Open the goddamn gates at nighttime.

[Malifaxis]

What if the gates acted like clan-compounds gates for citizens, or if that too much then for certain clans liek AoD/Byn/GMH's and whatnot?

This does have some serious appeal....

Optional option:
Have an NPC gate watchman outside under guard that you can buy your way in past.  
If you're a citizen 50 sid.
Non-citizen 200 sid.
Fuck elves.
Fuck witches.
Muls get in free with a complimentary collar.

The fact is that yes, it's a game, but there's also a very IC reason for those gates to shut, guys.  There are horrorbeetles and drovfuckers and deathspiders out there.  Night time has less sane traffic outside because most caravans/wagons are going to be leaving more often during the day.  Yes, it is hotter, and that keeps down the raiding scum in the wastes... also it gives better vantage to see the dangers of the wastes coming.  

Yes to optional coming in after buying your way in.
No to being able to leave the gates at night.  I could see them perhaps opening it up for someone outside (keeping the citizens safe... living citizens = more taxes) but not opening it up for Amos the GrebWitch who wants to go out before dawn and spampractice Create Sex Slave.

[lostinspace]

I'm all for paying to get in, be it official, a corrupt unit of guardsmen at the west gate, or some sort of token or pass you pay an expensive one time fee for. Also, pretty sure Yaroch closes it's gates at night still.

[Vositus]

Or the gates could just, you know, stay open. That's a much easier solution. And I wouldn't' have to rely on a PC Templar being around.

Last thing because I'm starting to come around to the idea... Especially the bribing gate guards idea.

There are non-Templar PCs with the ability to open and close city gates. (Riding an IC info line here, methinks)

[Gazarsgo]

I think it would be way better to have some shops that are only open in the day and some that are only open at night.

Despawning is a cool first step, but I'd rather merchants had different routines where they walked to the bank and then an apartment and then actually slept.  I treat merchants as largely 'out-of-bounds' for shenanigans simply because their default mode is a permanent state of high vigilance.

I think you should be able to ask the guards (via talk guard keywords, talk guard hello, talk guard open gates, talk guard close gates) to let you OUT at night but not in, and it'd be awesome if it depended on whether you were told the right keyword to use from the Templarate.

[Norcal]

Tuluk did not shut its gates at night.  Luirs does not.

If you want to shut the gates then give the option for players to purchase a "gate token" that they can wear.  If you have the token, the gates open for you at  night.  Otherwise...you are either in or out.

Shops staying open I am not sure on. Maybe till late at night.

[RogueGunslinger]

RGS: Though frustrated you may be, there's probably better more constructive ways of asking about this. I know that I personally read your post and thought "Yeah, I agree, but what an asshat."

Yeah I thought as much after I made the OP. It's just hard to put up with all these annoyances when I know there's a great game underneath. Every tiem I encounter the slightest bit of "Oh you want to play, well, too bad you get to wait around instead!" I just want to stop playing. It's not worth forcing coal down my throat at the hopes I'll shit out a diamond when all circumstances are perfect.

[Reiloth]

RGS: Though frustrated you may be, there's probably better more constructive ways of asking about this. I know that I personally read your post and thought "Yeah, I agree, but what an asshat."

Yeah I thought as much after I made the OP. It's just hard to put up with all these annoyances when I know there's a great game underneath. Every tiem I encounter the slightest bit of "Oh you want to play, well, too bad you get to wait around instead!" I just want to stop playing. It's not worth forcing coal down my throat at the hopes I'll shit out a diamond when all circumstances are perfect.

I totally know your feel. Especially when you play a game that gets certain things right that Armageddon, for one reason or another, just gets horribly wrong. But...Ain't no game like Armageddon out there, so it keeps us coming back! And things have VASTLY IMPROVED over the years. All those little code quirks do get fixed. So I think posing things in a constructive way that might get a Staffer interested in working on it, is the best way to go.

Remember when you couldn't quit outside of a gate? That changed, IIRC, because someone mentioned it passingly on the GDB at some point. The list is quite large, but when you take a breath and pose things like 'Wouldn't it be nice if...' instead of 'FIX THE GODDAMN SOMETHING OR OTHER', you get more traction I think.

[RogueGunslinger]

Yeah, I already made that "constructive" post years ago(maybe just a year ago?). I'd say I was switching up tactics but really I was being an ass because I was upset. Sorry everyone. 

[BadSkeelz]

Sometimes cursing is just what you need to open a gate at night.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCQ3P2_qb7M

[Lizzie]

Used to be there was no quit-safe room right outside the gates. Now there is. If you need to log out and you -just- missed the gate, you can log out. You can ALSO now use quit-ooc, which didn't used to exist at all, to quit out if you're unexpectedly needed to do so, and aren't anywhere near a quit-safe room.

Because of these relatively new changes, I don't see why it should be important at all that the gates close at night and open in the morning.

I do, however, wish the shops that do close, would stay open just a little longer OR open a little earlier. That single 10-minute difference, to me, would make a huge difference.

[RogueGunslinger]

Used to be there was no quit-safe room right outside the gates. Now there is. If you need to log out and you -just- missed the gate, you can log out. You can ALSO now use quit-ooc, which didn't used to exist at all, to quit out if you're unexpectedly needed to do so, and aren't anywhere near a quit-safe room.

