Best posts made by Auspice

I made something work!

Some of you will love it. Some of you will hate it.
Which is basically business as usual around here.

In the bar above the edit box, there is a new, self-explanatory button. It says GIF. Click it.
Enter a search term.

Select a gif.

VOILA.

@tinuviel said in Original Sci-Fi?:

@auspice How did you know that tonight is taco night?

Uh, Taco Tuesday. Duh.

@Three-Eyed-Crow said in FS3:

In fairness to at least some of the 'zomg this ruined my RP' (tho not a lot of fairness), the level of customization you can do with the FS3 system (and the spotty way some game-runners document it and what they're doing with it), has led to some wonky shit in implementation (BS Pegasus and its billion non-sensical action skills always LEAPS to mind). I hate the player/staffer, not the game, as it were, but if Wonky Game is all you've played, that's all you've seen.

This is why alpha/beta periods are always a good idea. Shut off XP gain, get a few good people in, take feedback. Figure out what works, what doesn't. Usually some of those Action skills can be condensed and go away.

Y'all, this is what is called a highland cat. Apparently a newer breed. This is my friend's kitten, Gigi. They recently adopted her after recovering from the loss of their older kitty. And not only is she, from what I hear, a precious cuddle monster, but she is just an adorable, masterful blepper:

I give nodebb an F.

There's nothing lower than an F or I'd give it that.

I've always been fond of the games that allow players to sort of 'create' their own tech. Set the level of advancement, then allow people to be free. Bonus points if it's grounded in RL.

Examples I've used on games before:

• Having a drone-like device that had 360-degree cameras. I based this on an item that exists today: a ball that has 360-degree cameras. It can't fly, but you throw it up in the air and it snaps photos at its apex. If we have that now, logic dictates that in the future there could be one that does video (that part's easy) and manages to fly. We've seen similar things in movies, so why not?
• A 'mesh' that could be put under the skin to display whatever... For changeable/animated tattoos, essentially. Already in RL, they're working on small screens in the skin to be used for medical purposes. So again, down the line in the future, why not be able to get a 'sleeve' implanted that you can program to display whatever?

And wikis easily allow people to share the things they've come up with.

But yeah, the technobabble thing is an issue and I think it's on both Staff and players of any game to foster an environment where handwavium is the norm.

Count me in as wildly intested. Hell yeah colonial marines.

@derp said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

@auspice said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

I've been taking Lyft/Uber/etc for a while. I've never had a weird/wtf experience until tonight.

Guy kept asking if I wanted him to just 'drive [me] around.'
Kept insisting I take his number.

Outright asked if I live alone at one point.

I almost went to a neighbor's door other than my own, but I don't know any of my neighbors, so it would've been an added layer of awkward. I just made sure to immediately lock my door as I got in and I was texting a friend the whole time.

But holyfuck.

Did you report said creepy behavior to the company? If not, you probably should.

I intend to, yes.

@derp said in Hello MSBites! Grade your administrators.:

NodeBB blech. There has to be something better out there somewhere. Make it happen already.

The reasoning for this is that we couldn't transfer over the archives/history.

Personally? I'd be OK with that. Take off and nuke it from orbit. Fresh slate. >.>

I second Ares.
Digital Ocean is easy to use, inexpensive, and Fara has instructions on the install process.

If you hit any speedbumps (I did; turned out a change on DO required some tweaking of the install process), she is very quick to help and happy to do so. The Ares discord is a great resource.

If you decide to go with a different hosting plan, I have a friend who provides hosting and support for $5/mo. He can at least install things for you and add stuff to server cron, etc. if needed.

There's already discussions on ways to enhance the 'OH GOD THEY KILLED KENNY YOU BASTARDS' beyond hoping people can give a damn about an NPC that was in two ST poses.

Because this is a thing I care much about and I think I've even had discussions with @Seraphim73 in the past on it.

@templari said in The Kitten Army (GIF Heavy):

@auspice But but.. I'm supposed to be scary.

It's okay. You can pretend. I won't tell anyone.

(But the kittens know, man. They know.)

