Space Lords and Ladies

[bored]

@Ghost said:

You mean...the non-consent WoD games where most people spend time in private rooms and only a certain population of players and their alts actively involve in dangerous plots?

These people exist, certainly. That the ones who wholly prefer to avoid all conflict vs. the ones who settle into filler RP when nothing else is available are a majority is not something I see any evidence of, and indeed much to the contrary.

Relationship-only people will have an effect on the games around them, especially if those games have nothing else going for them. But again, your theory of MU-reality doesn't adequately explain people leaping into big conflicts when those big conflicts are available.

[ThatGuyThere]

@bored
From what I have seen on the Standard WoD non-consent the norm seems to be finding a small group you fit with and doing your own thing.

While it is true there are people on every game who leap to get into plots there are also those who leap to avoid them, do I think it is a majority? Honestly I am not sure but at the very least I would say it is in the ball park of 30 percent of the population, and I think that small core, whether there for relationship rp or to tell their own stories among their small group are doing what they choose not because they lack other options.

[bored]

Well, 30% isn't 'most', if it's even that much, so it's not correct to frame it that way when it might be a smaller core of people (which I don't disagree with; and I realize you're not the one doing so, I'm just comparing).

I think very likely the majority go where staff takes them. History supports this, and there's no reason to think anything has changed in the hobby, because we've seen games of both types, old and new. Firan's death & rape non-consent jamboree existed alongside 'everyone just RPs in private with their weyrmate' Pern games. More recently, you can put say Star Crusade next to 5th World and see very different cultures on games that were superficially very similar looking. WoD games even seem to shift within their own lifetimes, between focus on metaplot and staffers (not shockingly) burning out and leaving people to their own shit.

But I'm simply not willing to accept a view of the hobby that is so fundamentally backwards. None of the degree of obsession on game systems, mechanics, theme elements, xp and advancement, etc etc etc makes much sense if everyone wants to just get their fuck on in private, and can do so without a staffer having a chance to butt in on it on Shangrila.

[Apos]

I'd say the larger games do a pretty good job of appealing to multiple subsets of players, which is pretty much the reason they are large. Even with staff at their least fair and most arbitrary towards players, it's not like most GMs are randomly picking players out of the rooms they never leave and killing them, so even the more player-death and non-consent-y type games can still support people that would be perfectly happy on pure consent games with no pvp whatsoever, since the super risk averse players just hang out and avoid obviously risky behavior.

I think saying, 'I will punish those 'relationship players' and make them engage in risky behavior' would just largely result in a much more niche and smaller game and there's no reason to do so when games can easily support both. Sure, there's people like Cirno that go, 'THIS GAME IS A CAREBEAR RELATIONSHIP SIM' even when it manifestly is not, but I think going to extremes to appeal to someone like that is a recipe for failure.

[bored]

@Apos

Well, Firan did pick randomly pick people out of their room and kill them

That aside... pretty much. You'll always have players with different inclinations. But on a well-run game I rarely see the total shut-in population as anything but a tiny (and readily ignore-able) minority. Usually, the socially focused people are not total shut-ins, and they can still be a game asset. If nothing else, they want to show off their relationship in public (or else they really would be on Shangrila), so they will attend social events. That's... not worth nothing, even if it's as far as thing goes. It makes those events more active.

More often, I think, even those players who might not want combat and violence can be drawn into lower-stakes politics etc. They will definitely have friends they want to support and enemies (or at least targets of jealousy etc) that they will want to be bitches to, etc. This is all stuff that feeds RP.

[Ominous]

I'm on the non-consent side of this discussion. I'm a fan of old-school D&D and one of the key pieces of understanding the mindset of early D&D can be found in this blog post by a gentleman who played D&D with one of the first players - http://blogofholding.com/?p=3889 The takeaway from that post that is relevant to this discussion is the paragraph concerning The Seven Geases: “The story that D&D tells,” said Mike, “is the story of the world. Heroes aren’t invincible.” Now old-school D&D has carbon copy characters, because death is so common; however, I think the same mindset still applies to MUs. A MU is the story of whatever world it is focused on. You can be a part of it - a significant part of it - but in the end it is not your character's story. Unless you're playing on a freeform server, specifically designed for that sort of thing. In that case, have at it.

