Too Much

Lotherio · May 25, 2022, 1:45 AM

@tooters said in Liberation MUSH: One Month Review:

But that's the problem with 20-30 person scenes: not just here, but I have been MUSHing for 20+ years and NEVER have seen it done where everyone has fun. So it's not just this particular situation. A smarter decision would have been to break it up, even if you have to do it on multiple days.

I had to steal this out of another thread. I almost put it in the RL friendly thread as it seems good advice, but then I figured why not put it here. This is sound advice. Big scenes don't work. I know some folks like larger scenes, but I think there's a critical mass for any plot type scene.

It sort of goes hand in hand with pondering the RL friendly question but how to support numbers of players within plot architecture. Currently I do like the trend in seeing lots more smaller games that can focus on smaller groups of players to do more plot. Its in the range of step up from TTG. My ideal TTG is 5 players if I'm being honest, so I can give everyone attention at my table. If I get more players at a table, I've a longtime GM friend that will co-GM with me, we've been at it long enough players probably think we read each others minds.

Just rambling, but what is a good critical mass for major plot like scene/event? Aside from as many as the runner can handle, is there some ratio of player to staff that works/doesn't work?

reimesu · May 25, 2022, 1:59 AM

@lotherio One of the games I was on did it so that most of the scenes were "anyone and everyone can sign up, but we're going to be splitting this into smaller groups."

The groups tended to be up to about 10, depending on size. Sometimes it worked brilliantly, sometimes not so much. All depended on the ST's mindset at the time and how invested the players were.

Devrex · May 25, 2022, 2:03 AM

@lotherio Eight is about my limit, and I prefer four to five...for the same reason. My attention span just can't keep up with more, and as it is I'm reading poses and jotting down notes that boil each pose down to the action so I can call for rolls and write a pose that includes everyone at the end of a round. Ideally everyone feels like they contribute something to the scene or at least has the opportunity to do so if they want to (sometimes reaction is all a PC can give and if it's fun for them that's still a success). The more people in it, the harder it is to offer ways to make that happen.

Tooters · May 25, 2022, 2:05 AM

@lotherio I think big scenes could work, hypothetically, but you can't run it with one person or else it'd take all night. In addition, prep work through jobs would be a good idea, to cut down the clutter and focus on the task at hand. A lot of little scenes that coalesce into a big scene is likely the ideal goal, IMO.

Hella · May 25, 2022, 2:44 AM

Big scenes are a major pain in the butt. I used to put months of RL prep work into them. And even then, I would generally get a 'council' of other players ICly to help out. Sometimes it was really great. Sometimes not so much.

I hate when the answer is 'it depends', but... it depends. When it comes to plot (and not just large social scenes) player buy in is key, I think, to how many people can work well in a big scene. A really engaged group makes it light work, makes it easier to handle more people and make each person come away feeling like they've told a part in a great story.

Edited to add: which brings me to a question that maybe should be a thread of its own but, how do YOU make a group engaged in your plot? Tips and tricks?

faraday · May 25, 2022, 2:58 AM

Any more than five or six players and it just gets too much for me. When I did big scenes on BSGU, I would set it up so there were natural ways for folks to break up. So for instance we did a big awards party, and there were a couple different locations - the beach, the bar... I forget the others. Or if there were a big battle, there'd be separate angles. Air wing and marines, or two groups of marines, or whatnot. So it was really like multiple interconnected scenes under the same umbrella.

Ghost · May 25, 2022, 3:03 AM

Yeah and that # of players per scene, to me, was a time equation. I can't tell you how many nights I had FOUR HOURS to RP and it ended up being three, maybe four, poses; the first being a pose in and the last being my "gotta go to bed pose-out". When it takes an hour or more for the turn order to cycle back to you, it felt like a time sink more than anything, which drove whatever latent ADD I had up the freaking wall.

