Merchant Archive
Thread: Request: Able to 'mute' merchant droids
I'm betting it would be hard for them to program a 'no macro zone'. It's probably easier to make it a 'no speaking zone'. That might have some merits too though
DesktopSaki wrote:
Anyone who's going to ignore barker droids isn't going to buy from spammers anyway, probably, so at least let those people go by in peace.
Your saying people won't buy from a 'Barker Droid' Merchant? or just the ones that ignore the spam? I am confused. I personally think it adds atmosphere to my visit to the busy NPC cities. Ever been to a major city in RL and not been 'hassled' by someone trying to sell you something?
Barker Droids are well worth the 15sp IMO. I can see the days I use it and the daysI don't. Based on previous experience, macro spamming your shop location def doesn't work anywhere near aswell as the Droid. And the droid is less 'Offensive' 128 characters every 60 seconds - whats wrong with that?
Crustyfur wrote:
DesktopSaki wrote:
Anyone who's going to ignore barker droids isn't going to buy from spammers anyway, probably, so at least let those people go by in peace.
Your saying people won't buy from a 'Barker Droid' Merchant? or just the ones that ignore the spam? I am confused. I personally think it adds atmosphere to my visit to the busy NPC cities. Ever been to a major city in RL and not been 'hassled' by someone trying to sell you something?
Barker Droids are well worth the 15sp IMO. I can see the days I use it and the daysI don't. Based on previous experience, macro spamming your shop location def doesn't work anywhere near aswell as the Droid. And the droid is less 'Offensive' 128 characters every 60 seconds - whats wrong with that?
Sorry, I wasn't clear. Most people who would mute the droid would do so because they don't want to buy anything, and don't want to hear ads. So those players are not your target audience anyway.
Barker droids can be effective, sure, but I simply think that if we can mute AFKers, we should be able to mute barker droids, too. Or if I have someone on ignore, it mutes their droid as well. Hey, I'd be happy with that, even.
Once every sixty seconds can still be annoying to some people. If they fix the store bug, then we might wind up with ten barker droids per starport, and that's one line every six seconds. That's a lot of spam that you can't contol or ignore. So, I don't see why we can't give them the option to mute the droids is all. It won't make or break our profession.
On the other side of the coin, I think 128 characters is short. Go figure!
Then again, I also want to sic a rabid Durni on anyone who says, "kum shop @ my maul." (If they only had to type it once, you'd think they'd get it right! 
)
Message Edited by Yogol on 02-19-2005 11:45 PM
Smart_Darwin wrote:
There are lots of things that are annoying in this game. After reading various profession threads its seems reasonable to conclude that everything that annoys me personally should be changed. At the same time I am entitled to more of the stuff I enjoy, other players can eat it! The idea of turning out barker droids if but another example of this.
I simply don't see why our profession should let us get around filters. Should someone with Master Politician be able to override ignore filters in /shout?
Not without putting their skill point costs back in
Smart_Darwin wrote:
Desktop, I apologize for being a bit to agressive in my earlierpost (not enough sleep). You do raise a legitimate concern. Spamming is unpleasant for both the sender and the recipient. My point is that we don't have a decent alternative option: Allowing an easy mechanism for filtering out advertising poses an undue burden on the merchant profession.
The burden is already there. The fact that shouting in starports and having droids that override ignore filters are the only way to efficiently advertise shows us that. Hopefully the next Merchant upgrade will make it so spamming is no longer needed--it'll be something that will let people choose whether or not to be exposed to the ads.
Not that spam will ever stop unless it's outlawed. After all, we have the /auction channel, but it hasn't made a dent, despite being better than shouting--it's global, not local, and you can chose to filter it to another tab and never see it. (Maybe that's a solution, too--Merchants, as a whole, agree to move to the channel. Transition it by having macros also/shout, "See my goods in the /auction channel" for a while, then cutting that out completely. Best part: you can do it from anywhere on the planet. You can advertise while being in your shop or crafting.)
But if it can be cut back on in any way, the better I say. It shows that the profession is strong enough we don't have to stand and shout, just like the guy who doesn't even have Novice Artisan.
I ask that before seriously considering taking from one class of players, the SWG community explore ways to solve current unpleasantness in a "give and take" nature.
I'm a Ranger who's favorite weapon is a Carbine. I know all about giving and taking.
Given the likelyhood of an actual fix from the developent team, perhaps we can consider some self-policing. Let us discover what exactly is annyoing about merchant barking. Is it the frequency of the messages, thier repetitive nature, or is it simply the fact that they exsist? I suspect the answer lies somewhere in between... When my toon barks, I make sure the message is unique, informative, current and lends an element to roleplaying to the game. In this way I hope to add value for the recipient of my message above and beyond conveying what I belive is useful information for some of them. I also make sure to include plenty of pauses in between each message and in between the marco loops, so as to reduce my messages impact on other players chat windows. I know many other players do not do this, but also know of several who do the same. I know that there are some that will place me on thier ignore list despite my efforts, but I also have evidence that my messages have been useful to many. I do not belive that we should so lightly consider removing a benefit from some players for the benefit of other players.
Plenty ofpauses, a LEGIBLE and READABLE message, taking only one line to put up your ad and having good, truthful information are all good things. They show that not only do you care enough to look professional, you care enough about the surroundings to not overwhelm them with spam.
As for the rest, see above. I also have to question if the benefit is greater for us or for the players--that's one I can't answer, but is still worth thinking about.
Message Edited by DesktopSaki on 02-21-2005 06:28 PM
Switch your chat to GroupChat or another chat outside Spacial and you won't see a single Yell or Barker Droid message. (uhh.. unless you're putting it on Market)
In real life you can't /ignore advertisements, you just learn to ignore them. I've learned to ignore Yells and barker droids quite well without /ignoring them.