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Entering/Leaving Room Shortdesc Only

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I missed the disguise chat, but I just read the log and I was thinking about disguise meta, smallworlding, and cameras. I think a -lot- of issues surrounding these related topics could be improved if the messages for entering and leaving a room printed only your short description -- so instead of

John (squat guy wearing a red shirt) enters/leaves the room it says A squat guy wearing a red shirt enters/leaves the room.

We do this basically already with motorcycles. I'm not suggesting we stop rooms from displaying the names of the people in it, but it means that you're no longer identifying people in a giant crowd without other information from cameras or through windows, people are able to move through crowded areas where people aren't paying attention with less meta, and also that people will -- by their nature -- be 'looking' at rooms and people more, which means they will be getting actual information about folks from their descriptions rather than just relying on the name.

To be clear, I am -only- suggesting stripping names out of the entering/leaving messages, not anywhere else -- I know there are code issues with having people display in room contents by shortdesc -- but I think losing the 'name' from that message would increase the sense of the world being busy and crowded immensely and cut down on a lot of smallworlding. Given that we're able to do it when people are riding bikes, it seems like it should be relatively easy code-wise to do.

By Pavane at Apr 9, 2021 12:30 PM
I really like this as a compromise decision.
By Rhea at Apr 9, 2021 1:29 PM
I agree with this as well. It is a little immersion breaking for me to have to "not notice" people coming and going because my character doesn't know their name, but the game prints their name in glowing letters for me. I can still separate that in gameplay, but it definitely reminds me of the fourth wall whenever it happens.
By Shieldman at Apr 9, 2021 10:52 PM
Bumping this. I posted about this a few months back right as the bike change was rolling out. I think if all movement didn't display names -- only short-descs -- it would reduce camera meta considerably.
By Pavane at Oct 30, 2021 7:29 PM
It's not necessarily an argument against, but I do find the bike messaging to somewhat clash with how all the other messaging works. The game was designed around unique character IDs and it really shows in that case.

If it were extended to all character movement, we would end up with not knowing what character had entered a room until the room, feed, or character was looked at, which feels kind of spammy in terms of just checking who is present.

By 0x1mm at Oct 30, 2021 11:15 PM
That's sort of the explicit reason for it, 0x1 -- basically every room in the game (especially in the Mix) is extremely crowded. You should be looking at people (or at least 'glancing') in order to identify them. The rules suggest that people's display names don't provide (much) IC info; we should be at least making a token effort to look at someone's description and say 'yeah, that's who I think it is.'

This is most relevant when people are viewing things from afar via IC means or when they are kind of idling -- we should reward people paying attention, rather than using non-IC information (people's names) to draw conclusions.

By Pavane at Oct 30, 2021 11:18 PM
Yeah, agreed with 0x on this. Our system of short descriptions is aight, but it leaves a lot to be desired in terms of being able to effectively identify who is who in a room, as there can be overlap. We almost need a unique identifier to be appended to the shortdesc / name of a disguised person like 'a shrouded short chick [XY1]' where XY1 is the unique identifier. Something that changes every hour (or every time you redisguise). This would help in combat and other situations like when 2 people with the same shortdesc and you don't know which is talking to you.
By Slither at Oct 30, 2021 11:18 PM
To be clear, Slither, I am not suggesting that the people -in the room- be identified only by shortdesc. I think that's a bridge too far. Just the entry/exit messages. Cameras, especially, are my target here.
By Pavane at Oct 30, 2021 11:19 PM
Using the bike message comparison doesn't provide full context until you know that the bike message used to just be the bike moving by. It didn't include the rider. The messaging including the short description was a compromise.

I think making it so it only shows a short description without a display name by default is going too far for common room entrances. People can already hide their display names in a number of ways, even something as basic as an autostyler.

The extra spam would be annoying, and the truth is that while small-worlding is something we avoid if a person doesn't want to be identified, there are plenty of options to avoid being identified. If you don't want your display name to be seen on a camera, there's a host of tools available to you. Use them.