@arkandel said in Hello MSBites! Grade your administrators.:

It's not the headache that I mind, it's the nitpicking. This whole thing about administrating microaggressions seems so petty that I can't get myself interested enough to even read some threads - I'm just too lazy for that (stop gasping, @Coin). If something serious like harassment happens I definitely intend to get involved, but the he-said she-said bullshit... about some random clash of personalities, not so much.

Seriously, this.

We have all -- all -- warned administrators of games how they shouldn't mire themselves in the morass and they'd be better off not engaging or by making a single statement and walking away.

Many, many people on this board would be served well by following that same advice.

Yet a lot of people (I, @Arkandel, and @Ganymede have been guilty of the same) on the board do the same. We engage. And engage. And engage.

And some of those people will snipe back rather than walk away... and when they get rounded upon (by the person they sniped at in the first place or that person's friend), they run to us for help.

• If you nitpick at someone and they defend themselves, even if they're harsh about it... I'm not going to leap to your aid. You chose to poke the bear.
• If you continue to engage, over and over, I'm not going to leap to your aid. You could step away at any time (when the mob has come after me, I have had to do this; ask Ark about the times I've had to tell him and Gany 'Hey guys, I'm taking the evening off').

This goes hand-in-hand with my statements above about 'the loudest voice.'

If you come running to me to handle a situation, you are probably not going to like how I handle it if you are sniping just as much as the other person. Being the one to ring the bell (hit report) doesn't clear your conscience if you were dogpiling or attacking, too. I will drag you all out by the scruff if I have to.

Code is one.

Star Wars is something that needs code. And most of it is so out of date and no one's around to work on it.

Fires of Hope tried being a more narrow focus on just a couple planets, but it still struggled because it lacked that feel of a universe and so many of us (I absolutely include myself in this) wanna be on a ship.

The last reason is perhaps the biggest: many people wanna play Force Users. Not all but enough. Games would limit these....usually to 'applications' in theory, but in practice it always went to a staff alt or a friend of staff.

That soured many of us on SW games. I know I'm really hesitant to join them and have been for a long time. I don't wanna play somewhere that I can never play what I want. (Pern games used to have the same issue, but nowadays save for gold largely just let people have whatever they want.)

When NPCs are regularly used and then die, it's easier. However, it's hard to keep track of a catalog of NPCs. Some people will reference specific ones on the regular (like me with Pitbull on BSG:U), but it's pretty much 'old hat' for an ST to whip out some NPCs special use for a scene to kill them off.

And it's hard to dredge up those fucks to give. I try. I find it easier to slip into those other mindsets (but then, as an author, it's why I RP; to explore other character types, upbringings, etc. to help my writing). But when I'm writing a screenplay or novel, I know the deaths coming, I can weave in the characters involved, it's not just...

'Anderson died and plz remember you knew him for the past year!'

@surreality

To this day, one of my favorite things on the intarwebs.

@lithium

Oh, some people do get dogpiled more often and more relentlessly. This is true.

People hold grudges. Sometimes for reasons we know. Sometimes for reasons we don't.

I've often had people hate me and when I finally learn why, it's for something I said/did months, years prior that I was wholly and completely unaware had upset them and they'd held onto it and used it as a reason to attack me for ages.

Me? I personally prefer just to move the fuck on. It's a lot less effort and my blood pressure appreciates it a helluva lot more.

@wizz said in Make MSB great again!:

@arkandel
What do you mean by help? What are you asking for and what are your expectations?

Tiny gripe:

My coffee mug is too good at keeping my coffee hot.
It's been an hour. I want to drink my coffee now.

@kdraygo said in Hello MSBites! Grade your administrators.:

It's fine to be selfish mentally

Shut up. You like me.

@sunny said in Hello MSBites! Grade your administrators.:

Reporting tools can (and are often) used as a form of griefing

To be perfectly and totally honest, I sigh and go 'what now' more often than not when I see a new report in the queue. Usually because if one of you reports something, 6 of you report it. And when someone is mass-reporting, I usually want to ban them.

Flooding me with reports is never, ever gonna make me go after the person you're reporting. EVER.

And akin to what @Arkandel has already said: a lot of people will report things like, 'This person attacked me.' ..........in a Hog Pit thread. This is part of why I think the Hog Pit is ridiculous. Because some of the very same people who argue about wanting the Hog Pit will turn around and report the people attacking them in the Hog Pit.

C'mon, y'all.