Beds/sleeping should disable the AFK timer

  • One thing that really bothers me about this game is the AFK timer. Having to constantly be active on the server so that you don't get booted and lose your progress is unhealthy and bad for player enjoyment, especially for newcomers or solo players (I've had to play for 14 hours straight because I didn't want to lose the progress I was making and it left me with migraines).

    I appreciate that there are obvious reasons behind the mechanism so I suggest bringing in one possible solution. The beds in ships and on islands should disable the AFK timer. This way the player can take a break for as long as is needed without having any advantage over other players on the server or "cheating" at the game.

    I see many people say that not being kicked for going AFK would allow people to abuse the mechanism and get extra points even though inactive, but with sleeping, your senses are disabled so you have no awareness of your surroundings, you stay in real time so it can't be abused by running away from PvP etc. (if your ship goes down, your ship goes down) and most ships/islands only have one bed available so you won't have whole crews sleeping to stay in the game whilst collecting points from a single player.

    At the moment the bed is very unnecessary, so I feel this would give it more of a use whilst fixing a major flaw in the game, in my opinion. And even if it wasn't a full disable, just increasing the timer to 30 minutes or an hour whilst sleeping would give most players enough time to take a break and rest their eyes before getting back to looking at a screen for another 2-3 hours.

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  • If you read the patchnotes it was a thing for this update.
    Not anymore because if you disable lazybeard then it's gonna cost a lot especially on the long term for Rare.

  • An AFK solo player would keep a slot on a server, dropping possible ships to encounter from 4 to 3.

    If you get found, and your ship gets sunk, that's the end of it as well.

    Staying in game for 14 hours for not losing progress ? Whatever were you doing ?

  • If you need to take a break longer than 10 minutes, then you should sell up and log out. It’s really that simple.

  • There is no reason to play for 14 hours in a session based game other than choice.

  • I've had to play for 14 hours straight because I didn't want to lose the progress I was making and it left me with migraines).

    There is no need to keep playing if your head is hurting! Dude…that is a late sign to get off the flickering lights

  • @troublecook said in Beds/sleeping should disable the AFK timer:

    One thing that really bothers me about this game is the AFK timer. Having to constantly be active on the server so that you don't get booted and lose your progress is unhealthy and bad for player enjoyment, especially for newcomers or solo players (I've had to play for 14 hours straight because I didn't want to lose the progress I was making and it left me with migraines).

    I appreciate that there are obvious reasons behind the mechanism so I suggest bringing in one possible solution. The beds in ships and on islands should disable the AFK timer. This way the player can take a break for as long as is needed without having any advantage over other players on the server or "cheating" at the game.

    I see many people say that not being kicked for going AFK would allow people to abuse the mechanism and get extra points even though inactive, but with sleeping, your senses are disabled so you have no awareness of your surroundings, you stay in real time so it can't be abused by running away from PvP etc. (if your ship goes down, your ship goes down) and most ships/islands only have one bed available so you won't have whole crews sleeping to stay in the game whilst collecting points from a single player.

    At the moment the bed is very unnecessary, so I feel this would give it more of a use whilst fixing a major flaw in the game, in my opinion. And even if it wasn't a full disable, just increasing the timer to 30 minutes or an hour whilst sleeping would give most players enough time to take a break and rest their eyes before getting back to looking at a screen for another 2-3 hours.

    Complains about something being unhealthy to set an idle kick timer of 10 minutes, then proceeds to say they play for 14 hour sessions...

    ...WHAT?!

  • @troublecook nothing on this game requires you to play 14 hours. Take a break and relax. It will make the game more fun.

    Tall Tales have checkpoints.
    Quests don't have to be finished.
    Grade 5s are pretty easy to get.

    Just sell and log off.

  • @lovelocc I don't see how a player staying idle for a little extra time over a player simply being "active" makes any cost difference to Rare, in fact making it more open to people being able to take breaks regularly is more likely going to encourage people to play more and so increase Rare's traffic and profits.

