Guild Wars 2

Here’s the question: Does ArenaNet care about players’ current lack of privacy control options?

I’ve previously posted about the broken invisible mode (with no response), but this post covers a broader scale. Here are the things I cannot do in GW2 that I can do in other MMO games:

1. Login as invisible. It’s also broken in that it reveals online activity even while invisible:

• Location updates on mutual friends list or guild roster
• Player name changes/updates to mutual friends and some guild window functions (MOTD, I think)
• Forgetting to leave a party before going “invisible” reveals any new characters I switch to

2. Consent to other players tracking my online status. Anyone can add me to their friends list and see if I’m online.

3. Have my alt/inter-guild activity protected. I can understand the purpose of being able to represent different guilds easily, but if I want to represent a certain guild, why does every other guild need to know that I’ve done so? And why do they need to know if I’ve created an alt that I want nothing to do with their guilds? Even if invisible mode were fixed, it still wouldn’t solve this problem. This could be fixed easily by showing non-representing players as offline.

Let me make some analogies. Here are some things the current privacy functions are like:

• Tweeting my location at any given time even if I don’t want that to happen. I should have control over my tweets, and not have them sent out automatically if I don’t want them to. Currently, it’s almost like wearing a GPS tag/collar.
• Being a celebrity without the fame or money. If I wanted people to follow me without my consent, I’d be a movie star.
• Calling up Friends Group A to let them know I’m going to hang out with Group B, even if they had nothing at all to do with Group B — separation of interests.
• Letting my parents know I’m going to be in town, but I’m not going to visit them. If I go somewhere, it’s my choice to let people know, even if they’re supposed friends or family. And like it or not, there are people who will get a little hurt or offended if they know I’m choosing not to be with them even though I might be busy.

Here are some solutions I’ve come up with:

• Removing real-life friends from my friends list because it shares more info than I’d like.
• Not joining multiple guilds (even though I want to) because of above scenarios.
• Choosing not to play even though I want to, because I’d have to first login as visible.
• Buying another account. Is this really the extreme I have to take?

So is this not seen as a serious issue? What was ANet’s intention in designing the friends and guild functions the way they are? It seems to me this causes more problems than it solves. We can’t keep our social groups separate.

If it is in fact ANet’s will to decide for players what information they’ll share, will we at least get a fully-functioning invisible mode? That still wouldn’t solve the problem of inter-guild visibility while playing as “online” but at least it’s something. And before someone makes the comparison, this isn’t GW1 — very different scope, gameplay, playerbase, and different guild functions.

I may be the most vocal person about this, but that doesn’t mean others don’t care or that this isn’t important.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised at the number of replies. Sure would’ve been nice to at least receive a courtesy reply though! It’d be nice to know sooner rather than later if I’m going to have to buy multiple accounts in order to have privacy, or will inter-account character transfers be allowed or purchasable at some point?

Here are some comments from other people on another message board that’s heavily unmoderated, so people tend to speak their mind. None of these replies are from me, but believe what you will. I copied the replies into a pseudo-threaded image format.

Ignore any highlighting and colors; those are just from the board formatting. I’ve also censored some of the words in case it terribly offends anyone.

https://www.box.com/shared/static/a9cdszqszpl27p2hmxdt.png

Edit: I don’t know what forum improvements you folks have planned, but if a public dev/bug tracker is out of the question, maybe at least a way for mods/devs to mark threads to acknowledge that a particular issue is being looked at? It’s not like anyone needs to be coddled, but it’d be nice to know something’s not being ignored simply because more players are crying about not two-shotting people with pistol whip anymore.

Don’t even know where to start – are you trying to eliminate the multiplayer aspect of an mmo ? It’s a social game, a whole bunch of us enjoys the very tools you find invading your privacy. Why would you want to hide? Why would you not want people to be able to contact you, why would you not want to see where your friends are? As a guild leader, why would you not want to see which members are representing your guild, which ones you can count on most, which one actually contribute to the community?

