I miss quackers!

[Second Breakfast]

I will be opting out when or if the quackers system is introduced. Now, others have said that is fine and the game won’t change for those who do choose to opt out, and that simply isn’t the case.

Consider a conversation between Person A and Person B; they’re whispering to one another, talking about sensitive stuff. Person A has opted out of quackers, Person B is opted in. Person C sees Person B’s quackers above their head, deduces they are whispering to one another, and decides to eavesdrop. Person A has no knowledge that this has happened, or why this has happened, because they opted out.

Now, you could (and they have, when first I posited this scenario on Discord) argue all manner of things. “They shouldn’t have been doing this in the open.” “They should have casted True Seeing!” “Well, they should be emoting that they’re whispering anyway!” Yes, yes, and probably; but these are all actions players do while acting in-character when playing their role.

Quackers are explicitly an OOC indicator; they tell you when the player is typing, and yet Arelith’s playerbase is so afflicted with bleed-through of mechanics into the sphere of roleplay that I guarantee you that for some players, quackers will become synonymous with talking within the first month of this being permanently added. Yet while this is absolutely metagaming, how precisely are DMs going to and supposed to enforce this, especially when evidence is presented that the system was gamed to stall for time in PvP or when the complaint is levied that the assailant didn’t “wait their turn”?

[Chaoshawk]

I did not enjoy the scrutiny from using them and found the abuse for meta gaming to be high. It might be mildly convenient to see if someone is afk but I personally don’t think it is worth it and it is likely to be treated as IC given the indicator shown and how one might react differently when leaving.

I sometimes type out several sentenced only to decide ‘nope’ and begin anew or when the lines dont fit the flow of RP (especially in a large group). I play an egotistical blowhard who loves talking over people so the notion of turns might make sense on one of my more polite ones but as pointed out, it can be used to The advantage of assassins or in PvP and intrigue related situations.

I shall certainly opt out. Last time there was a sense of obligation as some expressed anxiety of those who did not use it.

[Apothys]

I loved quackers, i really miss them. I struggle keeping a steady flow of conversation and tend to space fill if they don't respond as quick as i do. When there was an indicator it set me as ease and i would find it a lot easier to resist the urge to keep talking. It would help me a lot with my RP if it was to come back. I tend to keep talking in real life and switch topics all the time, its a mental health thing and it translate into the game unfortunately and i sometimes look back on the conversation thread and see I'm rambling like an idiot. Either way ill cope, but i do miss Quackers for this reason.

[Turtleduck]

Though a neat feature, I find quackers to be highly immersion breaking and unfitting for a roleplay server. It disrupts the natural flow of interaction for me. I think the feature would be more appropriate for an action, or other OOC server.

[ThisIsNotADrill]

Whereas I found quackers to do quite the opposite because it let me know that someone was in the process of speaking or acting, which in a way is more immersive than them just standing there.

[AstralUniverse]

Quackers are absolutely terrible.

[stoneheart-]

Whereas I found quackers to do quite the opposite because it let me know that someone was in the process of speaking or acting, which in a way is more immersive than them just standing there.

Really, because you've never just ignored anybody or been focused on a task, or spaced out in public?

[chocolatelover]

I also miss quackers. I cannot keep the natural flow going when conversing with someone else who may not type as quickly (thought probably more accurately). It helps me not overwhelm the other player with constant 'chat'.

And once... I did wait around for quite some time until I had to decide that the other player had fallen asleep. (They had)

[Kythana]

Quackers(Typing Indicators) are a mainstay in almost every modern roleplaying format.

They're ultimately extremely useful, and very healthy, even if there is a lot of doom about them.

I also would like them back.

[Richrd]

Quackers are great.

[ReverentBlade]

I dont miss them. Good riddence.

[Arkadia Vaskerkin]

I would say to all those who hate them to just turn them off but. There are some STRONG opinions about the funny dots even if not over our own character's heads. We don't need a server-wide crash out over the dots.

I like them. I hope they come back. If only because it encouraged patience in conversations. But that's just me.

[ReverentBlade]

I was fully happy to turn them off but people will badger you to turn them on again. It was annoying.

[triaddraykin]

I enjoyed them thoroughly.

They provided a status of the player behind the scene, allowing for courtesy to let someone respond to what I already had typed, or if they were waiting for more to respond themselves. There's a favorite player of mine that I know tabs out all the time. The quacker let me know whether they were typing up a response, or were afking. It let me be patient with them, and to catch my attention the moment they were engaged again.

As for all this OOC pressure to turn them on? Simple implementation: Make a quick command that reports quacker demands. Like the -recommend command, send it as a tell, and that lets the staff track who is making these demands, and they can -noquack them. Turn off Quackers for them, like notells, until they can learn to be courteous about them.

[ThisIsNotADrill]

Whereas I found quackers to do quite the opposite because it let me know that someone was in the process of speaking or acting, which in a way is more immersive than them just standing there.

Really, because you've never just ignored anybody or been focused on a task, or spaced out in public?

Not while I was directly engaging someone, no.

[AstralUniverse]

I would say to all those who hate them to just turn them off but. There are some STRONG opinions about the funny dots even if not over our own character's heads. We don't need a server-wide crash out over the dots.

I like them. I hope they come back. If only because it encouraged patience in conversations. But that's just me.

