Upgrades for Clubs feature

[Dragonwhisky]

I would like to suggest some features for consideration to include in the Clubs feature of the GT6 Community.

In my capacity as a League Administrator, it would be very useful to have a few more options for Club Lobby and Club event access. These options would be in the form of Access Controls. The Block List is good for preventing (I'm assuming here, since there is very little in the documentation on Block List functionality) PSNIDs from joining club lobbies and events, public or otherwise. What I would like to see implemented is the following;

Club Membership is a given in all cases.

• Explicit Allow All w/exceptions to Club Lobbies
  
• Explicit Allow All w/exceptions to Club Events.
• Explicit Deny All w/exceptions to single Club Events.

The reason I ask for these options is to allow the league I help administrate finer control over the entry process we've been refining since the Community features were added last November. The Club Events functionality does not provide the versatility to use for our racing on Sunday nights so it's been used for Practice Time Trials for the car and track combinations being run. Initially, due to the open nature of the results of Time Trials, we were hesitant to use the Club Events for our Division Placement Time Trial but have since included it in our process, and while not an ideal solution, is workable for our purposes. Having the ability to limit which club members can access which events and lobbies will help maintain the integrity of our divisional placement process and keep it from being taken advantage of. Being able to add exceptions will allow us to step a new member into the league without the need to communicate who can do what and when.

I know this level of functionality logically exists for most modern computer file systems, but am unsure if this can be extended to the programming involved in the Club modules. I hope it can be and it is also my hope Polyphony Digital can figure out a way to implement it successfully. It would certainly smooth out some of the rough spots we currently bounce over in our journey getting new people up to speed in our league.

If anyone from Polyphony Digital is watching, thank you for your time and attention.

Sincerely,

Dragonwhisky

Disclaimer: My use of terminology may not be precisely accurate. I hope you get the idea from the context in which it is used.

 

[watermelon punch]

Yeah, what you said.
I've thought a lot about this now after some experience with the Community Clubs Events feature.

My 2 biggest beefs...

There ought to be an option to make Events be championships where you can change tracks/laps.

Now, if you want to have multiple races in an event you either have to have it Track Day style on the same track OR create separate events (no RGO then!), or just open a separate non-Event lobby (which is what we're doing).

Also, this business of putting the farthest off events in the future at the top most prominent spot in the club events list - what were they thinking?
Club events are not like a BLOG. It's a schedule.


Also, it would be nice to have the option of allowing other club members additional access to a club's features. Like event creation or forum thread creating or whatnot.

I know some clubs just use a separate PSN account, but frankly that's rather annoying to have to do that. I don't want to have to use 2 separate browsers on my computer & tablet to access GT6 on the web... and obviously you can't be signed into 2 PSN accounts on the ps3 at once, and that's a time consuming PITB to have to switch to do anything.

 

[tarnheld]

I think PD is really on to something with the community club!

Club Membership is a given in all cases.

• Explicit Allow All w/exceptions to Club Lobbies
  
• Explicit Allow All w/exceptions to Club Events.
• Explicit Deny All w/exceptions to single Club Events.

allowing other club members additional access to a club's features. Like event creation or forum thread creating or whatnot.

Seeing that the allow/deny stuff is already implemented for club membership itself (block list -> explicit deny, private club -> explicit allow from club owner), this all could be done by adding member groups to a club.

Owner can create groups, add members to groups, and give groups allow/deny rights.
Each member can belong to multiple club groups and has the rights of all those groups.
Each event and forum belongs to multiple groups.

Rights are:

• enter events/lobby rooms/single event/forums
• view events/lobby rooms/single event/forums
• create/delete events/lobby rooms/single event/forums
• right management itself, adding/removing members to groups

So the owner can delegate event creation to members of the 'admin' group and add members to Leagues by putting them in the 'leagueX' group, where only some events/forums belong to the group.

Club events are not like a BLOG. It's a schedule.

💡 I can see a calendar here ... in the club and in each PSN user's page!

 

[watermelon punch]

Another issue I've found now.

CLUB LOBBY HOSTS SHOULD HAVE OPTION TO KICK

There is no mechanism to "kick" in the members only club lobby.

And even using the block mechanism, won't oust them.

(At least in the days of GT5 friends lounges, you could remove someone from your friends list, and they'd be automatically kicked from the room.)

Granted, you can make a club private, and invitation only.

But then how do more people find your club?
And then, to get to know someone, they'd have to be invited and join.
And if you don't invite them, you'll never find out what they're like to race with or how they might behave.

If you keep it open though, anyone could join. And then anyone could join and wreak havoc in your members only club lounge, and there's no way to stop them.

But seems to me that just means that the prize of all prizes for a griefer would be to request invites to clubs, and then stick it to people, because once they're in, they can wreak havoc, and they'll know that there's no way to kick them, the room would have to be dissolved, and the CLUB OWNER would have to be present and correct, to then put the offender on the club block list to keep them shut out.

As it is, this is a problem if people are using club lobbies when the club "owner" is not present. 👎
A griefer could repeatedly join any club lounge the club members tried to make, until the club owner could block the offender.

