Posts made by Arkandel

@sunny Oh, ouch. My sympathies. I've never had any but I've heard it be described as the worst pain ever.

@faceless The Heroes is a fucking brutal book. It's amazing, and without mercy.

@tempest That's my secret, I'm always listening.

... that came off way more creepy than I intended it.

@tempest said in Regarding administration on MSB:

Faraday appears to be super mega invested in turning this into rainbow unicorn times. Way more invested than anybody willing to argue with her about why she's wrong, anyways. It's not worth the time.

Let's not reduce this argument on either side into a strawman. It's not a "people who just want to see the world burn" versus "people who want rainbows and unicorns".

There's more nuance than that, so let's find a compromise instead of demonizing each other.

@faceless For some reason I didn't enjoy that series as much as I did. I love most of his work though - The Heroes and Red Country, damn.

@auspice Development plus some printing costs $50k? That seems... lower than I expected.

Then again I've no idea what the profit margins for White Wolf are these days.

@thatguythere said in Regarding administration on MSB:

Ahh so this is one of those community things that I just don't grok.
To me if the main thing I have in common with someone is that we MU then they are a MUer and regardless of the other bits of their lives that is what they are.

Allow me to try and help you grok it.

So let's say you're a MUer and you meet another MUer; that person does something that makes them unlikable to you. It doesn't need to be (and often isn't) anything really bad - maybe they pose a way you don't like, or play characters you find obnoxious. Maybe they spam a little more than you like. Perhaps they use wiki codes in their poses (ugh, those people).

Either way we've seen, again and again, these little petty dislikes go back and forth as the feeling is returned until they become toxic. A perceived microaggression just gets to the point of groups - since people get their friends involved, too - dogpiling each other, until loners get flamed sometimes right out of existence. For nothing.

Anything that helps us keep in mind that 'hey, that's the person who just got a new job and was talking about that movie that I also liked' also establishes the fact the annoying jerk is an actual person. It's a small thing, but it fucking matters.

When I had to put my cat down and I saw all the messages here comiserating it didn't change the fact I no longer had Izie around. But it's nice to think that hey, some of these folks are more than names on my screen and that, maybe, I am occasionally more than that on theirs too.

That, too, matters.

@wildbaboons There goes 80% of my free time for the next few days.

@thatguythere said in Regarding administration on MSB:

@faraday
Oh we have the tastes less gamey section here, but to me it is useless to the purpose of the board. It is generally harmless so not really an issue and while i will comment in them they are not what brings me here.

Sometimes I think those sections are as, or even more useful than the rest of them put together.

The greatest hurdle we have - sometimes - is keeping in mind there are people behind the character or user names. Those threads reveal those; the sportsy, the nerdy, the weird... we're here, persistantly, and we have lives beyond the hobby.

It can't hurt to think that more often.

I've got a character there but I have only had limited time to play (in general) due to the RL workload.

What I can say is that this is a game where they're paying attention to detail. My application was actually read, and staff pointed out areas that could be elaborated further, ways for the character to be better integrated with the theme, and make observations I found insightful.

Basically it all reminded me of @Apos' approach, which is a very good sign. Don't shovel applications through, don't block them for no reason, but instead work to add value to them.

This is great stuff so far.

@auspice Not MSB-specific, but if anyone tried to give me limitations about what I can or can't do outside of their game, I would explain very carefully where exactly they can shove it, and walk away.

I left the gym at 7:15, parking outside isn't allowed after 7... $150 ticket. Are you kidding me?! I didn't run over anyone, wtf.

@bobotron A part (and I can't tell how large it is) of the population can't handle any threat to their IC status, be it bigotry, base politics or just being made fun of.

Because how dare you.

@auspice

@auspice Don't quote those fake 'fahrenheit' monopoly degrees to me. They mean nothing.

Go Celsius or bust, yo.

@pyrephox said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

That said, if I did play a historical game, as a /player/ I'd want to see that reflected at least in the setting, if not in the PCs, or I want it explicitly excised from the setting.

I think my only caveat for historical games - unless, of course, it's explicitly stated they are going 'Holywood' with it, which is perfectly fine - is that nothing utterly implausible takes place. So if there's an Asian person in mid-1600s England they should be prepared to get stared at, that sort of thing.

But I don't doubt it's actually safer for staff to build their theme in a way that IC discrimination just doesn't become too much of a thing in different ways. Ultimately it's a tradeoff; does the MU* benefit more from the thematic inclusion of racism or sexism than it loses from potential jerk players ruining things for others?

@auspice Fucking people in climates they can wear sleeveless anything in mid November. I hate you so much.

@pyrephox said in How should IC discrimination be handled?:

In general, I'm more comfortable with playing fantasy prejudices than real world ones.

That's the key though. No one will get triggered because your PC says all shavs need to be driven out of the land, because none of us is a shav iRL (... I think). It's only a controversial matter at all because some people who've come out, or who have faced actual racism, or who've been mistreated based on their gender might not want to encounter it.

Fantasy (and sci-fi) racism is pretty safe in comparison, but not all settings get to use those tropes.

@auspice That's one way to do it, too. Maybe make it part of the rules discrimination can only be directed at or affect NPCs, but not PCs.

Perhaps knowing the black guy is badass, and has badass friends, and you might be in combat with him at your back mitigates your IC views; that might limit these characteristics' footprint a bit, and avoid having venues blocked for PCs ("sorry, we don't accept your kind in our crew").

I do agree with @Admiral that if everyone is just a liberal, nice person then it makes the game more generic, and avoids having some IC friction which can spice things up. Characters who aren't quite villains but are jerks can be great... if played right.

Now the clear argument here is that this is a truism; obviously a PC will be fun if they are played right, no? The issue is that if a racist/sexist/whatever PC is not played properly they can really polarize people very quickly, and shit can hit the fan soon after that.

For example consider the possibility of a homophobe Sheriff in a WoD MUSH, and the escalation from "he rolls his eyes when two girls are kissing", "he goes out of his way to IC disparage homosexual characters" to "he turns down a gay PC for a position of Deputy". All of those things can be perfectly legitimate RP, and the player might have the best intentions, but the IC consequences to the characters themselves may be something they should discuss with staff (or, perhaps even better, with the players of the PCs who stand to be affected).

Respectful communication when playing these sorts of themes is very important. Playing a villain can be charming or it can be offensive based on just that.