Guest observer mode

[Readcom]

Hey.
I just got this brilliant idea.
Why not make a guest observer mode? Like I wanna watch other people playing i can room in a quest as a invisbile ghost, and see what people are doing?
What ya say about that?

[dunklezhan]

Hey.
I just got this brilliant idea.
Why not make a guest observer mode? Like I wanna watch other people playing i can room in a quest as a invisbile ghost, and see what people are doing?
What ya say about that?

I think the argument would be that we have that already kinda sorta - its called Twitch.

Now... an ingame way to tie into Twitch... might that be a good way to bridge the gap?

That would probably require DDO to have an api of some kind of course. Fingers crossed SSG are in a better position to open things up like that again, compared to turbine/WB.

[Readcom]

I think the argument would be that we have that already kinda sorta - its called Twitch.

Now... an ingame way to tie into Twitch... might that be a good way to bridge the gap?

That would probably require DDO to have an api of some kind of course. Fingers crossed SSG are in a better position to open things up like that again, compared to turbine/WB.
that's not the same of freely wandering around...

[Loromir]

Hey.
I just got this brilliant idea.
Why not make a guest observer mode? Like I wanna watch other people playing i can room in a quest as a invisbile ghost, and see what people are doing?
What ya say about that?

I think its a cool idea. Not sure how easy it would be to do...but could be fun.

[Astoroth]

Hey.
I just got this brilliant idea.
Why not make a guest observer mode? Like I wanna watch other people playing i can room in a quest as a invisbile ghost, and see what people are doing?
What ya say about that?

So like have a bunch of people be able to randomly lag out your instance. The game is laggy enough already.

[dunklezhan]

that's not the same of freely wandering around...

True.

[Amundir]

that's not the same of freely wandering around...

Hey, guest X, could you run a head and come back and tell me where all the reapers are?

[Uska]

Not feasible or at least no worth the resources to develop it

[AngryDude]

You can simulate the thing you want. Have someone carry your stone in a longer quest.

[Bob_of_QF]

So like have a bunch of people be able to randomly lag out your instance. The game is laggy enough already.

Properly coded, it would not lag anything-- as the "observer mode" cannot interact with the map at all, apart from passive observation, so this could be coded in such a way that there is no lag at all.

Lag requires two way communication, and a breakdown of that-- but observer mode could be pure passive (i.e. your instance is receive-only). And it would hardly matter if the observer was several seconds behind the *actual* combat activity-- since there is zero interaction? It wouldn't be an issue, and unless there was an alternate channel of communication, the observer wouldn't even be aware they were behind.

This sort of thing isn't rocket science.

[Memnir]

I think the appeal of such a thing would be too limited to be worthwhile.

[Tscheuss]

Run the game through Steam and Broadcast your play. :)

[Stoner81]

Hey.
I just got this brilliant idea.
Why not make a guest observer mode? Like I wanna watch other people playing i can room in a quest as a invisbile ghost, and see what people are doing?
What ya say about that?

LoL called and they want their Spectate mode back...

On so many levels no!

Stoner81.

[Uska]

Properly coded, it would not lag anything-- as the "observer mode" cannot interact with the map at all, apart from passive observation, so this could be coded in such a way that there is no lag at all.

Lag requires two way communication, and a breakdown of that-- but observer mode could be pure passive (i.e. your instance is receive-only). And it would hardly matter if the observer was several seconds behind the *actual* combat activity-- since there is zero interaction? It wouldn't be an issue, and unless there was an alternate channel of communication, the observer wouldn't even be aware they were behind.

This sort of thing isn't rocket science.

Are you a programmer and DDO has lag they can't fix already you have no clue what or what wouldn't cause lag. The idea isn't exciting it would like watching people playing d&d

[Bob_of_QF]

Are you a programmer and DDO has lag they can't fix already you have no clue what or what wouldn't cause lag. The idea isn't exciting it would like watching people playing d&d

Yes. I am/was a programmer. Lag is due to two-way communication breakdown and/or synchronization failure.

Observer mode would be pure receive-only. No need to synchronize, and thus no real lag issues.

It is dirt simple to duplicate the information stream to passive, receive-only stations.

Think: broadcast TV.

As opposed to Two-Way Video Skype.

[JOTMON]

Hey.
I just got this brilliant idea.
Why not make a guest observer mode? Like I wanna watch other people playing i can room in a quest as a invisbile ghost, and see what people are doing?
What ya say about that?

seems creepy..

