As I’ve recently gotten back into Fallen London after yet another absence, I’m struck by something of an issue: at this point I have absolutely no clue who on my contacts list is still playing Fallen London, let alone who is actually available and willing to partake in social actions. How do the rest of you manage your contacts lists–do you routinely cull them for players who do not respond to social actions, or do you simply have a separate list of "active players" that you use when making these choices? How do you pick which player from your list of contacts to interact with (or does everyone but me just use an alt for that?)? And what do you do with the unaccepted invitations–leave them sitting for weeks, maybe months on end, or do you at a certain point give up hope and clear them from your queue? (And while we’re on the subject–does anyone have a guide and/or advice regarding the "calling card" system?)
And most importantly: how can the system be improved? A "last active" indicator on the profile/"choose player" field, perhaps indicated as some kind of special Quality? A way to sort your contacts, both on the tab and in the "choose player" field? Some other solution, or combination of solutions? It’s something that’s piqued my curiosity, so I’d like to hear your thoughts. :)
A "currently online" button would be useful, as would a "last active" - but I have no idea how easy that would be to implement from a technical point of view.
For my part, I’ve worked out over the last few months which of my contacts respond most quickly (i.e. within 24 hours) and they are generally the ones I will go to for social actions. There are a few who are on more regularly and will generally respond within a couple of hours, which is good when something needs accepting quickly.
To answer your specific question - I will generally clear a queued invitation queue after a week or so, although that’s only happened a couple of times (and once the person involved wrote me a most corteous note of apology a few days later!).
Calling cards are very straightforward. Many people now state in their signature lines whether they are accepting them from new contacts, and there is also a thread in the Singing Mandrake where you can find people willing to become Acquaintances.
Hope this helps, and I’m sure others will "Chime" in (Aha! Ahahahahahahahaaaaa! Aha. Ahem. Excuse me) with other info.[li][/li] edited by A B Nile on 2/20/2014
[color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]This has come up before, but we’re wary about it because of privacy issues, if players don’t want other players (who might include their boss, or an ex) knowing whether they’ve read an invite or when they last logged in. I’d encourage people to talk about how they feel about that issue, and whether we’re being overly sensitive.[/color]
[color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]We are currently considering: closer journal integration (edit: I mean being able to follow a link to a player journal, and see when they last recorded a journal entry); easier messaging, including ways to reply to invitations without having to go via Write a Letter; and ways for players to manage groups of players.[/color]
[color=#009900]
[/color][li] edited by Alexis on 2/20/2014
I don’t manage my contacts, I just let them accumulate. But I do collect all my private messages and other social actions in a TXT-file, so if I need to know what my history with a given contact is, that’ll tell me. I also rely on the notification emails sent to me, though I’m going to start copying those to TXT-files as well, to get the timeline right. I wish there was an automatic system that did something like that, or that I could get my own social actions and private messages sent to me as emails, though as of yesterday I haven’t received any of the emails I should have, so I guess I’d still have to do it manually to make sure the records are kept straight. (Now it’s time to contact support, because my Time, the Healer is late as well, and it has been exactly on schedule since they fixed that in December.)
Regarding calling cards, I don’t quite understand why strangers send them to me without a personal message explaining why they are sending them. But I still accept them, because I’m not even close to the cap for acquaintances. Though as far as I know, being an acquaintance is really only needed for private suppers, mentor/protégé and to become "seen with" as a courtship that’s recognised by the game. But I suppose some players might just be trying out social actions and clicking the ‘Recommend a player’ button? And then not adding a personal message, even though the instructions suggest that. Maybe they’re also playing the game on their phone, and typing on the phone might be cumbersome?
[quote=Alexis Kennedy][color=rgb(0,153,0)]This has come up before, but we’re wary about it because of privacy issues, if players don’t want other players (who might include their boss, or an ex) knowing whether they’ve read an invite or when they last logged in. I’d encourage people to talk about how they feel about that issue, and whether we’re being overly sensitive.[/color]
[color=rgb(0,153,0)]We are currently considering: closer journal integration (edit: I mean being able to follow a link to a player journal, and see when they last recorded a journal entry); easier messaging, including ways to reply to invitations without having to go via Write a Letter; and ways for players to manage groups of players.[/color][/quote]
A good point. Perhaps addressed by leaving it up to a player’s option whether they display their status or not? I might be showing my age here, but MSN messenger had a similar facility (you could choose to appear as "busy" or "away" instead of the default setting of "online").
