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okay, this is going to be controversial, but I'm going to post it anyway. currently, the game doesn't have a lot of roleplaying. actually, it has very *little* roleplaying. one of the primary reasons for this lack seems to me to come from channels like 100. everyone chats there and by *far* most of the chat *isn't* in character nor is it actually relevant with regards to ongoing events in the game itself.
to make things a lot more RP-friendly, I'd offer the following as food for thought:
1) remove all universe-wide channels *except* 11, group and guild chats.
2) remove numbered channels, and rename 11 to "nation chat".
3) make a *delay* of 0.5 seconds for every system a message has to travel through, and add 2 second for every border it has to cross. also, Serco and Itani don't forward communications from characters of the opposing faction. sector chat is instant, inter-system chat (you're in the same system as the one sending the message) is as well. but if you're in Deneb doing BP and ask for help, someone in Bractus watching over the convoy won't see your message for almost 10 seconds. it won't matter *much* except that it'll give you feel of distance and vastness of space. it also makes random chatting a lot more of a "get together and chat" event.
4) remove all human-readable IDs of ships from other nations than yourself. your onboard computers should however cache the values of ships you have seen, and add an ID hail. if I ID-hail someone, they will know my ID and in the future, my name will show up in the sector overview, not "Unknown Corvus Vulturis". ships bought from grey do *not* give off your ID even to your own nation so only those who have your ID call can identify you. note that groups and guilds don't automatically exchange IDs.
5) only allow private messages between characters that have exchanged ID hails, or are of the same nation. the delay should be as for any other message.
6) as for help, use 11 or post on the boards.
okay, what does this do? well, yeah, it severly limits out of character chatting. yes, it severly changes the players way of dealing with eachother. *but* it makes guilds a *lot* more potent --- you want to chat with people no matter where they are if they aren't from your nation, join a guild. also, this makes every nation a lot more cohesive, since you truly belong to that nation, you'll always feel them around. going far from your nations space will also make your communication harder and harder and make grouping vital if you have multi-national get-togethers. it also allows people to be anonymous (but you should be able to see what your local ID for someone is, and attach notes to it so you can remember them). of course, since it's your local ID, it's worthless for identifying the character by asking anyone else who that character is, except if someone you know has someone unknown to you IDed while being in the same sector as you are and tells you who they are.
yeah, I'm aware that it will *really* shake the boat, but in the long run I think this would create a *lot* more roleplaying and tension in the game. for one thing, egos are hard to stroke, since you don't know who just killed you unless they wanted to let you know. and even if they did, there is nowhere and nohow to brag except for nation or guild chat. as for tension, it'll be so much more rewarding to play a role, since your reputation will be word-of-mouth and you won't be identifiable in any way unless you choose to make yourself just that.
apart from helping to control egos, it will give guilds a lot more of a vital role in the game, and which guild you choose to join actually matters. you can't even talk en masse to any opposing faction, so your view of the universe is shaped by those of the same nation. and as for deserters and stuff, fix the faction system and let people change nations.
Edit: btw, the fact that Serco and Itani systems don't forward eachohters communications means that a Serco in Eo can't talk to *anyone*. this is how it should be at the core of things, but offering improved communication systems and forged transmittors and so on might be a future thing.
to make things a lot more RP-friendly, I'd offer the following as food for thought:
1) remove all universe-wide channels *except* 11, group and guild chats.
2) remove numbered channels, and rename 11 to "nation chat".
3) make a *delay* of 0.5 seconds for every system a message has to travel through, and add 2 second for every border it has to cross. also, Serco and Itani don't forward communications from characters of the opposing faction. sector chat is instant, inter-system chat (you're in the same system as the one sending the message) is as well. but if you're in Deneb doing BP and ask for help, someone in Bractus watching over the convoy won't see your message for almost 10 seconds. it won't matter *much* except that it'll give you feel of distance and vastness of space. it also makes random chatting a lot more of a "get together and chat" event.
4) remove all human-readable IDs of ships from other nations than yourself. your onboard computers should however cache the values of ships you have seen, and add an ID hail. if I ID-hail someone, they will know my ID and in the future, my name will show up in the sector overview, not "Unknown Corvus Vulturis". ships bought from grey do *not* give off your ID even to your own nation so only those who have your ID call can identify you. note that groups and guilds don't automatically exchange IDs.
