Posts made by Derp

@Ganymede said:

@Derp

I used to think that way until I got kids on my own. It's not always that simple.

Ah. Yes. I do happen to be childless (to my knowledge), so I suppose that I can't directly relate to these circumstances.

@Arkandel

Had to gank this from the other post, but:

@Eerie said:

. The reason for the sphere caps is it's essentially our best guess of how many people we can actively ST for in a way that makes the game feel exciting.

It's ... not really an assumption when the staff says that's the reason for it? And even if that's the case, and it's about workload, there's still gonna be the same number of players, if they're really interested in playing.

To be fair, I understand a sphere cap as a starting-out measure to get your feet on the ground, but unless you're capping everything then this doesn't make a lot of sense, and will eventually create bad blood because ... people hang on to characters.

@HelloRaptor

I'm not sure that I agree with your sentiment there. Anyone can create as much work as anyone else. Simply believing that the full-on supernatural characters are going to be the most active and involved is reaching.

ETA: To be clear, here, I think that Eldritch's staff have been fantastic so far, and I understand why they crafted the policies. I'm not claiming that there's some grand and diabolical conspiracy. I'm simply wondering if maybe the policy as it's been crafted is going to produce the results that it says are desired, and if not, perhaps it could use some polish. It's meant to be a constructive discussion, not a harsh criticism.

@Arkandel said:

@FiranSurvivor AFAIK non-full Supernatural templates aren't capped in any way. You could always even make a Wolfblooded character (for example) and have an in-game First Change when the sphere has room.

I still don't understand how this prevents storyteller burnout, truth be told. Are the stories focused on full-on supernatural characters? Because it seems tha 2.0 is really focused on the agency of the minor templates.

I mean, that totally might not be what's going on, mind you. It just... I dunno. Kind of seems weird to me, as a policy. Sphere caps on full supers to prevent ST burnout while not capping anything else seems to ring of the idea that everyone else is secondary.

@Ganymede said:

@HelloRaptor said:

@Ganymede

if the kid was kicking somebody in the head,

Dude, I didn't say anything, man.

That said, I concur with the point that parents ought to manage their kids when they are in public. I concur with @Cobaltasaurus that special-needs kids should get more of a pass on bad behavior, but also agree that there were ways to accommodate that child, if he had special needs, that the parent should have explored.

Like a babysitter. If mom and dad need to get out that damn badly, this is the perfect option. No kid, fun times, nobody suffers.

@Sponge said:

Just finished The Babadook. The first third of the movie I wanted the kid to be gone. About halfway through it started to get creepy. Then it kind of fizzled out with a Stephen King ending.

Agreed. I liked the overall story, but that kid grated on me like woah. The ending was aight. I think I'd compare it more to M Night than King though.

@il-volpe

I am firmly of the mind that in games where communication through text is the only form of medium one can use to transmit information, there are other things that have to come into play that wouldn't normally come into play at the regular gaming table, some of which I find to be highly lacking among staffers.

Being able to clearly articulate your decision is an important skill, for one. Please know the exact scope of the problem that you're attempting to address, and craft a rule based on that scope. Please, please do not just arbitrarily throw up a rule with vague wording and a broad scope and consider it done, because you may have created even more problems than what you just solved, especially if you're playing World of Darkness games. There are so many places when where you could break something by being overly broad, or overly vague. Be specific, and tailor the rule to the exact specifications to address the problem. Expand it later if necessary.

In the same vein, and in my opinion more importantly, include the reasoning that went into the creation of the rule in the first place. If you are using a wiki, this is the perfect use for the discussion tab of your house rules page. You can keep the rule there, as is, but put the thought process in the discussion page so that not only the players but also your future staffers know why the rule was created, what circumstances it was intended to solve, etc. I've seen dozens of examples of people saying 'oh, well, this rule might not make sense to you, but it made sense to us at the time' and nobody can explain what whimsical flight of imaginative fancy generated it in the first place. Staffers feel constrained to keep it in place because they don't know the history, players get upset if it's removed without some reference as to what's replacing the rule, because those who were around for its inception remember that there was a problem (but rarely can they remember what it was, or tell you how this fixed it beyond "It totally threw a wrench in the gears of the mechanic that did it!"). In short, decisions without adequate documentation that is available to those who are affected by it is poor form.

