More importatly... will the update cause the amout of chaos the LAST one caused?
To answer some of these questions, here's an article by Talzhemir.
Yes, I said Talzhemir.
Alas, it's programmer-ese for, "Warning: Unfinished game ahead. MANY things you encounter are unfinished". I understand it's frustrating, and trust me, I'm not unfamiliar with problems. I spend alot of time in different places of Furcadia, as different inconspicuous alts. There's a lot of "wizard" powers that we don't possess, on principle, with the deliberate result that we are subject to all the grievances that other players are. (There is one exception: I can delete Dreams, and so, I can delete my own at will. If I'm around, and you want your own deleted, I'll gladly help you with that. And, yes, of course we're going to code it so that Dream owners can do that themselves.)
If we don't respond to a complaint, it's never that we don't know or don't care. Far from it. It's that we generally have a bigger plan which, when followed, will lead to the correction of the cause, for which the complaint was just a symptom. And it's not that we aren't fixing these things. We are. It's just that you're not necessarily talking about mere miswritten code. You're talking about large amounts of code that have yet to be written.
We don't call these "bugs", we call them "caterpillars". That is, homely and horrible creeping things which, we are confident, will be transformed into wholesome nice butterflies, given the normal course of our work. If we had put little fixes in to make the caterpillars less unpleasant, we would be only a third as far as we are now. Taking out those temporary kluges is very hazardous-- even though we're careful, it spawns more bugs, which cause even more delays. We chose to go with "open alpha", that is, letting everyone play, even knowing that there might be "pitfalls". We're painfully aware, for example, that Furcadia is old enough to enter kindergarten, yet it doesn't yet have what my design documents refer to as tools for "asynchronous communications and self-organization", a.k.a. in-game messaging and chat channels run by furres. These are all "caterpillars".
Dream placement is another good example of a caterpillar, a fairly complex one.
1. "Dreams interfere with IC interaction."
The original plan was for all Furcadia Dreams to be uploaded to "dream pads". That was dropped four years ago, by popular demand. The accusation that we don't listen to what players want, is unfounded. I suggested that Dreams not be uploadable within 3 tiles of each other. That would have required a major rewrite, so it wasn't done. This is the same reason we don't have Dragonspeak that plays sound effects or a MIDI to everyone within N spaces of the triggering Furre, for example.
2. "Talz's Way"
I'm very much an advocate of "Play the way YOU want to," and I'm surprised how often I'm characterized as wanting everyone to play some certain way. I wrote what I wrote, in detail, for a large number of furres who *asked* me to give them one specific way to play. That writing has undergone significant development and I'm not done yet. What I wrote was probably too complicated for most serious RPers, and there were lots of complaints that it didn't revolve around statistics (like AD&D). I changed it to be more that way, in response to the overwhelming majority of requests.
About two years ago, Goldwyn was added, and its entrance placed far from the entry to Imaginarium. Its "restrictive" nature was, again, in response to the overwhelming vox populi (voice o' the people) that it not permit (yes, NOT PERMIT) the wierder character types individuals invented. Although Furcadia is hardly a democracy, what furres want does influence us in major, tangible ways.
In this case, what furres requested turned out not to be what they would actually use. Thus, Goldwyn's entry instructions have been rewritten, removing the ban on non "canon" character types and high-powered characters. I'm sure there will be alot of complaints from individuals against other individuals, and alot of unfortunate slinging of the word "twink". I don't see a way to compromise between having an anything-goes IC region and an area with more rules. (Having official staff monitor it to make furres "play right", though,as I am often asked to do, is still out of the question.) All I will do is remind folks, please, remember Furcadia has all levels of experience, age, and maturity, and you should have realistic expectations.
There was, at this time, no reconnect-at-logoff-point, a VERY serious problem with trying to Roleplay. We moved the entrance to Goldwyn near to the entrance of Imaginarium. I wrote Felorin a note asking that its entry text be changed to something less restrictive. That didn't happen; the chore was lost, buried under the work he was doing to allow more Furres to connect, and more Dream Servers. So that was an ordinary bug. That should be fixed within one day. The current Goldwyn text won't say anything about how to play, except these two things:
(1) Keep OOC comments to whispers (so that the IC feeling isn't damaged) and
(2) The Consent Rule (because we have no time to make sure every player has read and agreed to ANY special RP rules, and we have no time to be Storytellers/Judges)
For those who like dice and character sheets, the Furre! game continues to be written. I'll even be adding in a new section, called the Furcadian Bestiary, which will feature BMP graphics and write-ups and stats for the many as-yet-undiscussed monsters of the Dragonlands. Again, this is for those who *like* this particular style of gaming.
