@VulgarKitten said:
I would be okay with it. Who doesn't want some humor on their commute?
<raises a hand>
I want people on commute to be silent robots. At eight o'clock on the subway, don't talk. Whatever you do, don't you goddamn laugh. Or giggle, cut that shit out. Just stand/sit there and be taken to your place of daily torment in exchange for money already!
@tragedyjones said:
Date girl for a few weeks, have slight falling out, remain friends. Feelings grow, she gets a boyfriend. See each other, romance rekindles much stronger. Wait too long, she is afraid to leave her boyfriend and I won't see her while she has one.
Just one question - you won't see her while she's with someone and that's fine. Do you think if you would that she'd go for it?
Because if so then that's a pretty bad mark right there for the lady.
@tragedyjones And yet it's very very rare (in my experience - YMMV) to see money be important on MU*.
I've only see it make a difference in three ways: When you have none and let it affect your RP, when you have a lot and pose its trappings, or in games where you can only get certain goodies with it - such as say, TR, when you wanted a great sniping rifle.
Otherwise the impact of the difference Resources 2 and 4 makes seems negligible to me.
There are generally two ways to see this.
One is the liberal 'let people have stuff'. This has the advantage of generally making for happier players and staff, since no one has to keep track of most of this crap.
The other is the restrictive 'earn what you have'. This has the advantage of making rewards mean something since having things isn't a given.
Either way the game's theme and implementation is what will make or break the system. For example a MU* like SHH where resources are supposed to be scarce could perhaps benefit from strict control of who has access to what, making even small gains valuable; a plot where the PCs gain access to a radio transmitter and a solar battery could become significant. On the other hand a game set in a modern metropolis where access to a handgun is easy would probably not gain a lot from all that oversight as the characters wouldn't view such things as something special.
I.e. before we can actually discuss this we need to know what kind of game it's being discussed for.
How about this: Pre-made templates. These are mortals, unless we delve into M+ there are somewhat limited options. So you choose a character name/sex, pick a template for stats, write their background and get on the game. Done. Very low staff overhead at CGen, even the BG is only checked later on in case it turns out you created something truly absurd. If the PC croaks, get a new one.
@TNP said:
Everyone has a second bit already approved and in the wings waiting to step in when the first one dies. If there's going to be XP transfer from the dead on, let them just stay in Cgen almost finished until the first dies and then they can use the XP on the new and submit almost instantly. BG and stats could even get pre-approval.
Cgen will still be 'not easy as pie' but there will be no long wait to continue playing.
Or run due diligence post-CG. People pick everything automatically and staff only peeks at their stuff afterwards and/or when it's actually contested.
@Ganymede I think you can make a game pretty lethal without making it draconic, though. The illusion of hope ("I have a pretty powerful PC now with all that XP!") is more fun than the certainty of mediocrity.
@Coin See, I think that depends on what you call "trained Hunters". To me that's not 'former marines/SAS', it's closer to 'breakfast joint waitresses and McDonalds shift managers'.
Sure, I guess PCs could be excluded from the DnD rule though just to let them not get slaughtered every single time a wolf looks at them funny.
@Tempest Given Gauru alone would trigger Down and Dirty combat (which basically means 'one PC dies every turn') it doesn't look so good for the good guys. 
Not to mention how many powers in both Werewolf and Vampire - such as Fortitude - can reduce damage taken, heal up extra fast, exercise crowd control by making some of their enemies flee, etc.
But basically I'd have no issue with a clever group of Hunters finally isolating a Vampire and attacking them where she can't get help from ghouls and even taking her down. Sure, let them have the win, celebrate it with some drinks and copious hooting about how badass they are. Yay!
That's not the end of the plot though, it'd be the beginning, since then the other bloodsuckers would investigate using their own bag'o tricks - including Auspex - then start hunting the hunters down like dogs. That's where the fun is.
XP is irrelevant if you can't buy anything with it.
If you're a regular mortal then even if you get 3-4 XP a week (which is a lot) you still won't keep up with a single enraged Uratha or Gangrel.
For mortals spreading that shit out is all you can really do. Having influences, maybe multiple hideouts, alternate identities... just trying to desperately stay a step ahead of an opposition which outclasses you in every conceivable way.
