I am definitely smug. But I get drubbed for it pretty often, too. 
@Thenomain said:
I don't know if he enjoys crow as much as I do, though.
I've given you props for being right several times, and made adjustments based on those times where you were. That's eating crow enough for my tastes.
Just like you likely don't believe that I see all of the times that I'm wrong, I probably don't believe that you see the times that you're wrong. The truth, as is the way of things, is likely in the middle somewhere.
A moment ago I revisited a fleeting split second of internet innocence.
It was refreshing, if brief.
I discovered this thread after poking around (admissions of an infrequent lurker), read the first page with optimism, and then skipped to the last page to see where it wound up.
As mentioned; brief.
Weird, I've never seen Thenomain angry before. I spent like a whole month or two trolling WORA by expressing my inner-most thoughts, and I never even saw him get angry once >_>.
Anyone else notice that @Jaunt pulled a Spider with the picking just enough to cause an explosion then standing back and playing the 'high road' card? Or the use of 'well-meaninged'? I gotta admit, that bugs me more than the trolling. Not a real word.
@Miss-Demeanor said:
Anyone else notice that @Jaunt pulled a Spider with the picking just enough to cause an explosion then standing back and playing the 'high road' card? Or the use of 'well-meaninged'? I gotta admit, that bugs me more than the trolling. Not a real word.
Do you feel like that's the case, objectively?
Do you feel as though it's possible that my response was because I posted this after taking days in an attempt to be considerate of posting "the right way" here:
@Jaunt said:
After discussion, we've decided that we'll be posting to MSB to promote Optional Realities in the > following way, from now on:
We'll post within the first week of each month, only with links to content on OR that we believe
will be interesting to MSB users. Each piece of linked content will be described in a way that
explains why that content might be of interest to you, as a MSB user.** ETA: October 2015's Optional Realities News for MSB**
Attempt to share relevant content per the suggestions of MSB users
"Your Cthulu" Monster/Antagonist Contest Results
Attempt to share relevant content per the suggestions of MSB users
October Contest: Create a Short Interactive Fiction Game
Attempt to share relevant content per the suggestions of MSB users
And the reaction I got was:
@Thenomain said:
@Thenomain said:
@Jaunt said:
One of the biggest issues with older MU* Engines is their restrictive licensing.
... What?
Seriously. What?
@Thenomain said:
@Jaunt said:
for-profit games
Are we going to try to do that, again?
This is a major issue?
I'm still on my "seriously, what?" thought.
@Jaunt said:
@Thenomain said:
@Jaunt said:
for-profit games
Are we going to try to do that, again?
This is a major issue?
I'm still on my "seriously, what?" thought.
That's my opinion, for sure. Generating profit to help promote and advertise our genre, and perhaps cut down on administrative burn-out by paying administrators at least some money, is something that I think is important.
If you disagree, that's cool. Evennia's worth taking a look at for other reasons, too.
And that I didn't start actually rolling up my sleeves at all until after this:
@Thenomain said:
I didn't see a point being made greater than:
That's my opinion
Making this not a discussion, but a slap-fight. Who is the more foolish between the two engaged in same?
Really, you seem to me to be defending something that isn't what I was asking about, leading me back to "know your audience".
Providing a bit more context:
I think that our reliance on pure hobbyism has contributed to our population decline
This is a decent point, but I don't see the lack of for-pay options as a major issue. I think the lack of decent for-pay games being an issue, as we can crank out something just as good, if not much better, than I've ever seen on the pay side.
Evennia's a rather good means to broach creating a professional MUSH. I can't say that nobody here, a community full of MUSH developers, would be interested in that. Can you?
I can also not say that there's no invisible purple unicorn, nor a teapot halfway between here and the moon. Can't remember the name of this logical fallacy. Asking someone to prove the absence of something, or that they can't prove the absence of something means that it's probative, is a dick move.
My goal was to share content that I think would be interesting or valuable to MSB users. I think it (at least, partially) worked.
And I think burying the lede was important enough to point out. You also created your own content for an article that had nothing to do with the above. Both of these things are, in my opinion, sad things to want to do.
If you're interested in what licensing and profit in the Mu* (mud and mush) world, write an article about it. I'd be interested in the conversation it would kick up.
Do you think it's possible that I felt like I went out of my way to try to do something specifically "right" for this site, only to feel like I was being marginalized by @Thenomain's ... less than co-operative response?
Maybe he's right. Maybe he didn't mean to be offensive. Maybe I incorrectly attributed his intentions. I can't really know that for sure.
