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Here are the ideas for developing a better chat system.
We will start all over on discussion of the chat systems as they are all merged into one thread now. Please take the time to comment and tell us what you think.
I feel their is a lack of personal interaction between players in this game. A simple chat box in the corner of the screen can liven up the game a lot.
The Idea
A simple box in the lower right hand side of the screen while in game that allows you to chat with other players of the current world you are in.
The Chat Groups
I believe just having one general chat would be foolish, it would be constantly flustered by hundreds of members and be difficult to keep up. Thus we break it down into 3 to 5 tabs at the top of the box that you can click on to interact with select groups of players. Example follows.
World Chat: Anything you type will be seen by ALL players within the world you are in.
Ocean Chat: (optional) Anything you type will be seen by ALL players within the selected Ocean you are currently in.
Alliance Chat: Anything you type is seen by ALL players in the same alliance as you.
Trade Chat: (optional) This allows for the trading of resources between players only and should be regulated as such.
Help Chat: (optional) If you have an In Game question or are stuck or are simply new to the game and want some one on one help this would be the place to ask. And would also be regulated to only help related chat.
Friend Chat: (optional) This allows you to compile a list of players that are your friends in game and allows you to chat with one specific friend at a time (or possibly have a system where several can all join one session).
Moderation
This system would have to be monitored. Certain curse words would have to be censored for our younger players. Chat groups such as Trade and Help would have to be regularly monitored to keep the chat on topic. This could be accomplished by giving long time players that have devoted time and money into this game Moderation status and limited powers to enforce guide lines.
Impact
I feel this would have a significantly positive impact on the game as a whole. The main impact would be allowing players to interact in real time between one another. This alone can forge new friendships, alliances and so on. But as well would allow alliances to be far more effective at attacking, defending and overall conquering their world.
Their would be one small negative impact as comes with all chats and that is bashing and flooding. Moderation would limit bashing and allowing a 'Report' feature where you can report select players for language or abuse would eliminate it as long as moderators were swift. Flooding is also an easy moderation by simply banning anyone whom does so from chat.
Ending Comments
I have played MMO's for years and in my experience games with chat have a more stable and larger force of active players then ones that don't. It allows players something to do In Game when they are bored, nothing to do or have a problem. I feel that this is something the game truly needs and that all will benefit from it.
The Idea
A simple box in the lower right hand side of the screen while in game that allows you to chat with other players of the current world you are in.
The Chat Groups
I believe just having one general chat would be foolish, it would be constantly flustered by hundreds of members and be difficult to keep up. Thus we break it down into 3 to 5 tabs at the top of the box that you can click on to interact with select groups of players. Example follows.
World Chat: Anything you type will be seen by ALL players within the world you are in.
Ocean Chat: (optional) Anything you type will be seen by ALL players within the selected Ocean you are currently in.
Alliance Chat: Anything you type is seen by ALL players in the same alliance as you.
Trade Chat: (optional) This allows for the trading of resources between players only and should be regulated as such.
Help Chat: (optional) If you have an In Game question or are stuck or are simply new to the game and want some one on one help this would be the place to ask. And would also be regulated to only help related chat.
Friend Chat: (optional) This allows you to compile a list of players that are your friends in game and allows you to chat with one specific friend at a time (or possibly have a system where several can all join one session).
Moderation
This system would have to be monitored. Certain curse words would have to be censored for our younger players. Chat groups such as Trade and Help would have to be regularly monitored to keep the chat on topic. This could be accomplished by giving long time players that have devoted time and money into this game Moderation status and limited powers to enforce guide lines.
Impact
I feel this would have a significantly positive impact on the game as a whole. The main impact would be allowing players to interact in real time between one another. This alone can forge new friendships, alliances and so on. But as well would allow alliances to be far more effective at attacking, defending and overall conquering their world.
Their would be one small negative impact as comes with all chats and that is bashing and flooding. Moderation would limit bashing and allowing a 'Report' feature where you can report select players for language or abuse would eliminate it as long as moderators were swift. Flooding is also an easy moderation by simply banning anyone whom does so from chat.
Ending Comments
I have played MMO's for years and in my experience games with chat have a more stable and larger force of active players then ones that don't. It allows players something to do In Game when they are bored, nothing to do or have a problem. I feel that this is something the game truly needs and that all will benefit from it.
Proposal: To have a chat that is permanently on, while you are online in Grepolis.
Reason: I run a large alliance in Ephesus, and currently I find that while players are very active in the Forums, they are neglecting the chat function. I believe that the chat function should be put forward to being a more accessible and easy to use function.
