Posts made by Coin

@HelloProject said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@Ganymede said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@HelloProject said in How Do I Headwiz?:

I basically went into this project with zero intention of using XP at all. My intent was always to entirely replace XP with something else. I highly recommend reading the DICE system and seeing how what you want to do would apply to that.

The DICE System doesn't really eliminate XP at all, from what I read. It simply eliminates the idea of advancement without doing anything. Instead, the DICE System seems to permit improvement when you spend Time to do so, which is sort of how I envision handling XP in my system. (To wit: spend X Time, get 1 XP.) And I like how the DICE System makes you choose between character advancement and developing character assets.

Then that does kind of bring up a good question.

Is there a way to eliminate XP? Should I even try? People have seen my game thread and my concept, is the elimination of XP an endeavour worth pursuing, or should I just try to refine XP to work in a way that's not shitty?

Anime-based stuff is always going to be a headache. Because on the one hand, you have power levels, which is conducive to XP. But then on the other hand, you have (as famously ubermemed by DBZ) the fact that when push comes to shove, power levels don't mean jack or shit.

I would rather divide the player base into tiers: Protagonist, Support, Sidekick, Antagonist, Henchman, Disposable, etc., and then instead of XP, give them something akin to the Unisystem's Drama Points, which are basically points you can spend "in the moment" to do things that you normally couldn't (or that are special in some way or another). Have a system that allows a character to spend enough "power points", or "hero points", or whatever, to "jump up" a category for a moment.

Maybe if you spend 5 points as a Sidekick, you can do something at the Protagonist level--suddenly Krillin busts out a badass Destructo Disc that cuts Vegeta's tail off, or Piccolo kills Raditz (and Goku, SPOILER) with his Special Beam Cannon. They're not on the main Protagonist/Antagonist level, but they can be momentarily. Otherwise, their abilities all function at the lower tier and any inter-tier interaction is a. nominal, and b. always going to end up in favor of the higher tier.

You can probably make it more nuanced by making there be more than three basic tiers--make it 5, make it 7, whatever you need. But this basically provides a way for a consent-based game that has a mechanic for back up the different power levels intermingling and affecting each other while respecting the "does he have the heart/balls/spirit/soul/resolve to do the thing" trope that so much Anime runs on.

(extra e.g.: that moment where a character normally thought of as weaker than the protagonist loses their shit and wails on someone much, much more powerful than them for a prolonged period of time can be the outcome of a player blowing ALL their special points. Of course, once the scene's over, they're out of points and probably exhausted and useless for a while...)

P.S. This would also be a good system for comic book MUs, especially if you separated the categories of levels. Like, Superman has Strength 10. Metallo has Strength 8. Sure, Superman is far stronger, but Metallo's close enough to go a few rounds anyway, and he can spend special points to do "Strength 10 stuff". Same can be applied to pretty much anything.

@HelloProject On the other hand, what you see as giving them too much weight can also be taken as having enough prescience to recognize something as what it could become, and acting like it.

@HelloProject said in RL Anger:

I try not to apply the term "Nazi" too liberally, because I think it lowers the impact. I also think that a lot of people are kind of new to the levels of racism that are currently in the media (even though most of it isn't particularly new). So it's easy to freak out and go "The Nazis are back". This kind of shit has never been particularly abstract to me.

I remember when I was about nine, and I was homeless with my mother and stepdad. We stayed in a shelter in a small town, except it was a town with KKK activity. So I was literally not allowed to go anywhere or play on my own, despite being used to that in the big city I grew up in (Philadelphia). A lot of people in the news, like Richard Spencer, are so fucking many layers removed from the kinds of groups I'm actually afraid of, that to me calling that guy a Nazi mostly shows that, despite everything, the country at large doesn't truly understand how bad things have always been.

People are so new to this kind of shit that what is essentially a rather meh level of racism compared to a lot of the racism in this country, seems as bad as literal Nazis. That's my whole perspective on this.

Now, if you punched Neo Nazis or the KKK, I might think you're onto something. But when you punch actual fucking terrifying groups like that, not some fucking nerd-ass "White Nationalists", you're straight up risking your life. That's why these "White Nationalists" are starting to clash with legitimate fucking white supremacist groups and are getting their asses kicked. These "White Nationalists" themselves don't even realize how racist this country can be, so they think that actual fucking Neo Nazis and KKK aren't going to kick their teeth in when they try to go "Wait we don't want anyone to think we're evil, let's calm down and be reasonable!"

