I’ve been on several games with Discord Integration. I’m a fan of it, because there are times when I little hit of that game-derived dopamine, but can’t log in to the actual game. But I also think that it’s very important to only have game channels on the Discord (except maybe an ‘Images’ channel or something like that) because otherwise it feels like more of a Discord game than a MUSH (even if all the RP takes place from the web portal). I want players to be able to have the full (or very nearly full, just without image spam) experience from the web portal/client.

Yeah, if the Discord is limited to the game channels, then Discord just becomes a supplementary client with which to engage with the game. That would be my ideal, because then you don’t run the risk of there being game-focused public chatter and development happening that completely excludes those who don’t want to Discord.

@KarmaBum I assume that there were channels on the Discord that weren’t reflecting on the game. I wasn’t on the Discord, so I don’t know for sure, but it sounded like that.

And, honestly, I don’t know how you stop that. One of the great things about Discord is how easy it is to make new channels and threads without having a lot of fuss about it. It feels like if you take a ‘Discord’ and restrict that, you’re losing a lot of what makes Discord useful. But if you don’t restrict that, then you’re creating two separate communities.

IMO, if it were for a game of mine, I’d PROBABLY just have it as a reflection of the game channels themselves, just to try and avoid the thing someone mentioned earlier about lots of game chatter happening on Discord channels that they couldn’t participate in. Yeah, Discord makes it real easy to add channels, but it wouldn’t be a general chat server, it’s specifically a server for that MUSH, so I don’t think I see it as an issue that you restrict it accordingly.

But also…

@L-B-Heuschkel said in Ares & Discord Integration:

Anyhow, we seem to have found a working middleground on Keys: We echo the Questions, Game and RP channels to Discord so that people can stay in touch and answer questions/find RP to log into. Chat, however, is not echoed because we want people to actively participate – not simply idle on the Discord chat.

It seems to me that people will participate on a game when there are things they want to do there, and that having access to the game’s main Chat channel in hours where they can’t necessarily be RPing wouldn’t impact that. Chat/Public is usually a major hub of general game chatter IME, and I don’t see how someone having access to it on Discord would make them more or less likely to participate in the game at large.

@L-B-Heuschkel

WHY YES, it is your game. But I you.

Come play more often. Prove it. PROVE IT.

WHY YES, it is your game. But I you.

And, honestly, I don’t know how you stop that. One of the great things about Discord is how easy it is to make new channels and threads without having a lot of fuss about it. It feels like if you take a ‘Discord’ and restrict that, you’re losing a lot of what makes Discord useful. But if you don’t restrict that, then you’re creating two separate communities.

I am on one game that has it, but immediately turned them on mute. While it’s nice, I don’t reallllyyy want to be connected to a game unless I deliberately choose to connect.

Awwwww.

Anyhow, we seem to have found a working middleground on Keys: We echo the Questions, Game and RP channels to Discord so that people can stay in touch and answer questions/find RP to log into. Chat, however, is not echoed because we want people to actively participate – not simply idle on the Discord chat.

There were some problems last year with the links going down with annoying frequency. Discord would wipe access keys for no reason, or they’d change something in the interface without telling anyone. But it seems to have been pretty stable lately? I haven’t gotten any complaints anyway. It relies on the Discord.js library, so it’ll always be kinda at the mercy of the whims of Discord.

You can also, for those with the concern, set your settings on a server so that others on the server can’t DM you just because you have the server in common.

IMO basically what discord integration adds that you can’t get on the game/portal these days are

1. push notifications on mobile apps
2. messages in a place you already are

I’m personally not interested in either of those - I’m good with needing to CHECK the game, and I’m good with wanting people to be in the game space when they’re engaging in the game. So I haven’t, any probably won’t, implement it.

Did the Discord have a bunch of channels that weren’t feeding into the MUSH?

I wouldn’t want to do it if it wasn’t a seamless exchange. That is, if you could have a conversation on the game’s Discord that didn’t show up on the channel… then no.

I just want to be able to use the Discord app to chat on the channels when I’m on my iPhone or iPad, since Ares doesn’t play the refresh-game very nicely on those devices.

It’s something where everyone has to either buy into it together or not at all. Half-measures don’t work with this kind of thing. I guess the only reason it works with mine is mostly because that’s how the game started before the game was actually created, a bunch of people talking about the planning and development and it just kind of became apart of things.

I’m not sure it’s something I would use just yet. I’ve always spoken that I try to run things like an extended TT group because the population numbers more or less support something like that. But anything larger I wouldn’t see it being fesible.

I didn’t last long there, not just for that reason, but it did feel a bit…unfriendly? Like, I’m here to play THIS GAME RIGHT HERE; I don’t want to have to go to a different place to get conversation or anything related to the game.

As an anti-discord type who prefers to keep games and things tied to work separate, I don’t use it myself but it can and does happen with Ares a fair bit.

We just used discord as normal.

It could be a lil’ fucky? But that was a while ago, it might be better now. I think @sao is the only one who actually logged in to the game to use the channels in any real way, so she has user experience.

This is always my concern as a player who doesn’t want to engage with game-integrated discords. They don’t bother me, except in that I don’t want to use them, but it would suck if this additional app I didn’t want to bother with a lot of the time was the main place where story and RP discussion happened and it wasn’t actually optional.

Have you played on an Ares game where it’s in use? You don’t have to out the game or anything, just curious if this is from experience or a (completely legitimate) concern?

The things you’re expressing are the reason why I never used it before, so I’m curious how integrated it is, if people are feeling excluded. My understanding is that it feeds directly into game-chat, so you can chat back-and-forth.

I do think that depending on the structure/culture of the game discord if that’s the place where people are helping each other/making rp contacts/where most timely info is dispersed that should be made SUPER CLEAR on the game especially if its not integrated. Otherwise that’s a pretty lonely and frustrating experience for people not on it bc they think it is optional, but the communication on the game is a ghost town.

This is always my concern as a player who doesn’t want to engage with game-integrated discords. They don’t bother me, except in that I don’t want to use them, but it would suck if this additional app I didn’t want to bother with a lot of the time was the main place where story and RP discussion happened and it wasn’t actually optional. Especially since I can read channel backscroll pretty far back if we’re talking about Ares games, and always have access to my pages, I don’t see what it gives me other than OOC contact with strangers in ways I don’t really want.

Never used it, but - as with all things @Faraday puts out there - install and troubleshooting are very well-documented.