Posts made by Ganymede

@Cupcake said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:

Do I think staff overreacted?

Yes.

This really doesn't have to do with you. It never did.

You never owed me an explanation or answer or opinion. If @lordbelh's still watching, though, I think he appreciates the support. As do I.

But, you refrained from talking. And I'm guessing that this is for cause. Because few of us paused to shit on Fallcoast or The Reach. We shit on it, and we gleefully did so, even though many of us still played on it.

No one should ever be concerned that what they say here will come back to haunt them on a game. Ever. That's why places like this exist.

Just ignore what @Thenomain said. I'm far too stupid and impulsive to be villainous.

@Cupcake said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:

I realize you're probably just using my post to leapfrog, but it kind of came off like that was a direct snark at me. If it wasn't, I apologize for assuming.

I was using your post as a leap-frog point, yes. The phrasing was just what I was looking for. I'm more direct in my snark than that.

But, in a way, yes. I'm being snarky. And I'm being snarky because what was said about keeping one's opinions to themselves seems to be holding true. And if it is holding true, then there is a problem here beyond @lordbelh. And this is far more important to the game than what's happening IC with the Thrax family.

A friend of mine here once reminded me about the importance of standing up and making a point, regardless of whether it benefits me personally. That is the case here.

@Cupcake said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:

I kind of feel compelled to point out that this isn't a static issue.

I kind of feel compelled to point out that, while many of you have expressed seeing @lordbelh go, few seem to be intent on why this occurred.

I also kind of feel compelled to point out that, while at least one has expressed the fear of saying anything contrary to the status quo, no one has given many fucks as to why, or what will be done to fix that.

@Tinuviel said in RL Anger:

I'm almost 100% certain that's not something I want to google.

She said 'labral', not 'labial'.

@Lisse24 said in Politics etc.:

And when are you opening a game, hrm?

Shut up.

My system needs playtesting. I'm this close to getting the rule set ready for alpha. Then it falls to my trusty coders to do their work on their time.

@mietze said in Politics etc.:

It was eye opening to see how much staff can have an impact--but also to see how high the bar truly is for sustaining things long term.

They did not do themselves any favors by being overly-draconian. Staff members could not hold any titles, and I believe they could only have territory is vassaled. I expressly refused to staff there because I felt my PC had more value as a political player, which I could not do if I was staff.

I respect their goal, but they made the bar so high so as to discourage anyone from wanting to be staff. And, in the end, they were unable to sustain the game.

That's not to say that I would not advocate similar policies on my game, but they will be better moderated so as to not discourage people from wanting to staff to help the game out.

@Roz said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:

I am pretty sure that neither of the two recent bans (or any others that I've heard about, really) were really only because of one single conversation with no prior history of conflict. There's usually a final straw in instances like this, but it's rarely the first straw.

What are you basing this on?

@Arkandel said in Politics etc.:

If I'm negatively predisposed toward your character because FUCK GANY and so are all my entrenched buddies because we're a hivemind, even if you play your heart out you can only make so much leeway.

So?

You're not the entirety of the game, and, if you were, I simply wouldn't play there.

The fun is having everyone else turn on you and watching you flail in the above situation. And having you resort to brute tactics, only to be slapped the fuck down.

Intelligence also includes knowing when and if to fight.

@lordbelh said in Politics etc.:

RfK 2.0 was run by people who, frankly, were incompetent. No offense to them, either. I figure they tried their best. But they didn't have the skills to staff a political game.

RfK 1.0 worked on auto-pilot for how long? Mostly because the players were intelligent and motivated enough to scheme among themselves.

I don't blame everything on the staff, but you're probably right on that. They dropped the ball more than once -- and dropped it hard.

Still, I sit on my point. Intelligent people figure out politics. Brutes resort to brute tactics.

@lordbelh said in Politics etc.:

I don't generally think intelligence has much to do with it. People will conform to the culture of the game. Smart people make terrible choices all the time.

There's a difference between making a bad choice and not realizing there's a choice at all.

An intelligent player is going to cream you in politics. Period. This happens time and time again. Be it you or HelloRaptor before he went crazy, you don't stand a chance against a player that understands how politics works. Unfortunately, most players don't -- and don't bother taking the time to consider it.

You can give people the tools, like on RfK, but you cannot force them to use them. Which is why RfK's second version failed so quickly.

