Making it easier to enter biographies

[a strange shadow]

To be honest, playing Armageddon regularly is starting to feel like a part-time job, with homework.

Not only do I have to try and remember to think and feel about my character's real motivations even when involved in fast-paced scenes or when falling asleep at the keyboard, I also need to write up regular updates to clan staff, and now, on top of everything else, I should remember to fill in biography entries. Yet, when I log in, I get caught up in playing and rarely have time to enter the ones I've written. Then, backlog accrues, and tackling that huge project feels like that time when I had a massive final essay due and only a couple days left before I even started the rough draft. It becomes a chore.

How can we make it easier for players to write biographies regularly?

The only solution I can come up with is this: give us a way to enter our biographies while logged out.

Please.

Humbly,
Shadow

[Gimfalisette]

Oh sweet Krath please yes.

I would actually do biographies if we had this. As it is right now, I just can't bring myself to sacrifice time in game. Not to mention the constant string of contact attempts I'd get while doing it.

[Dakurus]

Yay for biographies!

Just for the sake of discussion, what would you imagine?

If you have to access the mud anyway (even if at the account level), you could have just written them earlier in notepad, and cut and paste them.

Or are you suggesting some kind of web account interface?

Or something else altogether?

PS. Just so my other point doesn't get lost. Biographies are great! Both for you, and for us as staff, and maybe we'll be able to do something historically with them, but, IC actions, emotes, thinks, feels, talking, etc are much better for the environment, because they convey it to those watching, even those you don't realize are watching.

[mansa]

Oh sweet Krath please yes.

I would actually do biographies if we had this. As it is right now, I just can't bring myself to sacrifice time in game. Not to mention the constant string of contact attempts I'd get while doing it.

You can type:

Code Select Expand


.x contact templar
.x psi Hold on a minute, I'm taking a very large shit.
.x cease


WHILE in the IG Editor!

[mansa]

Yay for biographies!

Just for the sake of discussion, what would you imagine?

If you have to access the mud anyway (even if at the account level), you could have just written them earlier in notepad, and cut and paste them.

Or are you suggesting some kind of web account interface?

Or something else altogether?

PS. Just so my other point doesn't get lost. Biographies are great! Both for you, and for us as staff, and maybe we'll be able to do something historically with them, but, IC actions, emotes, thinks, feels, talking, etc are much better for the environment, because they convey it to those watching, even those you don't realize are watching.

I like the Web Account Interface that is currently set up to view bios.

[Gimfalisette]

mansa, I would honestly never be able to get my biography entries done. It would be a constant string of me interrupting myself to contact people and tell them I couldn't talk right then.

Writing bios in notepad and then entering them in the game doesn't work for me, for the same reason. I -do- pre-write everything, when I've done it in the past. But it takes large chunks of time for me to input things through the game interface. (I wrote like 8 books when I played my noble, this way. I know how it works, and I HATE it.) It's cumbersome, takes too much time, and I am constantly interrupted.

I want to be able to put my bio entries into a web browser and have the formatting done for me. That's really what I want.

[Melody]

I write bio at least once every week. I sent in update. (so much I feel bad for spamming staffs) I absolutely hate the editor.

A better editor in the game please.

I want to be able to do this in the game:

- delete any lines I want, not just the last one

- add new lines into the middle of the text

- replace any old lines with new lines

[Lizzie]

As long as I can put up a barrier, and hole my character up in a private room, I'm good with bios. But not everyone can do both, let alone either.

Make bio part of the login menu, instead of an in-game mechanic. That would be great.

Also, just as an aside, a thought for Arm2.0 - if ALL editors could provide an echo instead of "OK" every time you hit the enter key, it would save a lot of headaches. I get tired of wanting to make intentional paragraphs, but going over by 1 character and ending up with a line consisting of a single word, with a full line after it...having to .f, and resulting in no paragraphs at all. It's also confusing, to -not- know how to delete the entry you're working on as opposed to a previous entry. I typed out a paragraph and changed my mind and wanted to start over again, and didn't know how to do that. And I couldn't type "help bio" because I was in the middle of the entry, and doing that would have just entered "help bio" into my entry.

So I had to disco from the game, because I didn't know if I needed to -not- save my entry or not, and I really didn't -want- to save the entry. Very confusing. Much less confusing if the editor would spit back what we typed in, each time we hit the enter key, instead of spitting back simply "OK."

[a strange shadow]

Just for the sake of discussion, what would you imagine?

Either an editor that you can enter at account level, or a web interface.

The most important part to me is that I don't have to be playing my character in the gameworld to access the biography menu and editor. I'd like to keep the option of doing so, but would prefer to do any actual entry and editing from the account level, since it not only ruins immersion but frequently gets interrupted by activity going on in the area around my character.

Also, being in the editor prevents psionic messages from coming through.

p.s. Lizzie, you could turn on your client's command echo. It's not the same but it would help.

[Maybe42or54]

I'd prefer a web interface as that would be the easiest to enter it into.

[Lizzie]

Ugh that would be horrible. The client echo doesn't echo back the game's response (that is, the finished line, as the editor would accept it). Plus if I had to interrupt the bio to do what mansa suggested (the .x contact templar) I would end up with a HUGE headache and die the frustration of a hundred thousand Islamaterrorists stuck for eternity in paradise, and all the virgins are old wrinkled crones.

[Winterless]

Yay for biographies!

Just for the sake of discussion, what would you imagine?

If you have to access the mud anyway (even if at the account level), you could have just written them earlier in notepad, and cut and paste them.

Or are you suggesting some kind of web account interface?

Or something else altogether?

PS. Just so my other point doesn't get lost. Biographies are great! Both for you, and for us as staff, and maybe we'll be able to do something historically with them, but, IC actions, emotes, thinks, feels, talking, etc are much better for the environment, because they convey it to those watching, even those you don't realize are watching.

