As of last night I no longer go on unleashed when there is 10 people, this is for a simple reason:

The AFK checks, every 5-10-15 minutes.

I am not a person that pays a whole lot of attention to chat. Frankly, the only time I notice anything is if a donator says something (because red is such an off colour from the green grass i usually prance around on).

As a result I often miss these AFK checks, and with penalties to missing them, I am going to rack up warnings far too fast on a full server. I just do not tend to read anything that is not horribly noticeable to me, not in any game unless I'm out to chat. Which if I'm crafting or such, I am not.

I could understand if they were every hour, on the hour (aka, exactly 17:00 or such) because I could take in account that at 17:00, I have to pay attention to chat and then have an hour to craft or do other things that take my focus from chat until 18:00. Well, I'll prolly be offline then, dinner. But you get my point.

I'm wondering if anyone else has any trouble - or perhaps, advice other then my current solution of not-playing - with the AFK checks.

As is I'm heavily considering stopping playing, which would be sad as I like this community a lot. I just can't play a game if I can't even begin on building a first wall, let alone get to a fourth =(

Just to avoid misunderstandings: you won't be warned/kicked/banned just because of one missed afk check. Phone call/toilet break/coffee/smoking/crafting is perfectly ok, of course.
As for the afk checks: i think a minimum time between them would be good, like, once an hour.
At the moment only the slot limit hurts; the people that manage to get on most likely make use of their playtime and don't afk at all. But not much we can do about the slot/resource limits.
*sigh* i'd love to play right now...

Thing is, people were saying it would warrant warnings etc yesterday.

And with the every 5 damn minutes going on yesterday I felt with all the reading I was doing just to not offend anyone I might as well log out and pick up my necronomicon.

Theres one thing i'm always afraid of in online games: breaking the rules, something I go as far as enjoying in offline games. Even the bare potentiality of being percieved as breaking the rules to me is greatly detrimental to any enjoyment I might otherwise have =(

To clarify - You get two checks and a physical appearance. So 3 chances in about 20 minutes per set of AFK checks. in this time if anyone logs off the checks are reset.

Example:

AFK 1 - Missed (next afk check 5 minutes)
AFK 2 - Missed (next in 5 minutes)
AFK 3 - Physical appearance and prod
"Oh hai. sorry didn't see the check"
This would mean the your check would be reset to (Here)

If you missed the 3rd check that would mean a "warn" which would kick you from the server and incur a 2 point penalty.

This goes for anyone including mods/helpers.... Even broonie unless he's fixing something.

If the server is 100% "here" on any of the checks it's reset back to 10 minutes between checks.

I'd sometimes wave the checks to some degree if there was no one waiting to get in but there is always at least 2 or more on vanilla and potentially more not on vanilla waiting for a slot.

Can another staff member clarify this so players know were clear on this fact.

Still draze, every 10 minutes isnt even enough to get into any part of the game.

I'd rather grab a book if I have to read all the time.

The rules were set out as Draze has stated, purely to stop people hogging the server slots by being AFK without announcing it (whilst they let other stuff run in their base).

I personally think that a warning is a little harsh for this, as a simple kick with no penalty should suffice (unless a member continuously repeats this behavior, in which case a warning should be issued from then onwards).

Please remember that the FTB Unleashed server is still technically in a testing phase while we try and iron out the bugs. If you remember when Tekkit was introduced, only specific players were given access to bug test it. Therefore, with FTBu - we're all bug testers. Once they are all ironed out, hopefully the player limit will be increased - negating the need for AFK checks.

So to summarise...

AFK checks are in place to ensure that when the server is full, only active players are playing ... otherwise you could end up with a load of players that have machines running (requiring their presence to do so), hogging the server while those players are actually doing something else (i.e. playing another game).

I understand why theyre there. Its the frequency that is my main issue. Im afraid to go to the toilet while logged in even when there arent any AFK checks, so finding me actually AFK is unlikely.

The problem is that I am often inresponsive, due to not reading the chat and that i feel called out and scolded for this. If it was a scedual I could wrap my mind around, say ever hour or every 30 mins (at 00 or 30), I would know to pay attention to chat at those exact times.

As if I'm often surprised that I a[[arently missed a bunch of AFK checks and get called out in public chat, which honestly makes me wanna drop through the floors of a 30 storey building....

Chista, we are not trying to pick on you ... To be honest, I'm just as bad at checking chat for AFK checks when I'm busy doing someting as you are.

Would it be better if they were done as announcements? (green text only messages). Anyone VIP and above can do /announce if I remember correctly (VIP's get their name mentioned in the text, Helpers and above don't). It will definitely stand out from the rest of the chat.

The problem is the green doesnt stand out much to me either. the only time i really notice someone is talking is when it's a donator (red).

Im pretty sure if the announcements were some horrible shade of hot-pink i'd notice too, but colours that are predominant in or around my build don't tend to call much attention =(

I know you're not trying to pick on me, you're not bad people. If you were I wouldn't be playing here. But with my extreme phobia of doing things wrong, for other people or otherwise, each time I miss a check I feel like crying.

I think the frequency of the checks gets a little annoying, and the timing of them is non-standard so you never know when to expect them, but that said, the server doesn't fill up at a standard rate. We could though still have the checks every 15mins of the hour, once a server is full.. eg: i join at 8:10 and the server is now full, checks start at 8:15 and so on. (i think you get the idea) just making them at standard times.

