Register the Games We Play - Profile Item?

[mathogre]

It would be helpful to identify the game(s) we play.

I play D&D v3.5. I've also picked up Talislanta in the last week, and there's no quick way to find others who play Talislanta. Yes I can do a custom search and hope that someone has indicated in their profile that they play, but it is hit-and-miss.

I could imagine a Profile area with a list of games and checkboxes that can be selected by each forum member. The list could include games from the popular to the obscure. "Other" could be for everything else. (Perhaps a separate thread could be used for suggesting games to be included.) Once saved, a member's profile would show the specific games the person plays.

When searching the registry for other players, maybe it could search on a chosen game without any distance limitations. This could allow people to coordinate IRC/IM type games with people who are not local or otherwise physically accessible to each other.

Is this possible? Thanks in advance for considering it.

[fmitchell]

One of the previous incarnations of the DFW-RPG boards had just that. The problem is that you'd need some sort of write-in capability. Checkboxes for "D&D 3.5", "D&D Old School", "World of Darkness", "Call of Cthulhu", etc. are a given ... maybe "GURPS", "FUDGE/FATE" or "PDQ/Truth & Justice/etc." ... but "Talislanta" or "HeroQuest" would be pretty rare.

Maybe if the feature were somewhat intelligent: first you could select from a combo box of previous entries, or, if you didn't find what you wanted, write in your own. But that might be quite a bit of PHP and SQL.

[Grimwell]

http://www.accessdenied.net/
They have a very extensive checklist on that site. The problem is that it's sooooooooooo big that it becomes a burden to sleuth through. I prefer what we have going here where I can search my area and see everyone who games no matter the game, and then I can make contact and see if I wouldn't want to try something other than D&D.

I'm not Farcaster, but I'd welcome talk about Taslantia (and other settings) in the Fantasy board.

[Farcaster]

I tend to agree. The reason that I did not add in specific games is because the list is so very extensive, and I wanted the interface to be as easy and efficient to use as possible. The favorite RPGs section of the profile hopes to bridge the gap a bit, so that when you open the profile from the search results, you can see what games that player enjoys. I'll give it some thought though on how we could make it easier for players who want to play a specific game to meet up.

[mathogre]

Okay. Makes sense. I grok.

[whatiswhat]

Adding a small text field limited to 150 or so characters entitled "games I Play," or some such would allow people to list the games they play. The text in this box could be searchable within the site as key word based. You would than go to a member search area were you could entire criteria like location and games the search algorithm would do the rest.
These "key words could be optionally showed under member signature and or name etc.

[rabkala]

But, would you turn down a player because a game wasn't listed? I think it is kind of limiting. I would like to try just about everything a couple times. I would like to retry many games that I only briefly tried many years ago. While I guess I am not an active player of many systems, but that doesn't mean they are not worth looking into...

[Farcaster]

Perhaps you could have a couple different fields. One would be: Games I Have Played. The other would be: Games I Would Like to Try. I've been thinking about this one. I was resistant at first, but I would like to add this in. The only concern I have is that people use a lot of different names and acronyms. So, I'd like to have some way of standardizing it so that we don't have:

DnD
D&D
Dungeons & Dragons
DandD
etc, etc...

[boulet]

Yeah the canons of RPG names would help

Maybe it could be the opportunity to build a glossary for all those acronyms

I already suggested that a month ago ? Really ?

[cplmac]

Yeah the canons of RPG names would help

Maybe it could be the opportunity to build a glossary for all those acronyms

I already suggested that a month ago ? Really ?

A glossary would be nice. It would help when someone uses an acronym that another person has not seen before. Especially since there are so many different game systems out there.

[nijineko]

perhaps instead of an editable text field, a list of checkboxes? that way the format is pre-determined. how about splitting the list into groups of 20-30? and the list be generated by the input of the board members? that way the 20-30 most common games would be the default displayed, with a link to the other page(s) where less common games (as selected by the members) are displayed. i wonder if there would be any way to tap into the access denied list. at the very least, it'll give you an idea of what games are out there. i've added about 7 games to their list already. ^^

also, since we are theoretically focusing on pen and paper, one could consider nixing the network play list, as well as the board game list and ccg list.

[Farcaster]

I was thinking of cascading, dynamic prompts. That way it would be easier to find things. Example:

Fantasy -> Dungeons and Dragons
Super Hoeric -> Marven Superheroes.

You find what you're looking for in the lists and then click Add>> to move it over. Something like that, perhaps.

[nijineko]

ooooh, that could work. catagorizing might be a tad challenging sometimes. unless you were willing to have a lumpy other catagory or somesuch.