5) only allow private messages between characters that have exchanged ID hails, or are of the same nation. the delay should be as for any other message.
6) as for help, use 11 or post on the boards.
okay, what does this do? well, yeah, it severly limits out of character chatting. yes, it severly changes the players way of dealing with eachother. *but* it makes guilds a *lot* more potent --- you want to chat with people no matter where they are if they aren't from your nation, join a guild. also, this makes every nation a lot more cohesive, since you truly belong to that nation, you'll always feel them around. going far from your nations space will also make your communication harder and harder and make grouping vital if you have multi-national get-togethers. it also allows people to be anonymous (but you should be able to see what your local ID for someone is, and attach notes to it so you can remember them). of course, since it's your local ID, it's worthless for identifying the character by asking anyone else who that character is, except if someone you know has someone unknown to you IDed while being in the same sector as you are and tells you who they are.
yeah, I'm aware that it will *really* shake the boat, but in the long run I think this would create a *lot* more roleplaying and tension in the game. for one thing, egos are hard to stroke, since you don't know who just killed you unless they wanted to let you know. and even if they did, there is nowhere and nohow to brag except for nation or guild chat. as for tension, it'll be so much more rewarding to play a role, since your reputation will be word-of-mouth and you won't be identifiable in any way unless you choose to make yourself just that.
apart from helping to control egos, it will give guilds a lot more of a vital role in the game, and which guild you choose to join actually matters. you can't even talk en masse to any opposing faction, so your view of the universe is shaped by those of the same nation. and as for deserters and stuff, fix the faction system and let people change nations.
Edit: btw, the fact that Serco and Itani systems don't forward eachohters communications means that a Serco in Eo can't talk to *anyone*. this is how it should be at the core of things, but offering improved communication systems and forged transmittors and so on might be a future thing.
Hmmmm... let's see...
1) I think more channels are needed than that. General is what some Sci-Fi movies and books refer to "open-comm" or "hail all frecuencies".
2) Jumping around channels using numbers is far faster than using channel names. If you simply make it so the channel is named "nation chat" yet it's still controlled by the number 11, people will still refer to it as "Channel 11", just like General Chat is referred right now to as "Channel 100". But if you force people to type "Join Nation" everytime, most will make a bind or not bother at all.
3) I'm not a programmer, but I'm sure it would be a lot of extra load to the servers/clients or whatever would have to calculate the delays for each sector for EACH message people type in. Once the population explodes, this extra load could be prohibitive.
4)Now this is totally unrealistic. All modern airplanes have a transponder so they can be identified by any nation; this is for security and safety purposes. Military aircraft have no such transponder (or can turn it off or is scrambled, not sure), and thus when such an identified craft is detected it causes the local military to scramble, unless the craft was expected and thus can be identified by transponder, radar, and/or the pilot hailing in.
Thus, ALL non-fighter craft should still be readily identifiable by their transponder, regardless of whether they're packing heat or mining gears. Fighters could turn it the transponder off, but if done so in NFZ or nation space the defense forces should scramble to deal with the unidentified intruder. Finally, even scramble transponder signals would eventually be cracked, so not even that would work in the long run.
The acquisition and storage of ship IDs is a good idea, though of little use right now; maybe when the P2P faction system is up, it would be useful. as of right now, having the 'U' screen filled with "unidentified" craft will only cause paranoia, not a desire to RP.
5) The only purpose this would serve is to limit player interaction through chat and lead to the rupture of the community, since most of us interact through the chat far more than through actual gameplay; when you consider 99% of the time said gameplay involves you getting shot up by someone else, there's little chance of people becoming friends over this, specially if they can't talk it over afterwards. DUMB idea. For example, take the universal "newb shot by pirate" scenario. Usually the newb complains on 100 or 1, and people talk to him and tell him it's part of the game; the pirate usually also chimes in and helps the community calm the guy down, accept the fact and move on. Sometimes, the newb even ends with a mentor and some extra cash; the end result regardless is a newb who's been through his first PvP experience, has come to realize the potential of the game and has learned the community rocks. Such an scenario would not work as well with limited comm access, and would much more likely result in a frustrated newb that leaves the game.