 

[VBR]

The clubs feature is yet another good idea badly executed by PD. When will they ever learn some common sense!


👎

 

[Dragonwhisky]

The clubs feature is yet another good idea badly executed by PD. When will they ever learn some common sense!


👎

I wouldn't say it was badly executed. Just needs a few tweaks here and there. Seeing as how I'm pretty sure they are treating GT6 as a test bed for features for the next iteration of Gran Turismo, I'm almost satisfied we have it at all. So far, it's made league night easier to deal with in some respects. Now, if we could just get some players who live in Kansas City to host all our league lobbies.

While I'm on the subject of tweaks for the community features; How about adding in an option for club events to be set for a certain number of "attempts". One or unlimited would do for starters. While they're in there tweaking the code for that, perhaps they can code it in so an expired event can be re-opened simply by resetting the expiration time and date. As it stands now, an event that will always be in our club events has to be recreated when it expires. I would much rather be able to open and close it at will.

 

[watermelon punch]

I agree that for the most part it seems to be mainly "oversights".
And yeah, seemingly lacking common sense... but more like lacking insight into how people want to use these features.

While they're in there tweaking the code for that, perhaps they can code it in so an expired event can be re-opened simply by resetting the expiration time and date. As it stands now, an event that will always be in our club events has to be recreated when it expires. I would much rather be able to open and close it at will.

Events have a time frame limit?
I thought you could just keep extending it.

 

[Dragonwhisky]

I agree that for the most part it seems to be mainly "oversights".
And yeah, seemingly lacking common sense... but more like lacking insight into how people want to use these features.



Events have a time frame limit?
I thought you could just keep extending it.

You can, as long as you catch it before it expires. Once it expires, it's done and you can't "re-activate" it. You have to create a complete new one.

 

[eran0004]

One upgrade I would like to see is exact dates and times for events created by the clubs. Maybe I just haven't figured it out yet, but when an event is listed from 5th of January to 15th of January, when is it actually taking place?

 

[watermelon punch]

One upgrade I would like to see is exact dates and times for events created by the clubs. Maybe I just haven't figured it out yet, but when an event is listed from 5th of January to 15th of January, when is it actually taking place?

It's there, it's just that the font and the way it's displayed with the date it looks like one long run-on number.

There's also no way to choose how to display date & time. It's just straight up YYYY/MM/DD 24:00

 

[Dragonwhisky]

I like the active date and time just the way it is. Leaves no doubt, at least for me anyway, when the event will be active.

 

[eran0004]

I like the active date and time just the way it is. Leaves no doubt, at least for me anyway, when the event will be active.

View attachment 305808

It leaves a lot of doubt when the date says 2014-11-20 to 2015-02-28. Basically it could be any day and any time and you have no idea when. I want a fixed start date and time: this is when the event will start, make sure to be online then if you want to join.

 

[Dragonwhisky]

I don't know about anybody else but the little clock symbol indicates active time of event and the first date and time is when it opened, then a - and the date and time it closes. Looks pretty plain to me.

 

[watermelon punch]

I know what you mean @eran0004 ...
You are expecting it... as a SCHEDULE.

And that's how I've been using it... to schedule events, so members can look and it shows in their time zone.
I'm careful to put in the start time, and then the end time when I expect the event to be finished.
(In fact, we usually don't use the "event" itself to make the room, it's held in the club lobby usually. But the event is scheduled as a way for people to see it there, and then sign up that way.)

But not all clubs work that way. Some clubs have regular schedule one day of the week at a certain time and then that might be in the club description or the "forum" area... or here on the forum for that matter.

Obviously Time Trials are different, as anyone can go and do those while it's open. And for those they can be open for days on end.

I guess whatever club you're joining, you should look around to see if there's some schedule posted somewhere other than events. 👍

 

[eran0004]

I know what you mean @eran0004 ...
You are expecting it... as a SCHEDULE.

And that's how I've been using it... to schedule events, so members can look and it shows in their time zone.
I'm careful to put in the start time, and then the end time when I expect the event to be finished.
(In fact, we usually don't use the "event" itself to make the room, it's held in the club lobby usually. But the event is scheduled as a way for people to see it there, and then sign up that way.)

But not all clubs work that way. Some clubs have regular schedule one day of the week at a certain time and then that might be in the club description or the "forum" area... or here on the forum for that matter.

Obviously Time Trials are different, as anyone can go and do those while it's open. And for those they can be open for days on end.

I guess whatever club you're joining, you should look around to see if there's some schedule posted somewhere other than events. 👍

Maybe I just joined some poorly managed clubs.

 

[watermelon punch]

Maybe I just joined some poorly managed clubs.

That's always a possibility too.
But also it could be the club manager(s) don't actually use the Community features to the fullest extent because it doesn't quite fit their needs.

Example: I did notice one club that had all its schedules posted in their club forum, along with other threads in the club forum describing rules & restrictions, etc. And no events posted at all.
So definitely don't forget to check those forum areas... that's where the important stuff might be "hiding".