telling people that you're up and about. They were created to reduce who abuse. Now I'm not saying that they're very useful or very effective at reducing abuse, but I am saying that they give us a clear view of the admin's intentions.

I wouldn't mind a feature to re-send tells you received while offline as you log in. "You remember that about X hours/days ago, So-and-so said <message>". I don't think it would interfere too much with mail, as that's used more for formal messaging.

If you want to roleplay it as if someone's awake all the time, send the tells blindly. Using who to make sure they'll connect is having a character with some kind of clairvoyance, and that's not intended.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#6 Post by lanyara » Sun Jun 06, 2010 3:07 pm

I really think it should be easier to send tells.

Clerics have it easy here, scribes perhaps too (at least with recharging).

What if skalds could get that ability? Simply make it drain a LOT of mana. Or, if you so will, have them require components in addition to that ...

If you would be almost completely veggie after such a magical tell song, then at least people could still have a way to use that. (And they could waste a component too)

I do agree with what @Urlyth wrote. Players really need to have it easier to interact with one another, no matter if good evil or whatever.
Playing ALONE is not a good way to encourage new players to join and stay when they never see another face on the who and have limited resources to buy tell rings.
Communication should be made easier in my opinion, at least by having more options available for doing so. The main interaction areas are usually Arborea up to the way to Elvandar and back. The other areas are less important right now (interaction hotspots also include stuff like the gremlins, i.e. places where new players hang out).

The more dangerous areas are usually more a place for stronger characters to visit.
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Re: RIP . re WHO

#7 Post by ganandorf » Sun Jun 06, 2010 3:28 pm

I've always used the who list to find out whose online. Not so that i can alter how I'm playing, but moreso so that i can find someone to hang out with. When you're alone and have checked arborea and elvandar and no one is around, the game is dull. I check the who list, see whose online, if theres someone interesting or someone i need to talk to, i go to a priest, and send a call. The call isn't worded like "I know you're awake come here blah blah" I word it reasonably, "I'm not sure if you're awake, but if you are, for the next half hour I'll be waiting at the crossing if you want to hang out" or something like that.

Since most of the people who appear on the who list are neutral characters anyway, chances that i change my roleplay are low, if i wanted to find out if any crusaders or other good guys are on, that easy, just walk by a watchtower and wait for someone to show up :D (hint for other evil characters: watchtowers work both ways you know, crusaders are predictable).

Yeah i know sometimes the who list is just there, taunting you and calling you until you give into using it for worse things. But in my opinion, i'd rather have my who on, if i use it to find others, and others use it to find me, then the game is definitely more fun.

Messenger's dont work the same way. What if you don't know who you're looking for? What if you're just waiting for someone you like, anyone you like, to log on, and not just one specific person. Messenger's are useless there.

Sure leaving notes might work, but someone might spite you and erase it. For those non-guilded evils set up some kind of symbol, for example, a head planted in the chapel means your awake, or a silver coin in the first room of the chapel means your awake, and whatever your symbol is make a note on the general board for other characters to see. If you play often, it works, I've done it. Again someone might spite you, and remove the item, but within asador its far less likely.

edit: use common sense. If you can manage to morally use the who list, i say do it, if you can't, then don't
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arxthas
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Re: RIP . re WHO

#8 Post by arxthas » Mon Jun 07, 2010 5:06 am

I never understood how to use those messengers.. what are they for?

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#9 Post by arxthas » Mon Jun 07, 2010 5:12 am

I think the weird part is that it's optional to go "who off". Either all should be "who off" or all should be "who on". If all are "who off" there could just be a counter for the number of people online, so you would still get the information you really want.

But Ganon, I think just because you re-phrase your sentence does not make it less OOC-use. The point is the person you are sending it to, not the message.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#10 Post by Olrane » Mon Jun 07, 2010 11:56 am

arxthas wrote:I think the weird part is that it's optional to go "who off". Either all should be "who off" or all should be "who on". If all are "who off" there could just be a counter for the number of people online, so you would still get the information you really want.

But Ganon, I think just because you re-phrase your sentence does not make it less OOC-use. The point is the person you are sending it to, not the message.
Right. Having the toggle acknowledges that there will be people who abuse it, so it may be strategically superior to be who off.

The who command really is very inconsistent. It says who is online if and only if your character knows them ICly, even though it is an OOC command. As an OOC command, it should probably give a full list of player characters online. Also, because it works off the remember system (IC info), it fails to recognize or display masked or disguised characters.

