Discussion: Configuring Your In-Game Web Options
By
After_Shock,
Posted on: 2007-11-20 11:30 in News, Events and Announcement Discussion
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if this is going to be something that reflects our stats on the website, I am against something like this as it just gives the RMT spammers something to work with especially if it is a friends list. I would feel horrible to subject friends to that spamming because I didnt click an option. If it strictly an in game thing then make the friends list non-viewable by default.
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We don't believe this will make it any easier for spammers to reach you.
Additionally, we are aware of the situation with in-game email spam and working to address the problem in a future version of the game.
[/ QUOTE ]Can you elaborate on this some because putting a giant list of all the names they could possibly spam all in one space seems like it will make it easier for them to spam us to me. If you can go into details as to what is going to be done in the future version of the game on that aspect I would feel more confortable about it, until then I am very skeptical because /ignore_spammer has not done jack for me as i am getting the same emails daily, RMT tells and it is even on toons I have not logged in for weeks at a time.
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If I can:
1) Spammers already use dataminers in-game to collect user data. These use both the /find tools- which don't locate "hidden" characters and data-skimmers that hang out at choke points (ferries on CoV) that do catch hidden players. In short, they already have a rather comprehensive list, and it's populated rather quickly through in-game means.
2) It would be much easier to identify and block a spammerbot regularly spidering through an HTML-based character site picking up new names. Web server log analyzers are out there with features that detect this for similar things- like a competitor botting through your product list to automarkdown his own.
3) Our "mail" service is largely an in-game custom tool. I'm not suggesting this is in the works but a "next-gen" game mail could be based on real e-mail engines, and thus be compatible with spam protection software available to most ISP's. Heck, it could even offer a webmail portal to let you check your mail out-of-game.
4) Spammers and Antispammers are in a continuing arms race- and one that's tough on the antispammers because blocking ONE legitimate mail is bad. It will likely be a continuous measure/countermeasure game until the cost of doing business is too high for the profits they get from it. It'd be quite a bit easier to reach that threshold if players stopped buying the crap.
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I am having a little trouble wrapping my head around this. Will this allow use to view our characters and Bios online?
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It'll let /everyone/, if you opt in, to see things like build (and possibly enhancements), costumes, badges, and, presumably, bios online. This also might cut down on board spam where people cut 'n' paste their current builds from hero planners and instead use a link to their heroes' online info.
If the devs really nail it, the system will also (finally!!!) let people see what their set bonuses add up to without using a spreadsheet or a hero builder.
I, for one, am digging this announcement 
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Sweet! It's hard to sell this game sometimes to folks who haven't played an MMO, but with this, I can show them some of my characters to seal the deal.
"Samual_Tow - Be disappointed all you want, people. You just don't appreciate the miracles that are taking place here."
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I would prefer, if you were to go ahead with this type of option, to have it automatically set so that the information is NOT published on the WWW. Having such a setting set to grant access, as it appears, is a false agreement between NCSoft and myself. I would consider that type of publishing data, without prior consent, an invasion of privacy.
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I don't know if I feel quite so strong about an invasion of privacy, but I would indeed like my characters' privacy to remain intact.
I would much prefer an opt-in system instead of an opt-out one.
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it would actually help if the options we are selecting are actually readable? Most of the lettering is all jumbled together whenever you try to read what those options are.
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The settings/options window is resizable. Grab it by the bottom right corner and you can stretch it out wider and all of it will fit then. The new stretched size even saves for that character.
An easy user fix to that issue.
actually being able to simply forward spam email to the GM's would be a godsend. having to transcribe the contents of the email into a petition is a bit tedious.
oh.. as for the web stats settings... cool, thanks for pointing them out.
"City of Heroes. April 27, 2004 - August 31, 2012. Obliterated not with a weapon of mass destruction, not by an all-powerful supervillain... but by a cold-hearted and cowardly corporate suck-up."
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I would prefer, if you were to go ahead with this type of option, to have it automatically set so that the information is NOT published on the WWW. Having such a setting set to grant access, as it appears, is a false agreement between NCSoft and myself. I would consider that type of publishing data, without prior consent, an invasion of privacy.
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I understand your attitude, but I don't want to dilute the value of the phrase "invasion of privacy."
I think all the data they're displaying is already available to others in-game, which is not a "private place." Information placed in public that's already available to the public isn't really much of an "invasion."
Perhaps I just hold that term to a higher regard, though.
No, I think that was the point.
"Samual_Tow - Be disappointed all you want, people. You just don't appreciate the miracles that are taking place here."
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I would prefer, if you were to go ahead with this type of option, to have it automatically set so that the information is NOT published on the WWW. Having such a setting set to grant access, as it appears, is a false agreement between NCSoft and myself. I would consider that type of publishing data, without prior consent, an invasion of privacy.
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They can easily change the EULA that appears when you launch the game to include this functionality.
@Sunstroke
The Pillars of Might: http://pillarsofmight.guildportal.com
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... but I would indeed like my characters' privacy to remain intact.
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If you do not wish to have your character information available in the future, please make use of the above described settings. This is why we are giving advance notification.
Please keep in mind that these settings are on a per-character basis. Also, know that characters who haven't logged in for over 90 days, such as an alt you haven't played in a while, will not be included.
Lighthouse
Community Relations Manager
If you have a specific in game, account, tech or billing problem please contact our Customer Support team via The Knowledge Base "Ask A Question" page.
I'm all for more toys--especially ones that might entice the foolish non-CoH-playing people to join us.
There are no words for what this community, and the friends I have made here mean to me. Please know that I care for all of you, yes, even you. If you Twitter, I'm MrThan. If you're Unleashed, I'm dumps. I'll try and get registered on the Titan Forums as well. Peace, and thanks for the best nine years anyone could ever ask for.
