Know what "sleepers"

[Snake_byte]

I had an idea. I'm going to apply a way of thought that dogs have to the game with any sleepers that may occur. Maybe you should too.
Dieing alone! When a dog knows it's going to die, it will go and hide under something or if it's outside usually run away somewhere. Instead of "sleeping" sleepers, travel aimlessly. Less sleepers clogging up cities...

What do you guys think?

[EchoMan2]

My sleepers (suicides) usually walks out of town b4 stopping and waiting for the unevitable. Much less "lighting up" of the player page.

[Doug R.]

I proposed something similar.
http://forum.cantr.org/viewtopic.php?t=17237

There are two reasons sleepers sleep, that I can ascertain:

1) The player just doesn't give a crap anymore (so they're not going to go out of their way to convenience the rest of us).

2) They're holding onto the illusion that they're still going to play if somehow their interest becomes mysteriously piqued again. They'll want their characters out so they can check them once a week to see if that magical moment happened (although if it did, it almost certainly happened and passed while they were sleeping).

[catpurr]

Well actually I've more characters than I got time for to play.

I created them when I was more active, but now I decided rather to try to play one maybe two convincing, the others are sleeping in case I get more time/interest. Only here and there I do anyting with 'em.

If I'd be able to kill them individually from character screen I would. Otherwise I don't even care enough for them to kill em.

[SekoETC]

I think that due to mailing dysfunctions a large part of people who register into Cantr never receive the email that tells them the account has been accepted, so they can't log in (or maybe their password would work but they assume that their application was never handled).

Would it be too much trouble if when someone send an application, they would be given a ticket number and there would be a form where you could check the status (Unaddressed/Under processing/Accepted/Rejected) of your application? Then if it was accepted or rejected but you didn't get an email, people would know to send a support request. That would also give a hint of how eager a person was to join the game if they were checking the status of their ticket every ten minutes rather than just once or never.

It's happened more than once that someone sends a support request saying "I got this email saying my account is going to get deleted if I don't log in soon, but you never sent me my player id". And by the time someone replies, the account has already idled out and lead into two characters dying without ever waking up. Sorry if this is classified information but I think people should know it happens.

[Doug R.]

I don't know. It seems a lot of effort to fix something that really isn't our problem in the first place. It's a user's responsibility to make sure that their email program accepts legit email. If they have that problem with Cantr, they'll have it with much more important things also.

I think your idea of not having their 2 charries spawn until they log in is much, much better.

[Chris]

Why is a character created before the email address is confirmed? When you create an account on a forum or anything else, you have to verify that your email is a real, working address.

[Snake_byte]

I think your idea of not having their 2 charries spawn until they log in is much, much better.

Why is a character created before the email address is confirmed? When you create an account on a forum or anything else, you have to verify that your email is a real, working address.

Fourth

[tiddy ogg]

I don't know. It seems a lot of effort to fix something that really isn't our problem in the first place. It's a user's responsibility to make sure that their email program accepts legit email. If they have that problem with Cantr, they'll have it with much more important things also.

Not so. It took me four tries to get a response when first trying to play Cantr - eventually did it with PD help. I can't be the only one, and others won't keep trying.
So apologies to those who had to bury my first three chars so long ago.

The e-mail system still doesn't work - I can't get day reports, I don't get notifications when a char dies, I sent an e-mail to prog d and heard nothing, (OK maybe they didn't reply,but I can't be sure.)

So yes, it is Cantr's problem.

[formerly known as hf]

I proposed something similar.
http://forum.cantr.org/viewtopic.php?t=17237

There are two reasons sleepers sleep, that I can ascertain:

1) The player just doesn't give a crap anymore (so they're not going to go out of their way to convenience the rest of us).

2) They're holding onto the illusion that they're still going to play if somehow their interest becomes mysteriously piqued again. They'll want their characters out so they can check them once a week to see if that magical moment happened (although if it did, it almost certainly happened and passed while they were sleeping).

I'm am very much at stage 2)

I have one character I just checked in on today, after not having done so for about 4 weeks. Not that did anything other than log in, see he still had food, have a quick look at the events page, decide it was too much to be bothered to read and log off.

I would love something like Doug's suggestion. The chances are I will get back and play cantr again in the future. I've gone through long periods with sleepers before, then played at a much more active level again.

Being able to backburner him without having to worry about food (and likely forget, like I did before, thus loosing a character I enjoyed playing and therefore losing even more interest in returning to the game) would be welcome.

[Andu]

If you don't have time to read the event page, just let him/her wake up and say:"Hi, I have been sleeping a bit, what's up?"

Easy as that, did it with one char.

[Doug R.]

Not so. It took me four tries to get a response when first trying to play Cantr - eventually did it with PD help. I can't be the only one, and others won't keep trying.
So apologies to those who had to bury my first three chars so long ago.

The e-mail system still doesn't work - I can't get day reports, I don't get notifications when a char dies, I sent an e-mail to prog d and heard nothing, (OK maybe they didn't reply,but I can't be sure.)

So yes, it is Cantr's problem.

There are periods of downtime when the system is broken, but there's nothing that can be done about that. The system, right now, works fine, and if a user isn't getting their emails, it's because their email program is filtering it. I get every game-related email that I'm supposed to get, and I get a lot.

Would it be too much trouble if when someone send an application, they would be given a ticket number and there would be a form where you could check the status

The flaw here being that this ticket number would presumably be emailed to them. If not, we'd have to rely on them writing it down when it was given to them on the screen, and we all know that won't happen.

[SekoETC]

The flaw here being that this ticket number would presumably be emailed to them. If not, we'd have to rely on them writing it down when it was given to them on the screen, and we all know that won't happen.

They would write it down if they cared. If they didn't then it would be their loss.

[Doug R.]

If they cared, they'd email support wondering about the status of their application, which some do when they don't get accepted right away (which on many email clients automatically white-lists that address, so they can be responded to).

My way works with the current system, and since both methods rely on them caring, that makes my way more cost effective.

If anyone can think of an easy way to help players that don't care, then I'd like to hear it (as they're the vase majority of the players that don't play). Realistically, though, if they don't care, they're not gonna play anyway, even if they do get the email.

PS - Even if they cared, they wouldn't write it down because they would assume that it would be emailed to them, like every other confirmation page on the internet.

[chase02]

The e-mail system still doesn't work - I can't get day reports, I don't get notifications when a char dies, I sent an e-mail to prog d and heard nothing, (OK maybe they didn't reply,but I can't be sure.)

So yes, it is Cantr's problem.

Not entirely true. It's emailing death reports (sob, my poor starving newspawn), so it must be working for some things.

Are the parts that don't work fixable? my money is on yes..