You'll find it in degrees. Some people are compulsory expsitors and will basically give you a frame for their character's entire life in every set, and a page-long reasoning for whatever actions they take in every pose.
Others, like me, are often more "iceberg principled" and will give less in-depth details rather than an entire picture.
There's no real standard.
I think we call that Metaposing.
By custom or culture some places frown on it, some invite it.
Generally its okay if you share things that give insight into a character or situation, or link it to some overall setting theme, but deeply frowned upon if laden with insults, boring useless stuff, or things that the other characters will never be affected by or be able to affect.
So metaposing that you can read everyones emotional auras and are enjoying the good mood of the street crowd, boring and useless. Using the same ability in a riot to home in on those who are manipulative or otherwise not rioting but are fanning the violence? Maybe entertaining, maybe insight providing.
@Jeshin said:
Example: Jeshin walks down the road after a long night out drinking. He has a faint sheen of sweat on his face and cannot walk straight as evident by his slow weaving route.
I guess this is sort of metaposing because it mentions the long night out drinking, but it's mostly just calling attention to body language cues that would be observable in any normal interaction, but are harder to highlight in text. Most communication that we have in-person is non-verbal. I don't think it constitutes meta to highlight these things, since they're a big part of normal interaction if you aren't a blind moron.
With a lot of other narrative posing there's more of a gray area. The kind that's generally targeted (rightly) for hate is passive-aggressive thought-posing that there is no way to respond to, ie: Three-Eyed Crow sits at the bar, chatting pleasantly, all the while thinking about how much she hates Creature and her awful personality.
In general, I don't mind it unless it's the above insulting-but-not-outloud thing, or if the useless character information goes on and on and on.
@Three-Eyed-Crow said:
@Jeshin said:
Example: Jeshin walks down the road after a long night out drinking. He has a faint sheen of sweat on his face and cannot walk straight as evident by his slow weaving route.
I guess this is sort of metaposing because it mentions the long night out drinking, but it's mostly just calling attention to body language cues that would be observable in any normal interaction, but are harder to highlight in text. Most communication that we have in-person is non-verbal. I don't think it's constitutes meta to highlight these things, since they're a big part of normal interaction if you aren't a blind moron.
With a lot of other narrative posing there's more of a gray area. The kind that's generally targeted (rightly) for hate is passive-aggressive thought-posing that there is no way to respond to, ie: Three-Eyed Crow sits at the bar, chatting pleasantly, all the while thinking about how much she hates Creature and her awful personality.
Agree. The example barely even pings my metaposing radar. You're giving explicit reasons in your pose for the physicality, yeah, but it's info that seems pretty overt from the physical cues that other people could observe.
And also agree that the meta that everyone hates most is passive-aggressive insults you can't respond to. I'm also personally not a fan of posing meta about thoughts in general, but that's a YMMV sentiment. I just don't really like stuff in poses in general that is stuff other players can't respond to, although I'm way less bothered by stuff that isn't the p/a stuff. (Unless, of course, you're sitting there posing to a telepath and you pose your thoughts because the telepath can read them.)
I am a fan of metaposing for when things need to be made obvious or explicit, or for light comedic value.
I mentioned somewhere else that I was at one point known in my group for always metapose-remarking that my characters were jerks.
e.g.
Tony watches as John pats around for his contact lens. Spotting it, he shifts his foot and crushes it quietly. "Gosh, John, I can't seem to see it anywhere!" He's such a dick.
I'll also do things like:
Tony shakes his head. "I swear I didn't know anything about this!" But he can't contend with the fact that he's a horrible liar.
The former is to highlight that I know my character is a dick; authorial awareness is a good thing. The latter is to let people know I'm okay with them calling him on a lie. If I don't do that, I'll generally ask for rolls or contend the calling out (and often his lying skills will find their way into the pose, e.g. *[...] He hods his up genuinely; if he's lying, there's no obvious outside indication."
In either case, if the game is with dice, I'll be more than happy to roll them.
Yeah, I kind of love dumb meta where players are being self-aware about their own characters.
Metaposing between characters that are aware in general of the information, even if they can't read thoughts etc can add to a scene. For instance, two characters who often argue over the same things, like council members or family.
I find it a great way to expose a little something of the character without giving away too much explicitly. I'll often express an opinion IC in dialog and then give a brief (one sentence, usually no more) reasoning behind the opinion. It helps create an in-depth character for others to see. I especially do this for characters who aren't open about their reasoning in general. If my character would tell you why if you asked? I might not. But if they wouldn't, I probably will, because I like to share.
And then there was Shadow. But Shadow was special.
"Excuse the hell out of you. He's a bag of dicks. I'm a carefully curated box of cocks." -- to @GirlCalledBlu upon being misrepresented.
@Coin Metaposing is your friend, if done right. When people abuse it there is much annoyance, but it's just another tool.
Pretty much, yeah.
"Excuse the hell out of you. He's a bag of dicks. I'm a carefully curated box of cocks." -- to @GirlCalledBlu upon being misrepresented.
