Best posts made by Derp

Saw my first boerboel today.

I want one. I want one a lot.

Not me, or the dog I saw, but including a photo for reference:

I need one of these dogs in my life. It's me-sized.

@TiredEwok said in The Savage Skies - Discussion Thread:

As interesting as a topic as this is, I think we've derailed things and gotten away from the point of this thread.

Where this thread's going, we don't need rails.

@testament said in RL Sads:

I can no longer tell if I'm being distant from my online friends or if my online friends are being distant from me.

I think this is really relative. For me, online friends remain online friends, but if we aren't actively playing together or on a discord server somewhere, or here, then it might be a year or more between chats because I will just get tunnel vision and flat-out forget to check in.

It's not that I don't care about them. I very much do, and would still consider them friends. But there aren't any flashy things or warning bells or whatever telling me to make sure to stay up on my contacts, and most of my social stuff is done through just random interactions on channels or whatever, rather than me trying to reach out to them specifically.

I have two friends in Michigan, one I talk to regularly, and one where we don't talk as much now that we aren't actively playing together anywhere. But I'd still go to bat for both of them in a second and I've got the gas to drive to their respective houses should something go terribly, horribly wrong and they need a friend for something. Because they've absolutely been there when I needed one. The one I don't talk with as regularly isn't less close than the one I do talk with. I just consider us less chatty than we used to be because we aren't in a space where that chatter comes organically to me.

@A-B said in Spirit Lake - Discussion:

Ominous - Well, I didn't want to do it publicly, only Tat seems to insist on talking to me here rather than in the private chat I sent to begin with.

Oooh. No Not a good way to start.

Owning your actions is pretty big in this hobby. Nobody is obligated to excuse your bad behavior. And most certainly nobody forced you to come here and write a post with a gun to your head.

That was your choice. As was the other thing that got you banned, that you now wanna fight about?

Not a good look. And definitely not a winning strategy. You're doing yourself no favors here really.

I would just let it go. You basically just used the mu-equivalent of the 'Well she was asking for it by wearing that skirt' defense for your (ongoing) bad behavior. Not a way to win friends or influence people, man.

I was gonna donate too Wednesday when I got paid, but I'm glad that you got it together! I told you. We might talk mad shit to each other, but if one of us needs something, this community watches out for each other.

It's one of the reasons I stay. Ya'll're family.

Even if I don't really like some of you. Same as family.

@surreality said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:

Person: "OMG, you haven't watched The Sopranos?"
Me: "No."
Person: "But you're Italian! And it's about being Italian!"
Me: "...no, it's about organized crime, and tries to normalize and glamorize it. It is not about 'being Italian'."
Person: "But aren't you even part Sicilian?"
Me: "...and still not part of organized crime, nor is any member of my extended family."
Person: "...oh, I get it, you have to say that."
Me: "..."

Have you told the Don that people are asking about this kind of crap?

runs away

@macha said in The Dog Thread:

But I mean.. How can I not love this face?
ETA: And yes, that's his own queen size comforter he 'confiscated' When I was putting a new bedding set on the bed.

Yours has your comforter. Mine has my beanbag lol.

@HelloProject said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:

Also on the topic of banning races for there being "too much" of them, can we talk about how so many MUSHes have treated Asian culture like a weird trend that they have to ban or restrict? Like yeah, I get that there's people who do unfortunately bad portrayals of shit, but I can't be the only one who has seen MUSHes literally put Asian characters on a restricted list.

I don't ban asian characters, or restrict them (save in like, a rare few fantasy settings where they literally are on another continent and I'm planning a First Contact type situation later).

What I will ban the fuck out of is your anime samurai ninja master dragon lady concept that just so happens to be east asian because that shit usually goes well outside the theme of what I want to run.

Few people seem to be able to differentiate between the two, however. I didn't restrict your asian character, I restricted your weird-ass concept that happens to have asian stereotype culture tags just slapped on it.

#SorryNotSorry

Also, not you you as in @HelloProject, the general, nebulous you that refers to no one in particular.

Post-bath, nail-clipping, and flea meds.

The betrayal trifecta.

Robbed of all those glorious stanks he so carefully curated.

@wizz said in Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them:

It's fun to play a villain, but if you're not ultimately there to serve the story in the long run and give the "good guys" the big win in the end, things tend to go pretty sour pretty quickly.

Why do the "good guys" have to win? Plenty of pretty remarkable stories end with the good guys losing. There is nothing in the rules that says that good has to triumph over evil. Hell, if anything, evil is really the more likely to triumph anyway, because they aren't bound by any kind of limitation on their actions other than what they set for themselves.

Going into it with 'well the good guys are clearly going to win, duh' as the starting point is more the problem here, I think.

TIL, slightly paraphrased:

"The calories in, calories out model of weight loss has been almost completely debunked. It has about as much credibility among endocrinologists as climate change denial has among geologists."

As a large person that has been stigmatized about my weight as essentially one of the few minorities that it's both acceptable and encouraged to routinely be shitty to, this makes me smile.

