Posts made by faraday

@Wretched I never understood those questions. People plan? Like, their lives? My brain doesn't even comprehend how that's a thing people do.

@Wizz Making a game is a ton of work no matter what. My only goal is that code is not the defining obstacle

Yeah, the whole point of Ares is so that people don't need to know code to run a game.

But it all comes down to what type of player experience you want. Sure, if you want to use a custom system (not FS3/Fate/FFG/Cortex, which are already built) and you want coded chargen/xp and automated dice rolling to account for modifiers, skill+attribute, opposed rolls, etc. you're going to need to write a crap ton of code. There's no avoiding that. But that's not the only way to run a game. Text or PDF-based manual character sheets and dice 2d6 works fine for some folks.

@insomniac7809 said in The ADD/ADHD Thread (cont'd from Peeves):

@Tributary This is not an unfamiliar issue.

Not at all, unfortunately. Consolations.

There is already a tool where you can convey expectations for a scene, whether it's "Only Viper pilots" or "Super-slow work scene" or whatever.

The real issue is that if folks come into it with "Oh well everybody knows that the expectations are <blank>, I don't need to say anything." So that's where having a game-wide expectation can help.

If people bother to read and remember it. Which a lot won't. So yeah... social contracts are hard to manage with technology.

@Cobaltasaurus said in Pacing in Ares Scenes:

a "slow web scene" or a "live scene".

I looked into adding a 'pacing' tag to the scenes, but the issue is that it's not as cut and dried as fast/slow. As we've seen here, everybody has their own definitions. And as I've seen in Storium, a lot of folks just flat-out ignore the setting, where even games marked as "Normal" (2-3 scenes per week, ideally) will go weeks between poses. It's actually pretty maddening.

It's a social contract. I don't see it as any different than if I'm playing on a TinyMUX game taking an hour to craft a 3-paragraph masterpiece while everybody else is tossing out a few lines every 15 minutes. It's good if a game has a sort of "default" expectation, but it's really something that everyone should get on the same page about.

@mietze said in Pacing in Ares Scenes:

Or a time stamp visible on scenes in progress, ect. So that people can make decisions prior to hopping in before they wait for hours or get run over thinking its a slower scene.

There is a timestamp for last activity.

@Three-Eyed-Crow said in Pacing in Ares Scenes:

Also, what do people think a good 'standard' is for Open/non-Limited scenes, if one is having a standard?

Forgot this part. I think each game should set their own 'conventions' about the general expectations, and when players should use Limited tags or content warnings to advise people to expect something different.

Just as in Penn or Tiny games, it depends entirely on the game's customs, the people involved, and the expectations. There is no one universal constant.

On my last Penn game, I had scenes with Friend A who'd pose once every couple hours. I had scenes with Friend B who was on a different timezone and we'd pose at each other via Google Docs once every couple days. I had scenes with Friends C & D who'd pose maybe once every 30 minutes. And I had scenes with Friends E & F who were super-fast short-posers who'd pose every five minutes.

I played with all of those same people on Ares and the timing was exactly the same. The only difference was that Friend A no longer needed to worry about keeping a connection open for backscroll, and Friend B and me no longer needed to use a G-Doc because async RP can happen within the game itself.

If more non-live scenes are happening on Ares, it's not because of the server it's because the people involved have been using other tools (like G-Doc or whatever) all along, and now they just have an in-game vehicle for that type of RP.

@Auspice One of my kids has the sensory fabric issues and the difficulty transitioning (being "locked in" once they get into something), which are symptoms of their ADHD. The other has the behind-me thing, which is more tied to their OCD. They are definitely not autistic.

Which is not to say your conclusions are invalid about yourself - you know yourself best, and I am not trying to dissuade you from your self-assessment. I merely use this to illustrate the complexities of diagnosis with overlapping symptoms and other co-morbid conditions.

Flat XP costs lead to the dino effect. That's fine in a TTRPG with a small group, but can lead to big issues on an open MU with characters rolling in all the time.

XP or tiered-cost chargen is complicated, and for many entails even more min-maxing and optimization dilemmas. It also charges people a disproportionate amount for wanting to start out good.

Every system has its pros and cons. There is no universal "one true system" that's best for everyone.

Flat-Chargen/Exponential XP (like FS3 with the default config... which is btw configurable) is really no different than running a D20 game where you can choose whether you start at level 1 or 10. There's nothing inherently bad about starting out at a lower level. You get the rookie and mentor stories, you get to advance faster while the higher level chars become stagnant and hit the level cap. You'd never want to use a system like this on a PVP game, but on a PVE one? It's perfectly workable.

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

et's just say I never, ever, thought some of the things I do/feel/etc, could be autism related. I thought everyone felt/did/etc those things

It's been very interesting for me, learning about neurodiversity, to be like: "Oh, so that's why other people seem to do/feel/see things so differently."

I will point out, though, that there's a fair chunk of overlap between autism and ADHD symptoms. Some researchers are beginning to suspect that they may be on the same spectrum, or very closely related.

This chart is kind of reductive in asserting that all people with ADHD or ASD have the checkmarks, or none of them have the blanks, which is decidedly not true. But it's still useful for highlighting the commonalities.

@mietze said in Water finds a crack:

The fear/obsession that not being The Best means you are Worthless in any kind of rolled scene is something that dies really hard, in my observation.

