Posts made by Arkandel

@Ashen-Shugar Then that sounds like what @Admiral is looking for.

@Roz said:

At the very least, I know of Pern games that have more than one grid that technically exist within the same world but basically function as two separate entities.

Yes, but staff is the same for all, policies are identical, etc right?

@Admiral said:

I know zilch about coding but I'm curious about why every game that comes out is on its own server.

It's basically like this:

A server is a machine. It doesn't run 'games', it runs all sorts of things, some of which are games like a MU. It's very rare these days for a server other than some piece of hardware in someone's literal basement to be used for just one game, since it's extremely wasteful. You know the port any MU ever uses (6000, 8100, whatever)? That's so the server knows which of these more-than-one programs it's running you're talking to.

What MU* runners usually rent is a share on a server. You're given some space on their drives, access to their database, etc.

An address is just that - it's an arrow pointing at the server above. More than one of those arrows can point to the same server. It's the port that differentiates which is which.

So for example a server like mechanipus.com can (and does) run a bunch of games. Eldritch conducts its business at port 6666.

Would it be possible to have a single MUSH address host multiple games? You appear in the start room when you make a character and then select which game you play from the list available and go from there.

I think what you're talking about isn't different games. It's one game with different grids, staffs with +job buckets of their own, and a central nexus with exits leading to those different grids. But you'd also need separate channels, +events, separate controls so staff from one game can't spy on players from the others, etc.

It's not necessarily a bad idea, you could try to flesh it out further, but the administrative logistics is what could do it in even before you can solve the code issues of segregating every single thing between the sub-grids. The overhead might make it save less than you may think it should compared to the traditional model, but once you explain how you'd deal with the above maybe there could be merit in it.

@Coin said:

@Arkandel said:

That doesn't even make sense, @COIN.

I already told you, "your mom" comebacks don't need to make sense. You need some memory supplements or something, bruh.

How can it be a comeback? Comeback from what?!

@ThatGuyThere said:

Look at Dirty Harry. He is a maverick cop. Lets say there is a game that focuses on realistic crime drama. Harry Callahan is a perfectly in theme character but near the edges, well the next char that want to play the common maverick trope goes one step father since who wants to be the lesser maverick .

Let's say you launch a game based on Dirty Harry. It's set in the seventies for that added grit factor and you intend to run hardcore cop drama.

Some players come in who like the seventies angle. Not the cop drama stuff - they run something completely different, such as try to run their time-machine version of Narco there by having their PCs start importing heroin from Colombia, or maybe don't even go to crime but play PCs engaged in a oil tycoon family fued. Or whatever else that's not quite what you had in mind, hand-picking one aspect of your game (in this case the time period) to do something else instead.

Now - this is where it gets tricky - say they're having fun with it. In fact it's gaining popularity compared to the mainstream game purpose, more players are getting into that than chasing bank robbers or avenging kidnapped kids. What do you do?

That doesn't even make sense, @COIN.

@VulgarKitten said:

@Thenomain said:

You are not contracted, obligated, or otherwise forced to do so, but if you include people in your character's play-space, you will become more popular and you will enhance that person's experience knowing that they will do the same for you.

This is such a lie.

Well, lie is a strong word. I doubt Theno was trying to intentionally misrepresent the truth or anything. At worst it could be incorrect, which is a whole different matter.

But well, I need to agree with him it's a good policy to have in general - including others, letting them into your story, allowing them to play with your toys. It's not needed by any means but as ours is a highly interactive, collaborative word-based hobby I don't see the problem with it. It might not work as well or often as we'd want, but what does?

@Coin Wtf, the 100? I only watched the first episode or two but it looked shallow as hell, pretty kids with very clean teeth in a jungle playing at being badass survivors. Maybe I need to give this another shot.

@Thenomain said:

Not a theoretical question. How would you enforce a certain reading of Alice to get that kind of game?

The easy answer is 'you can't'. You can enforce - which to me means "oversee and infuse scenes with" - that sort of thing but doing it game-wide is impossible since not all players would be able or willing to do so without supervision or assistance, and you can't provide them all with a Storyteller around the clock.

A better answer though is 'you can, but it's slow, by working on making it part of the game's culture'. Then those specific players who don't conform are either regulated or isolated by the majority and new ones become educated as to what you're looking for through osmosis simply by being in roleplay with others.

I suspect what it comes down to is whether your vision of the game is something players are willing to coopt and invest in or not, which isn't a given. I mean you'd think "hey, I'm making a game about a certain reading of Alice" would only draw folks who like the material or the angle you chose but there's a kind of player who will go to a MU* with a specific theme and play things contrary or at least irrelevant to it. The trick is to make people want to do it.

