Nepotism versus restricted concepts
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I think if you want to cast your MU like a play, you should consider OTT or an invite-only game instead.
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@bored said:
I think if you want to cast your MU like a play, you should consider OTT or an invite-only game instead.
Possibly good advice, given that people have a diverse array of experience in what works and what doesn't, but I think that there's an alternative (and more broadly universal) view that could be taken here, which is: if you're the one putting the time, effort, and resources into the creation of the game, you should be able to set it up any way you want to set it up. If there is not a game that appeals to you, then perhaps consider opening one of your own, rather than demanding that other people make a change to suit your tastes when they're offering a free service. While taking into account advice and prior experience is always certainly helpful to draw on for a pool of ideas, calls still have to be made in regards to theme, vision, etc, and as a hobby we seem incredibly focused on past things. We have an awful lot of baggage that we seem to cart around with us. I almost want to call it a problem, but I've seen good come from it too, so I think I'll call it an issue instead.
Ultimately,though, the folks at the top are the ones that call the shots. People can set up the games that they work to create however they want to create them. That's part of the beauty of the system. The diversity of experience and resources and tools that are out there waiting to be utilized is a bonus which should create more diversity, but ultimately we seem to get bogged down in arguments about the One True Right and Only Way a lot more than we seem to get anything productive done when it comes to trying something new.
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Sure. Your game, your dime for the server, you can do anything you want, include being a nepotistic scumbag.
Because that's what you're going to be when you decide to play director, cast your stars, and then oh yeah, we need some extras too.
This bullshit gets you one thing. It gets you Firan.
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All my friends quit MU*ing already. If I ran a game I would get to abuse everyone equally.
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@bored said:
Sure. Your game, your dime for the server, you can do anything you want, include being a nepotistic scumbag.
Because that's what you're going to be when you decide to play director, cast your stars, and then oh yeah, we need some extras too.
This bullshit gets you one thing. It gets you Firan.
Not quite. Lots of game have had narcissistic despotic owners over the last couple of decades - most of them were incompetent and, as such, died the quiet and quick undignified death they deserved.
Firan did not. It ran for a long time, attracted a lot of people and some of them must have have fun. That's not a sign of incompetence; you can argue its bullshit and many people will agree, but not that this is what this is the game it gets you.
It takes the combination of consistency, skill and effort to make a successful game no matter if you're an asshole or not.
- He who takes offense when not intended is a fool. He who takes offense when intended is a greater fool.
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@Arkandel said:
It takes the combination of consistency, skill and effort to make a successful game no matter if you're an asshole or not.
Serenity stands as a monument to skill and effort not being necessary for this equation.
It's really all about consistency, if there's a game in a theme people like and no other choices. I will leave a game fun by total, fucking assholes, but a stunning amount of people won't, as long as the damn thing is up and running.
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@Three-Eyed-Crow said:
It's really all about consistency, if there's a game in a theme people like and no other choices. I will leave a game fun by total, fucking assholes, but a stunning amount of people won't, as long as the damn thing is up and running.
How do you explain Fallcoast/TR then? By all accounts it's a festering wound, but it's not the lack of alternatives which keeps it popular - no other theme offers more choice than the nWoD.
- He who takes offense when not intended is a fool. He who takes offense when intended is a greater fool.
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Mostly I just don't think big, long-lasting games are necessarily either fueled by effort or skill. Incompetent staffers who still log in regularly can create an illusion of activity or just wank, which players can latch on to and create real activity. All of us have been on very popular games that were also very bad, for various reasons.
People go where their friends are and, from what I understand, those are games where people just kind of Were en masse, because TR was very popular at a certain point and inertia is powerful.
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@Three-Eyed-Crow said:
People go where their friends are
Bingo.
No larger factor than this exists to account for a game's playerbase. The trick is getting them there in the first place and stay long enough to make the initial investment.
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@bored
I dunno. Many MU*s I've seen have had an 'audition process,' especially for FCs, and it seemed to work out pretty well (again, not WoD, so different cross-section). -
I just don't think "Everyone has the opportunity to apply for certain concepts but staff will use their judgment as to whose application to accept" is unfair. "Everyone gets everything they want" is not actually a point of fairness.
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@bored said:
I think if you want to cast your MU like a play, you should consider OTT or an invite-only game instead.
You say this like someone that has not been involved in the casting of a play.
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@bored said:
Sure. Your game, your dime for the server, you can do anything you want, include being a nepotistic scumbag.
Because that's what you're going to be when you decide to play director, cast your stars, and then oh yeah, we need some extras too.
This bullshit gets you one thing. It gets you Firan.
Serious question. If you were the one running Firan in an imaginary scenario where you somehow had the game and were in complete control, how would you have handled their roster system with its playerbase at peak?
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@bored said:
Sure. Your game, your dime for the server, you can do anything you want, include being a nepotistic scumbag.
Because that's what you're going to be when you decide to play director, cast your stars, and then oh yeah, we need some extras too.
This bullshit gets you one thing. It gets you Firan.
Nobody is claiming what you're responding to.
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@Arkandel said:
@bored said:
Sure. Your game, your dime for the server, you can do anything you want, include being a nepotistic scumbag.
Because that's what you're going to be when you decide to play director, cast your stars, and then oh yeah, we need some extras too.
This bullshit gets you one thing. It gets you Firan.
