Posts made by faraday

@tinuviel said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

Keeping your pens neat on your desk, or organising things a certain way, is a compulsion. It might even be regarded as obsessive. Unless you have some serious impediment to your function, it's not a disorder.

Look, my family has OCD too and that's just factually incorrect. It is possible to have mild OCD, just as it's possible to have "mild" a whole lot of disorders. The impediment to your function does not need to be serious to qualify as OCD. But don't believe me, check out Psychology Today or a host of other actual resources on the subject.

I agree the term gets overused as @Auspice is griping about. So do ADD, depression, bipolar and other disorders. I'm not saying it's okay to joke about that or whatnot. I'm just saying that it is possible to have a mild, non-debilitating form of these disorders.

@tinuviel said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

I mean. That sort of is the definition of a disorder. Debilitating, like the disorders themselves, is a spectrum. You still have a broken leg, regardless as to whether you can hobble around on crutches or are stuck in a wheelchair.

Yes, which is why I was quibbling with the assertion that someone with just a mild "OC" didn't have a disorder.

@paris said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

I kind of consider it OC without the D, as a lot of these things run on a spectrum. Categorizing your stuff by color may be a little distressing, but you still don't have a disordered life.

I think that's important to highlight. These things are a continuum, not a yes/no. I'm not saying that "I like to have my socks organized" is OCD, but something doesn't have to be debilitating to be a legitimate, diagnosable disorder.

@sunny That’s quite true, but those people, like the immune compromised, could be covered by herd immunity if all the people who -can- get vaccines do. It’s the people willfully opting out that are putting everyone else at risk.

@highfalutin said in AnomJobs - Trouble With Installation:

There's nothing there for Mux. Could that be it?

No. All of the switches seem to have a default value (the final one) for MUs not listed, which would include TinyMUX.

@ganymede I am not on staff so don't take this as speaking for them in any way. But my understanding of non-magic users is that they're basically like the support people in my BSGU game. They're background characters, outside of the main plotlines. Fine for an alt; not advisable as a sole character. From that perspective, it makes complete sense why they would allow them as alts but not let someone new app in as a non-magic person (and probably be disappointed when there isn't much for them to do).

Obviously "interesting" will vary depending on your tastes, but here are some fun things I did when I visited Phoenix:

• Phoenix Zoo - It's a cool zoo, with some neat 'desert-y' exhibits that we don't have out east. And it's right next to...
• Papago Park - Has some cool walking trails and cacti and desert flowers and stuff. The botanical garden and history center are nearby, but I didn't visit those.
• Hall of Flame Museum - I'm in EMS so I was biased, but I think seeing all kinds of old firefighting equipment is neat.
• Horseback Riding - There are various tourist-y stables around the area. (Hey, I'm a city girl. We don't get to do these things when we're not on vacation.)

A little further out of the city (but not as far as Vegas or the Grand Canyon):

• Out of Africa - safari park
• Camp Verde - Fort Verde historical buildings and Montezuma's Castle cave dwellings.

I've felt the same. MUSHing is a fast-paced, time-intensive hobby; no two ways about it. I've taken breaks from the hobby before, because I just didn't have the right blocks of time at the right times of day to RP effectively.

It was my hope that the Ares scene system would enable more organic "slow RP" as @Seraphim73 describes. Not because I want to supplant the "live" MUSH scenes we're all used to, but as an alternative for folks like us who don't want to leave MUSHing but just need a little more flexibility in our RP. Some people use Google Docs for the same. As Seraphim mentioned, it still leaves you out of big events and stuff, which can be frustrating, but it's something?

I've also played around with Storium RP. The pace is slow - sometimes maddeningly slow - and the quality is very hit-or-miss depending on the players. But it's much more friendly to wacky schedules and limited time.

@tinuviel said in What's your favorite MU* client?:

Two inputs means I can have a pose in the works and still answer questions, queries, stupid comments on channels if I so deign.

Yeah I would like having dual input windows, but I can live without them. If the thing-needing-response is in my same input window, I'll generally remember to answer it after I pose. Or I'll copy my pose into a safe buffer if I need to answer right away. (Ares incidentally has save and recall commands to do this for you). It's only when it gets put out of view on a spawn that I have issues remembering to circle back to it. Out of sight, out of mind.

@silverfox said in What's your favorite MU* client?:

That's okay with me though, because I never could use spawns. I did it for like... three months back in 2004, but I found myself unable to ignore the notifications from them. So I would quickly flip over to look, but not really read because I was posing, then forget that it was there! If I turned the notifications off I just never checked them and then missed everything!

That's actually similar to the reason I don't use spawns much. I have one for the public channel, because that gets super-spammy and it generally doesn't matter if I forget to chime in on the latest random conversation. But other than that, if I spawn things it's like... "Oh I should answer that... SQUIRREL!" and I won't get back to it until hours later, feeling guilty.

@arkandel said in What's your favorite MU* client?:

I am the same way but here's a thing; it might be that we're simply used to one interface - after all it's the one we've been using for what, 10-15 years now? - so it's hard to give any other a fair chance if it's different at all.

I think a lot depends on what features you use and how picky (I don't mean that in a bad way) you are about how those features work. I used SimpleMU for over a decade but then I got a Mac and switched to Atlantis. I've also used Potato. I don't really care. They all have the same basic features for the most part.

@sunny said in criticism not allowed in ad threads is only enforcing a false positive, prove me wrong:

@arkandel said in criticism not allowed in ad threads is only enforcing a false positive, prove me wrong:

See why a wiki is better, g'dammit?

No.

ETA: People following the rules, and the rules being enforced consistently, is better.

Yeah, still not seeing the value of the wiki. I mean... "don't post to the ad threads unless you're the OP". How hard is that for people to follow? We're all (allegedly) adults here.