There's got to be a better way to compartmentalize scene elements so more players are relevant and get some good RP in, but ALSO allows for more than 8 people to RP.

kk · May 25, 2022, 3:39 AM

! one in the scene is just posing to myself and that would get boring quick!
Two people in a scene can be super wonderful - but if I always play with the same other person, the rp gets sandboxy and eventually boring. Private duo scenes are great - but best when broken up by other rp, giving us a more complex and moving forward storyline.
Three people in a scene can be terrific although sometimes there is a /third wheel/ as people like to like form duos.
Four people in a scene is pretty awesome - but can get bogged down is one of the four is posing slowing. Sometimes better to jump to the 3 pose rule here.
Five people in a scene is still good!
Six people in a scene is bordering on confusing, but sometimes still lots of fun!

Anything more than 6 is a big big scene, can still be fun, but often smaller rp pockets start to form. It still can be exciting, giving a sense of a bit game, big event, big plot etc.

Best scenes are?
Generally

Duos and small groups.

But big scenes have their place!

kk · May 25, 2022, 4:50 AM

@kk

Best size for ts scenes! Because really everything is sort of about sex or something idk.

Rping a sex scene with myself is just textual masturbation
A two person sex is sort of standard and a good size for a tinysex scene, but rping sex scene after sex scene with the same characters (without breaking it up with other rp) can eventually become a pretty dull shade of gray.
. Three person sex scenes are in theory totally wonderful. As one of those pan folks, I am like yay, a threesome with a boy and a girl at same time sounds great. /Sounds/ great lol, it rarely works out. Hard to line up times. Easy for it go to wrong and often in danger of the third wheel effect.
A four person ts scene tends to turn into two duos having lateral sex scenes - yes I know from experience, gasp!
A five person sex scene is officially and orgy and well pretty confusing, hehe.

Ganymede · May 25, 2022, 5:04 AM

@faraday said in Too Much:

So for instance we did a big awards party, and there were a couple different locations - the beach, the bar... I forget the others.

And then DWOPP got with my PC, and we TS'd, and I found out later, and I was, like --

Anyhow, it was still fun, and I have no regrets. BSGU was one of the best experiences I've had in 20+ years. I wish it was still around.

@kk said in Too Much:

A two person sex is sort of standard and a good size for a tinysex scene, but rping sex scene after sex scene with the same characters (without breaking it up with other rp) can eventually become a pretty dull shade of gray.

I hate to think of ever being thought of as a dull shade of grey, dear.

kk · May 25, 2022, 5:15 AM

@ganymede

I admit scenes with you were never dull!

RightMeow · May 25, 2022, 5:58 AM

The number in a scene that overwhelms me is conditional. If I'm work stressed, I can't do large scenes. if I'm having a focus issue RL - can't do it.

I also tend to have a very energetic character and that expends a lot of OOC energy to play. Also, I get super self-conscious that I'm boring people, or I worry about my posing style, or my pose size. That's not a please give me compliments, it's a I probably have social anxiety/imposter syndrome.

I think a good scene is 3-4, although for deep char development I find 2 is good. You can really focus on the other person and in turn be focused on.

Ghost · May 25, 2022, 6:07 AM

@kk said in Too Much:

Three person sex scenes are in theory totally wonderful. As one of those pan folks, I am like yay, a threesome with a boy and a girl at same time sounds great. /Sounds/ great lol, it rarely works out. Hard to line up times. Easy for it go to wrong and often in danger of the third wheel effect.

I dunno why but when I read this I lol'd in my head about the idea of a 3 person TS scene where my character is there with headphones and a microphone narrating the 2 person sex incident for their podcast.

Missed opportunities I spose.

kk · May 25, 2022, 6:11 AM

@ghost

There is always time...one can go back to mushing and do that!

It is never to late to follow your dreams.

faraday · May 25, 2022, 1:12 PM

Three people is about my limit for a normal scene. Any more than that and I mentally check out. It's just too long between poses or too hard to follow all the threads of conversation. Especially since most players will pose a paragraph replying to multiple people at once. It's like having six different conversations going at a dinner table and you're never sure which ones you need to pay attention to. (name highlighting helps but not enough)

@ganymede said in Too Much:

And then DWOPP got with my PC, and we TS'd, and I found out later, and I was, like --

But I mean, my PC was dating his, so I can relate - even if it was solely FTB. To wit, my comment in the other thread:

Setting a shared expectation up front can help, but there are some who will push things even if you're super clear about no TS, no OOC bleed. It's annoying.

