When you use a schedule based bus service that's point to point (they pick you up at your house, take you to your destination and drop you off) so you have a set time to be picked up (in this case, 8:20PM) and they're over half an hour late because Reasons, and you are just expected to suck it up. Of course, if you're 10 minutes late they can just declare you a no-show and leave you. 
They know that their customers have no alternatives. It shows.
For the love of GOD, posebreak please, Theno. It's not hard to install...
Count me in.
Now I have to decide...Verbena or Euthie...
This is going to be hard. I'm also rusty as hell since I've only been playing Nwod.
@Coin said:
Biokinesis doesn't work that way. It never has. This is stupid. I can make it up, and it would still be stupid.
Oh, I know. When I discovered that, I went and read the rules on it, and went "Uh." I don't remember what poor bastard on the staff had to deal with this guy (who argued that we were wrong and he was right!) but thankfully it was not me. Things that should be kicked to Shang...
@Coin said:
I also find it crucial that if people complaining, whining, and screaming at you gets them results, you should not be the person in charge of deciding stuff, because they're going to abuse the shit out of it.
Oh, I agree. That's certainly part of why I'm never staffing again. The other part is that it completely sucks the joy out of RP for me. I can't just relax and play because I get worried about stuff I need to do as staff. Another part is certainly seeing things that cannot be unseen.
Like staff's opinion of players.
Or the PC who used Biokinesis 5 to have 2 working penises. You just can't make that shit up.
@Cirno said:
It would be like any other WoD game, except with 50% more rape. Graphic, unsettling, violent rape, with vomiting, screaming, and crying.
Warform BDSM sex! While the victim freaks out because their WP is too low.
Silver dildos on the weapons list.
@HelloRaptor said:
people demanding that staff assess damages for violent rape, and make pregnancy rolls
Because saying, "1 or 2 Lethal, take your pick, and no because whether or not a character gets pregnant has always been the purview of the player of that character. Decide for yourself. Make a roll if you want, but it's not our call." would have been just far too onerous an effort.
There were several staffers who were prone to the most extreme of shrieking histrionic behavior, which generally ended up in long screaming pages to me, Troy or me AND Troy. So she made rules. So it goes.
The first time was 'only' the usual rape clusterfuck with the rapist getting killed and demanding to be immune to punishment.
"This is a non-consent game, so no."
You seem to be a lot less susceptible to people whining and crying and having fits then Troy or I though. It got especially bad when its some friend of Troy's/Staff that is doing it.
How on earth did the conversation not go:
PLAYERS: This character killed his girlfriend, we demand that our characters be allowed to kill him for it.
STAFF: Okay? Have combat rolls started yet? Call for a ST when they do, if you guys need one.
It went like this:
Hunter Player A (Victim) has been PK'D by Hunter Player B (Aggressor) and its a huge mess and he's claiming OOC flipout as justification because of past psychological trauma RL,
Complicating matters: Hunter Player B was either fired the previous day or was in the process of being fired for basic cheatery: reading all the +jobs relating to player A and her interaction with the vampire. It was revealed to me by Troy and Player A that she had been asking vampstaff for permission for Vampire C to embrace her. Apparently (Can only guess based on Hunter Player B statements) B flipped out hardcore OOC at A over that too, and she backed off from doing it.
So. Hunter player A is busy crying OOC to every player who would listed that B was a shithead, unreasonable and PK'd her for no reason. (These things could all be said to be true, I think. But it did not help with the situation.
Here's what the -players- said:
Hunter Player A - Please please please retcon my death. I promise next time I do rape RP I'll make sure it's all properly laid out for everyone involved. Yes, i know I broke that rule before. I'm so sorry, please help me?
Hunter Sphere she talked to OOC - They do not at this time have any IC info on how she died or even that she's dead...BUT. "We want to PK Hunter B to death!!!! We'll all quit if we get blocked!"
Hunter B - What do you mean I'm going to lose my character???? cries No, no, please let's do what sghe said and retcon the whole death scene. I agree to avoid her player OOC and leave her alone, she can just do the same for me.
Vampire C - OMG guys. I can change the rape scene to just be feeding that leaves a bruise!!!! (They are a nice person. They were freaked by all this.)
On TR a scene can be retconned if staff believes it needs to be done and all involved players consent.
Troy noped out of dealing with it all, overstressed.
We ended up retconning the death, warning her that the next time she did this she was for real losing the character
Yes, how dare a player engage in roleplay other players might find fucked up or traumatic. Good thing you instituted a rule about how if you're going to roleplay anything that anyone might find fucked up and/or traumatic to deal with, they get forms signed in triplicate from everyone they interact w-... oh right, my bad, just the one thing.