If you don't like people chatting it up in channel 100, may I suggest leaving the channel? RPing is up to each particular player, and though I also agree that it would be incredibly cool if everyone on 100 RPed and left RL outside the game, I don't think anything should be done to enforce this. And your ideas certainly are not going to help, they don't encourage RPing (which is the best solution) but rather simply make chatting difficult. Most will simply stop chatting than start RPing, and that will only hurt the community. This is TOTALLY NOT the way to go about it.
Oh, and this should go in Suggestions :P
1) I think more channels are needed than that. General is what some Sci-Fi movies and books refer to "open-comm" or "hail all frecuencies".
2) Jumping around channels using numbers is far faster than using channel names. If you simply make it so the channel is named "nation chat" yet it's still controlled by the number 11, people will still refer to it as "Channel 11", just like General Chat is referred right now to as "Channel 100". But if you force people to type "Join Nation" everytime, most will make a bind or not bother at all.
3) I'm not a programmer, but I'm sure it would be a lot of extra load to the servers/clients or whatever would have to calculate the delays for each sector for EACH message people type in. Once the population explodes, this extra load could be prohibitive.
4)Now this is totally unrealistic. All modern airplanes have a transponder so they can be identified by any nation; this is for security and safety purposes. Military aircraft have no such transponder (or can turn it off or is scrambled, not sure), and thus when such an identified craft is detected it causes the local military to scramble, unless the craft was expected and thus can be identified by transponder, radar, and/or the pilot hailing in.
Thus, ALL non-fighter craft should still be readily identifiable by their transponder, regardless of whether they're packing heat or mining gears. Fighters could turn it the transponder off, but if done so in NFZ or nation space the defense forces should scramble to deal with the unidentified intruder. Finally, even scramble transponder signals would eventually be cracked, so not even that would work in the long run.
The acquisition and storage of ship IDs is a good idea, though of little use right now; maybe when the P2P faction system is up, it would be useful. as of right now, having the 'U' screen filled with "unidentified" craft will only cause paranoia, not a desire to RP.
5) The only purpose this would serve is to limit player interaction through chat and lead to the rupture of the community, since most of us interact through the chat far more than through actual gameplay; when you consider 99% of the time said gameplay involves you getting shot up by someone else, there's little chance of people becoming friends over this, specially if they can't talk it over afterwards. DUMB idea. For example, take the universal "newb shot by pirate" scenario. Usually the newb complains on 100 or 1, and people talk to him and tell him it's part of the game; the pirate usually also chimes in and helps the community calm the guy down, accept the fact and move on. Sometimes, the newb even ends with a mentor and some extra cash; the end result regardless is a newb who's been through his first PvP experience, has come to realize the potential of the game and has learned the community rocks. Such an scenario would not work as well with limited comm access, and would much more likely result in a frustrated newb that leaves the game.
If you don't like people chatting it up in channel 100, may I suggest leaving the channel? RPing is up to each particular player, and though I also agree that it would be incredibly cool if everyone on 100 RPed and left RL outside the game, I don't think anything should be done to enforce this. And your ideas certainly are not going to help, they don't encourage RPing (which is the best solution) but rather simply make chatting difficult. Most will simply stop chatting than start RPing, and that will only hurt the community. This is TOTALLY NOT the way to go about it.
Oh, and this should go in Suggestions :P
point for point reply:
1) more channels might be needed, yeah, but currently, no, they're not. 100 isn't even particularly active, 11 isn't used.
2) we're getting a new UI. there, channels can be redefined as tabs or whatever. how we name the channels is pretty irrelevant for how fast is is to swich channels if the UI is designed for it.
3) eh, all messages are sent with a source system to you. that'll add less than a byte of network data (in VO, that's not more than a character of the message) and your client can use a set of lookup-tables to calculate the delay, or use a simple shortest path algorithm. it is *not* noticable for load on either side. and yeah, I am a programmer.
4) modern airplanes also don't peek at 250m/s. they're also not built around waring factions. as for paranoia, welcome to space. you can recognize your own nation mates ships, so you get a sense of belonging. that helps RP. the feeling of not knowing your enemy and what you call "paranoia" will *help* drive the state of *war* we are in. right now VO is so cuddely it's almost silly, and one of the reasons for this is that we know eachother so well from 100 that we're all mostly "buddies". we shouldn't be. that should come over time.