All I have are context clues, and so far, context tells me that we're much more interested in personal blasting here than we are in engaging in actual conversation about content and ideas. That's pretty frustrating to me, as I'm constantly told that I'm a bad guy because I don't want to engage in discussion -- yet the only discussion that seems to persist on this thread is the one about how bad of a guy I am.
Step back. Turn off territorial protector mode. Consider the alternative. Maybe we can just talk to each other and share ideas between two communities without it becoming some sort of silly internet war.
@Jaunt Oh I'm far from territorial protector mode. If you'll notice, I've barely posted in this thread. I don't have any real dog in the fight, I've never been to OR, I have no real interest in the types of discussions the three of you from OR say happen. But I have followed this thread, and I have noticed a pattern. Your posts and responses tend to fall into one of three categories... defensive, aggressive, or playing the 'high road' card. You seem to either blatantly disregard or are unable to process the tone of a given post (reading defensively), then immediately post back to deny nearly anything anyone says to you in an increasingly aggressive manner (posting aggressively), then finally, when the other party is ready to shake the ever living shit out of you for the previous two... you hide behind the 'context', which you're only seeing in one very small corner of the site, or suddenly 'remove' yourself from the equation (taking the high road).
There were bad first impressions made in the thread on both sides. But you are in our house. It behooves you to be the one to amends. Instead, you continue to defend your own continued poor attitude while pointing at ours and saying we're being mean.
CONTEXT: When I say you're acting like Spider, what I mean is that you say things that are designed to be irritating and obnoxious while not really stepping over the line into outright rudeness. Then, when called on it, you step back and play the wounded party who didn't do anything wrong, or 'refuses to get into a slap-fight' even though you've been taking potshots the entire time. The majority of us here have spent anywhere from the last 2-10 years dealing with someone like that on nearly every WoD MU* that's occurred in the past decade. Her name was Spider. So maybe you can see why this tactic is getting a little extra irritating now.
And finally... this is, I think, the real grain of sand that's irritating the oyster. You don't know us. You have no context for this group as a whole. Motivations, shared history, you were never part of any of that. But you still insist on sitting there and talking about how we're the ones that don't understand and don't comprehend. So yeah... we could talk. But you have to recognize that you're the guest in this house, and while Mom Or Dad (Moderators) might allow you to stay despite the attitude, nobody here is going to want to talk to you if you can't or won't adjust it.
PS. This isn't to say some of the people posting here haven't been being inflammatory or rude. There's been some pretty good mud-slinging that's happened. Nobody here is innocent. But again, you're the guest so the onus is on you.
@Miss-Demeanor said:
When I say you're acting like Spider, what I mean is that you say things that are designed to be irritating and obnoxious while not really stepping over the line into outright rudeness.
Thanks for the clarification, and I mean that. Your perception of my intentions, while understandable based on your previous experiences, isn't correct though. I'm not Spidering you. I have felt like @Thenomain is Spidering me, though. He ended last night by assuring me that he isn't. That's why I said this:
@Jaunt said:
The truth, as is the way of things, is likely in the middle somewhere.
@Miss-Demeanor said:
You don't know us. You have no context for this group as a whole. Motivations, shared history, you were never part of any of that. But you still insist on sitting there and talking about how we're the ones that don't understand and don't comprehend.
I don't know you as well as I know some other sub-sets of the greater MU* community, but I do know you. I did take part (albeit, much more quietly and to less of a polarized response towards me) in WORA back in the day. I have run MUSHes before. I do keep up on current MUSHes. I have read the entirety of this thread, multiple times, and I have read many other threads on this site since I started posting here a few weeks ago.
I'm also super willing to not have aggressive conversations. I'd rather prefer it. I've made many calls to action in regards to finding common ground, because I do think that there's value in more positive interactions between our communities. I've gone as far as to purposefully create content on OR that I think would be meaningful to MSB.
But, my polite and positive approach has limitations. My reactions over the past couple of days to @Thenomain (and once, to @Sunny) stemmed from my perception of persistent aggression despite my attempts to try to keep things civil and positive. Re-read my quotes on my post above, and you'll see that that's what I was trying to do.
I'm not saying that I'm without fault. I'm confident to the point of being arrogant sometimes. I know it. When I argue, I argue hard. Since I'm not an "insider" here, I'm told that that's perceived more poorly than it would be otherwise. I'm also very much dedicated to making the MU* community a better place. I've been dedicated to it for a long time.
