X-Cards

[Auspice]

@faraday said in X-Cards:

Sure, you could create a wholly different system (like the tag thing @Auspice mentioned) but that really wasn't what we're talking about here.

I was actually going to ask you how difficult it would be to add a tags field to your events system in Ares. A non-mandatory one, of course (since social events, casual ones, and 'it takes time to adopt' would mean it's not necessary for everything).

I think it could have a lot of value and help people in identifying 'Is this event for me?'

[Lotherio]

I think what @Thenomain is also getting at is: if no-questions asked is the hold up, what about adapting the system?

@Auspice touched on ideas discussed, like events with ratings and helping players understand if its just not suited for them versus trying to get a GM to drop a subject.

I completely agree with the reasoning of no need to adapt it. Like in the article, the GM dropped reference to an NPC smoking or something because some player was trying to quite and raised their x-card. I do think communication is key, but is there some twist on the idea that could help people less comfortable in the MUSH world? The Red Flag Raiser, just +flag or whatever in some circumstance and it just notifies the staff or the helpers or whatever, the folks good at communicating with others, to see what the issue is and help a player decide if its not for them or if a scene is too much.

The core of x-card is no questions asked, the concept is to help with comfort levels in a community setting (and honestly all who have staffed, how many comfort levels and boundries lead to +requests and complaints - in situations staff could have helped before major blow up in the hog pit).

Obviously no questions asked is out the window, but is there some variant/new system to address this. I think it could help new players understand things like they don't have to stay in uncomfortable situations (and triggering a helper with a quick +flag is easier than seeing who is on staff, seeing who is the helper, seeing if their unidle, etc.). I can think of a few scenarios this could have helped on my games (the notification without them trying to find me to page me or whatever). I agree, unilateral no, change topic isn't the way to go.

Like its continually being shot down cause of 'no questions asked' and folks are wondering what other options there may be, similar but not exact copy of X-card?

[Ghost]

@Arkandel said in X-Cards:

@Ghost said in X-Cards:

• Asking the X-Card player to leave the game due to discomfort is contradictory to the spirit of adopting the X-card "mission statement".

That has been the default answer since the 80s. "If you don't like it then don't play here".

It fixes nothing.

I do not believe that to be correct. It fixes the problem of players playing on games with content that they do not enjoy and players being forced to play games they do not wish.

All anyone can do is ask if content can be molded to their wishes, and if the playerbase does not wish to do so, they (the existing players) are not doing anything wrong by declining to do so. That's just the way life works. You simply have to accept that some games are not a good fit for your wishes, and (this is key) if the playerbase does not wish to alter the game to your wishes, then forcing them to so so would still leave you playing with people who did not wish to alter course for your sake to begin with.

• You don't go to a Catholic church and demand sermons on Xenu
• You don't go to AA and demand them not to talk about alcohol
• You don't go to a Magic: The Gathering night and demand everyone plays Yu-Gi-Oh instead

You ask. If they don't want to, then you find groups that will meet your criteria or start one of your own. It's a tried and true method that has existed for hundreds of years; ask Christianity or Satanism.

[Lotherio]

@Ghost said in X-Cards:

You don't go to a Catholic church and demand sermons on Xenu
You don't go to AA and demand them not to talk about alcohol
You don't go to a Magic: The Gathering night and demand everyone plays Yu-Gi-Oh instead

This summarizes the stance against the concept, but there is a lot of middle ground. Like if you see a certain theme for a game, adult horror, you can expect there to be varying levels of horror (not just dark fantasy, but real horror). If there was no horror, players would probably be let down. But if someone goes to like Star Trek and some game runner wants horror night event (horror planet was discovered or holodek went crazy), does someone opting out or saying its out of them get discounted? And if one staffer or staff approved ST keeps trying to do horror events that don't jive with theme? While we assume most are comfortable talking about this on the community level, what about the players that feel its wrong to bring up weekly slaughter fest on the Star Trek Game with head staff or the other players (like, I see you guys love horror star trek, ever think going GOMO, I'd probably play there cause it sounds fun, but this might not be the place to do that).

[Arkandel]

@Ghost said in X-Cards:

It fixes nothing.

I do not believe that to be correct. It fixes the problem of players playing on games with content that they do not enjoy and players being forced to play games they do not wish.

I think either you missed the point or I did a poor job of making it. Probably the latter.

In games historically the onus has always been on the person who's inconvenienced to suck it up or go away. And it's been placed there more by an established culture in each game rather than its policy.