I've heard complaints by staffers to the effect of "Well, we don't feel like making everything public." This is also poor form. It's a public game, in most instances. You don't have to divulge every dirty secret that happens behind the ST screen (for instance, player names can be changed to protect the innocent or not-so-innocent), but the methodologies employed should absolutely be visible. Staffers also like to sometimes use the idea that players will reject the reasoning of the rule, and so not make those details public. I find this equally silly. Players are intelligent, and they are as invested and well-versed in the game as the staff is. Sometimes even moreso. . Those processes should be open to player review if for no other reason than it is perfectly likely that one of your players could craft a better alternative than the one that the staffers did. This is not something to be feared. This is something to be encouraged. This means that your players are active, participatory, and feel like they have the power to make real contributions to the gaming environment. That is an excellent way to encourage player participation.

All of these things will contribute to a better gaming environment by keeping both players and staff, present and future, in the loop as to what information is necessary in order to gauge the environment they're playing in, which in turn should lead to much less confusion about what is or is not above the board, both in reality and appearance.

@7Wonders said:

Re: PBs.

I will never understand the wikis with multiple pics of a PB (usually female) that are intended to be sexual. By that I mean, sexualized topless shots or that old gem of thumbs hooked into the g-string as if to say 'teehee! I'm about to whip these off!'

The wiki goes on to say that the PC loves to nail anything with a pulse in game but the out of game information goes on for several paragraphs how they don't TS so don't ask and don't try and don't even look at my PC like that.

Don't want TS? That's cool, a lot of people aren't that into it. Playing a PC whose sexual exploits are all FTB, offscreen fun times? No problem here! But why then would you make this way sexualized wiki with soft core (or sometimes hard core) skin shots only to vehemently and often combatively make it known that you refuse TS on a blanket level? Wouldn't telling people on your PC wiki page that your PC likes to love their fellow man a lot without all the over the top visual aids just uh, be enough?

I think part of this is the culture of TS-shaming that tends to happen. Liking on screen sexitimes -and being ok with admitting that openly- gets people to stare down their noses at you. I don't understand how or why it works like that, but it's like... private promiscuity is cool and open promiscuity is not.

We're all adults. Why can't we just say we like sex?

@Thenomain said:

(n.b., If you can get to the server before the server upgrade is complete, please tell me what the cost is for your amazing demonic powers.)

I think the going rate is fourteen boxes of Turkish Delight, a professional quality porn star audition tape of yourself, and a brief essay describing why and how Tears for Fears was the voice of a generation.

There may also be some tax included, I'm not sure. Been awhile.

@Tempest said:

@Coin said:

@Derp

I would actually really like it if we could tag NSFW pages with a Category:NSFW and it would make anyone going to one of those have to go through a filter page that says, 'are you sure you want to see something NSFW?'

That would be ballz. Especially if you could opt out.

I wish games were more strict about character wiki pictures. It's like some people have no common sense when it comes to their "pb pictures" or I guess just can't play a sexpot without nearly erotic pics to support them. Sure, maybe they don't post outright nudes, but goddamn some people come close.

Would you find it more acceptable if such things were under collapsed categories, or maybe under their own subpages?

@Arkandel said:

@Tempest said:

Slightly off topic. I have no problem with TS, in some sort of context, I don't even care if there wasn't any lead-up RP besides one pose saying "joe and jane met in the bar and went back to jane's place", but I get really bothered by people who send random semi-sexual (or blatantly) pages or ooc poses/etc when in the ooc room or alone in some room for whatever reason. And there seem to be quite a few of them.

Yeah, on non-sex based games that's creepy. There's flirting, and there's ... that.

I generally only engage in TS if it is somehow appropriate for the character and the context. There are times when sex is a valid part of a story, or can be entertaining. But I have (thankfully) never witnessed someone doing this in the OOC rooms. That -would- just be creepy.

@Three-Eyed-Crow said:

Nothing wrong with that.

I'm happy to waste some time on People of Wal-Mart now and then, but I would NEVER read it at work.

Oh, I didn't mean that it was a bad thing. Simply that there are already some existing safeguards. Me being sad does not equate with thing being bad. I should have clarified that.

@Coin said:

@Derp

I would actually really like it if we could tag NSFW pages with a Category:NSFW and it would make anyone going to one of those have to go through a filter page that says, 'are you sure you want to see something NSFW?'

That would be ballz. Especially if you could opt out.

I could definitely see that being useful for other games! On Eldritch, I'm not sure it's that much of an issue. You already have some pretty conservative wiki policies on appropriate imagery (I've read them, and I sadded, because there was a picture that I wanted to post where like, the top half of a butt is visible, but it went against the guidelines, so I didn't....). I think that adding it for text might be a bit extraneous unless the opt-out you're referring to is setting the filter to 'off', in which case that's cooler. Otherwise it seems sort of burdensome if you're just going to straight text, which is generally more acceptable than imagery, don't you think?

