Can't we increase the AFK timers now?

Kappachi · January 3

No MMO has an AFK timer as short as 15 minutes, I'm not asking for like an hour or something but at least give us enough time to eat, clean up a bit and come back or take a phone call/do something on a different monitor without having to worry about clicking back into the game and moving one inch in order to avoid having to log back in again... Especially for those of us not using Steam or an alternate launcher we have to re-enter our password each time which is tedious. I propose increasing the AFK timer to 30 minutes so you don't have to worry about being kicked out while using the restroom and idling on your phone for a bit.

SkaiFaith · January 4

Consoles would appreciate this too by the way... But I don't see something like this coming if the new "sustainability features" are in indicator.

Sakiri · January 4

I don't get why logging you out would be needed as sustainability as the dang system is still running.

Heck ffxiv doesn't even have one for the most part, they turn it on at expansion launch then it's off a month later.

Northwold · January 4

SkaiFaith wrote: »

Consoles would appreciate this too by the way... But I don't see something like this coming if the new "sustainability features" are in indicator.

The sustainability features deal with home user electricity consumption and have an appreciable effect (multiply one player's energy saving by ten thousand up). I doubt that's particularly relevant to being logged in and inactive.

Personally I do think the timers should run a little longer for things like, to be blunt, people going to the toilet. Which shouldn't really result in having to restart a dungeon! Either that or progress should be retained / be resumable for longer on the server.

Sakiri · January 4

Tbf, if you need to drop one, you might have wanted to before queueing.

I do get emergency visits though. Holy cow those stink. But I don't queue when I feel that bad.

Artim_X · January 5

Increase in PvE land and use battlespirit to keep it at 15 in PvP land.

Kyip · January 7

It's a nuisance during rp, constantly having to scroll zoom or move a little to stay logged in. I dunno why eso has this. Revisiting other games recently, it's been refreshing to not have to worry about a crazy logout timer.

Heck, I can just enjoy leaving them up for background ambience. Not eso due to the timer, which is a shame.

Arunei · January 8

Sakiri wrote: »

Tbf, if you need to drop one, you might have wanted to before queueing.

I do get emergency visits though. Holy cow those stink. But I don't queue when I feel that bad.

I have either Crohn's or severe IBD, I need to get in with a gastroenterologist to find out for sure. There are times, especially when a flare-up is just starting, where I'll be fine, but then within five or ten minutes I'll feel awful and need to go to the bathroom. Perhaps TMI, but my main point is there are a lot of things that can cause a person to need to go with little warning. Certain medications can be a HUGE cause of frequent or sudden need to go to the bathroom, along with a number of other medical conditions. It's not nearly always just a matter of "feeling bad" from, say, a stomach virus or Covid.

And while we're asking for afk timers to be extended, can we apply that to character select please? It used to be that you could stay in the character menu infinitely, but then ZOS put a limit on it because apparently people just idling at the character menu was preventing people from logging in (because I assume people who were in the character menu were technically logged in and taking up space on the server despite not actually being loaded INTO the server on an actual character?). But that was done years and years ago, before the hardware expansions and upgrades, so like...can we get at least a 15 or 20 minute timer on character select now too?

Oh, and the MAIN thing that needs a longer AFK timer? FRIGGIN CHARACTER CREATION. It's one thing to step away for the bathroom or a phone call or just getting distracted by something else like chatting with someone in Discord, and having to log back in. But if you get pulled away from character creation? You lose literally all the progress that you might have made. So if there's one place we could really use an extended AFK timer, it's for character creation.

Sakiri · January 8

Thing is, most random groups aren't going to wait more than five minutes.

Like I said, I DO get it(though I mute discord and put my phone on speaker when I get a call in a dungeon) when emergencies happen. And in like trials or other pre-made groups it'd be great.

What I wish, is that you would get booted to char select rather than out entirely.

Arunei · January 11

Sakiri wrote: »

Thing is, most random groups aren't going to wait more than five minutes.

Like I said, I DO get it(though I mute discord and put my phone on speaker when I get a call in a dungeon) when emergencies happen. And in like trials or other pre-made groups it'd be great.

What I wish, is that you would get booted to char select rather than out entirely.

Eh, the thing is dungeons or trials or whatever aren't the only thing a person might be doing before getting yeeted out of the game thanks to being MIA too long. Granted if you're like halfway through a Trifecta run and it happens, that's worse than just running around questing.

It's not other people waiting or not that's the main issue. It's the game itself not waiting long enough. Any number of things can happen that suddenly pull you from the game for longer than 15-20 minutes. With all the hardware updates we've had over the years, I'd assume they could make the afk timer longer, 30-60 minutes maybe. We aren't playing on hardware or servers that are so limited we need queues (aside from the rare times in the last few years queues were imposed because of the game having major issues) because there's not enough bandwidth or whatever for everyone who wants to play at a specific time.

That said, I also wish you'd get booted to char select rather than logged out entirely, though for that to work and not result in the same thing (a full logout), the character menu timer would need to either be removed or extended to 20 or so minutes itself.

Also...how long IS the afk timer? I could have sworn it was 15 minutes but there have been times I've come back around 20 minutes later and was still logged in. Others I'll get back to the computer just as the 15 minute mark hits and get logged out (which let me tell you, there is little that is more irksome than getting back to the computer, moving the mouse or trying to move my character, and the moment my hands touch mouse and keyboard I'm getting chucked back to the login screen).

Kyip · January 13

Some stuff can extend or reset it. Like if a npc walks into you, forcibly moving your character, that seems to reset it. Also, if you need to step away, go to your guild roster for a big guild that refreshes frequently as people log in and out, that seems to last longer. I don't know why either of these things work the way they do.

SaffronCitrusflower · January 13

Kappachi wrote: »

No MMO has an AFK timer as short as 15 minutes, I'm not asking for like an hour or something but at least give us enough time to eat, clean up a bit and come back or take a phone call/do something on a different monitor without having to worry about clicking back into the game and moving one inch in order to avoid having to log back in again... Especially for those of us not using Steam or an alternate launcher we have to re-enter our password each time which is tedious. I propose increasing the AFK timer to 30 minutes so you don't have to worry about being kicked out while using the restroom and idling on your phone for a bit.

Good idea with one caveat.

The AFK timer in Cyrodiil should be closer to 10 minutes and no longer than 15. We don't want Cyrodiil to be entirely populated with AFK players. Extending the AFK timer in Cyrodiil would invite other factions to log on and then go watch TV or something just to take up a player slot on their opposing factions.

DreamyLu · January 13

Me too, I would appreciate that the afk delay up to be kicked becomes longer.

I have a real life and can very rarely play without being interrupted (dog, husband, door bell, phone and so on...). I try to be fast of course, but regularly, once back at keyboard, the game already kicked me...

Northwold · January 14

Sakiri wrote: »

Thing is, most random groups aren't going to wait more than five minutes.

Like I said, I DO get it(though I mute discord and put my phone on speaker when I get a call in a dungeon) when emergencies happen. And in like trials or other pre-made groups it'd be great.

What I wish, is that you would get booted to char select rather than out entirely.

I think you're missing that people solo dungeons!