[Knobull]

The idea isn't exciting it would like watching people playing d&d

Not that I necessarily support the idea of an observer mode in DDO, but just thought I'd point out:

Critical Role (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7atuZxmT954bCkC062rKwXTvJtcqFB8i)
Geek & Sundry · 91 videos · 6,713,325 views · Updated 5 days ago
1,485,054 Subscribers (though there is more on the channel than just Critical Role)


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-p9lWIhcLQ&list=PL7atuZxmT954bCkC062rKwXTvJtcqFB8i

www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7atuZxmT954bCkC062rKwXTvJtcqFB8i (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7atuZxmT954bCkC062rKwXTvJtcqFB8i)

Also:
www.twitch.tv/geekandsundry (https://www.twitch.tv/geekandsundry)
Last I looked (a few months ago now), they had over 70K subscribers on twitch at $5/mo.

This has got to be bringing in millions of dollars per year.

I had to stop watching it though, as the narcissism of one of the actors was too much to bear for me, it spoiled the whole thing.

[cdbd3rd]

You can simulate the thing you want. Have someone carry your stone in a longer quest.

That's what I was thinking. No development needed and minimizes the cheesy 'ghost scouting'. The 'guest' just has to deal with the faded colors of undeath.

[Dragavon]

I think GM's have this already.

It used to bug sometimes and if GM on high lvl char was observing some group on low levels they sometimes did not get XP.

[Stoner81]

Not that I necessarily support the idea of an observer mode in DDO, but just thought I'd point out:

<snip>

To be fair though the folks on Critical Role are highly talented professional voice actors which makes the world of difference from the average game at home.

Stoner81.

[Tscheuss]

Observer mode would inevitably lead to more frivolous threads accusing <name redacted> of exploiting this and cheating that. Now with eyewitness video. :rolleyes:

[zehnvhex]

Observer mode is typically an invention used in PvP games so you can have someone, well, observe and live commentate. Since you don't necessarily want to give someone that power in a PvE setting the functions of an observer mode would be extremely limited. It would then be functionally identical to watching someones Twitch stream. If you just want to watch a buddy play you can share your screen using Steam, you can upload the replay on youtube, you can skype it to him using a camera pointed at your monitor, whatever.

This is one of those things where if resources were infinite I'd say "why not?"

Resources are obviously stretched precariously thin and I don't see this being popular enough of a feature that it would attract new players/keep veterans interested. So I'd have to vote "no" on something like this for now.

[CSQ]

This would be an interesting feature, but one that I don't think is likely to be implemented (or worth implementing, in my opinion, because of the diversion of resources necessary), for a couple of reasons.

1) Scouting/perspective issues. Granted, there's this thing called a wiki that tells you everything you really need to know about a quest, but still, checking for certain things could be abused. However, it would also be boring because of the way DDO does spawn triggers; most of the time, unless you're where an actual character was, all you could do is fly around and wait for party members to do stuff anyway, in which case you might as well just bring a toon and tag along (or watch a Twitch stream or something like that). Granted, you could get some cool camera angles in some fights to watch stuff, but for the most part dungeons are mostly tight and cramped, if not in their whole length, in parts, which would limit the experience.
2) Level design issues. Camera clipping is a fairly minor issue for DDO, but it does happen and would be quite jarring if given the freedom to fly around. To get a good bird's eye view, you'd have to, for most dungeons and adventures, clip through a skybox or ceiling which could result in display issues and other problems. The engine DDO is built on probably doesn't have the best support for free-flying, no-clip cameras. In addition, there are probably some quests with things that don't display to the players but would be immersion breaking if spectated by an eye in the sky. It would also betray the presence of secret doors, which in an age of wiki ubiquity doesn't really matter that much but hey, it's something.

In order to make this feature "work" on a greater scale, any, all, or maybe none but probably not none of the following would need to be done.

Engine overhaul for floating, flying, and no-clipping cameras.
Line of sight for the party to keep spectators from seeing things they shouldn't. (optional, but addresses many of the "experience" concerns)
Level design for the sake of cameras.
New systems for spectator movement. Doors, barriers, and other things that players need to interact with but a spectator couldn't without breaking balance need to be bypassed somehow; a no-clip system could work but introduces its own issues.
New client front-end or major character select/in game interface changes to choose spectating modes. The way DDO works now has you log in and choose a character, but you'd have to either choose to spectate in game (such as at the character selection screen or once a character is loaded, which could have its own issues with the game's code) or run a different client entirely to spectate.

Again, it would be cool to whoosh around, and perhaps a "free camera" mode like screenshot modes in other games would be fun, but I don't think a dedicated spectator mode is worth the time or effort.

Now a "free camera" mode piques my interest, and probably would be less of a headache to implement (still a pain), but doesn't quite satisfy your initial request.