Yes. On numerous BSG games, numerous times, I've seen dogfights where someone walks away from the scene saying things like: "This was a waste of time / I was useless / etc." just because their character didn't get a "kill". Even if they did damage. Even if they helped to take down one of the enemy planes. Even if they had banter with the other pilots. It's like if no glory was had, if they didn't get to be a big darn hero, then the scene was worthless.

I've never understood that, myself. But if that's the reason someone plays, then being "good" isn't enough. They have to also be better than everyone else.

@insomniac7809 said in Water finds a crack:

If my sheet says "good" but I'm in a six-player scene with three "great" and two "peerless," "good" sucks.

I disagree, honestly. If you're still hitting the bad guys 90% of the time, and you're able to contribute meaningfully to the story, then you're still in fact "good" by any objective measure. It may not be fun for you personally - some people want to play a complete badass and that's okay. I've done that too on some games depending on what type of character I was making. I have also played the clueless newbie who objectively does suck compared to everyone else, and the support character who is good at medic-ing but no use in combat. It all comes down to your personal priorities and likes. No system is right for everyone.

At the risk of being nitpicky, y'all are referring to FS3, not Ares. FS3 is a skill system with the free background skills, slow XP burn, etc. Ares can use any skill system - I've built Cortex, FFG and Fate for Ares, and there's somebody making Pathfinder and WoD games. Ares != FS3.

But yes, the FS3 XP and luck systems were consciously designed to eliminate some common grinds and make FS3 games more palatable for casual players.

However, this point from the article is one of the reasons why some folks hate FS3:

a single, dominant strategy actually takes away choice from a game because all other options are provably sub-optimal

If you want to optimize your character in FS3, you start off with the "important" skills maxxed and don't bother with anything else you can raise later more cheaply. It comes up so often I made a whole article about it.

Personally I don't really care if you want to start out with expert in piloting and gunnery, as long as you have minimal points spread around the other skills your character should have according to the theme. (for instance, my BSG games required all military personnel to have minimal dots in things like first aid and athletics because that's part of basic training).

But some players do mind. Some players hate that they feel like they have to bend the system to be competitive. Some players feel cheated if they try to make a more balanced character while someone else min-maxxed. Or "messed up" their point/xp spends in a sub-optimal way.

So even numbers-light, co-op PVE games are still subject to the issues described in the article.

@Sunny said in Hello!Project's Mysterious Game Project Thread:

This is part of why it's doubly important that you have a firm understanding of what you need the platform to do, because you may have an unmet need that Evennia / Ares don't address, but Rhost does, or some mud platform, or whatever.

Seconded. I focused on Evennia and Ares above because someone mentioned web stuff. If that's your focus, they both come with a website built in. The others have only a minimal web client, AFAIK. Anything more than that you'd have to build entirely from scratch.

That said, there are certain use cases that ONLY Rhost supports easily. So like you said, it all comes down to what your priorities are.

@Wretched Very true. I think it's different for everybody though. Sticky notes work really well for me as long as I don't leave them sitting there long enough for them to become part of the woodwork. Alarms work when accompanied by some external urgency. I've trained my brain to heed the "time to go pick up kids from school" alarm, but the "time to make snacks" alarm tends to get waved off with a "yeah yeah I know, I'll get to it in a minute." (cut to 20 minutes later)

@Auspice That is my life.

@Cobaltasaurus said in Welcome to the Euphoria!:

Can the descs for each room just be: "This is the bridge, use your imagination". Or "This is the medbay, figure it out."

As someone who once literally had a room desc saying little more than: "It's a junkyard. There's... junk... in it." I say go for it. Maybe some of the early players will be motivated enough to contribute descs. You could also just slap some reference pictures on the wiki.

@Derp said in Hello!Project's Mysterious Game Project Thread:

I dunno, man. Xanatos's pad was pretty dope:

That is pretty dope. And hey, if you're happy with the castle/highrise Ares hybrid, go for it. It's open source. Go to town You could build a MUD or a super-immersive thing like Firan with Ares if you took enough of the pieces apart and reassembled them. You just have to ask yourself whether it's worth the effort compared to just building it in Evennia (which is an equally-solid platform more geared toward that sort of game).

@krmbm said in Why no Star Trek games?:

In 20 years of Pern gaming? I honestly have zero memories of ever having a playground fight about it. So going statless can totally work.

I don't discount your experiences, but mine have been polar opposite. I "grew up" on statless consent MUs, and I would never go back. Too much confrontation and drama. I think it probably depends on the player sub-community you're dealing with.

Comic games are also often consent, so I'm definitely not saying that it can't work. Just that I have my pet theory on why it seems to have fallen out of favor, and it has little to do with advancement.

Everybody has something different they want out of a MU. XP/levels/skill advancement has long been the traditional 'carrot on a stick' in RPGs, but it is by no means the only option. Players can be motivated through prestige or rank, recognition (i.e. ooc achievements or in-game medals for achievement), exploration (discovering something new), in-game tallies (like the BSG kill boards), or ticking off boxes on quest lists, just to name a few. And yes, some of us just come for the RP.

Statless games may be pretty rare, but I think that has less to do with a burning need for advancement, and more because we've come to realize that the playground version of cops and robbers ("I got you!" "No you didn't!") doesn't work too great on internet games with strangers.