@krmbm I tried to keep it pretty generic and mention differences across servers.

@goldfish said in criticism not allowed in ad threads is only enforcing a false positive, prove me wrong:

I'm just gonna state this: When I made the ad for Echoes, I felt the need to mentally prepare myself for the critics. I'm a sensitive soul but my desire to help out outweighs my nature. Now, if you think that users need to steel themselves before posting an add, fine. If that's not a problem, make a change.

I will second this. I didn't advertise BSGU here for months after the place opened out of fear of getting lambasted by criticism. (It was a player who eventually posted an ad. It didn't go as badly as I'd feared, but nor would I say it was particularly fun either.)

It's all well and good to sit here and say "Well if you can't take criticism, don't make a game."

But here's the other side of it... if you want people making games for you to play on, it helps to treat them and their creations with respect.
This doesn't mean "only say positive things". It means keeping criticism constructive and respectful. (Unless of course they've done something heinous. Then warn away.)

And let's not fool ourselves about the supposed "purpose" of the community being to warn people away from bad apples. Most of the commentary in these ad threads isn't "warning" anyone. It's rants and criticisms and doomsaying about decisions that game-runners have made, and it's freaking demoralizing. Even if it's not your game!

If you think that's beneficial to the community? Well, carry on I guess. It seems to me though that we should be encouraging game-creators, not discouraging them. There are few enough games being made as it is.

Not stomping all over their game advertisement is one way to do this.

@prototart said in criticism not allowed in ad threads is only enforcing a false positive, prove me wrong:

say, having to go to the length of making an account and clicking to view one particular sub forum where it's ok to say "hi this place is run by someone gross"

I will just point out that this is not necessary even if the current rules were enforced. You can a) Link to a game discussion thread from the ad thread as an alert and b) Post criticism about a game in the publicly-viewable Mildly Constructive area as long as you don't turn it into a complete dumpster fire.

@tinuviel said in criticism not allowed in ad threads is only enforcing a false positive, prove me wrong:

This place can't seriously be the only source for information on new and upcoming games...

Do you know of another one? If so please share! TMC is the only other one I know of, and I don't think a lot of MUSHes bother to list themselves there.

@arkandel said in criticism not allowed in ad threads is only enforcing a false positive, prove me wrong:

Especially before the actual design of how the wiki will work or who will be able to edit what has been completed yet.

Fair enough. I'm coming at it from more of the philosophical meaning of "wiki", which is community-edited, moderator-curated. You can certainly use wiki software as more of a locked-down CMS if you do enough gymnastics with permissions.

And I don't think you can argue it would give us options in terms of seeking out games - which is what ads are about - we don't currently have.

But, um... I can and do argue that. I think that an "Ads" section, which was locked-down to JUST ads and updates (and not 27 pages about why people don't like a skill system, had bad experiences, think the forum policies need work, or heaven-knows-what other tangents) is perfectly useful.

Just look at the Playlist threads. They're fine. The owner puts all the relevant info in the first post and 'bumps' the thread when they update it. Occasionally there's some "I knew you when" chatter, but it's pretty limited and tame.

A wiki could organize the info better, sure, but it's a lot more overhead and yet another place to check for information that I think could be addressed perfectly well right here.

ETA: Oh, and if the ads thread were JUST ads, there's no reason not to delete them when a game closes. Thus reducing clutter and helping people find games more easily.

@arkandel said in criticism not allowed in ad threads is only enforcing a false positive, prove me wrong:

So you can be the change you want in the world by stepping up! There's been a post on the Announcement section asking for a volunteer for a short while now, and the position is still unfilled.

Personally I have no interest in managing a wiki for this place because

a) It strikes me as a PITA to now have to check two places for updates, and
b) Perhaps (probably) I'm jaded, but it seems like a moderation nightmare waiting to happen. Especially given how prior attempts at MU game/people wikis have turned out.

So that is not the change I want to see in the world. The change I want to see is a clear, enforced policy on what goes where here.

If the mods don't intend to enforce the "this is not the place for criticism" piece of the Ad Thread Rules of Engagement, then change it. You guys wrote it. Un-write it.

Rename the Ads section to the Games section.

And instead of an "advertisement", it's just a Mildly Constructive "Anything you want to say or ask about this game" thread.

Alternately, enforce the policy as-written and leave the Ad threads for just, y'know, ads.

Either solution would be better than this muddled middle-of-the-road thing we have now, which just gets everyone arguing all the time with "You're not following the rules!" "Well the rules are dumb!"

@tinuviel said in criticism not allowed in ad threads is only enforcing a false positive, prove me wrong:

And when it does become such it is swiftly merged with the "you can't post that here" flailing (no, I won't stop going on about it it annoys me) for eventually @Arkandel to show up and sort of shrug about it.

Well, it annoys me when people can't be bothered to follow the posted rules of a forum, and when the moderators can't be bothered to enforce their own posted rules. So I'd say we're even. Shall we keep ranting in circles about it or call it a day?

@roz said in criticism not allowed in ad threads is only enforcing a false positive, prove me wrong:

To my memory, the reason for not locking the initial ad posts was so that people could ask game questions and have them answered. Which is not an endorsement or condemnation, but I think at least one person was like "I don't know why they don't just lock the threads." I believe that was the idea.

I realize that was the idea. My observation is that it just doesn't work because people can't limit themselves to just Q&A. It swiftly becomes Q&A+commentary+random enthusiasm+criticism.

Of course we could make the ad threads be "anything about the game, good or bad" dumping ground, but that kinda seems to defeat the purpose of an ad to me. The other easy alternative is just having two threads - one that's just an ad & updates, the other that's game discussion if people want to discuss.

Nobody is saying there shouldn't be a place to discuss games and ask questions. The only thing at issue is where.