Look Troy up and complain. She wrote it. I DO think it is highly fucked up to spring Surprise Trauma on unsuspecting RP partners. Have the decency to discuss it with them first. I feel the exact same way about Surprise Pregnancy RP where someone just suddenly became a Baby-daddy without a word to his player.
The point at which I have to order one player to have no contact, at all, ever with another player, is the point at which I'm just removing one of those players from the game. I'd probably flip a coin, given all the givens here.
I wish. I'd have removed Hunter B in 2 seconds even if I had to grab someone to run a mob scene of other hunters offing him to satisfy them. He was OOC nucking futs. Dealing with him was always a bit fraught in the first place.
Unfortunately, even as Ashur, I did not have the authority to kick people off the game permanently. Only Troy could do that, and she was not super likely to do so in almost any circumstance as she does not like to be The Bad Guy. Not is she likely to do it to friends.
We were told not to, and then treated with everything from derision to open antagonism for even indicating we'd be willing to handle it.
Troy had already been run over by the staffers prone to frothing fits. Once she decides how something is going to be handled and who has to do it, that is pretty much that.
Fun times. I cannot remember any logins as Ashur that were not just about that stressful. I mopped up a lot of shit that Troy told me to take care of.
@Misadventure said:
@HelloRaptor said:
there were multiple staffers (myself included) who indicated they were willing to handle the >situation and any future such situations (rape or otherwise) which might come up.
Yup.
There was too much loud shrieking from the staffers who were busy having hysterics for me to pay any attention to the calm ones. It doesn't take many people screaming in your face to deal with it and deal with it NOW to make noticing sanely behaving people very easy.
@Cirno - I am a huge mutt. I'm white, and my ancestry as far as I know it includes the Irish, the French, English, possibly some Scottish blood, Native American (Cherokee, Blackfoot) and a general smattering of 'European countries'. I don't know if I have any black blood, but it's possible. (Someday I am going to get one of those DNA scans that traces your ethnic origin. My history seems so bland and boring. Nothing exciting like my husband's - he came from Vikings!)
I actually really wish I had some kind of ethnic heritage to claim, other then "Generic Midwestern American". But I wasn't raised around/in the Native cultures I have the bloodline for, and nothing else is so strongly present that I could say "I have an Irish heritage."
@Misadventure said:
Could you note the last three times you saw RP'd rape played out as an attention seeking bomb? Just a year and a MU name or type.
I can. TR had a subset of players - it was just a few, but they certainly were obnoxious as hell, who used "Oh noes! Raep!" as a mechanism both to get their jollies (Ok, some people like that.) and to attention-whore. When I mentioned people demanding that staff assess damages for violent rape, and make pregnancy rolls - that was one of them. That IS why TR has rape rules. Staff doesn't want to read gory, disgusting rape logs to decide if you anus is damaged.
There was another who decided both to get her jollies and yank other people's chains. She did it twice. The first time was 'only' the usual rape clusterfuck with the rapist getting killed and demanding to be immune to punishment. The second time, that was special, She was ICly married to Mr Badass Hunter when she decided to get raped by Mr Vampire. She did not discuss her plans for this with Mr Hunter's player. Who actually had some serious RL damage as a person revolving around rape victims. She plays out her vampire sexytimes, he finds out, flips OOC, has his character immediately PK her 'because he failed to protect her'.
The whole Hunter sphere flipped out and started demanding that they be allowed to hunt him down and kill him over her, IC.
Troy and I needed hip waders and shovels to deal with all that crap. We ended up retconning the death, warning her that the next time she did this she was for real losing the character and ordering him to stay far away from her player. (No contact. At all.)
There are reasons I am now never staffing again. Most of them are players like that.
Bleh!
My stance on rape and child molestation: Put it in your background. If it nauseates the app staffer they can always turn it over to someone with a certain level of detachment.
On-game as a RP element? No. That kind of thing causes Drama every single time. It splashes over onto innocent bystanders. Staff gets dragged in and wishes that they could just @nuke both people involved. People ask staff to assign damage, to make pregnancy rolls, all kinds of disgusting crap.
There are just too many survivors of such trauma in the hobby to make this kind of RP worthwhile overall.
If it has to be in there, then let the people who want to do it get consent from every single player who is going to be affected, and leave staff out of it other to inform them that it occurred. FTB. And accept the IC consequences of the action. (Almost always the killing of the rapist with extreme prejudice)
@Arkandel said:
To kick-start the conversation here's a question: Do you TS? If so, why? If not, why not?
