The psionic beeper

[Cutthroat]

This is a different idea from the one in the Waying offline people thread. It was written somewhat in that thread, but I figured it would be better to move it into its own home, because it is different.

You try to contact an offline person, and it shows you that you failed to find them.

Offline person logs in later, and sees a list of people that tried to contact them, but couldn't since they were offline.

Code Select Expand

The following people tried to contact you:
the tall, muscular man
the short, wiry woman
.
.
.


The only way you would be spammed up and bothered is in the unlikely situation that the number of sdescs exceeded your pagelength.
You still are in the loop about who is trying to find you, and you aren't obligated to respond.
The game would make no distinction between dead characters and logged out ones when you are trying to contact a person. The game will always show the generic failure message to the contacter whether they are trying to contact a dead person or a logged-out one.

Why?
It's unreasonable to assume that when a PC becomes virtual by logging out that they are oblivious to people that are trying to find their minds. We take it as fact that the PC still exists in the virtual world, but when you log out of the game, your PC codedly disappears.
I think that, in the light of all that contact can do, this would generally be beneficial, not a detriment to the contacter and contactee.

[MarshallDFX]

Didn't staff say there were good reasons why you couldn't see who the "foreign presence" that contacted you were?  *looks in ATS*

[Cavaticus]

That's correct. This isn't something that we'd implement.

[Cutthroat]

Oh, okay then.

[daedroug]

What would happen if you combined the two idea, basicly have the whole setting away or available and contacting them but instead of leaving a full message it just left their description when they psi'ed you. You wouldn't get anything if someone contacted you and then ceased before psi'ing. Only thing i don't know is whether or not you'd inform the other person that your not actually there or just let them go and when they didn't hear back then they can assume your not there.

[Cerelum]

You log in and see.

60 2 4311 403

That's a beeper as I remember it, I got that message after I broke up with my ex girlfriend in junior high. lmao

[musashi]

Yeah there are IC reasons why that wouldn't work. That's why I was thinking that you should only see who was contacting you if they sent you a psi message.

[daedroug]

Yeah there are IC reasons why that wouldn't work. That's why I was thinking that you should only see who was contacting you if they sent you a psi message.

Thats what I'm saying minus actually seeing what they sent. The only difference is that instead of getting a ton of messages in one, you just get told that these people where trying to talk to you in the other.

[Lizzie]

I am against anything that would occur to my -character- when I am not logged in to control my character's reaction to it. When I am logged out, my character is unavailable. Period.

[Synthesis]

If they actually sent you a message via the Way, you would know exactly what they looked like.  I think that's the point of the OP.

It's not just "oh, so-and-so contacted you."  If they broke the contact before sending a message, then it wouldn't show up in your "beeper" list.

[daedroug]

If they actually sent you a message via the Way, you would know exactly what they looked like.  I think that's the point of the OP.

It's not just "oh, so-and-so contacted you."  If they broke the contact before sending a message, then it wouldn't show up in your "beeper" list.

my thoughts exactly.

[MarshallDFX]

I am against anything that would occur to my -character- when I am not logged in to control my character's reaction to it. When I am logged out, my character is unavailable. Period.

I am afraid I feel the same way.

[Synthesis]

I am against anything that would occur to my -character- when I am not logged in to control my character's reaction to it. When I am logged out, my character is unavailable. Period.

I am afraid I feel the same way.

Your character ages when you're offline.  Sorry to break it to you.

Additionally, the entire gameworld remains dynamic when you're offline, and countless thousands of things that influence your character in ways small or great continue to occur.  This is essentially an empty argument.

[daedroug]

If anything this gives your character a better chance to react to those things once you are online.

[Myrdryn]

Only if mindbenders could also mindbend you while you're offline.

[daedroug]

Only if mindbenders could also mindbend you while you're offline.

They wouldn't even know what you said, why would you be able to mindbend them.

[Myrdryn]

Only if mindbenders could also mindbend you while you're offline.

They wouldn't even know what you said, why would you be able to mindbend them.

If characters are allowed to get psionic messages, it's only logical that they should also be vulnerable to the whole spectrum of 'the way' (whatever those mysterious things might be).

[AmandaGreathouse]

I'd love that, myself, Myrdryn.

I'm not sure what exactly 'could' be done in the way of mindbending a list of sdescs, but I'm sure it's something interesting. (Well, not sure, but I would guess it is, especially if it draws out commentary before the other thread about offline Waying.)

[daedroug]

Only if mindbenders could also mindbend you while you're offline.

They wouldn't even know what you said, why would you be able to mindbend them.

If characters are allowed to get psionic messages, it's only logical that they should also be vulnerable to the whole spectrum of 'the way' (whatever those mysterious things might be).

That's just it you wouldn't be getting psionic messages you'd just know that someone was trying to contact you. It's like caller ID rather then an answering machine. You can still get solicitors or people convincing you to do stuff on an answering machine, but not caller ID.

[Synthesis]

Only if mindbenders could also mindbend you while you're offline.

This has been the assumption throughout all discussions of offline messaging.

Nobody is addressing it specifically, for obvious reasons.

[Niamh]

So you would like to log in with a queue of attempts at being psionically screwed with as well?

[Tzurahro]

You log back in.

You had five contact attempts by the short, mangy man.
You had three contact attempts by the sneer-faced templar.
You are now terrified of milk.
You now trust the wide-bottomed man completely.
You cannot remember most of your childhood, but instead completely believe you were raised by tregils.
You had two contact attempts by the dark-haired hottie woman.
Whenever you hear the word "Borfrast" you must cluck like an erdlu, thumbs jammed under your armpits.
You had two contact attempts by the slender, yellow-eyed half-elf.

[MarshallDFX]

With so much staff support this should get implemented in no time!

[Ghost]

You log back in.

You had five contact attempts by the short, mangy man.
You had three contact attempts by the sneer-faced templar.
You are now terrified of milk.
You now trust the wide-bottomed man completely.
You cannot remember most of your childhood, but instead completely believe you were raised by tregils.
You had two contact attempts by the dark-haired hottie woman.
Whenever you hear the word "Borfrast" you must cluck like an erdlu, thumbs jammed under your armpits.
You had two contact attempts by the slender, yellow-eyed half-elf.

omg it is like you get a new surprise everytime

I WANT THIS

[Synthesis]

So you would like to log in with a queue of attempts at being psionically screwed with as well?

I was thinking more along the lines of mindbenders being able to see who's been contacting you as well, and limiting it to that, as a reasonable compromise.

Or being able to browse through your "messages," if you were able to send messages.

I suppose that you could include the typical newb-psi FAIL messages as well, if you really wanted to be comprehensive about it.

But you know, hyperbole seems to be running amok with respect to this generally, so I don't suppose I should've expected it to be any different with this offline-lite idea.