    As someone that has only recently started playing the game, I didn't really get a chance to use the game with the ability to avoid idle timers through sleep or sitting otherwise my opinion may be different.

  • @lem0n-curry which is why I suggested that you still be affected by real time so you're taking it into your own hands. I'd rather lose my stuff to a pirate sinking my ship than a server telling me I didn't move in 10 minutes so I've had my items and voyage progress cleared

    And as someone that gets very little time during the week to play this game, I decided to do a long run at a weekend to try and increase my reputation without having my ship sank by every other ship that was on the server. I'll admit it's extreme but when it's that or play for an hour, sell my stuff, log off, go do something that takes me half an hour, sign back in somewhere random, figure out where I need to go again, repeat, it seems the better choice to just fight through it and hope I don't lose it all in the process.

  • @thetwistedtaste it could take longer than 10 minutes to make a coffee or go toilet. Is it really the simplest route to go when it comes to taking a break? What if there's something I need to deal with urgently and don't have time to go to an outpost to sell what I've collected? Am I expected to just lose all the items I've been accumulating? That would just make me decide that signing back in and figuring out where I need to go is too much effort and decide to not play anymore, is that really going to benefit Rare over simply adding a function that lets you stay part of the session for a little longer?

  • @redeyesith I'll admit it's an extreme example, but when the choice is that, be forced to run back and move your mouse ever 5 minutes, or completely sell everything and sign out of the game session you're in, even if it's only for 20 minutes, the choice is quickly made for you, especially when you're someone that has only recently started playing and is trying their best to increase rep and coins without going the expensive route of purchasing coins.

  • Why would you hold a spot in the server, not doing anything productive? You can get supplies when you're actively playing, you can get loot when you're actively playing, you have tall tale checkpoints to continue from a certain point in tall tales, when you're actively playing.

    Being AFK for more than 10 minutes means you're taking too long doing what you're doing and need to give that spot to someone who will be more active. If you can't manage your time well for this game, you'll either want to find something you can pause for long periods of time, like a single player game (which Sea of Thieves is most certainly not), have an active crewmate who will invite you back to the crew (special note: if you afk before a fight, you might not have a very happy crewmate afterwards) , or, and I hate to say this, don't play this game for long periods of time at the risk of getting yanked off of the keyboard at a moment's notice.

  • @burnbacon you're not wrong, it is an extreme situation for me and is something I don't do often. But I really didn't want to lose the progress and items I had collected but had not yet sold. I did actually get to take an hour long break but I had to invite someone in as a crew member to move about and keep the progress active even if I did get kicked, I guess that's kind of abusing the system mechanism but what else could I do. If only there was something that allowed me to take a longer break without clearing all my items and kicking me out the session.

  • @troublecook
    Money, cash, dollars, pounds, euros.
    Keeping that server up just for you isn't gonna be free.

  • @kommodoreyenser I hope I made my initial post clear enough to understand, what I was speaking about was that the system encourages people to play for longer periods of time due to being penalised for being inactive for 10 minutes. When it is a game that includes missions that do not always have checkpoints, yes tall tales do but as far as I'm aware voyages don't, you're being told to play long or just leave the game. Which doesn't make sense to me. And just to clarify, the 14 hour session is a one of a kind as I have only recently started playing the game and have very little time to play it during the week, leaving me with only really weekends to play. So it's either that or progress at a snails pace, lose interest in the game due to minimal progress and stop playing all together haha. But I definitely won't be doing that again, so I'm sticking to the snails pace, it will take longer but that's the best option for my health that is possible.

  • 14 hour session what the heck, man?! You don't NEED to stay on that long to make progress on ANYTHING. Removing AFK kick timers would be extremely bad to boot, since then you could have players taking up server slots doing nothing for hours upon hours.

  • @captain-coel you're correct, there is nothing that would take 14 hours to complete, and I'll admit that it was an extreme move on my behalf. But it's definitely more efficient to complete multiple voyages, quests, tall tales etc. before going to an outpost and selling, especially when it can take a few minutes to get between each island whilst also dealing with other players trying to sink my ship and steal the loot I've collected. But why should I be disconnected from the game just to take a 15 minute break, just because I didn't spend 15 minutes getting to an island and selling all my treasure so I could close the game I'm going to be playing again shortly?