3. "Furcadia only listens to Guilds."
I promote Guilds not because I want to discriminate against individuals, but because I know at least ten furres found them worthwhile. I don't think it's unfair to limit web links from the official web page or the announcement of events on the opening screen this way. We have a limited resource, and you have limited time and attention. We go with what we think are the best bets.
It's my opinion that smooth RP takes FAR more rules than most furres assume, and if one wants "serendipitous" (casual, spontaneously occurring) roleplay, then one has to relax their standards. My documents are not "how I want others to play", though. They're ideas that I know from experience happen to work very well.
I rewrote the "Ethics" document a week ago. If you happen to disagree with what I wrote, well, that's exactly why I think you should negotiate beforehand what standards YOU want others to follow. And the easiest way to publicize those standards happens to be a Guild. Perhaps you think that players should vote on what standards to follow? Another reason to form a Guild.
www.furcadia.com/pixel/dragon/ethics.htm
I don't think it's that hard to form a Guild. But, sometimes, being an OOC leader in Furcadia is a matter of luck, not skill. You have to be the one whose ideas happen to be what a group of others want or can agree to. If what you want is not what alot of them want, you are out of luck. The SKILL of being a leader comes into play in two places: finding out what others want and explaining to others why they should agree with what you want. On Furcadia, you generally don't get the time to explain what is great about the way you want things to be. I recommend writing up Charters, and, if you aren't sure if that is what people want, also write in what procedure there is for *changing* it. (The Constitution had amendments; so can your Charter.)
4. "This is the only way we can be heard."
I used to read and write regularly on Kinetic Sage's board. Unfortunately, he had RL matters and stopped running it, and I have alot less time than I did then. I agree that being in a Guild helps you have a voice. Dragon's Eye Productions is small, and you outnumber us perhaps 8000 to 1. Please be kind, and understand we have precious little time to hear suggestions from individuals.
Emerald Flame has done an excellent job and continues to do it, organizing the Beekins. Through them, we do hear alot of your concerns.
Did you notice that furcadia.com has buttons for Forums and Community? We know they aren't active yet! Ciro and the other Web Beekins are definitely working on having places to be heard. But keep reading/posting here and other places, too.
5. "It's unfair that Guilds can place their Dreams anywhere they want."
Keeping a Dream up on a daily basis like Guilds do, is a considerable chore. Furres expect Guild Dreams to be in certain places, unlike regular Dreams. Giving them special spots is something they earned. *Any* Dream that has ten regular attendees can get this, by getting Chartered. Ten, that's not that many, is it? The only thing a Guild's web page needs to contain is their Charter. We provide forms to help you create the Charter. Communities.msn.com, Bravenet.com, Ezboard, and countless others offer free web space. I don't think that's asking too much in exchange for 24/7 support from Guardians (Owsla).
When you see the Dream spots have filled up, please keep in mind, we consider these symptoms of a bigger "cause" which is, "Not Enough Dream Servers" and "Not Enough Places to Upload". The havoc of October 31, 2001, all day, was the unfortunate result of Felorin trying to add more Dream Servers, and it turned out to be trickier than he thought-- he was not able to add more. This means that we will be working EVEN HARDER to get the Update out, and it will have more Dream Servers, amongst many other treats.
Now I'll have to be blunt: Players don't quite have "rights" in Furcadia. "By downloading Furcadia and connecting, you agree that Furcadia is not a public forum." But you *are* our honored guests, and patrons, and as long as you treat other guests/patrons well, you remain welcome in what we've come to think of as the home of a living, growing community.
Furcadia functions on five underlying principles:
1.) Don't be annoying.
2.) Don't be too easily annoyed. (See "have realistic expectations" above.)
3.) You're amongst friends.
4.) We'll try to fix it.
I considered adding a fifth, which was, "If we can't fix it, we'll tell you why," but I realized, I usually don't have the time to explain things like I just have. So, I just ask, please be understanding, and trust us. We've put our best paw forward for six years, and every Update's been better than the last. We know, the best is yet to come.
Reporters, photographers and columnists are needed for The Furry News.