I metapose when I'm playing with people I know to provide detail I feel they'd appreciate knowing that's impossible to convey otherwise. The other reason is if I want to make it easier for them to draw a particular conclusion, such as "Joe's still wearing the same clothes he was wearing last night when he was here, is it possible he hasn't gone home since?" and I'm not feeling particularly subtle.
I also tend to metapose with certain characters more then others, for example if I am playing some one who is not subtle I will include more meta stuff because it would be more readily readable to those around him, but if I am playing someone who is a spy that has trained a lot in hiding what he is thinking I would not metapose much at all because he would not be giving off those clues.
About the only universal opinion you will find on this topic is that the passive aggressive insult metaposing is bad.
Rook reads all the stupid opinions of others, shaking his head. "Fucking idiots," he thinks. Putting on his usual smile, he chirps, "Yup. Metaposing is awesome!"
Thanks this was helpful.
@Jeshin, I strenuously avoid metaposing; I've walked out of a scene when someone started off with a passive-aggressive metapose insulting my character's heritage (which could only have been known OOC) and appearance.. Even with that, the only changes I'd make to your pose are these:
It's dawn, and Jeshin is walking down the road from the direction of the taverns. He has a faint sheen of sweat on his face and cannot walk straight, as is shown by his slowly weaving route.
Is it common amongst metaposers that they assume that any info they share with you in their ooc metapose (like reason why they're acting a certain way) should be acted upon with full weight by your PC ICly?
In my previous experience, metaposing used in a not-fun way was a way for someone to be a real shit to someone else while risking no consequences because they didn't give the other PC anything really to react to IC. But fairly recently I had a player become absolutely furious with me and a few others because we reacted to the PC's actions rather than the (metaposed) thoughts and backstory that ICly we had no way of knowing, that this was some kind of clue that we were very wrong to not pick up on and therefore react in a way that was satisfactory to the metaposer.
I hate bitchy/snarky metaposing with a passion anyway (I do think humorous or open ended stuff can be great fun and I often enjoy OOCly getting a window into a PC's thoughts) but this was the first time I'd ever had someone get angry that despite the fact that they both posed being totally non-reactive/rude/distant/ect as well as OOC details about the character's reasons behind it that my PC had no way of knowing (or frankly that were...not the interpretation I personally would have taken, OOCly), that my PC didn't suddenly know about their inner workings and thus treat them as if they hadn't been rude/distant/ect.
@mietze said:
Is it common amongst metaposers that they assume that any info they share with you in their ooc metapose (like reason why they're acting a certain way) should be acted upon with full weight by your PC ICly?
In my previous experience, metaposing used in a not-fun way was a way for someone to be a real shit to someone else while risking no consequences because they didn't give the other PC anything really to react to IC. But fairly recently I had a player become absolutely furious with me and a few others because we reacted to the PC's actions rather than the (metaposed) thoughts and backstory that ICly we had no way of knowing, that this was some kind of clue that we were very wrong to not pick up on and therefore react in a way that was satisfactory to the metaposer.
I hate bitchy/snarky metaposing with a passion anyway (I do think humorous or open ended stuff can be great fun and I often enjoy OOCly getting a window into a PC's thoughts) but this was the first time I'd ever had someone get angry that despite the fact that they both posed being totally non-reactive/rude/distant/ect as well as OOC details about the character's reasons behind it that my PC had no way of knowing (or frankly that were...not the interpretation I personally would have taken, OOCly), that my PC didn't suddenly know about their inner workings and thus treat them as if they hadn't been rude/distant/ect.
No that sounds like just a bad RPer. I've never come across that, but I'd certainly be baffled.
I find that there are three kinds of metaposes.
Information that clarifies, prose that prettifies, and personal attacks. The first is desired, and I think will be pretty clearly okay to act on if you believe your character has that kind of perception or gives a damn. The second I think is superfluous but, like the word "superfluous", is a bit overmuch and I can do with or without it; this kind is not to be acted on, because it's fluff. Unless you're into fluff.
The third should be acted on as OOCly as politely as possible, asking the metaposer if they really meant to pose that and giving them a chance to back down before you tell them to cut it out.
It was totally baffling. But metaposing (except for the aforementioned poking fun at one's own PC without powerposing/expectation of others' reactions) is not that common/accepted practice in my circles generally, but ages ago on different mushes I know there were places where it is very common/accepted practice. So wasn't sure if this was a common thing or not.
But yeah, I was told that I should know not to have my PC react this way or that way, because they made it clear in their metapose the last scene or a few before that their PC wouldn't like it, and so I was not being a good RP partner and I should expect that I'd be negatively reacted to because I knowingly was so thoughtless as to ignore how their PC's inner workings worked. I wasn't the only person subject to this.
Though I don't know. I have run into players who definitely see themselves less as collaborators in the joint story (the scene) and more as primary authors who are giving you the privilege of interacting with their story in the scene. Maybe that's what this was more about than me ignoring psychic (in the sense of spilling info OOC that I had no way to know ICly) metaposes in favor of reacting to their posed actions.
You'll find it in degrees. Some people are compulsory expsitors and will basically give you a frame for their character's entire life in every set, and a page-long reasoning for whatever actions they take in every pose.
Others, like me, are often more "iceberg principled" and will give less in-depth details rather than an entire picture.
There's no real standard.
