Feelings of not being wanted...

[Sovereign]

@Ghost

It's completely true. I'm comfortable saying the only time I RP - which admittedly has been "basically never" for years now - it's to entertain myself, no one else. Out of pure self-interest it's good for me to be entertaining because it encourages others to play with me, but it's ultimately a selfish generosity.

[Ganymede]

@hedgehog said:

The Original Dreaming MUSH had an approval questionnaire. Granted, it was easy to cheat (I did, getting really specific answers from Turner/Demosthenes because I didn't have the books yet), but at least it was there. And, no, it didn't totally weed out abominations like Peri and Ranger, but I think it was at least somewhat successful.

It is great to make sure your newbies don't come in with no knowledge of the theme/setting whatsoever. But the questionnaire was a pain in the ass for folks who did know the system, and did nothing whatsoever to address or prevent the real problems from getting in.

So, I found that shit annoying.

[Thenomain]

There is a post-Forge indie RPG philosophy that goes like this:

Play for other people.

You are not contracted, obligated, or otherwise forced to do so, but if you include people in your character's play-space, you will become more popular and you will enhance that person's experience knowing that they will do the same for you.

I kind of do think that you are social-contract obligated to involve everyone in your scene, which means playing off their character and poses and making space for them to add to things. If they don't take it, if they don't want it, if they don't engage then hey, you did your part to create that upward feedback spiral of awesome that is an engaging situation.

So I would like to say it's everyone's responsibility to be engaging, and the level of engaging is enough to allow others a space to be engaged. Once two players are engaged, crazy fun shit happens, and it's such an easy thing to start.

Staff have a much deeper requirement, but this is going to mull around in my head a lot.

[hedgehog]

@Ganymede

And, like I said, easy enough to cheat on. That said, it was successful for me because it made me think about what I was about to be doing. It also gave me the impetus to buy the books and learn about things. But I can definitely see how it would be hugely annoying to people who already knew what they were doing.

[thebird]

@Arkandel said:

"Hey, anyone want to do something?"
"Sure! You wanna meet at $place?"
<silence>
...

"I'm so bored, someone run something for me."
"Alright, what would you like ran?"
"I dunno."
"How about $thing?"
"No, it doesn't fit me exactly right."
...

"Hey, I noticed you guys were playing, want one more?"
"Sure, come over!"
<comes over and starts chatting OOC about their day, poses once every half hour>
...

And so on.

If I had a nickle for every time I've run into this over the years...

Reminds me of multiple conversations I have about how time is precious, and I have a limited amount of it to spend actively doing things on a game...so for the love of god, be courteous, people.

Kind of ties into the issues of selfishness. I don't know if it's a general lack of empathy on the part of some folks, or what, but ... < Some point I was going to make, but work just ate me and I don't remember...damnit. >

[surreality]

@Thenomain said:

I kind of do think that you are social-contract obligated to involve everyone in your scene, which means playing off their character and poses and making space for them to add to things. If they don't take it, if they don't want it, if they don't engage then hey, you did your part to create that upward feedback spiral of awesome that is an engaging situation.

I agree with this on some levels, and not others.

I suppose it depends on how someone defines 'being included', first. Some need a bigger invitation than others. For instance, some feel a glance toward That Person You've Never Met with a 'I notice another person her' sort of nod like you'd potentially exchange in an office waiting room is enough to say: 'hey, let's find a reason to interact', which is perfectly reasonable for most modern settings. Others want an engraved invitation signed in triplicate by everyone in the scene for an 'OK', or instant complete focus from all parties thrown their way when they put a pose even if nobody knows them yet IC -- even if it's that same basic nod pose and scenario.

You can have two people with these differing expectations in one place, and both are going to sincerely believe to have done the right thing, but feel others have not. How reasonable either set of expectations actually is can be argued in a variety of ways.

Sometimes the culture of a game trends toward one direction or another, which can leave the person with the style less common to that space the odd man out, and feeling that they're doing something wrong or are unwelcome there. This can vary a lot based on experience -- good or bad or even if the trend that week seems to be headed in one direction or the other -- confidence levels, and how well the player does or doesn't know the play styles of others present.

My basic take on this boils down to some fairly simple principles, but they have the same ultimate failing "don't be a dick" ultimately does. Most people have some general areas of agreement about how to go about them, but differ on a lot of the fine points. It can be summarized as this: "Be observant. Create openings. Be willing to take risks."

