Space Lords and Ladies

[faraday]

@Arkandel :p. Technicalities.

[Ghost]

@faraday said:

@Ghost said:

Some players will get uppity on an OOC level about it, but the ones that stay will be your good roleplayers who care about things like metaplot, art, and story over whether or not they're getting their super sekret quasi-cheating romance escape.

I think that's an gross mis-characterization. I am against involuntary character death, but it has nothing to do with romance. I care about metaplot, art, and story. But when I'm playing a MUSH, I'm writing my character's story.

I'm taking a little longer to write this so that I can word it correctly, because I really appreciate you and enjoy the time we've spent together. So, this isn't a kickback to you in any way, okay? I heart you gurl.

...but the MU game is not a story where one person's character is the protagonist. Each character is, effectively, a supporting cast member for every other character. In a self-penned story, this may be the case, but in an environment that is to be shared, when each player writes or feels as if their character in the MU is the main character in their story, then a FUCKOFF HUGE problem arises:

1. This is precisely why players often have complaints about attention, or other players getting more attention than them.
2. This is precisely why some larger scenes are a chaotic game of leap frog where 4-5 players all butt heads trying to make their character the source of the solution or the big damn hero.
3. There is a logical issue with multiple players roleplaying or feeling as if their character is the main character in their story on a shared environment, and that is that this means, technically, every other character is a secondary cast member in their story.

The "my character is the main character in my story" approach, I feel, works very well on smaller MUs with more closely knit buddies running and moderating the game. When you're friends with the staff and it's a smaller population, you can afford to turn your character's long term story or endgame into a communal effort. On larger MUs with open invitations, it is all too easy for people to become lost in terms of importance and have to constantly feel as if they're jockeying for attention so that staff takes stock in their character and story.

It's just a big mess, but I agree with Seraphim on this one.

Other players are rarely, if ever, concerned at all about whether or not other players feel like their characters are main characters, because many are so damned busy focusing on their own characters. So, how do you write a character, your character, as the main character in your story, while extending time and energy to make your character a supporting cast member in someone else's story where their character is the main character?

!=

[Kanye Qwest]

@Ghost
I would upvote this twice, if I could.

To steal from WTNV: Death is only the end if you assume the story is about you.

[Misadventure]

I just want to get out what I have thought up for my character. I dislike being removed from play before that by something I had little to no interaction with. it MIGHT be possible to make players feel their actions have repercussions beyond their immediate RP, and thus understand the escalating states of tension and so on with effectively remote seeming RP.

Seriously though, players are not there to be someones extras.

[Ghost]

@Misadventure said:

I just want to get out what I have thought up for my character. I dislike being removed from play before that by something I had little to no interaction with. it MIGHT be possible to make players feel their actions have repercussions beyond their immediate RP, and thus understand the escalating states of tension and so on with effectively remote seeming RP.

Seriously though, players are not there to be someones extras.

Agreed. If my character dies, I want it to be in honest combat (where I knew the risks), or I want it to mean something. I have no want to have to restart a character or story because some other character/player arbitrarily felt it was a proper plot twist.

If it's a good plot twist, I may agree to it, but I have no wish to restart because my character was an excellent supporting actor death in another character's main character focus story.

[Kanye Qwest]

@Misadventure said:

I just want to get out what I have thought up for my character. I dislike being removed from play before that by something I had little to no interaction with. it MIGHT be possible to make players feel their actions have repercussions beyond their immediate RP, and thus understand the escalating states of tension and so on with effectively remote seeming RP.

Seriously though, players are not there to be someones extras.

I don't think anyone likes losing a character unexpectedly, and that's understandable. But I think you're going to the extreme other end of the spectrum. Not every PC can be the protagonist, but that doesn't mean every PC is an extra. Running with that analogy I would liken PCs to an ensemble cast, like in the Avengers or LOTR, etc.

It's not always fun for everyone involved, but good stories contain risk, and danger, and it's hard to really FEEL those things if they aren't...real.

[Misadventure]

I'm okay with supporting character.

Extras are just bodies on the screen.

I just think its wasteful of the primary resources for fun: another players time.

