Best posts made by ixokai

FWIW, PyCharm is IMHO the best Python IDE, and GitKraken the best git GUI I've used. I already own both sooo this isn't for me, but I thought I'd share that I think this is a pretty good deal.

As an aside:

I fucking love the jet pack. That whole 'climb over something' thing you do with the ctrl key? Why would you ever do that? Jet pack!

@Thenomain

I agree completely; the last game I used a multidescer on was CDI (a million years ago), where I used it because everyone used it, but as I hate writing descs and having like... three outfits, after CDI, I got into the habit of posing my outfit on entry to a scene.

And I promptly stopped using multidescers, which directly led me to fall out of the habit of writing decent descs, and lately, I ... admit I have a character with a url for a desc. Most of my people have descs, but this one I just wasn't feeling it during chargen... and after I was like... never got around to it.

I feel the shame of this, yes.

@zombiegenesis said in Potential Buffy Game:

Minor update, I'm still looking to move forward with this I've just been doing research on some things and trying to find a good map to base the grid on. I've also had some people ask if I'll be allowing Highlander style immortals and I'm undecided. I tried that with the last Buffy game I ran and...it didn't go so well. But we'll see. Anyway, just wanted to let people know that this project is still in the works it's just progressing at a leisurely pace.

Oy, personally, nothing would kill my interest more quickly then turning it from a Buffy game into a generic urban fantasy game.

You can play almost any urban fantasy concept in Buffy if its got a bit of demon in it, but you start introducing other IP's into the game and it just muddies the whole theme of what the game is. If a couple people want to make a Half-Demon race who have Getting Medieval and some Can Only Kill By Beheading (forget this quality's name) and a couple things like that, and write the story that they are all descended from Agamoth the Betrayed, and as they kill their breathren they absorb more of Agamoth's essence so that one day they will be Agamoth Reborn?

That's a Buffy story. It totally fits in the shenanigans that demonic races get into in Buffy and how varied/weird they are.

The Highlander style Immortals just don't... fit if you're just expanding the universe to include them. Next someone will want Beacon Hills and Supernatural and and and. I love those shows and would play the hell out of either game but blurring them all together as if they were one theme that made sense in one world? Blah.

@Thenomain said in Mass Effect: Andromeda: The Thread:

"What is this thing? It is called ... human?"

Meanwhile, twenty light-years away, the same race has been dealing with humans for about a year.

--

20 hours in and I feel like I'm getting to the core plot. And I just got an achievement called "almost there", with only two planets at 100% viability. Ironic since I just did something that almost doubled the number of systems I could get to. Halfway there, more like!

I do have to say that I appreciate how you don't have to be a completionist to get 100% viability on a planet.

I note getting the five planets to 100% and the core plot are actually very separate. You can get the core plot done pretty quick and still have work on planets to do. On my first play through I put off the core plot until all my planets were done just because I wanted to.

That said:

Oh my god. Go into Profiles, and on the bottom hit Favorites. You can save your loadout (profile + 3 current abilities) to a favorite slot and quickly swap out with F1-F4. My first playthrough I was going nuts with constantly swapping abilities manually. Granted, it puts all three abilities on cooldown when you swap but that's what cover is for.

S

@rnmissionrun said in Regarding administration on MSB:

Granted, it's much worse in the MU* community given it's smaller size but I think this is due to the fact that we, as a community, are not well people. It speaks volumes about the state of our community when the only forum for open discussion of MUs and MUing focuses so heavily on vengeance, shaming and WrongFun. It's no wonder there are so few new people coming into the hobby. Between the general toxicity of the community and the craziness of so many of the folks running games, it's a wonder there are any active games left at all.

I take so much issue with this.

"We, as a community, are not well people" <-- checks part of forum Fork you. It has nothing to do with that. What it has to do with is this is an OLD hobby, and the people here are more then likely to have been it in what can be counted in decades.

And oh, the things we have seen.