...you can probably see how that works and how it doesn't.

I'll actually try to write up what that all means while snowed in this weekend in hopes it might be a help, but for now... coffee.

[Thenomain]

@surreality

I tried to be careful about explaining what I meant, and didn't use "include" on purpose. I think the only reasonable rule would be that you make space for others in a scene. You can't make anyone feel included any more than you can make them feel wanted.

Which is, by the way, my main problem with the premise of this thread. Feelings come from interpretations of situations. Since it's not reasonable to ask strangers to play to your personal sense of "feeling wanted", then what we have left is changing the environment.

And really, even then all you can do is try, which is all I'm saying that everyone is required to do. I've laid down solid requirements of what "trying" means, so that someone can't come by and start with the inevitable, "Well, it depends..."

@surreality said:

I suppose it depends

Yeah, like that. Everything "depends", but everything has to start with an idea as the foundation.

@surreality said:

Be observant. Create openings.

You are arguing with me ... why? You even quoted me saying:

@Thenomain said:

which means playing off their character and poses and making space for them to add to things

Sometimes I wonder about you.

[surreality]

@Thenomain It isn't really arguing so much as feeling my way around the concept and expanding on the idea.

There is a lot of 'it depends' and, yeah, most of it comes down to expectations. Sometimes to comfort levels and game culture. Some players require more hand-holding or a more direct 'invitation' to participate -- some games are more passive than others about involving new players.

There are definitely corner cases -- god help us -- that break even a 'make space' principle. For instance, the chick who was knocking on the door to a private room on Shang to elbow into a private scene involving a couple that finally got some alone time after three weeks. Sure, there are (and hilariously were) real IC responses to that, but there are, frankly, times that you do not want to make room for another person in a particular scene on the player level, and I think people are reasonable to expect they should be able to have time to themselves sometimes, too, given conditions like the above (private space, not a public scene, etc.).

Going back to the differing expectations and ideas about what being included means, ultimately, some players still make something as simple as 'make space' a more complicated thing than, ideally, it should be.

A lot of the dynamics of this come out more often in more social M*s, I think, where running plots or events is less common or even absent entirely, and all RP involves direct networking, without a sign-up sheet to help it along. (Tangent: as much as a lot of folks complain about events not being perfectly what they want and the like, they're a pretty big boon to getting one's foot in the door that aren't available everywhere.)

[Hella]

@Thenomain said:

You are not contracted, obligated, or otherwise forced to do so, but if you include people in your character's play-space, you will become more popular and you will enhance that person's experience knowing that they will do the same for you.

This is such a lie. I cannot count how many times I have experienced/heard from others "Well I invite you to all of my stuff, but you don't invite me to yours." MUSHing is an inherently selfish experience, where 9 and 3/4 times out of 10, people will take what they can get while excluding others who give them RP/plot for justifications x, y, and z. Maybe they're even legit justifications. But not usually.

[Apos]

@VulgarKitten It varies a bit. I think the more sandbox-y it is, the more that exists, since it falls on players to make more of their fun and it's a lot easier to see people who are simply unwilling to do that for anyone else. On something less sandbox-like I tend not to notice.

[Hella]

@Apos I've seen it everywhere, big places like TR, and smaller places like RtA. Places like Elendor in it's heyday, and places like Eldritch.

[Arkandel]

@VulgarKitten said:

@Thenomain said:

You are not contracted, obligated, or otherwise forced to do so, but if you include people in your character's play-space, you will become more popular and you will enhance that person's experience knowing that they will do the same for you.

This is such a lie.

Well, lie is a strong word. I doubt Theno was trying to intentionally misrepresent the truth or anything. At worst it could be incorrect, which is a whole different matter.

But well, I need to agree with him it's a good policy to have in general - including others, letting them into your story, allowing them to play with your toys. It's not needed by any means but as ours is a highly interactive, collaborative word-based hobby I don't see the problem with it. It might not work as well or often as we'd want, but what does?

[Coin]

@Arkandel said:

It might not work as well or often as we'd want, but what does?

Your mom.

BOOM!

[Arkandel]

That doesn't even make sense, @COIN.

