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Minigame Queue /leave Message

Honey_Dwarf1

Archivist
Minecraft IGN: Honey_Dwarf1
Phoenix Raven
#1
When you join the queue for a game, a message comes up saying that you can leave the queue by doing /leave. I agree that it is very good to have that message, as it means fewer people will ask how to leave a queue.

However, as many players have learnt the hard way, /leave doesn't only take you out of the queue. If you are in a class, it leaves the class instead. This is why many people use /exit instead. The message that comes up when you join a queue is aimed at newer players, as players who regularly play minigames will know how to leave a queue. Therefore, the players that the message is aimed at probably don't know that it will exit the class instead if you are in one. I think that the message should be changed to say /exit, to make it clearer so players are less likely to accidentally leave a class instead of a minigames queue.
 
#2
I must admit, I've made that mistake a couple times, and I've played Potterworld for years! If a new player is already a bit confused (we have a LOT to offer!) then very similar commands like '/exit' vs '/leave' could make it substantially more difficult to learn their way around the server. To add on to your suggestion, possibly changing the '/exit' command to something like '/quit' would be easier because exit and leave are very similar words. I don't think 'quit' and 'leave' are as easy to mix up. However, I'm just writing down a suggestion / an add on! Love this idea.
 

Aurora

Potterworld Legend
Staff
Minecraft IGN: Invisibilia
Auralock Dark Follower Staff Phoenix Raven Vampire Werewolf Wizencouncil Class Helper SPEW Sr. Prefect
#3
Hello Honey_Dwarf1,
Thank you for bringing up your idea. We really appreciate it!
I will now be bringing up your idea to the other Poltergeists so that we can discuss it and get back to you with a response.
Meanwhile, have a wonderful day!
 

Aurora

Potterworld Legend
Staff
Minecraft IGN: Invisibilia
Auralock Dark Follower Staff Phoenix Raven Vampire Werewolf Wizencouncil Class Helper SPEW Sr. Prefect
#4
Back again!
After talking about your suggestion, we have unfortunately decided to decline it. This is because we will look into a different solution, namely making /leave prioritize leaving games over leaving classes. This means that if you do /leave while in a class and in a game queue, you would leave the game queue first and only when you type it a second time would you leave class. We aren't sure when this can be done since while it is doable, we need to look at a few rare cases first, to make sure it works as intended.
If we do this, the change in the queue message would not be required, as /leave would make you leave the games queue first and players could therefore still use it while in classes without unintentionally leaving. We think that changing the way the /leave command works would solve the main issue here, namely that players accidentally leave classes, without changing the commands completely and forcing everyone to re-learn them.
We are always looking for ways to improve the server so thank you once again for sharing your idea with us! We hope you will utilize these forums more in the future.
Have a great day!
 

Nik_Blazius

Magician
Minecraft IGN: Nik_Blazius
Honeybadger
#6
I'm disappointed that you discussed this matter properly and came to a solution that makes using these commands only more difficult. I don't really see now which command you are supposed to use leaving queue normally, leaving class normally, leaving queue in class and leaving class while being in a queue. :unsure:
For me it seems like players have to explain you everything and telling you exact ideas and solutions for problems because you can't really do it on your own, but I believe you are really supposed to do it. And it's not the first time I see something like this... I understand for you it's important to see the players' reaction to everything, but 1) it's never representative 2) I hope that members of the Poltergeist team are creative and have their own ideas. Moreover, I believe you need to be creative and responsible enough to provide solutions for any problems, fortunately players provide that anyways... Ash, what's your opinion? ;)
 
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Aurora

Potterworld Legend
Staff
Minecraft IGN: Invisibilia
Auralock Dark Follower Staff Phoenix Raven Vampire Werewolf Wizencouncil Class Helper SPEW Sr. Prefect
#7
Poltergeists did indeed suggest that there could be two completely commands for leaving classes and games (/leaveclass and /leavegame or various short forms of that) however changing the /leave command was what ultimately won out.
The reason is that players have gotten used to these commands over years now so changing them completely might be more confusing.
 
