Best posts made by kitteh

I recruited for this game, brought the thread to people's attention, etc. I was in the process of discussing concepts, group connections, etc with some of these people. But not surprisingly, some of them have RL jobs and couldn't leap on instantly this morning.

I appreciate not wanting to GM more than you can handle but this seems like an ill-planned way of handling things, to say the least. Now we're in the situation of having some people who slid in under a wire no one even knew was there, and others excluded just by virtue of not creating a charbit in the first ~12 hours. I get to choose between excluding friends and quitting (and tossing an app I worked on). Kinda sucks.

I prefer the 'no OC' thing even though it's meant skipping games that otherwise looked good because the good OCs ran out.

The bottom line is that OCs are often disruptive on FC-centric games (just like FCs are disruptive on OC-majority games, not that shockingly). I've had to deal with them glomming on a team I was a part of and trying to be involved with everything while blissfully unaware they were either stomping on people's fun with their powers or just killing the mood RP-wise.

Are there badly played FCs? For sure. But I can count the good comic OCs I've played with on no hands because it hasn't happened yet.

And it really sucks that it has shitty implications for some players but I don't know how to fix it without opening the general floodgate. Maybe the genderswapped/etc alternative versions is a good approach, whether its actually using the main character or using spinoff versions. Could these work as demi-OCs?

So I want to preface this by saying I love some of you guys (especially @Apos and @sparks) but I do kind of agree that the game has issues in terms of combat being 'the thing' compared to social (or maybe that should be, combat/investigation/snowflake magic being the stuff vs anything else). I've had the prestige system sold to me as a future patch to this.

But I'm just gonna say... looking at those lists, I can't help but get a really Firan feeling of 'some dudes just have a million SP and you'll never really catch up so why even try.' Which feels like it's going to get in the way of RP more than it helps, if that's all it is. Do we really need another system to tell us that the top houses and their leaders are on top? etc.

I have a supposed social-maven type char. Yet despite that, both her and her org are barely blips on that radar. She'd use a fashion system (heck, I've already had a major storyline hinge on her clothing choice!). But mostly I dread the idea of the Prestige stuff more than I look forward to it, because it just seems like another unassailable dino-fortress / grind / reminder that the Graysons are the best / etc.

Just so I'm not left out on the love-pile, ditto everything @Ganymede said. Also she wrote all her own code and stuff and it's amazing and really clean and easy for noobs to use and well integrated and... I could go on

It's a small game but I've gotten great RP very consistently, and I prefer this a thousand times over to sitting around playing a werepoodle sexymancer who sits around having a latte with the faepire archduke while they discuss the plot of the month that I didn't actually get to go on.*

*Not intended as an actual description of any WoD game, but close enough.

@Pyrephox It would be good if they did, yeah, at least re: the reset. The system is a total black box as it is so it's unclear how to even get higher on the list.

Re overall character stuff, I don't even know. XP has very little impact for me, largely because I don't do combat. Both my characters have their primary skills at 5 and then sometimes even sit around accruing xp they don't use. But that's also, in turn, another thing that 'devalues' social (and other non-coded things). Anyone can have those stats while combat is this rare and special thing. And while I am sure staff doesn't consciosuly think of it this way, you do get the subconscious reaction that combat is 'honored' while asking to do something impactful with another skill often gets you side-eyed as overreaching.

I'm looking at apping!

Fwiw, I'm pretty sure all L&L MUs are garbage when it comes to historical accuracy, realism, etc, so I don't really see a reason to criticize inauthentic Ireland over inauthentic England, magical Angel Sex France, or anything else.

I just hope the staff isn't expecting too much in terms of authenticity in the culture, politics, and mores. We saw this play out in Realms Adventurous; people weren't really interested in depicting early near-Roman Britons, and in general RPed toward the High Medieval version of Camelot right away (ignoring that Pendragon was meant to eventually get us there in accelerated fashion).

Basically, people gonna Game of Thrones, wherever you play and whatever your setting.