@krmbm said in GMs and Players:

@reimesu said in GMs and Players:

So, it's a question you'd want to ask.

@Derp @Devrex#0676 Thoughts on pre-banning for past bad behavior?

Not against it.

We've got a sort of nebulous one. Most of the big names are on it. Vaspider, etc. There might be a few more on a case-by-case basis depending on whether they're currently acting the kind of fool we've seen them act like in the past and whether we want to put in enough effort to deal with them or not.

Not gonna lie, if a few of the MSB people that have been a constant thorn in my side show up, I'd probably point them back out the door, for both of our sakes.

It'd be the empathetic and humane thing to do.

@aria said in The Work Thread:

The first comment, the very first one, was an employee who felt the need to lambast us for making the celebration "secular and superficial" instead of "creating a safe space dedicated to the real meaning behind the holiday."

Dear Sir,

While we certainly respect your sentiments, that is not our role at Company. Here at Company, it is our job to create safe, welcoming environments for a diversity of faiths, nationalities, and traditions, in accordance with our company's ideals and various laws.

Religious observance is, we feel, best left to professionals trained for such measures. We would recommend that you research religious leaders that specialize in your specific situation and seek their services. We believe in the value of professional expertise and would not want to infringe on the hard work of others by attempting to reproduce the quality and quantity of their work product.

At Company, we believe in staying in our lane. We find, as a general rule, that it produces quite a bit of employee satisfaction, and heartily suggest that you consider taking up this practice as well.

However, Company believes in a strong culture of professional development and career advancement. If you feel that your expertise in various religious traditions is being wasted at Company, we fully support a transition to Religious Leader, and are happy to write you a letter of recommendation upon request.

Sincerely,

Everyone Else

@faraday said in MUs That We Would Love To Make (But Won't):

The overwhelming majority of players will not run plots for others, ever, just as most TTRPG players are not GMs. The fact is that running plots means opening yourself up to a fair bit of stress and drama, and requires a lot of preparation and effort. No matter how grateful you are, or what OOC badges or kudos you offer, that's a high mountain to climb for your pretendy-fun-times.

I think that's what was meant above re: 'that is a mentality that needs to change'. And it really does. GMs are not an infinite renewable resource, and are already in short supply. At some point, we're going to have to shift some definitions. For some people, 'collaborative' means that they show up and write poses. But to me, 'collaborative' means that everyone shares in some portion of the work to make the hobby run.

I don't think it's a very high mountain to climb. People need to be willing to do their share to keep the thing moving.

@Nymeria said in MUers in the news?:

We have no "only white characters" rule. However, the character database is 99% Westerosi nobles because we wanted to focus on court roleplay. In book canon, that limits the ethnicities available.

@Nymeria

That sounds an awful lot like a thin veil over a 'all important characters must be white' rule. Phrased another way, "you can play a non-white character if you want but if you want to be part of this game's action then you need to make a white character." We've already seen depictions of brown and otherwise indigenous-looking characters in the books, so we know they exist.

This is like the person that insisted that Anne Rice's vampires don't have sex despite them being depicted as such in the books. You're looking for a purity that you're largely imagining, using it to justify a bias that adds absolutely nothing to your games other than satisfying your biases, and people are rightly calling you out on it.

@Ominous said in Leadership, Spotlight, and PCs of Staffers:

Perhaps the solution is that, if you wish to play and experience character development and staff, then your server needs to run with a system geared towards joint GMing by all players. If you want one where a select number of the players are staff and serve as final arbiter, a la White Wolf, D&D, etc, then you have to accept that choosing to be staff means you don't get to enjoy the perks of being a player.

But the problem there is that, if this is the only way that people will accept it, your staffing pool will forever be those few who choose to do it, and they'll get easily burnt out.

It sounds to me like we, as a culture, just need to accept that staff are players too, and should enjoy all the benefits that other players do. Because they do a hard job, and deserve to at least have as much fun as any other player. Stop asking staffers to be selfless masochistic martyrs for your fun if you aren't willing to appreciate their need for the same.

@Ganymede said in MUers in the news?:

So, I'll say my piece: creating and enforcing a monoethnic game are racist choices.

In @Nymeria's case, she strongly asserts that her game is not mono-ethnic. But if you want to play anyone with any kind of actual power, importance, influence, etc, you have to be from the Noble houses, which are all apparently white-as-the-driven-snow.

Which is exactly the kind of systemic racism that we're still dealing with. So it doesn't even get a wash for not-actually-monoethnic because it's creating a clear power disparity for those who aren't in the Superior Caste.

I want to make that very clear.

And for those of you who questioned this before, let me say this very loudly:

Racism. Is. Wrong. This is not an argument, this is a statement of principle. I and @reimesu had a long discussion about whether we wanted to try to sieve out the Mod Voice stuff from the Personal Voice stuff on this one, and while I didn't get a chance to chat with @Runescryer about it I'm pretty sure that we're all on the same page:

MSB doesn't support racism and we absolutely will not be "fairly engaging" with racist ideas in an attempt for someone to try to justify why their bigotry is acceptable based on some kind of convoluted logic dance.