So we are harsh and skeptical and quick to the gun, because again, oh, what we have seen. In many ways, IMHO, the abuses of this day-- like everything accused about UH-- are almost quaint. Spying on players? Abusive, harassing creepers? This is familiar, old territory. Oh, its BAD, and what you see in this negative realm is us saying SUCK GO AWAY. But I remember much, much worse.

I've seen MUCH worse in the MMORPG community. I've seen doxing, I've seen personal, out-of-community threats, threats of both horrific violence and unspeakable things done to people. For very small issues.

The vast majority of the negativity here will come down to, 'I think you are a fucking idiot', with everyone saying that every way.

If you're really thinking this is a special level of negativity, worse then others, I have serious questions about your experience and history elsewhere.

But this, "Are not well people" thing, ... I can't frame a response that is useful in Mostly Constructive, but if you imagine a F and an Off, you'll get the idea.

Lots of little responses....

@coin said in Potential Buffy Game:

Unisystem would lend itself really well to Teen Wolf, although honestly, that show's lore is such a fucking weird mess that making a system out of it would take some bullshit amount of work.

Yes, unisystem would fit Teen Wolf very well. Adding Teen Wolf werewolves into Buffy would not better make a Buffy game. That unisystem could do TW doesn't matter when we're talking about a game that's just not TW though, to me.

@arkandel said in Potential Buffy Game:

@ixokai said in Potential Buffy Game:

Oy, personally, nothing would kill my interest more quickly then turning it from a Buffy game into a generic urban fantasy game.

That's the thing though. What makes Buffy Buffy is a very specific blend of themes without which it is just a generic urban fantasy game. It needs the drama, the camp elements, and IMHO the teenage factor else what separates it from being a Hunter MU* is precious little.

In fact unless the game is carefully designed to specifically cater those tropes it would feel very generic.

It doesn't need the "teenage factor", it needs the "young adult factor" -- it grows out of teenage at a point and continues both in the last two seasons and in Angel without the "teenage factor" and continues to be itself. It does need a bit mix of serious and lighthearted, but it also has a remarkably consistent theme. While almost anything can happen in a Buffy game, why that happens is actually usually clear: the loner is a witch or makes a robot or turns invisible.

But a lot of that ties into the high school stuff which is not essential. Remember Angel.

@arkandel said in Potential Buffy Game:

@coin But I did watch Angel. Those are two very different shows, and they'd lead to (or should) different kinds of MU* altogether.

To me - and obviously YMMV - when we discuss a Buffy game we mean a Buffy one, and if not we need to make that clear.

Oy. To me when someone says they're making a Buffy game, its a Buffy/Angel game unless they explicitly say otherwise. If your tone is going up or down in age, it can still can cohabitate on one game.

@coin said in Potential Buffy Game:

@arkandel said in Potential Buffy Game:

@coin But I did watch Angel. Those are two very different shows, and they'd lead to (or should) different kinds of MU* altogether.

To me - and obviously YMMV - when we discuss a Buffy game we mean a Buffy one, and if not we need to make that clear.

The thing is, it's clear to pretty much everyone. so far I think you're the only one who's watched both shows and who thinks there needs to be a distinction.

I could be wrong, I guess? But while I do think they are different shows, I think their core is the same, which is why they can co-exist in a MU.

100x what @Coin says here.

@arkandel said in Potential Buffy Game:

I mean it's possible I'm alone in this, sure. But - again, IMHO - Angel is basically every WoD MUSH ever with maybe fewer politics; good guy monsters fighting the good fight with their friends who sometimes have powers, magic, etc of their own. It would be way harder to create something which stands out thematically so that its players would go "oh yeah, this totally feels different than that City by Night MU* I played a dozen times already".

I... don't even see where you're coming from with this. Gunn, Wesley, Fred, Cordelia, are 'good guy monsters'? There's one (or two) 'good guy' monsters (both of which are 'good guy monsters' in the Buffy series for years), otherwise its just another scooby team.