[quote=A B Nile][quote=Alexis Kennedy][color=rgb(0,153,0)]This has come up before, but we’re wary about it because of privacy issues, if players don’t want other players (who might include their boss, or an ex) knowing whether they’ve read an invite or when they last logged in. I’d encourage people to talk about how they feel about that issue, and whether we’re being overly sensitive.[/color]
[color=rgb(0,153,0)]We are currently considering: closer journal integration (edit: I mean being able to follow a link to a player journal, and see when they last recorded a journal entry); easier messaging, including ways to reply to invitations without having to go via Write a Letter; and ways for players to manage groups of players.[/color][/quote]
A good point. Perhaps addressed by leaving it up to a player’s option whether they display their status or not? I might be showing my age here, but MSN messenger had a similar facility (you could choose to appear as "busy" or "away" instead of the default setting of "online").[/quote]
Or perhaps something more vague - just an ‘active in the last one (or even two) weeks’ thing would be enough to give a good idea whether someone still played. And you could choose whether to display it - the very act of displaying it might show a more active user.
I have my messages emailed to me too - then a search for the relevant contact’s name in my Gmail will give me a useful timeline. I also wish that messages I had sent were available in this way - it’s a shame they’re not, as I’m currently only able to view one side of the conversation…
Agreed on both points - and I’d add that on a few occasions I’ve been sent a Calling Card with no message, and then never heard from the sender again. Perhaps some people are simply trying to increase Influence as high as they can?
I don’t think I’ve ever killed a request I’ve sent. I figure the other person might get back to me eventually, and it does no harm to leave them there.
I will often send social requests to the most recent people to send them to me - because I know they’ve at least been online recently.
That does raise an interesting question - what should happen for someone who marries another PC who later disappears?
Agreed on both points - and I’d add that on a few occasions I’ve been sent a Calling Card with no message, and then never heard from the sender again. Perhaps some people are simply trying to increase Influence as high as they can?[/quote]
Oh. I’m guilty of that. I want to have all the influence. But I do almost as randomly send social things/gifts.
I’ve not killed any requests either, that I can think of, even though the friends who got me into the game all stopped playing years ago and never answer anything. But I figure it doesn’t hurt to have it there, and I’d rather not spend actions on withdrawing them.
I have sent calling cards without messages–sorry! I do usually try to leave some sort of IC note ('We met at Lord G–‘s soiree; I hear the Colonel has quite recovered’) or some such, but am not always feeling terribly creative, and don’t want to forget I was going to send it!
[quote=Alexis Kennedy]
[color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]This has come up before, but we’re wary about it because of privacy issues, if players don’t want other players (who might include their boss, or an ex) knowing whether they’ve read an invite or when they last logged in. I’d encourage people to talk about how they feel about that issue, and whether we’re being overly sensitive.[/color][/quote]
Would it be possible to have an opt-in feature for this? If one does not opt in, then one’s butler informs all visitors that one is indisposed, regardless; if one opts in, then people can see one’s active/last active status.
[li]
[/li]
Honestly, you could probably just get away with a binary designation of activity. You guys could set some measure of activity (Played within the last week/two weeks/month etc) and just show whether or not a player meets that threshold. So, say if you considered a player active if they had played in the last two weeks–you could then allow other players to filter by that criteria.
[quote=æsc ]I have sent calling cards without messages–sorry! I do usually try to leave some sort of IC note ('We met at Lord G–‘s soiree; I hear the Colonel has quite recovered’) or some such, but am not always feeling terribly creative, and don’t want to forget I was going to send it![/quote]Oh, it’s not creativity I’m looking for, even if that’s always appreciated. It’s just the reason for contacting me that I’m curious about. When it’s a stranger, that is. If it’s someone I recognise from an earlier exchange it’s no great mystery if they want to become closer acquainted, but receiving a ‘blank’ calling card from a complete stranger is kind of like answering the phone, hearing the caller introduce themselves, and then they’re not saying why they’re calling. And I’m not one to send a message back to them and ask them who they are, what they want, and how they found out about me. Well, not immediately anyway. I leave that for invitations to private suppers when my Free Evenings are about to expire. :D
It’s different with random blank requests for menace reduction though. In those cases it’s quite obvious what people want. ;)
[quote=Gillsing][quote=æsc ]I have sent calling cards without messages–sorry! I do usually try to leave some sort of IC note ('We met at Lord G–‘s soiree; I hear the Colonel has quite recovered’) or some such, but am not always feeling terribly creative, and don’t want to forget I was going to send it![/quote]Oh, it’s not creativity I’m looking for, even if that’s always appreciated. It’s just the reason for contacting me that I’m curious about. When it’s a stranger, that is. If it’s someone I recognise from an earlier exchange it’s no great mystery if they want to become closer acquainted, but receiving a ‘blank’ calling card from a complete stranger is kind of like answering the phone, hearing the caller introduce themselves, and then they’re not saying why they’re calling. And I’m not one to send a message back to them and ask them who they are, what they want, and how they found out about me. Well, not immediately anyway. I leave that for invitations to private suppers when my Free Evenings are about to expire. :D
It’s different with random blank requests for menace reduction though. In those cases it’s quite obvious what people want. ;)[/quote]
:-) If a name feels familiar I’ll add them. That said, I did a massive import from twitter as well as the Seekers and K&C, so people may be familiar to me without them having a clue who I am. (The fools. Everyone should know me. I am all that is great and, well, not so much good as … threatening. But let’s just call it ‘good’.)
