Signup lists?

[breakinglight11]

Just throwing this out to all you programmery-types out there who build and maintain larp web sites (which may just be natbudin, but to any possible others there may be):

Is there any particular reason why players aren't allowed to see the lists of everyone who's signed up for each game? I know I'm always interested to see who else will be playing in the games I'm in, and it might even help me decide which one to choose if I know lots of fun people will be in one but not another. Players shouldn't have access to GM-only functions relating to sign up lists, like changing role gender or anything like that, but I don't think it would hurt if they could at least SEE who's in. I know I would like that. Is that possible to do?

Comments

[yunafonfabre.livejournal.com]

I've never understood why this was hidden either. I suppose people might be leery of playing with a known bad player, but I've had people drop last minute because an ex was in the room and surely that's worse.

[zrealm.livejournal.com]

From a technological standpoint, ProCon actually supports this feature (we use it for Genericon, a non LARPing gaming convention).

From a social standpoint, I know I've heard people mention concerns of things like game-stalking when we've brought this up in the past. I know some LARP community people consider it a privacy issue - they feel they might be stalked by undesirable LARPers.

I don't know if there have ever been any actual incidents of this, though.

[pezzonovante.livejournal.com]

On a related note, one of the pet peeves I have with a lot of questionnaires is the question "Would you prefer to interact with / not interact with any other specific player?" without telling me who the other players are.

From a technical standpoint, I don't see why it would be that complicated. Showing the player list only to the players signed up wouldn't be too big a privacy violation or technical feat, and it would prevent yunafonfabre's scenario from happening. Plus it makes asking that question about awkward/desired personal interaction much more reasonable to ask.

[contradictacat.livejournal.com]

But you can also make the argument that if a player could see that said ex was also signed up for the game, they could drop out earlier and thus make it more possible to bring in another player.

..oh, wait. You are making that argument. I need coffee.

[zrealm.livejournal.com]

On a related note, one of the pet peeves I have with a lot of questionnaires is the question "Would you prefer to interact with / not interact with any other specific player?" without telling me who the other players are.

In some ways this question is a cheat. The questions we really want to ask are: 'is there anyone in the LARPing communtiy you feel so objectionable that you would never ever want to be cast near them in a game, and it would cause lots of problems' and 'Is there someone who you so want to play with that you're coordinating games and know you will be miserable if you arent cast with them.' - but those questions would be impolitic and if we asked it that way and then ignored it for some reason, would bring even more anger and misery into the situation, IMHO.

[darkoni]

I usually don't ask that question. I usually just finish off with an "Is there anything we need to know when casting you?" which covers anything someone might want to say, good or bad.

[laurion]

It's a sociological thing. Intercon wants to be an inclusive community, and one of the ways we can foster that is by getting people to play in games with a wide range of other players. If we show the lists of names, we get into some 'popularity/clique' problems, where everyone wants to play with -that- person, or wants to play with their group only. This can have the effect of freezing out new people, or of having the con self-segregate, which will surely bifurcate the community. And for every person who can avoid a game because they don't want to play with someone, there could be someone who signs up for a game just to get close to someone else. Both can be good or bad.

So in general we default to not sharing your information and in practice, most people share it with the people they choose to share it with.

[laurion]

That's.... unfortunate. If I've signed up for a game, I've made a commitment to play that game, even if someone I don't like is also in the game. Still, unfortunate things happen all the time, and I'm not sure relationships are something that should be dictating technological changes. There are good reasons for and against the disclosure of names.

Maybe the player could find a different channel for learning what games the ex is in.