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Nik_Blazius

Magician
Minecraft IGN: Nik_Blazius
Honeybadger
#8
/leave and /exit?
I believe if you change them everywhere and mention it a lot, you could create a consistent system. It's not so difficult to be aware and if you used the wrong command once, it's better to learn two different commands then the preferation thing of multiple commands...
 

nathan1e

Animorphus
Minecraft IGN: nathan1e
Honeybadger Auralock Dark Follower Phoenix Vampire Werewolf SPEW
#9
The reason is that players have gotten used to these commands over years now so changing them completely might be more confusing.
This does seem somewhat nonsensical. There's 2 commands and 2 different things that can be left. Changing the commands so each is specific for either games or classes makes everything very easy. Confusion in such a case wouldn't arise on a big scale in my opinion, if all of the broadcasts were changed accordingly and all the staff were properly instructed to clear up any confusion that may arise. After a small amount of time, everyone would be used to it.

The way that it was said to go now is something that I think will create much more confusion. What if someone is in a game queue AND in a class queue, but wants to leave the class queue? They'd have to leave class queue by leaving game queue, for them to then go into class queue yet again. This may sabotage their chance of actually getting into a game, because if the game is already preparing to start, requeueing makes you lose the opportunity to join that game.
 

Nik_Blazius

Magician
Minecraft IGN: Nik_Blazius
Honeybadger
#10
If you want to change the whole gameplay it's not a problem if players come online and see something totally different, but you won't change something small because it's a custom to use a nonsense system. ???
 

Deniz

Graduate
Minecraft IGN: DenizTM
Auralock Dark Follower Phoenix Serpent Vampire VIP SPEW
#11
Hey, I think there seems to be a misunderstanding here, so let me try to clear some of it up.
I think it would be a better solution to have different commands for game and for class, so you can't make any mistakes.
I can personally confidently say that 99% of the 'issues' that has occurred with players using /leave, has come from players wanting to leave the queue instead of the class. Players wait hours for classes, whereas minigames are often a message in /ch ga away. If there's 100 people who uses /leave in a class, 99 of them are using it to leave the queue, where that 1 other person is meaning to leave the class to join the minigame.

This suggestion is proposing a solution to the following issue: "/leave makes you leave class, instead of the minigame queue". Okay, if we make /leave remove you from the queue instead of the class, would that not solve this issue? Seems like it would? :p

We're changing it to work like that, but I do think changing it to recommend using /exit would cause less confusion, so I've gone ahead and changed that. You should expect this to be live in a few days (maybe more, depends on a lot of things).

I do wanna comment on some things said:
For me it seems like players have to explain you everything and telling you exact ideas and solutions for problems because you can't really do it on your own, but I believe you are really supposed to do it.
At the end of the day, the Potterworld staff & development team are volunteers. This means none of us are doing this professionally, or know how to do things the right way. We try as we go, and see what works and what doesn't work. A comment like this is really uncalled for, and is downright false. We'd love to hear what solutions you think is best for a specific issue, but at the end of the day, we look at the bigger picture and we know *a lot* more about what goes on than you - which means the decision we make might not be the solution you proposed. Did you know that the message that says 'You can leave the queue by typing /leave' was only added a few months ago? Players have been using /leave for *years*, changing this message would not do much. This has been an issue for years. Changing how it works (by prioritizing the queue instead of the class) would solve most issues, changing the message wouldn't.

2) I hope that members of the Poltergeist team are creative and have their own ideas. Moreover, I believe you need to be creative and responsible enough to provide solutions for any problems, fortunately players provide that anyways...
I can assure you that the Poltergeist team are creative and have their own ideas. You haven't seen the work they do behind the scenes, but yeah. At the end of the day, the Poltergeist team is not actually the department making the decisions. This decision was not made by them, it was made by the Development team.

