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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So the first question that pops in my mind here is..."Why?" Why do this? This is already available by checking each other out in-game (which I liken to dogs sniffing each other's butts, by the way). How is this going to improve my enjoyment of the game?
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Why? Because to be selfish it is incredibly useful for me. I have over 50+ characters spread across 6 servers. Something like this would be a great tool for me to check my characters out. In addition having your slotting and what is slotted available right there on the web page. That is simply wow, a fantastically useful tool.
See I often read the boards and post from work while doing things like reimaging and other tasks the require some but not all of my attention. Ocasionally I might even be happy to go over my characters planning what I want to do or what I need to build. At this point I keep it all in a text file on my old computer but that isn't available to me at work. Some people keep large speadsheets of this info, so having it easily called up is fantastic.
And Frankly I don't see my builds as somethign super secret. For that matter builds aren't super secret in PvP the only place it matters. I gurrentee you I would keep a spotter logged in on the other side so I could pull up info data on someone if I wanted it. Not hard to do.
But it's MY sadistic mechanical monster and I'm here to make sure it knows it. - Girl Genius
List of Invention Guides
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So many people against this, I'm wondering what you all are hiding 
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I have no clue, the best I can figure is that people are afraid others will point and laugh at their build. That seems silly considering the number of builds I see posted on the boards.
But it's MY sadistic mechanical monster and I'm here to make sure it knows it. - Girl Genius
List of Invention Guides
Pure speculation on how they MIGHT bring these tools to the forefront.
I believe that COH is controlled by a series of databases and xml-like sources that explains what is going on to the client-side of the game.
With that said; I believe they'll be using some form of AJAX/XML linkage from their data-source to the site, only because it's traversable one way and extremely secure.
Regardless of what methods they might use, I'm sure I and a few others will be quick to make a script that links such information to your SG's site on a 'every hour' basis using most web-sites' Cron-Job and/or server-time functions.
I was actually in the works of re-writing one of the sources to one of those background tracking alternatives, but it was resource hungry and the "scanner" (device that scanned the channels for DMG, frags, heal count, etc,...) had to be updated almost every time there was a new patch release.
Anyways, I've been looking forward to this since they became visible in issue 9! It should revolutionize the COH Community!
Can't wait!
Next;
~text-based chatting client that lets you speak in the game to certain channels without needing the game open.
~Possible VoIP capabilities...? make sure you tell everyone FAR in advance if you guys intend doing this one 
... a lot of people have paid full year(s) for a talk server... and I worry about server lag if/when this ever becomes an doable idea.
YA RIGHT, these last two things will never happen ;D! (Lets see if reverse psychology will work this time... crap, can they hear my thoughts... what the hell... why I am I writing this down... oops)
~Steiner
Titan Network
(Co-Owner & Lead Mids' Developer)
Looking for an easy PHP COH/V server status script? Check This Out!
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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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I just want to make a short comment on this.
Why can't the DEFAULT setting be set to private?
This way folks who would like to make their character info available can enable the web settings to their liking.
Why must the DEFAULT setting be to display your info?
I find that folks, especially new players, are overwhelmed with game settings etc, and to have their info posted without their approval simply because of being overwhelmed with the game's learning curve seems a tad much.
Also, even for those more experienced players, sometimes you make a new character and simply FORGET to toggle some settings on or off. I often spend weeks after creating a new character tweaking settings that I often forget to set when I first enter outbreak becuase I have so many QoL preferences that I change to make the game more enjoyable for me.
I would hate to think that now I have to constantly think about wether my info is set private or not on my many alts. I would rather just be content knowing that everything is private unless I make an active conscious choice to make it public.
This reminds me of the ruckus that the recipe drop caused back when everyone in the team would get notified of who recieved what recipe/salvage drop. That was changed back then because people wanted their privacy, I see this as a similar issue.
"All that crap is grey to me, no XP." - Positron 5/15/05 8:36am . . . The world stopped and silence ensued except for the sound of a crying infant off in the distance.
"Everyone needs to chill the hell out." - BackAlleyBrawler 11/13/08 3:26pm . . . Geeks around the world stopped and blinked.
I would like to suggest two things.
1. Don't show friends list.
2. Please, can we have this information also available as a web service so Super Groups with web sites can consume this information and use them on their own web site. I would like to create web pages for our members that just feeds off this information to keep the pages up to date.
Thanks
wow. 5 long pages of junk. Those options have been there for as long as I can remember. I've always wanted some "out-of-game" character management tools; maybe they're finally getting around to it.
No longer will we need to log in every toon to see who needs that Taskforce/Strikeforce. Sweet.
