If someone doesn’n know yet: “Conan Chat” is a free chatclient, available for Windows and Android, which can be downloaded at
EDIT: The above link does no longer work. Here is a new one:
https://conan-chat.software.informer.com/download/
With it you can log on the AOC chat server without the game running.
I run the Windows version where you can add friends to your list and see whether they are online or how many days they are offline.
Guild members can also be traced, but that works not with Windows (at least not for me, perhaps someone has an advice how to get it ot work).
BTW: You cannot log in to the chat server and play the game simultaneously (unless you have a second acount to run the chat server seperately).