Making the most of limited playing time

General out-of-character discussion among players of Cantr II.

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Mafia Salad
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Making the most of limited playing time

Postby Mafia Salad » Sun Jan 29, 2017 12:28 am

I don't work at a job with a computer or much on the job down time. Beyond that at least once a week my job takes me to remote areas where I might not even have cell service for hours on end to sneak a quick read of an events log during a break. Sometimes not being a part of the regular computer access + cantrspy crowd can leave you feeling like an outsider as you play. So how do you get the most enjoyment out of the game if you might not play it for more than a couple hours spread out over the week?

I have a few ideas.

First, don't expect too much from your characters. You're not going to have 15 dynamic town leaders on 3 min a day each. If you play an influential character, then build a way to work around them such as a second person with the keys and authority to act while you're sleeping. Frankly I pick favorites and play them first. They are my most interesting, dynamic, and involved. And if I don't get to my other characters I don't get to them.

Try not to overspawn. I've done this over and over again. When nothing is going on with my characters while I have some free time to play, I make a new one. Then I have an 8 day stretch of heavy real life schedule and I can't keep up with two thirds of my characters. Instead of spawning new characters create a couple self activated characters with little or no responsibilites. Creative characters are good for this. When you have some free time, wake up your bard. Sing and dance, then fall back asleep. The trick is low responsibility, proactive instead of reactive, and fun. An unusual character that can get annoying if you're playing them every day can be enduring if you're doing it once and week.

Ctrl+f is your friend. Say you're in a town that is too busy for you to read everything that 's going on. You click on your character and bam: text wall of relationship drama and and that guy who thinks he is a fish emoting all by himself. If you've been offline for a day or two and your character is working for someone or asked a question before you went offline, then ctrl+f and search your characters name in the events log. There is a very good chance if someone is answering a question or talking to your character they will use your name. I do this all the time when confronted with a wall of text I don't have time to read so I don't have to sit there asking the same question over and over again hoping that the person I need to answer it will be online while I am. That gets really annoying from the other end too. On my sailing characters when I am in a noisy port I search my ship captain's names to see if they are saying or doing anything I should pay attention to (for example saying goodbye and going into the harbor) and I do it to find where I left the conversation off last time I was online ctrl+f "you say"

Event page text wall solution 2: Modify your game skin to make important events stick out. I have mine color coded with CSS, something I knew nothing about when I did it, but now I can scan for purple text (whispers), skip over anything in blue (radio) and jump into action when I see red (attacking, dragging, wait nevermind just a pillow fight). Other's have changed the size of the text or greyed out things they care less about. Resources http://forum.cantr.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=26881, http://forum.cantr.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=18625
Investing some time in making your user interface more user friendly for what you need will save you a bunch of time in the long run.

That's all I got for now.
Fortune Cookie Says:
You should consider a career change, you'd make an excellent doormat.

[quote]1441-7: You skillfully kill a racoon using a broom.[/quote]
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Mafia Salad
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Re: Making the most of limited playing time

Postby Mafia Salad » Sun Jan 29, 2017 12:34 am

I lied. I got one more.

I don't see any breech of RP to talk about when you will be awake or sleeping. Impending sleep sensing is sixth sense I think helps the game roll a lot smoother even if it isn't realistic.
Fortune Cookie Says:
You should consider a career change, you'd make an excellent doormat.

[quote]1441-7: You skillfully kill a racoon using a broom.[/quote]
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Joshuamonkey
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Re: Making the most of limited playing time

Postby Joshuamonkey » Sun Jan 29, 2017 6:10 am

Mafia Salad wrote:I do it to find where I left the conversation off last time I was online ctrl+f "you say"

Ah, so I'm not the only one that does this! I use this often, for the same reason.
I also search for "says to you" for whispers. I should try the CSS idea some time (especially considering that I'm a programmer and web developer..).

Some of my characters are well known as hardcore sleepers that still stay aware of important things. Since they're town leaders though I do read through the text (but over the years I've gotten used to scanning events quickly, skimming over long RP sessions or unimportant conversations if I need to). Sometimes they're more active, sometimes less. One of my philosophies is to ensure that it's better for others that my character is alive than for them to be dead; that includes having others with the keys who can help manage things.
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the_antisocial_hermit
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Re: Making the most of limited playing time

Postby the_antisocial_hermit » Sun Jan 29, 2017 7:00 am

Some good ideas here!

I do the searching, for sure, when I've had to be out of pocket for a long time. Ctrl+F is one of my most useful friends, even when I am on regularly.

The character thing is so important to me. I've found that resisting making new characters has been much easier for me this time around. I had two for a little over an IG year before I made any more, and then I only made a few. The number felt very comfortable- so much so, that I have only made one more since then, nearly 9 months after, even though my initial restriction for making any more was to let my first character get to 30. I find that it's usually enough to keep me entertained when I have time, and not so much to hold me back and make me reluctant to log in when I don't.

I am also resisting as much responsibility as I can IG. I know that's always been a factor that can hold me back from enjoying the game. Sometimes it is impossible to avoid, but for the most part I've managed.
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Rebma
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Re: Making the most of limited playing time

Postby Rebma » Sun Jan 29, 2017 9:27 pm

Anicators grease monkey script helps a lot because I colour the people I need to and can scan for what they're doing in crowded towns where all I need is them. The rest is quick scan for my char name and to get the gist of town feel

I don't ctrl+f but only the only character i would do it wit is my most important and because my more important character has nicknames and has built themselves around missing nothing. Unfortunately this means if a lot is happening on multiple, everybody but that one gets neglected.

When my time was first limited I asked PD to knock off half of my characters to bring me down to 6. When they do this they lock your account for a minimum time and honestly this has been great bc it makes me not able to create more that I won't have time for. I struggle for time with the ones I have.
kronos wrote:like a nice trim is totally fine. short, neat. I don't want to be fighting through the forests of fangorn and expecting treebeard to come and show me the way in

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