5) the purpose of removing arbitrary /msg is to remove gloating, random comments and idle chit-chat. you're not supposed to become *friends* over getting blown up. you might learn to respect eachother, but if you're fighting a *war*, you don't becomes buddies and go at it again. the players might be buddies, but the *characters* SHOULD be hesitant of the enemy.
anyway, this is pretty much the kind of response I expected, and, eh, whatever. thing is, today any attempt at RP in VO is dead from the get-go. if you RP, and mostly everyone else doesn't, you'll grow tired and stop. leaving 100 doesn't *help*. leaving 1 doesn't *help*. it *hides* the problem from you, it doesn't make it possible to actually RP with anyone who is set on basically having an avatar of themselves in VO. heck, that's what I eventually did and that's what 99% of the people I met in VO did and still seem to do.
and it *will* help people to RP, since out of character stuff is a lot harder to push around, it is also easier to avoid. today, there is no way to really play without listening to 100 and 1 from the start, since joining a guild without 100 and 1 is rather hard.
also, there is currently no incentive to roleplay at all. with these changes you could roleplay a few different characters and be truly immersed as characters are a lot harder to peg down as being the same player. there should also be less interest in if it *is* the same player as your interactions are moved from the "hi, hello, come to b8 to fight between friends" to actually doing things like CTC / BP / trade whatever with people you meet and *can* communicate with.
and no, this isn't a suggestion as much as a request for comments. I want to hear what the players (and if possible, the devs) think of immersion in VO today. the changes listed are food for thought, a conceptual change in how VO deals with character interaction. not a suggestion to do this now.
1) more channels might be needed, yeah, but currently, no, they're not. 100 isn't even particularly active, 11 isn't used.
2) we're getting a new UI. there, channels can be redefined as tabs or whatever. how we name the channels is pretty irrelevant for how fast is is to swich channels if the UI is designed for it.
3) eh, all messages are sent with a source system to you. that'll add less than a byte of network data (in VO, that's not more than a character of the message) and your client can use a set of lookup-tables to calculate the delay, or use a simple shortest path algorithm. it is *not* noticable for load on either side. and yeah, I am a programmer.
4) modern airplanes also don't peek at 250m/s. they're also not built around waring factions. as for paranoia, welcome to space. you can recognize your own nation mates ships, so you get a sense of belonging. that helps RP. the feeling of not knowing your enemy and what you call "paranoia" will *help* drive the state of *war* we are in. right now VO is so cuddely it's almost silly, and one of the reasons for this is that we know eachother so well from 100 that we're all mostly "buddies". we shouldn't be. that should come over time.
5) the purpose of removing arbitrary /msg is to remove gloating, random comments and idle chit-chat. you're not supposed to become *friends* over getting blown up. you might learn to respect eachother, but if you're fighting a *war*, you don't becomes buddies and go at it again. the players might be buddies, but the *characters* SHOULD be hesitant of the enemy.
anyway, this is pretty much the kind of response I expected, and, eh, whatever. thing is, today any attempt at RP in VO is dead from the get-go. if you RP, and mostly everyone else doesn't, you'll grow tired and stop. leaving 100 doesn't *help*. leaving 1 doesn't *help*. it *hides* the problem from you, it doesn't make it possible to actually RP with anyone who is set on basically having an avatar of themselves in VO. heck, that's what I eventually did and that's what 99% of the people I met in VO did and still seem to do.
and it *will* help people to RP, since out of character stuff is a lot harder to push around, it is also easier to avoid. today, there is no way to really play without listening to 100 and 1 from the start, since joining a guild without 100 and 1 is rather hard.
also, there is currently no incentive to roleplay at all. with these changes you could roleplay a few different characters and be truly immersed as characters are a lot harder to peg down as being the same player. there should also be less interest in if it *is* the same player as your interactions are moved from the "hi, hello, come to b8 to fight between friends" to actually doing things like CTC / BP / trade whatever with people you meet and *can* communicate with.
and no, this isn't a suggestion as much as a request for comments. I want to hear what the players (and if possible, the devs) think of immersion in VO today. the changes listed are food for thought, a conceptual change in how VO deals with character interaction. not a suggestion to do this now.
I like the idea. I can't see how it could hurt the game, and would also solve the problem of what ch100 is going to be like with 500 people on.