I am all about moving forward and beyond this shitstorm. If you go back and read the past five or six pages of this thread with that in mind, I think that you'll see my attempts to do so. But my tolerance to being trolled here is not without its limitations. That's probably because I'm a proud guy. Another fault.
But I'm just not interested in participating in the pretense of "You have to let us knock you around until we decide that you're one of us." I don't find any value in hazing rituals. I do find value in good discussions, and I do get frustrated when the potential for good discussion is abandoned for focusing on personal attacks.
So, again, I propose that we move the conversation back to Optional Realities, and the subject matter of our October content share. That's not me taking the high road -- that's me trying to make a positive change in a thread that's unnecessarily mired in "he said, she said, he's a dick, you're a dick" garbage.
And that includes my own garbage too. I think that we can all do better here.
@Jaunt said:
So, again, I propose that we move the conversation back to Optional Realities, and the subject matter of our October content share.
Here's an idea, perhaps you should do just that. And by that, I mean you should do JUST that. Only talk about OR. When you read a post, assume it's being written with the best of intentions and the purpose is to debate OR and the content you posted regardless of how you interpret it. Only answer those comments that directly pertain to OR and the updates you post.
Don't whine about being attacked. Don't attack back. Don't jump off that bridge just because someone else jumped off it first. If you want to get the conversation back to OR then converse about OR. Stop playing the high road card then take the low road in the very next post and whine 'But he called me names first!; It's bullshit.
Totally fair. You've got it, then.
When last we were productive, a content post talking about the Evennia MU* Engine, OR's September "Design-an-Antagonist" Contest results, and OR's October "Write a Short Interactive Fiction Game" contest had been posted. It eventually branched off into a discussion about the potential value in exploring for-profit MU*s ...
@il-volpe said:
I don't think we need revenue to advertise the hobby. We just need better newbie support, more different kinds of games, and to take advantage of free advertising among table-top and play-by-post RPGers.
@Jaunt said:
I think that those things are important, too. But I don't think that they're going to sustain the genre in the long-term, as we continue to get older. Table-top gaming is likely to move, more and more, onto online platforms like Roll20. The play-by-post community is shrinking even faster than we are.
It's something that I can compare to real life work that I do. I perform/direct frequently for two different theatre companies. One of those companies does "edgy" plays and Rock & Roll musicals -- the average age of their patron is around 30-45. The other company does Opera -- the average age of their patron is probably 50-65. The age at which most patrons stop seeing theatre is between 65-70, for both companies.
Guess what the Opera company's number one goal is? Market penetration to younger audiences, and re-branding what they do to be more appealing to younger audiences. They know that if they don't do this, then the Opera will die. It's basically the same for Opera companies around the world.
It's the same for MU*s. We have to ask ourselves two important questions.
- How can I market to a younger audience? The most obvious answer is to penetrate the video game market, to get press from popular blogs and magazines, to cast a wide enough net that people actually know that we exist.
- How can I appeal to a younger audience? I believe we should be considering things like beautifying our game clients through MUSHclient plugins, or significantly improved web-clients. Create intuitive links between gameplay to helpfiles, engaging and immersive character generation and industry quality tutorials. Most of all, I think we need to find a catchier way to brand ourselves to them. Right now, for Redshift (for instance), I'm considering calling our game "an online tabletop RPG", and I've taken that branding to heart in my design of the game (by creating a tabletop like interface with the GUI and a tabletop-like combat system instead of a standard DIKU-like room-based system).
The solutions are going to be different for every game, but I don't think that we can afford to soft-ball our marketing attempts and expect to see a big change.
You hear the phrase "you have to spend money to make money" a lot in the world. It's relatively true. In our case, though, it's more like "you have to make money to spend money to attract a future generation of players". Unless you're independently wealthy --- I know that I'm not.
@Tyche said:
That's not at all accurate. This restriction appears to be limited to only DikuMuds and some LPmuds. It certainly never affected Aber, Mush, Muck, MOO, or the 50+ other mud servers released (many of them Dikumud clones).
In fact, most of the older mud engines were created specifically for commercial use.
@Jaunt said:
That's actually a rather contested point, and not just in our community. The Artistic License can be rather tricky when it comes to using it to make money, particularly because of how the code in the old engines has come from all different kinds of sources.
I was not able to find a single instance of a pay-to-play (via a one time cost, annual cost, microtransaction-based, merchandising, or any other type of model) MUSH anywhere on the net. Have there been professional attempts at MUSHes before? If so, can you link me to them, because I'd be very interested in learning more about them.
