Best posts made by Arkandel

@Ghost It's also not a consistent ride.

The first five books are (in my opinion, obviously) quite good. Not necessarily on the masterpiece level but great reads with a lot of ideas, fresh concepts and interesting characters.

For instance the way the One Power worked and the sheer level of detail RJ put into it were pretty amazing for the time, paving the way for Sanderson's own magic systems later on. A lot of details were also awesome inventions - how ta'veren worked, for instance, explained in an in-universe fashion why these characters always seemed to be around when interesting stuff... happened to happen or survived out of luck and circumstance. Those weren't just coincidences, it was because they were ta'veren.

But, again in my opinion, some time during/after book six things went wrong. Too many dangling subplots, and RJ kept opening new threads instead of closing older ones. We kept being introduced to new characters (each of whom seemed to be more powerful than the last, when we were already told the last ones were the most powerful seen in hundreds of years) and the bloat built up both in in-setting power but also just things that needed to be resolved and weren't being.

A TV show can fix some of those things, hopefully. If they are lucky enough the casting will work, too.

That's many ifs, but I'm hopeful. Now if we get a great WoT MUSH out of this, I'd be overjoyed.

@kestrel said in Attachment to old-school MU* clients:

Well, I see it as a limitation. There are definitely things you can do on a web game that you can't do on standard MU* client.

Yes you can do them, but have they actually been done? Because then we could actually debate whether the trade off of no longer being backwards compatible is worth it (or yet).

@faraday said in Attachment to old-school MU* clients:

The need to support old-school MU clients is a tremendous limitation on new platforms and individual games.

Got it. I won't argue the point, you obviously have vastly more experience in this probably than anyone else.

Or the market will... find its own ways.

Piracy, I'm talking about piracy. While there was just Netflix and it provided a great service for around $10 a month torrents and other streams were simply not worth the inconvenience. Try to cram 4+ services down people's throats and that is going to change very quickly.

@carma said in Weird or unrealistic gaming... stuff:

I agree with this. Something I've had to contend with is that writing on a MU* is not the same as writing a good work of fiction.

The vast majority of us are amateurs!

But also RPing on a MU* is more improv theater in writing than it is writing. If for no other reason than that there is no one controlling the narrative 100% of the time, and that there are multiple authors involved in the story's telling.

That my dog is starting to realize peeing in the house is NOT OKAY.

<braid tugging intensifies>

@Coin

@derp I think one of the reasons 'bar RP' is so popular is that some players find solace in how formulaic it is. You don't need to get creative - the only 'expectations' are to reply when it's your turn, describe what your character is doing at the time, maybe what they look like (which you can just have in a @desc or even an image on the wiki) and you're done.

No one can tell you you're doing "I have short dark hair and I'm drinking a beer" wrong.

But the perception of PrPs is that someone could say you're doing it wrong. There's a plot hole, it doesn't make sense! That magic spell doesn't work that way, stupid! This NPC doesn't have the authority the whole premise is built around, ugh! You ran combat but you're not doing initiative right, learn the rules first you noob!

... It doesn't matter whether players scrutinize or get this mean about PrPs (the majority are just happy to have someone run anything...). That's the fear. And it's enough to keep folks from trying it out.

Compared to drinking at a bar? It's not even a contest.

@runescryer said in MUs That We Would Love To Make (But Won't):

A thought...

Rather than leaning all-in on PRP, how about this:

When players go through CharGen, they get 'bonuses' from submitting Subplots for the game. Not necessarily subplots that involve their character, but for the game in general. These are then used by the GM's of yhe game to create stories and events to run.

This has been suggested before - basically creating a 'library' of plots, as modular as possible, so that GMs can more or less pick one up from a pre-approved pool.

The problem with that is exactly what you'd expect. It's not coming up with the concept that's the blocker. Most people can cook up a "my dog was kidnapped by a goblin, get her back!" questline, WoW-style.

It's running it. That takes more time, effort, following up.

RIP Daffy, 2004 - 2021.

Ah, @Misadventure, you are just the person I wanted here for this. I have two problems with the existence of systems in scenes where I'd really like to evoke interesting reactions from characters.

1. Systematizing the challenge makes it relatable, understandable. It's a clear solution, an obvious approach; you encounter something that's truly horrific and instead of having to figure out a proper reaction to it, you have a very easy way out.

"Let's roll +init!"