Now, if they could only detail certain badges (did I do Bobcat? or do I still need Malaise?), that'd be sweet.
I'm very hopful for this "addition"
-r0y
"Look how many pages of crap are in this thread already!" -r0y to all threads on these forums.
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So many people against this, I'm wondering what you all are hiding
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I have no clue, the best I can figure is that people are afraid others will point and laugh at their build. That seems silly considering the number of builds I see posted on the boards.
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I for one don't post my builds on the boards.
Because people would point and laugh at them. 
I do agree that the default should be unhidden, so that the feature gets used. My characters will be hidden at first, but I'll probably trickle them into unhidden status, after I see what the web pages are like.
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Why can't the DEFAULT setting be set to private?
This way folks who would like to make their character info available can enable the web settings to their liking.
Why must the DEFAULT setting be to display your info?
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I dare not speak on the Devs behalf, but I'm pretty sure the default was set to ENABLE these settings to see if their script (which is probably in development stages) can handle the overhead of a 100,000+ users retrieving information at one time.
It's a process that most code needs to pass through. Obviously the creation of 10 or 20 fake accounts to test it would be just as good, but not on a long-term scale.
I believe they needed to see if their servers could handle that kind of resource.
It obviously not public yet, but they wouldn't announce its launch unless it was being tested behind the scenes.
~Steiner
Titan Network
(Co-Owner & Lead Mids' Developer)
Looking for an easy PHP COH/V server status script? Check This Out!
Incredibly useful - as long as I have a way to link to the information on other sites. I keep a list of my characters on Guildcafe, and I've been irritated that I can't populate hero/villain information like the WoW and Guildwars folks can.
I like having the friends list available too - as long as it hotlinks to those hero profiles. A great way for me to easily view my friends and see what they're up to.
Now we just need a similar tool for accessing/viewing SG information.
I'll just re-state what I'd like to have as an option for this, since there are so many people who are unwilling to accept that some people don't like the proposed implementation:
Go ahead and enable all the options--excepting the friends list--but give us a global option to hide all of the characters on an account so we can completely ignore the built-in game system and stick with the player-designed tracking sites.
Also, give us the option to keep any and all of our own characters off of other players' friends lists.
| Issue 9 Fly poses | IO's and ED
| Cycling the Combat Monitor | Load Macros from a Text File |
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Why? Because to be selfish it is incredibly useful for me. I have over 50+ characters spread across 6 servers. Something like this would be a great tool for me to check my characters out. In addition having your slotting and what is slotted available right there on the web page. That is simply wow, a fantastically useful tool.
See I often read the boards and post from work while doing things like reimaging and other tasks the require some but not all of my attention. Ocasionally I might even be happy to go over my characters planning what I want to do or what I need to build. At this point I keep it all in a text file on my old computer but that isn't available to me at work. Some people keep large speadsheets of this info, so having it easily called up is fantastic.
And Frankly I don't see my builds as somethign super secret. For that matter builds aren't super secret in PvP the only place it matters. I gurrentee you I would keep a spotter logged in on the other side so I could pull up info data on someone if I wanted it. Not hard to do.
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You'll recall that I have nothing against the option in and of itself. My objection was that it would automatically be "On."
And it's not so much that my builds for my toons are "super-secret" as they're none of anyone else's business. Simple fact. If I want someone's opinion of my SO's, IO's or whatever, I'll ask. If they require I turn on the stats, I will for a short period. Once they're done, I'll turn them off again.
Setting those options for each alt is an added chore that we didn't have before but it's fine since we got advance warning.
However, if something useful does come out of this such as others have mentioned of a web page players can use to look up their own characters for a convenient single point of reference, i'm afraid the binary nature of those settings seems discrimatory to the privacy conscious. If someone wants their privacy yet still wants a web page reference only for their own characters, then they seem out of luck or depend on third party sites/software.
Any way to add options like: Show <setting> - Disabled, Private (viewable by player owner only), Public (viewable by all)
Perhaps default setting to Private then would be fine to all. Everyone will still be using the new feature by default while still remaining, at first, private.
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Go ahead and enable all the options--excepting the friends list--but give us a global option to hide all of the characters on an account so we can completely ignore the built-in game system and stick with the player-designed tracking sites.
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I agree. I am very excited about this system, and even hope that there might be some way for fan pages and applications to consume this information. But there needs to be a way for people to easily opt out of this service.
I suggest that each setting be giving three options: Enabled, Disabled, and Use Global Settings. The default value of all options should be Use Global Settings.
