A forum post about WoW. A important read for anyone.

[Photics]

Originally Posted by residentgood

I wonder how easy/difficult it is to add chat channels?

for Guild Wars, the interface alone is a problem.

Wow has their zone/global channels separated by numbers. I don't remember the exact numbers, but it's something like this...
1) Is looking for group
2) Is trade
3) Is local defense
4) Is Looking for a group
5) Is global defense

So they can just add... 6) Recruitment Spam
Nice and easy... all channels are managed by a simple menu.

What's nice is how you can easily switch channels...
/p for party
/g for guild
/o for officer

Guild Wars has this, but it also uses shift characters /$ and stuff like that. It's confusing to me. Guild Wars has all the channels on the chat box. The check boxes are a good idea, but they're always there. This doesn't lean itself to expansion. The Guild Wars interface needs a complete redo. World of Warcraft has better chat management. Not only can you toggle/check chat channels on and off, but you can activate/deactivate specific messages... for both combat and general text.

For example, I like to see my faction gains on my chat window.

Guild Wars needs...
- Logging
- Combat messages

...and yah, a Guild Spam channel would be cool.

[residentgood]

I havent played War Craft, or its online game WOW. I understand enough about the chat in GW to understand most of what you said, but some of it just flew right by. I think I get the gist of it though. Thanks for explaining. :D I like the way WOW does it too, seems simple.

So there is an (easier) way to switch channels instead of clicking on the chat icon, and then clicking on the channel? I thought there might be, but I didnt know about it until you brought it up. I thought it was kind of difficult to fight monsters, while chatting with my team, then responding to a guild channel question all at the same time. I always had to wait until I finished fighting the monsters until I could change channels to respond.