CLOK BBS

CHAT is now usable as a guest immediately upon connecting to the MUD, before login.

I'll roll out a nickname system some time this weekend after I make sure that they're secure (Able to register a nickname, assign it a password, and reconnect to it at any time)

The WHO command has been updated to show nicknames rather than player names and is usable prior to logging into CLOK. The /who command (which is actually different) has been removed. You may now use WHO instead.

The NICK command can be used to set up a nickname. It will be shown on the WHO list and in CHAT/QUESTION. Also, people using the nickname to attempt to steal/impersonate another person's identity will be dealt with harshly, so just don't even think about it.

Presently, tells are still using the old system, I should have that fixed sometime this coming week.

Just to address some concerns:

Why do I have to log in twice now?
Right now, I'm just focusing on getting the basic functionality working. Once all that is done, I can work on some additional features to make it easier to manage, such as having the option of tying a nickname to a specific character and auto-assigning it upon login. The idea is to give people the freedom of choice and leave them with the ability to remain anonymous unless they want to be known.

Once this goes in for the TELL command, does that mean people are going to be sending me tells and I'll have no idea who they are?
To avoid the potential for abuse, TELL will only be usable by people who have selected a nickname. It won't be usable while in "Guest Mode".

What if someone takes my name?
Then they aren't going to be able to use who, chat, question or tell anymore on any of their characters, if we verify that an attempt at impersonation/identity theft took place. Seriously, don't do it.

Where did my title go?
Titles, options, and achievements are going to be moved to the client side of the house rather than being character-specific. This will take some time and will happen after all the basic functionality has been ironed out first.

TELL now requires you to specify a nickname rather than a character name. You cannot send or receive tells as a guest user.

Currently broken (working on it): TELL RECENT, REPLY.

I want to start by saying, I like the new chat system, I really do, but I also think it is at least partly responsible for the low player numbers since its implementation.
While I think the changes make things better, at least from a mechanical standpoint, if people are unwilling to adopt those changes, the benefits are lost. Instead of getting a who list populated by people's chosen nicknames, we get a who list populated buy guests, and a chat full of the same.
If i was looking into CLOK for the first time, or even considering coming back after time away, and saw a list full of guests and only one player and a GM I honestly would probably just go play something else.
I fear that the new chat system is just one of those good ideas that for one reason or another just doesn't work, which makes me sad, because I really do like having the same ooc name across all my characters.

That's one of the reasons why I went ahead and flipped the switch for TELL now, even though REPLY and TELL RECENT aren't working, to kind of... encourage people to use it more.

I realize it's a bit disheartening to login and see 5 anonymous users, 1 GM, and 1 player. But, still, we had 6 players online in the middle of a weekday, which... yeah, of course I'd like it to be higher, but it's still not bad considering it's off-peak. Hopefully once I get a unified login system setup, people will be using nicks more and it'll be a bit easier on the eyes rather than a bunch of guest users on the who list. Only time will tell though.

If the system was set up to assign your character name as your nickname instead of "guest" on creation and first log, and if you wanted it different you had to change it I imagine it would go a long way.

Would it be possible to add re-allowing partial nickname completion on tells to the list of modifications for this system? Typing a person's full nickname can be challenging at times depending on what they choose to set.

Kiyaani wrote:Would it be possible to add re-allowing partial nickname completion on tells to the list of modifications for this system? Typing a person's full nickname can be challenging at times depending on what they choose to set.

Should be pretty easy. I'll see what I can do after work tonight.

Should be done.

tell otarij test
[TO Otarij (OOC)]: test

EAvd>
tell otari test
Unable to find tell recipient.
EAvd>
gm rcom tell
Reloading tell.py...
... done!

EAvd>
tell Otari test
[TO Otarij (OOC)]: test

EAvd>
tell ota Test
[TO Otarij (OOC)]: Test

Nice! Thanks for the quick work on that little fix, J.

Thanks!

Would it be possible to make it so that when I type "nick" it shows what my current chat nick is?

Since /who no longer works, it might be good to change the text that shows when you first connect to CLOK to reflect that. It still says you can use /who to check the who list.

Dorn wrote:If the system was set up to assign your character name as your nickname instead of "guest" on creation and first log, and if you wanted it different you had to change it I imagine it would go a long way.

I actually like this lots. It's a great replacement for guest##. It could stay guest if say, I want to chat but don't want to actually log into the game.