Shadowhunters MUSH

[GangOfDolls]

I also had the same question. I watched about 1/3 of the pretty terrible movie on a plane that resulted from the book series and that's about all I know from/about it which is to say: pretty people, dead moms, lol demons.

[Cupcake]

If you're interested in checking out the canon, you have other options. There's a movie (90 minutes of your life) and there's a tv series (different actors, and I consider it the better adaptation despite some...issues). Otherwise you can poke around the wiki and get a pretty good idea of what's what. I'm also willing to crash course people.

I'm not sure if the movie is available via Comcast and the like, but the tv series can be watched via On Demand, and I think a few of the sight services - Hulu, Amazon Prime, maybe Netflix?

[Sunny]

@Cupcake

Cool. I'll check the show out when I can convince the SO we actually want to watch it. >.>

[Auspice]

I've read a few of the books. The trope-y love-triangle stuff annoyed me, but I did like the setting. The movie -was- painful. I haven't heard enough about the show yet to decide if I want to watch it or not.

What sort of system is the game using? Like, sheet/dice/code-wise?

[Cupcake]

A quick analysis, without spoiling:

The tv show has a superior actress as the heroine, and a superior actor as the hero (he also has heterochromia which I gotta confess is visually interesting). I also prefer Harry Shum Jr. as the magic-y fella as opposed to Geoffrey Gao, though he wasn't bad. The support characters I'd mostly prefer from the movie, except for two: How do you pick from Johnathon Rhys-Meyers/Alan van Sprang and Aidan Turner/Isaiah Mustafa? You don't. You just enjoy.

@Auspice I thiiiink it's based off the Eden System, similar to the mechanics used for the official BtVS RPG: here's the link to the game's app process walk-through.

[Insomnia]

@GangOfDolls Don't watch the movie, watch the series (if you can find it, season 2 starts next month). Not just because the movie is bad but it cuts out so much of the stuff.

And if you can't find the series for some reason, you could read this other series. Apparently they are really similar (spoilerish spoilery as hell if you read the simularities document. Both "father" characters wear plaid. THEY BOTH WEAR PLAID!).

[Auspice]

Maybe I'll give the show a look once I'm caught up on Mr. Robot and Man in the High Castle. aka next time I'm sitting around all 'shit I need something to stare at.'

App process doesn't look toooo bad, even if it's making me eye-cross-y right now (I blame that on being tired, however, and not the game). Pretty straight-forward overall.

I'd play a Shadowhunter, so... Anyone wanting hooks, lemme know? This seems like a setting where having BG ties might help a lot RP-wise.

[TNP]

At least for me, the show is available On Demand till the end of the year. I've seen 7 episodes so far and am hardly an expert on the theme. Staff are happy to help though from my experience.

I just had to get on another urban fantasy game. It's been too long.

[GangOfDolls]

So some questions about policy and theme that I saw when I was on earlier:

Quoted from the game itself (though in parts because its a long ass post and if you want to read all of it, you can on the game):

Also, related to this topic is sexuality in the shadowhunter world. As anyone who has seen the movie, the TV series or read the Mortal Instrument books knows, being gay is not viewed kindly in the shadowhunter world. While roles in their world are genderless, the world of the shadowhunter is very "old school" and is absolutely not Politically Correct. That's a mundane thing. Players who can't deal with this aspect will find it very hard to play a shadowhunter.

The stigma of being gay is one that most shadowhunters really hope to avoid, but most will know that it is less about their sexual preference and more about the selfishness of the sexuality itself. Shadowhunters numbers are dwindling, and it is imperative that hunters produce offspring. Another factor is that in this culture marriage has very little to do with love.

....

Remember that this purely theme based. I'm mostly positive most players are perfectly fine with your choices or lifestyle RL. There is no need for OOC hurt feelings or asinine behavior on the topic.

So TLDR is:

Being gay is bad. If you are gay in this game, you will be treated badly.
Marriages to non-Shadowhunters is also not viewed as good.
This is theme. We're not getting weird about your real life. But you're not allowed to react to this, either.

Or that's... how I'm taking it?

