Best posts made by Ghost

Constructive Devil's Advocacy:

So does this mean that if I really want to play a serial rapist with an immunity to jail time who uses his powers to justify uncomfortable sexual situations, that I can drag all of my Shang friends with me? Can we play a cadre of Furry BDSM experts who don't partake in plot due to what we, OOCly, really want out of the game is to have a new theme space where we can work our kink into roleplay on a new server?

The problem I see with promoting a liberal-Yes First arena of roleplay, is that NO will become, at some point, necessary to keep the game balanced and/or in genre. Some items on your list, like automated xp spends and build requests, sound like good ideas, but what if people start to buy things with XP with no justification (I was a 7-11 clerk with no combat skills yesterday, but I saved up xp and became a secret agent with diplomatic immunity after my last Thursday shift) or building egregious sex clubs on grid that would fit NO existing ordinance code ever (Undocumented Korean Immigrant K-Pop rape club SLASH torture hotel that is protected by the mayor of the city!)

If there's one thing I've learned from years of mushing is this: You have reasonable players, and then you have WHAT THE FUCK.

EXAMPLE: On Battlestar Genesis, I believe, we had a char named Gars. Gars' PB was Linc from Tropic Thunder (Robert Downey Jr playing Kirk Lazarus who was playing Lincoln, an "Amos and Andrew" talking Mississippi black man from 1967 who was in the Vietnam war). The problem was, he wanted to play the character, but saw nothing thematically wrong with being a marine who, mid-firefight, would say things like "Come get some, n+gga! Huah! Mississippi Black Snake in your MOUTH, Bitch!" in a setting that took tens of thousands of years before Earth history, in outer space, where there was no Vietnam war, nor Mississippi.

Gotta say, this game and its code looks slick as Hell

@Arkandel said:

@Apos said:

It's very surprising how many players feel pressured to RP out scenes they are deeply bothered by and they really, really need to feel that staff has their back. I wouldn't take it for granted at all that players would think first to fade even in scenes.

That's a fair point. How would you make it more crystal clear that if anything happened they'd be backed? I.e. other than stating the usual stuff (which exists in almost any sane game I've been on) about fade-to-black and whatnot... what else can be done?

I think it's important to remember the high number of MUers who have no RL social outlets and cling to games for social acceptance. This is why so many players will roleplay a scene that makes them uncomfortable, yet just go through with it, because sometimes there is a RL need of a sorts attached to the hobby.

I don't think there is any other good answer other than establishing guidelines as to what is acceptable behavior on any game. Due to the risks of minors playing the game as well, people should absolutely avoid scenes involving rape and other forms of sexual assault.

I don't think that is a lot to ask of a player base.

I mean -- shit -- if you can't ask your player base to not roleplay fucked up things like sexual assault, molestation, or other forms of rape, then this basically becomes a fucked up hobby, right?

I, for one, would never roleplay on a game, even if staff backed me up where there were no rules governing whether or not my character could be gangraped ICly. I don't log in for that shit and it's fucked up. Period.

I think the point to an FC only game (and, yes, if this belongs on another thread let's do it) is simply to play the characters known and loved from the comics without so many personally-driven influences getting in the way.

In the case of G&M, DC has hundreds of characters across the male, female, and racial spectrum with mantles passed down. These are balanced characters with balanced powersets. Now, I'm not any sort of spokesperson for the game itself, but I can understand the draw of wanting to focus on these characters.

Unfortunately, OCs, especially on supers games, can tend to be an absolute mess. There's often too much OOC influence involved, imbalanced power sets, super weird desires for overpowered power sets, and in a lot of cases the lack of familiarity with an OC versus dozens of established FCs can make it hard to find ways to incorporate these foreign characters into an existing canon.

So, I think the point of barring OCs really isn't to exclude one of the 45,000 demographics, but that there is an established canon with balanced characters that works. The game is about the characters in the comics. So, since it is about the characters in the comics/setting, it's not about the ones that arent.

@Tempest said:

I'm not reading all of this. Is 'yes-first' a thing people actually want in a MU?

Sounds like an awful fucking idea. Especially since most MUers are complete and utter, entitled, self-centered trash. Somebody /needs/ to smack the population of this hobby around, even if it means they leave that particular game.