Details: A permanent chat box in the bottom left hand corner of the screen (minimized).
The user is automatically logged into chat when they log into Grepolis, and the player will be notified when someone posts in Chat through the current notification system of a little box appearing.
The Chat function will work as it currently does apart from.
1-It being on while the player is playing Grepolis permanently.
2-The player logging into Chat automatically.
3-No log in/log out signatures as they would increase effectiveness of a spy, and spam up chat.
4-Player has ability to sign out of chat whener
5-Ability to turn off notifications without turning off chat
6-Ability to default turn chat off completely
Improvements
I find that this has worked in many other strategy games.
Balance: A few minor changes to the current chat system
Abuse: Increasing spying efficiency
Minor Problem: May slow down Grepolis slightly, however user will have the option to log out of chat whenever they please.
Reason: I run a large alliance in Ephesus, and currently I find that while players are very active in the Forums, they are neglecting the chat function. I believe that the chat function should be put forward to being a more accessible and easy to use function.
Details: A permanent chat box in the bottom left hand corner of the screen (minimized).
The user is automatically logged into chat when they log into Grepolis, and the player will be notified when someone posts in Chat through the current notification system of a little box appearing.
The Chat function will work as it currently does apart from.
1-It being on while the player is playing Grepolis permanently.
2-The player logging into Chat automatically.
3-No log in/log out signatures as they would increase effectiveness of a spy, and spam up chat.
4-Player has ability to sign out of chat whener
5-Ability to turn off notifications without turning off chat
6-Ability to default turn chat off completely
Improvements
I've given my thoughts on the subject already, I'd be in favor of it if the in-game chat supports anonymity by removing time-stamps for appearances and posts in chat.
A nice idea. I think that the chat should be opened and notifications should be active by default in order to get new players to communicate but one should still be able to switch it off if it is too annoying. Of course the alliance would need to be strict about chat rules if they want it to be effective.
Balance: A few minor changes to the current chat system
Abuse: Increasing spying efficiency
Minor Problem: May slow down Grepolis slightly, however user will have the option to log out of chat whenever they please.
Proposal:To have a "Chat" feature available for each island.
Reason: Beacause sometimes you want to have a talk with your island freinds that aren't in the same alliance as you.
Details: To get a new "Chat" tab on the island overview. This costs zero (0) gold to use. Each island has to ave 4+ 800 point players to be able to use this.
Visual Aids:None
Balance/Abuse Prevention: The highest point player on that island is a "Moderator", who can't delete posts, but can flag as spam. All players can "report" posts.
All opinions are welcome.
Reason: Beacause sometimes you want to have a talk with your island freinds that aren't in the same alliance as you.
Details: To get a new "Chat" tab on the island overview. This costs zero (0) gold to use. Each island has to ave 4+ 800 point players to be able to use this.
Visual Aids:None
Balance/Abuse Prevention: The highest point player on that island is a "Moderator", who can't delete posts, but can flag as spam. All players can "report" posts.
All opinions are welcome.
Proposal: As nobody knows, there is actually a chat system in the game. Well, nobody uses it as it's buggy and doesn't really do that well of a job. I remember back in the old days when people created chat rooms like chatzy and used that and kept asking inno for an in-game chat, and nobody uses it. I'm proposing and improved version of the chat.
Reason: This is not a neccessary improvement, but it will encourage other players to actually use the in game chat more and make people more aware of it. It also doesn't require any downloads like skype. This will make life easier for players because; it let's us communicate with our allies; our islands; and people from all over the world. Also some bug fixes.
Details: I am proposing a few ideas, mainly which I got from the other Inno game The West (maybe have their devs help with the coding for it? ), and suggesting some bug fixes. If you currently use the chat you will notice that every time somebody posts something you phyically have to scroll down to read it, if they can auto scroll down whenever somebody posts that would be nice. Now for the ideas. I think that there should be multiple chats, an island chat, an alliance chat, a general chat, and a "whisper" system. What I think it should be is first you click on the chat button, then there are 3 different options, you can enter island chat which is what you will be speaking in, then if you click on alliance chat or general chat you will switch chat rooms except when you switch back you keep your history. Now the island chat should depend on what city you are currently overviewing and what island that is on, and it could be bugging switching cities while in island chat so I if this is passed I suggest not doing that. Alliance chat is just a chat with everyone from your alliance. I am thinking though that the leaders and founders should be given a right, chat rights or something along those lines. It's where they can set a topic for the chat so at the top of the chat screen it may say Op On bobdude678 today, check forum for more details And general chat is everyone from all over the world, for example everyone from rizina. Except, there are mutliple general chats and you are assigned one each time you log in, and there will be only around 100 people in each general chat so it doesn't get too overcrowded. Now the whisper system. I'm thinking all TW here basically, but say you want to whisper bobdude678. If you are a player recieveing the whisper, you will get a little beep similar to facebook and their name will pop up in your chat room under your chat rooms, you'll have to click on their name to enter the private convo. You will have to type in the current chat room you are in, and type this /whisper bobdude678: hey and then press enter. By doing this your current chat will switch to a private chat conversation with this player and will be added to the list of chats along with island alliance and general. Also I'd like to propose the addition of smilies to the ingame chat, like the smilies in the forum except you can do them in chat do by typing the same thing. Along with the addition of making reports able to show up in the chat along with all other bb codes.