In other words if you're uncomfortable then you are also expected to speak up about it; that's already a hard step to take, especially if it shows vulnerability on your part, sets you apart from others who are (seem to be) having fun and you'll ruin it, etc. What's even worse is you're often not actually told to leave if you don't like it or if you are then it's not by some game admin but a person in that scene who, because they are not inconvenienced by the cause of your discomfort, simple choose to dismiss it.

There are clearly boundaries and compromises when many different players are present in a single game. If I go to a horror game I can't complain that it scares me; if I'm on Shang I can't be scandalized by the focus on TS. But it's still important for us to look at someone who's genuinely disturbed by a theme not integral to a MU* (or a scene) and try to accommodate them even if it comes at a slight cost to our own enjoyment.

That's just a common courtesy.

[Ghost]

@Lotherio That's reasonable. This isnt a problem for my RL group because we know each other well and try to stay in genre. Our house rules (that we made together) are pretty simple:

• No graphical scenes involving children
• No graphical roleplay involving sex, be it an assault or mutual (because Steve ACTIVELY roleplaying an IC blowjob on the other end of the couch from Janet is awwwwwwwks.)
• If it's weird? Ask first
• No RP that pins a PC at the whim of another to be forced to perform any house rule, graphically depicted or off-camera
• The maximum amount of time that we will discuss OOC upset is 30 minutes

[Ghost]

@Arkandel Ah I read better now, thank you. Agreed.

[Auspice]

I think, unfortunately, part of the reason it's difficult to say 'If you don't like what's being played then leave' is because we are discussing uncomfortable content at times.

Violence. Smoking (as referenced in one of the prior posts). Murder. Sexual content. These are 'triggering' things as discussed. Yes, I very much agree that if it is something where if you realize 'Hey, this is a negative environment for me, the rest of you are enjoying it' ... you need to step out. There are things where the group probably shouldn't be playing it (I'm not OK with on-camera rape, for example: way not OK.... but y'know, uh, that'd probably be where I step out), but not to digress.

The reason it's difficult to discuss is because over yonder in the HogPit we've had people get upset over these things. Scenarios of 'I was in a scene' or 'They play this stuff on this game' and the response has been 'Hey it sounds like it'd be healthiest if you removed yourself from this situation because the rest of these people wanna play this, but you are very unhappy right now. Don't put yourself through that if it's taking you to a bad place' and the response has been 'Don't victim blame!'

... so where do we find our middle ground here? If suggesting someone remove themselves from an uncomfortable/bad situation is victim blaming but we also acknowledge that one person shouldn't be able to force an entire group to change (like another scenario above: an entire plot is themed around investigating a murder and someone is triggered by the concept of murder so....... how do plot?)

This is why it's hard to discuss and why it gets so frustrating to discuss sometimes. I lean to the side of 'it's best to step away' because that's what's always worked best for my health in the past.

[Wretched]

Tags?
This PRP has been rated for mature Audiences only, may contain Nudity, Sexual Situations, Goreand Murder.

Player: You wanna join anyway but have a problem with one of those things: Hey ST, 75% of this plot intrigues me but descriptions of gore are a big nono for me, when we approach that scene can we make an excuse for my PC not to be in the room, but allow me to move on from there?

ST: Why certainly, how about when it comes tot hat gore I emit to the rest of the players and let you be uninvolved or only give you a vague detail of 'bad stuff in there'.

Is this too hard?

[Thenomain]

@Wretched said in X-Cards:

Is this too hard?

It's not as easy as telling someone, "This is the World of Darkness, not the World of Fluffy Kittens."

It's not hard, but it's also not universal. When people disagree or slip up because they're running a plot as well as managing everyone's personalities—and people will slip up—then others will feel empowered to complain. And we'll be right back here on Soapbox reacting to gray-area situations like they were black-and-white.

Patience and Understanding are the things that make any of this work. From the people who are running things, from the people who react to the mistakes, from everyone.

I personally think we should start there.

[Ganymede]

@Thenomain said in X-Cards:

I personally think we should start there.

I concur.

I mean --

[Thenomain]

@Ganymede

That makes me Legolas doesn't it.

...

Fuck.

[Wretched]

@Thenomain Does this mean we get to watch you toss @Ganymede around?

[Arkandel]

@Auspice said in X-Cards:

Violence. Smoking (as referenced in one of the prior posts). Murder. Sexual content. These are 'triggering' things as discussed.

