Proximity Chat | Thoughts on Extending for World Wide | OPT IN

**Hey Everyone!**

So, we all know that Ashes of Creation already has proximity chat in the game, but here’s the thing—it’s currently limited to taverns. And while I *love* the idea of being able to chat with fellow adventurers in those cozy, lively spots, I can't help but think we’re missing out on a *massive* opportunity by not expanding this feature to the entire world.

Imagine how much more alive the world of Verra could feel if proximity chat was available *everywhere*—across all regions, in every town, dungeon, or out in the wilds. I’m talking about the kind of spontaneous, player-driven moments that make this game unique. Whether you’re running into a rival faction in the middle of a contested zone, stumbling upon a world event, or just hearing someone shout out a random, hilarious comment while you’re exploring, the potential for memorable moments is endless.

Sure, some might argue that it could disrupt the game’s immersion, but here’s the thing: it’s *opt-in*. Players who prefer to chat with their friends on Discord or other platforms can easily ignore it. Those who want to dive into the world, interact with the environment, and hear the buzz of the community all around them would love it. It’s about adding layers to the game world without forcing anyone to use it.

And let’s not forget the impact on *content creation*. More than just making the game feel alive, proximity chat would generate a steady stream of player-driven content. Imagine a streamer stumbling upon a random group of players having an epic, unscripted moment that goes viral. That kind of organic exposure is priceless, and it could help bring in fresh players and build the community even more.

In short, I think Intrepid is missing a golden opportunity by keeping proximity chat limited to taverns. Expanding it to the entire world could unlock so much potential—both for the game’s social experience and for the *free* player-driven marketing that would follow.

What do you think? Would you love to see worldwide proximity chat in *Ashes*? Let’s talk about it!

— [AchillesPlayzGG] YT

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Comments

Its_Me

Yes, I actually enjoy the salt, tears and toxicity of proximity voice chat in games during pvp battles. My vote would be yes ✅.

ElderLancer

I think the key term for this would be "opt in". If people don't want to hear the trash talk they don't have to. I love hearing people and their mic shenanigans.

bloodprophet

No.
It will diminish the size of the world.
Imagine 1000 people all trying to talk at the same time while some asshat is blasting music.
What a mess that would be. Hell even the server discord channels now are a mess with just a 30+ ransoms.

Its_Me

bloodprophet wrote: »

No.
It will diminish the size of the world.
Imagine 1000 people all trying to talk at the same time while some asshat is blasting music.
What a mess that would be. Hell even the server discord channels now are a mess with just a 30+ ransoms.

I believe the OP said 'proximity chat' extending to the entire map (not just in taverns) and was not suggesting everyone all over the map be heard by everyone else, it would still be limited to closer/proximity area.

bloodprophet

Its_Me wrote: »

bloodprophet wrote: »

No.
It will diminish the size of the world.
Imagine 1000 people all trying to talk at the same time while some asshat is blasting music.
What a mess that would be. Hell even the server discord channels now are a mess with just a 30+ ransoms.

I believe the OP said 'proximity chat' extending to the entire map (not just in taverns) and was not suggesting everyone all over the map be heard by everyone else, it would still be limited to closer/proximity area.

Kind of the same thing isn't it?

Expanding it to the entire world and all.

ElderLancer

bloodprophet wrote: »

Its_Me wrote: »

bloodprophet wrote: »

No.
It will diminish the size of the world.
Imagine 1000 people all trying to talk at the same time while some asshat is blasting music.
What a mess that would be. Hell even the server discord channels now are a mess with just a 30+ ransoms.

I believe the OP said 'proximity chat' extending to the entire map (not just in taverns) and was not suggesting everyone all over the map be heard by everyone else, it would still be limited to closer/proximity area.

Kind of the same thing isn't it?

Expanding it to the entire world and all.

no, it means that you will have prox chat wherever you go, not just relegated to taverns. you are thinking of area chat. also it would be opt in, meaning you wouldn't hear it unless you wanted to. Also also there will prolly be a way to mut the idiot with the music, so you wouldn't have to listen to it anyways.

Its_Me

bloodprophet wrote: »

Its_Me wrote: »

bloodprophet wrote: »

No.
It will diminish the size of the world.
Imagine 1000 people all trying to talk at the same time while some asshat is blasting music.
What a mess that would be. Hell even the server discord channels now are a mess with just a 30+ ransoms.

