AskED The Admin: Answer Compilation (10/14: Reincarnation)

[x_Angie_x]

Wow, this is nice and organised!
I don't bother reading through the Ask the Admin topics anymore, since they're too long, so it's nice to be able to read all the answers in one go. Thanks a lot!

[Platonix]

Inti Castro

muhaymin

I don't read the Ask the Admins thread in the GCD nor Lanzer's post history. Instead, I read yours. ORGANIZED! heart

So do I! =)

Only thing I'd suggest is to not include some of the random chats but rather focus on actual Questions & Answers.

That's just a suggestion though, you can do as you please.

The way I see it, asking questions about the Admins' likes, dislikes and such is perfectly fair game for (capitalized) Questions, as is "Who would win, a Kung-Fu Watermeat or Gino's Eyebrows", because there are honestly people who truly care about these things and spend a significant amount of time thinking about them. I do leave out some things, but primarily just "Hi, How Are You?" "Fine." That's not worth recording. Also, I nearly always end a conversation on a quote from an Admin. If a user asks a question and another user answers, that question doesn't wind up here at all unless an Admin adds his/her two cents' worth.

[M370-D]

As important as the "issues" are, it's always nice to remember that Gaia is fun as well as work.

I mean, I'll probably be the first in line to want to get into the public release of the Battle system, but until then we always have chicken fun with other things.

[muhaymin]

This day, Platonix is not on the front page of today's Ask The Admins Thread. How sad. ninja

[M370-D]

Well, that's Christmas for ya. But let's read some of these.

...

Hey, Lanzer forgot to say goodbye before the thread was sealed.

Judging by the degrading grammar and passive wording of the answers, I think he was a bit tired at the time.

Don't blow a gasket! We neeeeeeds our event celebrations!

[Platonix]

muhaymin

This day, Platonix is not on the front page of today's Ask The Admins Thread. How sad. ninja

Yeah, I got home late, and by the time I arrived in the GCD there were two pages already. sad Oh well, at least I haven't missed two in a row since I started posting those links.../gets to work transcribing thread/

[Platonix]

December 17th
What is the future of Gaia Cinema and Gaia Rally? Did we really hit 130,000 users logged in at once during Halloween? Just how much rhubarb is in a Portal cake, and how does the Companion Cube taste!? Read on; the answers may surprise you!

crazy spork i am

|Kohta|

heya Lanzer!

just one quick question.

does snacktopia really exist?

snacktopia really does indeed exist. it's right across the way from my cubicle. such major temptation when it comes to looking for something to eat xp

Lanzer

Morrighu

1- Will you guys be getting new/more servers soon so we don't have a huge lag? It's getting quite hard to be on when we are getting 108k members logged on for hours. ((Perferably before the christmas event))
2- If I were to do art for you, or any admin/dev what would be the best way to get it to you?

Happy holidays all. ^^

Bandwidth issues are something that keeps me up at night. We keep adding a lot of servers to make sure that we can keep things fast, but in the world of networking, there are always other equipments that can break under stress. This time it was the firewall that we have. (actually it's more of a hardware failure) But we do expect that access will be way over 110k, so we're getting things ready for Christmas.

You can post your art here, or just PM me. smile Thank you!

crazy spork i am

Fatal!ty

Hi admins. I and many others really enjoyed the events in which users create their own items, and I was wondering whether this trend will continue with possibly more events? It's beneficial to everyone, and I think it was a great idea. I'd like to see it incorporated into holiday events and others.

Thanks. : )

i think that would be rockin'. it's fun to see what crazy ideas you guys can come up with :3

kirbyUFO

Annyx Phantom

crazy spork i am

Annyx Phantom

Hey Lanzer, I was wondering, it concerns the Back Wings quest, will the be full on angelic/demonic? or will they start small and grow with time?

Also do you like Daft Punk?

i love daft punk. kirby introduced them to me when we first started going out :3 i think he's used them in a few of the bleemixes too if i remember correctly...