"White Nationalists" and the alt-right are basically internet tough guys and entitled gentrifiers who are now entering into a world they didn't know existed, and I'll be damned if I use a power word like "Nazi" for them. The actual Nazis are kicking their ass.

If you fly the Swastika as a flag, you're a Nazi. if you don't, you can still be just as awful a person: white supremacist, racist, genocidal,fascist. Nazi, specifically, refers to a particular political party with right-wing, nationalistic, authoritarian politics in favor of racial cleansing and racial superiority. If we're being especially technical about it, it also denotes that they have to have the backing of the monetary powers within the territory they operate in, since that's what the actual Nazis had in Germany and was an integral part of their politics and infrastructure as a political war machine.

That said, I don't believe that 'Nazi' is a power word. I believe that Nazi had a specific meaning and that we're perfectly capable of understanding the nuance of what we mean when we say 'that person is a Nazi', even if they aren't flying the Swastika. If I call an alt-right persona Nazi, it's pretty clear why, and how the analogy relates.

This is much different than, for example, the term 'feminazi' which just banks on "joking" hyperbole by attributing something truly heinous (fascism) to a movement that is the opposite (feminism).

So on the one hand, yeah--most people that are being called a Nazi are, perhaps, not technically Nazis.

On the other hand, everyone knows why they're being called that and making a sticking point out of it just makes me roll my eyes hard enough that I can see my synapses firing.

@HelloProject said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@Coin said in How Do I Headwiz?:

I am more and more in favor of XP being a player thing and having players distribute the XP among whatever alts they have as they see fit, logistics and logic be damned.

Since I'm using what is essentially an alternative to XP that I don't even fully grasp yet, I'm not sure if this will be possible. But if it is, I'll certainly keep this idea in mind.

Unless the alternative you're using is so alien as to not be dependent on points in general, it's very simple: any time a character would gain XP, give it to the player instead and let them spend it on whichever alt they want.

@Arkandel said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@Coin I was actually talking about this with a friend recently but one thing is... the definition of what conflict of interest entails tends to be pretty damn fluid, and sometimes downright unfair. I've seen staff (not just headwiz) being complained about because they ran plot for their friends, even if it wasn't metaplot or gave those PCs any particular advantage that a normal ST couldn't convey.

And the funny thing is the ways around it are just as baffling to me. For instance running those same plots as your alt - using the exact same commands - sometimes mitigates such complaints when really, all that changes is which tab you're typing from.

Anyway, that's why having a thick skin is so important though since otherwise it's easy to be worn down from being nagged at while genuinely trying to just help people have some fun, and having others go "well, why are THEY having more fun than ME?". However I'd still rely on trusted outsiders I can go to for an objective sanity check because there is always the chance I might be doing something borderline unethical and not realize it - wholesale assuming players are just being whiny bitches about it is probably going too far.

Don't get me started on the whole "it's okay to run it from your player bit but not your staff alt because CoI" or "the xp goes to the bit you ran it from".

What-ever.

I am more and more in favor of XP being a player thing and having players distribute the XP among whatever alts they have as they see fit, logistics and logic be damned.

@Arkandel said in How Do I Headwiz?:

So if you are going to do this then staffing itself had better be fun enough for you to keep doing it. You might have 'a character' but that character can never be or do what other PCs get to. It'll always be the headwiz's alt, never Bob or Jane.

At the very least, make sure that wshen you create a character, it's one that you can be content playing at the lower tier of the character's sphere / context.

Make a werewolf who cares about his neighborhood andlittle else; make a vampire who has his own vendettas and doesn't really have an interest in court politics; make a Mage who's really more into the small Mysteries and not in fighting big battles against the Abyss. It will limit what you can do in some respects, but it's just as easy to include people (and even easier to include just the people you actually want to RP with) this way, and it doesn't generate conflict of interest.

Another great thing to do is make a character who has a very specific niche, and then make that niche valuable in a peripheral way to the plot you're running. Many people will wail about Conflict of Interest, but it really isn't. If my character specializes in Maeljin lore, and I'm running a sphere-wide Maeljin plot, then having my NPCs refer the active characters to my PC is just good sense and a way for me to play my character, contribute to the plot, but leave the spotlight on other people.

A third thing you can do is divorce the plots your character is involved in from the setting in some way. Many people run plots outside the city the game in general is set in, etc. You can be awesome and even run stuff for yourself and your friends without destabilizing the local structure or having people wail Conflict of Interest.