So, I get that staff has a theme vision here but I'm a little concerned by going chapter and verse on this stuff (mostly the queer stuff). It seems a little backwards to go with this and force people to play cis straights or put yourself up for persecution for your IG orientation if you don't want to do that. And maybe some people do?

But to then tell players that they're not basically allowed to have a reaction to that that isn't positive is the part that seems so unnecessary? Like, yes, people will have a reaction to this and it will not be positive and I don't think its a good idea to tell them that its not allowed.

If you want to this game to be a success from the point of view that we have plenty of gay/nonbinary/queer/trans people in our MU* community that would like to support this type of game, making it a theme where their experiences are up for stigmatization and mistreatment in game has a chilling effect.

I would encourage this to be rethought.

Also, feel free to move this to the Pit.

[Auspice]

Well, it's just for Shadowhunter PCs, for one. You can be a gay vampire or mundane and have no issue whatsoever. I think the 'don't react' is more of a: don't sit on channels and accuse staff of being homophobic for retaining this aspect of theme / don't go around acting like staff is attacking you IRL for this.

And, I mean, some people like to RP that. I've encountered a few players over the years who are so obsessive over playing the person persecuted for their sexuality that they've convinced Staff to let them subvert theme (such as: the overall theme is that homosexuality is totally OK, but they somehow managed to be super persecuted by the society in game that is... accepting towards everyone else). So, for some? Might be a great theme to play.

The policy could use some improved wording, I agree... But it appears it's a) only in affect for one group on the game (not the game overall), and b) basically going 'This is just us retaining what we felt was an important part of theme. Staff is LGBT positive and we support your RL lifestyle. Please don't lash out at us or other players for what happens IC.'

[Cupcake]

^^^^^^ This.

[Auspice]

(And I'll be totally honest. I'm kinda considering playing a lesbian Shadowhunter who is stuck in an arranged marriage/engagement... Anyone wanna play the poor guy stuck with her? >.>)

[GangOfDolls]

Right and I want to clarify that individuals are free to play there or not as they see fit.

For me though, I have a hard time with this aspect of theme. I'm a person of color and experience enough awkwardness to sheer actual terribleness in my real life around an aspect of myself I cannot change. While I don't see parity in being PoC and being gay, I do see both of these as things aspects of yourself you cannot change and that there are very real safety issues for both groups everywhere.

For me, also, I play in various MU* to escape the hard presses of reality and for me and my reality, being treated a Other for my cultural origins is a reality. There are some people who want to work through or explore or unpack dark topics like this and others on games. But for me, I work through this enough in my real life that I don't want to also have to work through it in my game life.

It's pretendy but its definitely not fun.

And I am uncomfortable with the contradictory messages of inclusiveness OOG but not IG. I think that you can have a very fine supernatural game full of conflict and high drama and plenty of actions without this needing to be a facet of these things.

YMMV but that's why I'm about it.

[TNP]

I'm playing a gay Shadowhunter. And I'm perfectly fine with getting flak for it ICly by other Shadowhunters. Maybe less so from the younger PCs (that was mentioned in the show) but definitely from the Clave which is, basically, old fashioned patriarchy. Raziel went out of his way to make sure I knew it was not accepted ICly and that I would be okay with that.

@Auspice I even mentioned that to Raziel, that Cade would be willing to marry some lesbian and they'd both do their duty to keep the bloodlines going. Though with a tradition of arranged marriages, any woman would work and they could both have a guy on the side.

@GangOfDolls

And I am uncomfortable with the contradictory messages of inclusiveness OOG but not IG. I think that you can have a very fine supernatural game full of conflict and high drama and plenty of actions without this needing to be a facet of these things.

it's the theme of the universe. I understand not wanting to go against theme and, in fact, agree with not doing so. It waters down the feel of the universe when you start changing things, even to make it more politically correct.

Edited to add: And he's not at all closeted. It's a family scandal that, I assume, most Shadowhunters know about given their small number and close connections.

[Cupcake]

I am slightly uncomfortable weighing in, because I am not queer, so I'll try to keep this succinct.