There should then be global options created that mirror the character-specific ones, allowing players to set their preferences across all characters. I would guess most people would want the same visibility settings applied to all or most characters, so that would solve 99% of the cases. And for the others, they would only need to configure the settings for the specific characters that they wanted different than the global settings.
Just where exactly is all this info going to show up, and what for? I know about the Cityinfoterminal/Badgehunter like sites where you sign up and can put in your character info and whatnot, but how is this all going to work? Could someone go into further detail about these features?
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Just where exactly is all this info going to show up, and what for? I know about the Cityinfoterminal/Badgehunter like sites where you sign up and can put in your character info and whatnot, but how is this all going to work? Could someone go into further detail about these features?
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We have not been given specifics, but I assume it will be a web site maintained only by NC Soft. Whether they will allow the player-run sites to be able to access this information using this feature is unknown.
| Issue 9 Fly poses | IO's and ED
| Cycling the Combat Monitor | Load Macros from a Text File |
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It's not just character stats that some don't want displayed. What I'd like is a way to not have anything at all about my characters displayed, no names, pics, nothing. Hopefully that is what you mean by 'not have any information displayed.'
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From a PvP perspective though, I certainly would not want people's builds unless they were from our own SG or volunteered...more information means an edge...
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/signed
one question: I've disabled to show friend list. A friend of mine wants to show his own friends. Will I appear on his web page?
<AR>
Hmm, ok I can agree to default friends list off default everything else on. That mix of settings would make sense. Additionally I wouldn't object to the wording of the settings being cleaner.
But I do prefer the web settings defaulting to the show mode aside from friends.
But it's MY sadistic mechanical monster and I'm here to make sure it knows it. - Girl Genius
List of Invention Guides
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You'll recall that I have nothing against the option in and of itself. My objection was that it would automatically be "On."
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QFT
The default of this should be OFF. ever since word of this upcoming feature activation was announced I've been setting all my toons to not show anything on the webpage until all the specifics are known.
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And it's not so much that my builds for my toons are "super-secret" as they're none of anyone else's business. Simple fact.
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QFT and QFE Of late there have been one or two....people...(for lack of not being able to use a stronger term onthe boards), on the server I play on that seem have to gotten it into their heads that they have some divine right to demand to know the builds of all they team with and to demand players respec on the spot into something else if the build doesnt meet their precious standards.
A person's build in terms of power choice and slotting of IO's is their own business first and foremost. having it auto-displayed on the upcoming website just doesnt seem like an overall good thing. While some people will use it to track their toons and plan out adjustments, I see man PvP'ers using this to scope out the competition and to be ready for em.
Also the question about the friends list being displayed needs to be addressed. If i set to not display my friend list or any other data for that matter, btu a friend of mine sets theirs to display on the site, is my toon then displayed or will my name simply just appear on their list?
No, the default should be ON, the system will likely fail otherwise. The devs are already giving you the option to opt-out. Use that option and let the system be used by the rest of the players without crippling it from the start.
Also, the solution to people demanding to know your builds is to not team with them. Simple, effective. If they continue to be annoying, /ignore them.
I don't care if someone can see my powers or build, it's just a video game. I don't think it was necessary to hide builds in PvP zones, either, but the devs have apparently detected that the CoH playerbase is unusually concerned over the privacy of their video game characters. So be it.
But defaulting everything on these new pages to OFF is taking that too far and impacting the quality of the entire system as proposed.
The default setting needs to be on.
90% of the players DO NOT read the forums and thus have no idea what's going on here. Many of that 90% don't bother to read the MotD either.
So if the default setting is off then something like 80% - 90% of the characters won't ever show up on the site. What would be the point behind even having the site to begin with?
And I'm still not getting it, really hoping someone will explain it to me in small words. What is the freak out about? ZOMG!!! Someone will see my character online!?!?!?! Oz Noez!! Ahhhhhh...
Yeah, just not understanding the fear... maybe I'm just too stupid to get it. Or maybe it's just that nothing on the internet scares me. I'm a bit older than most people on the net I think, so if it doesn't involve 10 guys with machineguns knocking on my door in the middle of the night I just have a real hard time working up any fear. My generation is kinda funny that way I guess.
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The default setting needs to be on.
90% of the players DO NOT read the forums and thus have no idea what's going on here. Many of that 90% don't bother to read the MotD either.
So if the default setting is off then something like 80% - 90% of the characters won't ever show up on the site. What would be the point behind even having the site to begin with?
And I'm still not getting it, really hoping someone will explain it to me in small words. What is the freak out about? ZOMG!!! Someone will see my character online!?!?!?! Oz Noez!! Ahhhhhh...
