The main reason I prefer dedicated clients is that it's easier for me to keep track of a dedicated window then a browser tab, esp when set up to blink when there's unread messages.
It should probably be possible to convert any given Web infer face into an electron app for the benefit of both though.
@arkandel said in Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them:
The reason I dislike it is because it taints future interactions. How is Bob supposed to build up to the next small tidbit of apocrypha he pries out of Joe and feel legitimate excitement about it when Jane has read the fucking handbook IC and knows everything there is to know complete with its canonical terminology?
I think this is an inherent issue with multisphere. You can either try to create a cohesive thematic experience or you can have the entire kitchen sink roam the grid but you can't have both.
Back in the day people tried to force it with the whole 'OOC maquerade' but we don't try to do that anymore for good reason.
@ganymede said in Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them:
@groth said in Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them:
I think as a rule of thumb, it's not worth the headache to have militaristically opposed groups (like Camarilla and Sabbat) in the same game.
I'm pretty sure that any NWoD game I can remember with vampires involved militaristically-opposed groups thrown together. Sanctified-Crone-Dragon conflict is inevitable, as is Invictus-Carthian. One may argue that it isn't quite as diametrically-opposed as Camarilla-Sabbat relations, but I disagree.
That aside, yes, policy and staff oversight are important, but they always are so we are talking about truisms.
None of the nWoD groups are at war with each other, even the Carthians and Invictus can live together in the same city just fine in large part because even though the Carthians are directly opposed to the Invictus they're quite capable of working within the rules and in fact their specialization as a covenant is making sure everyone follows the rules.
The Dragons are not as a group opposed to anyone, their conflicts with other groups tend to relate to sites of interest or poorly conceived experiments.
@arkandel said in Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them:
@rightmeow said in Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them:
The PC itself needs to have connections, friends, etc. They need to be more well-rounded than just to sow discontent. They also have to have a reason for their thoughts.
Beware of trying to codify what makes for a 'good' antagonist.
Think of the worst, most abusive examples of predatorial assholes in gaming. They all had connections, friends, and they could offer long treatises on exactly what their reasons were.
They were, also, predatorial assholes.
Defining what makes a good antagonist can be complicated however I've found an easy rule that identifies all the worst PvP encounters I've come across. It's when one player attempts to use the other character as a prop instead trying to create a mutual story.
You can always justify whatever but if the other player isn't feeling like you're respecting them they're not going to have a good time.
@tinuviel said in Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them:
It's important to note that there is a difference between PCs who are antagonistic, and groups that are designed to be antagonistic.
My Ventrue and your Toreador are PCs who have antagonism between them. My Camarilla and your Sabbat are in groups that are designed to be antagonistic. The latter is harder to deal with and would probably require policy, the former is... basically expected in many kinds of games. So OOC communication is an absolute must, and that's basically it.
I think as a rule of thumb, it's not worth the headache to have militaristically opposed groups (like Camarilla and Sabbat) in the same game. People will be way too eager to jump to any justification for murder and it can be hard to come up with good non-combat scenes.
That said it's possible to create a PvP centric game as long as you carefully manage the game community to create a focus on story over winning. Most game settings tend to have competing factions of various sorts and you can try to set up situations where people can arrange their own faction to come out better which doesn't require the other side to be murdered.
@littlelizard said in Antagonistic PCs - how to handle them:
Just a quick thought: I encounter way more 'White Hats' or 'good guys' that are antagonistic and ooc problematic than bad guys. I've encountered way more communication and community in antagonistic spheres barring a few jarring examples.
Sadly these examples tend to be the only antagonists people care about or remember
.So I don't buy the 'Assholes are the only people who are likely to play villains' argument.'
Usually if you have 'the good guys' and 'the evil guys' in a game, the 'evil guys' tend to be massively outnumbered and are usually the ones that have to deal with people randomly deciding it would be fun to murder them.
The one exception is a post-Clone Wars era star wars game I was in where Empire had the population advantage. It worked out ok since there existed a rule of sorts you couldn't kill people, just capture them and let them escape later.
One of the problems you run into running a mush is that players are often until after the issue has already exploded into something huge and even then they often just choose to silently leave instead.
Reasons can be varied. Maybe they don't want to be seen as needy, maybe they worry staff won't take them seriously or act against them. Either way if you want a healthy game culture you want things brought to you early so you can address them preemptively.
Player ombudsmen are helpful here because they can be seen as someone you can talk to without 'Bothering' the administrative staff and they can also offer to relay your issues anonymously. Player ombudsmen can also play the game in a more normal way and spot and relay issues in a way more empowered staff usually can't.
All in all I find them useful as a way to build trust between players and staff and more preemptively maintain good atmosphere.