I mean you could chase them around with a big stick but it's a soul-grinding process for everyone involved. I'd go with the cultural shift thing.

"Hey, anyone want to do something?"
"Sure! You wanna meet at $place?"
<silence>
...

"I'm so bored, someone run something for me."
"Alright, what would you like ran?"
"I dunno."
"How about $thing?"
"No, it doesn't fit me exactly right."
...

"Hey, I noticed you guys were playing, want one more?"
"Sure, come over!"
<comes over and starts chatting OOC about their day, poses once every half hour>
...

And so on.

@Ganymede said:

It's one thing to clamor about "wrong-fun" over-policing, and another to stop people from taking a shit on every part of the thematic material.

It's one of those sad times I feel compelled to agree with you. I had a similar butthurt issue on SHH when all kinds of people seemed to be having no post-apocalyptic issues at all; beer was flowing freely (beach party!), there was electricity, the internet, better medical care than we get in Canada (courtesy of a bunch of bored Life 5 Mages around), bars were open, at least one person had a cool car...

Granted, I was told it's not quite the way it was but just how I perceived it, yet wrongfun was something I kept muttering to myself over and over again anyway.

The logistics here seem pretty obvious.

1. People are bored.

2. There aren't enough STs around on average so they can be all divided into smaller numbers than five per scene.

So something has to give, either we compromise and join a scene slightly larger than we'd like, we find/run a scene of our own, or the MUSH will not be an entertaining place for us.

Also note that when it comes to staff scenes things are worse, much worse. Because those tend to gather even more interest since they are 'official' and easily become a damned if you do/damned if you don't proposition - they either accept everyone into a big ol' scene or deny more people and risk being accused of $thing.

@Miss-Demeanor said:

Devil's Advocate for a moment... I've left scenes of 5 people (myself included), not because its too busy but because it was taking too damn long for other people to pose.

Arkandel's PrP rules (which I've macro'ed and fire at the beginning of every scene) is that they operate under an one-pose rule; if someone else has posed since your last one, you can pose again. In addition to it as a ST I am not bound by that rule and can go any time I see fit.

Pace in PrPs is a precious thing and I'll protect it with my last muttered breath.

Having said that, large scenes do have their challenges (I am so sorry, people who came to the SSH council meeting - all what, 13 of you? I should have broken it down better, that was on me). But I don't think five PCs are too many on their own, it's usually just at the limit between activity and insanity.

On top of it, there usually isn't that much plot to go around and I feel bad telling anyone we're full so they just can't come. I have, but I don't like doing it, so five is a better limit than four.

@lordbelh said:

I think it is Staff's responsibility to leave plot and story accessible for everybody, but beyond that its the player who has to give enough to the game to be wanted in return. If you can't get into one group, try another. If one character fails, perhaps try another. Change it up so that you have something to contribute.

Agreed. And you know, even in games which ultimately failed I can't help but think players were expecting staff to hand-feed them entertainment a bit too much, and gave up too fast.

A game launch is a very peculiar time - player interest is at its peak since everyone wants to see if this place is fun so they look for plot... but it's also the exact time period in which staff are often able to pander to them the least because there's suddenly a huge influx of +jobs, characters in CGen, questions needing answering they never considered before, stuff which needs deciding, etc. So it's disappointing to see people walk away because they couldn't find things to do right away, especially if they didn't try to generate something for themselves or even answered calls for RP over public channels.

One of my most memorable frustrating experiences was on SHH where a player was saying she was bored on a channel, so I mentioned she could come to the +event I was running in an hour. At first she didn't want to - it wasn't official, was it? Did I have permission from staff? Ooookay, well, I explain I did happen to have permission (I had discussed it with Ruin beforehand) but it wasn't needed as it was an exploration fact-finding scene. She ended up coming over - and left within the first twenty minutes because there were five people there herself included. Too busy.

Now, I get it. It's nice to have nice things given to you. It's nicer to have the exact kinds of things you want custom made and given to you. But we as players need to manage what we want versus what we offer back in return, too. Even the best of us aren't god's gifts to the rest of the community so we can maybe adjust our expectations about everyone else's need to entertain us a bit.

If you want people to invest in your enjoyment, you have to invest in theirs.

Absolutely.

If this thread has to be merged with another please go ahead, admins.

So - the new trailer for Suicide Squad looks goddamn amazing. If the movie is half as good, maaan.

@Ghost The last one I was in staff had to be involved since the person used NPCs in a way he shouldn't have. @Sunny may remember my annoyance at the time.