I just got there Alive 2007 tour CD, its pretty cool they mixed Robot Rock with Human After All.

heheh HUMAN -- AFTER ALL. i was kinda disappointed by that album, but i guess since discovery and homework were so popular and definitive they're particularly hard acts to follow. i wonder if that's what they meant by human after all >< or maybe something to do with them dressing up as robots. anyway, i'm curious about that tour cd. have to check it out now :3

Lanzer

link freak131

Lanzer

Hello everyone! It's just one week from Christmas! Can't wait for the Christmas event. whee

I can't wait, either, Lanzer! >w< It's going to be fun! <3

So, here's my question for you: How many languages do you know? You know... Besides English? XD

I know Cantonese and Mandarin. I've been learning Japanese for fun but I'm terrible at it. I hope that one day I can stay in Japan for long enough so that I can speak fluently. crying

It was later explained, though not by an admin, that Cantonese and Mandarin are the two most common forms of Chinese.

crazy spork i am

Purple Hair Spray

crazy spork i am

Purple Hair Spray

Why was the counter for most users online reset?

Heya Spork and fulltime! XD

hello you :3

^_^

Any plans for the holiday?

i think just kickin' back is the plan for kirby and i. did our major traveling around november when we went to japan and now i just want some free time to laze around. my sister is coming up on new years and it'll be great to see her again :3

crazy spork i am

caoxueli

Hello Lanzer
This is my first time posting here! And I have one quick question.

Have you bought all the Christmas gifts for everyone on your list?

i think we did...probably just a few things here and there. i'm always torn between succumbing to buying stuff or breaking away from that and coming up with something creative that doesn't lean towards material things. this year i went for buying stuff since i haven't had a lot of time to dedicate in doing crafty things.

MULTI-PART CONVERSATION AHEAD!

fulltimefailure

Cube B

fulltimefailure

Cube B

((fulltimefailure edited out most of this post.))
4) Have you played Portal yet?

The cake is the truths...there was an actual portal cake in Gaia HQ a few days ago. I got a chance to take a pic of it before eating a slice. The important part of this all is that the cake is not a lie!

DID IT HAVE FISH SHAPED GARNISHES? AND RHUBARB? surprised

xp I'm down with the rhubarb, but fish shaped garnishes? thats just ridiculous. It was pretty standard, however one difference was the single candle instead of numerous ones. So you bake with rhubarb huh? Thats like advanced cooking!

Continued next section. -Platonix

crazy spork i am

Cube B

fulltimefailure

Cube B

In the official Portal Cake Recipe, GLaDOS adds like, a Lethal amount of Rhubarb. XD

And electromagnetic imaging software, shaped like fish.

I have everything except the pull and peel licorice...gonna have to stop off at the store tonight. eek

I'd so want to make a Companion Cube Cake.

WHY DID IT HAVE TO DIE? WHYYYYYYYY! crying gonk

heheh i've been thinking on making a bento box lunch that has portal themed food. i think onigiri would make excellent companion cubes, hehehe. i haven't really worked out all the details yet though.

Lanzer

Lyera-san

Hello Mr. Lanzer, Lyera was told that you have answers to lots of questions so she decide to come by and find out if you could answer hers.

Lyera loves adventure but Lyera noticed no matter how far she adventures in place called "towns" she never seem to come across different areas. She wonders if there will ever be other places she can go and explore, like forests and caves.

Lyera sees lots of species around Gaia, like undead and elves..she would like to know if there will ever be Dragon kin that play important roles on Gaia?

Lyera wonders, if Mr. Lanzer know all about Gaia, does he know where her Mama is?

Hello Lyera,

Towns today is an area that repeats itself. Soon it will join with other areas like Gaia Rally, Gaia Cinema, and future areas from Gaia Battle to personalized areas as one giant world. eek There will be caves, forests, and things like urban areas even.

Lanzer

Purple Hair Spray

Why was the counter for most users online reset?

Heya Spork and fulltime! XD

Last time we reached 130k because of a server error. The web servers were clogged up which made kind of a traffic jam. A lot of people went off-line but we couldn't log them off fast enough... Well it's not exactly that, but kind of. smile It's really, really hard to deal with traffic during events. crying

Lanzer

|Kohta|

heya Lanzer!

just one quick question.

does snacktopia really exist?

Judging from how much weight everyone's gained... yes. smile

ANOTHER MULTI-PART CONVERSATION!