It bears mentioning that I come from a culture where Conflict of Interest is viewed much less strictly, and in my experience, often led to much less drama than the strict, overbearing paranoia I've found in MUs, where everyone is super worried about whether or not one person's alt is helping their other alt.

@Catsmeow said in RL Anger:

I feel like we should all go back to kindergarten. "Keep your hands to yourself." That was a really good rule.

I just don't think that violence is the answer.

Like Nazi (since we are using this) hates all the things not them.
Nazi is violent and does a thing.
It is not the right show (to me) that you put your hands on them.
It is okay to find a legal ramification against them.
It is okay to educate them out of this thought pattern if possible.

I (personally) feel that the only thing that violence begets is more violence. If you are violent against X group, etc. Then you in a way give them an example to point to and prove their point.

This is definitely a naive way of looking at this particular chain of events.

The problem here is that the law doesn't do anything about it. The problem here is a systemic bias in favor of Nazis, white supremacists, and men who engender and foster bigotry against people of color, women, and non-heteronormative people in order to victimize them.

There is no recourse in the law at this time because the law is on their side.

What do you think the law would do if it did something? You think it would be peaceful? In what world are cops peaceful when facing opposition willing to turn to violence? (And, further, in what world are cops generally peaceful at all? Not mine.)

Your proposed solution is just as violent, in the end, as someone who says "yes, it's always okay to punch a Nazi". It's just that your solution looks for backing from a system that is, at this time, categorically unable and unwilling to take those actions.

So it goes.

As for people deciding they get to punch anyone they define as a Nazi, regardless of logic and actual facts, that's just because there are stupid people, and not indicative of a significant problem in a movement (if you can even call it a movement).

If anything, a small percentage of people deciidng they now get to punch anyone they can define as a Nazi based on their arbitrary and non-sensical definition of such is still probably less of a problem than actual Nazis and white supremacists fomenting bigotry, violence, and systemic disenfranchisement of others.

@Auspice said in RL things I love:

@Coin said in RL things I love:

On the other hand, Charging Bull is a symbol for the USA and especially Wall Street's "indomitable spirit", which in this case pretty much means (and cannot be more accurately represented) "we will rampage and thrash all over anyone in our way".

That wasn't Charging Bull at all.

http://chargingbull.com/chargingbull.html

"Arturo Di Modica first conceived of the Charging Bull as a way to celebrate the can-do spirit of America and especially New York, where people from all other the world could come regardless of their origin or circumstances, and through determination and hard work overcome every obstacle to become successful. It’s this symbol of virility and courage that Arturo saw as the perfect antidote to the Wall Street crash of 1986."

He made it to sort of mock Wall Street, if anything.
It was made for the people, not for the banks.

Meritocracy is crap philosophy, to be honest. In any case, see @Meg and @Ganymede above.

@Thenomain said in RL things I love:

@Auspice said in RL things I love:

I know Fearless Girl really upsets the artist of the Wall Street Bull, which makes me hate it more. I wish it'd be taken down.

I'm of deep conflict on it. On the positive side, it brings a needed conversation to the fore. (Would've been even better if the girl were hispanic or black.) On the negative side, exactly what you and others have said. Wall Street may have hated the Bull when it was first installed but it was done with love for America and has become a strong symbol for Wall Street and New York; the Fearless Girl demeans that love and has become a strong symbol for the more tolerable (1st and 2nd Wave) Feminism.

On the other hand, Charging Bull is a symbol for the USA and especially Wall Street's "indomitable spirit", which in this case pretty much means (and cannot be more accurately represented) "we will rampage and thrash all over anyone in our way".

My only complaint about Fearless Girl is that it co-opts feminism for capitalist objectives (it's basically advertisement). But I don't find the Charging Bull to be celebrating anything that, you know, is worth celebrating.

Pissing Pug is just dumb, because while I understand the aim to challenge the undercover capitalist source of Fearless Girl, it refuses to acknowledge its (albeit shallow and distorted by the source) message of feminism. You can't attack something that marries the two things so directly without confusing the target; it was sloppy and poorly thought out.

@mietze said in RL Anger:

Maybe our compulsion to dehumanize anyone we find threatening/distasteful/disagreeable and declare them garbage is part of what got us into the current mess we are in.

I don't know. It depends.