There have been many times when I was the ST when I wish players - rather than characters - didn't always have that option. For starters even one player doing it seals the deal; everyone rolls. It's all broken down neatly into numbers and specific actions from there, an old song and dance.

2. Players who front-load the dice. And then roll constantly, going through their goddamn list of powers one at a time, best to worst, trying to solve the encounter rather than participate in it. It's one of the worst things in scenes, particularly because this kind of player spends so little posing and so much of it trying to throw bags of dice at the problem until it goes away.

"So you walk into the room and here he stands, a cloaked figure who..."

"I roll detect magic!"

"There are elemental energies around him! So he lifts a skeletal hands and says..."

"I roll read thoughts!"

"Its thoughts are alien, you glimpse at flickering images and concepts instead of words and sentences, like dipping your hand in dirty oil. So the figure points a finger at you and says..."

"I roll flame shield!"

"Alright, done. So he says, 'Did you bring me what I seek, interlopers? For I...'"

"I roll wits+occult. Do I know anything about skeletal figures?"

"@^&^&*@#@#^&$"

We finally moved houses. It was tiresome as fuck but it's such a cultural shock to be out of a major city and into suburbia.

This whole area is strictly residential without a 7/11 in sight, and there are multiple large parks within a ten-minute walk from my house, yet I can also drive for literally under five minutes to entire city blocks' worth of big box stores - restaurants, Home Depots, you name it.

But what did it is a large garage that can host a home gym. It's not heated so I'll need to get some space heaters for the winter for sure, and it will cost... more than I care to think about to buy all the gear. But in the long run it will save money (at a conservative estimate that's after 4 years' worth of memberships, mind you ), and... it's available. Unlike actual gyms in the midst of pandemic lockdowns.

The cats on the other hand, for some reason, seem to be surprisingly okay with this. And the dogs really like the much larger yard, especially the puppy when she gets the zoomies.

Pet peeve #48: Players passive-aggressively promoting their own numeric roundedness as a sign of good roleplay as opposed to everyone else who's obviously a powerhungry twink.

As a white guy, something that caught my attention a lot lately was when I was reading the Falcon and the Winter Soldier subreddit - and it's not a spoiler or anything so I won't hide it behind tags here.

But it was a thread in which a black woman was posting being ecstatic about Bucky hitting on Sam's sister, who is black woman herself and not paler skinned, mixed heritage, straight-haired or in any way a more... streamlined potential romantic interest.

I had never realized it before but apparently that is pretty rare, especially for one of MCU's premier single hot dudes to show interest in someone like her.

So yes, the racial diversity seems to absolutely be important even in our shows about guys with vibranium arms who are also former Cold War weapons and WW2 veterans. All they need to do sometimes is look at a black girl and go hey, how you doin'?. It's the small things as much as the big ones.

@Thenomain Maybe they're lost.

...I'll let myself out.

@VulgarKitten said:

Disclaimer: playing with OOC couples who are also IC couples weirds me out.

That said, this seems especially prominent when there are couples RP'ing together, creating multiple alts who also RP together. I've seen the line blurred more often than a cop at Timmy's. Don't think there's really anything you can do about it except avoid if shit gets real.

I've played several IC couples with my OOC spouse and see nothing weird about that - there are many (many!) players who're not together iRL but have paired up more than once on characters so why is that 'better'?

When I have time to MU* it means I'm no longer watching TV, having supper, etc... which strangely enough is exactly when when my wife isn't busy doing those things either. So if we're both available and want to play at the same time is it weirder that we do so or that we avoid each other?

I just don't see why any of this would be actionable in any way. What's the problem?

@aria At this point I'm convinced many of the businesses who want workers to return just have leases for the office space they are already paying for, and they figure they might as well use it.

But they might be in for a rude awakening. Although not every line of work can WFH, the ones who can have had a year and a half to realize that hey... they can work for anyone. Maybe that other company located a thousand miles away will pay them better without having to deal with a 45 minute commute each way.

@Kanye-Qwest said in Finding roleplay:

Wikis seem to be a much bigger deal in WoD games - but then, I've only ever played Firan and a couple of WoD games. I much, much preferred Firan's grid because it had no ooc lounge room for people to just hang out in, and public places were public places.

If you ask me, hanging out in the OOC room is too high a price to pay for finding RP. No matter how great the RP ends up being.