OneOfLittleHarmony

crazy spork i am

OneOfLittleHarmony

Question from a friend:

sarachan

"are you free on friday night?" hehe :3

I think this applies to anyone.

heh fridays are usually the busiest for me! actually last weekend i went out and got my hair dyed to black and pink! then kirby and i went out to do a little mini photo shoot type thing for fun (and to record this newest phase of my never ending quest to find the craziest and most fun hairstyle!) :3

LOL =) I will tell her your answer. I work laaate on Friday Night, so I only have a short amount of time to do anything after lecture. =(

Are you going to post pictures of the miniphotoshoot?

Oh, there's no way this isn't continuing. smile

crazy spork i am

OneOfLittleHarmony

crazy spork i am

hehehe, hmm...i dunno, i'd feel a little embarrassed. craig and kirby told me i look like a real life avatar now, lol. i do a little bit of modeling on the side primarily as a hobby because it helps in practicing compositions and gestures/poses for my illustration work.

O_o; Real life Avatar? Giant forearms and everything?

Do you model for some sort of clothing company or for like old ladies doing those inhouse fashion shows to market something to their bridge club?

hehe probably because of the clothes i wear and my hair is what they're thinking :3

my modeling thing is a little more modest than that. i was going to pursue it further back when i was doing freelance work because i had all this free time but that was also around the time when kirby and i were getting interviewed for gaia. when it became a choice between that or working here i chose gaia :3 something i'm a little more comfortable and more familiar with than being in front of the camera :3

i would love to have more time to dedicate to it if i could. surprised

crazy spork i am

Chrysanthemum Tea

Do you participate in the judging of the Name The Game contest? And have you begun looking through submissions? And have you come across any really good ones? Have you seen my submission? whee

i haven't seen any of the submissions...i kinda of wish i could be there though, since i haven't really heard much about it. then again things are pretty busy on my end so i haven't had a lot of time to check out what's going on.

lanzer

Fatal!ty

Hi admins. I and many others really enjoyed the events in which users create their own items, and I was wondering whether this trend will continue with possibly more events? It's beneficial to everyone, and I think it was a great idea. I'd like to see it incorporated into holiday events and others.

Thanks. : )

The end goal is to have user created items. There's a lot to work out, like how do we prevent people from creating a halo, for example. smile Though at the same time, there are a lot of suggestions for things like that. We just need to first, have the tools to let people add items to Gaia's database, and second, to administer them. It's a big project that might or might not happen next year, because there are so much to do, like launching Battle.

-Derek

Lanzer

Annyx Phantom

Hey Lanzer, I was wondering, it concerns the Back Wings quest, will they be full on angelic/demonic? or will they start small and grow with time?

Also do you like Daft Punk?

The plan so far is for a full blown pair of wings. A evolving one does sound really cool though.

Not a fan of Daft Punk, but I do listen here and then.

crazy spork i am

katanachan

crazy spork i am

katanachan

Hey Lanzer and anyone else coming aboard, this is my first time posting :3 I've been here since 2003, but I never seem to catch one of these.

I was wondering, is Timmy going to be a zombie, and if so will their be Zombies in the Christmas event?

((a few other questions sporkii couldn't answer either. Don't worry, Lanzer will later.))

Thank you for answering any and all questions, I am so happy to be part of Gaia. If you weren't in CA I'd be applying for a job there XD! I'm an artist and all <3

OH, just a question to the artist, did you happen to go to art school before you joined Gaia?

hey there and welcome! i wish i knew more of the gaia questions... emo timmy is turning out to be an interesting character, heh. i totally didn't know what was going on with him until i checked out the announcements...whoa!

the question i can answer is: yes, i did to go an art school before i joined gaia. fulltimefailure, your-father's-belt, kirbyufo, and myself all went to the art institute down in so.cal and that was where we all met up!

Thank you Crazy Spork for answering my question heart I want to go to Art school too but I'm scared of CA xD; so I was actually thinking of the Art Institute of MN.

Yeah, the whole time I was watching the Announcements I was like "Yeah. He's so gonna be a zombie." But everyone laughed at me emo -- I hold my breath everyday waiting for announcements to see whats going on with the evolving animals.