I like the Web Account Interface that is currently set up to view bios.

I like this suggestion... as I am currently logged in right now trying to do bios things happening in the environment make me lose track. Plus, it runs up your days played time by having to be logged in to add them, which I don't feel is right.

Oh and ps, I do the write it in Word and copy/paste thing.

[Troicha]

Yay for biographies!

Just for the sake of discussion, what would you imagine?

If you have to access the mud anyway (even if at the account level), you could have just written them earlier in notepad, and cut and paste them.

Or are you suggesting some kind of web account interface?

Or something else altogether?

PS. Just so my other point doesn't get lost. Biographies are great! Both for you, and for us as staff, and maybe we'll be able to do something historically with them, but, IC actions, emotes, thinks, feels, talking, etc are much better for the environment, because they convey it to those watching, even those you don't realize are watching.

Submission tool option.

Easy to code, easy to use, and it brings bios closer to staff attention.

[Lizzie]

Not everyone can use the request tool Troicha. If it was switched over, I wouldn't -ever- be able to make a bio. Though - having that as an option would be great for people who can use it.

[spawnloser]

Oh sweet Krath please yes.

I would actually do biographies if we had this. As it is right now, I just can't bring myself to sacrifice time in game. Not to mention the constant string of contact attempts I'd get while doing it.

You can type:

Code Select Expand


.x contact templar
.x psi Hold on a minute, I'm taking a very large shit.
.x cease
WHILE in the IG Editor!

Sure, you could... but correct me if I'm wrong, but while you are in the editor, they can contact you but they can't send you any Way messages.

Now, for someone approaching you the traditional way, yes, this is true... only I'm sure you won't be using the Way to respond.

Editted to add: I like the web-interface idea... expand the functionality of the request tool so that it's not just for requests.

[Gimfalisette]

Sure, you could... but correct me if I'm wrong, but while you are in the editor, they can contact you but they can't send you any Way messages.

Correct. The sender gets the "Something is blocking your telepathy." message and the Way does not go through.

[bardbard#4]

I'd like to be able to tack things onto my character besides chunks of text.

Pictures...

Drawings...

Diagrams...

Maps...

MUSIC (ie mp3s...maybe sheet music??)

Videos (i mean who hasn't thought about re-enacting scenes on tape before?)

Haha, I can just see the server space piling up now.

[Only He Stands There]

Bump out of nowhere for the original idea. Please? Please? Thanks.

[Cerelum]

I say make a web-based application that allows you to do it.  This way you don't have to jack around with the IG editor.

J-Rod

[FuSoYa]

I've never done a biography in game but I think if I had the option of doing it through some kind of tool other then my client I would be very interested in doing so.

Brandon

[Rhyden]

I find if you write up your biography on notepad, the width of the average main description, then copy and paste them, you can write up your biography in like 5 seconds.

[Cerelum]

I find if you write up your biography on notepad, the width of the average main description, then copy and paste them, you can write up your biography in like 5 seconds.

I always get the... Your line is too long, trunicated to .... bullshit and get pissed and cancel it

J-Rod

[Belenos]

With the current account structure, I'm not real comfortable with making bio's writable from the web for a number of reasons.  When the new system is on line I'm sure we produce an online tool for bio's.   It's one of those things you'll just have to wait for.

[helix]

Belanos - what about making the editor accessable from the login menu, rather than in-game? Would something like that be more possible?

[mansa]

We're dealing with the same things Immortals have to deal with when they make items and npcs and rooms.

As with the RMBT, I'm sure all these tools will come in time.

[Tomeglow]

I'm all for this, I have it when my bio entries accrue, and then it feels like a giant English term paper than fun.

[Raesanos]

I definitely want to have a web page where you can do stuff like this at some point.

Also, biographies are optional, so I recommend skipping them when you feel like its too much of a chore.  That may go without saying but just wanted to make sure

[Sanvean]

Biographies were put in because people wanted to be able to add to their backgrounds. They don't have to be essays -- if you want to track when something important happened to your character, you can add a brief line, but even so -- as Rae said, they're optional.

Dakurus noted:

Biographies are great! Both for you, and for us as staff, and maybe we'll be able to do something historically with them, but, IC actions, emotes, thinks, feels, talking, etc are much better for the environment, because they convey it to those watching, even those you don't realize are watching.

and that is really on the mark, in my opinion.

[brytta.leofa]

I always get the... Your line is too long, trunicated to ....

Do like this.  Open Notepad, and turn word wrap off (Format -> Word Wrap).  Start your file with a 70-character line; this is to remind you how long your lines ought to be.

_123456789_123456789_123456789_123456789_123456789_123456789_123456789

Then type your text below, pressing "enter" at the end of each line to
manually wrap the lines.  When you're done, go into the bio command and
paste each line separately.  It's still fairly quick to do.

Works well for me.

[Sanvean]

.f on a line by itself at the end will also format your entry nicely for you.

[brytta.leofa]

.f on a line by itself at the end will also format your entry nicely for you.

Nicely, but differently from how I'd 'ave done it. Blank lines are anathema to it.

[Marauder Moe]

.f eats blank lines I think.

.i will format the text, eat the blank lines but put an indentation after each one.

I write my stuff up in notepad, past it into the client 2-3 lines at a time, then use .i and all is good.

[Zoltan]

I typically do the notepad thing, copy and paste. At the end of paragraphs I do the old .i, and then I just push enter in the client to keep the paragraphs seperated. That actually took me a little bit to figure out. I just can't stand seeing a jumble of text in one giant block. I gots t' have my concise paragraphs, man!

And I actually found myself typing a long-ass bio straight into the game late last night, which was a first for me. Wasn't as clunky as I figured it'd be.