What is your turning point?

[faraday]

@thatonedude said in What is your turning point?:

I never mind a: <name> waves. or <name> salutes. or <name> pages, "Hey hey, how goes?"
Everyone else thinks this is bad?

I don't mind. I do the same. I mean, like... you're just saying hi. Isn't that what folks traditionally do when someone arrives?

Now if within the first five minutes it's like: "Hi! You ready to do that scene we talked about?" then yeah -- dude, chill.

Tangentially - Scheduled RP makes me uncomfortable. It just doesn't mesh well with folks who have RL unpredictability -- kids, migraines, work call, whatever. I'll just end up stressing out over potentially disappointing someone and then having to apologize for it. Big events - yeah, I view that as a necessary evil. But for day to day stuff I'll see you when I see you.

[Sockmonkey]

How do y'all RP with people when there is something specific that you need to RP about without scheduling? I mean, like, for example (and I'll use Arx here since that is the game I am playing on currently):

I get a message from Bob, saying that Sally told him to get in touch with me about a survey trip he is putting together. We need to have a scene to discuss this stuff. Should I just .. put him on watch and hope that the stars align at some point? Because my instinct would be to send an IC message back and then reach out OOCly to figure out when our schedules align.

I'd say my RP is half just hitting the grid/events and winging it, half plot-focused, scheduled RP. When it comes to the latter, I am not sure, with everyone's RL schedules and timezones, how you can move specific plots along without scheduling some scenes in advance.

[saosmash]

I am only saying to give me more than five seconds upon logging on before paging me about stuff. Like ... it's not about what is being paged.

[MagicGirl57]

@sockmonkey I feel like some scenes just have to be scheduled in order to get things done, especially if it's from a player who's constantly in high demand or has limited play times because of RL obligations. It's just one of those things we have to do if we want to ever cross things off our agendas or lock down that person we'd otherwise constantly near-miss. Don't get me wrong. I do love it when you can come across someone randomly on the grid and have an entirely organic, interesting scene, but those are pretty rare.

[faraday]

@sockmonkey said in What is your turning point?:

how you can move specific plots along without scheduling some scenes in advance.

+mail Bob=The Thing/Got your IC message. My char would definitely try to meet with you about it. Let's try to sync up this week if we can. If not I suggest we ((backscene/off-camera/say we ICly missed each other/G-Doc RP/whatever fits the circumstances)). I'm usually on weeknights after 9:30EST unless my kids lose their minds or work explodes.

Then I make it my priority to RP with Bob if he's around, over other RP. If it doesn't happen, hey that's life. There's always a way to move the plot along somehow, even if it means a few +mails back and forth negotiating an outcome.

But really, the most you're going to get out of me is "I'll try to be there". I just don't like to do hard RP commitments.

[surreality]

@faraday What you're describing right there is what I see happen most often/what tends to make the most sense to me.

[onigiri]

That sort of +mail is usually what I do, just with specific free days attached to that time because some nights I have specific other-hobby things or RL things, or I promised myself to someone to RP (and I can barely double or triple-scene anymore, another regret of mine.) That's literally my only difference.

I also don't go in with a lot of emotion when it comes to schedule. If someone has to bail on me, my thought is 'sure, cool, we can do another time!' and that's about all the thought I give it. If someone actually goes to the trouble of arranging something, then bails without giving me any kind of notice, like a page or a @mail, then I sigh.

The act of scheduling doesn't really turn RP into work for me so much as the other particulars that can come into play: whether that RP in itself is just some token Info Dump scene where I have a feeling I may not be able to explore my character properly, rather than be used as a substitute plot NPC. Or someone wanting to RP without contributing ideas on their own end that I can brainstorm or adapt to. Or any of the 'players RPing selfishly' things that people have well talked about.

But I understand RL unpredictability because I have it, even with scheduling. I've had to bail on many things. I also never want to equate a predictability in scheduling the RP as predictability in the RP itself. If it's 'let's show up, do this, go home', I'd just roll over onto my face. I need organic dev or it's just not fun RP.

