As we all know, all guides and devs have the ability to speak to every player online via the great white letters. This is done to contact every single player ingame, even if they aren't on a channel. Given this, say the server needs to shutdown, a dev can tell us all without the worry that someone didn't hear. Now, having said this, these white letters can not be ignored and can get annoying. Recently, they have popped up excessively, more than nine times in less than 24 hours. I personally have asked that it be announced on 100 of Obsidian, but I have been ignored. Opinions?

I'm annoyed that I had to implement special blocking logic in #sigma to avoid clogging the channel with various "event starts in 30 minutes"- and "event starts in 29 minutes 45 seconds"-type messages.
-:sigma.SB

I think the /oper /global command should be restricted in use to server status updates, in particular restarts (of the game server, individual sectors/systems, DELIVERATOR or anything else that might need restarting) and updates. Anything else, namely player-and guild-run events and contests, should be broadcast over 100 and/or put into the ingame news.

I disagree. While there should certainly be limits (and I should know, having had an, uh, "incident" with white text), I think the white text is a great way to announce impending events. I wish it were automatic, meaning player event planners could apply for and have them set up in advance (see the event powers thread in suggestions). A lot of people leave 100 turned off for role playing purposes, but would probably still like to attend in game events. I've never seen the event announcements become excessive by any means.

I smell a hint of jealosy, and errrm, there are LOTS of REAL newbs about atm, that dont know anything about storys that you have played out for years n years that just might appreciate it, stfu

The problem with it being "okay" for events is that the only group that ever gets their events announced is TGFT. Ever. I've never seen another group's events announced, and ten times in 24 hours (for just ONE SINGLE EVENT, even!) IS repetitive and abuse of the system. The rest of us get along just FINE with channel 100 for spreading information.

Errrm, I myself have had white messages placed by a guide for an even I hosted, try talking to them.

I don't have any problem with limiting usage to critical functions only. We could also create an event-specific channel and subscribe all new clients to that channel, which would allow RP-type players to continue to receive notifications without being on 100.

1 point inc, sorry, but 100 = general chat, its not our fault channels aint named, which would be nice. (specially if guilds get a [guild tag] general channel folk can join and get banned from by a guild commander :P)

There needs to be a global method of spreading news about events other than channel 100 (ed: or the news, which is nicely tucked away and can be easily missed). Until there is Obs has been using the white text for events that she helps run. Player events are a good way to keep people interested in the game, and they should be encouraged more than discouraged due to people 'who don't like to see lots of white text on their chat log'

Obs does it for her events. She says they are TGFT events because we have discuessed and brainstormed about them on our forums, but for the most part they are 'hers'. Would it help if it were announced just as a Convoy event, instead of a TGFT event? I think that might be more of the cause of concern on this topic perhaps?

I personally think some people are making much ado about nothing. The Runs (both of them) are announced over 100 as their starting time comes near, and then the actual commentary goes to channel 500. With the Mining Event, Obsidian uses the white text instead of 100 and then channel 444 to actually comment on it, so it's the exact same thing in my opinion.

Plus, there are more Guides, aren't they? you could ask any of them to use the white text for your own events.

Lastly, the Guild channel yoda suggests is an EXCELLENT idea. We all know that, as riddled with alts as all the Guilds are, they won't be spy-proof anyway.

true jex and true kim, i one time had an issue with the TGFT part of the white messages, but then i realised we as [CLM] also had some simaler messages posted by just askin for em, soehum, catch 22? or maybe its a case of if you dont ask you dont get,

try talking to em.

Uhm, are people this seriously bent out of shape that these events are being announced by the guide who is running them?!

C'mon people, these events are targetted toward both new and experienced players, and their goals are to make people want to play the game. This is not about abusing any powers that the guides have. This is about making Vendetta a better game.

As previously mentioned, a number of people routinely turn off 100. So event announcements need to have a way to get to everyone's client.

I'm sorry if this sounds like flamebait, as that is not my goal ... my suggestion to the devs: don't waste time on such a trivial issue.

maybe there should be a way for guide/devs to "announce-lock" a channel?? ..or is our current no-chatting-in-201-or-202 policy sufficient?

either way, it'd be nice to designate a global no-spam announce channel

Well, I agree with Moby, yoda and jex on this one. The idea is to catch the eye of less experienced players to draw them to in game player or guild run events, surely experienced players aren't distacted by them ?

Cheers

Ecka

I dont see a problem with them, just a couple weeks ago I was trying to announce a bus war and Obs was nice enough to broadcast the info for me. If you dont ask you dont get, and I agree with yoda, a guild specific channel would be great with the guidelines he mentioned.

I'm frequently amazed at how heavy-handed people can be in their denouncements of the guides. She's organizing and running events, ferchissakes! Of the 8,640,000 seconds on a particular day, 9 of those seconds were interupted by a white text message. Most people wouldn't even be on or running logs for that amount of time.

Okay, so it might not be the best use of the global text, but instead of casting suspicion and making accusations of abuse, couldn't we just have a Suggestions thread discussing better ways to announce events? This sort of thing must be very demotivating for such an active and committed guide.

Anytime I have asked a guide to announce an event for me, they have been more than happy to. It's not even close to being abused.

LOL I agree with Whistler.

White text scrolling thru a chatlog is quite seriously nothing to get excited about. This is so far down the list of things to worry about that I don't even think it warrants any more of my thought processe...

Okay, so perhaps a compromise:

Guild/Player-run events don't use the white global text, but instead have their own special channel that can optionally be subscribed to, perhaps with a seperate color, maybe brown or pink or some color not like those we have now. So, something like:

(event) Super Happy Fun Ganking Event in Sedina B-8 will start in 40 minutes! /msg Someone to register!

This could perhaps be subscribed to in the Options > Game panel, where you can turn various chat filters on and off.