Do you have Atychiphobia by any chance?

The problem is the green doesnt stand out much to me either. the only time i really notice someone is talking is when it's a donator (red).

Im pretty sure if the announcements were some horrible shade of hot-pink i'd notice too, but colours that are predominant in or around my build don't tend to call much attention =(

Chista

I have the bind set to do both /announce "AFK check"
and /Say "AFK check" at the same time so it double posts in 2 ways.

That's possibly a good idea. Change the Staff announce to another colour.

When doing checks I usually tp to non responders and hit them once with my hand , (I can make sure they don't die as I have damage indicators on ) and then I they're in another tab or reading a book or wiki or something then they will look up and move around or say something in chat , this way people don't go down as actually being Afk , which stops the chance of an unfair warning , if they're actually Afk then they can't complain about being warned .

What if their sound's off?

Well if they are in a chest or book they'll be able to partially see they're being hit , nothing much can be done for people in other tabs , but its unlikely that they will stay in that tab for more than five minutes (between check times) other than that just keep your sound on , minecraft sucks without the repeatative sounds .

Basically if you're playing the server but want to do other things you need to make a choice. is what you're doing going to take you longer than say 10 mins? (adequate 1st and second AFK check timer) if so, log off.

I know sometimes you have to stand around waiting for a machine to process, or something to charge but we ALL need to be watching to some degree.
I've caught myself accidentally being logged in while fumbling around in the attic.
If say mega booted me for missing AFK checks. that would have been my fault.

I had to try and balance 8 players asking me to do AFK checks from Vanilla whilst dealing with complaints about the AFK checks from FTBu. Not easy to deal with guys. That's why the AFK checks are set for the time they are.

If it was 30m - 1hr. We would loose so many players because no one would be able to get on for 59min AFKers.

When the new vanilla launches it will level out some due to others moving back to vanilla. Also when they fix the bugs in Unleashed that "may" allow broonie to up the player count.
Either way things WILL get easier in time. Patience is a virtue and something we need to keep hold of in beta stages of a new mod.

Also a side note for you all. I've been rather lenient with the checks. Sometimes i've been giving us 20 mins between checks if there hasn't been much word from anyone wanting in to play.
I Could change to constantly doing the exact check timer 10/5/5 if you all want me to?
but because we're all helpful players and give each other a break when it comes to this as do i to you all when server demand is low. Please keep that in mind.

Are the afk checks really needed that often?
The ones i did or witnessed so far only found players short time afk (i.e. toilet break) or just not reading chat or crafting stuff.
During afternoon/evening hours we simply have more players wanting to play than the slot limit allows. Checking does not help with that.
My vote would be afk checks only once an hour to not distract players from actual playing too much.

I see your point of not noticing the chat when buissy, but when they give you 2 checks pluss a poke and no response to none. Then chanses are your not there, maybe removing the warning part can be an idea, so just a kick.

But when you get anoyed for having to reply to an afk check, think of all the other members that want to get in, and the anoyance that people go afk and hugging the 10 spots give them. Probably all of you have been on the not enough room side.

Maybe as Draze said, and we can change the announcement colour that would help. To a flashy pink or something so you can see it eaven when in a crafting grid. And checking chat every 5 min and pressing tab too see if the server is full is something all of us can manage.

We are a community and have to considere the other members when we play here. So I hope we keep the current afk timer settings but maybe remove the warning and just have a kick instead.

If the colour would be more flash then yeah, i'd probably jump each time they happened.

As for the Atychiphobia, only the fear of failure part, the strange things not so much. I used to talk to the monsters under my bed for example...

I used to do that as well Chista. had one under there called george, i miss him he was cool

When you share a bedroom with my sister, even closetmonsters seem nice =S And they're not usually the sociable ones.

I would be in favor of a /kick command with no points penalty for those that forget they shouldn't be AFK for too long (sometimes you go AFK, then something comes up and you forget / can't to go back to your computer for a while). Repeat offenders deserve a warning after being /kick-ed several times.

However, I think that when the server is full, AFK checks on a regular basis is the only way to keep active players on the server as opposed to those that just want to AFK to keep their machines running.

Also, if someone fails an AFK check, requiring a visit from a VIP or above - and we find them doing something, then we can assume they were just too busy to notice chat - hence why the "go prod them" rule was introduced - that way we can physically see who is active / inactive

For christs sake just install an AFK plugin for bukkit. this one is good http://dev.bukkit.org/bukkit-plugins/justafk/

Well we can just spam /announce AFK CHECKS 3 or 4 times im sure that would get attention. You really dont need to worry about going to the toilet or getting something to drink we all do that its just people who say, sit by their quarry while they are away doing something else for half an hour that the afk checks are for.

I think the reason we warn instead of having the /kick command is that you shouldn't give us a reason to have to kick you. Its selfish to take up a 1/10 slot for you to go afk for half an hour or more (not for 5-10 minutes).

Also just pointing out, staff dont enjoy trying to set timers for each individual member who hasnt responded to the checks and then dropping whatever theyre doing to go prod them but it keeps the server flowing.

Personally i hope broonie raises the limit to 15 or higher with CFUK 2.0 but thats his choice.