Star Wars: Insurgency

Ganymede

If FCs are no different, even stats-wise from OCs, then why differentiate between the two?

The staff are talking about treating them equally stats-wise, but Luke Skywalker is different than OC-nimnob.

TiredEwok

I find it amusing that those who do not like the concept of the game or how things are being done keep on reiterating the reason they won't play on the mu*. Just say that it is not for you, giving an explanation if you want, wish staff and the players luck if you're so inclined to do so, and drop the subject. It (usually) only takes one time for someone to get the idea.

Auspice

I personally feel equating Star Wars FCs to comic book FCs in a MU* sense is sort of unfair.

The reason being that the vast majority of comic book games do a 'Year One' style for FCs. Meaning you choose what history to build for them. Which comic era or even your own take on their background. Add that to the fact that there are so many more of them (with the size of the MU* community nowadays, I think it'd be impossible to run out of Marvel FCs).

But with Star Wars, you have a fairly small pool of FCs unless you go into people apping random Cantina patrons and the like. And a lot of us have been there. On games with FCs. Where plot crops up and the whole scene centers on the FCs in the plot, treating OCs as if they're just there to ooh and ahh at the FCs. Or the majority of FCs sit in their rooms and idle.

Will that happen here? Maybe not. But I've been in the shoes of the OC-player because I'm not cool or Staff-friendly enough to play an FC, struggling to ever feel involved and being told that to 'keep with the spirit of the game' everything must filter through the FCs. Being told 'Your character is special because they get to witness these major figures do their thing!'

That's like telling the kid who sat on the bench the entire season that they're special because they're part of the team.

Who knows. Maybe in six months or so, this game will be great and someone I trust will come along and tell me 'No, seriously, people who aren't FCs and aren't bffs with Staff DO get to be involved!' and I'll happen on by. But I just don't have the energy anymore to put a lot of time and love into an app only to sit on the fringes at every turn.

gasket

@TNP said in Star Wars: Insurgency:

Plots focused on the Rebellion will be for Rebel PCs, not Rebel FCs and others. If someone apps an OC X-Wing pilot who survived the assault on the Death Star alongside Luke, then that is what he shall be and that is what game 'history' shall be.

There's the automatic rarefied air that comes along with a FC right here in your explanation of how there's really no difference between Nameless Shlub and Luke Skywalker Who We All Know.

People want to play FCs because they are the heroes and the centers of attention, and not the masses of nobodies milling in the background to make their glamour shots happen. This is how they get played, and how they get treated, because /it's what they are/. There's no equalizing the playing field for Luke Skywalker vs. your 'OC X-Wing pilot' because they will never be the same thing, not even by your own description of them.

The people desperate to play the hero of the show are typically also the last people you want actually playing them, but that's probably a tangent for another time.

Like others, I think you are opening a very well-labelled Pandora's Box for no good reasons, but maybe you'll make it work. Best of luck.

Ghost

@TNP said in Star Wars: Insurgency:

Now, you can believe that or not. We're going to do our best to make sure that's the case. If you don't believe that, I'm not going to argue. Don't come play. Please, don't come play. But don't call us liars either. Go make a thread in the Hog Pit to do that but at least wait till you have evidence. Don't be Trump.

Don't be Trump. LOL. Chill. I was just explaining (with a few rhetorical questions) why --outside of Super Hero games where playing FCs is the focus of the game-- FCs are historically a sign of a bad game and disliked by the 80% of the gaming populace who have had negative staff-ethical experience involving them. There's a certain amount of pre-determined responsibility, baggage, and fame that comes along with those FCs in terms of leadership to the Rebellion.

I'm not going to be playing, but that's not because of FCs or staff or any of the typical MU drama. I'm not playing anywhere. I just saw a place to insert a point about why FCs are a problem, and why people do not like them. If this game becomes the exception to the rule? More power to Star Wars: Insurgency.

Just be advised that this will be Star Wars Game #72 with FCs that is claiming that they won't be favoring FCs, and if this game makes good on their promise, they will be approximately 1 for 72.

