Pointless IC Board Posts

[PonchosAreGoodPonchosCanB]

Today, I noticed one of the most pointless posts on an IC board. Basically, it stated that a crafter was around and that he was making things.

To maintain IC confidentiality, let's assume the crafter was a dwarven weaponsmith who lived in a hole in the middle of the desert by Luir's Outpost. The post says that the guy makes weapons and he emerges every so often and gives the dwarf's name.

That was the basics of the post unless I misread it and quite simply, it seems like a waste of board space. If you're trying to advertise that you're selling this or that, do it in-game and indicate that you're selling this or that specificially if you should be able to manage a reputation of some sort?

As it was, the post is in an area which has a high level of said craft and a LOT of the virtual and PC population does what was listed so it wouldn't make much sense that people know of one person in particular who manages to make this thing when so many others make it as well. Back to the example, instead of weapons, I guess it would be rocks (stonecrafter) except a city being surrounded by a massive quarry. Pretty easy to imagine where the post was at this point I think but that's the general idea. There seems to be no point to it and it's a pain in the butt when you go through the posts, sifting through the ones that are pointless to find something that might peek your interest and be an actual rumor. It's even worse when some recruiter comes around wanting to post or something truly interesting like the end of the world is approaching but it's impossible to post because the board is filled with pointless posts.

All in all, this is a long, tiresome rant without a point aside from indicating the absolute uselessness of posts that don't indicate any reason at all for existing. If the post had said the person in question was interested in selling X for X or looking for work as X, it would have probably been annoying (since work - you e-mail the clan imms if you can't find a recruiter and selling well, you do that IC either way) but not quite as much as a post that just took up space to tell about a guy among thousands of others who does the same thing as thousands of others if not more.

[Bestatte]

I've seen similar - though I don't consider it "against the rules" to post stuff like this, I do find it to be wasteful of limited space that is better used for -important- or -significant- gossip and rumors, and possibly falls into the category of a marked lack of posting ettiquette.

Now, something I -am- tempted to do, to give posts like these enough interest that they're worth reading:

I read that post about the dwarven miner who lives in a hole and makes weapons. I then have a conversation with the VNPC who is telling me about this "rumor." It would go something like this:

say (to the green-haired waif, arching a brow) So ya say he lives inna hole huh? What's he doin in there? What else is in there? And howd'ya know he ain't lyin?

emote Listening for the response, her eyes widening as she shakes her head, @ shudders for a moment.

say (loudly, her voice rising with fear and shock, to the green-haired waif) He's livin inna hole I heard was occupied by demons. I bet he's a magicker! I bet that's how come he stays there an only comes t'town once a week! An' how he kin make all them blades so fast! I mean where d'ya think he's gitten all that stone an' bone and stuff! He's magickin'em up I say!

write Vile Dwarven Magicker Weaponmaker!
blah blah blah blah blah

See, NOW that post is worth reading, and warrants being categorized as a "rumor" or as "gossip."

[Linedel]

One could argue that, like NPC populations, there are "virtual IC board posts" in addition to virtual NPCs.

The purpose of posts like that are probably less "rumor" oriented than trying to get their character established in the world.  For this purpose, while I'd never post something like that... I think it's probably "ok."

If someone repeatedly did it with the same character... yeah, it's going to be kind of hokey unless there's some major twist.

[Angela Christine]

It doesn't bother me at all.  I think this sort of post is usually made by new players, who don't yet know how to get their character integrated into society.  Besides, most of the IC boards are under-used and any new posts are better than a bunch of very old posts, even if the old posts were more interesting.  I wouldn't want to discourage people by making them think their posts aren't "good enough" because eventually they will hear an interesting rumor, and I want them to feel comfortable enough with the process to post that rumor.

As for boards filling up, that isn't really something players can control.  Each board only holds 50 posts, and players can't remove old, irrelevent posts.  When a board gets close to 50 you could send a note to the imms in charge of that area and ask for some old posts to be removed.  You might even say something like "posts 11, 14, 22, 27, 36, and 42 are no longer relevent and could be removed" to make it easier.  Often a board may have 2 or 3 posts that a certain house is hiring, and the oldest versions are either inaccurate (because the named recruiter is no longer active) or simply redundant.

[Cuusardo]

I agree that it can be frustrating for people who need to post a significant rumor on an IC board, but can't because some of the message slots are occupied by posts of things that many people would ignore anyway.