Deliver story messages sensibly when the player was away or replied early

A story told through chat messages with delays has to cope with a player who closes the game for an hour, or who answers before the nagging follow-up is due. This entry shows the rules for what arrives, what is dropped and what is cancelled.

Why this works

A chat should feel like people, and people do not talk about what is no longer true. Giving every message a due time, a lifespan and a reaction to the player's reply keeps the conversation sensible however long they were gone.

When not to use it

Not suited to stories where every message must be read, such as clues or instructions that matter. Dropping those would break the plot. Mark them as important, or deliver everything in order and let the player catch up.

In the full entry

• What to build, step by step
• Starting values and the reason for each
• 3 common mistakes and the fix
• A diagram of every state
• 28 lines of example code with 4 checks that pass
• How your AI shows you that it works

Say this to your AI

Use the Spielerando entry "Deliver story messages sensibly when the player was away or replied early" (read_entry chat-messages-that-arrive-while-away) in my game. Build it step by step, and show me how you checked that it works.

Or skip this and connect the MCP: your AI then finds all of this by itself.Connect the MCP