Nope.

@Thenomain said in Identifying Major Issues:

@Derp said in Identifying Major Issues:

@Thenomain said in Identifying Major Issues:

There's absolutely zero reason, at all, even a little, for a game to need your email address.

You mean except for all those @surreality listed above?

Those aren't needs. Those are tools that can be handy for the player. I've never asked a player to prove that they were who they said they were with an email address, though I can understand if someone wants to. Need? No.

So no, nothing Surreality said is a requirement. As she said, and even stressed, they are OPT IN systems. Last I checked my definitions of things, this doesn't mean "need".

In her system they are not. Her system is not all systems. I will decide, as a game owner, what I require from players who want to play. You can play the semantics game all you want to here. What a game needs from players is whatever the game owner decides the baseline is. Players can choose to join in with that or not.

Car dealerships don't need to see your identification before you buy a car, either, but good luck finding one that won't require it. They may be out there though. Happy hunting.

It's not a bar for entry.

So?

I'm serious. So what? Something not being "a bar for entry" doesn't make it a good idea. Your logic is flawed and you should feel bad, or whatever Dr. Zoidberg says,

It doesn't make it a bad idea either. Again, it depends on the goals of the game.

And if I'm running a game? Honestly, there are things I will want for my own security and game features that will require this. And if you can't trust me enough to even provide a burner e-mail for that, fine. Play elsewhere. There are other options.

Your logic is still flawed and etc. etc. I don't need your permission not to play your game (something that drives me nuts; staff, I know that I can log out, and I will decide if I'm going to or not, the ball's in your court if you're going to throw me off your game).

No. But you do need my permission to play on it in the first place. You can choose to leave at any time, but my options expand beyond 'am I going to throw you out or not'. I can choose not to let you on in the first place.

You either missed or purposefully ignored the initial point I made: Making a burner email is not in everyone's interest, nor in everyone's capabilities. Expecting people to do so to get around a system is pretty much admitting that the system is flawed.

Look, if you are so bad with technology that you have trouble making an e-mail account? These games are not for you. Your argument there is just flat out weird. If you cannot follow thise kinds of simple tasks, there is no way in hell that you will get a game system, or the complex structure of MU commands, and you damn well know it, so why are you even going there?

Also, I'm sick and tired of people demanding that trust is binary, that you either trust completely or you don't at all. This logic is bad and ... you know the rest.

Who said trust was binary? Show me. I don't recall making that argument. But someone said that trust flows from players to staff, when it in fact goes both ways.

The staff of a game are not your martyrs, and can impose requirements on you since they are incurring costs to provide you something for free. This is a perfectly reasonable requirement to be able to benefit from that.

Wow. You think you're a martyr, now. Look at you, pretending you know what that word means. I'll look impressed just for you.

Really? Because it seems more and more that staff are expected to exclude themselves from things, work in a timely manner for no compensation, and generally take all kinds of blows from players because of 'trust'. How many games keep staff pcs from having positions of power for instance? Or expect that staff gain no benefit from being staff?

There is an expectation now that staff should be less empowered than players, should sacrifice their own fun and expectations to make players happy, etc, and it's frankly bullshit. Players are not customers, a MU is not a business, and this 'the customer is always right' attitude is a bunch of crap. It's someone's digital house that you are a guest in. If you don't agree with the house rules, don't come in.

No, it's not martyring asking players to do something, but don't pretend it's because it's a) easy to get around therefore it's perfectly sensible to demand it, or b) that it's necessary for 99% of Mu* systems. It's not.

Easy to get around or not, it is a reasonable requirement. And again, the game owner decides what is necessary for their game. Players can agree or disagree.

@tiredewok said in MUs That We Would Love To Make (But Won't):

I can't wait to play a space elf!

They're called Vulcans. God.

@hobos

I don't begrudge them anything. I don't think anyone is an evil villain in this story. Two groups had a disagreement, and one of them decided to part ways and do their own thing. It's a tale as old as time.

It's also an action that I approve of, as I'm sure @Ganymede does as well. Competition is healthy. It's a crucible that lets you really refine what you're going for and appeal to the crowd you're seeking to attract. If there's one thing that we learned when MSB was dying a slow death due to Redis weirdness, it's that there really weren't any alternatives out there if, for some reason, the server that MSB is stored on catches fire tomorrow.

Now there is an alternative. People have choices. Two different cultures can come out of it. Or, if not that, then at least there are options and redundancy for if something terrible happens to one or the other.

I don't wish any of them ill-will. That's not what the post was about. It's just not something that we want to see here.

Most of the folks over there aren't banned from here. I'm sure that no small few of them will wander to one or the other, and a large chunk of them will stay on both. Nobody is persona non grata unless they've deliberately gone out of their way to be so, and even then we've decided that a few of them were edge cases enough that they were probably a bridge too far.

Hopefully the few that are trying to get out their last hurrahs or whatever get it out of their system soon, so that we can move on to something more interesting and everyone can get settled into their respective preferences.