Nope. I used to, with reasonable frequency. I'm transgendered, and I'm never going to be able to transition, so that was how I expressed my actual sexuality. So I only did this with close friends or people who were in an actual relationship with me.
I stopped because I found that it was taking too much time entirely, and my energy/ability to sustain RP is much more limited then it used to be. When I started finding it exhausting instead of exhilarating I quit doing it.entirely. I re-directed all the energy that was being used for that into other kinds of RP.
Do I care if people TS? Not at all, I prefer not to see it in public, I prefer that game powers not be used badly/incorrectly to make it more titillating or something. (Biokinesis even at 5 is not going to let you grow another fully functional penis.)
I only object to it when the character doing is is supposed to be doing other things without which nothing can get done. For example, the Prince. The Hierarch. Important characters need to see to thir non-conjugal duties first.
I may be a little rambly, I am very sleepy. But...our house is payed off totally in May.
To celebrate this, we are going to go to the FACE clinic here in Indianapolis and adopt at least 1 but possibly 2 disabled cats. (We are assuming that the kitties will like us and want us to be their humans.)
Cat 1 is Puzzle, She's 2 years old and has been badly mistreated by people, and shot. She is missing a rear leg.
http://i.imgur.com/dMCezeQ.jpg
The second cat, we know much less about. He's also around 2 years old, and he's missing a front leg. FACE asked us to consider him too, and we are.
Hang on, kitties! We're coming to the rescue!
@Luna - Hmm, I wonder if that's happening around here. I'd go!
Fuck, it's almost Lent. My absolutely least favorite part of the year. Yeah yeah we're all mortal and going to die, and we should reflect on discipline and repentance for 40 days.
Meals served at Church are going to be crap for 40 days. Normally a treat I look forwards to for Thursdays, but likely to be meatless everything, or institutional fish sticks for the next while.
I Do Not Like.
The worse thing I ever saw RE kids: Women had 3 toddler age kids. Locked them outside at sunup. Only let them back inside at sundown. In semi-rural Ohio. No lunch, no diaper changes, no supervision. My parents used to feed them, like feeding feral cats. They pretty much came to our house for food and attention.
They were running a brothel/dealing drugs out of the house. My parents called the Sheriff and CPS a lot.
After over a year, CPS finally took the kids.
Then my parents bought the house so they could force the women to get lost.
We had to clean it out with pitchforks, like mucking out a barn. Garbage several feet deep everywhere.
I decided my parents (compared to this example) were pretty good.
I have something awesome as hell.
So, if you are articulate, seem a good person, and stand still at my Church, a Ministry shall fall upon thy head. I stood still, and discovered myself leading Sanctuary, our Church's LGBTQ Outreach movement. So far we've helped our congregation move towards being a 'Believe Out Loud' congregation - publicly affirming that all persons are welcome in our church without regard for sexual orientation or gender identity.
Last meeting was big. We decided that we /will/ have a table at Pride, and that we're going to march too.
And we talked, and we discerned that the persons most in need of help in the community are homeless LBGTQ persons. We're going to take several steps: we'll invite them to join us for a hot meal and fellowship at our meetings, with no pressure to express any faith at all. Just a safe space with warm food and a chance to talk openly to people who will listen. We're going to arrange to be able to hand out bags of items like soap and deodorant, snacks, bottled water, feminine hygiene supplies, definitely warm socks and gloves.
This is huge. After a very long time just...idle...there's something in my life now that gives me driving purpose. It's exhausting, and hard work, but it needs doing.
I'm also considering becoming a Deacon, although not urgently pressing to do it - I have to finish one more year of classes anyhow, before proceeding. (The last year is Theology. Ack...weighty topic.)
I wish we had the technology to let me exist as a brain in a bag of nutrient solution with an internet hookup. I'd be happier and probably saner.
I would like to scream a little about the local Paratransit service,. This is part of the city bus company, so you already know it is likely to be bad news.
If the company is 2 hours late to pick you up? Too bad for you! Shut up and ride. Or don't, they don't actually care. Of course, if you're 5 minutes late, they will leave you and mark you down as a no-show, which you can be penalized for.
They broke your wheelchair, and you have to pay for the repairs out of pocket, because your insurance won't. Too bad, so sad.
You have to schedule rides 3 days in advance. Too bad that your doctor only makes same-day appointments.
They sent the wrong kind of vehicle to pick you up, again? Oops. You can sit and wait until they can free up a regular bus.
Idiots.