And this is so hard to enforce because limits ought to work both ways. For instance my instant thought when I saw smoking was "wait, really? that's too much", simply because I'm not a smoker and/or it doesn't bug me.

But if it bugs someone else why not allow them to point it out? If it's a minor thing in the scene they could just be accommodated without any true loss or need to nitpick, which seems to be the entire point of X Cards in general - that they don't need to be explained.

Because the moment they have to be justified and debated they are that much less likely to be raised in the first place, which leaves a person unhappy with something that might be trivial to remove.

[Thenomain]

@Arkandel

This is a response about nuance.

If a character is known to smoke as a response to something that is happening, and another player pull out the x-card about smoking, then I hope that a discussion takes place.

Even if the discussion is: Okay, we can FTB on the smoking, but this is what my character is doing throughout this while he's repressing bad memories about the situation we're RPing about right now.

The person pulling the card should understand that, too. I can understand the chilling effect of not wanting to get into an argument or being told you're wrong, but the player you're pulling the card on should get a chance to find a way to make it work for everyone.

[Wretched]

@Thenomain Now i was just thinking about official PRP's, the extension that this could just be used to X-Card out other peoples character traits... sounds like a step way too far. (not that that was what you were suggesting, just a thought that crossed my mind re: smoking)

[Thenomain]

@Wretched

I was just in the middle of editing that this only works if everyone is acting in good faith to one another.

Which is the position we should start from, not be argued into.

Also, the "smoking" flag probably doesn't carry the same weight as the "self-mutilation" flag and certainly doesn't carry the same weight as the "doing horrible things to my character" flag.

They should be treated seriously, of course, but someone with understanding would probably get why not talking about how to FTB some of these things is why they raised the flag to begin with, good faith or otherwise.

Like I said: Nuance.

[Ghost]

WoD is just altogether bad for X-carding.

• Gentry kidnapping babies.
• Bloodletting
• Tackle and neckbite for food (which some people equate to a sexual assault)
• immortal vampires in the body of minors
• Litany laws demanding wolves breed and a caste of breeding stock characters
• Vaginas Vaginae with fangs
• Smoking
• Trenchoats, katanas, tommyguns
• Dolphin guys with bang lists
• mental illness as a non-voluntary character trait (Malks)
• character death
• Theres always some sect hunting you
• PvP elements
• People hunting vampires because someone <insert xcard>'d their sister
• Every vampire character story starts off with: You died
• The WoD is not meant to be happy. People are assholes. You don't prosper in it; you survive it

D&D is far less edgy. WoD is not a great place to implement the X-card altogether, as some of these entries are jokes, but others are central to theme and/or character design.

[Thenomain]

@Ghost

Vampire 5th Edition, Page 423-5: Appendix III: Advice for Considerate Play: Calibration Techniques

• Lines and Veils
• Fade to Black
• The Stoplight System
• The X Card
• The OK Check In
• The Door is Always Open
• Debriefing

These authors know and knew they were pushing lines hard (c.f., the entire rest of the Appendix) and that even when—or especially when—you're pushing propriety you need to accommodate.

Yes, I know the irony considering that Paradox Entertainment fired them, but there it is, "The X Card", right there.

Sure it's not at the start like in some RPG books, but it's there. It's also in Changeling.

I see your premise as taking an all-or-nothing approach. That is, if you're okay with Vagina Dentata then you must also be okay with Breeding Rules.

People should be aware of the game they're about to play, but everyone has limits.

[Ghost]

@Thenomain Yeah I mentioned V5 brought up the X-card as an option a few MSB thread pages back. That whole section of the book has a lot of good material as to how to handle the issue of content with lots of methods.

Their key one, which I really like, is at SESSION ZERO the group discusses their list of no-go points and their preferred coterie list of morals.

Those poor guys got wrecked. They put a lot of good work into how to handle extreme content, that not all aspects of canon needs to be followed, that they don't support RL monsters, and despite all that it's gonna go down in history that they were allegedly a bunch of Swedish alt-right neo Nazis who were apparently so alt-right that they created an all Islam faction, a progressive SJW Gangrel canon character, and a rogue group of women at the helm of a new worldwide Tremere sect who chose to break out of the male dominated "boys club".

There were so many interesting ways to play, some of them with inspiring progressive ideas and yet...

Anyway /rant. Entitlement thread stuff.

But if y'all can get a snippet of the chapter where V5 addresses this it might be some amazing ideas/wording for MU/wiki sites.