  • Session based game. You need to stop getting hung up on "not losing progress" so much. Progress that matters doesn't go away. Once you get the Rep or Coin at cash in you have it - finish the full Voyage or not.

    A Voyage costs you 250 Gold. Almost all Loot in the game pays out that much, so if you cash in basically one item you come out ahead.

    Tall Tales have checkpoints.

    Understand that Voyages are just an excuse to get you out in the world and interacting. They aren't even needed, there is loads of Loot just laying around islands, Skeleton Captains and Ashen Skellies to point you to Loot, Megs and Krakens with Loot, Shipwrecks with Loot, Barrel/Bottle Voyages pointing to Loot.

    The game is made to be casual and put down whenever. I often log out without selling my last haul cause I've sold enough over the session already for it to just not matter. If I need to go do something else, I go do that and come back and load the game up fresh and start a fresh session. That is how it works.

    You're making a mountain out of a mole hill here.

  • @troublecook said in Beds/sleeping should disable the AFK timer:

    One thing that really bothers me about this game is the AFK timer. Having to constantly be active on the server so that you don't get booted and lose your progress is unhealthy and bad for player enjoyment, especially for newcomers or solo players (I've had to play for 14 hours straight because I didn't want to lose the progress I was making and it left me with migraines).

    euhm the AFK timer is not the issue here, it is you having a session of 14 hours straight, nothing in the game takes this long and it is your personal choice to create this situationn which indeed is unhealthy.

    a disabling of the mechanism doesnt help the health of the server though, server capacity is limited and having a ship/crew be inactive for extended periods of time can and will directly and indirectly affect all the other crews on the server

    the AFK timer is pretty good, allowing people to have a 10 minute bathroom break or 10 minutes to do whatever they want, and if they interact with the game for a few seconds in between it is a way to extend it. even for work it is advised to have a 15 minute break every 2 hours, and that can easily be achieved with the current system.

    At the moment the bed is very unnecessary, so I feel this would give it more of a use whilst fixing a major flaw in the game, in my opinion. And even if it wasn't a full disable, just increasing the timer to 30 minutes or an hour whilst sleeping would give most players enough time to take a break and rest their eyes before getting back to looking at a screen for another 2-3 hours.

    it used to be useless, now it heals you and it is not a major flaw, a developer cannot be held accountable for people that play their game for a unhealthy amount of time like you did, 14 hours that is almost 2/3 of a day and barely leaves you enough time to get a recommended amount of sleep for the night.

    if there would be quests in the game that would take that amount of time in one go the story would be different, but especially with how sot handles it you can go in do a voyage and not even complete it and deliver the loot. tall tales have checkpoints and are set up in stages etc etc dont place your health choices as a responsibility for someone else

  • @nex-stargaze you make it sound like these servers are built and booted up for each player specifically. These servers will run no matter what, they're likely rented out to Rare from some other company at a monthly or yearly cost, meaning it makes no difference whether I'm on it or someone that's getting supplies is on it. And going by how many times I get moved to a new server due to lack of players on that one, clearly the slots are not that high in demand. If anything all the AKF timer does is kick people that don't want to PvP as PvP players are the only ones that will be constantly moving about whilst they look for someone to battle.

    Also that is what I ended up doing, getting a crew mate to keep the session active, which surely contradicts your statement about taking up unnecessary slots on the server, but apparently that's allowed. And surely by penalising people for not being able to play for a short period of time because of an unexpected event in the real world is just minimalizing their audience and traffic to the game, making it less popular, and less likely to gain new and long lasting players. It's a path to an early game shut down.

    I will make a counter thought though, what if rather than being kicked and having your progress cleared, you can still be kicked, clearing your player slot on the server, but you still hold the progress on your local game so you can rejoin a server when you return and proceed with where you were. But only when you're kicked for inactivity, as I know someone will counter argue that people will just exit and rejoin to get away from PvP. SO accidental kick for inactivity, you can resume your progress, intentional leaving and you lose your progress.