[Ghost]

@bored You make a really good point here.Mall Cops (who presumably do not want a higher risk security job) do not occupy the same arena as Marine Force Recon. If the player isn't into the idea of risk or PC death or negative consequences for their character, then they shouldn't be involved in higher tier risk ICly. Period.

In my long years mushing, all too often I came across people that wanted to be IC leadership, or super awesome pilots, or super deadly assassins, but when it came time for the sense of risk and destruction they were so eager to inflict on other players or NPCs came to risk their own characters, a sudden avalanche of rules lawyering, OOC drama, and RL angst accompanied those episodes.

If I were making a Space Lords and Ladies game, or any game, I would definitely hold players of higher risk IC action/job/politics to non-consent for high risk rewards/failures. You cannot, cannot, allow players to gamble with monopololy money while other characters are gambling with hard currency. It breaks games.

EDIT: Also, to note, players that don't want to involve in combat, risky politics, or dangerous metaplot events like the big battles of Fifth World have got to understand that, when they choose to abstain from the high risk arena, by means of dramatic guidance alone, their characters are not central to the main story. Staff is infinitely less prone to write plots around characters who don't want to heavily affect, or be affected, by the central theme. These players have got to be honest with themselves. If you're playing a pacifist character who wants to maintain a horse stable and farm on a game whose main focus is intergalactic warfare, then your character really isn't important to the story the game itself is trying to tell as a whole. This character may be important to you and your friends, but you have GOT to understand that when it comes to furthering the metaplot, your character is simply NOT important to that major story piece. Choosing to not partake in that is your choice, and because staff isn't straying from the metaplot they're trying to manage to whip up sandbox pacifist horse stable plots doesn't mean you're less important, it just means that you chose to tell a different story than the game, staff, or plot had ever intended.

[ThatGuyThere]

@bored
Thirty percent of a population is a pretty significant number(For example according to the 2010 US Census it is larger then any single minority population in the US.) And I did say that was the minimum number i would put on it. I would not argue against most to be honest but that would depend on the game. I have certainly been places where most would be accurate.

Also I think you are over estimating the number of people that care about systems etc, I think most of the posters here do, but I see a lot more people on games being all like tell me what i need to roll to notice something.
I don't think the population of Mu Soapbox is really representative of the MUSH population as a whole in that regard.

[Seraphim73]

@Kanye-Qwest said:

@Ghost
I would upvote this twice, if I could.

I upvoted this post too, as a way to upvote the post @Ghost made twice.

[Kanye Qwest]

@Apos said:

Even with staff at their least fair and most arbitrary towards players, it's not like most GMs are randomly picking players out of the rooms they never leave and killing them

You SAY that. I can remember firebombs and attacks in the city in Firan where offline characters were forced on grid in case something burned down their shack.

@Seraphim73 said:

I upvoted this post too, as a way to upvote the post @Ghost made twice.

And now I upvote YOU for being a helper. OMG feel the love.

[Lithium]

@faraday Here's the problem: Your character isn't the protagonist of the MU*.

It's not.

Neither is anyone else's.

People like to say that they're writing a story, and they are, but they aren't just writing their characters story. They're writing the /Story Of The Game/.

Where your character /fits/ in that story is really going to depend on who's reading it and their take on the story and situation at large.

There is no one single 'Protagonist' in a MU*, at least not on any one I've ever been to unless it was a super FC like Rand Al'Thor on a WoT game. There is no reason /not/ to kill off a character if the games story has lead to that event happening. It all further pushes the story further, what ripples occur because of that death? How does it impact other characters? How does it impact the power structure of the game? How does it alter the future of the game and further the /games/ story?

This is why the idea of immortal characters, that anyone is writing out the 'protagonist' story is a false assumption. Everyone can't be the protagonist. Even if you allow only one specific thing, like only Arthurian Knights, who is the Protagonist? Arthur, Galahad, Gawaine, Merlin, or Lancelot?

It just doesn't work, and when people realize that the games story isn't about /them/, then we can see some beautiful history take place as the game takes on a life of it's own that isn't full of consent abuse and drama llama's.

