Should we get rid of the buddy list?

[zanzibar]

A problem with the buddy list is that it let's you know who's online, even if they're on the other side of the world or even in the next room.  It takes away from the RP atmosphere.  It also encourages /tells, which are inherently OOC.

On the other side, it's a very useful tool when it comes to hooking up with friends and people you're running events with.  It's an indicator of whether or not there's a lot of activity in game, and it can tell you if an old friend is online after months of absense.

So, keep it or lose it?

[Zan]

Definitely keep it.

Why?

Because it is an essential part of online games, you need to be able to see if the friend/enemy you're looking for actually is online. Sure you could say it's not realistic but in reality you don't have to distinguish online from offline. In the real world you'll always know that your best friend is around somewhere ... In planeshift you can think he or she is online and go looking for them for days without any luck because they were logged off.

Hence buddy lists, although not realistic and OOC, are needed in an online environment to avoid frustrations.

[Nividia Stormlance]

And if we removed buddy lists people would yust chat in msn/aol/something other. To se if people were online. So it would yust be stupid to remove the list.

[VMann]

and you could also look for someone with /who <playername>

[Peacer]

  not a good idea, if i am waitning for someone let it be freind or enemy i need to know if they are online or not, thye cna't stay online all the time

[Arangol]

lol it could be something like telepatic-friendhsip. So good friends that you know when they enter the world. And /tell could be telepatic-messages sent over brain waves. 

[zanzibar]

and you could also look for someone with /who <playername>

Which means you'd have to do a search for each and every person that might be of interest.

[LigH]

If you are a "radical roleplayer", keep it empty, and hide the window.

But do not attempt to decide over the opinion of other people who are not such pure roleplayers, and prefer to know the presence of other players. It is everyone's personal opinion to use this feature, or not.

A feature to let a player decide wether he may or may not be added to anyone's buddy list, may be an alternative feature we could talk about - similar to the "invisible" mode of a forum member. Maybe even a feature to decide if you want to be able to receive tells, similar to the feature to decide wether to exchange Personal Messages in a board.

[zanzibar]

Being able to turn tells off?  I like it.  Make a thread in the wish forum. :-D

[Karyuu]

Vengeance just made a big optimization in the buddy list, so people with ~500 names on there (fact) shouldn't be such a strain.

[ou8i8uo]

I have to agree with keeping it. I like to keep my friends close and my enemies closer. It's also handy for setting up RP stuff. If we lost it, I would just end up using Skype to replace it.

[fireofsoul]

Why the heck would anyone in their right mind remove the buddy list?

[neko kyouran]

I believe zanzi answered that in his opening post Fire.  And the best post I have read in this thread to counter it was by Ligh.

[zanzibar]

I have to agree with keeping it. I like to keep my friends close and my enemies closer. It's also handy for setting up RP stuff. If we lost it, I would just end up using Skype to replace it.

Enemies closer?  But OOC, we're all friends here. :-D

[Peacer]

* Peacer nods "ooc almost everyone is friends here, *cough*realism*cough*"

illori is right though, if u don't want the buddy list remove the window and don't put anyone on there, People have a real life to attend to and can't be on planeshift all the time, so it couldn't be expected that they are always in yliakum unless they sleep a lot and can't be woken up because the azure crystal binds them to their sleep untill they are fully sleptoff