[Arkandel]

@Kanye-Qwest said:

I don't think anyone likes losing a character unexpectedly, and that's understandable. But I think you're going to the extreme other end of the spectrum. Not every PC can be the protagonist, but that doesn't mean every PC is an extra. Running with that analogy I would liken PCs to an ensemble cast, like in the Avengers or LOTR, etc.

It's not always fun for everyone involved, but good stories contain risk, and danger, and it's hard to really FEEL those things if they aren't...real.

I think what @Ghost was saying is it's different to know there's a potentially tense situation ahead which you decide to become involved, and - for example - an +event advertised as a social event in which the ST gets a PC casually carved to pieces by the Prince simply to drive home the point of how impulsive, powerful and unpredictable the Prince is without any warning, previous build-up or reason to expect such a thing might be in the works.

Gameplay is a very important consideration for, you know, games.

[mietze]

Most (not all) of the "involuntary" PC death I've seen (barring PvP) has been very boring and anticlimatic.

Why?

Because most of the time, it happens at the end of a 4-6 hour slog into the wee hours where by that time both the ST and the players in the scene are half assing it with 1-2 sentence posing every 20 minutes because that's all their fried brains can handle.

I think if you're going to get all excited about involuntary death for DANGER! and EXCITEMENT! and SUPERIORITY!! Then honestly? It's up to that staffer (usually it's a staffer) to provide a exciting and superior experience for all involved. Kick out the dragging their asses players. Keep it moving. Repsond! Be proactively respectful of everyone's time so that when/if someone dies it's not at the absolute most lame-ass period of the night where even the ST isn't delivering their best.

I'm good with making players bring it! But IME, it is not actually the players that tend to make these things so that people want to chew their own legs off to escape--but a lack of respect for time, follow through, and a willingess to boot deadweight.

[Arkandel]

@mietze For me the very worst IC deaths I've seen - and they haven't happened to my PCs - were off-screen ones handled through +jobs. I absolutely despise that kind of thing as long as the player is available and willing to play something out.

There is just no reward at all, no involvement, dramatic moment or at least closure offered to a character who is killed via a Geist power or the such in his sleep. It can be fun to deal with portraying a demise and walk away from it feeling ending it was a story told with a beginning and an ending - but if all you have to show is a @mail "yeah, you're dead. Sorry about that, please let us know if you have any questions!" then none of these factors apply.

[mietze]

I hate those too, to be honest. I think at least the person should be offered a backscene or SOMETHING, or require that it be a scene as an option for the player, even if they can't realistically do anything about it.

But there is something terrible about spending 6 hours in a scene only to oh oops you failed that roll, sorry, while almost no one reacts and the ST is even doing lame posing. I've seen that happen to several people, it makes me sad every single time.

[Coin]

@mietze said:

I hate those too, to be honest. I think at least the person should be offered a backscene or SOMETHING, or require that it be a scene as an option for the player, even if they can't realistically do anything about it.

But there is something terrible about spending 6 hours in a scene only to oh oops you failed that roll, sorry, while almost no one reacts and the ST is even doing lame posing. I've seen that happen to several people, it makes me sad every single time.

The few times I've mercilessly killed people I have tried to make it as dramatic as possible in my poses.

[Arkandel]

Yeah, if you are killing a PC then give them something to remember. You can totally brag about a well eviscerated character.

[bored]

@Ghost said:

I don't care what the game is or what setting it is, and I'm doing my best to not sound like some bitter Grampa type when I say this, but I've come to realize that a grand majority of the MU habit is roleplaying relationship simulation. My main advice for anyone starting a game idea is to understand this. Most of your players will focus on some form of relationship arc storyline as their personal baseline, and unless they want to roleplay a character death, will choose IC actions based on their OOC RP desires to avoid having to rekindle or reset their relationship roleplay. A large number of your players will be making IC relationship plans via pages, come into chargen with an already established plan to have relationship RP with another player's character, or will put the game onto the back burner if they fail to find relationship roleplay and are getting it on another game. Because of this, most players will avoid consenting to death, assassination plots, or risk of character loss unless it is predetermined that the outcome will allow them to keep their characters. These players do NOT want to lose their RP with their IC/OOC paramours, because if their character dies and their new character hooks up with the widow, players will call foul.