All the WoD games in particular seem to pretty quickly turn to garbage, out of fear of telling people they can't have/do things.

The counter-issue is that telling people no is usually flawed with that staff telling their friends yes, which is a whole different beast.

I couldn't agree with this more. There isn't a button that allows me to agree with this more, so I'll have to find the right wording:

I will gladly clean your toilets.

In all seriousness, though, I agree. A lot of downfall in games is based on whether or not people are getting what they want, even when what they want is selfish, unrealistic, or slyly calculated to give them an advantage over other players by means of begging a staffer to give them special sauce. Then, when they don't get their way, they flame, message, gossip, create WORA drama, and bitch bitch bitch until the game has some negative reputation. Then, the staff tries to save face or squelch the problem, which makes it worse...and over and over again.

@Goldfish Netflix Daredevil is actually a pretty accurate portrayal of what's in the comics, character personality-wise.

Often a loner. Roots for the underdog. Takes on hopeless cases. Constant martyr. Willing to die for a cause. Elektra is his Achilles heel.

I think the only thing people dont like is what someone plays an existing character and alters the shit out of them, like a Happy-Go-Lucky Partying Dancing Punisher, for example.

@Jennkryst said in NOLA: The Game That Care Forgot:

Someone either talk me out of Centaur Changeling, or explain how do horse half.

Its not bestiality if you keep your eyes on the human parts. Have fun.

I'm fairly happy with how this thread is progressing, because I really do believe that this topic is the root of all butthurt forum posts, gamesplosions, and inter-player shadow warfare that plagues nearly every game.

Ultimately these people circle around to MSB to see what's being said about them. Happens every time, even with people who don't typically socialize here. Plenty of people keep accounts just in case.

So with that in mind...

This kind of fucked up behavior isn't less severe simply because it's online. It's very real sexual harassment. If the staff of this game don't remove that staffer from the game itself (not just staff, but the game) then they are stating that sexual harassment of players is acceptable on their servers or in relation to their platform.

At some point the line has to get drawn, regardless of it taking place over Discord. It was sexual harassment/quid-pro-quo in relation to the game itself. On any game I would run, that would be a perma-ban. Safety first

@Arkandel said:

@VulgarKitten said:

@Thenomain said:

You are not contracted, obligated, or otherwise forced to do so, but if you include people in your character's play-space, you will become more popular and you will enhance that person's experience knowing that they will do the same for you.

This is such a lie.

Well, lie is a strong word. I doubt Theno was trying to intentionally misrepresent the truth or anything. At worst it could be incorrect, which is a whole different matter.

But well, I need to agree with him it's a good policy to have in general - including others, letting them into your story, allowing them to play with your toys. It's not needed by any means but as ours is a highly interactive, collaborative word-based hobby I don't see the problem with it. It might not work as well or often as we'd want, but what does?

But the connection between mushers, good mushers or bad, is highly symbiotic. There is no such thing as a successful game with only two players. You need the other players as much as they need you. That's why these conversations and gripes about selfish players explode, right? It's the roleplay equivalent of a guy telling a girl I'll get you back after she gives him a blowjob. Ive referred to it at times as Unrequited Roleplay.

Maybe it isn't the best term, and we could argue which words are better all day, but I do believe that there is an unspoken social contract that exists between mushers. If I had to put it into words, it might go something like this(bear with me I just woke up):

"We are providing each other with time. Time we could be spending other things, but we choose to be here. So, I expect you to try to be entertaining, copacetic, and a fair player. In return, I will provide you with this as well."

But that's why fucked up players drive us crazy, right? We love the hobby, but we need other players, so when other players are twinks, power gaming, disruptive, self-centered, and drama-mongering fucktards, they're effectively polluting what would otherwise be a very awesome writing hobby with their negative bullshit.

Some motherfuckers just don't get that they have a place in the unspoken, symbiotic contract. It fucks things up.

@Derp All I know is WHAT BALLS does it take to actually tell someone oocly that you'll do something for them ICly if they TS your character?

Pretty brazen and highly loggable.

And in the log they weren't so coy about it, enough that I could assume it wasn't the first instance of this happening.

In "The Realms Lustful" thread, players of a GoT style LordsAndLadies game are currently arguing over what Lust means and whether it means people bone ICly.

They're your core player base.

You have been warned.

So, in other words, they're saying that...