Though I could see how this would have its uses, too, especially for remarkably strict employers, but that also depends heavily on them being categorized properly.

Edit to Add: To Clarify, this is assuming that it does what Theno says and marks every instance of the link with the NSFW if it's properly categorized, so like, even on player pages it would clearly read NSFW. Every clickable instance would have that. That's the reason why I say it might not be necessary just for pure text.

@Thenomain said:

If DPL can turn all links, to images or pages or otherwise into the name of the link with (NSFW) after it, I will be very impressed.

You should do this!

@Miss-Demeanor said:

Man, I remember snow. I haven't seen it in awhile, but I remember it! Also... agreeing with @2mspris. Fuck you, pollen. I don't even HAVE allergies and it bothers me just for sheer volume.

Ah, that time of year where every plant in the world decides to forcibly rape your nostrils, causing all sorts of havoc. it's a lovely world we live in

Knowing that I am essentially getting paid to do homework, wherein homework for this class consists of watching Netflix.

I love my job.

I just tried connecting again, and got this:

Connecting to newprospectmush.com:7777...
Connected - 107.178.220.8 (8.220.178.107.bc.googleusercontent.com) - 17/05/2015 - 18:41:14

Sorry, connections are not allowed from this host.
Disconnected from host. - 17/05/2015 - 18:41:14

Since all I did was log on, ask what time the workshop was, and log out, I'm -pretty sure- I didn't do anything to get banned in the downtime, lol. What's the deal?

Are logins disabled?

@silentsophia said:

Honestly, I'm fine with NSFW stuff on a wiki as long as it is marked so I can click into it or catch up on things without having nudes dropped in abruptly. If you post TS logs, some sort of warning would be appreciated so I don't think hey, this is that plot investig-- oh he's investigating something alright.

But I'm not too fussed. I do feel a bit weird when pictures are put up wholesale with water marks (hi suicide girls pictures), but life is too short to worry about it I suspect.

Oh, there's another good topic. Instead of people just expecting logs to be marked hey sexytmes fun ahoy' why don'we just add something to whatever log template we're using where we can put a rating on it? Possibly also with a summary? Just have it post to little parenthesis after the log title for the short rating, with a box inside the log that gives the rating and information on how it got that way in the first place. Use the Motion Picture Association of America rating system, G to NC-17, possibly even adding X and XXX if it's nothing but sexytimes.

That way, marking something NSFW because of 'TS' doesn't put such a stigma on it, when something could also be NSFW because of violence or even language. Most people assume NSFW means that someone is gettin' their kink on, when that's not necessarily the case, and isn't even treated the same as other things that could get that label.

Rated PG13 - Distractingly gay acor in a straight role, goat love and a 70's soundtrack even though it's not the 70's.

@Misadventure said:

It is funny. However, it reeks of self assured blindness. You are very prone to getting staff who are SURE they know whats going on, they suddenly have internet telepathy, and so reductive stereotyping becomes funny.

Tell me how you would feel being treated like that. Staff KNOWS what you think, and why you think it, and can joke at you while they decide to intervene into your play.

Sounds like a great tool for staff you have lied to if you are an asshole player who needs their ego stroked.

Discipline should be impersonal and conducted with an open and serious mind. Not self righteousness and rancor.

I think that it's a fairly straightforward and pragmatic way to approach staffing professionally without making it seem like the most tedious, serious deadly business in the world. Yes, it's funny. It needs to be funny, because you don't want to scare away your new staffers, and it gives guidelines on how to act like a professional in a staffing environment.

Given the alternatives, like the staff at TR and their blind commitment to doing whatever the hell they feel like, regardless of consistency or even things like standard social graces? I'll take this over that shit any day.

Also -- reductive stereotyping in this particular situation, especially when dealing with specific problem players, etc, is often not entirely incorrect. The approaches to take there are all very valid approaches to dealing with things. So stereotyping? Yes. Invalid stereotyping? No, usually, and if it is, it becomes quickly clear.

@DamnitJim said:

Also possible: The God Machine is the DemiUrge.

From wikipeida:

"In the Platonic, Neopythagorean, Middle Platonic, and Neoplatonic schools of philosophy, the demiurge (/ˈdɛmiˌɜrdʒ/) is an artisan-like figure responsible for the fashioning and maintenance of the physical universe. The term was subsequently adopted by the Gnostics. Although a fashioner, the demiurge is not necessarily the same as the creator figure in the familiar monotheistic sense, because both the demiurge itself plus the material from which the demiurge fashions the universe are considered either uncreated and eternal, or the product of some other being, depending on the system."

The God-Machine is God's Machine. His robotic smarthome management system. Except it's run amok.

I like this. A lot.