Why do you (not) hide from searches?

I hide if I'm busy and won't be accepting invites anyway. If I'm locked in an Ouro TF, or doing marketing or an AE arc, or working on an AE arc, there's no point in making people think I'm available to team, because I'm not. I'm busy, and I don't like turning down polite requests to team (I ignore the "r u lft?" and such entirely, but if it's polite and I don't want to join I'll at least respond) so I just preemptively avoid them. I also tend to hide on Freedom because most invites I get there tend to be of the "r u lft?" variety.

If I'm base editing I hide from everything, since I don't keep my chat window up, I'll miss the tell noise if I have my sound turned off to listen to music, and I don't want my friends to think I'm ignoring them.

The game would be utterly dull and boring if I soloed all time. When I play with different players I see different and new things. (Of course, many of those things can be really silly). I do some teaming with some friends I made in game as well.

Amusingly, I get more tells to join teams when I am soloing a Scrapper or Brute and want to solo. I get very few tells when I am soloing a Character who prefers to team and have the LFT flag on: Defender, Controller, Corruptor, Blaster, Tanker, Mastermind, Dominator, VEAT or HEAT.

Now my stalker gets no tells at all even with LFT flag on. So these days when I do feel like soloing I play my stalker. Who will probably have to solo to 50 even if I want to team.

So yes, I have been tempted to hide whlie playing my scrappers or brutes.

So, are you saying I have to come out of hide to be on your teams, Dechs?

I hide form searches because I still hold on to this antiquated notion that people will use emails in this game to send messages to friends and strangers alike (So, I don't turn any email filters on) and hiding from searches stopped the onslaught I was receiving from the ever-growing list of RMT spammers.

Unfortunately, no one seems to use emails to send messages in game (any more).

Hehe, I don't hide out of some fear of getting tells nor out of some social anxiety nor due to my hatred of humankind (Well, partly not that last one).

I still get tells from random strangers while hiding (Though, not often about PuGs). I never felt like the number of tells I would receive when not hiding was bad (On Virtue).
And, I have no problem telling people "no", so that's not much of an issue for me either.
I just didn't like my names getting put on spam lists.

I think I've hidden once, ever. I like random invites, they lead to great teams sometimes. If I'm doing something else I just say so.

I don't know why people on Virtue don't get invited to teams, I was on at least 3 different teams just last night based on random invites. (I DID have my lft flag up.) And then I joined a SG team to end the evening. ^_^

I only hide from searches when I'm in a PvP zone with my Stalker to be more stalker-y

I hide for various reasons. I have limited play time with frequent stops and starts , I don't want to team with people running sewer runs when I'm lvl 28 or 32 or whatever. This has happened recently. Also I badge hunt and most people don't seem to want to.

I don't hide. I really enjoy teaming.

I like the arbitrary mix one finds on PUGs. It becomes an interesting exercise on how solve a particular problem given the heroes at hand, with the personalities they display. I have rarely run into outright griefers, so it has been fun.

I am on board for more robust team searches, especially a "Team Looking For More" flag. Likewise, if there is a better alternative than Hide for the dedicated soloist, I am all for that as well. Let those who want to team be guided into teams as quickly as possible and those who wish to be left alone be left alone.

I don't hide but there are times when I just prefer to solo. Generally just toggling on Do Not Accept Team Invites is enough to prevent the blind invite. I'd consider accepting a team invite if politely worded, and if I have time.

I've been pleasantly surprised lately that I've been recognized by my forum handle which is also my global name. I've had a lot of players whom I've met on PUGs who tell me they read my posts though they don't actively post on the forums. I'm assuming they like my posts since none of these admissions of recognition has led to me being kicked off of a team yet.

I usually hide because my window for gaming is very short and I don't want to waste my time, or someone else's getting into the "Join my team!" "Sorry, Logging off soon!" "No you're not!" argument again.

The big red NOT ACCEPTING flag usually works as well.

I generally do not hide. I am quite ok teaming up with PUGs, as long as people do not send blind invites and they are not farming.