I should add one more thing, Crazy Spork I am, I love the TM ( Time Peice ) thank you for making it! And can you PLEASE shake the hand of the artist who drew the FanserICE comic. They deserve a GOLD STAR XD~

CA is awesome! i send you warm wishes and luck on when you decide on going to an art school! i had a lot of fun (even though it was hard!) during my time in college, especially in meeting up with my friends who mean so much to me :3

Lanzer

caoxueli

Hello Lanzer
This is my first time posting here! And I have one quick question.

Have you bought all the Christmas gifts for everyone on your list?

I thought I did, but I keep finding out that there are people I forgot! My car's trunk is full of presents. biggrin

crazy spork i am

Sir Integra F Hellsing

crazy spork i am

Xiam

Wow, this place goes so fast... question repost again. sweatdrop

1. Who designed the Time Machine?
2. Why did you break down to the fangirls' demand for three NPCs licking a pole? xd
3. You said you would give MC hints this month, but didn't... did everything get too busy for 'em?

i designed the time machine O_O

As a Victorian steampunk fan, I /have/ to say that I LOVE YOU for that. biggrin The top hat and the time piece are particularly well-done. I'd be wearing my three pieces if it weren't Christmas time. xD

Along those lines, we've now had Rococo-inspired sets in the shops and some elements of other period fashions (ie Elizabethan ruff). Are we going to ever see other period-clothing styles in the future?

Personally, I'd die to see bustle dresses and 19th century frock coats. whee

Also, what has been your favourite item- that you've designed- thus far?

i primarily just did the clunky time machine thing in the back, the rest goes down to the art team and the specific people who came up with the concepts. i know that a few people here are really into steampunk so seeing the concept art for those was really fun!

i would love to see more period-style clothes in the future too! and after coming back from japan my favorite place was harajuku and seeing all the eclectic fashion style they have over there. i would love to see more of that kind of stuff too!

hmm, i haven't had much experience in rending out pixel items. i think kaya would be my favorite thus far, mostly because i spent a lot of time working on him and it was this crazy learning experience since i was the only one working on him. from initial concept to the finish piece it was an interesting opportunity so he holds a special place in my heart :3

Lanzer

LabtechMK

I've always wanted to make it to one of these sessions, and now that I have...
I forgot most of what I wanted to ask. gonk

However, I do still have some on my mind, so here goes:

1) Will users ever be able to in the future control certain NPCs, or will there be NPCs crafted after specific users? (Like the users who were used in the Manga in the past, for instance)

2) I don't recall if it has been answered or not yet, but Any idea what is going on with for Angelic Rod?

3) In a recent AtA session, you said the Weapons shop had slipped. Do you mean it is just getting pushed back, or has the idea failed altogether?

4) The observation was made by a fellow Gaian that Timmy's skin resembles that of the H2K4 Zombie skin. Will that skin at some point be rereleased, or is there something else in store for us you will not yet speak of?

That's all for now. Thank you for your time. ^_^
I hope the holidays are good this year for you and the rest of your team. mrgreen

~MK

1) Do expect more NPC related quests, but nothing more than that is planned for the moment...

2) Angelic Rod had been disabled due to all the botting and exploits. Which is a shame. We hope that we can fix the problems and once again introduce the "hidden" features.

3) The weapons store should be opening early next year. I wouldn't want it to slip any longer as everyone's waiting for it.

4) The plan originally was to allow easy access to the new skin. We'll be working on it. :O

crazy spork i am

Annyx Phantom

This is a question for all developers and the sorts, what motivates and inspires you guys the most?

truthfully i like to lurk around and read people's posts and look for inspiration that way. it's good to try and figure out what you guys would like and enjoy and see if we can fulfill those. i'm also inspired by art in general; kirby and i always want to see if we can push the envelope and do more things based on the requirements. and seeing the other artist's work here has been super inspiring and it really motivates me to want to practice and pursue my goals on getting better as an artist :3

fulltimefailure

muhaymin

Hey devs/admins, what are your favorite Gaia emoticons?

domokun domokun domokun

Lanzer

Aveklink05

happy holidays! mrgreen
and Lanzer, I got a really good question for ya (if you think this is good anyway)

in nearly past two week, starting around on December 6th, I been experiencing some puzzling episodes of failures of gaining access to Gaia Towns after I got onto the Barton Train Port. For almost every day since that, I been trying to get into Towns, only to get the Failure Notice over and over again. It really frustrating for me because I wanted to go into Towns, talk with my friends, and even catch some bugs too. There were two successful attempts for me however out of countless and failed attempts.