First of all I don't see this big distinction between the two. Angel's out of school and the tone goes a little more serious and dark, but not a lot. Angel's primary difference is the team is a little more formalized: the scoobies on Buffy are her friends, on Angel they're kinda employees, but since he's usually just employing any friend who can handle knowing anything.

The only serious difference between the two shows, to me, is that Buffy happens in high school and the main character makes a lot more jokes.

Buffy is not like that. It could turn generic very easily, mind you, especially if staff aren't careful about the direction it takes but it stands a fair chance of standing out, for better or worse. That's why I'm making the distinction.

Yeah to me the distinction you're making isn't actually real. What would make Buffy 'generic', to me, would be to allow anything under the sun without regard to the Buffyverse metaplot and setting.

Let's say a character is a werewolf, and they want to find out the source. They wanna run a plot, get a friend-witch and friend-watcher involved and do magic blood tests.

Generic Urban Fantasy: A million years ago the spirit of wolf was blah blah and this stole its essence and blah blah
Buffy Fantasy: In the time before time, the followers of the Lord Wolf would drink the blood of their lord to become his guards, and in time this would be passed on. Oh, when we say Wolf we do mean that guy who is one of the three founding partners that were the Wolf, Ram and Hart.)

Not a big difference. One though plays up that that Buffy has an actually coherent cosmology and setting and world. (One where, for example demon power is the source of the vast majority of things-- including Slayers themselves.)

@faraday said in Potential Buffy Game:

@arkandel said in Potential Buffy Game:

That's the thing though. What makes Buffy Buffy is a very specific blend of themes without which it is just a generic urban fantasy game.

Like @Coin said - what makes a show special is different to different people.

Agreed-- I think what I'm getting through all these million little replies is that how I experience Buffy (and especially Angel) and what factors make them distinct to me, are not what @Arkandel experiences.

@collective said in The Eighth Sea - Here There Be Monsters:

Something I came across when preparing a On Stranger Tides based home campaign a few years back:

https://sexselvesandsociety.wordpress.com/2014/03/24/all-about-the-booty-sodomy-in-the-golden-age-of-piracy-1718-1723/

I'm thinking queer pirates would fit right in, with the proviso that some people (mostly Calvinists) have a stick up their butt over it. And with a player understanding that 'gay' is a 20th century social construct and nobody would identify that way, verbally.

Oh, I have no issue bending to the theme where it needs to bend: 'Gay' as a worldview is I recognize, a modern convention. The flag, Pride, all kinds of things that is 'gay', and including the word, aren't things I'd expect to bring up in a historical pirate drama.

That said, yeah, I'm gay. I play characters like me. Thus the question. ... which was answered, thanks, @Auspice.

I honestly don't get the level of... crap, in this tread.

This is how economics works. There's nothing unique to it in art.

Person is willing to pay only so much; Other person is willing to accept pay of only so much. Quality will vary as his scale of pay rises.

Its not doing some harm to "starving artists" to pay someone who has a lower quality, less-skill, to produce lesser work.

I'm a coder, and I know what rates my experience and quality of work can expect. Someone offers less, its just not a job for me. But I also know there's whole realms of jobs paying more I'm simply not qualified for.

This is what work is like. The buyer tries to pay as little as possible and their value-judgment is slanted one way. The seller wants to be paid as much as possible, and their value-judgment is slanted another way.

Somewhere in the middle is agreement.

Seriously people, when is the last time on this board you saw someone threaten to rape someone for their views?

I ask you because seeing that threat in MMORPG's wouldn't even surprise me.

To call this community special in its negativity is a lack of perspective.

@bad-at-lurking said in Potential Buffy Game:

All roads lead to Dayton.

Mostly because Ohio has really bad road signs.