I’ll reply to messages - and accept everything flung at me - as there’s no use me expecting that of others if I don’t do the same. But, I’m also perfectly happy (I won’t hurt the person responsible too much) to be rejected, as it’s obvious I’m putting next-to-nil effort in my invites.
[quote=Gillsing]Oh, it’s not creativity I’m looking for, even if that’s always appreciated. It’s just the reason for contacting me that I’m curious about. When it’s a stranger, that is. If it’s someone I recognise from an earlier exchange it’s no great mystery if they want to become closer acquainted, but receiving a ‘blank’ calling card from a complete stranger is kind of like answering the phone, hearing the caller introduce themselves, and then they’re not saying why they’re calling. And I’m not one to send a message back to them and ask them who they are, what they want, and how they found out about me. Well, not immediately anyway. I leave that for invitations to private suppers when my Free Evenings are about to expire. :D
It’s different with random blank requests for menace reduction though. In those cases it’s quite obvious what people want. ;)[/quote]
That makes sense, of course! I’ve usually sent cards to people either after having just met them on the forum, in which case it follows a bit more logically, or because I haven’t actually MET them, but they’ve indicated in some way that calling cards are welcome. And to be honest, I’ve only been sending them at all for about a week, so am still new to the whole social part of the game–I’ve been playing alone for ages, but it’s come to a point where it really is more fun with other people, so trying to overcome the whole shyness thing. ;)
I like your metaphor about the phone, that’s quite apt. (And I know just what you mean about sending messages back. Much as in real life, I’m likely to go on pretending to know who they are…British, you see. g)
[quote=Alexis Kennedy]
[color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]We are currently considering: closer journal integration (edit: I mean being able to follow a link to a player journal, and see when they last recorded a journal entry); easier messaging, including ways to reply to invitations without having to go via Write a Letter; and ways for players to manage groups of players. [/color][/quote]
When in doubt, make it opt-in.
There is a huge difference between me deciding to advertise that I am on-line, and just everyone being able to access it.
That said, I probably wouldn’t opt-in because there are times I’m parked on-line and unable to respond for long amounts of time. Any naive, and some non-naive, ways of determining if I’m active would give false readings.
I’d love a marker for whether someone’s been online within the last two weeks!
Like Gillsing, I have a separate text file in which I try to track my interactions with other players, but lots of my playing is done in the middle of the night (I’m an insomniac-- the ability to use 120+ actions a day without Exceptional Friendship is one I wish I didn’t have) or during furtive work breaks, and the notes aren’t perfect. I’m also too lazy to note down how long it takes contacts to reply to action requests, so "I’ve just noticed I have no Sudden Insights, who should I try to play chess with?" usually gets decided by the associations I form between names and actions through repetition, not through consultation of a reliable system. Sorry, I know you’re all complex people (and characters) with your own nuanced aspirations, strengths, knowledge, values, capabilities, preferences, and personalities, but at 4 AM what I’ll focus on is "hey, you seem to like loitering".[li]
I never withdraw requests unless I’ve misfired, e.g. someone has previously stated they aren’t interested in loitering and I accidentally send them a loiter request. So far, I’ve never had anyone take longer than a week and a half to answer a request, and in probably a thousand action requests sent have only had three or four rejected.
I like the idea of having an “active within the last two weeks” marker. I would opt-in to a “currently online” marker, but don’t find it really necessary - in cases of emergency, the forum or the chat are probably more effective. What I really miss is the possibility of sorting people into custom lists, and an “acquaintance” list, because I tend to choose these people for social actions in general.
If you’ve returned to the game recently there is an easy way to check for active players: send calling cards to your whole contact list, see who accepts. But that’s a one time thing. An opt-in to show if the player was active (used his actions) withing the last week would be useful, I guess. Though I can make do without it, if you are active, it’s not hard to find other active players through forums or IRC.
While we are speaking about contacts. I wish there was some way to make a quick-list and load that quick-list instead of your whole contact list. It would probably decrease the loading time. And make selecting frequent contacts easier.
I would agree with both the opt-in, and a point after which they are considered inactive, even if it was for a month or so. Down to the day/hour should be a opt-in thing regardless, but I believe that if a person hasn’t logged on in over a month, they’re fairly unlikely to be playing atm.