Thus I typically put a "no blind invites, no farming" in my search text. Also, if I am working on an MA arc I change status to "not looking for team".

This generally has worked well for me.

I hide like Bill Z, because I prefer to solo (and avoid the morons.) I think the reason I don't enjoy teaming (more so than finding those few oh so special people) is that teams go so fast through everything. I like to take my time and immerse myself in the storylines and the ambience of the game. When I'm on a team all I see is the blinding lights of multiple powers going off and floors littered with bodies. What's the rush anyway?

I hide from searches because a significant number of players seem to be unable to understand that "No blind invites, please" in my search comment applies to them.

I don't hide from searches because I don't find being unhidden particuarly bothersome

I don't play tanks or healing defenders so I have nothing to fear in the way of spam invites.

Oh and I love PuGs! Just don't ask me to fill or farm.

I want people to be able to find me.
I run a coalition of 3 SG's so I'm always looking to meet new people.
I'm in several other SG's.
My global list has around 150 people on it.
Using any of the hide functions would hinder that.

The only time I hide is:
- I'm respec'ing.
- I expect to be AFK for more than a minute or two.
- I'm in a PvP zone for a Shivan or Missile.

I rarely /hide, even though I am at least as introverted as others here.

If I'm feeling really, really introverted to the point that I don't want to deal with people, I don't log in - I read a book (with a cat curled up beside me) or I just do some FaceBook games (I'm on FB to see what my circle of acquantainces is up to from reaidng their posts, not to post much myself).

Then, I also play on low-pop servers (of 60+ characters, exactly 2 are on Virtue, low level, and zero are on Freedom, which was too exhausting) so the occasional /tell invite is not a problem, and I can get a team when I wnat one by using the globals.

I concur with Eiko about wishing it was more understood that true introverts find dealing with extroverts an effort most of the time. The funny thing is, I've seen a study or two that show that introversion isn't that much in the minority compared with extroversion - we just don't talk about it

I hide (usually only from searches - I stay unhidden in globals and such) because I'm antisocial, I despise PuGs I don't form myself (or know the leader of), and it lets me contact people on my terms. I rather dislike the "can you give me 10 million inf plz" tells at the Black Market, but if someone asks in local or broadcast if someone could please spot them some inf so they can afford this-or-that I'll usually drop quite a bit of inf on them, with a quickie economics lecture to boot.

I feel guilty every minute I spend taking care of stuff solo (selling, crafting, training, etc), rather than Leading one of my PuGs.

Oddly enough (and modesty aside), I've gotten so good at Leading PuGs that I feel I *owe* it to other players to Form and Lead a kick-*** PuG every time I'm on, to help them level quickly and have a blast in the process.

So, I enjoy the Multi-player aspect of this game too much to Hide. I have stacks n stacks of single-player game DVDs. If I want to "Hide", I close CoH and boot up one of those.

For numerous reasons over the years.

I hid from general searches due to RMTers harvesting the search list for players to send tells to.

I hid from general searches due to the influx of AE babies who had no idea how to play the game.

I hid from SG, Global Friends, Global chat and Server Friends if I have an idea what I want to accomplish that evening, whether it's finishing up a story arc on one of my higher level characters, refurbish a character I hadn't played in a while or starting out a new concept character. I only have a limited time to play some evenings so I simply don't want to be bothered with invites onto servers I'm not currently on or level ranges I'm not currently playing. On nights when I don't have a plan, sure, I unhide from those but still remain hidden on general search.

I also have one other problem. As a dial-up user I simply can't play on medium or large teams due to network bandwidth issues. Duos, trios and sometimes quads are all right but when was the last time you found a team willing to not play at a full eight members? Easier to not be found than join and then quit because the leader keep adding teammates or being forced to explain my situation over and over again.

I don't hide because I rarely experience any of the horror stories told on these boards. In fact, I Pug almost exclusivley as I've got no set SG and they're almost always good teams. Also, I usually take a few seconds when I log on to change my status to "Looking for Any" in case anyone actually uses that.