  • @lovelocc I'll be real with you, servers are not set up for just a single player, they are rented out to businesses at a monthly or yearly cost and will stay running throughout the year, whether there are players on it or not.

  • @blam320 you're not wrong, and I'm not saying to get rid of the idle timer system. I'm saying to add a function in the game that allows you to take an extended period of time without having your progress cleared when you are kicked. The idle timer can stay, it would just be nice to have a way to increase it to an hour or something at your own responsibility, not being told to move in a game every 10 minutes by a servers.

  • @troublecook said in Beds/sleeping should disable the AFK timer:

    @kommodoreyenser I hope I made my initial post clear enough to understand, what I was speaking about was that the system encourages people to play for longer periods of time due to being penalised for being inactive for 10 minutes. When it is a game that includes missions that do not always have checkpoints, yes tall tales do but as far as I'm aware voyages don't, you're being told to play long or just leave the game. Which doesn't make sense to me. And just to clarify, the 14 hour session is a one of a kind as I have only recently started playing the game and have very little time to play it during the week, leaving me with only really weekends to play. So it's either that or progress at a snails pace, lose interest in the game due to minimal progress and stop playing all together haha. But I definitely won't be doing that again, so I'm sticking to the snails pace, it will take longer but that's the best option for my health that is possible.

    Reaching grade 5 emissary in any faction except Athena takes 1 hour or less. Unless you are doing Athena (unlikely as you said you are brand new) there is no reason a session should last longer than 2 hours.

    Not cashing out after an hour of play is called hoarding and in this game, I wouldn't suggest an experienced player who is solo do it, much less a new one.

  • 10 minutes is time enough to do a lot of things. And all you really need to do is hop once or twice and you get more time.

    Depending on how close your Xbox is, just bring your controller with you to the bathroom lol

    I can fold my laundry in less than 10 minutes now tho.

  • @redeyesith so you're saying that voyages have less worth in the game than being kicked for inactivity after 10 minutes? and I'll agree that the game is clearly designed to be relaxed and casual, albeit the constant tension that you could run into a reaper emissary or another ship that wants to sink you, but it just doesn't make sense to me to have a system that could take a couple hours to complete a task, include a mechanism that kicks you for being inactive for a short time. But that's just me and clearly not everyone feels that way. If people are happy to sign in and out of a game and lose the loot that the game advertises and urges you to collect for not moving for 10 minutes, then so be it. I'm not a dev and have no real influence over the game anyway, this was just something that I have an annoyance with.

  • @troublecook correct, Voyages are not the progress. They are a series of RNG tasks that will send you out in the world to acquire Loot. The Loot provides Coins and Reputation when cashed in, and that is the progression. Voyages are an excuse to get out there and get stuff, they hardly matter for the most part (the higher Tier Voyages have more point as they tend to have special things associated to them that are then tier to Commendations, but it is up to you if you care about that or not).

    And the game is a sandbox, no special linear path or character or ship upgrades, just cosmetics to make yourself look cooler in your own opinion. There isn't some limit on how much Loot is in the world, there is always more to find (Voyage or not). And it is about the journey, less so about the reward. Do things you find fun, and you win. Simple as that.

    And, as before, it is a session based game. You'll start every session fresh and just do what you feel like doing. If you need to step away, no real big deal, you'll sort it out next time or the time after that. It just isn't worth having any kind of stress over at all.

    So, again, don't make such a big deal out of it. Just do what you are gonna do, and when you need to step away just leave the game. The stuff you cashed in won't get taken away, and what you didn't really doesn't matter all that much. This is also why it doesn't matter if players attack you and you lose. So what, you had an intense battle and then move on with life. No harm, no foul.

    If you can accept that you'll have a much more enjoyable time out there. I never feel pressured. And when I am on, I am on and doing stuff. So the 10 minute timer is fine and allows me to step away to get a drink, use the restroom, have a smoke (cause I have a nasty habit), or whatever I need to do. Can even microwave some food if I need it. No stress ever, and no need for an extended timer.