Just my opinion.

EDIT: This is what happens when I respond without reading the whole thread. Sorry to beat a semi-dead or dying horse.

[Apollonius]

The best ST/GM brings together a random group of PCs into a story where they play an integral part as an ensemble. Some PCs may not get as much spotlight and others may indeed get relegated in a scene or two, but a good GM will know how to bring other people in. He or she will also limit the focus in advance so a pretty princess with no combat skills whatsoever is not in a heavily combat-oriented plot unless there's a good twist involved.

A good long-term showrunner will help each character feel like they are special in some way and make them the star of their own episode, even if they play tiny minute roles for the overall plot.

It's about trust with the ST/GM to help PCs move forward, grow, and sometimes die with dignity, explaining the risk of death or maiming and moving forward with a plot after everyone is aware of the risks. Sometimes death will have meaning. Other times, death will be totally pointless... but the goal of a game runner is to tell a good story where everyone is mature and able to have fun.

If a player cannot accept PC death gracefully, they probably shouldn't be playing on your game. If a PC goes Amber on you and refuses to RP except in staff sanctioned safe plots and only with a small niche of PCs, then that PC is going to have his or her toys taken away by someone more deserving. The system IC, as designed by staff, should accommodate for this but in a manner where players drive the change, not the staff as to seem like arbitrary staff fiat.

Everyone dies. Make it fun. Those that can't accept it don't belong on any game. I'm a jerk. Etc.

[deadculture]

The only thing the GM needs to be is fair. The Ambers of the life can be removed by a risk-taker over time, since digging in can only compromise their position in regards to the other players.

A GM needs to allow or help the players to assess the risks of their enterprises, which is what didn't happen with Firan, and Star Crusade. In fact, on the latter case, one could say that the death knell of the game was the gaslighting. Not telling a group the whole picture to make their best decisions, themselves, for instance, and then telling each individual, via pemit, different things.

[lordbelh]

@ThatGuyThere said:

@bored
From what I have seen on the Standard WoD non-consent the norm seems to be finding a small group you fit with and doing your own thing.

While it is true there are people on every game who leap to get into plots there are also those who leap to avoid them, do I think it is a majority? Honestly I am not sure but at the very least I would say it is in the ball park of 30 percent of the population, and I think that small core, whether there for relationship rp or to tell their own stories among their small group are doing what they choose not because they lack other options.

I believe this has more to do with the games than the players. Most standard wod non-consent games are sandboxes. In a sandbox politics are mostly just a question of ego, and plots are just PRPs run by your friends. Interpersonal relationships and character development becomes the primary thing that drives the rp, not plots or danger or whatever, because the stakes of those PRPs are low (they don't generally matter beyond whatever self contained story you're a part of). So why should anyone be surprised if players stick to doing that? Especially the subset of players who primarily want to do that wherever they go?

What I saw on RfK was even most of the relationship type of players, and there were plenty of those on that game, too, still involved themselves in the greater story because there were incentives to do so.

Not that there's anything wrong with relationship play in itself. I don't see a good romance story being inferior to a swashbuckling adventure.

[Apollonius]

@deadculture GM-endorsed entrenchment is a serious issue. Amber was given not just all the fun toys to play with but every logistical advantage to place her in her position where PCs faced enormous PC and NPC hurdles in removing her from her position.

This happens a lot on nWoD when a staff NPC Prince claims to step away from day-to-day affairs... and always designates a single Seneschal who may have some sort of good reason for being there (oldest PC on grid, oldest PC in terms of story) but is in a controversial and antagonistic position (usually Lancea Sanctum but sometimes Invictus) who is then free to terrorize the PCs and seems to have the heft of the GMs' approval to do so (i.e. rebelling against a Seneschal's decision at risk of pissing off the big scary Prince).

System design to allow players maximal control of their affairs is critical... and one that is pretty much an elusive holy grail for a self-sustaining political environment. I have grown to basically call for games that are totally removed from high politics and force a more collaborative approach amongst an ensemble of cast members but I know this is not what @Packrat is looking for and what a lot of players are looking for in a Lords and Ladies game.