It's a brave idea and it will change the game drastically, but it will also possibly make the game far more scary and have far greater RP potential.
Otherwise it's the worlds prettiest chatroom where people sometimes blow each other up.
It's a brave idea and it will change the game drastically, but it will also possibly make the game far more scary and have far greater RP potential.
Otherwise it's the worlds prettiest chatroom where people sometimes blow each other up.
Great idea. I love it.
That will happen anyway, one day, imagine 200+ people trying to talk on 100 at once? Well, some of us dont have to, we saw it, and well, once the game gets populated...
(ok, i cant even begin to imagine what 100 would look like if VO had 2000 users....)
Isnt this a suggestion? heh
(ok, i cant even begin to imagine what 100 would look like if VO had 2000 users....)
Isnt this a suggestion? heh
Once the player base gets larger (say, 100 or more players on at any given time), then I think this would be nice. But for the time being, I think that the player base is too small for this to work well. Space would become awfully quiet.
nah, this isn't a suggestion. honestly, it is food for thought. a suggestion would contain a transition plan, some ideas for how to deal with the changes it will create in splitting up the community in to more distinct parts, how to deal with the fact that a Serco logging on would on average have 5 people to talk to and so on.
I can *suggest* such a change, but I would need to know a lot more about the way the game is going before doing so.
also, don't focus *that* much on the removal of universe-wide nation-independant chat possibilities. that's just one part of the idea of making the community more nation and guild oriented. also, the small things this would do, like make a Serco pilot in Eo completly cut off from *everything* is a question of ideology in the game. is this desired or not? how about the removal of ship identifier by default, this will make space scarier, it will provoke a certain fear and hesitation when going out of your nations space (which doesn't exist at all today) just from the fact that you no longer *know* the pilots you meet. is this in line with how one wants to see VO in the future?
how much war, darkness and feeling of space being scary do we want to promote and have the game cater towards? this is one way VO could work, the question is, do we want VO to be the game something like this would push?
I can *suggest* such a change, but I would need to know a lot more about the way the game is going before doing so.
also, don't focus *that* much on the removal of universe-wide nation-independant chat possibilities. that's just one part of the idea of making the community more nation and guild oriented. also, the small things this would do, like make a Serco pilot in Eo completly cut off from *everything* is a question of ideology in the game. is this desired or not? how about the removal of ship identifier by default, this will make space scarier, it will provoke a certain fear and hesitation when going out of your nations space (which doesn't exist at all today) just from the fact that you no longer *know* the pilots you meet. is this in line with how one wants to see VO in the future?
how much war, darkness and feeling of space being scary do we want to promote and have the game cater towards? this is one way VO could work, the question is, do we want VO to be the game something like this would push?
I don't like the idea. Limiting chat does NOT mean you will get more roleplaying out of people. That is a choice each person makes on there own. Lots of people are not here for roleplaying, they're here for the space quake play and thus have no use for limited chat, that just makes it harder for them to find their next fight. Also, how does limiting chat make the game feel more scary? That has no barring on the "fear" of the game at all IMO. You want fear, let the hive loose on wh sectors, add in npc pirates in Corvus ships as strong as strike forces flying around grey space attacking anyone that will not drop cargo for them. Add more assault forces coming from both nations and attacking the borders, without the aid of a mission, make them random events. But limiting communications just makes the game more empty then it already is and will just make it that much more boring since 80% of the time players are talking to each other more then they are actually playing the game.
yoda said:imagine 200+ people trying to talk on 100 at once?
Yeah, I can imagine it, it would be like scrolling through a word document. (Except faster, that slug MS Word...)
Overall I think terjekv's idea will work better in the long run when there are many players online - you'll HAVE to segment the chats, it'll be MANDATORY. Using tabs to keeep track of the channels you are "listening" to is a good idea. I like it. Here are some tabs that people should be able to shoose from:
Itani newsfeeds (bias towards blue)
UIT newsfeeds (bias towards yellow)
Serco newsfeeds (bias towards red)
Corvus commnet feed
Guide/Dev/ATTENTION channel
Guild chat feed
Nation chat need
Advertisement feed
Trader's newsfeed
Miner's newsfeed
Bounty newsfeed
Emergency channel newsfeed
Sector chat feed
Numbered channels as they are now, virtually unlimited feeds
You can turn feeds on and off as you like. Have 'em all on or all off, whatever.