I would support a change in either direction:

A) All players are displayed on the who list. All PCs, even ones you have not met, are displayed on the who list by login name, not by character name. Strict and clear guidelines about what is and isn't proper use of who are posted in the helpfile. A toggle remains, but only to shut off your display; all players will still be listed.

B) The who command removes all mortal player characters and becomes simply a count of active players and a list of active wizards.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#11 Post by isengoo » Mon Jun 07, 2010 4:06 pm

I would really prefer the who function removed entirely.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#12 Post by Zehren » Mon Jun 07, 2010 4:14 pm

If any actions have to be taken regarding the who list,
I support Olrane's suggestion B.
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Re: RIP . re WHO

#13 Post by arxthas » Tue Jun 08, 2010 3:11 am

I'd go for the B option too.. you do want to know the player count and available wizards.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#14 Post by Delmon » Tue Jun 08, 2010 3:13 am

I like how it is now

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#15 Post by Desiderea » Tue Jun 08, 2010 3:37 am

Yeah, I rather like the who list...

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#16 Post by arxthas » Tue Jun 08, 2010 4:03 am

The ones who like it.. why do you want it?

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#17 Post by Loreen » Tue Jun 08, 2010 4:49 am

Why I like who?

Well, first of, it shows me who I might meet, which RP topics might come up, so I can have something "prepared" in the back of my head, and in emergency situtations, such as having to urgently leave but having to recover gear after an unfortunate death, by knowing whom to contact despite knowing to do so would be a breach in the rules.

To be honest, I try not to let my gameplay being influenced by the who list. However, seeing people around that I like rp'ing with surely makes me stick around instead of logging out and firing up some other game.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#18 Post by Delmon » Tue Jun 08, 2010 11:04 am

The who list allows me to know who I can interact with. If I know who to interact with, I will act accordingly. This is a game of interaction, and I fully admit using the who list to direct me to interact with the people on the who list if I have a reason. I try to make the game more fun for the people I interact with, and part of that is knowing who is online. Is this so terrible? I do not think so, considering IF geas was real life, then one could search for a character to talk to them, kill them, send mind messages, etc. for as long as you wanted.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#19 Post by Cuetlachtli » Tue Jun 08, 2010 1:28 pm

I'm going to have to agree with liking the who list the way it is.

The most frequent way I would use it would be, like others have mentioned, to have an idea of who I might be interacting with.

Or maybe to be more 'linger-y' in towns. But that's about it.

About lingering, as long as it's a place that your character will occasionally linger anyway, I don't see any problem with lingering in some public area just because you want to maybe run into them. My character is often sitting around the markets or pubs in Arborea (most often), the Underground (second most) and Elvandar. So I don't see a problem with doing it with an OOC motivation now and then.

That's something like saying that if you notice your sword skill (or whatever) is down to 98/100 that you shouldn't go out of your way to build it back up...since those numbers are kind of OOCish and that much of a difference wouldn't be noticeable in real life. Since obviously sword fighting is something you character does often, it isn't unreasonable to have them go swing it around now and then based on the OOC motivation of knowing the skill level.

As for using who to message people, in my case I'll usually try to find reasonable evidence of their presence in game first. Asking NPCs about who they've seen (a normal action) or asking PCs if they've seen a particular person or not. If I don't get IC info, I don't make IC actions. Sure asking those questions in the first place can be said to have been OOCly motivated, but I don't see that as being a big deal.

tl;dr
If you use the who list (or any OOC information you get from the mud) to do actions that your character can be reasonably said to normally do, I think it's not a big deal.

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Re: RIP . re WHO

#20 Post by Desiderea » Wed Jun 09, 2010 1:25 am

I personally like being able to look at the who list to see if people I know are around to rp with. I might see "Oh, so-and-so is on. I needed to talk to him." and go looking for him, or just hang around town where they might be. One time I logged on and was happy to see a bunch of people I enjoy rping with online, so I figured I would stay on longer and visit the different towns rather than going off hunting by myself or something. (Of course, another time there were people I wanted to talk to online and I went running around and couldn't find them, so I just said screw it and did my own thing anyway. ;))

Like others, I don't really see that this is bad form, using OOC information ICly or anything. Why is the who list there to begin with? I imagine it only becomes problematic when people use it to hunt down enemies. "Oh, this bad guy is on and I know he usually hangs out here. Let's go ambush him."

I think that right now, having the option to turn it on or off allows people to do what is comfortable for them. If they don't like it, they don't have to use it. If they do like it, they at least get to see other people online that do use it.

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