Best posts made by Apollonius

@Alzie The norm in a typical MU*, much less an nWoD MU* is for inactive PCs to be put into the freezer rather than meeting some sort of back office end of their narrative.

Every indication suggests that the policy that staff will commandeer an inactive PC as an NPC or to finish them off off screen is not a written policy and whether it is commonly accepted or not, testimonials have indicated that it is handled in a very ad hoc manner. All that staff has to do is have this in writing on the wiki in a manner that outlines standard protocol in writing and maybe a line saying that they will handle this on a case-by-case basis in writing.

In. Writing. Clear. Unambiguous. Policy. Get it? In writing.

In the time I had to explain to you the conundrum, someone could've pinged Kingsmouth staff and made it so.

No invective about whether or not this policy is a good one. No particular interest in casting any ill will on the game. As an non-involved third party observer, it seems that this would be a good idea and a rather simple fix. I have said this now a couple times now in no ambiguous terms.

Like a story of a Hawkwood Knight, a Decados Intelligence Officer, a Muster mercenary, and an al-Malik pirate captain that are led around by an Eskatonic crazy who has been seeing visions about a mysterious MacGuffin. Each of them have their different agendas and there may be break out sessions where the GM can explore their personal motivations in the face of communications from home to secure the artifact. They have to work together because each one has bits and pieces of the puzzle... but want to secure the artifact for their own faction. Romances and historical animosities optional but highly recommended.

On their heels is a Li Halan fundamentalist who is trying to destroy said artifact but motivated/manipulated by a demon-possessed 'old' Li Halan lord, a rogue Hazat Dervish who blames one of the protagonists for the death of his sister, and a splinter group of Engineers orchestrating a coup against the local Muster warlord who controls the region where this search is going on. The Orthodox has gotten wind of this search and has their own interests in the region, armed with Avesti who threaten to burn down everything and anything that moves.

Depending on how the search ends, it radically changes the background for the next sprint. If the Decados acquires it, the Decados start out with certain bonuses that remain until something else changes. Or if the Li Halan demon lord takes possession, add malevolent spirits/zombies. Or if the Engineers win their coup, add tech components to the next sprint. If the Muster win, lots of guns... a whole lot of guns. If the Orthodox and Avesti 'win' well, Game Over, restart the table top to a place before the pivot point and tell your players not to fuck up again.

If there are multiple TT campaigns going on, a 'successful' end of a campaign in one side of the planet may suddenly affect conditions on the other side of the planet.

Yep. Moth to a flame. Drink more wine!

The best ST/GM brings together a random group of PCs into a story where they play an integral part as an ensemble. Some PCs may not get as much spotlight and others may indeed get relegated in a scene or two, but a good GM will know how to bring other people in. He or she will also limit the focus in advance so a pretty princess with no combat skills whatsoever is not in a heavily combat-oriented plot unless there's a good twist involved.

A good long-term showrunner will help each character feel like they are special in some way and make them the star of their own episode, even if they play tiny minute roles for the overall plot.

It's about trust with the ST/GM to help PCs move forward, grow, and sometimes die with dignity, explaining the risk of death or maiming and moving forward with a plot after everyone is aware of the risks. Sometimes death will have meaning. Other times, death will be totally pointless... but the goal of a game runner is to tell a good story where everyone is mature and able to have fun.

If a player cannot accept PC death gracefully, they probably shouldn't be playing on your game. If a PC goes Amber on you and refuses to RP except in staff sanctioned safe plots and only with a small niche of PCs, then that PC is going to have his or her toys taken away by someone more deserving. The system IC, as designed by staff, should accommodate for this but in a manner where players drive the change, not the staff as to seem like arbitrary staff fiat.

Everyone dies. Make it fun. Those that can't accept it don't belong on any game. I'm a jerk. Etc.

I'd like to just be a bartender in space. With a handsome beard. A bartender in space with a handsome beard.