@ThugHeaven said:
I knew the pay to play thing was going to be a focal point. Posting from my phone, so I'll be brief. I think that model is a bad idea for many reasons. Even if we're just talking about rpi's, I don't think the quality of rp justifies paying for it. People are going to expect and want things for paying.....eventually you're going to give it.
I could go on and on, but please don't monetize your new mud.
@Jaunt said:
There were some frightening things that I learned about Atonement (an old RPI of mine) when it ended and I did some calculations. Important to note is that idling is less of a thing on RPIs than on MUSHes, generally. Without some sort of trigger, RPIs will log players out if they idle for more than 15 minutes or so. There were players that, over three years, spent up to and over 50% (ON AVERAGE) of their waking day playing Atonement. The average play-time for its players far exceeded the average amount of time players spend playing games like WOW or Guild Wars 2. Can you think of many other types of game that people play for free for 4-8+ hours a day? Do you think it's unfair to ask players to spend $5 a month for their unlimited (which might reach 300 hours+) play on your game?
I don't. And I think people are largely reasonable enough to agree. We live in the Era of Microtransactions, where people are willing to throw silly amounts of money to buy virtual goods for social-based games, without a second thought. $5 is less than the cost of a Happy Meal. $5 is less than the cost of a pack of smokes. $5 is less than the cost of a movie ticket. $5 is about the cost of a buying a single episode of a television show (that gives you 21-60 minutes of entertainment) off of I-Tunes.
It's actually extremely reasonable when you think about it like that, IMO.
I agree that the quality of RP alone isn't enough to justify a "professional game". I think that you need to spend time on the bells and whistles. You need an engine without legacy problems, that's stable and modern. You need a game that LOOKS good, even if that just means a simple GUI that's going to be attractive (and, preferably, immersive). You need a pay system that's fair for players, but doesn't entitle them to more than what it's designed to. You need administrative policies that protect players from the too frequent corruption of abusive staff.
If your point was just to make enough money to help promote your game, a one-time fee after a first, free month of play might work. Or maybe you charge $5/month, or $2/month, or you have aesthetic only microtransactions, or whatever is going to work best for your game and community. You don't need to rob players blind like IRE and Simultronics do (though they've proven that players will still play anyways, I think most of us can agree that they're exploitative and overly corporate).
If 200 players pay $2/month, that's $400/month that you have to spend on advertising. Not only that, the fact that your game is pay-to-play actually makes you much more likely to be able to get reviewers from big sites and magazines to come check out your game, and hopefully promote it.
I think that that's important. It's not for every game. For instance, if you're using a shared IP (Middle-Earth, Game of Thrones, Star Wars, etc), obviously your options are limited. Thankfully, part of the benefit of using shared IP is that you have extra means to market your product to a younger audience already. It's another viable option.
@WTFE said:
If you need persuasion, go look at the clusterfuck that was Skotos' batch of pay-to-play RPIs.
@Jaunt said:
Skotos' games were not RPIs. They also were terrible, and that's why Skotos failed. Their administration was often corrupt, their games were sub-par, and their marketing tactics were lazy and ineffective. They only had initial success, at all, because of the fact that they were "professional". When they couldn't meet expectations, they lost that good will.
Counter-point: Simultronics and IRE. While I don't like their pay-to-win approach, they've dominated for so long, largely in part due to their very attractive interfaces, reasonably high quality games (for their genres), more professional approach to administration and customer service, and far superior attempts at marketing to younger audiences and penetrating the video-game market.
There are success stories and failures. I don't think going P2P is for everyone. It's definitely more work. I do think it's worth considering. I do think it's necessary for some of us to do it if we're going to keep our genre alive, overall, well into the future.
... to which @ThugHeaven and I briefly conversed before the thread went off-topic ...
@ThugHeaven said:
@Jaunt I'm just saying the average RPI has about 20-25 players, some less. Many of which actually are idle or sitting at a tavern or pretty much unfindable in some way (you know what I mean there).
I'm sure a few people will pay to play....but well, good luck with that.
@Jaunt said:
Well, for me, I just have faith that I'll be able to attract a larger group of players. Part of that is my experience with marketing, and part of that is that I've always been able to do it in the past, and part of it is my belief in my product being a significant step forward for the RPI genre.
I also tend to build my worlds in such a way to encourage roleplay and interaction, and to reduce the separation of players. You've gotta learn from the past, and like many of the MU* genres, I believe that RPIs are often-times stuck to certain design tendencies that are counter-intuitive and hurt them in the long run.