[brent]

@apos said in What is your turning point?:

@packrat said in What is your turning point?:

Weirdly I have a kind of hard mental cut off for scheduling RP, outside of specific events. If somebody say asks if I will be free 7pm on Tuesday to RP?

The internal response is almost immediately a kind of mental FUCK NO! NEVER!

Even if I was originally probably planning to be around and RPing at that time.

I dunno why, but as soon as RP is hard scheduled with a date and time I just don't enjoy it. It carries a feeling of obligation, and it's no longer fun. I'll do it for people because some people can't RP otherwise and need me to help move their stories along, but I just think of it as work. I'm glad they enjoy it, but I often am so dialed out that when people talk up about how they loved the RP I have no idea what they are talking about since I don't remember the scene at all. It was a job that was taken care of.

I'll preface this by saying that my situation is a little non-standard (as far as playing the head of state on more or less the biggest game around these days goes), but in my experience scheduling is an absolute necessity because in a very real sense I am the event. (Super modest, I know.)

I like spontaneous RP as much as the next guy but if we're talking about something that feels like work, try juggling constantly having a list of seven or eight people who would like to have a scene sometime with differing degrees of unspoken necessity. I tried to freewheel it all the time when I started. IT SUCKED. Paradoxically, it was horrid for freewheeling because in the event I did go through my list without making a now connection, I'd go IC and find a thing to do and then thirty minutes into it somebody on the list either logs in or frees up and now either I ditch the person I've just started a scene with or tell them we'll have to try some other time later (again).

Needless to say, both spray-firing 'is now good?' requests and apologizing for being busy several times each day is draining at best. So for my personal sanity, I started scheduling.

tl.dr If I schedule you for next Thursday it does not mean you suck and I want nothing to do with you as a player, it means I am trying to get you a scene as quickly and reliably as I can without blowing off other people to do it.

[Darinelle]

@saosmash said in What is your turning point?:

Oh my gooood the immediate page thing. This is the equivalent of being pounced the second I walk in the door. Whyyyyyyy.

WHO WOULD DO THIS?! WHO DOES THIS? (I'm sorry I did this to you like... literally 10 minutes ago)

[Lithium]

I don't mind being paged when I first login, I don't mind spontaneous RP either, I do wish there was more of me. I have so many different directions and things going on that is /impossible/ to give everyone the RP that they deserve.

First world problem I am sure but...

It is no less frustrating, because I want to RP with everyone and make it an enjoyable experience for as many as I can, I just can't. There's not enough of me to go around because there are only so many hours in the day.

That said, another way to get me to back way off is to make me feel like I need to change who I am in order to RP with you, or talk to you.

Just no.

I don't mind people wondering what I am up to, because usually that means they are just asking if I am free to RP, or if it's something they can also RP about, which is cool beans to me.

[ThatGuyThere]

@faraday said in What is your turning point?:

@sockmonkey said in What is your turning point?:

how you can move specific plots along without scheduling some scenes in advance.

+mail Bob=The Thing/Got your IC message. My char would definitely try to meet with you about it. Let's try to sync up this week if we can. If not I suggest we ((backscene/off-camera/say we ICly missed each other/G-Doc RP/whatever fits the circumstances)). I'm usually on weeknights after 9:30EST unless my kids lose their minds or work explodes.

For me the way I look at it is my time has value, and if I am on a game it is to RP so unless we have some thing scheduled if I know you might be on at 9:30 but at 8 someone offers RP, no matter how important our scene may be I will take sure RP at 8 over possible RP later. Or even this tv program looks interesting at 9 over maybe RP at 9:30.
I can empathize over the feeling of a schedule making it seem like work I do get that, but with out that commitment it boils to the online equivalent of "Let do lunch sometime."

[Roz]

@thatguythere Yeah, that's usually what it comes down to me. I hate the game of "if I take this scene now, I might lock myself out of RP I'd really like later when this other player comes online/becomes available, but if I don't take this scene now, I might end up with no RP at all for the night." IT'S A STUPID GAME. It sucks and I hate it.