That could be hydrochloric acid you are drinking. I don't know. I am not a doctor.

That is all.

@dvoraen :shoves:

That is all.

Basically, Kirkwall is Sunnydale. And your Hawke is Buffy the Vampire slayer.

I liked Merrill's story line a lot, even if it usually ended in Elven genocide outside of town. Look, I didn't hate Fenris. He just happened to be dreadfully redundant in my party and his demeanor and looks did not appeal to me at all. I like my men manly and my women... uh... womanly. Elven men, by default, are just not manly. Case in point, LOTR and Orlando Bloom. I don't care how hot and bad ass he is, he looks like a girl.

Then again, I may just be strongly biased against Fenris. After all, I was sleeping with Anders, who I made into a dirty Blood Mage in DAO:A. In spite of or because of, he turned out all weird with a healthy dose of bad writing. I really just wanted to find him a fucking kitten and DA2 wouldn't let me do that. THAT would have saved Anders entirely.

RL preferences aside, however, I usually just go with the so-called canonical Romance that Bioware likes to slap onto your Character. MaleShep ME1 was Liara, MaleShep ME2 was Miranda, MaleShep ME3 was Liara again. Male DA:O was strongly Morrigan between her and Leliana. DA:OA had no romance but my Male DA:O Warden would've totally slept with DA:OA Anders. Male and Female DA2 was Anders.

Gay DA:I Male was Dorian and Straight DA:I Male was Cassandra. That said... I got the weird vibe that the canonical Romance for DA:I was actually no romance.

I disliked FF7 and FF8. My favorite FF was FF6, followed by FF4, followed by FF5, with Chrono Trigger in between FF6 and FF4. I liked FF9. I am still unconvinced that RPG writing had not peaked with FF6 and a slight taper to CT before collapsing during the modern 3D era. FF6 had a huge cast of characters but you really cared about every last one, even the ones that were really whiny and annoying like Locke. DA2 had a surprisingly good set of well-written characters overall.

You know what was truly monstrous? No, not how they screwed up Anders. Did anyone notice how they reskinned Zevran from DA:O to DA2 to follow the new Elf model paradigm. It looked like they took his face, injected it with botox, and bashed it in with a frying pan til his face stuck a certain way.

Edit:

This is Fenris: http://i1306.photobucket.com/albums/s573/Stormborn8811/Fenris2_zps124a5a7d.png
This is female Korean Pop Artist Lee Jung Hyun: http://www.allkpop.com/upload/2010/05/100520_LJHmubank_main.jpg

I'm a 90/10 Gay/Straight Bisexualish Gay Male IRL who plays a wide variety of characters. I had tried out a female PC a very long time ago on Firan, and the female PC I played on a pay-for-play MUD to get fancy in-game items but I don't play them anymore. At most, I will NPC one or two but in a strictly non-sexual manner.

I used to have very strict boundaries between hetero-normative straight male PCs in RPG MUs and openly gay males in Shangrila. As my tilt got from like 60-40 Gay/Straight Bisexual to 90/10 mostly Gay, my appetite for playing straight PCs in either genre declined accordingly although I do did play more polysexual/bisexual PCs for the most part in RPG MUs (until I basically dropped out of RPG MUs entirely).

My favorite PCs were brutally decadent in terms of their sexuality, where it was sort of an exploration of a world that isn't in austere gay/straight dichotomies but fluid and open to both relationships and flesh-on-flesh activities that are driven by innate desire. Even my hard sub gay male PC on Shang engaged in the occasional heterosexual activity to great and explosive effect. My more dominant PCs tend to be much more heterosexual for some reason.

I get totally squicked at women playing men and men playing women. I don't know why, I just do. I will RP with anyone but I don't dip into that sort of cognitive dissonance IRL or in-game (nothing wrong with it, just not my thing) but we can still do brunch.

I've actually started to forget all the PCs I've played over the years. Or in some cases, the MU themselves. The running gag in recent memory is naming my PCs with L names.