@Auspice

@Arkandel said in Politics etc.:

The problem is when the only tool you have is a hammer every problem looks like a nail.

The other problem is when your players lack the intelligence to look at something other than a hammer as a viable option.

@Gingerlily said in Politics etc.:

What do you think would work for something that wasn't WoD?

I don't think any of the above is unique to the vampire game. It is easier to describe in vampire terms, but it could exist anywhere.

@Lisse24

I concur with your additional points.

@Three-Eyed-Crow said in RL Anger:

Maybe there was no way to port it well if they were being faithful.

This is my take on it.

I mean, when you start to poke at canon material too much, you get The Man of Steel.

@lordbelh said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:

Also, sorry for any trouble with the storylines connected to Victus that are about to be disrupted.

Not the Primarch!

Pew pew pew, my friend. Pew, pew.

@Gingerlily said in Politics etc.:

A lot of people have mentioned how cool the politics rp was on that game, I never played there. What was in place to make it work so well for so many people? Could it be adapted to something that wasn't WoD? Tell me more about these boons.

Aside from having the right mix of players and the proper distance of staff (the Head Wiz eschewed RPing; staff members were prohibited from holding all but the most minor positions of power), the political game worked on the following levels:

1. Generally low-powered PCs. Most PCs hovered between 50-100 XP, with the big-movers-and-shakers having maybe 50 XP more. This was accomplished with nWoD's GMC/CoD XP system, with escalating beat-costs-per-XP; the more XP you have the more beats needed to get an XP (normally, it's 5 per XP, but it would go up to 6 or 7 with each 50 XP).

2. Caps on beats for RP. The most onerous part was how you had to claim beats after RP, depending on the kind of RP you engaged in. RP could be categorized as in-theme, general, goal-driven, etc. You could only claim a certain number of beats per week. This did not just throttle XP-gain; it also directed players to try to get into particular scenes in order to be able to claim those beats. Staff on the back end had to review and approve of all the claimed beats on a weekly basis, which was probably super-tedious.

3. Shit to do. Every now and again, there were crises that had to be taken care of in the city: generally, it was occultish shit, but it could be as simple as a Strix or two. If you took care of anything in the city, that could be reported to the local Harpy PCs, which would then create a report that would be published.

4. Player-controlled status. The Harpies had the ability to award status, and were player-controlled. You'd think that everyone would want to be a Harpy, except that they were constantly harassed/bugged about status choices all the time, with people wanting to depose them left-right-and-center for being "biased" and "unfair." But this was all IC, and people, I think, knew that. If you were a Harpy that was too biased, you'd probably get your head removed or unseated.

5. Boons. The Harpies also kept track of the promises people did or did not keep. Although there was code to list boons, these had to be reviewed and approved of by the Harpies. Again, the players had control of this aspect of the political game, and it was important that they did.

With the above, you had to make friends quick: (1) to get XP quick via RP; (2) to make sure you weren't gacked (which was easier because, again, low levels of power); (3) do shit to get recognized; (4) make peace with and be nice to the right people; and (5) make sure you paid off your debts. And aside from the approval of beats, much of what went on did so among the players.

You really had to win favors fast. I had an in with @lordbelh, but it came with being constantly scrutinized by his super-paranoid Mekhet and doing all of his shit-jobs. It worked well with my Ventrue handy-man concept.

@Auspice

"Would you like a doughnut?" And then the murders began.

@Coin said in Marvel: 1963:

For example, in the Marvel universe, mutants suffer a lot of persecution (let's ignore the fact that Average Joe and Jane seem to have a special radar and are always able to tell when someone is a mutant, and thus worthy of persectuion, and when they aren't, and thus worthy of trust because superheroes). Meanwhile, in DC, most metahumans (many of which are essentially 'DC's mutants' since it's basically just 'born with these powers randomly') are not.

The Kingdom Come series portrays an interesting setting where metahumans are, actually, sort of persecuted. By other metahumans. I'm a huge fan of it.

I figure that metahumans are treated with suspicion and wariness, regardless. People probably don't fuck with them because Superman appeared, and everyone was, like, wtf how do u persecute that dood???

@Monogram

Hell yeah.

Here's to Shawn James. Fuck, that song is deep-powerful-soul.