I am aware of queer players on the game. I am aware of queer players on the game playing Shadowhunters. I have not made any assumptions about the orientations of their characters.

With that in mind, if any of the players want to speak up from their perspective, it might help.

At the end of the day though, @GangOfDolls, it's completely okay for you to decide this isn't your cuppa, and I don't want to press the notion of BUT BUT BUT! I will suggest that the perspective of our queer players might be useful here, and that without the context of canon it can be hard to judge. This would solely be for edification, not persuasion.

Edited to add: Thanks, @TNP!

[Auspice]

@TNP said in Shadowhunters MUSH:

@Auspice I even mentioned that to Raziel, that Cade would be willing to marry some lesbian and they'd both do their duty to keep the bloodlines going. Though with a tradition of arranged marriages, any woman would work and they could both have a guy on the side.

OK. That could be a lot of fun. Plus, y'know, younger generation. They could just go and get a home insemination kit. >.>

Ahem. All that said - yeah, it may not be a comfortable place for some. I get that. But I also, having read the first 3 (or maybe 4?) books... like @TNP said, the Clave is hella old fashioned. Like the city the Hunters live in is basically 1600s era Italy (or similar; been a handful of years since I read said books) and the older generation very much lives that way. It's part of why some of the main characters, I think, rebel in the ways they do (partying, etc.).

So I also think that you're not going to be as inclined to see a lot of lashback IC since it is the older generation like that and not the younger.

[ThatGuyThere]

@Auspice said in Shadowhunters MUSH:

OK. That could be a lot of fun. Plus, y'know, younger generation. They could just go and get a home insemination kit. >.>

Thanks you for pointing this out. Going a bit off topic here but that is one thing that has always annoyed me about the whole dwindling population trope if you are in any setting with modern or better technology reproduction through sexual intercourse is not particularly required for bloodlines continuing.

[gasket]

It's a weird thing a few games have been doing more recently, in my observations -- saying that they support the ICness of being a bigot (to pick one of many flavours of closemindedness) but then get all twitchy and SSH DON'T ACTUALLY TALK ABOUT THE BIGOTRY.

Why include it, then? Will your many-splendoured theme fall apart if people aren't bigots? Perhaps it's not so many-splendoured if it will.

My working observation is that the people who put forward these kinds of games and themes don't also confront this thing in their everyday lives, and so they find it exciting and edgy to be making believe that they're persecuted.

To each their own, but it's definitely not my sort of fun.

(edited for grammar)

[Bobotron]

I've been reading the site and planning to app and, speaking as a gay man, I don't find it problematic. It's part of the inset theme of the game, much like how the Game of Thrones books (no idea if any GoT games talk about it) handles being a gay character. Or any other aspect of theme that should be adhered to. If it's not your cup of tea, then that's fine.

But treating it as some social normative issue is leaning in a fairly disingenuous way to do it, because looking at it, it's NOT the point of it. It's something IC and, I would trust staff to adjudicate and take action when/if something crosses the line into OOC.

[Catsmeow]

Here's my thoughts and take it as you will.

Some genres/themes/etc IC are very restrictive and not politically correct. I think the point here was that admin were letting people know that this IS going to happen. So if it is your trigger, this is not your safe area. Just so you are protected by this knowledge. They are also saying that they are not anti-civil rights in their RL just in the game term. Also they don't want someone OOCly harassing a person that might drop a 'no bomb' or hate on a certain populace.

I understand that it might be uncomfortable for some to play that out. It's very 'taboo' to do so. People have actual struggles with it IRL. So I think it's more a disclaimer that this may or may not be the game for you. I love playing on pre-civil war western games. Or around civil war era. Just because they are calling women chattel and not letting them be doctors - doesn't mean that the game thinks that.

However, games with IC prejudices aren't for everyone. Just like games with certain brutality measures aren't for everyone. We just need to find our safe areas and it's good to be up front with what might not be one for someone.

Also --- I have never played the game, read the books or watched the show, but @Auspice why aren't you asking if anyone wants to be the woman in your life?! I was just about to make a char and everything. Sheesh.