Canned Social Metaprefixes

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Serity
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Canned Social Metaprefixes

Post by Serity »

This topic came up in Discord this morning, and Rias has expressed a potential interest in canned social MPFs, but has some concerns, and suggested a thread for feedback:
Serity —
Canned socials are second class citizens without an MPF, because they won't show in separate chat panes or backlogs. For that reason, I often specifically emote out canned socials to ensure certain people see it, especially when traveling.
Rias —
The trouble there becomes deciding which ones are socials and which aren't. Does having any sort of mechanical effect whatsoever exempt it? Or do we have so many qualifying to the point you're pretty much treating the main window as a combat window with 90% of output being filtered elsewhere with the MPF stuff?
Serity —
Are there any mechanical socials where having it display for sure in a backlog would be bad? The only one that immediately comes to mind is enter (portal) though I'm certain there would be more. But I think quite a few people are using backlogs or separate chat panes, and when reviewing, the context of someone nodding vs. shaking their head is pretty important.
Rias —
But then if we're MPFing nearly all output, I feel like that defeats the purpose. Better to filter out the minority you don't want than the majority you do, right? So the question would be: what -don't- you want marked as a social? (And this would make a great BBS thread. And FYI these aren't meant as gotcha questions, I'm not against MPFing more stuff. Just trying to make sure we don't end up MPFing so much that a filter would become over cluttered and less useful)
I think that perhaps the best starting point would be exempting commands if they have any sort of mechanical effect. For example, 'shake' (your head) would be tagged, but 'shake' (target out of mesmerize) would not. Anything whose only output is an echo (including socials that only yourself see like "You smile to yourself in the shadows" or "You smile behind your mask", but excluding failures such as "Glance at who?") would be the best starting point, in my opinion. However, I suspect that many objects or mobs (the cat) are set up to reply to socials, which gives even echo-only socials some mechanical purpose; nonetheless, I think this is the best starting point - though I do acknowledge that it's a lot of developer work to go through every command's echos and there will inevitably be a lot of bug reports about "XYZ does not have social metaprefix".
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Rias
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Re: Canned Social Metaprefixes

Post by Rias »

My starting point is prefixing anything that goes through the standard RP-command-messaging function, which most canned socials run through already. That covers a whole lot in a single place.

The big question though: What should the metaprefix be? I've got it as ::SOCIALS:: on my test server. I figured it would be good to keep it separate from ::EMOTE:: to give individuals more control over what they want to filter where. (I'd probably leave this one turned off while keeping emote/say on, or have it go elsewhere rather than cluttering up my "verbal communications" window.)
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Serity
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Re: Canned Social Metaprefixes

Post by Serity »

Rias wrote: Tue Jun 07, 2022 10:37 amThe big question though: What should the metaprefix be? I've got it as ::SOCIALS:: on my test server. I figured it would be good to keep it separate from ::EMOTE:: to give individuals more control over what they want to filter where.
I agree with that, personally, or perhaps rather ::SOCIAL:: (it's not ::SAYS::, after all). Emotes that people have absolute control over should definitely be distinct from game-ruled socials.
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Re: Canned Social Metaprefixes

Post by Rias »

Serity wrote: Tue Jun 07, 2022 10:42 am perhaps rather ::SOCIAL:: (it's not ::SAYS::, after all).
That was the first thing I went with, but it seemed a little too vague, like "anything social-related" vs "canned social commands." Maybe ::CANNED::? Hee hee
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merin
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Re: Canned Social Metaprefixes

Post by merin »

I don't see a problem with socials, myself. Either way, I'm just throwing support behind this; especially when doing other things and shutting my screen reader up on the regular when I do play, I'll miss people giggling or smiling or what not. Having a whistle sound or a whatever sound to alert me that a social went off--or a buffer--would be so, so helpful. I can already accomplish that with says and emotes, so just having this one would allow me to trigger on the MPF and make sure with a sound I didn't miss the important RP. It would also allow me to idle in the inn and hear when someone waves at me so i can switch to the window and try and start something, or ignore them depending on the day :).
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Re: Canned Social Metaprefixes

Post by Rias »

I had the code for this stashed away for some reason and never got around to actually pushing it. It's pushed live now! Per the changelog:

New metaprefix option: social. When on, the text ::SOCIAL:: will precede the output of canned social commands such as nod, laugh, smile, frown, etc.

If any canned social commands were overlooked and don't have the ::SOCIAL:: metaprefix that should, please report them via the BUG command in-game. Just keep in mind that this metaprefix only applies to canned social commands that give essentially a canned emote output and do nothing else - no mechanical applications. Crafting commands, combat commands, bandaging, etc. all actually do something that has mechanical effects beyond simple fluff text output, and are not considered "socials" despite having potential RP uses.
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