Ganymede

@Auspice said in Star Wars: Insurgency:

But with Star Wars, you have a fairly small pool of FCs unless you go into people apping random Cantina patrons and the like.

With the number of Star Wars games and novels in existence, I can say with reasonable certainty that the number of potential FCs can easily rival Marvel FCs.

TNP

@gasket said in Star Wars: Insurgency:

There's no equalizing the playing field for Luke Skywalker vs. your 'OC X-Wing pilot' because they will never be the same thing, not even by your own description of them.

There's a certain validity to this. Luke is the one who pulled the trigger and blew up the Death Star. There's never going to be someone else who did that. He'll always have that under his belt. And Leia will always be Leia, Han will be Han, etc. No escaping that.

Superman will always be Superman. And while the analogy to the supers genre isn't exact, @Auspice , there's a huge difference between the popular superhero FCs like Captain America and, say, Moonknight. I've personally never had any desire to play any of them. Maybe Han. But I think turning him gay wouldn't work well.

All I can say is that FC or not, famous established background or not, once a PC hits the grid, they will have the same opportunities to be involved and make a difference.

@Ghost Fair. I played on a Star Wars game where staff had every single FC doing Great Things and all the rest of us were spear carriers whose sole purpose was to be there in the background and 'oo' and 'ah' at how wonderful they were. I'll be damned if my own OC is going to do that and I don't think the other staffers without FCs will either. We look forward to Insurgency being 1 out of 72.

I personally invite all skeptics to come give us a chance and flame us here if we end up being one of the 72. But. If you think it's happening, please let us know and give us the chance to correct things. Different perspectives, forest for the trees, etc.

Caveat: this is alpha. The game went up ONLY 3 weeks ago. @ixokai is an amazing coder and the builders were truly inspired. We're moving remarkably fast but we're still changing things as we discover they're not working (notably in the mechanics of the Force). On the other hand, it's the perfect time to get in on the ground floor and help influence what's happening. Sheets are not final since we're tweaking things and RP before approval is doable so you can flesh out your PCs once you have the basics set.

Ghost

@TNP You handled that with class, brother. Bravo.

Edit: I don't know if you're male or female, so "Sister" applies, too.

Arkandel

@Ghost said in Star Wars: Insurgency:

I was just explaining (with a few rhetorical questions) why --outside of Super Hero games where playing FCs is the focus of the game-- FCs are historically a sign of a bad game and disliked by the 80% of the gaming populace

Citation needed.

TNP

@Ghost Brother is accurate.

Ghost

@Arkandel said in Star Wars: Insurgency:

@Ghost said in Star Wars: Insurgency:

I was just explaining (with a few rhetorical questions) why --outside of Super Hero games where playing FCs is the focus of the game-- FCs are historically a sign of a bad game and disliked by the 80% of the gaming populace

Citation needed.

I was just explaining (with a few rhetorical questions) why --outside of Super Hero games where playing FCs is the focus of the game-- FCs are historically a sign of a bad game and disliked by the 80% of the gaming populace -- (Ghost, 2017, http://musoapbox.net/topic/1411/star-wars-insurgency/66 )

Seraphim73

@TNP The Rebels clearly had a presence on Corellia in the EU--Garm bel Iblis was one of the original creators of the Rebel Alliance. And I agree with your statement that it was probably more of a fundraising/recruiting center. But the moment you start trying to incite a revolt in a Core World, you have to think about what the Empire just did to Alderaan a short while ago in your canon. They clearly aren't going to flinch from destroying a Core World that strongly supports the Rebellion. Sure, they don't have a Death Star anymore, but a (relatively small) fleet of Star Destroyers can still make a planet uninhabitable pretty quickly. And you -know- that Rebellion PCs are going to want to fight it out with Stormtroopers and TIE Fighters; it's happened on every Star Wars game I've ever been on. Once that happens, Corellia is at war with the Empire, isn't it?

@Ghost -- I would say that the concerns aren't so much with having FCs as a whole (from what I've been seeing), but having FCs as PCs. Having FCs as quest-givers is (in my opinion) awesome, as long as you can balance that role so that you're not actually in "general" RP.