Not quite. Lots of game have had narcissistic despotic owners over the last couple of decades - most of them were incompetent and, as such, died the quiet and quick undignified death they deserved.
Firan did not. It ran for a long time, attracted a lot of people and some of them must have have fun. That's not a sign of incompetence; you can argue its bullshit and many people will agree, but not that this is what this is the game it gets you.
It takes the combination of consistency, skill and effort to make a successful game no matter if you're an asshole or not.
Yes, you can be a nepotistic douchebag and create a successful game (or be ethical and create a failure, and yes, vice versa). Firan could have done all its good things and not been shitty to their players. Rampant favortism was not a key element contributing to its success (indeed, lack of ethics was still what killed it, when they got past a certain ratio of shitty to actual fun shit).
That is not an argument in favor of being a nepotistic douchebag.
@Bobotron said:
@bored
I dunno. Many MU*s I've seen have had an 'audition process,' especially for FCs, and it seemed to work out pretty well (again, not WoD, so different cross-section).I think basing handing out certain things that have to be handed out in game, based on in game observation/behavior is fine (although this is usually beyond the CG process, and on to things like 'who gets to run the org' - I think everyone should use the same CG). That is not what I understand @Ganymede's suggestion to be.
@Ganymede said:
@bored said:
I think if you want to cast your MU like a play, you should consider OTT or an invite-only game instead.
You say this like someone that has not been involved in the casting of a play.
Correct, I do not have your level of amateur theater wisdom/dictatorial megalomania.
I have seen most games run like this, and mostly it has shitty results. Because I don't understand that you're advocating for anything other than the pretty much bog-standard (and bog-shitty) approach of 'just give shit to my friends.' Everyone pretty much does what you're suggesting already, except its just a way of justifying their nepotism. We've seen the results, they usually suck.
@Sunny said:
@bored said:
Sure. Your game, your dime for the server, you can do anything you want, include being a nepotistic scumbag.
Because that's what you're going to be when you decide to play director, cast your stars, and then oh yeah, we need some extras too.
This bullshit gets you one thing. It gets you Firan.
Nobody is claiming what you're responding to.
Sure they are. What do you think happens when you cast a bunch of your friends as all the key players, give them all the toys, and then open the game to 'other people who aren't as OMG awesome.' You get a bunch of haves and have-nots, stars and extras, and all the bullshit we see on every WoD game ever.
Saving the interesting reply for last:
@Apos said:
@bored said:
Sure. Your game, your dime for the server, you can do anything you want, include being a nepotistic scumbag.
Because that's what you're going to be when you decide to play director, cast your stars, and then oh yeah, we need some extras too.
This bullshit gets you one thing. It gets you Firan.
Serious question. If you were the one running Firan in an imaginary scenario where you somehow had the game and were in complete control, how would you have handled their roster system with its playerbase at peak?
The full answer to this is beyond the scope of this thread I think.
Relevant to this argument, not designed it with 3 tiers including characters that were purpose-built to be shitty nobodies who could accomplish nothing?
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@bored, you might be taking the discussion personally. It's either that or I'm misreading your agitation levels.
It's a debate about MU* ethics. We're having those all the time.
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It's not agitation, its lack of equivocation
There's a lot of 'oh well good staffing can make anything work' in this thread, and on this forum in general, but I think that's BS. The sort of thing @Ganymede is suggesting is a) not actually different from how MU* have always worked and b) fundamentally terrible, as the history of this stuff tells us.
Its fine to make adjustments in game, as I hope I've clarified, but the 'casting' analogies are just kindly euphemisms for nepotism. If you don't promote equality at the fundamental first step, when people are joining your game, you set a precedent of favoritism and bullshit permanently.
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@bored said:
It's not agitation, its lack of equivocation
There's a lot of 'oh well good staffing can make anything work' in this thread, and on this forum in general, but I think that's BS. The sort of thing @Ganymede is suggesting is a) not actually different from how MU* have always worked and b) fundamentally terrible, as the history of this stuff tells us.
Its fine to make adjustments in game, as I hope I've clarified, but the 'casting' analogies are just kindly euphemisms for nepotism. If you don't promote equality at the fundamental first step, when people are joining your game, you set a precedent of favoritism and bullshit permanently.
You sound like exactly the kind of person those screening processes are designed to weed out, frankly. Everything is a personal attack, everyone is an unethical bastard, which makes me think that you've gone out for these things before, flaked the fuck out, and now you're just ranting about how unfair it is that nobody trusts the twitchy guy giving everyone dirty looks with the matches and gasoline. Discrimination! What sort of country do we live in if someone can't walk into someone else's fantasy world and expect to have all of their flaws ignored in order to be on the same level as everyone else!?!
MU's are not democratic organizations, in many cases. Therefore, you also have no right to expect to be treated the same as everyone else, or have access to what everyone else does regardless of reputation or personal history. If that's not a concept you can handle, then this hobby is not for you.
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The only truism about Mu*s is that they must have group participation. How that participation comes out depends on so many elements that I don't think it can be quantified and barely qualified.
What I see most in this discussion is one trying to find fairness. You cannot. I see a little push back that all of a certain action is wrong, which is also untrue.
What you can be is open and honest. I steal this from Ganymede. My take is that you also show some level of human understanding, that this is the closest to fair that anyone will ever get.
And most of us won't even get that close.
