Finding roleplay
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@Lithium said in Finding roleplay:
One of the things I have considered is just dropping plots on IC gatherings. Like, if I (or other staff) see a group RP'ing in public then boom, I drop a 1 shot on them and depending on what happens it could lead to more plot.
I do that, but these days I ask first. Some people appreciate having something more interesting than Bar RP to do; others get irritated if you disrupt what they're already in the middle of.
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@Coin I agree and this is an approach I'm using, since I think no single style of xp system create incentives for every form of good, RP fostering behavior that helps a game grow. Relying on a single approach without any kind of bounds I think usually undermines the approach as a system for rewarding good behavior, since often players cut back on or stop doing the good things that aren't rewarded by the system while making them half-ass the single thing the game was focusing on.
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Having plots randomly dropped on me would make me not want to go out in public too. I'd rather be able to choose to be on a plot thing or not. I don't necessarily like scripted outcomes but since I rarely play fighty type bits it's generally not my thing to have a plot randomly dumped on my head since most of the time they are combat things.
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I have no objections to random plot dropped out of the sky, but if you REALLY wanted to rev the engines and storytellers had time, it'd be even better to page the people involved and say, "Hey, I've got a few hours to run something for you guys - what would you like to have your characters do that could happen where you are?"
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@Pyrephox said in Finding roleplay:
I have no objections to random plot dropped out of the sky, but if you REALLY wanted to rev the engines and storytellers had time, it'd be even better to page the people involved and say, "Hey, I've got a few hours to run something for you guys - what would you like to have your characters do that could happen where you are?"
When I run out of jobs I can take action on (Hah!) that's a thing I've been known to do.
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@The_Supremes That makes you Good People in my book! I always love more character-focused plots...not in the sense of internal navalgazing, but in the sense of actually furthering character goals, or giving them exciting things to do that are tailored to them.
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@Pyrephox said in Finding roleplay:
@The_Supremes That makes you Good People in my book! I always love more character-focused plots...not in the sense of internal navalgazing, but in the sense of actually furthering character goals, or giving them exciting things to do that are tailored to them.
The real challenge I have is in getting people to create jobs for that sort of thing. Impromptu stuff is harder for me than things I can think about and Plan(tm). A lot of people seem allergic to giving me "this is what my character is up to" jobs that I can be like... "Oh really... well then... -PLOT-"
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@The_Supremes said in Finding roleplay:
@Pyrephox said in Finding roleplay:
@The_Supremes That makes you Good People in my book! I always love more character-focused plots...not in the sense of internal navalgazing, but in the sense of actually furthering character goals, or giving them exciting things to do that are tailored to them.
The real challenge I have is in getting people to create jobs for that sort of thing. Impromptu stuff is harder for me than things I can think about and Plan(tm). A lot of people seem allergic to giving me "this is what my character is up to" jobs that I can be like... "Oh really... well then... -PLOT-"
Oh, well, yeah. +Jobs are where fun goes to die, lost in a hell of nitpicking, boring rolls, and being forgotten.
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@Pyrephox said in Finding roleplay:
@The_Supremes said in Finding roleplay:
@Pyrephox said in Finding roleplay:
@The_Supremes That makes you Good People in my book! I always love more character-focused plots...not in the sense of internal navalgazing, but in the sense of actually furthering character goals, or giving them exciting things to do that are tailored to them.
The real challenge I have is in getting people to create jobs for that sort of thing. Impromptu stuff is harder for me than things I can think about and Plan(tm). A lot of people seem allergic to giving me "this is what my character is up to" jobs that I can be like... "Oh really... well then... -PLOT-"
Oh, well, yeah. +Jobs are where fun goes to die, lost in a hell of nitpicking, boring rolls, and being forgotten.
Yeah but... how else can I make things happen without quitting my job, punting on my PhD, and winding up homeless because I refused to logout ever? XP
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+jobs are like getting a prostate exam, no one ever wants to deal with them but they is necessary.
