Implement A AFK Lockout Mechanism

[Omnispirit]

So in your own words, how much would you just love this?

Inb4 entitlements, ermahgerd game just started, deal with it, its still beta, etc.

All trolls shall be ignored and negative comments skipped.

Lets do this!

[randomrope]

Quote Originally Posted by MobianArnadi
"It's not a bug, but an issue regarding players taking advantage of a lack of AFK auto-logout system. Players are staying logged in permanently, and this prevents others from logging in."

Me
"This is absolutely the problem. I even have friends that once they log in they say they are not logging off. They are doing this because the the risks and frustrations so many people experienced during phase 4 and even now. And who can really blame them. After not being able to play for days and attempting to repeatedly log in without success most of us would do the same. By not having an AFK timer Square Enix is allowing a stagnant percent of the population to just accumulate and grow on their servers. Its like algae".

I completely agree with you

[Omnispirit]

So many feels right now on this. Testing to see if I can get on for my last day off of the week. Three days off for once at work and I've put in a total of about 11 hours tops because I refused to sleep. Too bad for me was that I passed out and woke up to find my computer crashed. lol

[Jinko]

Agree we need some kind of AFK timer/kick off period, no more than an hour.

[Pumkun]

I don't think it's necessary with the upgrade plans for the servers (iirc) and the people leaving who are crying about poor fan service. Don't get me wrong, I took days off and struggled to get on, and there was so much down time. But I still don't think it's necessary to introduce a compulsory AFK timer/kick off period.

[Battousan]

I agree with other on implementing an AFK kick-out system for those players who idle for 60 minutes. They will also need to implement a queue system when trying to log in so we don't have to sit here wasting time on trying to log in. Other mmorpg's have already implemented this in their system.

[Papamax]

I don't think it's necessary with the upgrade plans for the servers (iirc) and the people leaving who are crying about poor fan service. Don't get me wrong, I took days off and struggled to get on, and there was so much down time. But I still don't think it's necessary to introduce a compulsory AFK timer/kick off period.

Why? What are the reasons for not having an AFK timer? I can think of a couple of good reasons for implementing one:

1. reduce latency; removing afk players after a certain amount of time will reduce the load on the network and improve gameplay for active players.
2. increase playability; with the current setup only a specific amount of players are allowed on the server at any given time; kicking afk players after a certain amount of time will allow more active people to play.

For the life of me, I can't think of a single good reason to allow afk players to remain online. Can you?

[Shinalia]

I don't think it will help at all.

How do we decide exactly what is or is not "AFK?" Any afk timer is easily defeated on both systems. Turbo buttons on PS3 controllers and macros on PC would make adding any sort of afk countermeasure moot before it's even implemented.

[Kithicor]

Adding an AFK time-out mechanism is just putting a band-aid on one symptom of the root issue.

The real problem isn't that people are lounging around AFK; it's that the servers can't handle the volume of people who want to log in and play. If the server issues are addressed, people hanging out AFK for hours isn't such a big deal.

[CrisFirestaf]

I would personally love to have an AFK system in place. I keep hearing about all the people who log on early in the morning just to make sure they can play in the evening. Meanwhile, I CAN PLAY during the day, but cannot get logged in because there are a huge amount of people who are logged in but not playing.