So I tried to contact Admin about this, but so far I got ZERO response gonk then I went on the forums to make topic about my experience. I was amazed to find that I am not the only one experiencing this problems. Many Gaians claim and report that the reasons for this access failure to Towns are:

-Firewall
-Cache Overload
-Weak Internet Connection
-Server Problem
-Account Corruption

The firewall is not the cause of this, I cleared my caches, my internet connection is strong, and my account isn't corrupted. I am very curious that if this is a server problem or that Towns server is under lot of traffic stress. Or is this for different reason?

please answer because I really want to chat, bug hunt, and trash collection too. Thank you

peace and heart from Aveklink05

Hi Aveklink,

Gaia Towns today run underneath a game server that is old and buggy, though we've been working with Sun Microsystems on a game server called "Darkstar", or simply SGS (Sun Game Server). The system should end up being much more stable, scales better, and will allow for more interactive games and features. They've been really great at listening to our needs and making features that we need. It's at beta stage right now and we hope that we'll have it up and running during the first quarter of next year.

Lanzer

Ice1118

Hey!! The new Monthly Collectibles look great.
I had a few questions:
1. Are you guys going to expand on the Fire/Ice and Angel/Demon theme with like Water/Lightning or Wind/Earth.
2. Are we going to be able to equip every form of the evolving items once they are fully evolved?
3. Are the weapons going to be usable in the battle system?
4. When is the battle system going to be launched?
5. Are the games ever going to fixed? Like the word bump? Are there going to be more games?

Yes we constantly look at elemental item ideas, so that's very possible

Can't say yes or no, but we do listen to feedback very closely

Nope, battle system will be based on rings for attacks

Can't say when next year...

We need to fix the game server first, then we'll fix the games one by one

fulltimefailure

Cube B

fulltimefailure

MrsrachaelSnape

2. Will guns ever be added on gaia?

They were added the day my avi was made

*points to biceps*

*resists urge to make "Gun Show" joke*

haha couldn't resist.

crazy spork i am

Packs

crazy spork i am

Packs

Hey Lanzer and Crazy spork Hows things smile

Questions!
1) Will we ever see Zurg again, even if its not a main storyline?

2) When will it snow in towns? It seems pretty white everywhere else..

3) Whens the Chrismas event going to start?

4) Lanzer will you ever get a new avi? XD

5) Is Vo ever going to come back? D:

6) Will you tell me the exact location of the gaia HQ so I can sell it on ebay for lots of money D:

7) New question, I dont know that much about multiple servers but.
Does gaia have a Core? XD Like if that one server goes down so does the rest of gaia.

cool Does the Sushi database still exist e.e

most of these sound like lanzer questions surprised

gaia HQ is a mystery... ninja

e.e Ill pay you 2.50 for it D:

What about you? What have you been working on lately. XP

My avi been used in any ring testing lately. ninja

kirby and i were in lockdown for a while to get some stuff done for battle. mostly effects for attacks and some environment stuffs. getting stuff crossed off our large list so i'm glad that we're making progress. did a little bit of this and that for the holiday thing too :3

Lanzer

katanachan

Hey Lanzer and anyone else coming aboard [ Crazy Spork I am & fulltimefailure ] Happy Holidays! This is my first time posting :3 I've been here since 2003, but I never seem to catch one of these.

I was wondering, is Timmy going to be a zombie, and if so will their be Zombies in the Christmas event?

Also, is there a reason the new items in the shop are so expensive? Like the PJ bottoms, are they priced that way because you also get the virtual gift as well?

Another thing, with the evolving items, I know you said the generations should be different, do you think we'll start seeing a good example with Pora? I'm sure some where I read that they would come in different colors and so such.

One last random question, when should the Christmas event start this year? Would it be right before xmas or has it started with the 12 Days of Gaia?

Thank you for answering any and all questions, I am so happy to be part of Gaia. If you weren't in CA I'd be applying for a job there XD! I'm an artist and all <3

OH, just a question to the artist, did you happen to go to art school before you joined Gaia?

