I've been thinking a lot about this post: After a while an idea occurred to me, one I've seen suggested a couple other times here, and is usually met with answers like "You can send a /tell or @name ingame" or using the forum's PM/Conversation system to communicate with offline users. That's nice and all, but it's not what I have in mind here. I would like to see an in-game postal system for EMC. Updated & revised! Thanks jkrmnj for the suggestion /mail open : Opens an inventory similar to /vault. This would only be a single-chest in size, and would display any items that have been sent to you. (Should this be available in the wilderness?) /mail send <username> : Would transfer whatever item(s) are in your current active slot to the player in question. This could be a written book, an enchanted tool, or a stack of blocks. A system message, as with enchanted-item shops, will ask you to confirm if you wish to send the item. If sent successfully, you will receive a system message telling you the item was sent, and charged a small fee of rupees. You cannot mail things to yourself. /mail auction <username> || /mail auction send : Only available in town. This function allows you to ship an entire DC's worth of material. The first command, /mail auction <username> opens a DC-sized page similar to /vault, for a fee. This can then be filled with the auction materials. When the chest has been loaded, use /mail auction send, and the contents will be shipped to their recipient. No fee for shipping, but opening the chest will incur a cost similar to the 10r vault fee. (Thanks to Dudelol523 for sparking this idea). /mail auction open : Opens a DC-sized page showing received items sent with the auction function above. No fee for receiving, but available only in town. /mail notify <on/off> : Players can choose whether or not they wish to be notified of received mail. Senders will still receive confirmation messages, and the notification that their mail was sent successfully (or, if it was not, "<username>'s mailbox is full. Your mail cannot be sent.") On by default. /mail accept <on/off> : A flag available to every player, in case for some reason they do not wish to receive items through a mail system. In case some troll thinks it's funny to mail an entire inventory's worth of dirt to everyone online. On by default. "mailbox" sign tag : I still like the idea of having a physical mailbox to be placed. Thus, in town only, a player could place a sign with the word "mailbox" in the first line. Upon clicking "done" the sign becomes clickable and allows the player to use "/mail open" instead of typing in the command. Postage Fees: Rupees would be charged for the following. Exact fees subject to discussion and balancing, these are simply proposed suggestions The sending of mail = 15r (per item, counting all items in a stack) / 150r in wild (to prevent abuse of the system). Mailing one item or letter wouldn't be so bad. Mailing stack after stack of mined ores & goods would be prohibitively expensive. Sending auction chests = 20r to open "send" page. (in town only) Using /mail open in the wild = 100r (if applicable) Placing "mailbox" signs = Free (in town only) The original suggestion posted involved the use of signed books and special chests, but having time to consider it, this would be much simpler.
I think this is a great idea! I hope this is approved because, it would help out a lot! I also hope that since it is like mail, we can write letters from an outpost even, to get supplies or just write a quick message to someone.
Sounds like a great idea. What if something like this was player run? Each server could have a mail center where players drop off and pick up mail. If a plugin could be created for this then that would be much better then player run though.
There could also be some sort of notification either when you log on notifying you of mail or when you receive mail while online. This would make sure that communication could be achieved as quickly as possible.
Player-run might be possible now, to some degree, but the theory behind this is that a server-side plugin would remove the "mail" being sent, charge a rupees fee, and place it in the receiving player's mail vault, automagically. I see no reason mailboxes couldn't be placed and used in the wild, but the key to remember is, they're meant ONLY to accept written and signed books - my original thought was one-page "letters" crafted using paper, quill, ink, but that requires a new recipe and I don't know if such a thing can be added to EMC. Written books already exist though.
As far as coding goes, I think the only real tricky bit is the mailbox itself (I have 0 code experience btw), I think the vault coding could be modified slightly but mostly transferred over, am I right coder people?
I don't know if the chest and books and everything is necessary - It uses quite a bit of items, and a lot of coding... However, there are mailing mods, where you can /send mail (player) (message) ... etc ... and when you come on you can check your mail using like /mail ... and if you have any new messages it will say who it's from and what the message is... and when it was received. As for your idea... if you wanted it only on each smp it could be end chests because they aren't stationary and already send data across the world. if you want it across all smp's - like others said, it would have to be on the vault system because it's like sending a normal book across vaults to be able to go from smp to smp... But in the long run I have a question: If you are able to write in a book and take it to a custom chest... couldn't you just take it and give it to the player in person... or put it in your vault and take it to the other smp... or even just write a conversation on the website or send them a message in game? Thumbs up for the idea, but the general practicality of needing to use it when we have forums, convo, and /tell ... I don't see the total usefulness in it other than wanting to advertise or other functions that already are able to be accomplished using one of the other commands.