That could be an interesting plot. There's a devil's trap that makes all roads lead to Dayton for anything supernatural

@auspice said in Stranger Than Fiction MUX:

Mod Voice
I have gotten report of a supposed "MSB plot" to take down this game. I don't know if there is any truth, whatsoever, to this. I don't know if it was a joke, if it was a few people trolling and when they got found out they decided to point fingers this way to try to cover their own ass, or what.

What I do know is that no one on the moderation staff here condones any sort of behavior in regards to 'taking down' games, trolling games, or otherwise misbehaving on them. And we certainly don't appreciate anyone doing so in MSB's name.

Frankly, not only did it not need to be said, but that you felt a need to say it, is a little problematic.

Here's the thing: Your entire premise is bullshit. You don't know if it was a joke, because you know, it probably doesn't even EXIST. You don't know if it was trolling, because it probably doesn't even EXIST. You have other heavy handed statements about Don't Appreciate and Don't Condone, but you're landing heavy on STUFF THAT DOES NOT EXIST.

Your first thought, "I don't know if there is any truth--" presented with staff showing a rampant tendency towards paranoia and bad behaviors, should be just to stop there.

You didn't need to Mod Voice this. You didn't need to respond to a paranoid game which got some bad reviews being, predictably, paranoid.

It is so far beyond not helpful to say, "no one on the moderation staff here condones any sort of behavior in regards to 'taking down' games, trolling games, or otherwise misbehaving on them. And we certainly don't appreciate anyone doing so in MSB's name." because as far as I can tell, that DID NOT HAPPEN.

People bitched about a game which is weird and has weird policies and weird behavior. Game got all OMG CONSPIRACY OF DOOOM THEY ARE OUT TO GET US. This, since you've seen a thousand times, deserves a response of: ... nada.

Don't feed the trolls. In this case, the trolls are the guys with the wild conspiracy theory.

I thought the whole point of A Shout in the Dark was connecting to people you lost connection to

Let me rephrase the question. Does anyone who played there a) remember who they played, b) want to reminisce over who we did and what we did?

Does The Clique still exist?

See, I'm all for protecting the game, protecting people. I'm all for the first state one takes when hearing a complaint should be believing it. I'm all for believing not just the complaint, but the second hand report of an issue.

I brought this up before and was told I was the reason why a person didn't want to trust staff to report an issue, but that doesn't make it any less real.

I know for a fact that a regular tactic of The Clique used to be to file false complaints against someone that went against them. Pillowfort would decide on an enemy and organize around destroying that enemy.

This isn't denial, this isn't shaming, this isn't minimizing the real abuse people can have. But its real and the awareness of it has to also be a part of how we address these situations.

@ixokai said in Potential Buffy Game:

@bad-at-lurking said in Potential Buffy Game:

All roads lead to Dayton.

Mostly because Ohio has really bad road signs.

That could be an interesting plot. There's a devil's trap that makes all roads lead to Dayton for anything supernatural

Refinement of plot idea: the REASON someone put a devils trap over Ohio to churn the supernatural to Dayton... is to effectively safeguard the hellmouth in Cleveland.

The event was fun. It wasn't a kill scene but it was creepy and interesting. Its apparently meant to kickstart the first seasonal plot, so!

I look forward to running some stuff in this system; I'm almost more interested in that aspect then playing, not that I'm not interested in playing.

@tnp said in Star Wars?:

@ixokai Character growth can happen independently of levels and XP.

Some can. A lot can't. "I get better at basketweaving" isn't really true if my basketweaving skill is 2 forever.

I mean like, I totally agree that you should minimize and guard against re-traumatizing the victim.

But "start an investigation against my will" being an issue? Its like, okay, staff suspects there's someone toxic on the game, so they should just wait until such a time that someone wants to come up with an official complaint?

I thought the whole consensus we had before on topics about harassment, etc, was that staff should be MORE proactive with rooting out and kicking these abusers off the game?

I've been a professional python programmer for over a decade now.

Anyone who wants to demand I call it tuhple, I'll challenge to a drinking game and you'll die of alcohol poisoning.

It's toople, people!