Suggestion: Player-modifiable status indicator and/or text

[MimeRifle]

Apologies in advance if this idea or variant has been hashed and re-hashed. Trying to avoid that, I searched several phrases I would expect to be used and saw a couple of conversations back in June of this year making similar suggestions and didn't see much follow up to it.

I think it would be really helpful to have a presence/status indicator and/or status text that a player could assign to their character while online. Similar to IM clients work. It wouldn't necessarily have to be visible on the toon, though a great suggestion was made back in June that the little X,O,triangle vanity icons could be made to "mean" something, simpler yet a red/green dot hovering near the toon would work.

In order of preference my suggestions for Character Status indicators would be:

1. A short status message (preferably with a timestamp showing when it was updated) the player can set that would be visible on their Avatar screen. With no additional features, this could be used to communicate anything from "AFK for a few min" to "Looking for a party to run such-and-such campaign" to "Interested in buying item xyz."
2. Having #1 accessible from the friend/guild list somehow would be awesome (as you can't reach the avatar from there).
3. Visible presence indicator perhaps with a few stock statuses to toggle. (red/green light, maybe "available", "no not disturb", "AFK", etc.) Again - the message could serve that purpose pretty well also, but maybe some designs would be more technically feasible than others.

I beg your pardon if this was redundant. Interested to hear how realistic this idea is and what other players' thoughts are on it. Be well! :D

[drewcapu]

I used to use the X Play vanity to indicate I wasn't around, but I don't think that ever really caught on.

Whatever the implementation is, it would really have to be seen not only when you're standing next to the person, but also via the Friends List since the most common time people will message me when I'm not around is when I'm not in the same map as them.

With that in mind, I think the "lights" method works well. You can have status loadouts where you pick your status indicators along with a brief message to attach to the loadout. Such statuses would only be seen when mouseovering a status light (whether from FL or next to name in Towne).

There should be a specific status that is automatically given when someone is actually in a map doing a run and also perhaps another one if someone is on a PVP/CTF map, just so that you can tell right away that someone is around, but might not necessarily be open to a barrage of PMs.

[CanonicalKoi]

Something to indicate "afk" would be nice--a red dot on the opposite end of the player name from the guild indicator, maybe? I guess that'd work equally well for "DnD" and "Hi! I'm anti-social today. Speak to me at your peril." It might help with the, "I sent a PM/invite/guild invite/whatever and you never answered!" problem. Hmmm....or a lighted "Out of Service" banner above your head? ;)

I'm kidding about the last, obviously. But some sort of indicator that you're having an "out of char body" moment would be nice. Good idea, Higgins!

[MimeRifle]

Thanks for the thanks Veronica! I do value politeness, and as a GM also like my guildies to feel I'm "there" for them when they want to talk to me. Currently, unless I'm at the controls, I try to log off so people aren't expecting replies from me they won't get (and possibly thinking I'm just ignoring them) which isn't as smooth as it could be. Hopefully the idea gets some consideration. :)

[Skeletonlord]

Good idea