Is there no General chat?

I know what you mean. Perhaps I will post it as a bug in case they are not hearing. Also I am hoping that the chat interface is a placeholder not feature complete since it needs work. I hope you got your answers Chatele, let me know if i can help in any way.

 

Shroud really should have global chat for new players. The channel is on by default until you reach level 10. Those over 10 can volunteer to join for moderation and answering questions.

The positives far outweigh the negatives.

 

a help channel where you asked a question and only was heard by the N nearest people that had flagged for trying to answear

 

Maybe a location to go for help would be better. The local tavern, or maybe something more specialized like a information/help center.

 

Think of a new person to Shroud. Do this or that doesn't work. Global help on by default until level 10. After level 10 you have to opt in. Moderated by senior players if not help related no go.

I can not logically believe why so much objection. With exception of a guy I work with who has a few issues. Such a channel would anger him if anything said not 100% completely topic related and he would monitor endlessly. He also would be irate if playing and turned the channel off because then certainly someone would be abusing the channel without his moderation.

 

One option that was implemented by one game I played was a 'global' chat channel specifically for helping new players that Not-New player who felt so inclined could join of their own volition to help those that had questions. So, I've seen your suggestion work before.

 

Not to invalidate this suggestion, but how could this channel be controlled? Would people use it for more than just a help channel?

 

They only problem is most games do the opposite. Can't use Gen chat till lvl 15 20. Reason is gold spamers

 

Well one thing I did notice in r16 is that now /L is working for me to get back to local chat. Before when whispering or in party I could not get out of party chat or whispering except by opening a new chat window to get to local. So this will help for that tedious process to not be necessary.
Now in regards to having a separate window that shows your whispers, party, and other player discussions, that is what I want.





***edit it is /l...........I just used the capital L to differentiate it from the I which is some fonts is similar***

 

I totally agree with him. I played LOTRO, WoW and few other games that has many players in it and global chat is operational. I tried to join global chat from time to time, but pros and cons of global chat is all too obvious.

Existence of global chat is to communicate and share useful info regarding gameplay anywhere in game, and the current state of SotA demands that kind of info sharing. SotA is under development, so there's a lots of rooms for improvement, but right now it's not-so-easy to understand whereabouts of everything due to lack of map system guidance feature that modern MMO have.
Casual gamers would probably want user-friendly stuff like global chat in order to get some easy assistance, but don't get me wrong, I'm a casual gamer myself, and I did get help from global chat from time to time in other games.
On the other hand, as mentioned by other fellows, It will destroy SotA's atmosphere. When there's global chat, there'll be spammers, trollers, meaningless advertising and so on that'll pulverize exquisite feeling of New Britannia into money grinding, mindlessly swashbuckling typical fantasy mix-up. THIS is something I do hate, and I sincerely hope SotA would not come to that.

 

I agree 100 percent.

 

After the last 8-9 yrs of playing mmo's with general chats, I'd absolutely be against general chat in SotA. Before I left WoW, it wasn't surprising to hear a guildie razzing another for not turning gen chat off. Spam, trolls, bullies, whatever else... far outnumber those that actually would give a legitimate response to any question. Help channels wouldn't work either unless moderated strictly, but even then gold spammers or bots would slowly take it over just to advertise.

Just my opinion, but like another earlier said, I think chat bubbles or even just chat over a person's head like in UO (limited in characters of course) would suffice. Sure, areas get spammed like Brit Bank always did. There was a distance away from someone that you wouldn't see it if I remember right so it can be easily avoidable if you need to clear the screen lol. Any other Uo'ers remember selling goods and having to move a bit here or there so your 'ad' didn't get covered up by other's convos? lol

With whispering instead of ICQ of old, chat bubbles, for me would be the way to go. Peace and perceived quiet when I wanted it and the rumble of a busy marketplace when that would be needed

 

With vendors being local instead of a global auction house. Global chat will quickly become global vendor spam.

 

+1

 

I have never played a game with global chat, but I don't think I would participate if it were in SOTA. Just listening to local chat at large events is confusing to me with all the conversations going on, and the chat window just scrolls and scrolls. And even one troll would make me turn it off. My blocked player list would get longer and longer. I like the idea of a help channel, especially if abusers could be banned in some way from using it to troll. It would be nice to have an oracle quest to become a virtuous question answerer.

I also like the idea of having physical info centers in game, but experienced players might not want to hang out at them. Perhaps only the information seeker would have to be at the info center physically, and his question would be relayed via help channel to other players who flagged themselves at the oracle as question answerers.

 

Doesn't need to be a chat channel, but rather a 'ticket' system. Each player can use one 'ticket' at a time. Nobody but the selected people who were choose to help can see the tickets. 'Taking' a ticket opens a 'whisper-like' chat between player and helper (both should not even see each others name).
And you're set. You avoid all the advertising and gold spamming or inter world trading, but have the benefit of instantly connecting beginning player to a volunteer willing to help.
And given this community I'm almost certain you'd find a good deal of people willing to volunteer on helping.

 

Chats fine working in close vicinity for the most part. However I can see need for longer range shouting or emphasised chat within a zone perhaps when asking for assistance or for group events where everyone is not together and cannot be in the same party - perhaps for large guild meetings as it would stand out from the guild channel by being in red, not truly global across zones but useful at times across larger zones.

Perhaps the addition of "/shout <text>" could be made, and a toggle box added to the corner of the chat window to filter it out so the less inclined to help can ignore others pleas for attention. Limit shouts to 1 per 5 minutes per player and a maximum of 3 per hour as its exhausting yelling at the top of ones voice and doing it too much strains vocal chords. This would allow just a handful of messages to be stressed out by players in need but restrict its use enough to keep spam down.

Also add a minimum level limit of 5 before you are important enough for the world to listen to you (to keep fresh rolled gold seller bots out) and keep the messages no longer than say 30 characters - enough to get attention of others and provide a subject line of importance but not enough to flood the channel.

There is no reason some standard MMO options can't make it into the game but if they do they should be reworked to fit the bill for this game, we don't need another WoW clone full of chat spam, gold sellers and trolls but that does not mean we need to leave the more useful features out completely.

 

Perhaps we could have a stretch goal to fund a dedicated payroll for a full time SOTA moderator for general chat. About $90,000 would fund a full time 24hr/day minimum wage position (3 @ 8 hrs.).

 

IRC=general chat/trade chat/help chat/etc.

It's nice in there, come join us! At least if/until they add more chat functionality in game.

 

The problem with general chat is people will say almost anything to get attention. That includes going to general chat just to talk trash and to entertain themselves. Just check out the WoW trade chat--it's horrible.