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I am having a little trouble wrapping my head around this. Will this allow use to view our characters and Bios online?
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If this feature is what I think it is, there's something similar over on the WoW website, that I have always thought would be a neat addition for our community.
The Armory
This is just some random person's character (I don't play WoW or know this person). You can check their stats, rollover their equipment to see it's stats and bonuses, etc. All in all if CoX is getting something like this, I for one think it will be an awesome feature.
Now...to go wash this WoW stench off of me...
Also, is the "sekrit" we were debating about?
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Not to mention you can just right click on them and view "Info".
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Nope, you can't. In any pvp or co-op zone a hero cannot get info on a villain and vice versa. I am only a casual PvP'er and even I know this. Can't recall if they disabled same faction in the arena or not (i.e. hero v hero or villain v villain).
Do not tell PvP'ers what they should "feel" when you apprently aren't one. I say apparently because if you consider yourself a pvp'er and don't know this, well, you're not...
Regarding the other stuff. I would hope there might be some granularity to the "controls." e.g. cityinfoterminal.com tracks your characters and allows you to make things like "inf" not visible.
Last thing you need is beggers having another way to try to beg.
Ahh! Very cool. I approve. Now I to need to wash the WoW stench off.
"Samual_Tow - Be disappointed all you want, people. You just don't appreciate the miracles that are taking place here."
Could this possibly be expanded to include supergroup stats, such as an auto-updating roster viewable offline?
That would be truly awesome!
Shockfront.net - We play together.
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... but I would indeed like my characters' privacy to remain intact.
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If you do not wish to have your character information available in the future, please make use of the above described settings. This is why we are giving advance notification.
Please keep in mind that these settings are on a per-character basis. Also, know that characters who haven't logged in for over 90 days, such as an alt you haven't played in a while, will not be included.
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Will this be just a list of everyone's characters in no particular order or will they be clumped by something like a global account name?
If they are tied together by account I'll probably just have to go ahead and hide half of them like I'm forced to half the time on global now. I have different groups of characters on different servers and I like to keep their "lives" seperate.
Interesting, I'd noticed those settings, but never new what they were for...particularly what I was thinking, 'WHAT web page?'
Are there any plans to include info about the settings and what they'll eventually mean in-game? I don't know what the percentages might be, but I believe the number of players who visit the forums to see this kinda thing is small compared to the total playerbase...so I'm afraid if there wasn't some way for people to find out about all this in-game people aren't going to know about it. Which could cause privacy concerns and so forth.
Early to answer the above perhaps, but if such isn't planned already, I'd like to suggest it--a 'mini-tutorial' or whatever, or at the very least some kind of pop-up that comes up once for every character (and hopefully ONLY once for every character, if that's possible).
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Could this possibly be expanded to include supergroup stats, such as an auto-updating roster viewable offline?
That would be truly awesome!
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I was thinking that as well. Having the name of which supergroup a character belongs to as part of what can be displayed along with powers, badges, etc. would be nice.
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... but I would indeed like my characters' privacy to remain intact.
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If you do not wish to have your character information available in the future, please make use of the above described settings. This is why we are giving advance notification.
Please keep in mind that these settings are on a per-character basis. Also, know that characters who haven't logged in for over 90 days, such as an alt you haven't played in a while, will not be included.
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Will this be just a list of everyone's characters in no particular order or will they be clumped by something like a global account name?
If they are tied together by account I'll probably just have to go ahead and hide half of them like I'm forced to half the time on global now. I have different groups of characters on different servers and I like to keep their "lives" seperate.
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Odds are they're not globally conntected, but as LH has said, he doesn't have any information on specific implementation at this time A good example of this can be seen at the eq2players site, where each character has a profile.
will it show days since logged in?
It would be fantastic to have the web display days since checking Wentworth's. This would make it easier to make sure you check on your sale/bought items before 60 days elapse so you don't lose stuff!
I would much rather all of this info to be disabled by default and only turned on when I turn it on for that toon. Otherwise we will all get spammed I dont see why no one is agreeing with me on this. Things are bad enough due to them taking a very slow approach to the whole spamming issue. All in favor of /ignore_spammer sending electric bolts thru the keyboards say Aye!!
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Legendary Sannin Ninja/Pain Mastermind
Entoxicated Ninja/PSN Mastermind
Ninja Ryukenden Kat/WP Scrapper
Hellish Thoughts Fire/PSI Dominator
Thank You Devs for Merits!!!!
Dear Devs:
Plz add a Nerf-Button option to that web-screen. ...It doesn't actually have to do anything as long as people still *think* it will do something. Then instead of coming -->here<-- to complain about people they fight with in-game, they can just go to that character's page and take out their frustrations. I feel this will cut down nearly 30% of the useless traffic on the main forums .... especially in the PvP, Blaster, Stalkers, and <general>Archetype forum. 
Exciting times.
Good to see something being done with this.
Exciting times. 
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Also, know that characters who haven't logged in for over 90 days, such as an alt you haven't played in a while, will not be included.
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is that like, ever? Or once we log them in after 90 days they get their stats displayed?
Also what about new alts that we make after this feature goes live? will we be able to have a page for them as well?
Can I humbly suggest to the Devs that while you're contemplating these settings to get in touch with the existing, and extensive, tracking sites already out there like Titan Network (City Info Terminal, City Game Tracker, etc)?
It would be a very nice gesture and useful for a lot of people if when you go to make use of these settings you could also allow sites like that to read data that players have made available for the web.
As a QoL item, if you /hide it could it disable whatever settings you might have until you /unhide?
Sometimes, I impress my boss. Sometimes, I impress myself. The rest of the time, I scare people. I can live with that.