[Ghost]

@Arkandel said:

@VulgarKitten said:

@Thenomain said:

You are not contracted, obligated, or otherwise forced to do so, but if you include people in your character's play-space, you will become more popular and you will enhance that person's experience knowing that they will do the same for you.

This is such a lie.

Well, lie is a strong word. I doubt Theno was trying to intentionally misrepresent the truth or anything. At worst it could be incorrect, which is a whole different matter.

But well, I need to agree with him it's a good policy to have in general - including others, letting them into your story, allowing them to play with your toys. It's not needed by any means but as ours is a highly interactive, collaborative word-based hobby I don't see the problem with it. It might not work as well or often as we'd want, but what does?

But the connection between mushers, good mushers or bad, is highly symbiotic. There is no such thing as a successful game with only two players. You need the other players as much as they need you. That's why these conversations and gripes about selfish players explode, right? It's the roleplay equivalent of a guy telling a girl I'll get you back after she gives him a blowjob. Ive referred to it at times as Unrequited Roleplay.

Maybe it isn't the best term, and we could argue which words are better all day, but I do believe that there is an unspoken social contract that exists between mushers. If I had to put it into words, it might go something like this(bear with me I just woke up):

"We are providing each other with time. Time we could be spending other things, but we choose to be here. So, I expect you to try to be entertaining, copacetic, and a fair player. In return, I will provide you with this as well."

But that's why fucked up players drive us crazy, right? We love the hobby, but we need other players, so when other players are twinks, power gaming, disruptive, self-centered, and drama-mongering fucktards, they're effectively polluting what would otherwise be a very awesome writing hobby with their negative bullshit.

Some motherfuckers just don't get that they have a place in the unspoken, symbiotic contract. It fucks things up.

[Coin]

@Arkandel said:

That doesn't even make sense, @COIN.

I already told you, "your mom" comebacks don't need to make sense. You need some memory supplements or something, bruh.

[Arkandel]

@Coin said:

@Arkandel said:

That doesn't even make sense, @COIN.

I already told you, "your mom" comebacks don't need to make sense. You need some memory supplements or something, bruh.

How can it be a comeback? Comeback from what?!

[Coin]

@Arkandel said:

@Coin said:

@Arkandel said:

That doesn't even make sense, @COIN.

I already told you, "your mom" comebacks don't need to make sense. You need some memory supplements or something, bruh.

How can it be a comeback? Comeback from what?!

Exactly.

[Ghost]

I slept with your mom.

I wish I could take my comeback.

[Thenomain]

@VulgarKitten said:

@Thenomain said:

You are not contracted, obligated, or otherwise forced to do so, but if you include people in your character's play-space, you will become more popular and you will enhance that person's experience knowing that they will do the same for you.

This is such a lie. I cannot count how many times I have experienced/heard from others "Well I invite you to all of my stuff, but you don't invite me to yours."

One of the things I'm finding lately is that I am pulling back from my usual hyperbolic ways, only to realize why I was that way to begin with: The number of times people take what I'm saying to some theoretical logical conclusion.

Making space for people is not bending backwards for them. Nobody who asks you to be a doormat has your interests in mind, and you should take no shit from them.

If you are turning yourself into a doormat, you are trying too hard. Relax. Chill. Take no shit from yourself.

MUSHing is an inherently selfish experience, where 9 and 3/4 times out of 10, people will take what they can get while excluding others who give them RP/plot for justifications x, y, and z. Maybe they're even legit justifications. But not usually.

Which is why I think that not doing this should be a requirement. Fuck these selfish people. Fuck them right in the ear. If people cannot share their play-space, they have no right to mine.

But you have no control over them. You have control over you. The only thing you can do to help the game is make the attempt, to give other people a chance to fail on their own actions and not because of your preconceived notions.

If you can't be bothered, even with the smallest amount of effort, to try to include people who are in your scenes, then you're part of the problem. It's these people who need a punch in the cloaca with a dagger and tossed out the airlock.

--

This is an extension of a discussion that began long, long ago on Swofa, I believe by TNP or PsyJack that was this: We are the source of many of the problems we complain about.

If this is true, then we need to think differently about what we do, change how we do it. I don't admit to massive failure because I'm trying to score humility brownie points with anyone, I'm doing it because we all need to take a more adult view of the problems.

Having a place to vent is nice, but who is trying to solve the problems? (Yes, several of you are. Cookies to each of you.)