[Feature] Looking for roleplay

Bugs & Features
#1

We need a better way to find others wanting to roleplay! And I need your help in coming up with a good solution for this.

Currently, we have the ways of:

  1. Going to Station Park in hopes to find someone to interact with
  2. Gambling by going to places in the area with population > 0, hoping whoever is there would be fun and willing to roleplay.
  3. Searching the Awake list and sending messages.

None of them are great, really.

What I imagine is being able to set a “Looking for roleplay” (LFRP) state. Maybe like this:

lfrp Stacking wood by the cabin = The wolf is spending time outside his cabin, chopping and stacking wood to keep him warm through the rest of the winter.

Maybe a boring example. But I want it to be an IC statement of what your character is doing, as a starting point for the roleplay you invite others to join, rather than some OOC: “Anyone wanna battle RP?”

Additionally (or maybe optionally?), when set as “LFRP”, your location will also be announced, so that others may know where to find you.

So, we have:

  • Title - Title for others to see. Eg. “A beer in Umber Point”, “Girl lost in the woods”, “Preparing to rob the bank”
  • Description - A longer description, which may include ((OOC)) info of what type of roleplay you are looking for as well.
  • Location - (Optional?) info on room/area you are in.

But where should we display this?

  • Awake list, as part of the characters listed there?
  • A new tab in the Realm panel, similar to Awake and Watch?
  • In the Area map, so you can see rooms containing characters looking for roleplay?
  • Other places?

And can we somehow combine this “Looking for roleplay” feature to also be used as a way to tell others in the same room what you are currently doing? Or is that a different feature?

I’ll stop now. Feedback, please!

3 Likes
Release v1.57.0 - Looking for roleplay
#2

LFRP is such a mouthful. Why not DTF – Dabble in Frivolity?

On a serious note, I think we can improve the existing mechanisms before we make more, e.g. your first and second points would be improved by excluding the away people from the area counters, meaning that you don’t wander aimlessly to an area with 11 people only to find they all are afk.

As for more states, well, we already have statuses. I don’t think adding more means to communicate the same will make it any easier. But maybe making the statuses in-your-face and more IC will? Like in this old idea:

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#3

Thanks for feedback, Shin!
Yes. I was also thinking about that post specifically. And I also thought of another post (which I can’t find) where someone suggested to allow you to toggle if others can see your location.

Those Statuses of ours could be the “title” I was mentioning. Or rather the title would be the status of yours. I don’t think we should have two text statuses; it would be redundant.

But I think announcing the location is important in order to allow people to find/create roleplay in other places rather than just Station Park or Fox Hole.

#4

We could just improve the area map for that, maybe. Make it more interactive; show clusters of peeps, maybe even pics of those who signed in for FMF (that’s Find My Furries, Rift-wide search and sexcue service)

#5

I may not be the most active when it comes to wolfery, but I do think this is something that is needed, or would at the very least be a good idea to implement.

And as for places to hold the information, personally I think the panel or area map might be a good place to put the LFRP status and text, as the awake list might lead to excess clutter, especially at times where there are many people online looking for roleplay.

I do think this is an idea best implemented as a new feature though, as to roll it into statuses or the area map might just lead to more menus, clutter, and time spent adding it anyways. I’m not a developer though, so if I’m incorrect just let me know. At the very least the feature should give where you are, and a brief explanation of what your character is doing, or looking for. Maybe a little ooc bit of text to clearly put what it is you’re looking for, if wanted? Just spitballing.

#6

That was me, in the away population count thread ;3

I think when thinking about re-using the status field for this, it is important to remember that currently the status does not explicitly specify that it is the character status. Thus it seems to be just as often used for player status (afk, brb, sleeping, pants on fire, etc), which would be completely unrelated to the LFRP system.

I think the area population counts are a good start, but they don’t fully answer the problem either, since it’s possible and likely that people go to less populated areas to idle and OOC chat too. This happens for example on the road to the forest a lot.

IMHO the awake list would be the preferable location for this information. Usually you’d check the character profile first and then make the decision of whether you think it would be fun to engage. Though in the spirit of good UX, it does not have to be limited only to the awake list. It could just as well be in both the awake list and the area panel.

Having the information in the awake list would not preclude people from using it to set up play in private areas. Of course the area list doesn’t need to exclude private area LFRP:s either, but not all private rooms are tied to a globally visible area at all.

Worth considering also is… Does the LFRP system need to require that the person looking for play is currently in the area they want to play in? Could you simply specify the area and wait for someone to msg you that they’re interested? Both have their ups and downs.

#7

What about The Plum’s dating site? That can be useful for something.

#8

I think it would make a nice tab for the left panel.

#9

Not many people are probably aware of it.

#10

Can’t say I’ve heard of it, or seen it’s existence in my travels.

I’m a big fan of the idea of the LFRP/DTF/whatever you want to call it system ending up as it’s own separate tab, between the Awake list, messages list, character select, and alerts tab.

It would avoid cluttering the already busy awake list, while giving plenty of space to store information. I believe the only mandatory fields should be a brief detail and then an explanation of what is being sought out. Extra categories like gender preferences, kinks hoped for, smut or story (or both, for silly folk like I), and location would definitely be a nice to have.

2 Likes
#11

I see how players are currently using Status, and it is clear many of you want a proper feature for this.

I will try to make a Minimal Viable Product solution for the LFRP feature, and we can start from there. It may not yet address location or what we wish to do with the current Status. But it can help us explore how we want the finalized feature to be like.

2 Likes
#12

Would it make sense to remove the away characters from the LFRP filter? After all, they aren’t actively looking for LFRP (being away) and that takes the immediacy of the LFRP down a notch.

#13

True that they are not really actively LFRP. But if you wish to filter them not to be seen, you can simply type:

!away

in the Search filter to achieve that.

#14

There are times when I’m just sitting around, doing nothing for so long that I go idle. Yet I AM still looking for RP and if anyone interesting shows up, then I’d be happy to RP with them.

2 Likes
#15

One suggestion that might be a bit relevant: Should entering DND disable LFRP? Or at least show some status on the card that the person actually is DND.

I’ve run into this situation three times this week now already, where someone has an LFRP note up asking to message for more. Then I go to type an elaborate introductory question/offer only to be met with the DND womp womp message.

(Alternatively maybe trying to message a DND person should show up as not a valid target already when typing the message, as if they were offline.)

2 Likes
#16

This is an excellent point! Maybe DND has a red dot instead of a blue one?

1 Like