This idea comes from a discussion with a friend, and is his thoughts, not mine. I am posting it for him as he does not have the access to post a new thread.
Got an idea for foresaken, an OOC lounge.
Going OOC toggles a flag like AFK, and transfers you to an OOC area. This area is a lounge for players to interact out of character and chill without having to quit. You don't transfer there in your character though, so I wouldn't be there as Ghran. Ghran would be suspended as if I quit, and I would go there in an avatar of another chosen name. Maybe Ted or Dave or whatthehellever. Just to keep the beauty of Foresaken maybe you're not allowed to tell people about your alts in this lounge, or strategize about IC storylines and tactics. It would be no different from quitting, except that you could chat with the players instead of logging off
If they really thought it through there could be a room with message boards. These message boards would be fed by the web boards for forsaken, so you could browse and post the boards from within the mud.
The board code would just call the posts from the same mysql database feeding the web boards.
Not happening. I think there was an OOC chat long ago (before my time), that was taken away for abuse. You can chill here at the forums instead. 
that wouldn't be a smart thing to implement, although I did think of it at first. But the truth is there's a reason to why you can't log onto lowbies then quit and come on your pinns and it's pretty much similiar to that. Most people won't necessary use the ooc lounge for chatting but just a simple who list preview or to wait out an opponent cabal or something of the sort and end up abusing it in that way.
If your friend with this idea doesn't have the ability to post this on the forum, logic would lead me to the conclusion that he/she is probably banned.
Why would the IMMs go to the effort of coding them a second chance if they already took the forums away from them?
If I'm way off base with this one, fine. I still don't think it's going to happen, because a few of the playerbase aren't even mature enough to handle a shout outs forum, which resulted in it being taken away from the playerbase as a whole. I don't see the IMMs giving themselves another responsibility like that.
If that's your kind of logic you don't deserve to be in college. You deserve to be fat. And not in college. lol
This guy doesn't have very money posts. His friend doesnt have access to post a new thread, didnt say his friend could read old ones. And his friend's "idea" is so old and beaten, that LOGIC would lead me to believe his friend is new as well and just hasn't had his forum account activated yet.
evas just a warrior, impale them! They mut be banned!!
on your idea, ooc chat would break the mood of the game.
Maybe you shouldn't assume anything, ever.
His account merely isn't activated, and just because I don't have many posts, doesn't mean I'm new here, either.
Also, this is an idea that he thought would be cool for the mud, I'm sorry you don't agree with him on it. It would be easier to control than the shout out forums, as I imagine the imms don't have much control over the server and their databases (unless it's hosted by an imm themselves, which I don't think it is).
Personally I don't know if I'm for or against it, I think it could be coded in quite nicely and made to work without worrying about abuses. The concern about just using it to check the who list? Simply disable the who command, except for people in the ooc lounge. Keep in mind, the coder would be able to work with this 'ooc lounge' much more extensively than an immortal would be able to with controls on the forum.
Its an rp enforced mud. adding an ooc channel, removes the rp enorced. Now, people log in to chat, which is ok...but...while chatting, well your not rping. Muds with ooc chats always turn into...ooc chats, this is what I have seen happen on several other muds. Just my opinion, but I would HATE an ooc chat in FL, beyond the basic newbie chat.
I believe you're wrong there. This forum is hosted on the same domain as the website. Many hosting companies include a mysql database along with php with the hosting. It is very likely that at least one or two of the imms have the access to the db and the forum code to tailor to suit their needs.
The ooc lounge however would present a much larger difficulty. How do you monitor what is said in there? Log everything and read it later? How long would you spend doing that after three or four days away? Do you actively try to filter out keywords? Which keywords? How do you prevent knowledge sharing that would be difficult to filter?
There have been proposals for an official room on irc numerous times. This has always been shot down for the same reasons I've listed above.
Which bug fixes would you advocate putting on hold to re-implement a ooc community when one already exists here?
This isn't a trivial thing you ask, there is a TON of potential for abuse and all of it must be covered. No, the forums work fine. If everyone was mature and able to control themselves, perhaps the arguments against would be slightly less. But people can't even use a shoutouts section properly.
It would be easier to control than the shout out forums' date=' as I imagine the imms don't have much control over the server and their databases (unless it's hosted by an imm themselves, which I don't think it is).[/quote']
There have been proposals for an official room on irc numerous times. This has always been shot down for the same reasons I've listed above.
There have been much more than just proposals, and the rooms were shut down under threat of banning anyone involved. The potential for abuse is, well, large. Even now, with the forum and uncontrolled passing around of AIM names, there is a huge potential for abuse. It's not sitting in everyone's face, though, and that is the fundamental difference. Trust me on this, I speak from far too much experience: If people are given an easy, pre-built way chatting in real time with multiple people (AIM names, etc, are too much work for alot of people and you have to build relationships to pass them around) they will start to abuse OOC knowledge of the game.
Yeah anyone passes my aim around would get a smack down...
Ive only got despiser and a couple goodies on mine and I dont need any of the OOC bull**** again.
An ooc lounge would not be used for the innocent purposes. Everyone is always looking to gain an advantage.
My days of 50+ people on AIM are over lol. I can count on one hand the people I talk to and it's only because I've talked to them for 6 years now. And since I stopped playing on and off and all that, I lost contact with some others.
I'm so lonely now? hah.
This idea is not happening...ever. It was considered long ago by Viri and shot at 50 paces and burned alive thankfully.
FL is not a no-PK chatroom.
You tell Chayesh, 'Yo whats up bro? Hows ur moms and dems?'
rip x 60
emote spits on your shredded shell of flesh.
rip
Pfft. Everyone knows that in the OOC Lounge, I am IMP.
Heh, I meant proposals for an OFFICIAL irc channel. I was invited to an unofficial one back in 2002. I'd been playing for a few months and was quite eager to talk with some of the people who played outside of the game.
I get in the room and there's like 20 people all afk. That was anticlimactic to say the least.
There's just a few people on my buddy list. Conversations are few and far between, and it's always just the "hi, how ya been". All good people though, and I'm glad to know them outside the game and the forums.
There have been much more than just proposals' date=' .[/quote']
if you remove IMP and replace it with OD, perhaps.