THIS particular incident of staff/player trying to force IC sexual situations and quid pro quo was a directed spoofing attack by someone using a fake Discord account, and is completely separate from lists of previous sexual harassment situations levied against the accused in the past.

Sounds legit

I was thinking today about scenes I've always wanted to have, but either due to being a self-admitted genre whore, or because I could never make them organically happen, they've never come up. Are there any scenes you hoped to have but haven't gotten there yet? I'll share.

• The hilariously bungled crime job or super intense crime job. One is like the bank heist and street gunfight from Heat with DeNiro. The other is the opposite, people yelling and slapping at each other version.
• The unsexy lap dance: I've seen plenty of players play strippers, but I never did get that horrible lapdance scene where the girl was holding a fifth of vodka and slurring the words to Bad Company
  
• Character death. I have never had a character, be it a power base character or a toadie (like a Ghoul/Kinfolk) get waxed for failing or reaching too far. Risk is vital to me in the rp experience. If there's no risk, it feels like Sim-Vampire, so I always hoped for a bullet to the dome every once in a while.

EDIT/SIDENOTE: By character death, I mean a charDeath I didn't plan. Saying goodbye to a character in a planned scene, while artistic, isn't the same as the thrill of racing for pink slips and the loser loses their car. That's just very thrilling to me and I never wanted to come across as a predatory player, so I never urged roleplay in that direction. Perhaps I should have.

@thebird said:

Lately, I've wanted an IC Nemesis so bad... Not just some NPC, but an actual character on a game. I feel like, sometimes, just because my characters have boobs, means that people can't not (double negative for the win) get along with them. I know that, generally speaking, people don't want to overstep, or whatever, but come on... Makes me miss the days of all the smaller MUSHes I used to play on. I guess since we were more of a tight nit group of players at the time, there was more ooc trust, which led to more IC risk.

So... No specific scene I've wanted, really. Just a series of them.

Also, as an ST, a scene where someone actually responds and catches on to little nuances in plot instead of skim-reading and missing half the shit I planned. I was just getting back into STing after years, and someone ruined it for me again,.kind of. What's the point of RP if you're not going to read? =(

I've done the IC Nemesis thing before and it's great. I think you just need to find a good player and have a liiiiiitttle OOC conversation that goes like this:

"Let's have our characters hate each other and be nemeses for our OOC fun. Deal? Deal. Make sure to tap me on the shoulder if you get uncomfortable."

That's pretty much how it went with me, and then while our characters were being horrible to each other, we were giving each other high-5s over pages.

If I mush again and you see me on? Look me up. I'd be willing to do this.

@Kanye-Qwest said in The 100: The Mush:

@Coin said in The 100: The Mush:

It's like saying, "I do apologize you fell down," after you trip someone accidentally. Mother fucker, apologize for tripping me, not for my inability to catch myself adequately.

No, fuck you.

Happy birthday to the ground!

I think it's also easier if you and the other player go into it knowing who will win, lose, or if the point is for it to be a bitter stalemate. You don't have to decide on how the win/lose will eventually happen (save this for RP!), but you'll likely avoid any feelings of butthurt if the two players walk into it knowing that eventually playerB will take the bad guy role and eventually lose to playerA

@faraday Yeah I used DB for lack of a better term for neonates. Your point is 100%. Databases are far easier to index and maintain than these connections, which to a certain degree are on private hosts. In terms of where it falls on "information collection" and how it applies to something like the GDPR, but you've gotta figure over time the GDPR is eventually going to get notices of people trying to be "forgotten" by Ai engines.

But in the US you're kind of screwed. In the US there is no "right to be forgotten", nor a hard requirement that only data necessary to the function is collected. We are kind of an "open collection" nightmare where the US's current approach to data collection is basically "if you give it to them, it's their property"

...and you've also got to figure that after blatant attempts in recent days like "if an actor inserts their image to my Ai engine, I can duplicate their likeness ad infinitum without paying them" and sites like 23&Me literally collecting your DNA as their proprietary data...it's good to know these things just in case.

(* GDPR is the EU's data collection policy "GeneralDataProtectionRegulation" that specifically limits what data can or cannot be gathered, but also is unique as it is the data protection that requires collectors remove your data if you request to be forgotten by their systems. The US has no such policy)