  • @troublecook said in Beds/sleeping should disable the AFK timer:

    @redeyesith but it just doesn't make sense to me to have a system that could take a couple hours to complete a task, include a mechanism that kicks you for being inactive for a short time.

    there isnt a single thing that cant be completed in less then an hour or have checkpoints in between

  • @troublecook Join game. Go open crew. AFK in a bed. Get PL.

    see why it's not the best idea?

  • @troublecook said in Beds/sleeping should disable the AFK timer:

    @blam320 you're not wrong, and I'm not saying to get rid of the idle timer system. I'm saying to add a function in the game that allows you to take an extended period of time without having your progress cleared when you are kicked. The idle timer can stay, it would just be nice to have a way to increase it to an hour or something at your own responsibility, not being told to move in a game every 10 minutes by a servers.

    Allowing players to AFK for an hour is still way too much. On top of that, anything that requires you stay away from the keyboard for more than 10 minutes is obviously more important than progress you can very easily recoup in another game session. You're complaining about nothing and asking for the developers to compensate for your own inability to manage your time.

  • @troublecook said in Beds/sleeping should disable the AFK timer:

    @lem0n-curry which is why I suggested that you still be affected by real time so you're taking it into your own hands. I'd rather lose my stuff to a pirate sinking my ship than a server telling me I didn't move in 10 minutes so I've had my items and voyage progress cleared

    And as someone that gets very little time during the week to play this game, I decided to do a long run at a weekend to try and increase my reputation without having my ship sank by every other ship that was on the server. I'll admit it's extreme but when it's that or play for an hour, sell my stuff, log off, go do something that takes me half an hour, sign back in somewhere random, figure out where I need to go again, repeat, it seems the better choice to just fight through it and hope I don't lose it all in the process.

    If your migraine starts around an hour of play (or you just need a break after an hour) and SoT is not played very efficiently in that time; perhaps try to find a crewmate that doesn't mind going solo for some time in session (or two that don't mind an undermanned brigantine &c). It may create its own rhythm (as not start a fight right before a break of yours &c), it may end up sometimes in getting sunk and such, and you may have to work harder the time you're on - but it may be a solution.

  • @wsurftvveeds said in Beds/sleeping should disable the AFK timer:

    @troublecook Join game. Go open crew. AFK in a bed. Get PL.

    see why it's not the best idea?

    This! One of the reasons we have timers is people were logging into crews and just leaving for very long stretches of time. Not contributing but taking up a slot in the crew (and server) while everyone else did the work. The timer helps minimize this.

    @troublecook said in Beds/sleeping should disable the AFK timer:

    If people are happy to sign in and out of a game and lose the loot that the game advertises and urges you to collect for not moving for 10 minutes, then so be it.

    No one is saying you should just log out and dump loot. Go turn it in and then log out. Also, never carry more loot on board than you are comfortable losing. If you have a loot haul that took you hours to gather up then you may end up losing it all to other pirates or to circumstances. Go turn it in. Ignore trying to complete voyages unless you just want to for personal reasons. There is not much need for it. Just focus on the parts of the voyage that have decent return for your time. Gold hoarder maps with several chests on an island. Order of soul flyers with three or captains on an island. Stuff like that. There is not much, especially in the beginning, that should be taking several hours to complete. Take that stress of yourself and take breaks.

  • If I need to take a break that takes longer than 10 minutes, it's most likely more important than getting virtual gold in a videogame.

  • @troublecook Then let's just let players occupy servers for as long as they wish in order to create alliance servers and all, let's polish it all and make it really easy for them ^^

    Everybody around you's telling how much this is a bad idea, prove yourself and be more open minded.

  • 10 minutes is plenty enough time to do what needs doing most of the time.

    No, we do not need to enable ways for bots and bad actors to idle and take up space in the game.

    What they do need to fix though, is not being able to sleep in the bed when the brig is moving and water clips the boat.

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