There are two reasons I outlined it as I did, rather than simply a /mail chat command (which I do realize would be simpler). -Text Limit: Minecraft's chat has a very short character limit and if you're trying to communicate with someone who's currently offline, there's a fair chance you might need to elaborate a bit. It would be quite a pain to leave seven different /mail tells at them, and an equal pain for them to go through them all. A written book is just easier to handle that way. -In-game functionality: I can't stress this enough, people who use the website and forums only make up a certain percent of the player base. How much I do not know, but the fact is, providing something for in-game use will reach all active players, not just those who feel like opening their browser. The thing to keep in mind is, this is primarily intended as a system to write to players who are offline at the time. If they are around and available, a /tell would do just fine. And again as I mentioned above, not everyone uses the website so PM/conversations here aren't always a reliable solution.
A thought occurred to me, that /mail or similar could open up the mailbox inventory, the way /vault does. My reasons for suggesting it as a physical chest are mainly because I like the idea of having an actual mailbox to place, but it's certainly not necessary for the idea to function.
For a while I didn't actually use the forums and neither did my friends so we could only communicate through minecraft when we were both were on which wasn't that often.this would make communication a lot easier. Having a player type /mail could open a vault like page and you could view your mail. Typing /mail send <username> could send the book in your hand to the players mailbox. A database could store the data with the senders username, recievers username, message, title, mail number.
Y'know... I actually like that suggestion even better. Using a /mail send command to address it to a player would be way easier than coding a plugin to read a book's title, I'd imagine, and wouldn't limit the system to signed books only - you could mail most anything that way. I think I ought to update the OP... EDIT: Updated! That actually works way better than my original idea. Thank you jkrmnj!
i think the main concern is - if it's able to send books, the system would have to only allow and check for books, cause if someone for instance places an item that's not a book, as a 'package' or gift to another player... this in term might be a go-around of the vault.... 'however' if 'packages' etc are able to be sent, you think there would need to be a small fee? like a stamp of sorts..
Yeah, thought about that a bit. Read over the updated OP and tell me if there's anything that still strikes you as exploitive, perhaps? I'm not sure if /mail commands should be allowed in the wild or not, and you certainly wouldn't be able to mail anything to yourself either way - /vault isn't allowed in the wilderness, so if /mail is permitted at all, it should be handled very carefully.
Okay - read it... here's what I think: Size: The SingleChest should be a DoubleChest and divided in half - The top three rows are for Mail Only ... Bottom three rows are for package, items, etc. (or to make it simpler, it be two separate single chests, so as to code it easier) Applicability of fee's: Putting mail in, back and forth is free | Putting Packages/Items in bottom row (or bottom singlechest) has a 15r fee. Availability in Wild: The Bottom three rows (or bottom singlechest) are grayed out, you are not able to use any packages/items received or be able to send them..... However, you can still send/receive the mail portion of the post in wild (top singlechest), so you can send/receive for instance coordinates to a base, or to tell someone your coords, or that you'd be in wild can you get stuff from town etc - this might be beneficial. Lastly, if we are able to open the mail using a command and send mail using another command, would the signs be necessary?
Not a bad thought, and would keep items separate from written mail. Would add an additional level of code to segregate books (letters) from other packages, but I suppose that's up to Aikar (or whoever else would do the coding on this). I'd actually go with 15r as a base fee and more for items. I picked 15 specifically because using /vault for most players costs 20r - 10 to open on one end, and 10 to retrieve their items on the other. If mailing something to another player, it's slightly cheaper than using /vault, and doesn't rely on having an "access" chest or public hopper on the other end. I like this suggestion. You can communicate with people, but not send whole shipments back, or receive them. No, I just added that one because I really like the idea of having a proper mailbox on my residence It is in no way necessary and in all likelyhood wouldn't get used much.
That's certainly your perogative, and nothing here would stop you from using it. Do keep in mind though, many players - I daresay the majority of them - don't log in to the EMC website at all, apart from the initial registration. Also, the proposed system here would allow you to mail items in-game, across servers, which is something the website inbox certainly cannot do.
