Best posts made by faraday

@popes said in Whatever Happened To Star Wars MU*s?:

I think there's a FFG plugin for Ares?

There is, but it comes down to what @Auspice said earlier - a great many SW players are more interested in the gritty simulationist aspects. They want gear lists and ship code and all these ancillary systems. Ares just provides a chargen + die roller; doing the rest of it would require a crap-ton of custom code, and that's a big barrier to getting a game off the ground.

@Arkandel said in Whatever Happened To Star Wars MU*s?:

It's like going to a fantasy MUSH and only being allowed to play peasants until you can earn the right to roll a Lord or Lady.

Except in the "Rebels" era, it's more like going to a fantasy MUSH and not getting to play the king. It's not like Jedi are an entire class of citizenry like lords/ladies, they're crazy-rare as an intrinsic part of the setting. Sure you could do KoTOR or whatever, but for some folks (like me) it's the rebels vs. empire that are interesting, not jedis running around rampant.

@Arkandel said in Whatever Happened To Star Wars MU*s?:

The playerbase being spread out between different planets, galaxies, etc.

This was a big problem even in early SW games. Some of my earliest MU experiences were being frustrated as all heck because I was stuck on a planet with no RP. It's only compounded with the smaller playerbases of modern MUs.

@Ghost said in Whatever Happened To Star Wars MU*s?:

By this I mean that if you go onto a Battlestar Galactica game, you'll probably come across players who were on the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh etc Battlestar Game that has come and gone. With enough time in the hobby you may notice that players and/or characters tend to repeat things from game to game.

That does happen in every genre (I know WoD players have complained about it too), but I really don't think it's as widespread of a problem as you make it out to be. I've played on most of the BSG games that have been made, but I can count on one hand the number of blatantly-repeated characters. I don't really think it's cause for concern.

@Kanye-Qwest said in The ADD/ADHD Thread (cont'd from Peeves):

IDK. Feels a lot like a disorder to me.

I get where the guy is coming from, but I think he's downplaying the negatives too much. I tell my kids (both of whom have ADHD, one mixed with OCD) that their challenge is also their superpower. Multi-tasking, trying new things, boundless energy, hyper-focus... there are aspects of ADHD that are definitely advantages in some situations. But much of our society (work/school/etc.) is centered around situations where those things are liabilities. That's why it's recognized as a disorder.

I actually thought the discussion was pretty tame by MSB standards. Go figure.

@WildBaboons said in Wheel of Time:

political Game then Arx may be the way to go.

Yeah I think you have to look at the sum total of all the coded systems that you intend to make for your game.

Ares comes with a ton of social features out of the box, and a fleshed-out web portal, but it doesn't have much of anything in the way of in-game systems because a) those are highly game-specific and I don't see much point in trying to make a generic econ system, for instance, and b) I hate those type of systems personally so my motivation to make them is nil.

So if you want a lot of in-game immersion/economy/organization/crafting/etc. type code, then an Arx-derivative Evennia platform may well give you a leg up when all's said and done, even if you have to cobble together some of the more MUSH-like features yourself.

@Arkandel - To be clear, I'm speaking in generalities. I have no idea what the post that started this thread was all about, as it was in a thread I didn't read about a game I have no interest in. That said, I agree with this:

@sunny said in Regarding administration on MSB:

I'm not just like arguing semantics here. There is a difference between 'don't do this' and 'don't do this unless the game runner, who we'll contact, doesn't mind'.

The rules for the ads forum rather clearly and explicitly say "negative stuff to a different thread". It doesn't say "... unless the game-runner doesn't mind" or "...only if the game-runner requests".

If that's the actual policy, then just add it. No biggie. But then you'll have to have a back-and-forth with the game runner any time you or they think that something should be moved. That sounds like a PITA to me but I'm not the one who has to deal with it.

@Thenomain genesismuds, thirdhosting, mudmagic... there are a bunch of them.

@Wretched That article is so on-point, thanks for sharing.

