So I've never really considered this before, not being hard of hearing myself, but a friend of mine is and will be playing this game. Given the stripped back UI and now the restricted API - there don't seem to be ANY tools in game other than plain old text chat to assist those who are hard of hearing or totally deaf in group activities!

Visually we have no target markers, Wykkyd's War Tools, which was a raid assist, has been gimped by recent API changes, so what is there? It must be very difficult with most players in PVP using some kind of VoIP. Is there anything I've missed? Are there tools in game or are there plans for any to include all players on a level playing field?

Adding a poll to get others' thoughts

This could fairly easily be addressed with a Battlefield esque 'call out' system. One button opening a radial menu with quick phrases to be said in chat, like 'need heals' or 'attack this target' ('this target' being the one you currently have tab locked, meaning they'd have to give us targeted emotes as well).

It's how an FPS game, with it's fast pace and quick reflexes, handles those who need assistance. I'm sure it's not too much to ask of an MMO.

Yep - this would go a long, long way to being inclusive. If it was native to the game too then it'd eliminate the argument of 'unfair advantage'

It's too bad that the war tool no longer work.

I can hear just fine but for one I'm not a native english speaker so I can misunderstand quite easily something said in Teamspeak, or just don't get people who speak with a particular accent.

And also I'm not used to playing in groups so having a visual cue along with a voice instruction would go a long way to help me figure out what is going on around me.

Text is enough.

Please explain? How in the heat of battle in Cyrodiil or a dungeon is text chat as quick or accessible as voice? It's certainly not equality at play.

It is not as accessible but it is still fine and you can make it work.

You will never have equality at play.

All the NPC's should talk in Sign Language or must have very good lip syncing so deaf people or the hard of hearing can lip read them.

My wife is also deaf (100%) but has got a Cochlear Implant since 5 years now (and it works great although she does not understand everything)

She plays RIFT a lot now and has no troubles with anything whatsoever. RIFT gives pretty clear what is going on with numbers and text flying around. She played beta of TESO and had little to no trouble. She might not join a guild which wants Teamspeak i battles because basicly she is very bad in English and can't understand it anyway. Mostly i help her out.

Just, wow...

Where do I begin? First npcs also have text windows, second npcs aren't giving you directions or orders in the middle of a fight, third TS is not mandatory for us and we will be using text chat, but targets markers will make things easier for everyone involved in group battles

No reason to not put in tools that can be toggled on/off.

My first sentence was a joke.

Maybe it was not clear in my post. My wife is deaf and can play games without any extra's. As you said NPC's have text and stuff and my wife can read. Although very bad in English so i help her with quests and stuff or if people ask her something in English.

I voted NO because i don't think it is necessary.

Got no worries over quests at all, I was thinking more for PVP and adventure zones. Simple target marking and some preset chat commands would make such a difference

Most games do have emotes for such things but I don't see why they couldn't put something like this is.. The biggest problem is the people without the hearing issues will not be using it..That being the case the impaired should just buy a macro ready keyboard and use that for ingame quick chat.. Need a heal smash G10 or something along those lines..

Yes, marking a target would be great. Also i raids. When in a big raid in Vanguard i lost oversight pretty quick. But they could target multiple target so i knew which one i should DPS and which target first, which target 2nd tanks should agro etc.

Don't know how it will be in TESO, but in spindleclutch i died many times because i just didn't know hich target we would attack. We got wiped a few times because everybody was attacking a different NPC.

I am hard of hearing and have played 3 beta's. I also play MMO's ever since Meridian '59 so i have seen the genre evolve in all those years.

Where in the beginning everything went over text and people were all adapted to that, communication nowadays make more use of VOIP than text.

So as an hairing impaired it is not just missing out on a great deal of social chat but also i am missing out more and more of essential game play. In big scale battles, PvP but also dungeons etc. there is simply no time to type out orders and for me its hard to keep up with all the chat spam to pick up what is going on. People will be on VOIP during those battles and once the leader said, in the heat of it all, go for target X, there wont be a lot of people realising that i didnt get that order.

If the game had a simple way to mark target X it will be obvious for me that thats the target.

Tactics nowaday will mostly been shown on Youtube and all i can do there is watch it but not hear the actual explanation of it. I know that this isnt a fault of the game, but it does show how much more i will need ingame visuals than the avarage player.

Also in pve a lot of hints and hints to new quests are given by overhearing npc gossip. I cant hear them. In beta i used Wykkys addon which gave me subtitles and that worked fine for me. I hope I can still use it next week, but I fear the worst.

And no, npc gossip can't be turned on in the chatbox with the normal settings, only the chat of quest npc's can.

I'd be really keen to find out what the reasons are for those no votes

Also once again guys, you focus on hearing impaired people and yes they are those who need it the most, maybe .

But ti's the same when you're in a guild with multicultural people and most of them are not native English speakers. It's easy to misunderstand or just have problems with some accents and need an extra visual cue to clarify.

So maybe the US server will be mostly used by English speaking people but in the EU server a lot of guilds will be filled with people from many different countries and languages.

It's not just hearing-impaired people, I was born mute and having things like marked targets would be awesome. That said, I don't expect special concessions, I will still play the game without them, but they would be nice to have for people who need them.

Yep this too!

Maybe Addons would help...

They did up until the API change lol