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@ThatGuyThere I think of them more like committees. They can serve a purpose, but generally are used to evade having to make decisions, or get so diverted into pointless minutia that they suck all the life and inertia out of the initial proposal. Typically, putting anything into a +job means that it'll be forgotten for weeks, then someone will get around to asking you to make a series of rolls, there will be more weeks of waiting (by which time whatever it is has probably been done/discovered by someone else), and then you'll get a reply of, "Sorry, you don't find anything" or "Hey, it looks like this was already wrapped up in X Event, so I'm going to close this," or "You rolled really well, but you're asking the wrong question/using the wrong method, so I'm just going to close this out because I don't have anything to give you," or, "Hey, this is a cool idea, but you can't do it because it conflicts with something else that's going on - I'm not going to tell you what that is, or how you could get involved, or why in a city of tens/hundreds of thousands of people two similar events couldn't be happening, but just ask people IC and try to figure it out."
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I ask on public and splat channels first, and then try my PC's various faction channels. If that fails I'll try whatever RP channel is available. If all else fails I drop it, and start playing again or continue writing.
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Getting tied up in details that don't move a story along (by tossing out false information that doesn't go anywhere, putting players in a dead end or getting sidetracked by semi-relevant tangents) really seem to happen quite often, but I don't think it's specific to jobs so much as people who handle jobs tend to get into a rubber stamp, super mechanical mentality, or are those types of people naturally to begin with.
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I tend to think that +jobs are great for tracking long-term research/construction/repair jobs that will likely take a couple of rounds of rolls. They're also great for things that multiple Staffers will have to look at (plot requests, information that bridges multiple plotlines, etc), and for things that need a delay before they're enacted, like a research request that gets a near-immediate response of "This will take some time to research. In 1 RL week, we'll do the +roll to find out what you've discovered. If you don't hear anything back in 9 days, please contact X Staffer via pages to remind them."
As for +requests sitting forever... I know that Staffers are busy running things, reading apps, and with their RL, but I don't generally think there's any excuse for a +request sitting in the queue for more than a couple of days. After that amount of time, you should at least get a response back of "We're discussing this, we should have a resolution by X time."
Anything less... is uncivilized.
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+jobs are like tech support. Some places have great customer service, and you get a sensible answer right away. With other places you sit on hold for 6 hours and send 17 emails and still don't have your dang problem fixed. +jobs are just a tool, and ignored jobs are just a symptom of lazy/uncaring staffers.
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@Seraphim73 said in Finding roleplay:
As for +requests sitting forever... I know that Staffers are busy running things, reading apps, and with their RL, but I don't generally think there's any excuse for a +request sitting in the queue for more than a couple of days. After that amount of time, you should at least get a response back of "We're discussing this, we should have a resolution by X time."
Anything less... is uncivilized.
Staff really need to heed due dates. RL shit happens, whatever, but at least be checking in, yeah.
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I think one of the things I hate the most about +jobs is that they have to be accessed on my client.
If I could go on a website and look up the entire job on a webpage and scroll up and down and whatnot, etc., without having to interface with my client save but for inputting into the job? That would make it infinitely more tolerable, IMO.
But that's probably just a personal quirk.
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@Coin said in Finding roleplay:
I think one of the things I hate the most about +jobs is that they have to be accessed on my client.
If I could go on a website and look up the entire job on a webpage and scroll up and down and whatnot, etc., without having to interface with my client save but for inputting into the job? That would make it infinitely more tolerable, IMO.
But that's probably just a personal quirk.
I'm with you on this, but I ain't gonna write that API. I suppose you could just push all job-like objects out to a web-based ticket system, though. Again, I don't have time to write it.
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I think @Alzie had/s something a kin to that. Might be recalling the wrong person, though. I just know /someone/ had a system like that.
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@alzie I think was working on a jobs system that was attached to both the MU* and a web interface, but I don't know how far it got.