Do you have a tendency of making multiple commitments at the same time then randomly choosing what to do based on what will benefit you the most at a particular moment? Can’t really thing of any other reason one would want to constantly hide.

It’s a game. You are free to do what you please, in a company that you find suitable, or even alone. You do not need to hide in order to do that. Those tools are there to help people socialize.

Most guilds out there only care if you represent them when you are actively participating in a guild event, which makes perfect sense – you receive something, you give something in return. Yes, there are some that require you to have all your toons in their establishment, and that is fine as well, you do not need to be a part of a guild, whose rules do not suit you. Some people are happy to form a tight community, if you aren’t, don’t:) People really have better things to do in game then spy on others lol.

The information provided is there for our benefit. As a GM, you glance at the roster and within couple of minutes, you know how many members are online, how many are engaged in activities with another group, how many can be contacted, and how many you can potentially count on for your guild activity. It’s great.

If you are flagged as not representing my guild at a particular time, I assume you are having fun elsewhere and simply take that into consideration when planning. If you are constantly flagged as representing some other group, you’re obviously enjoying whatever they may be doing more, great for you, we move on

You are taking this way to seriously.

Can’t agree more, especially on point 3.

@Alverad
Your first paragraph is simply … well, let’s just say your whole comment contains only one thoughtful, valid statement.

If you are flagged as not representing my guild at a particular time, I assume you are having fun elsewhere and simply take that into consideration when planning. If you are constantly flagged as representing some other group, you’re obviously enjoying whatever they may be doing more, great for you, we move on

This could be achieved completely without the instant, persistent notification of you not representing a guild currently. For example, the percentage (or flat value) of your time you represented the guild, updated weekly.
As it is now by many guilds (that aren’t just a amorphous pool of randomly recruited players) you are nagged at, threatened and even kicked if you stop representing them for a few days or even hours, despite your general commitment to the guild.

Alverad.3167:

Don’t even know where to start – are you trying to eliminate the multiplayer aspect of an mmo ? It’s a social game, a whole bunch of us enjoys the very tools you find invading your privacy. Why would you want to hide? Why would you not want people to be able to contact you, why would you not want to see where your friends are? As a guild leader, why would you not want to see which members are representing your guild, which ones you can count on most, which one actually contribute to the community?

OP gave many reasons and scenarios in which, from their perspective, they want to have the option to not advertise their presence or activity. Did you not read his whole post?

There’s nothing wrong with friends being able to know what other friends are up to or what other guild members in a guild are doing, so long as those other friends and members want you to know. The issue is that being a part of these groups forces you to offer up information that you don’t always want to share. Part of why they do this is because the systems for feigning inactivity don’t completely prevent information when they’re asked to do so, in a sense (offline mode).

It’s a game. You are free to do what you please, in a company that you find suitable, or even alone. You do not need to hide in order to do that. Those tools are there to help people socialize.

Perhaps you don’t understand why it’s important to some people that they have control over their personal information and activity.

These systems, while fulfilling their function of helping people socialize, can’t be switched off at a user’s whim. As such, they encourage and almost force some players to socialize in order to use them, the only alternative being to not use them at all. These things need to facilitate and not force socializing, and should give real control to its users about who knows what they’re up to and who doesn’t.

I really don’t think he’s taking it too seriously. Why’s optional privacy too much to ask for? Do you really have to play with or talk to others every moment you’re on the game, with them able to track you?

I love my guild, the two owners have been friends of mine for over a decade, but sometimes I just want to, say, pop in and check the TP or do something I’d forgotten to previously, get it out of the way, and get back off again without getting caught up in a conversation or group play. I don’t see how people knowing I’m changing characters when I’m supposed to be invisible just to do something for five minutes is “helping people socialize.”

Was going to be with Alverad on this at first. But thinking about it a bit more, I believe I can see some reasoning here. I don’t think there is any reason for the “xx is online” before they are actually completely in game on a character. Also I can agree to invisible/offline mode actually make you not visible to others. Reasons for ever wanting this can vary, and I think it will happen for a lot of people, that they just wanna play alone for a bit.
As for representing or not representing guilds… personally I would just not join a guild that was not flexible enough to allow multiguilding if I wanted multiguilding. But we are all different.