I believe the OP said 'proximity chat' extending to the entire map (not just in taverns) and was not suggesting everyone all over the map be heard by everyone else, it would still be limited to closer/proximity area.

Kind of the same thing isn't it?

Expanding it to the entire world and all.

No, it is not the same thing.

The feature would be expanding, the proximity of voice would still be limited. Plus, as the OP suggested, this would be an option, a feature you can turn off.

mainedutch

I want proximity chat in the open world. It's my favorite part about DayZ.

Think it would be great in a game like Ashes out in the regular world, but should have a pretty reasonable range of, say, like 30m? Idk. Regardless, I agree.

Caeryl

Are we talking about voice chat within the game? As I understood it, that's not going to be built in.

If you mean local chat in the open world, that already exists in both /say and /yell

Its_Me

Caeryl wrote: »

Are we talking about voice chat within the game? As I understood it, that's not going to be built in.

If you mean local chat in the open world, that already exists in both /say and /yell

The OP stated they are aware that voice chat within game is limited to taverns and is simply asking if others feel that it would be a good feature to have outside of taverns.

Steven has already stated that voice would be limited to areas like taverns, parties, and raids and he expects discord for everything else but it appears the OP is asking how people feel about this and what they would prefer.

Vhaeyne

It's not free to implement and maintain.

Serious people will exclusively use discord for privacy.

90% of interactions are cringe.

It's difficult to moderate.

I am struggling to find realistic reasons to want proximity chat.

Ace1234

Some people like it some don't, thats part of what it means to give players a choice. Encouraging social interaction is a pillar of the game too, so there is probably a stronger argument to include it vs not to. Either way, people will be able to communicate in other ways, so there is nothing wrong with letting people choose their preferred method.

As toxic as it can be, from my experience I very much miss the experiences i've had with proximity chat, in games that decided to remove it. To me the pros outweigh the cons, so I ended up having overall less fun without the feature.

Personally, I wouldn't give up my experiences with forced proximity chat for anything. There was nothing like the good old days of Black Ops 2 search and destroy, with forced game chat. The saltiness, the trash talk, the storytelling, the experience....irreplacable. The good, the bad, and the ugly, but the bad and the ugly was sometimes part of what made it good.

Noaani

Ace1234 wrote: »

Encouraging social interaction is a pillar of the game too

Encouraging positive social interactions, not negative ones.

90%+ of ann interactions that will be had with proximity chat if it were world wide will be salt based. All this will do is encourage people to turn it off (no way in hell I'm going to listen to you bitch that you got killed, think you're hit shit for 3v1'ing me, or crying that I won't fight you).

If it is limited to taverns, more people will leave it on.

Thus, an argument could be made that limiting it to tavern only will actually increase the total number of voice chat based interactions, but there is no argument that it will increase the number and ratio of positive interactions.

Really, the only reason to want it is to spread salt. The game will have more than enough of that.

ElderLancer

Noaani wrote: »

Ace1234 wrote: »

Encouraging social interaction is a pillar of the game too

Encouraging positive social interactions, not negative ones.

90%+ of ann interactions that will be had with proximity chat if it were world wide will be salt based. All this will do is encourage people to turn it off (no way in hell I'm going to listen to you bitch that you got killed, think you're hit shit for 3v1'ing me, or crying that I won't fight you).

If it is limited to taverns, more people will leave it on.

Thus, an argument could be made that limiting it to tavern only will actually increase the total number of voice chat based interactions, but there is no argument that it will increase the number and ratio of positive interactions.

Really, the only reason to want it is to spread salt. The game will have more than enough of that.

If its relegated to taverns then there is no real reason to opt in to it in the first place. Everything that happens in a tavern can be just as easily (if not more easily) communicated via the usage of text chat. Having prox chat in the open world would allow people in the open world to communicate without immobilizing themselves with the usage of the chat system, which would allow people not in the same faction to interact on a level that would be otherwise unwise in a game where combat can easily find you.

Noaani

ElderLancer wrote: »

If its relegated to taverns then there is no real reason to opt in to it in the first place.

If it is tavern only, there is no reason for it to not be opt in by default, and players will have very little reason to opt out.

Your argument in regards to everything happening in a tavern being able to be communicated via text equally applies to everything else in the game.

Having prox chat in the open world would allow people in the open world to communicate without immobilizing themselves with the usage of the chat system, which would allow people not in the same faction to interact on a level that would be otherwise unwise in a game where combat can easily find you.

