Goblin Squad Member
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One of the things that bugs me most in MMOs is the lack of proper organization outside of the game. What I mean is usually, inside the game, you are a member of a guild, with maybe privileges like being able to recruit members, giving reputation (good or bad) to other guilds, etc.
But once you close the game, none of that is maintained. You are just a username and password away from any blog/forum. And that username might have nothing to do with your character name.
What I'd like to see is an official forum that links to the game's database. If I'm a member of XYZ guild, then I have access to XYZ forum's section. If XYZ is part of the ABC alliance, then I also have access to that forum. If I'm given an administrative title in-game, it can also be mirrored out-of-game (guild master -> admin, recruiter -> moderator, etc).
I think that's the kind of feature that would enrich any MMO. But this is especially true for MMOs focusing on players interactions.
You know that many guilds in various MMO maintain their own forums or have their own sections on forums? This is a matter of things that should be players choice to be maintained by the players themselves instead of enforced by the game. Of course having easy tools to do it provided as a part of the game could be helpful.
By looking on EVE online community, which is important inspiration for PFO, including the massive planned reliance on players to be the major content of the game I suspect that out of game interaction will be stronger than in theme park MMOs.
This is a matter of things that should be players choice to be maintained by the players themselves instead of enforced by the game. Of course having easy tools to do it provided as a part of the game could be helpful.
Sums it up nicely. As an option I'm all for it, but mandatory integration is not something I want to see.
There is a degree of separation that needs to be maintained. As a member of x guild representing y views, and as a character with z alignment, in game I am bound to certain governing criteria. As a general forum poster, name, guild affiliations and the like do not matter. Only the ideas and opinions therein should apply.
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CEO, Goblinworks
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What I want to have is a Facebook-style social network tool that features characters instead of people. That tool will replace things like forums. It will be accessible everywhere you can make a web browser run, and have calendars, reminders, notifications, chat, etc.
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As long as it is completely independent from Facebook... :|
BTW: Have you considered PFO having internal web browser like EVE? It was great idea with length of travels.
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Goblin Squad Member
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What I want to have is a Facebook-style social network tool that features characters instead of people. That tool will replace things like forums. It will be accessible everywhere you can make a web browser run, and have calendars, reminders, notifications, chat, etc.
Heroic idea. Thinking about it, no originality is really required should one simply recreate facebook as a community system for an MMORPG. Surprising that, to date, the nearest thing we have is WoW's Armoury; Ultima Online's MyUO did the same job 15 years ago.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Facebook-style network would be awesome.
As for the optional vs mandatory, I don't see how you could force someone to read forums anyways. And nothing prevents you from creating a private forum if you so desire. All I'm saying is it'd be a lot less overhead for players to have a built-in solution.
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Goblin Squad Member
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An out of the box social networking feature would be totally boss, and I love the idea of linking it to character rather than account/username.
It would be great also if your relationships were automatically reflected in the network--your chartered company, settlement, nation, etc. so you didn't have to set/up join groups, but were "in them" in the network because you were "in them" in the real world.
That fantasy real world, of course.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The vast majority of players who sign up to play Pathfinder Online will have little to no interest in roleplaying. There is no MMORG on the planet that's been able to avoid that basic fact.
But the majority of them will be interested in social interaction and achieving their goals.
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Goblin Squad Member
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What I want to have is a Facebook-style social network tool that features characters instead of people. That tool will replace things like forums. It will be accessible everywhere you can make a web browser run, and have calendars, reminders, notifications, chat, etc.
Very nice. I wasn't expecting that but it sounds useful as heck.
The vast majority of players who sign up to play Pathfinder Online will have little to no interest in roleplaying. There is no MMORG on the planet that's been able to avoid that basic fact.
Who said anything about RP? Yes it will be helpful for RPers, but as both someone who has lead clans in the past, and someone hoping to lead a settlement or kingdom in PFO, I can see a lot of use for this that has nothing to do with RP.
You don't need to be an RPer to see the use of a calendar tool integrated into the game. Sometimes members don't like to use external websites so having our forums and the tools I need to schedule events right there where everyone with the game has access to them without having to register to our site... is pretty damn useful.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You don't need to be an RPer to see the use of a calendar tool integrated into the game. Sometimes members don't like to use external websites so having our forums and the tools I need to schedule events right there where everyone with the game has access to them without having to register to our site... is pretty damn useful.
And I'm hoping it could work both ways. If you become a new member of a guild in-game, then you have automatic access to guild posts out-of-game. And if you set a guild event in the out-of-game calendar, then why not send a notification to concerned players in-game?
These are options that are not available to 3rd party forums. Or at least not without an API.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You don't need to be an RPer to see the use of a calendar tool integrated into the game. Sometimes members don't like to use external websites so having our forums and the tools I need to schedule events right there where everyone with the game has access to them without having to register to our site... is pretty damn useful.And I'm hoping it could work both ways. If you become a new member of a guild in-game, then you have automatic access to guild posts out-of-game. And if you set a guild event in the out-of-game calendar, then why not send a notification to concerned players in-game?