But yes… offline should actually hide all activities, hide where you are etc. And no point in shouting to all friends that you are online untill your character is in. (I actually tried to talk to people the moment I saw the message not realising or later forgetting that they would not see what I was saying yet.)

My main question was – why do you feel the need to hide? I simply do not understand that, at all.

@Shayne

‘Perhaps you don’t understand why it’s important to some people that they have control over their personal information and activity’

No I don’t, it’s a game? There is no personal sensitive information, of any sort, displayed about you at any time. The only info out there available to the general public is your login length. That alone, doesn’t even tell us whether you actually play the game, or just hang around to keep an eye on a chat with friends. If you are an active player, we see you swapping zones/instances. How is that personal, private, confidential in any way?

You have signed up for an MMO – surely you must’ve considered a certain level of exposure?

‘As it is now by many guilds (that aren’t just a amorphous pool of randomly recruited players) you are nagged at, threatened and even kicked if you stop representing them for a few days or even hours, despite your general commitment to the guild.’

I have addressed exactly that scenario. Why would you want to be in a guild, full of immature management that can’t handle the multi guild system in this game?

Back to the op:

I am in 3 guilds, one is full of family, one is practically my WoW guild, and one is a GW2 PVE. The latter having absolutely no issues, with me switching back and forth. When I am in an instance with guildies, or farming events, I represent the guild from which the majority of players come from. Easy. Before I swap, I always shout in gchat that I’m doing so and so, and either are available if something comes up, or simply want to chill out for now.

Now, if you would like to benefit from a more competitive group environment, it is rather obvious, you may be expected to be loyal to one particular group. Again, it’s your choice if you accept the rules or not, but don’t hide behind privacy when in fact, you appear to have difficulties being honest about what your gaming goals are with the group in question.

If you want benefits and progress that comes from belonging to a hard core community, you need to invest your time in it. By hoping around just because you don’t feel like doing whatever is on schedule, you let down a big number of other people that are serious about said event. Such play isn’t for everyone, it doesn’t make you worse, it doesn’t make them more special. But people have the right to choose how they play, just as you do.

I did not mean to be offensive in anyway, but if you are a free spirit by nature, prefer to do your thing, when you feel like it, go for the casual game style, majority of guilds out there are like that.

Simply do not expect any sort of in game mechanism to cover up your lack of respect for other people’s time and effort and facilitate anonymity, so you can act in a way you’d never dare if people knew who you were or simply, in this case, whether or not, you are online;)

Also, out of curiosity, what other games/platforms have all these tools already?

The only part of this thread that I think should be in Game Bugs is the fact that logging in as “invisible” does not actually hide your information.

The rest of it should be separated into the Suggestions forum. You’re asking for changes to the design of the game, not reporting problems with existing features.

For the record, I can see the issue with the broken invisible status. That should be fixed.

As to the rest of it… quoting the OP: “So is this not seen as a serious issue?” Personally, no, I don’t think it’s a serious issue that people can friend you without asking. Nor do I think that it’s problematic that guilds can see that you’re online even if you’re not representing.

What’s the point of offering an invisibility option if it doesn’t do anything to make you invisible?

It’s not about needing to hide. Sometimes, for example, you’re down, and just want to log on and kill a bunch of stuff. You just don’t want to deal with whispers from others, and not because you have something shameful to hide, but it’s nobody’s business to know what you’re up to when you want time alone.

When people question what somebody has to hide, I think how I don’t have anything at all illegal in my home, but that doesn’t mean I’d be happy with the police doing a search of my place every day. Or ever, without a really good reason and a warrant. Just because someone else may be okay with opening their life doesn’t mean that mine is up for inspection.

As for people who don’t know you being able to track you, that could very easily be used for icky reasons, including stalking.