Edit: I keep making errors. I'm old guys.

WORA: Arcosanti

Kushiel's Debut:
Leo - Duc Rousillon, Decadent Deviant

Terre d'Ange
Donato - Caerdicci Noble... uh, Deviant by Virtue of Not Being d'Angeline

Fading Suns: Star Crusade:
Lyov - Decados Viscount, Viscount Auberry, Decadent Deviant

Fading Suns:
Caius - Hawkwood Baron, Ruler of Sheva, Closet Republican
Leo - Gunslinging Closet Hawkwood

Haunted Memories:
Leon/Valent - Mad Architect of the Monolith
Legion - Multiple Personality Rotgrafen

St. Petersburg:
Lyov - Taifa Gangrel Invictus Miscreant

The Reach:
Leo - Secret Kallisti Sworn of the Axe
Haakon - Political Rotgrafen Viking Pirate

5th World:
Cid Lothario Orelle - Mad Scientist, 27th in Line of Succession

Corporate Expanse:
Ryan - Drunk Mercenary

Aether:
Cyril - Drunk Aesir

Aether II:
Valerian - Bureaucrat on the Aesir Side

Aether Odyssey:
Valens - Bad-Ass Aesir Soldier

Firan:
I don't remember

Reno:
Lee

I have a friend who's an ectomorph. He can eat 5k Calories a day and still have a difficulty gaining weight. I'd love to exchange 20% of his ectomorphness with 20% of my endomorphness.

A building/house/shop/church/grave is burning/destroyed by earthquake/flooded/swallowed by a sinkhole, time is running out, do we put out the fire/let Timmy burn alive/explore ancient ruins filled with unspeakable horrors/TS.

I feel like this is best resolved by ambiguity.

He's not dead. He's lost at sea with a high probability of being shark bait.

If someone insists on trying to find them: And he was never seen or heard from again.

If he owned a restaurant or something: Next of kin or whatever took control of the assets after he disappeared. Retroactively create a will with someone who is connected and wants to lay claim. Have people fight over it if there is a PC-PC dispute.

I'm not involved with Kingsmouth at all but even in cases where Staff lets me knock out an inactive PC for a political position elsemu, I like to try and frame it so that if he or she really really wants to come back, they can.

But it sounds like, as @Coin mentioned, they just need a better disclaimer. After all, a vague disclaimer is nobody's friend.

@Arkandel Aw, you're in my old Duchy. I stopped playing though a few months back.

I will say that I never asked for loyal subjects. But was it so much to ask to not have PC and NPC subjects who were hell bent on driving a coup from Day One? Lyov's reign on behalf of his father was intentionally very vanilla and bland, per background. All the tax and military levies were moderate or light and Lyov was in the process of reversing some of his father's gross excesses and shifting some of those policies to the Jakovians.

To wit, Lyov had the ability to pretty much pull a trigger and get a free kill-a-baron-with-total-impunity card or a free kill-a-marquis-with-light-impunity card or a free kill-a-countess-and-still-be-okay card. But I felt that playing that hand was just asking for OOC drama and any boon that P or Lex throws at you is guaranteed to do a dramatic fail and kill off half your troops.

In hindsight, shit would've been so much quieter in Auberry if I just killed Chiaka when she started getting uppity and especially when she started conspiring with Amber to dislodge me. I'm sure @bored ICly wouldn't be happy but I'm pretty sure half the game would be cheering ICly and OOCly. She was a terrible baroness anyway. Her entire barony's infrastructure and economy was geared to supporting her boondoggle space ship.

Frankly, I got wind pretty quickly that Paulus' idea of a 'second chance' was to stack the cards in such a manner that my PC could not hope to succeed but because somehow he somehow scryed that it was 'what I would have wanted with my PC.' That's what rapists say.

Oh, here's some constructive advice:

If there is ever a voting system, don't stuff it with arbitrary NPCs that are designed to give staff whatever vote outcome regardless of the PCs voting, keep the rules opaque, and then change things up when the voting is seeming to go the other way.