@surreality said in RL Anger:

@kitteh Here's the problem: I wasn't complaining that I am not getting attention at all times. I don't want attention at all, most of the time, let alone for the shit I consider 'high value victimization'. As stated elsewhere: this is not the place for that, full stop.

The best way for you to not get attention would have been to... not jump into our discussion and tell us it annoyed you. The best way not garner attention for your other incidents would be to not tell us they are more important than what we're talking about.

The only 'high value victimization' I have discussed on the forum here was in a fight with @Ghost a few months back, and, ironically enough, in discussion with @shangexile here a page or so back. You will, ideally, notice I'm not asking people to feel sad or offer me headpats or sympathy or support for any of it, and that it's relevant only in context of: "Dude, you knew about this stuff... " which is relevant to that interaction -- which, itself, resolved with mutual empathy, compassion, and lots of uncomfortable honesty all around. I am not going to dig around for the exchange with @Ghost to find the reference, but I'm not asking anybody for cuddles or sad-eyed kittens there, either.

I didn't know anything about your or your interaction with him. I only knew you from a few previously pretty sympathetic interactions. Which is why your whole 'I am part of the enemy tribe that is showing up here to get me, just wait, more are coming totally for realz!!!!!' is bizarre. The reason I somewhat side eye your professed desire for empathy/solidarity is your habit of attacking those who offer it to you.

Calling me a harasser is extremely offensive to me.

Saying my mindset is ugly and implying that I'm supportive of harassers or at least callous toward their victims is offensive to me, and also lolzy as fuck. Shockingly, you get what you give.

I am asking you to leave me the fuck alone at this point. You will notice there are no insults to you in this post, despite plenty in yours to me, and it's that way for a reason.

Leave. Me. Alone.

I. Was. Leaving. You. Alone.

And then, you know, you decided to ping me to call my mentality ugly. So instead of continuing your babe in the woods "oh woe why is this happening to me!!!" routine that you have accused others of, you will own up to starting shit. Beyond that I still really have no beef.

@Ghost I realize. At this point I'm going out for a walk in the park. I am sure @surreality will have her parting words, but maybe I'll be a bit more zen by the time I get back.

@auspice Ahhhhhh, yep. I got a little of this. Mild by comparison, but it set off alarm bells even then. Funny how those instincts bear out.

@DownWithOPP said in BSG: Unification:

Now can we get off Canceron please? So hating that place now, lol!

Didn't we... just get to Canceron?

It's actually one of the things I like about the game, that it does have a pretty brisk paced episodic kind of structure. Not huge if you're not there for minute 1 and active in every plot you'll never catch up-'episodes', but... like ~2 week stints where we're at place X, doing thing Y, and then we go somewhere else?

This comes a lot closer to feeling like we're RPing the structure of a TV show than most games.

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

First, as always I think you guys are well-intentioned!

Reasons for combat characters to think - you know, maybe I could slaughter this person but in a social setting maybe I shouldn't be a douchebag because I have a sword and could do anything, because that person will get me laughed out of this party. Or shame my family. Or have some kind of meaningful impact.

I'm not sure this hits on any real issue, though? The whole 'maybe not slaughter this guy' 'there could be consequences' etc... I mean how much does that even apply to Arx? There's very little PvP, and the antagonists are all clearly evil supernatural doom armies. Who is actually swording people with impunity that this is problem social needs to address? I dunno, maybe this is just me not being in on the fun stuff where this is happening.

I'm not saying all combat characters do this (#notallcombatbeasts) or that everyone is a dick to social characters, but we want our social characters to have shiny things to play with and reasons to feel badass with what they do, and not just "hey, we're just biding our time until the combat beasts take care of business." That's seriously uncool and it's not very inclusive.