@greenflashlight said in Health and Wealth and GrownUp Stuff:
@silverfox said in Health and Wealth and GrownUp Stuff:
Plz tell me using crutches gets easier.
It does. Make friends with all kinds of padding to find the ones that don't rub your pits raw.
Only crutch I've ever used look like this.
Though the ones I get from the hospital usually come with clip on spikes at the bottom for outdoor use. I have never found them hard to use but whenever I've been injured and at home I tend to end up just hoping around and bracing the walls instead.
Edit:
After doing some basic internet research, it appears there's two major types of crutches. Forearm crutch (depicted) and underarm crutch, the forearm crutch is supposedly better in almost every measurable way and the default crutch in most of the world except the US where hospitals give out the underarm crutch because of what appears to be cultural inertia.
If you have an underarm crutch and find it uncomfortable or hard to walk with, try to find a forearm crutch and see if you find it easier.
As an example of the hate, I have a friend who says all of the right things, claims to be woke and progressive, but "just can't get into" She-Ra "because of the art."
Some things are just subjective. Art direction is the primary reason I haven't gotten around to watching She-Ra.
As for Revelations, I've watched the three first episodes so far and my judgement is it's ok. It's not bad but it's not something I'm ever likely to recommend someone either. That said the decision to kill off He-Man and Skeleton in the first episode and focus on the other characters is probably the only reason I kept watching, as someone with no nostalgic connection to the original He-Man has only ever come across as silly to me.
A Lord of the Rings series based on events from The Silmarillion.
A Wheel of Time production that's apparently already renewed for season 2 but has stopped twice due to Covid-19.
I... think House of the Dragon, a Game of Thrones spinoff is also in the works although I don't know if it wasn't the one being cancelled? That whole franchise was poison-pilled by GoT's last season, damn.
My default position is to have zero faith in book to TV adaptions until I actually get to see them. The fact that Game of Thrones and Witcher were actually good was a welcome surprise in the ocean of incredibly dull fantasy TV adaptions.
There was hundreds of pages' worth of content about how the One Power worked for example can't be quite transferred over as-is without it being boring, but they could spread it out across multiple seasons in a simplified form.
One advantage Wheel of Time has when it comes to high budget visual adaptions is how Robert Jordan was really big on visual metaphors for how the power works. Rather then explaining it through exposition they could just show it.
The new season of Rick and Morty just isn't doing it for me. I am having a really hard time pinning down why; I think there's been a fairly steady decline in quality since the second season, but even though there were still some rough gems in the third and fourth seasons, I haven't even cracked a smile in the last few episodes. Maybe it's just run its course for me, I dunno.
I think the Writers of Rick and Morty ran out of their best ideas a couple of seasons ago and are now practically running on autopilot.
@kanye-qwest said in MUs That We Would Love To Make (But Won't):
"Coffee shop" rp (AKA rp amongst yourselves) should be at least half of your rp on a game. Otherwise, you probably aren't roleplaying a character so much as playing the world's crappiest video game.
I make something of a distinction between what we could call 'social rp' and 'coffee shop' RP.
To me social RP is primarily about getting to know the other characters and exploring the interactions they have with my own character and the enjoyment I derive from those interactions is often the primary reason I play MU*.
However 'coffee shop' RP often takes place in a literal bar or coffee shop and has a habit of leading people to the most boring interactions possible.Often the RP is just rote poses about ordering/consuming whatever and talking empty platitudes. It's possible to make these scenes interesting(The article linked in this thread is great) but it takes more effort since you have to break the pattern and introduce something the rest want to interact with.
I'm tempted to suggest it might be good policy to not have any generic bar/coffee rooms on a game grid as a way to guide people towards doing something more interesting as their 'default' scene.
Anger isn't the right term but I am currently sitting in my car in the parking lot because I don't want to walk home through the rainstorm. Unfortunately it will continue to rain for the next 3 or so days so it is not as if I can wait it out.
@saosmash said in Ortallus Banned:
I agree that the repeated and misogynistic threats/invocations of death and mutilation were probably bannable but I think that using the derogatory term that has been specifically delineated in this forum over several years as one of the few that is off limits is also bannable & and an easier and more immediately enforceable banning rule which seems to require the mods to have to do less work figuring out what behavior is over the line in the future.
I'm all about easy objective standards when it comes to placing trash in the appropriate receptacle.
I feel like this is landmine modding. There is to my knowledge no list of illegal words anywhere on this forum. There is no way a new poster can know which terms are allowed and which are not.
There is however a rules of engagement sticky in the hogpit which disallows misogyny and RL threats.
I also don't feel in general the need for specific offences is important. It is the kind of thing trolls use to argue they are not breaking any rules while being blatantly disingenuous. Mods should feel free to ban toxicity on their own free judgement regardless of specific words.