Garbage was once useful and had value, until it became garbage. People can be useful and have value, but if they start espousing bigotry and hate, they become garbage.

I think the word "garbage" is actually probably the best and least problematic insult, in general. Maybe "shit", too, since shit is literally waste.

And look, yeah, peace and love. But my pacifism is practical. As in, I'm all for pacifism until it stops being practicalº.

º In a "reaction against bigotry and hate" sense.

@Arkandel said in Social Combat: Reusing Physical Combat System?:

@surreality Yeah, some amount of flexibility might be a good thing anyway even if it increases complexity, for very specific cases.

For example you might want to have two rolls - a Persuasion one to convince Molly you it's okay if you just go into her boss' office for a minute to drop off a memo and a Subterfuge roll to make it sound like you'd be in trouble if she told on you ("sighs I forgot to do it last night, I'm so dumb!") to keep her quiet. Failure on either could produce different results - not being allowed into the office, or letting you in but telling her boss afterwards to cover her ass, or both.

This is kind of what the Doors system tries to represent in its short-term version.

Convincing her to go into her boss's office to drop the memo is one Door, and convincing her not to tell ony our for "forgetting" is another Door.

@Arkandel said in Social Combat: Reusing Physical Combat System?:

Some issues, as @Sparks and others noted, can't be fixed. The same kind of player who won't accept 'losing' anything ever would also pitch a fit in a physical confrontation as well anyhow, and combat is supposed to be a solved problem for us.

On the other hand - for example - I keep going back to having too many possible specialties and sub-cases is a systemic problem; with physical confrontations I could conceivably specialize and be entirely functional at a far smaller cost than it takes to be versed enough to cover their every social equivalent - grab Weaponry and Strength... and you're done, you're now useful in 90% of fighty situations where you have access to an axe. But if you get Presence and Intimidation you might be useless to a diplomatic meeting; no, the ST called for Manipulation and Persuasion. D'oh!

To be honest after discussing these things at length in threads like this I'm inclined to agree with an earlier approach @Ganymede suggested; just not have social stats. I'm not satisfied with it, it reduces the number of different niches and 'builds' in games, but it still seems better to what we're coming up with so far.

Then again someone will come with an easy to use integrated solution one of these days to make it all come together... I hope.

Or you could treat plots the same way real life is treated, where a large majority of people use their social and mental aspects far, far more often than they do their physical ones when it comes time for conflict resolution, and where the physical approach is seen, by society, as something rather barbaric.

If you did that, the nuances of the social Skills being much less applicable to a wide variety of situations would make more sense, since you're theoretically rolling Social stuff way more often.

My point is, the problem continues to be people, not the system.

@surreality said in Social Combat: Reusing Physical Combat System?:

@Coin said in Social Combat: Reusing Physical Combat System?:

@surreality said in Social Combat: Reusing Physical Combat System?:

@Coin I dunno. I have no real objection to multiple rolls doing things with proper modifiers. (I may not want to play the character again after whatever it is, but that's a different issue.) Treating anything social as the equivalent of a one-shot-kill with superpower strength effects, though, is not horribly uncommon, and once somebody's been on the receiving end of this, I empathize strongly with the aversion developing.

I think the best storylines happen when people divorce themselves from their "vision" of the character they're playing and allow the story to mold and change them, including their interactions with others. But I can sympathize with the desire to play the character "as envisioned". I just think it's also one of the things that limits us from having truly great RP the most.

I think you're reading a little more into that than is really there.

For the really obvious example, I'm not at all interested, for instance, in playing a rape victim. On any given number of games, it's possible for that to occur. No, I'm not going to continue to play the character after that, even if it's entirely fair play to allow it to happen if the system says it does and there are no consent rules allowing an opt-out.

I'd FTB it, sure, but it still ICly happens, and I'm really just not interested in exploring that storyline at all in my pretendy fun times. It is non-enjoyable to me and I'm not going to waste my enjoyment time on that, nor should anyone ever feel obligated or pressured to do so in the name of some higher 'artistic roleplayer ideal'.

Edit: I agree with what you're saying re: the folks who just can never ever be lied to, or intimidated, or charmed, etc. But realistically, people absolutely have the right to have limits for what they consider an appropriate amount of non-enjoyment in their hobby time.

In turn, I think you're reading into my comment. Obviously there are limits. I would never object to them. But some people set those limits so tightly to the ideal of a character they've created that it becomes entirely impossible to have any character development be anything but their pre-planned thoughts on the matter and, frankly, I think that those people are a lot more common than we admit--and many of the people who are that way don't even realize it.

@surreality said in Social Combat: Reusing Physical Combat System?:

@Coin I dunno. I have no real objection to multiple rolls doing things with proper modifiers. (I may not want to play the character again after whatever it is, but that's a different issue.) Treating anything social as the equivalent of a one-shot-kill with superpower strength effects, though, is not horribly uncommon, and once somebody's been on the receiving end of this, I empathize strongly with the aversion developing.

I think the best storylines happen when people divorce themselves from their "vision" of the character they're playing and allow the story to mold and change them, including their interactions with others. But I can sympathize with the desire to play the character "as envisioned". I just think it's also one of the things that limits us from having truly great RP the most.

@Arkandel said in Social Combat: Reusing Physical Combat System?:

@Coin That's why I always advocate rewarding confrontations. If the only outcome of social 'combat' is that you either 'win' or 'lose', and winning essentially means you retain the status quo then from that perspective being challenged at all is never a good thing. The best case scenario for you is that nothing happens - at least from a systemic point of view.

Well, yeah. I think for Vegas, @tragedyjones and @skew and I are working on something a bit more rewarding for social confrontations.

@surreality Well, yes. But it's also true that people rail just as hard at the idea of their character being convinced of something that the player doesn't agree with, even if it would take a long time IC and require several rolls.

I mean, it's a problem, but not the problem.

@surreality said in Social Combat: Reusing Physical Combat System?:

@Ganymede For clarification:

In physical combat, we don't declare an intent of: kill the guy. We do something like I'm going to swing my axe at Joe's head!, even if kill the guy is the ultimate end goal.

Well, actually, in CofD, you're supposed to have your endgame kind of in-mind in physical combat. You're talking about turn-by-turn, but technically, you are supposed to declare your full intent at the beginning of combat.

@HelloProject said in A Constructive Thread About People We Might Not Like:

@Coin I respect your perspective as a linguist, but as a linguist I assume that you also know that textbook language learning only gets you so far, until you learn how people actually talk (which, as a presumably good language teacher, is something that I imagine you cover).

Native speakers of any language take certain things for granted because they already know how to communicate, to the point that they're not so much using "proper" language, but "common" language that most people around them who speaks the language understands. When I say that someone has no idea how language works, I'm saying that if someone is using colloquial language while not being self-aware about it, in the same post that they're railing against commonly accepted colloquial language, then no, I don't accept that they have any idea what they're talking about. It's picking and choosing what to rail against while doing exactly the same thing.

I feel like the argument is at best mild ignorance, and at worst hypocritical. I admit that I was an asshole about it, because to me it just seemed ridiculous, but I don't know how I'm supposed to respond to someone who arbitrarily draws the line between colloquial language they like, and colloquial language they don't like.

I will, however, say that your argument re: America is a hell of a lot better than that, and I don't inherently disagree with the idea that the nature of the way that we use the word "America" is imperialistic, especially in the context of other countries on the continent. It's also hard to argue that countries that don't give a shit about the continent beyond the United States have no reason to refer to it as anything other than America (Like for example, Japan). So, on the basis of this, I would say that your argument is significantly more valid than the argument ThatGuyThere was making, and I don't really disagree with what you on these points.

I don't know if I'm gonna suddenly start using different language or not, I guess that's something that'll take some thought. But this is certainly probably the only valid argument I've ever heard for not using the word America to refer to the U.S.

That said, we were asked to take this discussion out of this thread.

One salient point I need to make:

I'm not just a textbook learned EFL teacher. I lived ages 6-12 and 17-21 in the Bay Area. I am as much a native speaker of U.S. English as I am anything else, and I've kept up with it by communicating both vocally and textually with people from all sorts of English-speaking countries. This is perhaps a bit of information you did not have before when assessing my points, that you do now.

@HelloProject said in A Constructive Thread About People We Might Not Like:

@ThatGuyThere Except that you're entirely marrying yourself to the technicalities of how the words should work rather than how the words are actually used, which is pretty much a gross misunderstanding of language.

I no doubt agree that "America" is not technically the name of the country, and yet I'm going to continue to refer to the US as "America", because it's a commonly accepted way to refer to the country, to the point that "America" is a commonly accepted word for the US in multiple languages. Getting bogged down by such a technicality to the point that it "irks" you would be like me being irked by the fact that you're colloquially using the word "hell" in a way that technically makes no sense, which would be a real argument I could make if I decided to entirely ignore how language works too.

This is wrong. If you had read my earlier post about this very same thing, you'd know a lot of other languages use a completely different term for people who live in the United States. In fact, most of the languages that use 'American' to refer to people from the U.S. are used predominantly in countries that 1) have no cultural interest in America as a continent, and 2) primarily do business with the United States, and not the rest of America, and thus have absolutely no need to respect any sort of linguistics that would take into account those appropriative boundaries.

You know what does irk me?

When people who have no clue how language works talk about technicalities that don't actually apply to everyday dialogue all the time, as if suddenly having complete and utter cultural blindness to their own language, for reasons that could only be described as "no goddamned reason", or "I like to think I'm a really smart dude, surely no one can deconstruct what's wrong with my argument, it's not like languages are a science or anything".

You know damned well how the term African-American is commonly used, just like you know damned well how the terms "America" and "American" are commonly used. You can be irked all you want, and I'll just be irked by the fact that you don't seem to understand the fundamentals of what I assume is your native language.

What I know damn well is that the term 'African-American' is commonly used to refer to black people in the United States by people from the United States. This sort of thing you just posted just goes to show that you're still thinking that 'common use' applies only based on your country's, not, you know, the rest of the world. So while I understand your point, I'd be remiss if I didn't point out it's based entirely on an imperialistic mindset foisted on you by your own society.

You constantly talk about how you're reevaluating your life, exploring your roots, trying to open up to other experiences--okay, this is a good opportunity for you to stop, back up a bit, and try to see this particular issue from someone else's point of view.

@Wolfs said in A Constructive Thread About People We Might Not Like:

"American" has always applied to the United States by default, not the North/South American continents themselves. This dates back to the American colonies when the English crossed the Atlantic.

If you use "African-American," the vast majority of people out there know and understand this to be talking about a US Citizen.

If you really want to differentiate it that much, you need to be using "Americas" or "the Americas." By itself, "America" is understood to mean the USA.

Again, this is essentially just based on your own perspective. People in other countries--especially South American countries that have actually clashed or been the victim of the U.S.'s imperialistic and interventionist policies, will disagree. Your version of history isn't right just because it occurred around you.

@Wolfs said in A Constructive Thread About People We Might Not Like:

@ThatGuyThere Okay, maybe not always, but at this point you're pissing into the wind (and apparently content to do it) because you know exactly what the meaning is now to the majority, yet you insist on trying to tell people it really doesn't mean that. Sometimes, the usage of words and their meanings does change.

There's trying to argue a point, and there's being willfully stubborn. Guess which one you fall under?

Do you also go around trying to tell people "gay" really ought to mean someone's just happy?

Again, what majority? Your majority. Not my majority.

Languages, especially living languages that are used, grow and expand and change. This is natural, this is linguistics. But there is a very big difference between "gay" having two definitions (happy, homosexual) than the appropriative and exclusionary nature of one country, who's had political and military dominance over a continent for a century or more, using a demonym that should be inclusive to dozens of countries around it.

P.S. @HelloProject, I am an English teacher, and in fact, I am an English as a Foreign Language teacher, which means I was trained in Received Pronunciation, which is the internationally accepted proper English accent and semantic, syntactic, and grammatical form of the language (and by this, I mean by every country that isn't the U.S., which, I am sure will shock you, is a lot of people, I might dare say, a 'majority'). So when I tell you @ThatGuyThere has better talking points, linguistically speaking, than you do in this sense, I would hope (but not expect) that this carries some weight.

Please stop tossing around accusations that people don't know how language works. You don't have a monopoly on it yourself and in fact, haven't shown you know anything about linguistics beyond being able to type without glaring errors (which isn't very difficult at all). Stop. Backtrack. Reassess. Please. Especially when you're resorting to ad-hominem attacks. You were doing so well compared to other times you've popped up on this board (or WORA). I was rooting for you.

P.P.S. This conversation is not just about how language works, but how politics and imperialism affect language use, so your constant harping on linguistics seems like a simple and, in my case, ineffectual attempt at side-lining the political aspects of the discussion that you don't have any solid knowledge in. Especially since, being African-American (and I am using this term the way you do, to denote the specific culture of black people in the U.S.) you should be well-aware of how language and politics intersect to create borders, prejudice, descrimination, and segregation.

P.P.P.S. God fucking damn you guys for making me agree with @ThatGuyThere. Assholes. -_-

@Derp said in A Constructive Thread About People We Might Not Like:

So, my two cents here, trying to move away from specific people to a more generalized thing:

I think that it's a double edged sword in how we go about this. Either way, there's no real way to 'win' when it comes to 'people that other people don't like'.

Personally, I try and avoid Scarlet Letters. Each game is a unique space. They might share players, themes, hell, even code, but ultimately, each game is a thing unto itself. No two games have been perfect copies of each other. Even The Reach and Fallcoast are different beasts, for a variety of reasons, and that's the closest thing I've seen to a copy of one from another.

That goes for players too. I think that if we get into the habit of treating players differently based on past experiences or whatever, it's gonna lead us down a bad road. Players can have difficulties on one game, given that game's atmosphere and environment, that they'd never have on another. I've seen it happen before. While I don't buy into a lot of the 'hivemind' stuff, there is definitely a flow that you fall into based on a game's players, stories, environment, rules, etc, and like all social creatures we'll in some way conform to that, for good or ill.

This makes some people unhappy, sure. People who have been around for awhile and dealt with the same people can be wary, and with good cause. If you don't do what they expect, then you can catch a lot of heat.

But you can also catch a lot of heat singling out players for different treatment for any reason, and not treating all players as if they were playing on a level playing field.

There is no middle ground there. You either do treat them all the same, or you don't treat them all the same. No matter how you try and nuance it, it comes down to one of those two things. And either way, one side is going to be unhappy that you chose that path.

There is no right or wrong way to do it. It all depends on what you want from your game. Me, I choose to lean toward the 'all players starting on a new game have a clean slate, and will be treated as equals under the same set of rules'. Partly because I feel like that's the better option, and partly because it makes it less complicated. i don't have the time, energy, or desire to track the complete MU histories of the dozens of people that have A Reputation in this hobby. I staff on two games right now, and there are literally hundreds of players that I have to manage and work with. The ones with the Reputation are a small fraction of those.

So ultimately, I think that it just comes down to preference. And as I've said before, as much as we like to make it sound like MUers are a cohesive lot when it comes to certain things, it's just really not true. We're incredibly diverse, and we see it pop up all the time. We're just never gonna agree on certain things. And that's okay.

So that's my constructive two cents on People We Might Not Like.

I was going to go point-by-point to answer this but I find that I disagree with the core premise of your post, so that's pointless.

Character is what you are in the dark. Sure, an Evangelist said it, so we can't really be so sure what he considered 'the dark', since I'm sure he believed God was always watching, but the concept behind the quote is solid: who you really are is what you do when nobody's looking, when you're alone, when you know you'll get away with it.

In MU terms, we can transpose it to "character is what you do when nobody knows it's you". Me? I typically play cat-and-mouse with @Quibbler or @ILuvGrumpyCat until they figure it out, I slip, or I get bored. But other people use it to manipulate, hurt, and twist others.

This doesn't CHANGE because you go to a new game. My morality, my attitude, my conscience, my personality, my respect for myself and others, and all the things that influence how I behave and what I think, do not change just because I switch servers. Saying that the surrounding environment influences how we behave isn't wrong, you're just massively overstating its importance in this context.

The environment of any given game is similar enough to any other game that your attitudes towards and respect for your fellow players shouldn't change. If it does, you're an opportunist at best.

Spider has proven to be the same person time after time after time after time on game after game after game after game; at what point does your philosophy of "start from scratch" start feeling like you're being naive?

After what Sovereign did on Reno, I banned him when he came to Eldritch. I didn't wait for him to do something bad on Eldritch, because he's a shitty person I don't want on my game. Spider was pre-banned. These are people, not usernames, and changing their PC, going to a different game won't change that. Only a consistent, protracted, sincere change in attitude will, and even there, no one is under any obligation to give them that chance, especially when it's been given more than often enough, and always ended in calamity.

Your entire point is flawed, because you choose to grant a clean slate to people based on an arbitrary notion like "it's a new game". The action isn't justified by the reason. It's like saying, 'this man is a thief in Illinois, but in Michigan he's not'. No, dude, the guy's a thief, period--he may not have committed theft in Michigan, but that doesn't make him any less of a thief.

@Ataru said in A Constructive Thread About People We Might Not Like:

She can deal with the repercussions of that, including this thread which she might never see.

Lulz. Knowing her she's got it on automatic refresh every thirty seconds.