By crashdown at Oct 30, 2021 11:21 PM
To address Pavane's concerns, I think it's important to note here that cameras are easily thwarted with zero skill if you know what to do.
By ReeferMadness at Oct 30, 2021 11:23 PM
I was more speaking in general. We already identify disguised people just by the disguise shortdesc, and that is not unique which makes it annoying to deal with multiple disguised people with the same shortdesc.

The same issue goes for people entering rooms. If 5 short men walk into a room it's difficult to understand who is who.

Generally speaking I don't think we can solve this specific problem until we figure out how to improve the system overall.

By Slither at Oct 30, 2021 11:24 PM
'Bumping this. I posted about this a few months back right as the bike change was rolling out. I think if all movement didn't display names -- only short-descs -- it would reduce camera meta considerably. '

This is a concern I've been stewing on for months and never felt sure about bringing up. Not so much that this should apply to moving through rooms live because I do think spamming the 'l' command more than I already do would be hell, but characters should absolutely be reduced to their shortdescs on camera feeds to lessen the impulse to be meta. There's no way you'd realistically be able to identify someone on a crowded street through a camera so easily, we should have to recognize their appearance, clothing, voice etc.

By Nymphali at Oct 30, 2021 11:30 PM
It implies there is a mechanical difference between looking at a feed or room (which would show a character ID) and room or feed messaging (which would as suggested only show a shortdesc), which doesn't really make any sense to me.
By 0x1mm at Oct 30, 2021 11:31 PM
While I don't think it's necessarily viable or should be prioritized in any way, I have also stewed on this for a considerable amount of time concerning an implementation that makes sense but is also seamless without the monotony of memory code, aliases, or countless other identity management interpretations.

Hypothetically, if the moo could capture who you directly look at and pose at to a direct quantity then say query that when cameras, motorcycles, disguises, and other instances of absconded vision come into play - it might provide a suitable way to identify known vs unknown without isolating newbies and other PCs on the street making moves.

As for the problem with nine million shrouded goat ninjas in-person, I always enjoyed the risk and opportunity to exploit anonymity in a crowd. Making the wrong assumption, passing the wrong data, shooting the wrong baka, etc. It all makes the dome go around.

By ReeferMadness at Oct 30, 2021 11:53 PM
To the people complaining that "look" is spammy, remember that "gl people" is less spammy and gives you a complete list of everyone in the room.

If display name wasn't required to be a character's real name, and could be just some code name like Trotter or Adair, that might reduce a lot of meta.

By alittlelonger at Nov 1, 2021 2:23 PM
One thing I worry about here is if we are in a rabbit hole with this topic of preventing meta/small worlding in general, using code. We've made so many changes and improvements in the past few years around disguise and appearance-- is this really the issue we want to be spending limited coder time on? Would it be great to deal with this? Yes! Could RP solutions and people using sneak more, or disabling cameras through ic means solve this problem-- maybe?

The thing with this is-- we would need a dual system. If the camera is located in a high traffic area (a street) we would want to use short desc. If it was located in a low traffic area (corp, apartment floor landing, etc) we would want to show name or at least more info. You can't look at someone with a camera they way you can if you are there. Maybe we need a system for that? What about someone who truly stands out because of their manner of dress or them being super famous? It's never going to be a perfect system of course.

Is this a priority? I dunno. I rely on players to tell me if something is really being abused or if it's just a nice to have.

By Slither at Nov 1, 2021 8:34 PM
I'll start off that I don't want to see this introduced just to be transparent.

It's of my personal opinion that there's so many ways to avoid being seen by your display bit name on camera that this isn't necessary. Appearance, which can be done on the fly, disguise items - even just one, autostylers, sneak, disable cameras through multiple ways (and some for incredibly cheap). If you don't want to be seen by a camera, you can avoid it in almost every circumstance.

Unless there was code introduced to look at people through a camera, I'm just not in favor of doing this and I don't think it helps the world. Smallworlding and metaing are bad, but you've got to give people some chance at recognizing the people on a feed if they don't go to any measures themselves to prevent it.

By crashdown at Nov 1, 2021 8:50 PM
If there's no way to identify someone you are looking at through a camera feed, camera feeds are essentially useless, in my opinion.
By batko at Nov 1, 2021 8:52 PM
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