Visual Aids:View attachment 8502This right here is what a chat room in TW looks like.
View attachment 8503 Here is a rough sketch with my crappy artistic skills in MS Paint, but you have the different chat rooms on the left and you can alternate through them by clicking on each name of the chat.
Balance/Abuse Prevention: This idea doesn't create any new ways to cheat. It does however create more opprutunites for others to insult each other and make threats. But this is already against the rules of grepolis and is breaking rule #3 so all you would have to do is send in a ticket and they're gone.
I spent some time thinking about this and how I was going to present it and I know it may be hard to code if it passes but a lot of the fundementals of it are from TW so if the coding are similar and I mentioned before they could just stop by the office lol.
ro:
Reason: This is not a neccessary improvement, but it will encourage other players to actually use the in game chat more and make people more aware of it. It also doesn't require any downloads like skype. This will make life easier for players because; it let's us communicate with our allies; our islands; and people from all over the world. Also some bug fixes.
Details: I am proposing a few ideas, mainly which I got from the other Inno game The West (maybe have their devs help with the coding for it? ), and suggesting some bug fixes. If you currently use the chat you will notice that every time somebody posts something you phyically have to scroll down to read it, if they can auto scroll down whenever somebody posts that would be nice. Now for the ideas. I think that there should be multiple chats, an island chat, an alliance chat, a general chat, and a "whisper" system. What I think it should be is first you click on the chat button, then there are 3 different options, you can enter island chat which is what you will be speaking in, then if you click on alliance chat or general chat you will switch chat rooms except when you switch back you keep your history. Now the island chat should depend on what city you are currently overviewing and what island that is on, and it could be bugging switching cities while in island chat so I if this is passed I suggest not doing that. Alliance chat is just a chat with everyone from your alliance. I am thinking though that the leaders and founders should be given a right, chat rights or something along those lines. It's where they can set a topic for the chat so at the top of the chat screen it may say Op On bobdude678 today, check forum for more details And general chat is everyone from all over the world, for example everyone from rizina. Except, there are mutliple general chats and you are assigned one each time you log in, and there will be only around 100 people in each general chat so it doesn't get too overcrowded. Now the whisper system. I'm thinking all TW here basically, but say you want to whisper bobdude678. If you are a player recieveing the whisper, you will get a little beep similar to facebook and their name will pop up in your chat room under your chat rooms, you'll have to click on their name to enter the private convo. You will have to type in the current chat room you are in, and type this /whisper bobdude678: hey and then press enter. By doing this your current chat will switch to a private chat conversation with this player and will be added to the list of chats along with island alliance and general. Also I'd like to propose the addition of smilies to the ingame chat, like the smilies in the forum except you can do them in chat do by typing the same thing. Along with the addition of making reports able to show up in the chat along with all other bb codes.
Visual Aids:View attachment 8502This right here is what a chat room in TW looks like.
View attachment 8503 Here is a rough sketch with my crappy artistic skills in MS Paint, but you have the different chat rooms on the left and you can alternate through them by clicking on each name of the chat.
Balance/Abuse Prevention: This idea doesn't create any new ways to cheat. It does however create more opprutunites for others to insult each other and make threats. But this is already against the rules of grepolis and is breaking rule #3 so all you would have to do is send in a ticket and they're gone.
I spent some time thinking about this and how I was going to present it and I know it may be hard to code if it passes but a lot of the fundementals of it are from TW so if the coding are similar and I mentioned before they could just stop by the office lol.
ro:
We will start all over on discussion of the chat systems as they are all merged into one thread now. Please take the time to comment and tell us what you think.
Last edited by a moderator: