Thoughts about the Discord App?

GreenhaloX

It seems practically every guild within ESO nowadays are requiring the usage of the Discord App, and some even requiring it to join a guild. Some guilds are also requiring members to use it to be able to participate in trials and other internal guild/group events. Not saying it's a bad thing, and actually seems like something viable for the gaming community for the social aspects. However, my understanding is this is an app or venue was created outside of ZOS, Bethesda and its developers. So, how did this app gained so much traction within ESO? I just don't use app, in general for real world, such as cell phone and such. It's just an invitation for hackers and exploits. Particularly, with certain hacks and exploits occurring here and there on ESO. So, how did this app become so popular for usage within ESO?

Marabornwingrion

How are you gonna communicate in raids and organized PvP without voice chat?

DMuehlhausen

Because right now it's the "best" voice chat program. At one time it was TeamSpeak, then Ventrillo. Eventually another program will come and be better than Discord and guilds and players of all games will switch to that new one.

Just like the chat programs. ICQ was the original really. then you had AIM and Yahoo Messenger mixed in. There was one from Microsoft as well. Then somebody made Trillian which tried to connect all the chat programs together.

The point is there will almost always be something new that people switch to over time and will become the "one" people require or want you to use.

Feanor

It’s the equivalent of using shoes in a soccer club. You can play soccer without, but it’s just way more effective to use them. Hence guilds that want to be progressing through content - be that PvE or PvP - require Discord.

Kalitas

As already mentioned, Discord is the newest iteration of the Teamspeak/Vent/Mumble tools. I will point out that discord is an incredible tool for gamers and friends though. The customization and quality of discord shows the care that went into and still goes into its development. The fact that it's free is almost mind boggling. Without discord or a similar tool my ESO experience would be greatly diminished.

Alchemical

Voice chat and progression guilds are as old as MMOs man.

https://youtu.be/HtvIYRrgZ04

PouletRico

We still use TeamSpeak in my guild, no problems so far.

I think Discord took over because it's more user-friendly, have a lot of features that other voice tools doesn't have, and it's completely free (having a good TS3 server isn't free).

Like others said, end-game content requires communication, and I think Discord is a easy tool for Guild Master to gather people in the same place.

kylewwefan

You don’t need it for voice on console. But for organizing trials and stuff. Yeah. They’re all going there. I had a time convincing my wife it wasn’t some dating app like tinder or something.

DMuehlhausen

Alchemical wrote: »

Voice chat and progression guilds are as old as MMOs man.

https://youtu.be/HtvIYRrgZ04

Actually they aren't. I progressed all through Molten Core in WoW when it first came out shortly after launch and non of us were using a voice chat program. Everything was typed out in chat and people paid attention to what they were doing. We also weren't using programs/add ons like CTRaid. You could make it through all that content if you just paid attention to what was going on.

Even back in EQ there weren't voice chats. Internet speeds weren't nearly good enough to be talking over the connection and playing a game where your computer was doing most of the work.

GreenhaloX

Astrid_V wrote: »

How are you gonna communicate in raids and organized PvP without voice chat?

Isn't it why there is mic/voice chat made for guild!? When I was running trials back in the day, that was what I was using and worked fine. Again, I'm not saying this Discord is a bad thing, but when guilds are requiring the use of it, and if you don't have it or use it, then you can't play with your guild members. That's cool.. whatever goes within such guild, and yes, one does not have to be part of such guild if one chooses not to. However, again, plugging in a mic (as the ESO developers intended for the game) works just fine. Maybe I'm just a dinosaur with ESO.

Lake

Its popularity has nothing to do with ESO.

Discord is now big everywhere for practically every popular game, application, guild, streamer and online community (and so on). It's inescapable.

Odovacar

Discord is life! ESO and other games are heavily involved as well.

Anrose

The popularity has nothing to do with ESO itself but rather gaming as a whole.

Gaming is no longer just you playing Super Mario Bros by yourself. It’s now an increasingly social experience especially with games such as ESO. MMOs rely on a community to survive. So the community members need a way to communicate with each other. Discord does a better job of it than the native ESO client.

Tl;dr: Discord is to your cell phone as your gaming friends are to your real life friends/family.

generalmyrick

GreenhaloX wrote: »

It seems practically every guild within ESO nowadays are requiring the usage of the Discord App, and some even requiring it to join a guild. Some guilds are also requiring members to use it to be able to participate in trials and other internal guild/group events. Not saying it's a bad thing, and actually seems like something viable for the gaming community for the social aspects. However, my understanding is this is an app or venue was created outside of ZOS, Bethesda and its developers. So, how did this app gained so much traction within ESO? I just don't use app, in general for real world, such as cell phone and such. It's just an invitation for hackers and exploits. Particularly, with certain hacks and exploits occurring here and there on ESO. So, how did this app become so popular for usage within ESO?

paulsimonps

TEAMSPEAK>DISCORD. I like discord for the text chat but god I hate discords voice chat functions. Usually use Both, Discord for text msg and offline guild chat and Teamspeak for raids and hangout voice chat.

ShionRasenka

Discord is an absolute Godsend. I used Skype *shudders* for the longest time, then used Ventrillio for a time when I raided in WoW. Eventually, Discord came out, I fell in love with it, and I've been using it exclusively ever since. And you don't really even have to be a gamer to use it. You can still video and voice chat with friends, and screenshare whatever you're doing. So it's honestly great for anyone to use, gamer or not.

Alchemical

DMuehlhausen wrote: »

Actually they aren't. I progressed all through Molten Core in WoW when it first came out shortly after launch and non of us were using a voice chat program. Everything was typed out in chat and people paid attention to what they were doing. We also weren't using programs/add ons like CTRaid. You could make it through all that content if you just paid attention to what was going on.

Even back in EQ there weren't voice chats. Internet speeds weren't nearly good enough to be talking over the connection and playing a game where your computer was doing most of the work.

Okay but Ventrillo and Teamspeak are both even older than WoW (2002 and 2001 respectively). Just because you did it the old fashion way on your dial-up internet doesn't mean it wasn't a thing. I posted a silly, old, but recognizable meme video just to point out the fact that raids and voice chat have been synonymous for a long time now.

kathandira

GreenhaloX wrote: »

It seems practically every guild within ESO nowadays are requiring the usage of the Discord App, and some even requiring it to join a guild. Some guilds are also requiring members to use it to be able to participate in trials and other internal guild/group events. Not saying it's a bad thing, and actually seems like something viable for the gaming community for the social aspects. However, my understanding is this is an app or venue was created outside of ZOS, Bethesda and its developers. So, how did this app gained so much traction within ESO? I just don't use app, in general for real world, such as cell phone and such. It's just an invitation for hackers and exploits. Particularly, with certain hacks and exploits occurring here and there on ESO. So, how did this app become so popular for usage within ESO?

I feel it is a useful app, so long as the chat is heavily regulated. Meaning, having rooms for general discussions, and another room for official announcements. But in the end, it isn't necessary.

Our guild uses a PSN community page, which works well enough to communicate to the guild outside of the game.

kathandira

Astrid_V wrote: »

How are you gonna communicate in raids and organized PvP without voice chat?

paulsimonps wrote: »

TEAMSPEAK>DISCORD. I like discord for the text chat but god I hate discords voice chat functions. Usually use Both, Discord for text msg and offline guild chat and Teamspeak for raids and hangout voice chat.

I never used Team Speak, or Discord for Voice Chat. I only ever used Ventrilo.

(Hoping I explain this correctly since it has been well over a decade since I used this)

Does TS and Discord have Ghosts? I recall in Ventrilo, you could create a ghost in a private channel and have only certain people hear things that are said over the ghost channel, all while being in another channel listening to the rest of the people?

We used this for Music. We would broadcast music on the ghost channel, and if people wanted to listen to the music, they could be asked to be invited to the ghost channel.

reprosal

People who always claim their mic is broken or won’t join discord because they were told ‘it’s unsafe’ and play female characters are probably due to men pretending to be women for attention.

Fleshreaper

Most guild leaders have come to realize that, individual members have their own agendas when they login. A lot of members get tunnel vision when they start playing. They get rapped up in what they are doing and don't respond to guild chat messages. This is also a problem, for players that are in multiple guilds and not stop guild chats running. Which is why some guild require some time of voice chat. It's so, members can hear other members when they need help because text chat is not working.

Marcusito

What is their business model? Usually when you don’t pay for a product you are the product. It is not bad software but I don’t want more advertising or my data, game habits data collected and be sold to the highest bidder. Facebook has been compromised again, Google + got compromised and shutdown, Reddit, Twitter, etc all have this information about you to target you with ads. How does Discord stay in business? Remember when Skype was free? Got sold to Microsoft. Not saying Discord is bad software, I’d rather pay for it like TeamSpeak than have my more of my information sold without my consent.

jainiadral

For some odd reason, people love to chat in MMOs. This is the new flavor of the month/year/decade/whatever that lets them. *shrug* I've never used any voice chat programs, but people swear by them. I can't imagine it's any less secure than previous variants of free voice programs. The dangers are the same as any other game-related chat-- probably in-game stalking and abuse, etc.

Kiralyn2000

Anrose wrote: »

Tl;dr: Discord is to your cell phone as your gaming friends are to your real life friends/family.

...I don't have a cell phone.


----
(I did try voice chat once a few years ago. The old highschool D&D group tried to get together and play D&DOnline. We lasted one session.)