Doesn't have much to do with being able to quit the game. It has to do with not wanting to put your character in situations where you might end up leaving your runners out in the middle of the desert, so you just take the day off instead and don't even bother to bring them anywhere. There's a reason why every RPT tries to start at dawn. Because it usually takes half an hour just to get everyone organized and to the gates. I'm saying we'd have more people willing to start their RPT's, or hunting missions or whatever, whenever is most convenient if there was easy access into and out of the city at night. Instead we force people to wait, and wait, and wait for dawn to come.

It has to do with not wanting to take your indie out knowing you'll just be stuck for the remaining 30 minutes sitting outside the gates with nothing to see but "sand swirls about you". There would be a lot more interaction if that poor bastard could just get to a tavern.

I can't be the only person who logs in with an indie(usually off peak), checks the time, see's it's past noon, and decides to just log back out again... Or worse, see that's it's past noon and then spam-rides outside, spam-kills a mob, spam-skins it, makes a couple quick emotes, then spam-gathers everything then speed-rides their way back into the city.

Nobody is going to want to sit around watching nothing just for their hunger and thirst timers to start counting down and their food to decay in their bags.

[Erythil]

I don't mind the gates closing.  I think it makes the world feel a little more alive and gives you something to plan around.  It may not be condusive to casual play, but we have quit ooc for those emergency log situations.

The shopkeepers not being open at night is kind of more annoying than it is immersive to me, though, but it's not something I care about enough to want to make it a staff priority, I'd rather see new stuff instead.

[gotdamnmiracle]

I second (or eighth by this point maybe) RGS. Finding out it's highsun and logging out with the intention of logging back in in an hour sucks. Can confirm.

[valeria]

I like that the gates close, but I wouldn't mind if people could flash their merchant's token/flash some kind of gate token/and-or bribe their way in after dark.

I don't mind that the shops close, but I would like it if they actually packed up their wares and went somewhere else.  I'd like to see the time shorter.  I'd also like to see different shops with different schedules.

[Delirium]

I don't mind that the shops close, but I would like it if they actually packed up their wares and went somewhere else.  I'd like to see the time shorter.  I'd also like to see different shops with different schedules.

Shops closing at night is the most jarring part of this (admittedly annoying) piece of code.

In this brutally hot desert world, taking a siesta from late morning to early afternoon would make more sense.

It would also be less annoying from a playability standpoint, as PCs are by and large busiest during the day and only have the evenings free.

The second most jarring is that they don't actually close up shop; a simple change of long description would help.

This would alert PCs that the merchant is closed for business and provide more IC continuity.

i.e., The merchant stands here, hawking his wares. vs The merchant lazes around, taking a nap.

[Molten Heart]

.

[nauta]

There are ways into Allanak at night.

I wish you could crawl through those sewer pipes.  (If you actually can crawl through those sewer pipes and you'alls been bogarting the syntax, you're going to have a very upset nauta.)

[RogueGunslinger]

There are ways into Allanak at night.

Doesn't help the Byn sergeant... or 90% of the player population, for that matter.

[Yam]

There are ways into Allanak at night.

I wish you could crawl through those sewer pipes.  (If you actually can crawl through those sewer pipes and you'alls been bogarting the syntax, you're going to have a very upset nauta.)

drink pipe

[nauta]

There are ways into Allanak at night.

Doesn't help the Byn sergeant... or 90% of the player population, for that matter.

Oh, yeah, sorry -- meant that sentence to go with the pipes thing -- I'm 300% behind having the gates open 24/7.

[Armaddict]

Can we remove storms from the game please?

I dislike inconvenience in roleplay and this keeps me from following my plan 100% of the time that it happens.

On a more serious note:
I find the gates closing to be fine.  I plan my characters' days around it.  When something occurs that keeps me from making it, it is indeed a bad circumstance that makes sense for my character to be upset about, and I roleplay it as such.  I make a camp.  I search for another solution.  I worry about water.  I check up on my mount, and wonder if there are baddies nearby.  Sometimes, I use the extra five minutes to quickly get some meat before hunkering down to cook it overnight while watching for spiders.

But I guess you could also just log out and complain about your plan instead of continuing to play the character.  That's also an option.

[RogueGunslinger]

We get it Armaddict, you're a paragon of roleplaying. You never let ooc issues with the game get to you, and anything people have a problem with you find it really easy to roleplay around. Good for you.

[Molten Heart]

.

[Desertman]

Nah, I like it how it is. It creates a sense of urgency that wouldn't otherwise be there.

[Armaddict]

We get it Armaddict, you're a paragon of roleplaying. You never let ooc issues with the game get to you, and anything people have a problem with you find it really easy to roleplay around. Good for you.

If that's what you get out of what was said, that's well and good on you, I'll just feel all inflated that apparently I'm better than -I- thought I was!  But for that to be what you get out of it, you kind of insist on missing what the entire point of me typing all of it out was, which was that you're not seeing the forest for the trees and you're letting inconvenience in an RPI remove your reason to roleplay rather than augment it.  If everything was going perfectly all the time for your character, we'd be in a pretty bland RPI.  Hell...sit there and mutter at the gates or contact your buddy and bitch about it, if that's what they'd do.

I'm far from a paragon of roleplaying.  But I also don't expect 100% of everything to be easy and fun in an RPI based around hardship, either.  The gates closed on you.  Big deal, you were outside the gates doing shit anyway.  So keep doing shit outside the gates, keep finding things to do the same way as you do any other time instead of viewing this as some terrible code injustice.