German PlaneShift Community and "spoilers"

[Karyuu]

If someone absolutely needs a spoiler, can you not send them a PM with the info? There is no good reason to make a public post with the information available to any Joe Shmoe to see. I understand the sheer amount of work involved in taking care of a community and helping newbies - but there are ways to do that, that make everyone happy.

[Under the moon]

* Under the moon starts pondering more quests that can not be ruined by spoiler walkthroughs.

If anyone has a walkthrough on their site for a certain secret set of quests to get into a certain secret dark area, I will be -sorely- disappointed in both the person who posted it and the people who read it. A little help on parts of a quest that should work, but don't after 20 questions is OK (but then REPORT what answers you tried), but I despise complete walkthroughs. I don't write quests so people can read ahead and pick the 'best' ending.

* Under the moon grins evilly as he walks off.

[Xillix Queen of Fools]

To me spoilers that give the answer and take out any unintended "guess work" make it the case that questing system will not improve.

To me there is NO QUESTION OF THE TRUTH OF THIS STATEMENT.

We have provided you as TESTERS all the means needed to make the game better with us.

If testers continue to view the game as complete and use spoilers to find some obscure answers that one person found along the way and posted to a spoiler forum settings will NEVER KNOW that there is a problem.

If an individual says the npcs are stupid they can blame the failure of testers to test and grant the needed feedback, we have bent over backwards seeking more triggers for you and entered many thousands of new entries in response to what testers who have what I consider a more ethical approach to PlaneShift have offered us.

Spoilers are also an enemy of honestly roleplaying one's character as they provide the player a chance to min/max their approach for the best outcome without regard to who their character is.

[caveman42]

First, I'd like thank the original poster for posting this site.  I was just logging on to the forums to maybe post something looking for German players.  I am learning German slowly and conversation with native speakers would help.  So yes, no matter what your motivation was for posting the link, I am grateful and am bookmarking the site.

As to the Spoiler idea: Is it possible to consider more of a middle ground with the spoilers?  It is very frustrating to work part way through a quest, to dedicate time and effort to the quest only to be defeated by an NPC that won't understand the concept that you are furiously typing at it.  Perhaps if there was an ingame command like /bug <quest> <npc> <description> <other relevent information> where a player could submit a report about issues like these, then fire up the browser and find a workable solution so they can finish the quest instead of becoming annoyed and giving up. 

Now before I get flamed, I am very new to the game and haven't discovered all of the features yet, so please, if this already is a feature, if you wouldn't mind politely correcting me I would appreciate it.

I'm not suggesting this because I think that I know better than anyone else, I'm simply trying to see if there can be some sort of a win win combination.  I do realize that the game is still in testing and I plan on trying to break as many things as I can possibly figure out how to 

Thanks,
Caveman

[Taniquetil]

In a case like what you said, caveman, it always helps me to:

1. use the help tab and
2. calmly state the problem
3. state what you have already tried
4. politely ask for help
5. wait patiently for an answer

i promise you it works

[Fyre]

I fail to see what the great transgression is in all this.  It's hard to believe that anyone questing in Yliakum has not had clues spelled out to them, whether in dialogue or (mostly) through guilds.  The real problem is the nature of the quests themselves....they simply are not logic based.  Some of the correct dialogue needed for solving is so remote, so impossible to guess without assistance, that making a big deal over any 'spoiler' seems foolish to me.  It's acceptable to help a friend online or to 'secretly' offer them the answer in a password protected guild website, but a grave transgression if it's published in a public forum?  I fail to see any difference, except that the newcomer without a support system does not stand a chance with many quests.  Perhaps if all quests could be reasoned purely with logic and clues, then there would be some validity in withholding 'spoilers'

The only positive aspect with the system as it is might be that newcomers are forced to converse with others and hope for assistance from them.  Just my take.

[Jeraphon]

Some of the correct dialogue needed for solving is so remote, so impossible to guess without assistance, that making a big deal over any 'spoiler' seems foolish to me.

Provide Rizin with some examples. Watch what happens. Be part of the solution: don't proliferate what you see as a problem.

Heck, provide US with some examples. I'd love to see what you consider illogical.