Yeah, just not understanding the fear... maybe I'm just too stupid to get it. Or maybe it's just that nothing on the internet scares me. I'm a bit older than most people on the net I think, so if it doesn't involve 10 guys with machineguns knocking on my door in the middle of the night I just have a real hard time working up any fear. My generation is kinda funny that way I guess.
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Agreed.
Small Worded Summary: People on the game fear that their "perfect" build will be at public view. Sadly oh well.
/end of small worded summary
Truth is, the best builds can't be replicated... very few people are going to bust their... butts to buy/obtain every IO that build might have.
And if your perfect build doesn't use IOs than you have nothing to fear. The people low enough to steal your build and not experiment on their own time via test server will likely have no means in obtaining such information, based of their lack of intelligence to have to ask someone else for a build idea.
Stop worrying! They devs haven't even told us what will be on there or not, just a general sections!
ALSO, ALL/MOST web-based scripts will disable certain information on the actual site side script.
Which means; you will have more specific settings via the www.cityofheroes.com site versus the game...
BELIEVE ME! If the devs are a FOURTH as intelligent as they have convince us (or at least I) they are; there is no chance of "valuable" information being made public without warnings (such as this topic) and a time-window to make sure people take the correct precautions in safe-guarding such valuable info like a build or what people you talk to.
Take what you're given people and be happy such a service was made. This is one of the few MMORPGs where the devs care more about the players than the game.
P.S.
Who cares who's on your friend list, if you have something to hide on a video game, you need to find another pastime!
~Steiner
Titan Network
(Co-Owner & Lead Mids' Developer)
Looking for an easy PHP COH/V server status script? Check This Out!
This new website seems interesting and I am glad we can hide what we want not that I have anything to hide 
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The default setting needs to be on.
90% of the players DO NOT read the forums and thus have no idea what's going on here. Many of that 90% don't bother to read the MotD either.
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And that's why it needs to be OFF.
I, for one, do not intend to participate, at least not at the outset. I don't see the point of this. Certainly it makes no sense at all from an RP perspective.
I don't like having my friends lists available, either. With all respect, I still don't see how it would keep my friends from getting spammed. I *really* don't want to expose that number of people to that kind of harassment. I mean, they are *friends*, after all, and some are really getting annoyed with the spam. I'd like to keep them playing.
I also don't see why it's anyone's business how my characters are slotted or what powers I've taken, or even how that would help anyone. You can't get a sense of how well someone plays simply based on the powers they've taken. I've read of some powers which people think completely stink -- and yet I have seen others use them very effectively and very well. It's all about the types of situations in which one plays a particular character.
Give people the information and let them choose to participate. If it's really great and it catches on, people will choose to do so. Who knows, if it proves to be secure enough and there's a decent reason to use it, maybe I will, too. I'm not ruling out the possibility this could be ubercool.
But please, allow people to make the choice to participate rather than drafting them and forcing them to do so.
Leave the saving of the world to the men? I don't think so! -Elastigirl
The SOLUS Foundation - http://www.solusfoundation.com
A Liberty-based bastion, seven years strong.
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The default setting needs to be on.
90% of the players DO NOT read the forums and thus have no idea what's going on here. Many of that 90% don't bother to read the MotD either.
So if the default setting is off then something like 80% - 90% of the characters won't ever show up on the site. What would be the point behind even having the site to begin with?
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I think we can safely assume that people that know about the web site will know about the options to enable their characters to be visible. At the very least, they will ask questions about how to do such a thing.
Thus, if 80% - 90% of the characters don't ever show up, then that means either most people don't know the site exists or most people don't want their information seen. If most people don't want their information seen, then NCSoft should honor their wishes by not showing that information. And if most people don't know the site exists, then that makes it even less useful than not having 80% - 90% of the characters not showing up. So I would imagine NCSoft would spend a lot of effort to promote such a site, and thus make people aware of the options to make their characters visible on it.
Nonetheless, even if only 10% - 20% of the player population utilized the site, the characters that they would care about seeing would be their and their friends' characters. And given that those that used the site would likely communicate to their friends about it, I would highly doubt they would miss the 80% - 90% of the characters that didn't show up.
So the default should be off because those that don't know about the site might not know their information was made public. However, those that know about the site will at least be aware that the options exist, if not know exactly how to enable them.
So many people against this, I'm wondering what you all are hiding
Adjusting this with current toons won't be hard, and any new toons you should remember to change it when you to go turn the Profanity filter off and see it there.
I honestly wonder if some people just complain for the sake of complaining. Everyone has something they like and don't like about the game, not every part of it is for everyone. This little tidbit, not even related to game play, is coming free of charge to us.
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