I think this is the real issue more, and it reflects your overall story structures. What use are negotiators when our enemies are demon generals or demon pirate kings or demon-elves or... you get the picture. Oh, also all the foreign nations are run by evil sorcerer kings/dragons. Staff does run some 'social' stuff (I've been on a couple), but it just doesn't seem to have the weight that 'I killed the demon of the week' does. The occasional elf treaties are the only dimplomacy that even really touches the metaplot tier of importance, but those seem very quickly handled by comparison to the months we spend tracking down ways to kill demons and searching weapons to kill demons and building armies to kill demons and then eventually actually killing demons.

Beyond that, I agree with @Arkandel's points a lot. I recognize social stuff is much harder to do. But it's still largely the case that the combat people generally can still get a lion's share of the social fun but not the other way around. Several highlords are top badasses. They get all the sitting in councils debating decisions and leading the armies and fighting the stuff. Victus being gruff and uncooth and supposedly hated (according to the system) rarely seems to do him any practical disservice (I'm not picking on his player or anything, he's just a glaring example, where staff made the effort to make him and his faction 'disliked' and... then doesn't do much with it?).

It's also a problem with the orgs, because everything (money, military AND social power) is concentrated in the top tier houses (and maybe in the faith) and so specialized lower tier ones often seem overlooked. I once had a staffer ask me 'why my (purely social) org even needed money' and basically imply I was being twinkish for thinking about it, which again feels like that subconscious bias at work.

Yeah, I definitely think having the colonies available adds a lot to the game.

In a way, a traditional version of the game is kind of doomed to repeat the problems of the show, where eventually you end up with hokey civilian fleet plots about prostitutes and mob bosses and everything military is very same-y.

@faraday said in Social 'Combat': the hill I will die on (because I took 0 things for physical combat):

Also - we accept that a high degree of randomness in physical combat. "Yes, you shot him, but you hit him in the leg and only grazed him." That same degree of randomness is nonsensical in social conflict because people (generally) do not behave in a completely random manner. They behave in ways that are informed by their personality, their experiences and their values - none of which is reflected meaningfully on a character sheet.

This is really it for me and it's not the first time it's been brought up here.

Compared to many players, I'm very far on the non-consent, OK with random shit happening to my PCs. I don't even see much horror in 'welp, I rolled 20 so now we bone,' because even if its kind of stupid I don't see the result there being so much worse than 'oh, I rolled a 20, you ded.' Generally, it's better! My char is still alive! I have an event in their life to RP around. If the person doing the roll is a jerk/creeper, that's a totally unrelated issue (and would probably make a combat scene suck too), handled by the unrelated solution of not RPing with them (edit: or better, hopefully having staff kick them off the game).

But like everyone I do have visions for my characters and their personalities and that might at some point preclude some particular social outcome. And...

I REALLY WISH THIS COULD BE ON MY SHEET.

Because I don't want to be the person no-selling your dice without good cause. I don't want the stigma of 'she's just dodging consequences.' No, I'm not, it's just that THIS particular time, you picked the thing that's not gonna work for pre-established reasons. But I have no way of establishing those things.

So if people want games with social rolls, game designers need to go back to the drawing board and 2.0 their whole concept of these game systems. Nearly everything we play is a WoD-clone, with the same stat-skill conventions and minimal focus on social stuff beyond 'maybe you can put one virtue and vice.' These arguments will always go back and forth fruitlessly under these conditions.

@surreality Yeah, I didn't mean that I just want a couple 'outs' to put on character sheets as special category of out of social free cards.

I really mean that I think we need to work from the ground up to build sheets for games that are more about the social interactions that are common to MU and rather than trying to square peg round hole systems that are very wargamey.

Beliefs, values, fears, goals, subconscious drives, likes, vices, and sure even sexual preferences, etc. Ideally some of it would be mostly-permanent (ie maybe it could change but only with +request or whatever sort of limited 'I get to change my sheet occasionally' process), but some would also be more 'live,' so that for instance you could record that character X was a dick, character Y was a lover, etc.