These are options that are not available to 3rd party forums. Or at least not without an API.
Even with API key's I think most 3rd party forums still require you to register. At least the ones I've experienced have. Having a forum system build into the game will really help. Some people really just don't like to pop out of game and go register for some website.
Having these tools built into game means a higher % of my membership is likely to make use of them on a semi-frequent basis. That means better communication and higher attendance at events.
I would also put there needs to be multiple levels of security though. Just because you are a member doesn't mean I want you having access to everything. I would like the ability to set up. Member, senior member, and council level sections of the forums.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You don't need to be an RPer to see the use of a calendar tool integrated into the game. Sometimes members don't like to use external websites so having our forums and the tools I need to schedule events right there where everyone with the game has access to them without having to register to our site... is pretty damn useful.And I'm hoping it could work both ways. If you become a new member of a guild in-game, then you have automatic access to guild posts out-of-game. And if you set a guild event in the out-of-game calendar, then why not send a notification to concerned players in-game?
These are options that are not available to 3rd party forums. Or at least not without an API.
I am not much of a joiner, as in even if I do join a CC I do not expect it to be one that is much more than just a social club.
That being said, I can only think that it would be irritating that any time someone in my network posted something on their page that I would get an in-game notification.
I think that allowing us to check our 'network' in-game would be more than adequate, but I wouldn't even fight for that.
If I check my network before I log in then I catch up on stuff that I may have missed, and once I am in the game anyone there can tell me anything that I need to know.
In a large network, enough people may be logging in at different times that they could pass along the most recent updates (in the event that someone not playing wants to add something) in chat.
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Goblin Squad Member
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What I want to have is a Facebook-style social network tool that features characters instead of people. That tool will replace things like forums. It will be accessible everywhere you can make a web browser run, and have calendars, reminders, notifications, chat, etc.
As long as it remains FB "style" and not Facebook itself. I participated in a Massivley.com question post recently asking what MMO trends we hated of late and linking a game to any type of social media was, last I checked, one of the top answers.
My FB is to keep up with friends and family that I am no longer near. I have not and will not use it as a marketing tool to spam those people with my game playing habits.
I hope your intentions are to have a wholly separate site akin to the traditional "Game's website" that we log into and which has all the features you mention. That's what it seems you are saying but this is one of those things where I feel intentions should be laid bare.
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CEO, Goblinworks
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I can't really take credit for this idea. EVEGate was envisioned as this exact concept. I was a huge booster of EVEGate inside CCP and the reasons I supported the concept there are the same as the reasons I want it for Pathfinder Online.
It's important in an MMO to preserve a distinction between a player and a character. Some players won't want their identities to be known - for out of game reasons as much as in game reasons. In game there are a legion of reasons to do this - espionage, sabotage, or just roleplaying.
Goblinworks needs to know about you as a player for billing, customer service and community management issues. Nobody else does.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Would you be open to a global id system? Like CoH has, where you get a unique ID you can share on a friends list and see all their characters when they are online?
Simply having someone's unique ID would be useless, since the connection must be approved from both sides to take effect.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I am not much of a joiner, as in even if I do join a CC I do not expect it to be one that is much more than just a social club.
That being said, I can only think that it would be irritating that any time someone in my network posted something on their page that I would get an in-game notification.
I think that allowing us to check our 'network' in-game would be more than adequate, but I wouldn't even fight for that.
If I check my network before I log in then I catch up on stuff that I may have missed, and once I am in the game anyone there can tell me anything that I need to know.In a large network, enough people may be logging in at different times that they could pass along the most recent updates (in the event that someone not playing wants to add something) in chat.
Or you could just have a toggle in the options menu that says:
Post Notification [On/Off]
People who want them have them, people who don't want them don't have them, and everyone is happy.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It would be amazing if you could tweak skill training and queing in the PFO FB system. Especially if you can access it outside of the game via a PC or even an app for smartphones. It would also be great if we could design a template for skill training that could be shared. That way if someone has worked out an awesome crafting skill set, it could be shared with others. This would especially be good for newer players.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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*Points at www.argentarchives.org -- a player-run site for WoW Argent Dawn EU *
It's a site I've done most of the tech work for, while the initial idea and a lot of support came from a few other people, together with quite a large bunch of volunteers for keeping it running, helping people out, etc.
Having something like that exist as an integrated part of the game would be great.
I can even imagine having some parts accessible in-game, for example the noticeboards are already imagined to exist in specific sites in-game, it would be great if you could go there and read them/add to them. I recall some of the very first MMO's I ever played (I think Meridian 59?) had some sort of messageboards in the major hubs in-game.
And yes, EVE-gate is quite great as well.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Just found this thread through another thread.
I just wanted to say Gilthy....Wow i mean wow, thats just totally wicked.
@ryan we need something like this!
That's going to depend a lot on if they let us poll their info or not to do checks on players.
I'm in the midsts of building a social site like this that also includes news, forums and a wiki, but as of now it is not character specific since there aren't characters yet and I can't confirm whether the character exists or not.