I can't say I really agree/accept this like others have. I still think the staff sets the tone and the players follow.

And casual observation of the MSB-adjacent MUverse bears this out. If the overall desire for most people was to simply have their relationship RP and avoid at all costs anything that might threaten it, you wouldn't see the non-consent dominated WoD-playing population. Firan would not have been a popular game. SC, which gets (I think mostly erroneously/as a result of misinformation from Cirno) portrayed as a 'marriage simulator' was a game mostly about violence with a lot of PC risk.

So I'm kind of confused how all of these things can be popular or successful if all players desperately want to avoid them. Even on our recent example of Realms Adventurous, which definitely suffered from the problem, there were plenty of people willing to go out and fight and die (and people did!). The new staffers who took over the game wanted to make it more cuddly and friendly... and they lost some non-insignificant portion of the playerbase.

So the idea that everyone wants a safe, consensual cuddlespace seems dubious.

What I'll grant, is that there certainly are a subset of players who act exactly as your post describes. The new G&G regime in RA are those sorts of players. There are also plenty of games that are created quickly with nothing more than a thin veneer of theme to satisfy staffers who are the sorts you describe, which invite other people to join in and end up only having that kind of RP.

But I absolutely do not see this as a universal norm. There are plenty of people in this very thread saying they want more bite to their game, and asking @Packrat to provide it. If you build it (and support it thematically), they will come, and all that.

[Ghost]

@bored said:

And casual observation of the MSB-adjacent MUverse bears this out. If the overall desire for most people was to simply have their relationship RP and avoid at all costs anything that might threaten it, you wouldn't see the non-consent dominated WoD-playing population.

You mean...the non-consent WoD games where most people spend time in private rooms and only a certain population of players and their alts actively involve in dangerous plots?

Just because the WoD games are non-consent doesn't mean that a player can't make a character, focus on their relationship roleplay, never be at risk, and simply avoid the non-consent danger points because they're so busy in private rooms with their IC partner.

[faraday]

@Ghost said:

So, how do you write a character, your character, as the main character in your story, while extending time and energy to make your character a supporting cast member in someone else's story where their character is the main character?

It's all good... we can have a mutal admiration society and still disagree on some things

But to answer your question... for me it's easy because they're different stories. Peggy Carter can be a star in her own story AND a supporting char in Cap's. These things aren't mutually exclusive, in fiction or in MUSHing.

I just haven't seen this awful dog eat dog epidemic y'all are describing. Frankly I wouldn't want to play in that kind of environment, non-consent death or no.

[Ghost]

@faraday I've always found you to be a very fair and supportive RP partner, and I have always tried to share the stage. I think, sometimes, I've found that my attempt to share the stage has often left me feeling as if players were assuming I was taking a step back and letting them take point. Anyway, I'm digressing from the main topic, but I think fair minded people who wish to share the wealth are less common than we would hope.

[mietze]

I've found that most people with some ooc encouragement and knowledge that even if they don't know you/you don't know them that you're wanting to share the stage are far more common than people think. But too many people exclude/don't bother to get to know strangers or are afraid of taking that first step because of course everyone else must be selfish unless they're a friend, and when you come into it with that viewpoint, that's exactly what you're going to get most times.

[faraday]

@mietze said:

I've found that most people with some ooc encouragement and knowledge that even if they don't know you/you don't know them that you're wanting to share the stage are far more common than people think. But too many people exclude/don't bother to get to know strangers or are afraid of taking that first step because of course everyone else must be selfish unless they're a friend, and when you come into it with that viewpoint, that's exactly what you're going to get most times.

That's been my experience too. And I think staff can help encourage this cooperative sort of environment with thw world setup and plots that give different people chances to shine.

[Arkandel]

Sometimes I wish more people wanted to take over the stage. It's more often that I get tired of having to do something to get things moving than I am worried about someone else doing too much.

The sole exception to this is relationship RP. That just seems to happen no matter what.