And I'd be very interested in discussing any of the above -- whether it be OR content that is relevant to MSB, or the pros/cons and considerations of for-profit MU*s in the modern/indie gaming world.
ETA: Sorry for the re-edits. Quoting problems.
@Jaunt I'm not an "insider" either, actually I have no idea what it means to be on the inside (I guess I -have- TS'd a lot of people). But it's pretty clear that you and @Thenomain keep going in circles of intellectual-sounding aggression. It's like you guys are having a super polite British argument. One of you should stop engaging because it's not really getting either of you anywhere except frustrated.
I mean, my investment in this place could not be lower, I'm just bored and felt like participating as a productive member of internet society, which I'm only saying to illustrate the fact that I have absolutely no stake in defending the community. But what I'm saying is, you're being aggressive too. @Thenomain mostly seems like he's frustrated, as he's typically pretty professional, which I imagine is because you keep being pretty mildly aggressive.
You're somewhere in between micro-aggression and passive-aggression, like not even a subtle amount. You're going through basically the cycles that @Miss-Demeanor pointed out. Right now you're in the high-road cycle. To be honest, I have no idea what the fuck you guys are even arguing about. It just seems like you're both wasting steam being aggressive to each other, while people could be doing something productive like asking me to explain the comprehensive history of Alvin and the Chipmunks, which I learned two days ago for no reason.
I have no stake in anything, it's not my hill to die on, and I have no idea why anyone is doing anything, but I'm definitely not misinterpreting the pretty obvious cycles of the argument. If you truly are taking the high-road, then do what you said you're going to do, and focus on OR related posts. If you think @Thenomain is being aggressive to you for no reason, then stop engaging with more aggression and keeping it going.
Though, fyi, @Thenomain being aggressive for no reason is entirely out of character. I don't claim to know him all that well or anything, but I find it highly improbable that he's pissed off and shitting (Thank you dictionary, for pointing out that there are two T's in shitting) on you for no reason. I'm not generally one to victim blame, but there is no victim here. Going through cycles of aggression and defense, and high-roading, is at worst trollish behavior, or at best really poor communication.
No trolling you here. When I say that you're being a dick, it's actually because I genuinely think you're behaving like a dick. You're claiming blah blah blah, but your behavior is different than you're claiming it is. I haven't bothered putting effort into explaining the specifics to you like others here have, as I'm of the opinion that if you stop squawking for ten minutes and think about your behavior, you'll see the problem with it.
It could very well be that @Miss-Demeanor is entirely correct, and the similarities to Spider that I'm seeing are what's really getting under my skin. Even if that's the case, though, these aren't good behaviors being observed.
This post is not trolling you. I am posting because of your claimed persistent aggression towards you and because I think you should read what she wrote twice more, or what TNP wrote, and actually amend your behavior based on it. You will have a better time of it. Also, 'you're being a dick' 'am not, you're being mean for pointing it out'....sigh.
What do you think of the discussion posted/quoted above? Or the October OR content share with MSB?
@HelloProject
Oh don't get me wrong. Sometimes I spazz out entirely. It's because that that I do try to keep it professional. I mean, I've spazzed out on you back on Wora-days, tho I suppose it's good that you've forgotten it or didn't consider it a spazz attack.
I am less sure that I'm spazzing in this thread, except the once where I try to explain to my emotional clone that I've been on his side. That whole post is me flipping my shit, but I don't think it comes as unexpected.
That I post in this thread at all should call into question my professionalism, but thanks for the compliment.
Reminder, how you perceive someones actions, and their intent as well as the actual merit of the actions are not all the same.
"You are being a dick."
"I see this as dickish behavior, and here is why."
One requires someone else to perfectly and telepathically coddle your way of thinking and hot buttons, the other does not.
@Jaunt said:
Do you think it's possible that I felt like I went out of my way to try to do something specifically "right" for this site, only to feel like I was being marginalized by @Thenomain's ... less than co-operative response?
After you and yours for months not only don't do things "right" but go out of your way to flaunt the fact that you think what is "right" is unimportant, you think a week of playing nice cuts it for treating you like a member of the community?
Dude, for a "people person" (which I believe you self-identified as, but can't be arsed to go back and check) you really are entirely fucking clueless about how people work. For example, my own reaction to seeing you "play nice" was "OK, good start, but leopards and spots". And sure enough, in less than a week, you returned to being the dick you started as.
