@Sunny I'm sorry you had to deal with that. Simone's player here. I have tried KD several times over the years and every time I'm reminded quickly why I never last. Like @Shlappy said, it is a bland sandbox that only allows a chosen few enjoy crunchier RP. The rest have to settle for social play and dodging the OOC behavior of certain other members of the playerbase.
@faraday Fair enough, it's been 15 years since I worked in the field. I'm not current on what has changed and I know it's been a lot.
Coincidentally it's been 15 since I've tried a MUD or RPI too.
There is something in emergency medicine known as The Golden Hour and the clock starts ticking from the moment a serious injury is received or a medical emergency begins (heart attacks, strokes, etc.). It's used by EMS to gauge a person's prospects during assessment as well as how efficient EMS (fire, medical, etc.) are in responding.
It's also how many fire departments have justified larger budgets and more stations than ambulance departments but I won't get into that here.
There is some basis in reality here.
It sounds unfun to me but it isn't inaccurate by RL standards.
Do/did you play in a tabletop game now or in the past?: I have tried tabletop several times in the past but it never clicked for me.
What games(s) do/did you play as tabletop?: D&D, oWoD (VtM), Call of Cthulu and Traveller RPG.
Are/were you the GM/ST/DM at your tabletop?: No
Would you tabletop if you had the opportunity?: Probably not
Do you have the opportunity but choose NOT to tabletop?: Yes
Misc: For me MUSHing is a creative writing exercise. Tabletop isn't and so it doesn't have the same appeal.
So the entire game, which ran for over a year and a half, is horribad because of the first few months you experienced there? And even better, inspires such frothing vitriol a year and a half after the fact?
2 months ago, the NPCs were not active because Shava had stepped back from the game. Since then, (I want to say the beginning of August?) I believe Cthugha played one (1) scene with an NPC and a couple of PCs, to wrap out a request that had been in for awhile. So, yeah, that's not accurate.
As has been said, Shava's husband's alt (the one he picked up after the hundred year torpor) had no real power. None. Zero. He might have rubbed several people the wrong way due to his lack of social ability and tendency to go right for the jugular both ICly and OOCly but he had no sway on the game. Shava recused herself from all conversations having to do with Wulf and his behaviour.
I played a ghoul and I had plenty to do. I schemed, I politicked, I smoothed ruffled feathers and was working (first as a ghoul and then as a vampire) to set a few people up for reasons of both gaining power and satisfying a few petty IC grudges. I'm not telling you how much TS I had. The point is that if you wanted to do more, you could. The systems were in place to support and allow that. Or, if you wanted to be a mattress kitten, still provide dice support, or provide no support at all, you could do that as well.
I haven't seen anyone in this thread go 'rah rah our game was the super best!'. No one's saying it was without flaws, I could list several off the top of my head. The point here is that it established ways to play a politically-oriented vampire game that really, really worked. I'm looking forward to seeing what Ganymede does with the concept because this was my first experience with Vampire and I'd like to play the model again. I'd like to play somewhere that scheming and social-fu have actual impact, and repercussions beyond the immediate scene.
But until then, I-- like many others-- will be adapting to the pre-existing culture on other games. As one should.
The provoking situation was that the staff PC would not automatically step aside for the player character in that spot. The argument is that since it was a Rank 5 influence spot, which only one person could hold, that was automatically a position of power-- and that was the crux of the disagreement. Some felt it was not a position of power, some did and that a staff-PC shouldn't hold it. But Shava has always been very clear about her preferences on boundaries between staff PCs and non-staff PCs. It was one of the things that drew me to the game, after being burned by questionable staff ethics and actions on so many other games.
It is true that coming in as a new staffer on an established game in which 70% of the game was in one person's head, and the new folks left with no training or minimal guidance, was difficult. There were some attitudes towards the new staffers coming in that were worrisome, both from the player and the established staff side. New staff put in an incredible number of hours trying to play catch up, field complaints and try to rectify a situation that had been simmering for awhile. We worked our asses off and while I'm sad, I'm also proud of what we did do.
But the reason for closing the game was not over the 1XP reward.
@Alzie said:
@coin: https://github.com/ccubed/RFK/blob/master/Beats Code.txt
Also, the game was not closed due to any specific work load. The game was closed due to a disagreement staff side about a specific rule regarding staff PCs. As the staff we had recently brought on were unwilling to follow it and Neither Becca nor I could devote the major time needed to keep the game going, it was decided we would close it and work on a new project. The server remains open until we're ready to close it for the ~15 minutes it will take for me to start up the new game based on Mu2.
Er. Some of the staff, not all.
What I found with beat processing (hi, Myn here) was that if I just flat processed beat sheets without more than a quick check to make sure people weren't submitting illegitimate or duplicated beats, I bet I could have spent just an hour doing it. But it was also important (and I think appreciated by the players) to be sure that people received beats that they had earned but hadn't submitted for. This meant manually adding forgotten scene beats, event beats, every sort of beat, plus double-checking that rumor beats were claimed against rumors posted to the wiki, etc.
My first week, when I didn't have the commands, it took me over five hours.
After that, it was around two to three, plus time spent doing whatever else was needed and that doesn't count reading the beatsheets submitted via email, counting up the beats earned through answers there and manually awarding them on game. The system was time-intensive, any way you look at it.
But that said, I only did it for a few weeks and might have become a lot faster with more practice at catching what needed to be manually added.
You could also fill in supplemental informative beatsheets about your character, to flesh them out and earn additional XP, both while in chargen or at any time after:
It was nice playing somewhere where both social skills and social ability mattered. The in-character rumor system, when people kept it in-character, was very nice. I also liked the beatsheet/beats system, which made players responsible for their own advancement, though I admit (from the staff side, as I got to see in recent weeks) that also took an incredible number of admin hours to process.
The Prince was not idle, nor was he in any way responsible for the game closing.
Aww, thank you! 
Real Wiki<tm> is now up and can be seen here. We're still working on getting it set up with everything we'd like to see on there but the bulk of it is done.
Metaplot kicked off with the rediscovery of the Downtown Freehold's Hollow. It was claimed from a flock of freaky little bird hobs worshipping the owl talismans in the local Hedge. On July 23rd, stage two of this tinyplot will kick off with Chromeo running a return visit to the Hedge to see if anything has changed since the owl cult's ceremony was last interrupted.
We are a small game but we've pulled a pretty incredible and friendly group of players. The atmosphere is laid back and aimed at fun. C'mon by, have a look and if you have any questions, shoot DelRey a page (that's me).