@Wizz As you've noticed the rest of us are more shameless.
Best posts made by Arkandel
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RE: Good or New Movies Review
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RE: A General Apology from the Guy Who Was Ashur
@Ganymede said:
@Arkandel said:
Good staff consider all available facts, but the decision ought to come down to: "who would I want to deal with on a regular basis?"That's a spectacularly bad policy.
For starters some really iffy players are very nice to staff because of this very reason. That doesn't mean such exchanges encapsulate (or are even representative of) their overall general behavior.
For another even genuinely pleasant people can still screw up. If, for instance, player A comes to complain that player B used OOC information against them and it's demonstrated player B had no way of obtaining such information IC then the matter should be remedied in favor of player A; not only could the fact the other party sounds irritable (and thus is less fun to interact with at the moment) be attributed to them having to go to staff for a legitimate issue through no fault of their own but also what's the point of even listening to facts if we decided cases based on who we like the most?
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RE: Good TV
At this point two things are true:
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Not everyone will like something but those who don't - whether they're in the minority or not - will get loud and be noticeable. What would bloggers clickbait on? That no one complained? Who's going to click on that?
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If any character not explicitly defined as non-Caucasian in any work of fiction is depicted by a non-white actor people will complain. Oh. Well.
My personal opinion is that as long as it makes some sense I don't care. For example when Dracula depicted some black and Asian nuns among the cast I didn't care because that world already has vampires and shit so maybe racism works differently there. Hell, for all I know maybe it happened more often than I'm aware of - it's plausible, and that crosses my bar.
So yeah, it probably comes down to racism. Just make good casting choices and make the show good, then things will magically work out.
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RE: Is this hobby on it's last legs?
@Auspice said in Is this hobby on it's last legs?:
so drunk from the Nth iteration of this discussion
Just because many of us here have seen or been part of it that doesn't mean it's not relatively new to others.
Also circumstances change; this conversation wasn't the same before Ares and Evennia became popular.
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RE: What do you eat?
@Ganymede said in What do you eat?:
First, I have concluded that studies suffer from a great deal of confirmation bias and lack of controls. The diversity of food studies and their results only demonstrate to me how inconclusive the science is.
I concur. It was frankly shocking to me when I realized just how shaky research is on matters of nutrition and just how many studies either use tiny samples or lack some semblance of control groups to validate their conclusions.
For example even very basic questions such as "how much protein is needed" or "does the timing of meals matter" are answered differently by researchers who often resort to anecdotal evidence ('this is what worked for me') to support their claims.
It's frustrating and it's given way to a whole lot of bro-science to emerge, especially once confirmation bias started to play a role - is <athlete's name>'s nutrition what made them great, or are they great and their nutrition simply supported their needs? Unclear!
At this point I think the choice of diet should be personally chosen on the same basis as the choice of exercise; do what works for you, selected on the basis that anything you do will be better than nothing at all, and that if it doesn't fit your life then you won't do it, which ultimately defeats the whole point. Is it keto? That's great! If It Fits Your Macros? That's awesome! Eat small meals around the day? Weight Watchers? Some medically supervised diet?
Whatever, as long as it's relatively healthy then it's probably better than eating potato chips all day and we're better off for doing that instead.
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RE: MUs That We Would Love To Make (But Won't)
Nearly every good book I read makes me think "hey, this would be a fun MUSH!".
But it won't be, for oh-so many reasons.
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RE: Critters!
@Auspice My last cat was a stray. I was on my way to get my car and drive to work one morning when she literally came out of a random bush, walked in front of me, looked up and mewled expectantly.
I was like "okay, uh, I guess I have a kitten now".
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RE: MUs That We Would Love To Make (But Won't)
@bear_necessities said in MUs That We Would Love To Make (But Won't):
@tek said in MUs That We Would Love To Make (But Won't):
A Downton Abbey type thing where the two spheres are the nobility and the servants in one big manor house.
That wouldn't be hard at all to make on Ares. I'd definitely play even though I assume it'd rapidly dissolve into "nobles TSing servants: the MUSH" lol
If you look closely enough a lot of games are really "<X> TSing <Y>: the MUSH".
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RE: Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.
@Aria said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:
The problem is that they treat people like shit in the process
They do. 100%.
That's why treating companies as anything other than the other party in a mostly temporary arrangement is a mistake, as the association will only be valid as long as it's beneficial to them.
There's no such thing as loyalty on the corporations' end; they will drop you the microsecond it serves them better to do so, which is why if at any point an employee would be better served by leaving they should do exactly that. The same thing applies to salary negotiations, promotions, everything.
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RE: Sensitivity in gaming
@insomniac7809 said in Sensitivity in gaming:
The thing is, these are a lot more workable in smaller sit-down games with friends.
I think that's been why I've viewed table-top games much differently than I have MU*, since almost the sum of my physical games have either been with friends I already knew pretty well outside of gaming, and on a couple of occasions with coworkers.
I am not going to push the envelope with coworkers in any regard. There won't be kids dying or graphic depictions of people's guts hanging out! As for people I know well there's both more knowledge of what (if anything) creeps them out but also more trust; my spouse has a phobia of underwater terrors and I'm not sleeping on the couch just to get to spring that giant mutant piranha on the party.