[Nikodemus]

It is indeed so much true that most people using spoilers aren't helping making the quests better. Ideally you should report every phrase you tried before you tried the spoiler. And since this is kind of testing phase, spoilers are even justified, because you can go on with the quest and have possibility to report other phrases, which didn't work before the flustration eat you alive. But then again, no full quests spoleirs, only one time separate phrases. If you are smart and can use full quest spoilers the same you would do with the one time ones and help devs same as good, then congratulations, but you are in the minority.
But as i see it, people aren't really reporting. Exactly the same way as you read wikipedia, but you don't contribute I don't.
Although i really don't know how exactly the system with logging everything what players ask and NPCs don't understand works, but i'm of oppinion it should work better than players going to bug tracker and preparing whole bug report for a single thing, couple of phrases.
Although devs probably have the same amount of work, players don't have to do anything at all. Our time is precious too, everyone values their time.

[Dajoji]

You don't even need to leave the game to report a quest problem. Filing a petition or contacting a GM is enough. GMs will test and forward the problem to Settings, be it through the BT or on IRC. The thing is some players do the quests only because of the rewards and like Xillix pointed out, that is a "finished game"/"power quester" mentality and has little to do with a RPG in development, so if people with that mentality protest and leave the game frustrated, so be it. Let them come back when the game is finished.

So, if you want to use spoilers go ahead. Knock yourself out. All the devs are asking is that you do not share them through public sites. They put a lot of work into creating new content for the game and the least you could do is show a little respect for that. Don't blur out the punchline of a joke someone else is telling. It's rude and kills all the fun.

[Kaityra]

Provide Rizin with some examples. Watch what happens. Be part of the solution: don't proliferate what you see as a problem.

Heck, provide US with some examples. I'd love to see what you consider illogical.

Well, I think before one starts to work on specific examples one should work on the basics first as they tend to solve a lot of the examples. And the basic of the quest system in Planeshift is the communication with the NPC. If an NPC mentions a person, an item, a place, etc, one should be allowed to tell the NPC "tell me about <[person|item|place|...]>". This is the most frustrating part at the moment. An NPC tells you something and you ask about it but you will recieve a "Could you rephrase, please" way too often. Use this mechanism to give more informations about a quest and I promise that spoilers lessen in no time.
So here is the task that will keep Rizin or any other Dev busy for the next ten years: Rework every quest-NPC in the game to allow them to answer to the things they mention.

But I guess it doesn't need me to point out these obvious things.

[Dajoji]

How about we start with one of the quests you got frustrated with? What Jeraphon is saying is that players who find inconsistencies should specify where and when they occur. So, instead of comfortably saying "do it all over" again. How about you provide us with a more specific course of action such as: "In quest <Quest Name> by <NPC1>, he tells you to look for <NPC2> but when you ask him "about <NPC2>, they say they don't understand".

You can report this on the bug tracker, in-game contacting a GM, or here. But then some players just won't bother. It's easier to complain about everything.

[Nikodemus]

Hehe, there is that skill of finding out valuable information out of what other people write. Getting it out of this what isn't very constructive or personal input. If you can't do it, you probably fail to see the point or feel offended. I have experienced it from both sides.
In other words, Dajoji, Kaityra clearly wrote what is the problem.

And the basic of the quest system in Planeshift is the communication with the NPC. If an NPC mentions a person, an item, a place, etc, one should be allowed to tell the NPC "tell me about <[person|item|place|...]>". This is the most frustrating part at the moment.

There you have it.

Of course players can go on reporting it all to Jeraphon.... But if i was a dev, i'm not sure, but i would probably periodically go through different npcs, see what they talk about and write answers as Kaityra pointed out and i would be busy as hell.

And i will add yet another time. group npcs, write answers for things many NPCs should kow about and let multiple NPCs repeat the same message.

[Dajoji]

My point is that saying "all of them are wrong, review all NPC dialogues" does little to solve the problem. If the players share their experience and report what they think is wrong in specific cases (not only directly to devs but through all the means available and already stated), it will be a lot quicker. But when there are spoilers out there and players don't need to test different answers, that feedback is lost. They may never realize there is a problem with the quest or NPC.

[Kaityra]

Hehe, there is that skill of finding out valuable information out of what other people write.

Well, my English teacher used to call this skill "close reading" but I'm not even sure if this expression really exists in English. Just read what is written and not want you want to hear or read.

@Dajoji

Just complaining about everything would have been: "The quest system is a piece of s..." But that was not what I did. I gave a sound suggestion on how to improve things but players can't help this game of they are not listened to.

[neko kyouran]

If players weren't listened to, then there would be no public forums.  Re-think your statement please.