[Tinuviel]

@roz I always try to build in an 'out' during an unplanned scene. Get a phone call with an emergency, realise it's almost dawn and you have other stuff to do before the sun comes up, et cetera. Keep yourself as unlocked as possible.

ETA: It's also important to let the player know that you're free for now, but you have potentially a pre-planned scene later in the evening.

[ThatGuyThere]

@roz
Exactly, and it always feels like I made the the wrong choice. If I turned down the RP then the later person wouldn't show and I wasted a night when I could have done any on the literally hundreds of things more fun than watching a screen hoping someone logs on. Or if I took the scene then the person would log on and be free and I would feel like a shitheel for blowing them off for other RP.
It quickly became a thing that for my own peace of mind that either it is a hard schedule or it is not a concern.

[faraday]

@thatguythere said in What is your turning point?:

no matter how important our scene may be I will take sure RP at 8 over possible RP later. Or even this tv program looks interesting at 9 over maybe RP at 9:30.

And I don't mind at all if someone does that. That's the whole point of it not being a commitment. Sometimes people multi-scene with alts to get around the "oh I started another scene five minutes before you logged in..." problem, but it's okay if they don't like to split their attention that way. I'm pretty flexible.

I'm not saying nobody should schedule RP. If that's what works for you, groovy. But for me - it's just added stress I don't need in my life over a game.

We RP because it's fun - it's the point of the game. But I'm a firm believer in the fact that RP should never be required. Our character's exist in the game world 24/7 and just because the players can't sync up, that doesn't mean the characters can't. You can always work something out. Tech can help too. Ares supports a Google-doc/play-by-post style of scene RP that lets you RP asynchronously. It's not as fun as the 'live' style, but it's handy when people have busy schedules and can't get together.

[Three-Eyed Crow]

@roz said in What is your turning point?:

@thatguythere Yeah, that's usually what it comes down to me. I hate the game of "if I take this scene now, I might lock myself out of RP I'd really like later when this other player comes online/becomes available, but if I don't take this scene now, I might end up with no RP at all for the night." IT'S A STUPID GAME. It sucks and I hate it.

Yeah not to mention...trying to figure out how to say this without going off on a mean ranting tangent about my fellow players. I am a person who's pretty punctual and tries to respect people's time. I think people who RP with me can back me up on this. I don't get this in return very often. I've gotten to the point where I don't expect it, but it still bugs the fuck out of me. I mean, shit happens, but with some people, asking them NOT to flake on you seems like a huge imposition.

If somebody does show up vaguely when they say they will and proactively follows up with me for scenes in kind? 10/10, RUN ACROSS MEADOW AS SOARING MUSIC PLAYS, FRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEND.

[ThatGuyThere]

@faraday
I would rather do my actual job than RP asynchronously, for me the entire fun of RP is in the moment so that is a not fun activity with no pay that serves no real purpose. At that point I will just roll dice to a job or give a couple of sentences of what my character's IC desires would be bit not do the effort of even one pose.

[faraday]

@thatguythere OK? I mean everybody's different. If the purpose of MUSHing is to collaboratively write a story, I fail to see how doing it asynchronously "serves no real purpose". If it's not fun for you, nobody's making you do it. It's still an option for other folks who have a scheduling conundrum.

[ThatGuyThere]

@faraday said in What is your turning point?:

If the purpose of MUSHing is to collaboratively write a story, I fail to see how doing it asynchronously "serves no real purpose".

I would not agree with the purpose is to collaboratively right a story but to participate in an online RPG.
As far as the no real purpose, nothing done on game serves a real purpose because nothing is actually created or accomplished, it is all playing pretend which is fun and fine but not a real purpose.

[MagicGirl57]

I would rather people didn’t start scenes when they have RP commitments coming up within a hour or two of starting that scene, knowing they’re more than likely going to have to pose out and run off to the next thing. It always makes me feel like I’m someone’s temporary entertainment until the thing they want comes around, and turns me off from wanting to really be creative in how I engage someone if they’re just ticking down the minutes until the next thing.