Re: calendars -- I can't use electronic calendars. I've tried, but I constantly forget that they exist. It has to be physical and in-my-face every time I walk into the kitchen so I can see that I have something to do tomorrow. Even the ones that do pop-up reminders, I'll be like: "Yeah, yeah, I know..." then promptly get drawn into something else and forget. I will set electronic reminders on Alexa or whatnot, but it can't be my only tracker.

@three-eyed-crow said in Hello MSBites! Grade your administrators.:

I mean I was flagging that particular dude's posts like WHOA because he was clearly just off his nut in a way I found more sad than funny. Not like that registers outside the admins, though.

I flagged them at least once myself, but y'know ... when the guy who did something horrible is not only not banned but the horrible post you're complaining about is still there ... it sends a message. It sends a message to the people complaining that their complaint doesn't matter so why bother. And it sends a message to others reading the boards that such behavior is okay.

@ganymede said in Hello MSBites! Grade your administrators.:

So, we're all here good with my taking the mantle of permanent despot, right?

Aren't you guys already permanent despots?

@lithium said in Hello MSBites! Grade your administrators.:

Venting is how some people move through stuff and move on. Without that outlet it's just going to make the explosions when they happen elsewhere be all the more messy.

Everybody vents. It's good for us up to a point. Venting in public is generally not considered a healthy behavior, though. And repeated venting in a space turns it into a very negative space. I think it's naive to think that you can have a negative space right next to a 'constructive' space and not have some of that negativity bleed over.

But the mods have repeatedly and firmly affirmed their commitment to the Hog Pit so anybody talking about its merits are really only engaging in philosophical debate.

@gryphter said in Wheel of Time:

Ease of connection while on a VPN for remote work is a huge factor for me also, and Evennia nails this with its web portal client.

Separate post, not really related to this - but Ares also offers both a simple portal client similar to Evennia and a way to play entirely through a web page much in the same way that forum software works. I can use that through a VPN and many other folks are able to RP from school/work, so if something in particular isn't working I'd love to know about it.

@surreality said in Regarding administration on MSB:

Some folks are so sensitive to any criticism that they actually can't handle anything other than praise -- and most can agree that's not healthy -- so if we're focusing on making every sector of the forum a welcoming embrace to all sensitivities

For goodness sake, there's a difference between "criticism" and calling someone a "shit-flinging howler monkey". And the fact that this is even being debated is exactly the thing that's driving people like me away from this forum.

My post-apoc game was set in Maine, in a rural town with a population of about 2000 people.

So there's been at least one MU using the "largely rural and heavily forested with a low population density" setting of actual Maine

@Alamias said in The ADD/ADHD Thread (cont'd from Peeves):

Edited to add: One way I deal with it is set an alarm to go off the time the meeting is supposed to start, so when it goes off I know I have to get up and leave.

I always have two alarms for anything important:

1. Hey you have to go soon.
2. HEY YOU REALLY HAVE TO GO NOW

@apos said in Hello MSBites! Grade your administrators.:

So why not an inverse Hog Pit that's also opt in, but extremely heavily moderated and posts have to be in a respectful and civil way, with courtesy and care to avoid starting arguments?

I wouldn't be opposed to that, but I think the core of the issue is that @Arkandel in particular (and I'm not sure about @Auspice and @Ganymede) really just don't want to moderate except in the absolute most extreme instances of hate/harassment. And hey - I can respect that. I personally wouldn't want to deal with the headache of moderating this forum either.

But if that's the case, then let's stop pretending this is a moderated forum. We have admins, not mods. Accept the reality that it's WORA 2.0 - sink-or-swim, (almost) no holds barred - and continue to deal with the consequences. Either someone will eventually create an IGU2.0 that is moderated, or we'll all just accept what we got and not have to have dozens of pages arguing about how different "factions" within the board would like it to be.

I like documenting NPCs. We had a minimal NPC roster on BSGU and at least one of the NPCs got so popular that somebody made them up as a roster PC and they got played and it was awesome.