I'd love a Hunter and M/M+ only game where you are constantly outmatched and outclassed by everything at all. Maybe include ghouls and WB types as playable, too, but that's it.
That ghoul with Vigor 2? He's the PvP king.
@Bobotron said:
Make it easy to do so.
How?
Make clear rules if there are things that can't be run.
It sounds reasonable. I think many places have a list of things which can't be used because they're not thematic ("No Brood without pre-approval"), and it never seemed to create too many issues if it's not a draconic one.
Give opportunities to do things.
How?
Have a snippets database for people to snag like, one or two sentence descriptions.
This, too, has been done. Usually the problem is that it's not enough; either people already know what they're going to run (and need no modular things) or they require significant hand-holding, especially in terms of mechanics.
It is however something of a common request for some time, getting pre-determined modular plots to try and entice new storytellers out of their shells. The hard part is enticing them to start at all.
Be open to ideas from all parties.
How? What does that entail we haven't been doing enough of?
Enforce staff to run them, particularly metaplot stuff.
How? Quotas? Because at some point we'll dwell into the question of whether it's easier to catch flies with honey or not, and that's been a touchy subject as of late.
I don't think incentives are necessary myself. If necessary, just give them a baseline of like... I dunno, 1 XP or 2 XP. Make this consistent across the board no matter what.
For starters this thread isn't just about incentivizing through XP, there are other methods proposed. But also, since the number seems adjusted for oWoD/nWoD 1.0, can you put it in some context? What would it be comparable to?
My question is about plot-running. From my end I don't differentiate who runs it, as long as it ends up getting ran - so how do we get more?
The issue of how to incentivize plot-running came up in a different thread. Since it's one of the matters I'm interested in I thought to move it here for a more generic discussion of methods to coax more stories out of people.
So I'll try to organize it so we can discuss it in a way that's not terrible to keep track of. If someone has a better structure please go ahead and propose it.
a) Is incentivizing important?
There's a school of thought that says it's not, as people who have PrPs to run will usually do so anyway whether they get rewarded for it or not. Another is that people have been known to game the system by running throwaway scenes which are 'plots' in name only so they can reap rewards.
Arguments against it include that by not rewarding the practice we penalize it, as the default is for the ST's own alt to not participate in their plots, thus they're missing out on opportunities to gather either XP or meta-awards (Renown requirements, for example) by running things. Another is that if someone's on the fence (or even can be lured by the promise of shinies) it's still a gain for the game.
b ) How would you incentivize plot-running? (please note this could include rewards for things other than PrPs, something I know I've discussed with @EmmahSue before without coming up with any bright thoughts at the time)
So I'll list some of the ways I can think of. Obviously if you have others please, by all means add yours.
XP. The most common one and for a reason; it's how many games reward people for things. It's easy, easily used, quantifiable and trackable.
Recognition. We've seen that most commonly in "ST of the week" type of messages during log-in. In my opinion those tend to be counter-productive since they promote competition instead of collaboration but that might have been the implementation. I'd be quite interested in seeing if we could come up with a better system that doesn't simply come down to a string people see in a MOTD or some random board, the benefit of which probably suffers from diminishing returns since after a few weeks the novelty of seeing their name somewhere would wear off. So, thoughts?
Non-XP mechanical benefits. This can be any number of things - lower spend cooldown times or eased up stat-raising requirements, for example, things which XP can't buy.
Meta-benefits. Things such as not being counted against caps for things like rolling a character in a sphere or how many people can take part in a PrP. The latter seems fair to me - if you're dedicating your time running scenes then even if a PrP is capped for 4 people, you get to go (without taking anyone's spot, as a 5th participant if the scene's ST is alright with it).
Other. How would you do it (if you'd do it) ?
My wife has at times mistakenly referred to them as the "Fabulous Four".
I naturally debated divorce.
@ThatGuyThere said:
Messed up the quoting but @Coin said
Staff having access to metaplot information doesn't actually give them an advantage,Huh Of course it does, they now know exactly how to tailor a pc to be effective,they also know how the people running the meta plot think so how to interact with it better.
In a game that is primarily about social interaction knowing more about the people you are interacting with is a huge advantage. Now most do not use this in a negative way but that does not mean the advantage is not there.
If you mistrust story-runners so much you think knowing how they think yields an unfair advantage you probably don't want to be playing where they are. That's a really paranoid way of looking at things.