Online the expectations can be tempered but the line does blur. Yes, a World of Darkness universe can and should be 'dark'. On the other hand if every scene seems to somehow incorporate women enthralled to vampires perhaps there's something more to it than generic dark themes, right?
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RE: Dead Celebrities 2020
@eye8urcake Can we not do that on the thread about the guy's death?
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RE: Battling FOMO (any game)
I'm late to this thread. But IMHO a lot of FOMO doesn't have as much to do with the game itself (although it's certainly been known to happen) as much as it does with players feeling socially insecure about being left out.
What certainly doesn't help is how that same kind of insecurity leads others to over-promote themselves. Seeing them openly brag about their amazing RP the day before and pat each other in the back over public channels when you have been sitting on your thumbs looking to do something - anything at all - can have that effect.
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Dating in the 2020's
This is really interesting. I haven't dated in a reaaaally long time but it sounds pretty fascinating that the way we look for romantic interests can (or is!) actually changing society as we know it.
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RE: Good places to Sandbox/Anyone interested in forming a group for Sandbox RP.
@derp said in Good places to Sandbox/Anyone interested in forming a group for Sandbox RP.:
I mean, you might as well ask how to get people back into telegraphs and steam engines.
Now on that I disagree. A modern train is better in every aspect than a steam one; telephones or e-mail both cover every aspect of a telegraph's functionality and add more features on top of that.
Roleplaying in real time through words in a persistent multi-player setting is a very unique thing that's not being covered by any other type of game (that I know of).
For example while you can RP on an MMO you're limited by the graphics engine, and although you can /emote the words themselves an afterthought compared to the nuance, descriptiveness and details you can add in a pose. It has other strengths, obviously, but the goal is also different.
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RE: Getting into Writing
@Auspice said in Getting into Writing:
I'm also in that camp that MUing and prose, while both creative writing, are not remotely the same. There's so many reasons they aren't. One reason is actually the critique. Sure, you get feedback.
Obviously being paid for writing stuff is great feedback in and of itself. That goes without saying.
I do feel others choosing to spend their time with you is a form of feedback as well. Even if you don't actually get directly complimented for it it still means something; perhaps it's both your writing and your personality that compels people to hang around. That isn't so bad.
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RE: Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them
In regards to MUSH where collaboration is very important, and more so in smaller games since they are prone to rolling big antagonistic fish in a small pond, part of the responsibility is for the players who play those to ensure they aren't going to make other characters unplayable.
In other words: If my antagonist expresses himself by stabbing people in the face that's bad; I can't collaborate with dead PCs. If he exercises his Princely antagonistic authority by locking PCs in dungeons thus preventing them from meeting others that's also bad.
The key is to create RP opportunities through IC antagonism. A good bad-guy is priceless since they can encourage others to band together to stop him, offers RP hooks to everyone who wants to have something to discuss, they can attempt to pull minions into their evil plots, etc.
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RE: Bad TV
@Admiral said in Bad TV:
The characters do stupid stuff for sake of plot instead of organic reactions to situations.
Although overall I enjoyed the show, this bugged me so much.
Sometimes the good guys would win a fight but do something really fucking stupid just to promote the plot.
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RE: Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them
@reversed said in Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them:
If someone's playing their character in a way that's antagonistic to the point of disrupting how a faction operates IC
The gray area here is in defining just what 'disruptive' means and just what is unwelcome.
It's the very essence of IC antagonism to be disruptive. By definition you are in the way of what someone wants. However not being able to get what they want is not necessarily a bad thing at all since in many ways that's exactly what makes it valuable in the first place. If your Elder is blocking me with her vote from achieving a rank I want that adds value to the rank which would otherwise be a nearly empty string set in my +sheet.
The other aspect here is players are quite notorious for not being able to tell the difference between not being immediately able to get what their characters want and being harassed or singled out in an unconstructive manner.
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RE: Good or New Movies Review
Not quite a new movie review, but just based on rumors that Jennifer Lawrence will be part of the next Star Trek movie.
On its own that's fine. But my problem with bug budget Star Trek is that it's not really... Star Trek. You don't blow $150 million on a movie then base it on characters reasoning their way out of situations or finding complex diplomatic solutions to problems - which is arguably when the franchise is at its best.
In that case you need phaser fights for the big names to pew-pew their way out, which... is not inherently bad, but I feel it's moving further from its core identity.
Should I be yelling at the damn kids to get off my lawn?
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RE: Attachment to old-school MU* clients
I think for me it had mostly been a matter of what I was used to rather than what was being offered. After all using SimpleMU (for example) for 10+ years I had a hell of a time at some point to switch to even another client let alone play exclusively over the web.
But here is the thing. Why is that an issue? As far as I'm concerned the 'need' for the hobby to move to web-based clients is in order to attract new players who might find the dedicated MU* clients intimidating or off-putting.
Are there games out there which need to be played from a browser because of radical new interface elements or features telnet can't handle?
If not we can have the best of both worlds. Traditional clients for the oldbies and flashy, friendly web browsers for the hip newbies.
Do people still say hip? Is that a thing? I am not hip.