Assembly Hall

Back when Incarna was due to be released, CCP had announced that the screen in the captains quarters would have functionality that would be useful both to new players and old vets. As it stands, that screen doesn’t really have much functionality at all. I have a proposal that would make the screen vaguely useful, with (hopefully) very little effort expended. In the future this could even be iterated on, to further increase the functionality of CQ and the screen. This proposal is that one of two thing should happen. The first idea, is that we could create channels. The second, is that we could create filter options for the screen.

Channels:

At the moment the screen flicks between visuals of various different aspects of the game that might be dividable. We have displays of players’ “wanted” bounty posters, career agent adverts, incursion warnings, ship adverts, epic ark mission adverts, new pilot certification, clone status alerts, sov change alerts, nex store adverts, and “buy plex” adverts. If I missed any, please let me know. Now, I propose we slit them into channels, and I’ll give an example below;

General – All topics (Default Channel)
News – Incursion Warnings, Bounty Posters, Sov Change Alerts, New Pilot Certification
Careers – Career Agents, Epic Ark, Incursion Warnings
Market – Ship Adverts, “Buy Plex” adverts, Nex store Ads

Now it doesn’t need to be these specific channels (these are just examples), and the Clone Status Alert should probably show on all channels, because let’s face it, that actually is useful. These channels would be accessible by highlighting the screen, where you would see a UI interface similar to that of the seat, or the image of your ship that shows fitting/cargo/etc.

Filter Options:

You could also have a simple filter option where you tick only the types of displays you want to see on the screen. For example, I could turn all of them off and keep sov change alerts on, so that I can watch for the slow and painful destruction of certain alliances’ sovereignty. Or (If the bounty system worked) I could watch the bounty board only, for tasty PvP snacks. This might give a reason for station bound toons to actually pay some attention to the screen.

Buy Why!?:

I imagine there are a few people in here who will be like “Wtf, CQ is crap, why bother?”. I would answer, because it’s not going anywhere, so we might as well make it useful. Hopefully with channels/filters (and perhaps some later iterations), the screen itself could be used as a tool to improve gameplay, or even your toons financial performance.

Imagine for a moment that you’re a trader. Now imagine that there are also Item adverts now on the screen, and that these new item adverts and the old ship adverts had the highest buy and sell orders in various regions displayed on them. You could use the filter (or channels) to watch for these specifically and just watch for potential deals or trade routes.

Alternatively, imagine you’re a hardcore nullsecy just chilling out in your sov space with nothing to do. Now imagine the Sov Change ads had associated battle reports on them that you could click on. Whilst chatting, or sifting through your alliance/corp kill board you can watch the political landscape shift and change as people blow each other up. Glorious.

Throw your support or criticisms at the idea. The more the merrier etc.

In support!

So long as this doesn't get put ahead of more useful iterations, then supported.