Yes, but my point is that the vast majority of this would be negative interaction, which is not something Intrepid should be developing the game to encourage.

In other words, what you are saying is perhaps true, but if it is true it is a reason to *not* have world wide proximity based voice chat, rather than being a reason to have it.

If you disagree, feel free to explain why you think negative interaction would be good for Ashes.

Its_Me

If you disagree, feel free to explain why you think negative interaction would be good for Ashes.

What one person might classify as negative, others might classify as positive from an entertainment standpoint.

There are a lot of players that like to straight up RP with others in game. While I am not into RP, I just ignore it but I certainly do not mind those around me that decide to engage with others using silly dialect to strike up a little roleplay.

For some, banter is a part of this RP, it provides the immersion they are looking for when it comes to pvp encounters.

Some of the best pvp, wars and guild/clan enemy relationships in games I have played have arisen from proximity chat banter.

The OP is just asking how everyone feels about proximity chat being limited to taverns. I feel suggesting that the feature should not exist for anyone outside of taverns when there is an option to turn off (or on in taverns if that is your thing), comes across as a bit controlling and FOMO imo.

Caeryl

Its_Me wrote: »

Caeryl wrote: »

Are we talking about voice chat within the game? As I understood it, that's not going to be built in.

If you mean local chat in the open world, that already exists in both /say and /yell

The OP stated they are aware that voice chat within game is limited to taverns and is simply asking if others feel that it would be a good feature to have outside of taverns.

Steven has already stated that voice would be limited to areas like taverns, parties, and raids and he expects discord for everything else but it appears the OP is asking how people feel about this and what they would prefer.

I see. Default voice chat in my general experience has been unenjoyable, either people are annoying with music or their voices, or they just get rancid and start being assholes, so I'd prefer it not exist in ashes outside of the exclusively opt-in space.

Greyclouds

Please for the love of all that is great, do not waste game space and computing on this .... WHY? DISCORD. Plain and simple the vast majority won't use proximity except to trash talk while tea bagging. use the effort/energy to work on better things for the game. Just my opinion.

Ace1234

@Noaani

Encouraging positive social interactions, not negative ones.

To me the negative is a part of the positive of the experience. I know thats not the case for everyone but for me personally, I like the good, the bad, and the ugly aspects. Of course, this may or may not be the right way of interpeting their intent.

One could also argue that the positive and the negative can be 2 sides of the same coin in some cases, similar to the analogy Steven constantly uses when describing risk vs reward. Regardless, I still like some of the negative aspects so that reasoning doesn't really need to apply to me specifically.

90%+ of ann interactions that will be had with proximity chat if it were world wide will be salt based. All this will do is encourage people to turn it off (no way in hell I'm going to listen to you bitch that you got killed, think you're hit shit for 3v1'ing me, or crying that I won't fight you).

If it is limited to taverns, more people will leave it on.

Thus, an argument could be made that limiting it to tavern only will actually increase the total number of voice chat based interactions, but there is no argument that it will increase the number and ratio of positive interactions.

Speaking strictly in the context of opt-in, and from the perspective of players who have preferences different from myself or experience proximity chat different from how I experience it:

Maybe your right, but its not like you can't turn it back on again once you enter the tavern, just like you would do anyway if you were wanting to opt in if it was only available in the tavern. So, if you assume the interactions will be negative both in the world and in the tavern then people would opt out anyway so nothing would change. If you assume interactions would be better in the tavern then people could just turn it back on.

But, even though I hinted at opt-in earlier, my personal preference (probably not a good idea from a design perspective though) is forced proximity chat so what you are saying doesn't really apply to what I would personally want, since it would be forced regardless.

Really, the only reason to want it is to spread salt. The game will have more than enough of that.

Yeah pretty much, but I would still enjoy it. Like I said, I wouldn't trade the forced game chat COD days for anything, and the idea of forced proximity chat is kind if my reimagined way of replicating that in this game. Very fun memories.

Noaani

Ace1234 wrote: »

So, if you assume the interactions will be negative both in the world and in the tavern

I don't assume that.

I assume most interactions in a tavern will be either neutral or positive for both parties involved. Some won't, obviously, but most will.

Yeah pretty much, but I would still enjoy it.

This isn't a reason to add things to the game.

People would enjoy LFG type PvE content as well, but the game as a whole would be worse off if it were added.

Adding something to the game that makes the game worse just because some people would enjoy it is really not a good tradeoff.

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