Poltergeists simply leave their opinion, and propose alternative solutions if they can think of some and then bring it up to the relevant department. In this case, the relevant department was development, and all developers (including myself) agreed that changing the behavior was the best solution because a lot of players still use /leave, and have been for years. Changing a message slightly is not going to change this behavior that players have gotten used to for years (one of the comments admit that they've made the same mistake over and over, which is a prime example).
Ash, what's your opinion?
This reminds me of myself when I was younger - I'd ask my mom for something and she'd say no, then I'd ask my dad for the same thing in hopes of getting a different answer. That might have worked in my house, but that's not really how it works here :) Like I said above, this was a decision made by the development team, and if you ask any developer, you're going to get the same response. It was a decision made collectively.

Phew, that was a lot of text, but I hope it clears up everything. TLDR: Don't be so quick to assume and yell at the Poltergeist team, I've changed the message, and we're still going to change the behavior because changing the message isn't going to do nearly enough, but it is going to help so yeah.
 

Nik_Blazius

Magician
Minecraft IGN: Nik_Blazius
Honeybadger
#12
A comment like this is really uncalled for, and is downright false.
I suppose staff members especially in higher positions have more knowledge, but there are occasions when I don't really see that. I won't tell names, but there is at least one staff member who declined my suggestion with totally invalid arguments, so I denied all of them with exact examples/prooves. You can also find similarities in the forum, and I think I've already mentioned it somewhere else.

At the end of the day, the Poltergeist team is not actually the department making the decisions. This decision was not made by them, it was made by the Development team.
There was more problems about this, wouldn't it be better if the most responsible staff member would answer the ideas? The process is not transparent, Poltergeists talk with us, so we can only blame or love them. It doesn't matter who does the decision if at the end a Poltergeist announces it. It might be very convenient for head staffs.
I'm sorry, but personally I can't trust these anwers from Poltergeists, based on my experience in PW.

This reminds me of myself when I was younger - I'd ask my mom for something and she'd say no, then I'd ask my dad for the same thing in hopes of getting a different answer. That might have worked in my house, but that's not really how it works here :) Like I said above, this was a decision made by the development team, and if you ask any developer, you're going to get the same response. It was a decision made collectively.
Omg, I asked Ash about a problem in general, not about this exact thread, so can't agree with this part. I can tell you I wouldn't have asked anybody else, but you if I wouldn't have agreed with general statements, it's exactly the supposed way to do. I'm sorry if it was not obvious, this question is about the second paragraph of that comment.

Aurora's arguments were not detailled enough and as you can see, there were points to argue about. I don't understand why you provide arguments like this that makes the team seem somewhat incompetent. And again, it's not the first time that the argument of a Poltergeist gives an opportunity for this. Okay, I trust all of you since now and wouldn't question anything even if it seems dumb.

Last but not least, writing a controversial comment always help to reach out to staff members in higher positions to clear up the situation, it's a good strategy everyone can use. ;)
 

Nik_Blazius

Magician
Minecraft IGN: Nik_Blazius
Honeybadger
#13
It has just came to my mind that someone changed the Honeybadger Commons sign to Kitchen & Cellar. A player spent a lot of time to find our common room and I was in a completely different location so I could only tell them to find the Honeybadger Commons sign at the grand staircase and go that way. Sadly I saw the sign only the next day, and only because I always go back to Hogsworth if I don't have anything to do. I don't remember who the person was and I wanted to apologise to them. (I could have checked their name in the logs tbh.) I'm also not sure whether the player could find it or just gave up and left. With this comment I want to say that it's not clear for me which custom you think needs to be changed (secretly) and which not, and I believe mentioning every change (+known bugs +list of current aims and changes) could also be beneficial. (There were also complaints about changing customs with the Revelius update by other students and Butterbrew fest can be in the same category.) Btw I think changing the sign was a good step to make giving directions easier.