Staff blatantly stacked a vote to Amber's favor and when I secured enough votes to overturn the decision, staff padded Amber's faction votes to prevent an overturn of the decision. Amber still complained.

Elective monarchy. Heredity and good breeding matters, but if you can't get along with your peers, you either have to be with enough guns and money to take control or you are not going to get elected. The overall system I envision is less feudal and more of an aristocratic environment that is halfway in-between a feudal state and a democratic republic.

Encourage assassinations.

Discourage marriages. Love marriages are frowned upon and unlikely to produce children other than those with severe birth defects due to some sort of planetary/biological agent. Children need to be engineered and your marriage is going to be chosen for you. You may be paired off with Ugly McGee because he may be homely and a dwarf but he has super genius genes that your parents want your offspring to have because you tend to drool on the table and can't multiply past the 6s.

Encourage assassinations.

Flatten decision making but make the important positions matter. Remember Star Crusade and the Curia? What was the whole point of an executive council of Counts if at the end of the day, they will be constantly overridden by the remainder? All players can elect a councilor to the council per family but they themselves have limited ability to make decisions other than a large scale referendum that should rarely work because of family rival interests. Councilors make the decisions and vote to have someone be the executive head of the council. Day to day decisions are devolved amongst the various factions and they operate differently with different rules. This gives players a sense of stake that isn't by luck of who you chargened in.

Encourage assassinations.

Organic game balancing. One of the issues that I keep seeing is that staff, because of theme, want to preserve game balances at the detriment to normal development. Sometimes a family is going to die off. Sometimes a faction is just built wrong and no one wants to play. Don't encourage people to try and join a dying faction. Let them march into that one faction that everyone is playing in. Know what happens when that happens? They start fighting within and the faction breaks apart into multiple factions.

Did I mention, encourage assassinations? Encourage a messy, bloody environment where life is brutally short for those who aspire high. The lowest grass doesn't get mowed first. The more distant they are to the political center, the more likely they're not going to have a bulls eye on their back and they can spend their money dating or killing monsters.

I dunno. Honestly, I'm with the understanding that most MU*s are going to collapse and implode some time in their life span. Why not just let the whole damn thing accelerate to chaos, have some fun, and then reboot? Many games just limp along too long for their own good anyway.

Kill Kill Kill.

@mietze There's just too much baggage in all MU*s that have a particular theme that repeats. Think about the baggage that comes with nWoD. If you thought FS players were bad, some nWoD players come with blood feuds. I suppose FS comes a close second. My recommendation is to create a totally new themed game that has similar conceits but different structural elements. A lot of the issue lies in players willfully repeating their mistakes in an FS game. Certain players playing certain archetypes and factions over and over and over again, certain players acquiring IC positions of power over and over and over again, certain players rising to OOC positions of power over and over and over again.

I think that @bored and @ThatGuyThere are getting entrenched in the discussion of pretty princess marriage and babies simulator. Whatever. The tl;dr version is that staff needs to keep activity up with fun stuff in the game story line (adventures! murder! politics! ripping my eyes out of my eye sockets as we steer our ship into a black hole to hell!) or people will default to things that they readily understand (well, sort of... insofar as men living in their parents' basement and never having been touched by someone of the same/opposite sex perpetuate their notions of romance, marriage, and children).

It looks like in my absence, a Dune game that Ataru generated lots and lots of buzz for never happened either. Or if it did, people are being super quiet about it so I don't ruin it.

I vaguely remember Terre d'Ange as a place that had a lot of activity, but then I got sorta disillusioned about something that was remarkably not Custodius-related and then lost a stable connection to the internet for less than a month. By the time I logged back in, the whole place had practically vacated and it was never quite clear what had happened.

@Luna We can talk on Skype. There will be something I want to pull you into in a few weeks. Super Sekrit Mystery Project.