You won't meet as many people with this setup, and it will DEFINITELY tend to polarize things along nation lines. Which will make at least Jestatis happy when he makes more drunken posts.
I *REALLY* like the idea of "anonymous" ships. Is it an NPC? Is it a real player? Dunno, let's hail it. Ooops it's a pirate - Ruuun! That's a great idea.
I TRY to RP in character but usually no one plays along. It's OK, I don't mind it. I don't know if limiting the channels will increase the tendency of people to RP more, but for sure I wouldn't be able to hit on BUNNY as easily as I do now. :(
I don't like the delay aspect of the transmission. I think keep comm instant.
It will add to immersion. However, let's wait until later to implement it. Right now with an average of, what, 30 people online? I think it will just piss people off and make V-O seem LESS populated, if such a thing is possible.
Yeah, I can imagine it, it would be like scrolling through a word document. (Except faster, that slug MS Word...)
Overall I think terjekv's idea will work better in the long run when there are many players online - you'll HAVE to segment the chats, it'll be MANDATORY. Using tabs to keeep track of the channels you are "listening" to is a good idea. I like it. Here are some tabs that people should be able to shoose from:
Itani newsfeeds (bias towards blue)
UIT newsfeeds (bias towards yellow)
Serco newsfeeds (bias towards red)
Corvus commnet feed
Guide/Dev/ATTENTION channel
Guild chat feed
Nation chat need
Advertisement feed
Trader's newsfeed
Miner's newsfeed
Bounty newsfeed
Emergency channel newsfeed
Sector chat feed
Numbered channels as they are now, virtually unlimited feeds
You can turn feeds on and off as you like. Have 'em all on or all off, whatever.
You won't meet as many people with this setup, and it will DEFINITELY tend to polarize things along nation lines. Which will make at least Jestatis happy when he makes more drunken posts.
I *REALLY* like the idea of "anonymous" ships. Is it an NPC? Is it a real player? Dunno, let's hail it. Ooops it's a pirate - Ruuun! That's a great idea.
I TRY to RP in character but usually no one plays along. It's OK, I don't mind it. I don't know if limiting the channels will increase the tendency of people to RP more, but for sure I wouldn't be able to hit on BUNNY as easily as I do now. :(
I don't like the delay aspect of the transmission. I think keep comm instant.
It will add to immersion. However, let's wait until later to implement it. Right now with an average of, what, 30 people online? I think it will just piss people off and make V-O seem LESS populated, if such a thing is possible.
I'd say that universe wide chat should be removed... once we have more than like 200 or 300 or even 1000 players online at any given time. But not before then. Space would get too lonely, and newbies would leave too quickly cuz they weren't seeing anyone.
And once we get rid of universe wide chat, then the default chat should probably be within systems only. There are just too many sectors right now to reduce it to just that.
However, group, guild, and message chat should remain universe wide.
And once we get rid of universe wide chat, then the default chat should probably be within systems only. There are just too many sectors right now to reduce it to just that.
However, group, guild, and message chat should remain universe wide.
Leber, the main reason for adding the delays in the chat is to give some *feel* of distance. besides, how come we move datapads around if we can send messages instantly wherever we go? :-)
it's a big deal for me, but I think it would help make locations *feel* more relevant to players, and make us choose where we hang out with more care just to avoid the 10 second RTT that'd make idle chat annyoing.
johnhawl281: the limiting of the chat doesn't by itself make space scarier, but it restricts your communications to your own nation, making the enemy someone you don't know and don't communicate with outside of combat and sector chat. at least to me, fighting someone completly unknown has more tension than fighting people I know well.
as for the people here to play space quake and to chat, as I said, the question is what one wants VO to cater towards. long term this is a choice that has to be made somehow, and just asking some people to RP while ignoring the majority that don't is going to be asking a lot of the RPing crowd. with the current playerbase, anyone new coming on (and joining 100 upon character creation) will quickly fall into the "big nice community"-feeling, which while being a nice thing, does make RP very hard -- as those of you who have tried to play VO as if a war was going on know very well
CP: System chat might be a decent idea, yeah.