I will say that there are two pivots in any political game: staff-driven and player-driven. They attract different people with different interests and they will color the tenor of any game. Dissonance comes when a player-driven political tries to shake things up in a staff-driven narrative or someone used to a staff-driven narrative finds themselves thrown to the wolves in a player-driven environment.

A GM has to be fair, yes. But a good GM has to have a lot more good qualities than that to move things forward as well as the general activity level to sustain excitement.

[Kanye Qwest]

Who or what is Amber?

[Packrat]

Amber was a character on Star Crusade who...

Well actually she was not given unfair advantages over the other County level nobles and was in many ways arguably the weakest. Certainly she was not particularly favoured or disfavoured by staff, non of whom knew who she was from prior games and none of whom were particularly friends after she did turn up.

Remember that nobody had more than a fractional overview of what was happening on that game, people fixated on their issues or opposition without realising their rivals were generally being funked over in eight different ways themselves but dealing (or not) with it without advertising everything.

Some people have alleged she was kind of a bitch but it was apparently a given for people to complain that everyone who was not them or their ally was unfairly favoured and/or evil on that game. I only RPed with her like four or five times but she seemed okay.

She was markedly less prone to histrionics than most players though and was a political rival of Apollonius' character.

I think a staff member did play one of her vassal barons but he was playing a decadent fop who was not exactly a key asset.

[silentsophia]

@Packrat Well. She spent 4 hours telling me my character and I (OOCly) were incompetent, unfit, blah blah blah, for a position I had kinda worked towards.

I think it worked out in the end for me, and yes, I treated her kindly even after - I helped her with some of her tasks for her little territory. I just got kinda burned and really could've lived my life without being told I'm stupid, incompetent, and so on. I realize my PC was pretty young for what she was, but eesh.

[bored]

@Packrat

Whether she was a staff buddy or not, she was still a beneficiary of the really skewed general game setup. Maybe that was all done for Renaud's benefit (he was definitely buddy-buddy with Paulus; you don't take a player you admit has been a problem on prior games and make him a feature otherwise), but it benefited everyone in the south. So by putting Renaud and her together it really exacerbated things. Certainly I left because it was pretty galling to get the kinds of super-effective Kurgan attacks I did when Renaud was ignored and the only attack on Amber was led, and this is not hyperbole, by an incompetent child general.

Otherwise, she was just kind of a shitty person and dubiously someone who should have been given a feature slot since she seemed to dislike RPing with people and preferred settling things via OOC channels and discussions rather than ICly. @silentsophia's interactions are a good example of that.

Amber aside, though, I still think SC illustrates that the playerbase, even if you reduce it to 'L&L players' (as if they're totally different people), is perfectly willing to be involved in more than just TP-room fucking. So there's no reason for you not to go forward with a game focused on providing that conflict. The players will follow your lead, despite what some people are saying.

Also: Just make a Fading Suns game. Seriously. It will save you so much time on theme.

[Packrat]

It sounds like she was a jerk then, presumably something I did not see due to not really interacting with her all that much and her putting on a nice face due to knowing I was staff.

She was not so much a beneficiary of the game set up though, from what I remember she actually had potentially the worst ratio of her stuff vs Kurgan stuff of anyone given how insanely strong Tyche was down the coast and how poor her lands were. What she did do was 1) Establish diplomatic relations and constantly do everything she could to disengage militarily from the more competent/powerful Kurgans and 2) Pay them tribute, she spent almost as much on buying off the Kurgans as she did on her relatively anemic military. I definitely know that after she got the Chancellorship or whatever it was she then embezzled a shit ton of the city budget to avoid going completely bankrupt and was I think taking out loans on top of that.

She ran into some serious issues when her more militant barons did things like actually attack the enemy and I seem to remember her doing stuff like sneaking captives back to the Kurgans to diffuse hostilities. She was half way to being a Kurgan vassal in secret but the Imperial Eye player never did anything with it despite finding all about her shenanigans.

Needless to say Amber's player endlessly complained about how Lyov and Antonio were unfairly favored over her as well. The way Paulus/Lextius managed the economic and military stuff in general just lead to everyone believing that they were being particularly shafted by staff whilst they were unable to see how their rivals/enemies were in exactly the same shitty hole.