Danikat

You don't need to worry about people using Discord to hack or exploit ESO because the two are entirely separate and don't interact in any way, so there's no risk there. And as far as people using it to hack the device you're using there's no more risk than using an internet forum. I think it's possible to send files through Discord but it's up to each person to choose what they download and open and what precautions they take (e.g. using an antivirus program to scan it first). I guess the people making Discord itself could try to use it to hack computers, but if they were caught it would instantly kill their business - no one would trust them ever again, so it's extremely unlikely.

(Also app is just the new, trendy name for programs, so unless you don't have a smartphone or tablet and never use a PC you do use apps...and clearly you use at least one of those or you wouldn't be able to post on this forum.)

I actually like Discord, and I'm not normally a fan of voice chat programs. The three big things for me are that I find it easier to use than Teamspeak or Ventrilio, the mobile app is free and it does a lot more than voice chat.

Being able to use it on my phone saves me having to buy a microphone for the rare times I use voice chat on the PC, I can just put my phone in front of me instead. But it also means I can use Discord to keep in touch with my guilds when I'm away from home and it's very useful for my Pokemon Go group, since of course we're all out and on our phones when we're playing, and for both of those I mainly use text chat.

It also has lots of other nice features, for example you can set up macros to make sending common messages quicker. For example in my Pokemon Go group I can just go into the main raid channel and type '5 15:50 @train station' and it will create a new channel titled "5-star raid, hatching 15:50 at Train Station' with a google map embedded showing where it is and a countdown to the start. Then I can comment on that with !h2 and it will add a message saying "Danikat is here with two Team Mystic players" (it knows my team because I set that up in advance). Which saves a lot of time when you're in a hurry, or walking. You can use similar things during MMO raids or other times when being able to send a long or complicated message quickly is important.

Edit: Having said all that I don't actually use it that much. I start it up when I want to use it and keep it off the rest of the time. If a guild insisted I had to be on Discord all the time I'm playing ESO, and especially if they were using voice chat a lot for random chatter I think I'd go looking for a new guild instead.

Thogard

DMuehlhausen wrote: »

Alchemical wrote: »

Voice chat and progression guilds are as old as MMOs man.

https://youtu.be/HtvIYRrgZ04

Actually they aren't. I progressed all through Molten Core in WoW when it first came out shortly after launch and non of us were using a voice chat program. Everything was typed out in chat and people paid attention to what they were doing. We also weren't using programs/add ons like CTRaid. You could make it through all that content if you just paid attention to what was going on.

Even back in EQ there weren't voice chats. Internet speeds weren't nearly good enough to be talking over the connection and playing a game where your computer was doing most of the work.

Teamspeak was already old and dated by the time WoW came out. Every top level guild used either it or ventrilo. The usage back then was as widespread as the usage of discord is now

Tan9oSuccka

I hope this doesn’t spread much on console. I’ve seen some guilds require it.

Pass. I’ll pay my dues, Let me sell my crap. Done.

Danikat

GreenhaloX wrote: »

Astrid_V wrote: »

How are you gonna communicate in raids and organized PvP without voice chat?

Isn't it why there is mic/voice chat made for guild!? When I was running trials back in the day, that was what I was using and worked fine. Again, I'm not saying this Discord is a bad thing, but when guilds are requiring the use of it, and if you don't have it or use it, then you can't play with your guild members. That's cool.. whatever goes within such guild, and yes, one does not have to be part of such guild if one chooses not to. However, again, plugging in a mic (as the ESO developers intended for the game) works just fine. Maybe I'm just a dinosaur with ESO.

Unless I've missed something there is no built in voice chat on PC.

I know there is on consoles (but then I think they originally didn't have text chat, which seems crazy to me), but on PC it's ONLY text chat. If you want voice chat you've got to use an external program.

I don't know about ESO but I know other MMOs have said they're not including voice chat because there are already excellent 3rd party programs which provide it and they don't see any need to duplicate that service.

wenchmore420b14_ESO

Our guild has both Teamspeak and Discord.
I prefer Teamspeak my self and my PvP guild prefers it, but we offer both.
FYI, yes, Discord works with a background program that can slow you down a little in PvP vs TS3, but hey, its no big deal for some.
To run a successful trial, delv, AvA, you HAVE to have a communications system. I have used Steam, Ventrillo, Mumble, Discord & Ts3. Still prefer TS3.

Cavedog

Discord is a data mining service. Don't be fooled.

Cavedog

Marcusito wrote: »

What is their business model? Usually when you don’t pay for a product you are the product. It is not bad software but I don’t want more advertising or my data, game habits data collected and be sold to the highest bidder. Facebook has been compromised again, Google + got compromised and shutdown, Reddit, Twitter, etc all have this information about you to target you with ads. How does Discord stay in business? Remember when Skype was free? Got sold to Microsoft. Not saying Discord is bad software, I’d rather pay for it like TeamSpeak than have my more of my information sold without my consent.

yes, this...glad to see some others have figured it out too.