(if I was going to go all out, I'd also comment on prefering to see generated names only in the game.)
it's a big deal for me, but I think it would help make locations *feel* more relevant to players, and make us choose where we hang out with more care just to avoid the 10 second RTT that'd make idle chat annyoing.
johnhawl281: the limiting of the chat doesn't by itself make space scarier, but it restricts your communications to your own nation, making the enemy someone you don't know and don't communicate with outside of combat and sector chat. at least to me, fighting someone completly unknown has more tension than fighting people I know well.
as for the people here to play space quake and to chat, as I said, the question is what one wants VO to cater towards. long term this is a choice that has to be made somehow, and just asking some people to RP while ignoring the majority that don't is going to be asking a lot of the RPing crowd. with the current playerbase, anyone new coming on (and joining 100 upon character creation) will quickly fall into the "big nice community"-feeling, which while being a nice thing, does make RP very hard -- as those of you who have tried to play VO as if a war was going on know very well
CP: System chat might be a decent idea, yeah.
(if I was going to go all out, I'd also comment on prefering to see generated names only in the game.)
(if I was going to go all out, I'd also comment on prefering to see generated names only in the game.)
You would prefer it if i couldnt have whatever name i want ? oO
And you just did comment on it. :P
You would prefer it if i couldnt have whatever name i want ? oO
And you just did comment on it. :P
if one is talking about levels of immersion, yeah, generated names are a good thing. it is extremly unlikely for the forced use of generated names to become a popular request, so as with a lot of this stuff, I don't expect it to happen. again, it's a question of what kind of game we want VO to be.
one of my pet peevees in a RP setting are names that completly break all ties to the game itself. I even did so myself this time around, since it was so common in the game before I started. all of my alts used generated names though.
one of my pet peevees in a RP setting are names that completly break all ties to the game itself. I even did so myself this time around, since it was so common in the game before I started. all of my alts used generated names though.
Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the first chat system we had when the new universe first came out just that?
Sector chat, system chat and team chat?
Anyway, good stuff, the whole thread.
The "anonymous ships" is my favorite, but I'm having troubles imagining it being implemented, what with charinfo and hails and all thems things that hinge on knowing who you have targeted. Still, I'd love, love, love to see that happen.
Sector chat, system chat and team chat?
Anyway, good stuff, the whole thread.
The "anonymous ships" is my favorite, but I'm having troubles imagining it being implemented, what with charinfo and hails and all thems things that hinge on knowing who you have targeted. Still, I'd love, love, love to see that happen.
I think your correct genka, and nobody could find anyone, heh, well we did only have like 5 players online at a time, and i did eventually find niki :)
charinfo would be gone unless you know the ID of the pilot (which means the pilot has sent his ID hail to you). hail would work fine, except that you'd see yourself sending it to your localized ID of the pilot, like "S3403-X324", until you actually got one of those ID hails.
and as far as I'm told, the chat system was sector / system and team in 3.5test which was the closed beta, right?
and as far as I'm told, the chat system was sector / system and team in 3.5test which was the closed beta, right?
I think this is a great idea. Neat stuff.
With no flame intended, I would also like to observe that Jexerome and Johnhawl are almost universally negative in their replies, regardless of the subject matter. Thank you for stimulating conversation in others.
With no flame intended, I would also like to observe that Jexerome and Johnhawl are almost universally negative in their replies, regardless of the subject matter. Thank you for stimulating conversation in others.
tumblemonster you couldn't be farther from the truth, I just happen to not agree with a lot to the stuff that you happen to like. Personally I think you and your VO buddies a lot of the time are trying to move this game backwards to alpha days instead of coming up with useful ideas. When I see something I agree with or like I put my [approval] stamp on it, and if I do not like it I make it known. We just have different views and tastes. And while you say that it's "no flame intended" that's exactly what it was.
John - I was never in Alpha, and have no idea what it was like. I think you're a little miffed at the fact that my "buddies" come up with so many useful ideas. You are of the opinion that we are trying to make this game better just for us, and that's not true. We are, and always have, tried to make the game more fun for everyone.
I just got back, and I truly didn't intend a flame, but looking at an index of your posts, they more often than not come out against whatever the originator is saying, more often still when they are posts by my "buddies."
I just got back, and I truly didn't intend a flame, but looking at an index of your posts, they more often than not come out against whatever the originator is saying, more often still when they are posts by my "buddies."