No there won't be zombies during Xmas this year...

The new store items are more expensive because we're not making a lot of them... things are only cheap when we make thousands of them, but we don't think that the PJ's will sell that much...

I do think so, sometimes the differences will be pretty small though.

I think that the event starts this Thursday. We'll post in the announcement forum to confirm ASAP.

crazy spork i am

OneOfLittleFaith

crazy spork i am

MrsrachaelSnape

crazy spork i am how you come up with your name what made you pick that name? ninja

oh wow, i've had this name since high school. it started off as a joke/debate thing in high school between a friend and myself and one day when i got back home from school i tried making 'i am a spork' screen name for myself. all those were taken so i went for 'crazy spork i am.' later on when kirby kept pushing me to put my work online i just kept with the name because i'm unoriginal like that and pretty lazy, heh. so now i'm stuck with it :3

Why not "Am I spork crazy?" sweatdrop

i never got that far in coming up with combinations hehehe. crazy spork i am was free so i took it, yea! pirate

Lanzer

MurkyX

Are you guys going to do something about botting?
I mean completely make it impossible for it to happen.
The reason I am saying this it is because alot of users are being falsely banned for botting, and they have to go towards all the hassle of emailing gaia and waiting for almost an entire year.
If botting were to be made completely impossible, then future innocent users wouldn't have to go through these annoying cases like these.
What is annoying is that I see botters, and some friends that I know of, have been banned, when I know they were users that worked hard for their items.
Please do something about this? :/

Definitely. It's been tough, as we make new changes that stop botting one way, someone else will find ways to bot through another method. It's much like copy protection for games and so forth, there will never be a complete fix, unfortunately. We'll introduce more measures against bots though, and we'll see them in a month or so. Can't tell much about it, but it'll be pretty obvious when you see them. :O

Need to go and do some last minute Christmas shopping! Have a great week and enjoy the event!

crazy spork i am

Maril

Do any of you guys get called by your Gaia usernames irl?

back when i did freelance/contract work i was doing this project for a studio and they would actually call me sporkii instead of my real name. i thought that was all sorts of awesome, especially when i'd walk into their lobby and they'd be like, "oh, sporkii is here for the meeting."

crazy spork i am

Slanzer

To crazy spork I am: In Bizzarro world, would you be known as "Sane Foon I'm Not" or merely "Bizzarro-crazy spork I am?"

in some other boards i frequent one had the ability to change your nickname, so i always did weird things like that, hehehe.

fulltimefailure

Maril

Do any of you guys get called by your Gaia usernames irl?

Only in a joking manner....like when I fail at something :O

[Inti Castro]

Thanks for the update!

[M370-D]

Now, to anticipate how nuts the event comic is gonna look. And whether or not I will bother to manipulate it with Photoshop.

[OneOfLittleHarmony]

So anyway, I think it'd be awesome if you linked to the threads in the first part of the post.

[Platonix]

I wonder whether there'll be an Ask The Admin today, given it's Chri X-mas Eve...I guess we'll see! Too bad I'll miss most of it, since I've got Christmas Eve festivities to be a part of!

[Platonix]

OneOfLittleHarmony

So anyway, I think it'd be awesome if you linked to the threads in the first part of the post.

Sure, that sounds at least somewhat useful. Plus, I needed something to do today since there wasn't an Ask The Admin last night...check out the News section on the first page!

[M370-D]

Hay, New Year's Eve. Wonder if they'll do anything this Monday.

[Platonix]

Hey, here's a topic that doesn't have anything to do with Asians! It's AskED the Admin, with tons of answers from Lanzer himse...wait a minute, Lanzer looks kind of Asian...oh well, at least it's not a topic about Asians looking for lots of attention from users in the G...C...dang it!

Well, anyway, maybe we'll have a fun Ask The Admin session tonight, or maybe not! Either way, everyone have a great New Year (unless you use a calendar with a different date for New Years...like those Asians.)

(Kidding, Asians rock when they're not invading a forum.)

[Hyperdryve]

Hmm, I wonder if they're doing one tonight. Usually they start at 6 or 7 don't they? Have there been ones that have started later?