I tried a more in-depth one on BSP years before with a system that had notes and backstory and everything but honestly it barely got used. I think the more ornamentation there is on a system - the more 'work' it is - the less people are inclined to use it.

@tempest said in Charging for MU* Code?:

They are delivering you a product. You do not get any say at all in how they are making that product.

Yeah, that's really actually not how software development works. So best of luck to Theno and anyone else who decides to try to negotiate a software contract, a feat that even professional software dev companies struggle with daily.

@devrex The whole point is that people don't maintain solid control of a character.

And yeah, that's a pretty 'out there' concept for most of us, but that doesn't mean that it's an inherently terrible idea.

I mean, TGG managed to have a game where your characters were killed off like the WWI cannon fodder they were. It was niche, but people still played. You never know.

There are also other online RP forums where there's more community control over characters (though probably not quite to this degree). Storium lets players have far more control over storyteller-run NPCs and other PCs to a degree that still makes me feel weird.

@JinShei said in Health and Wealth and GrownUp Stuff:

And a dozen other things known to medics. 80% of chest exams are done with listening and looking, and not by pain symptoms. So. Yes, could be those, or something else. I could list a dozen other things but the thing is - without a physical exam, I can't tell. And I'm trained to be able to diagnose.

Echoing this as another medic. There are dozens of things it could be. Telling somebody not to go to the doctor because there's "probably nothing to be done about it" is not only bad advice, but potentially dangerous advice.

@surreality said in Hello MSBites! Grade your administrators.:

One True Way-ists

In my experience it's been the One True Way-ists who have instigated a lot of firestorms outside the hog pit. Because come on... if you say "X is the dumbest thing ever, it's everything that's wrong with MUSHing", that's about as much a glove to the face as saying to a Trekkie "OMG I can't believe people actually watch Star Trek. Yuck." Gamers are passionate about the things we like. And when people call the things we like dumb, we get worked up about it.

I think a great deal of drama in the constructive threads would be averted if more folks would just acknowledge that there is not just one "right" way of doing something. And yes, I'm guilty of it too sometimes and I don't mind being called out on it. I see that as something that more active moderation could address by nudging people to tone down the hyperbole. Because regular posters doing it just gets ignored (believe me, I've tried, and so have others.)

There's been an interesting discussion among the AresMUSH community about whether to store pages to the database, in the same way as mail messages and channel chat (if channel recall is enabled).

This is not a unique idea. It's the basis for how private messages work on virtually every forum and chat system out there. Historically, though, a lot of MU folks have had a knee-jerk reaction about this feature. I'm wondering if that's still true.

The main thing driving this on Ares is folks wanting to be able to page via the web portal, but there are other non-web advantages: a page/recall feature, being able to report harassing pages, and so on.

The main argument I've heard against it is privacy, and I would hate for this to be some deal-breaker that makes people shy away from Ares games. (Initial push-back is why I haven't already implemented it.) But let's be honest - no text you send to someone else's server is ever truly private. If a nefarious staff member with wizard privileges wants your pages, they can already get them (on any MU server).

Feel free to chime in with your opinions here (please remember this is the constructive area), and take my survey if you like.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/75NNHKT

Even if you don't already play on Ares games, you might find one someday and your opinion still counts.

@surreality said in Repurposing a Tabletop RPG for MU* Play:

There are real reasons the LARP rules are different from the tabletop rules.

Totally agree with the whole post. Look at how people actually play (and how you want them to play for a hypothetical new MUSH) and then figure out which parts of the tabletop system support that and which parts you need to throw out.

Like - I love Shadowrun but the base rulebook is hundreds of pages with hundreds of "it does this... except when it doesn't" type of twists and turns. That's an utterly absurd level of mechanics for a MUSH where people are running around doing BarRP and political plots with an occasional gang fight.

Strip it down. Way down. Reminds me of this scene from Armageddon where they're taking all the useless junk out of the Armadillo. Then you'll have something that's more suited for strangers interacting without a GM on the internet.