@ganymede said in Too Much:

BSGU was one of the best experiences I've had in 20+ years. I wish it was still around.

Lotherio · May 25, 2022, 1:51 PM

Lately for me, when I have time to staff a scene, I set limits. Like 10 mins between a pose or get skipped and such. I feel like when I do that I'm riding folks to hurry up and pose.

I like some of the ideas about utilizing player helpers and/or separating out the scene a bit. I would like to try to focus more on players in particular these days, make it their story. I've shied away from having one plot for a Mu where there is a finite end. It can fade away as interest fades, that's fine, but I don't like to have what seems like a railroad. That comes from my days of preferring open Campaign TTG when I run, let the players decide. I feel like I'm there in Mu*ing too, see what players want to do and how I can help them.

Rambling again, but players helping, or other staff helping to divide up large groups sounds like a good idea for the players too, they get a little more time to shine instead of lost in a large group.

Lotherio · May 25, 2022, 1:54 PM

@faraday This caught me, I don't think I've ever seen you throw in a gif. I laughed, good thing its my planning period and no students where in the room (in which case I wouldn't be on-line but still).

Ganymede · May 25, 2022, 1:57 PM

@faraday said in Too Much:

Some day, when I have more time and energy, I want to convince you to help me set up an original space fantasy game.

Lotherio · May 25, 2022, 2:00 PM

@ganymede said in Too Much:

Some day, when I have more time and energy, I want to convince you to help me set up an original space fantasy game.

Ain't gonna lie! This gets my hopes up! How do we help you get more time and energy, is this were we send you copious amounts of liquid courage of the expensive variety so you can sequester ala Hemmingway and come out with a masterpiece like the one about an old man and a big fish?

hobos · May 25, 2022, 2:00 PM

For me, it depends what kind of mechanics the game has to manage crowds. If there is a tabletalk mechanic, I will primarily use that. It also depends on the game's culture and if pose order is important. If pose order is important, what saved my sanity in large scenes was being able to use the '3P' pose order.

I've been in some large scenes on games that felt relatively comfortable (or uncomfortable for all the right reasons) and fun, due to the concordance of a culture where "pose order" was not something particularly taken into consideration, and tabletalk was nicely used by everyone involved.

Two problems I noticed in the 'pose order heavy' games are these:

A long dialogue scene will take forever. Strategy meetings become painful and really just another way to socialize. People are stuck online for hours and hours if they want to just handle a small item of business. This leads to people colluding OOC rather than discussing IC events IC.
The flow of the scene is constantly broken by a person responding to multiple people and multiple lines of conversation in one emote. Not only is this unrealistic in terms of conversational flow but it's also confusing, and can lead to the leeriness towards large scenes that we see here.

As a culture, how to not take pose order into consideration? Well, this doesn't mean you will never be stuck waiting for someone to emote. If the scene is describing something that cannot move forward without someone's input, then you should either wait for them politely as long as it takes, or modify the scene to move forward without them, without powergaming them. If people are just chatting, then just keep chatting. Leave room for interruptions. If you are asking someone a question, then wait for an answer. If you're saying something particularly dramatic that might warrant a response from them, then maybe give a long pause before continuing.

Pose order can be useful for async scenes or play-by-post roleplay so I think it has its place, but I just personally don't enjoy it in an immersive roleplay environment.

For me, in an ideal environment, it becomes too much when people are just firing out emotes so fast that they are colliding and thus don't make sense at all. And I have only seen this once, in a scene that contained roughly fifty people. And it only happened once during the scene before people noticed it was happening and all tried to slow down a bit, kind of like a bunch of friends talking rapidly over each other at a dinner table and then chilling out and slowing themselves down in order to hear everyone else.