Hell no. To everything you said here.

1. I will not opt out because I do not believe it is really possible to opt out. There are many explanations in this thread on why this is the case. Read them maybe.

2. Those dots are awful and we need a server-wide crash over the dots because they're not opt-out, they are 100% forced on me.

3. They do the very opposite of teaching patience.

As for all this OOC pressure to turn them on? Simple implementation: Make a quick command that reports quacker demands. Like the -recommend command, send it as a tell, and that lets the staff track who is making these demands, and they can -noquack them. Turn off Quackers for them, like notells, until they can learn to be courteous about them.

Not gonna work because the pressure is not coming from people expressing their demand to see you with quackers, it simply educates the masses to react to dots - rather than react to any person regardless of dots. I'm baffled that people still dont understand what the main core issue is, honestly. Please read through this thread and see people's comments about opting in/out.

[Vargrand]

Were the quakers a test? Never understood if the staff wanted to implement them anyway or waiting for feedback.

Mine would be overwhelming positive. Helps those people who have diffuculties to read / write and helps with the flow of conversation. One of the best if not the best tool I have seen in this server for now.

[PowerWord Rage]

Quacker is good if it's limited to just 2, 3 or even 4 people, basically a small group.
But when there're too many players, more than 10 people, the dots becomes pretty jarring.
Especially in a function where we need absolute silence or part silence...you see those dots above the players who whispers, a constant poke even if we do not really choose or want to see it, it's just too jarring.
So yeah, i'll vote no.

[Vargrand]

Now that I think of. There was a scene of my toon just staring in deep silence another toon with clear hostility. Simply moving my toon in place using A and D, as to emote my toon following the other with the eyes / head.

If we had quackers, the other player would surely have understood the intention better since I was not typint anything, just staring. Without quackers he felt a bit confused on the whole scene.

[triaddraykin]

I would say to all those who hate them to just turn them off but. There are some STRONG opinions about the funny dots even if not over our own character's heads. We don't need a server-wide crash out over the dots.

I like them. I hope they come back. If only because it encouraged patience in conversations. But that's just me.

Hell no. To everything you said here.

1. I will not opt out because I do not believe it is really possible to opt out. There are many explanations in this thread on why this is the case. Read them maybe.

2. Those dots are awful and we need a server-wide crash over the dots because they're not opt-out, they are 100% forced on me.

3. They do the very opposite of teaching patience.

As for all this OOC pressure to turn them on? Simple implementation: Make a quick command that reports quacker demands. Like the -recommend command, send it as a tell, and that lets the staff track who is making these demands, and they can -noquack them. Turn off Quackers for them, like notells, until they can learn to be courteous about them.

Not gonna work because the pressure is not coming from people expressing their demand to see you with quackers, it simply educates the masses to react to dots - rather than react to any person regardless of dots. I'm baffled that people still dont understand what the main core issue is, honestly. Please read through this thread and see people's comments about opting in/out.

Which particular core issue did I miss? There's like five, and I thought they'd been addressed by others.

[Coolguy McMagic]

I think the upside of Quackers outweight the potential downsides. Opt in/out should be handled client-side only ideally. That stops potential problems of expectations and demands while allowing players to hide them if they don't want to see them.

Whispers can be adressed by making whispered quackers only visible to those in whispering range. If I recall correctly, that was already the plan before.

I don't think quackers enable additional meta-gaming. Someone engaging in bad faith PVP can do so easily without any further mechanical assistance. I actually believe quackers do the opposite - they facilitate fair PVP between players that actually WANT to engage in fair PVP by signaling when someone is actually trying to type a response or not.

[Darkstorn42]

I really miss Quakers. It really helped me stay focused with my ADHD brain jumping all over the place. Just knowing the human on the other side was actually there helped me stay engaged and not jump from topic to topic.

[AskRyze]

I miss not having to worry about people walking away from me while I'm being long-winded.

I miss not having to worry about people walking away when I try to roleplay in a dungeon.

[AstralUniverse]

Which particular core issue did I miss? There's like five, and I thought they'd been addressed by others.

Quite a few posts to read which ilustrate exactly what players did not like at all about them.
This is my favorite in this thread, but there were other older threads too.

I -hate- the mindset that comes with them, that even if optional you had to use them.
I -hate- the playstyle of speaking turns that it facilitated.
I -hate- the anxiety it brings of people knowing you're typing and judging you on length of time to content ratio, even if people don't the anxiety is telling you that they are.
I -hate- the immersion breaking dots so much.

... Just SO spot on. Especially the part with the time:content ratio. A bit dark stuff but I couldnt word it better myself.

[perseid]

Which particular core issue did I miss? There's like five, and I thought they'd been addressed by others.

Quite a few posts to read which ilustrate exactly what players did not like at all about them.
This is my favorite in this thread, but there were other older threads too.

I -hate- the mindset that comes with them, that even if optional you had to use them.
I -hate- the playstyle of speaking turns that it facilitated.
I -hate- the anxiety it brings of people knowing you're typing and judging you on length of time to content ratio, even if people don't the anxiety is telling you that they are.
I -hate- the immersion breaking dots so much.

... Just SO spot on. Especially the part with the time:content ratio. A bit dark stuff but I couldnt word it better myself.

All of this and so much more