Try playing as part of the community for months without backsliding into your marketing persona and see where that gets you. (And believe me, months is about right. This doesn't apply solely to you either: I think most people here have seen the pattern play out of someone not getting WORA/SWOFA/WORA2/MUSB and then finally integrating into the community. Many of us have lived it.)
All I have are context clues, and so far, context tells me that we're much more interested in personal blasting here than we are in engaging in actual conversation about content and ideas. That's pretty frustrating to me, as I'm constantly told that I'm a bad guy because I don't want to engage in discussion -- yet the only discussion that seems to persist on this thread is the one about how bad of a guy I am.
When you come in as an asshole, well, first impressions are the most enduring. You personally have weeks (and OR/PR in general, months) of damaging first impressions to undo. If you're not willing to spend the time to undo that, perhaps it's just best for you to fuck off and go where you're welcomed.
Step back. Turn off territorial protector mode. Consider the alternative. Maybe we can just talk to each other and share ideas between two communities without it becoming some sort of silly internet war.
My reaction to you right now is not territorial protector mode. It's anti-sales&marketing mode. ALL of the OR/PR behaviour trips my "salesman" alarms except for a vanishingly short period at the end (which instead trips my "total fucking dicks" alarm). You don't reverse that kind of rep with a single pretty speech, no matter what Hollywood tells you.
You want in? You want respect? You want people to take what you say at face value instead of filtering it through (self-inflicted) preconceptions? Spend the time and effort. Or just fuck off to where your behaviour is welcomed.
In @Jaunt's defense, the sort of sales talk way of communicating is a pretty normal thing in some MUD circles when it comes to being staff and such. I've always found the MUD side of our hobby to somewhat have the expectation of being like, super ultra professional rather than super casual like in MUSHes and such.
Except stuff like DBZ MUDs, then it's like "Oh, you have tits? Let me page you dicks".
@HelloProject said:
I've always found the MUD side of our hobby to somewhat have the expectation of being like, super ultra professional rather than super casual like in MUSHes and such.
This explains why my first thought to @Jeshin's "a community is a board of directors" language was, "gigglesnort Yes, and I am CEO of my pants."
I still think it's silly, but seeing it in action I'm coming to the conclusion that the people who organize the games feel it's important, but the people who code the games don't really care, as long as they get to code.
My pants.
“If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos
@Jaunt said:
What do you think of the discussion posted/quoted above? Or the October OR content share with MSB?
As I said before regarding the content share, it was a nice try. I suspect that after you've done it for a while it'll get better. I do think you could stand to know your audience better in terms of what's interesting or whatnot to mention as a teaser, but it is at least showing an effort to engage. My frustration rekindled at the reaction to feedback to it, not to the post itself.
I know I do remember there being license 'things' way back once upon a time, but I honestly don't know if I've heard of anything like that (save that Rhost is no longer requiring an NDA!) in a billion years, so I don't know if that specific portion is relevant in a more than a 'huh, other platforms have that problem, interesting' fashion. I mostly play a genres in which I couldn't run a for profit game no matter which way I did it (even my own homebrew world stuff uses somebody else's system), so any discussion on that front isn't helpful for me. BUT, just because it isn't relevant to me doesn't mean it's not interesting. I do like hearing about how Evennia is progressing, it's super exciting to get a mu* platform of any sort that's all out there being new and such.
I don't really have much to say about the other things noted, except 'what do you mean an interactive fiction game'? I'm actually not familiar with the reference.
There is nothing in this post that is meant to be anything except helpful. This is not sarcasm.
@Thenomain said:
@HelloProject said:
I've always found the MUD side of our hobby to somewhat have the expectation of being like, super ultra professional rather than super casual like in MUSHes and such.
This explains why my first thought to @Jeshin's "a community is a board of directors" language was, "gigglesnort Yes, and I am CEO of my pants."
I still think it's silly, but seeing it in action I'm coming to the conclusion that the people who organize the games feel it's important.
Or feel that they are important. It's all game-playing in one form or another, and this "I'm a professional" schtick is part of the administrator game. It's a business simulator without the risks of running a real business. People who are this serious about it deserve about as much pity (or derision--take your pick) as someone who claims to be a marksman because he spends hours playing a FPS.
In @Jaunt's defense, the sort of sales talk way of communicating is a pretty normal thing in some MUD circles when it comes to being staff and such. I've always found the MUD side of our hobby to somewhat have the expectation of being like, super ultra professional rather than super casual like in MUSHes and such.
Except stuff like DBZ MUDs, then it's like "Oh, you have tits? Let me page you dicks".
