@Arkandel said in How can everyone play the same game?:
I like the conversations we are having here lately as they are quite constructive and the combined experience and wisdom and differing points of view are really interesting
One of their tangents was making sure everyone is playing the same game. That got me to thinking - how does that work? Once you have an idea, a vision for the kind of MU* you want to create... what needs to be done and what are some good ways to effectively communicate something locked in your head first to other potential staff members then to (heavens forbid) your players so everyone on roughly the same wave length?
One thing that I decided to do was make it as absolutely clear as I could what I expected and what they could expect from me, on an OOC level. This is why I have an going FAQ section. It's not house rules, per se, but it explains what I'm doing and why I'm doing it and how I think it should work. More importantly, it explains what we do not want to see, and the why there.
The clearer your OOC communication on these matters, the better.
For example:
- Is compromise a valuable principle at each stage of that process or does it dilute the vision? Do you need to draw lines in the sand ("my game will NOT focus on politics") or is it better to get buy-in from amalgamized contributions?
To a point. Compromise is fine when you can find a way to work it into the idea that you're trying to sell. Compromise is bad when people try and browbeat you to surrender, and then people learn that if they whine loudly and hard enough, they get whatever they want. We've seen it happen countless times.
I'm always willing to listen, and if we can reach a mutual agreement that's awesome. But my default answer is 'no', or at best 'maybe, if you can sell me on it'. If, for whatever reason, you cannot accept that -- then we have an entirely different problem.
- How useful are wikis? Do you find the information is read? How hard is it to keep it from being stale? Can it serve as a 'true north' of the MU*'s mission statement or is it just words just read over once or glossed over?
I've found that most people don't read wikis. Many people gloss wikis. But they're still useful. They're useful as a respository for the stuff I've done previously. They're useful for not having to answer the same question a thousand times (usually). But most importantly, they're useful to show that, yes, in fact, this policy has been in place since god was a boy, and it was right there the whole time, I didn't just make this up to screw you over. There is a design and a plan.
- How important are in-game channels for the purpose of defining the game's goals and theme? Do they serve a purpose or is that lost in spam or read only by the players actively reading them at the time?
Game channels are useful for facilitating RP, but they can also go too far. Channel for every sub-group out there? You can bet that most people won't be on the main one. And most people won't be on the sub-channels either because then there are just too many channels on.
I'll make channels for things like packs and cabals, and channels for spheres. More than that and we have to have a really good reason for doing so, or else people just use them as an extension of whatever IC/OOC hidey hole they prefer to be in.
- How critical (if at all) are the first PrPs ran either by staff or players? Speaking of, is it important - or possible! - to monitor the latter, and how can it be done efficiently without coming off as micromanaging them?
I do ask that logs of PrPs get posted. This is a pretty effective way of looking over everything and making sure it doesn't go off the rails. I also ask that people give me a thirty-second elevator pitch on the plot that they want to run before they run it. I can usually offer feedback and ideas on what sorts of things would be cool to include, and be on the lookout for pitfalls.
Logger objects make posting logs painfully easy. Making scene xp contigent on the log getting posted makes these easy enough to track. You don't have to read-read it. Just skim for content. It's easy stuff.