Absolutely at both @Paris and @Ghost

We can't trust on magic code to fix things that are otherwise broken. Clearly bad behavior should be easy to report, and relatively easy to act on. One part is on the complainant, and one is on staff. If the first doesn't do their bit, then they can't expect the situation to improve. If the latter doesn't, then they've obviously abdicated their responsibilities and are either indirectly or overtly supporting the behavior.

Abandon ship!

@surreality I'm in a pretty similar boat. Short-stacked alliance!

I have zero issue with the guy who walks past and does an almost cartoon-comical 'woah' double-take, or just otherwise has an obvious moment of getting sidetracked by their dick in the middle of a normal conversation. That's a instinctive (if culturally trained) reaction, and, y'know, it's even a little flattering.

But it's how they act when they realize they're doing it. "Haha, ah, sorry, what was I saying?" vs. "I am tuning you out while I imagine doing something I saw on redtube last night with those" is pretty obvious.

@DownWithOPP Well I missed those, so I don't mind And we were just at Scorpia before that, which was very different! Shopping, beaches, fancy hotels and ceremonies, etc.

But even on Canceron, presumably the flavor is different? Disaster relief, etc?

Again, I really liked this bit because it was something you don't always see. I mean ultimately, every BSG game is going to be 'fight the cylons, repeat 100x', with some random stuff tossed in for flavor. I thought this flavor was good

@faraday Even if I'm one of the people who ultimately drifted off into idle land, it wasn't because the game did anything wrong. Often long-term RP success is really a lot of luck, just finding a group and a niche which I never did (a couple people I latched onto early died/idled/etc, which didn't help). But overall the game does a great job and is a pretty good model for its genre, you should definitely be proud of it and count it as a success!

@surreality said in RL Anger:

@kitteh said in Random Bitching:

@surreality said in Random Bitching:

Fuck you.

And she wonders at the lack of empathy for her high value victimization. Right then, moving on.

There you go. That's why you got a mention in that regard.

Pointing out that your poor manner may be why people don't give you the amount of sympathy you were actively complaining about not getting at all times does not actually translate to '@kitteh only cares about her personal tribe (whoever the fuck that is) and is a callous bitch toward all strangers.' You're really one to talk about reading comprehension, words in people's mouths, and personal attacks.

If you want it dropped, like all the others who keep coming in here and slinging shit around the moment the dust starts to settle, then fucking drop it.

and

@surreality said in RL Anger:

Seriously.

People come to a general agreement and understanding... and kk comes in swinging.

That quiets down with mutual apologies, Kanye Quest characterizes it as me continuing to be a dick to kk.

Now we have the kitteh round as shit starts to settle again.

Dust starts to settle? This is some balls of steel level historical revisionism that you're doing in a place where people can effortlessly go and check who posted what when.

You @'ed me to bring up my, and I will quote you, 'ugly mentality', 5 days after the prior conversation had ended and in the middle of what was otherwise apparently a peaceful rhyming gif meme-off. I don't know what bizarre fantasy world you live in, but just like @kk wasn't attacking you, I am not 'starting shit' when I defend myself from your mudslinging that happens nearly a week after the prior issue had dropped.

Like seriously, in this thread, the #1 harasser? Is you.

On the topic of things getting stale too quickly vs. using up the Colonies (and I realize it's not meant literally, just that we'd probably want to give them all focus at some point), one thing sort of comes to mind:

This isn't Star Wars/Trek and there's nothing saying these these all have to be Hoth or Planet of Hats style things where each colony is a single overwhelming theme. A planet is pretty big, so there's a lot of room to shake things up a bit, even within a mini-arc. No reason we have to go down to the same jungle every time when we're launching from a fancy space ship in orbit, etc.

@Lotherio Ah, my bad.

Anyway re both Realms and newer game ideas, I still don't think a 'dirty' historical setup is actually MU-unplayable, a lot of people enjoyed it. You just have to be willing to actually tell the fairy chicks who walk in with their fantasy ball gowns that it's not actually in theme. If they flounce off in a huff, no loss.