@pacha said in Eurovision!:
I am just pleased that the endless ballads are somewhat gone and there are a few really fun, dancey entries this year.
A good Eurovision should have a little bit of everything, when you're listening to 26 songs you're going to get pretty tired of any one genre by the end of it.
When watching the Swedish version Melodifestivalen my most common complaint is how most of the entries are so painfully generic pop. The songs are perfectly fine to listen to on the radio but not exciting and for me to vote I need something exciting.
My favorite Eurovision songs are those which are special like
Fairytale https://youtu.be/WXwgZL4zx9o
And Toy https://youtu.be/CziHrYYSyPc
The Swedish entry is as everyone expects these days really good but I am not sure if it has the something extra required to take #1. I would be surprised if he doesnt get a top 10 though.
I think Set Me Free falls into the category of Eurovision songs that are good but not memorable. She might get a top 10 but she's very unlikely to win. I'm looking forward to watching it tomorrow.
If you ignore his previous visual incarnations for a moment and just go with 'A human form alien thats powered by the light of a yellow sun', wouldnt his most natural skin color be Blue(blue is what remains if you remove yellow from light) or atleast heavily tan/dark skinned?
I like how Tiger and Bunny is one of the more realistic takes on how super heroes would play out in that sponsorship money would be their primary funding and looking good for the camera would be increadibly important.
Imho White Tony isn't a particularly accurate depiction of social issues in the first place so Black Tony would hardly be a change in terms of resonance. Like Batman his wealth exists mostly as a background excuse to justify his toys and like Batman all the wider implications of where that money comes from and how it could be put to better use then luxury toys is ignored for the sake of the power fantasy.
Where Tony is accurate is that he is a very priviledged person who manages to convince himself that his succes means he personally is the solution to all things wrong in the world, something you can see in certain real world CEOs like Zuckerberg and Elon Musk. I see no reason why that would be a White only story or fail to resonate if he was another ethnicity.
In a world where Kanye West exists, is a black billionaire playboy really that unthinkable?
But even if you go with original version, why couldnt Maria Stark be african american and Tony mixed?
She could. In fact, in Ultimate Marvel she's Latina. However: if Tony were obviously mixed, his experience and the level of privilege he moves in within the society he was raised in would be different.
Being rich and white and being rich and black (even mixed, even if your father is alabaster) is still very different in the U.S.
What does the audience know about being rich of any color? The rich playboy part of Tony is a fantasy written by people who dont live that life for people who dont live that life. Any resemblence to the realities of inheriting a massive company are accidental.
International audience in particular who are becoming an ever larger portion of total profit would have zero clue.
If you want it to be a strong real world pararell, then black american is hardmode but anywhere Asia would hardly raise an eyebrow.
Also if you ever want a relatively young Tony Stark, he cant be the son of a WW2 weapons supplier anyway because timeline doesnt add up, so you have to tinker with the specifics regardless. Original Stark is 80 years old, MCU Stark is 50. In the MCU timeline Howard is 53 years old when Tony is born.
But even if you go with original version, why couldnt Maria Stark be african american and Tony mixed?
For me I will almost never notice if a character is recasted between a book and a visual mediun like tv/movies because I dont visualize books in any detail and will usually not remember what most characters were supposed to look like in the first place.
However in a visual medium, you quickly get used to the idea a character is supposed to look a certain way. If a pale skinned woman flew around throwing lightning about, I wouldnt associate that with the character Ive come to know as Storm.
Though at the same time, I think for some characters the association is weaker then others. I don't feel being white is particularly key to Tony Stark or Spiderman in part because their iconic look is fully suited up. Also once you start establishing a character can have different looks, people will get used to it, The Doctor has no true appearance for instance.
As a rule, as long as the show itself is good, I am not really going to notice ethnicity and I dont think most other people do either.
If youre into mastermind/xenatos gambit kind of shows or mecha, then Code Geass is a great watch.
In terms of classics, I think most people will enjoy Ranma, Inuyasha, One Piece, Naruto, Bleach and Hunter x Hunter. They all have the same story structure which is a young protagonist who refused to give up in the face of adversity and grows stronger as they keep facing incrementally harder opposition.
If you want disturbing violence, then Elfen Lied is the show for you.
If you want a show that is willing to take a critical look at some mecha tropes, Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet is worth a watch because it takes a moment to recognize some of the horrors that most mecha shows gloss over.
One of the shows that has stuck with me the longest after watching it is 'From the new world' which depicts a post apocalyptic world where all remaining humans are psychics and they use sentiment mole rats as servants. As the show goes on, the main character keeps learning more horrifying things about how things are and came to be.
For something much less violent. I quite enjoy the board game shows like Hikaru no Go (main character gets possessed by best Go player of all time) and Saki(it is about a group of girls wanting to save their mahjong club).