Anyhow, just pointing out my own concerns with the game, but as @Apu said, it seems like this isn't the game for me, and that's totally fine. I wish the creators luck with it.

Ghost

FCs are awesome quest givers. That's kind of the golden "badass" standard on MMORPGs. Once you're getting your quests from FCs, you know you're important. Always been a fan of FC quest givers/NPC plot devices/etc.

I'm a strong believer that when running an RPG, it's always more fun for players to RESCUE Han Solo than it is for them to ASSIST Han Solo.

Ganymede

@Seraphim73 said in Star Wars: Insurgency:

@TNP The Rebels clearly had a presence on Corellia in the EU--Garm bel Iblis was one of the original creators of the Rebel Alliance. And I agree with your statement that it was probably more of a fundraising/recruiting center. But the moment you start trying to incite a revolt in a Core World, you have to think about what the Empire just did to Alderaan a short while ago in your canon. They clearly aren't going to flinch from destroying a Core World that strongly supports the Rebellion.

You're going to need to suspend some disbelief.

Plus, blowing up Corellia is very different than blowing up Alderaan. Obliterating the latter wasn't going to cripple the Galactic Empire's fleet, whereas doing the former would piss off just about every good pilot in the navy.

SG

@Bobotron Agreed. I feel that at most a SW game should focus on a sector. Crisscrossing the galaxy to hit the bar or shop for different gear is silly.

I'm on board with the one world thing. You can agitate and recruit like everyone's talking about, and sabotage the means of production, but most of the big time rebel actions should be taking place off planet, most likely in other sectors or nav points in the system, but I like the idea of focusing on one planet quite a bit. I've enjoyed a couple of weeks on Dawn of Defiance, but nobody's ever on the planet I'm on, and I don't have a ship, so I'm shopping for a new game atm.

Akurel

@Ganymede Yeah. Premium recruitment population + powerful industrial base usually means you go out of your way to preserve one or both. For comparison, it's sort of like if you could recruit Cossacs from the Ruhr.

Arkandel

@Ghost said in Star Wars: Insurgency:

FCs are awesome quest givers. That's kind of the golden "badass" standard on MMORPGs. Once you're getting your quests from FCs, you know you're important. Always been a fan of FC quest givers/NPC plot devices/etc.

The way I look at it is this: There should be a distinction between whether FCs are played for the sake of their players or for the game's.

So when you pick, say, Nightwing on a comics MU* out you're out for yourself; there are probably some general guidelines you're still going to need to adhere to - it's an athletic guy, trained by Batman from an early age, etc - but otherwise he's yours. You don't owe anyone else an explanation about how he turns out. Maybe he'll end up hooking up with Barbara, maybe he'll discover he's gay, maybe he'll go on to lead a Suicide Squad. You can play him as a daredevil, or more brooding or anything in between - he's your character.

When you play an NPC handed out by staff specifically to facilitate thematic roleplay on the MU* that's not at all the same deal (in my eyes, at least); the goal is different, and so are the means. No, Han isn't going to break up with Leia because reasons. Luke isn't going to diverge too far from the path his current timeline in the movies suggests. Their role is to provide context for PCs and advance storylines, and if you start to go off too far from that then the character should be taken away.

They're different things. Yes, corrupt staff and idiotic players have messed it up before. But that's on corrupt staff and idiotic players, because it's also been done well before.

Ganymede

@SG said in Star Wars: Insurgency:

I'm on board with the one world thing. You can agitate and recruit like everyone's talking about, and sabotage the means of production, but most of the big time rebel actions should be taking place off planet, most likely in other sectors or nav points in the system, but I like the idea of focusing on one planet quite a bit. I've enjoyed a couple of weeks on Dawn of Defiance, but nobody's ever on the planet I'm on, and I don't have a ship, so I'm shopping for a new game atm.

PM me; we'll go flying together.

Akurel

@Ganymede Flyyyy me to the moon, and let me play along the stars....

SG

@Ganymede Somehow I have the Reading Rainbow song in my head now.