Posts made by L. B. Heuschkel

@Ganymede said in Privacy in gaming:

For that reason, I don't mind staff playing PCs or otherwise lingering around on channels.

I'm a newcomer to MUSHing and Ares (though not to online gaming or MUs in general) and I have to ask: Is this not normally the case? Nothing would cause me to burn out faster as a staffer than knowing I was helping make an awesome game -- but I'm not allowed to play in it.

Obvious disclaimers that staff shouldn't have advantages for their characters, that staff should stay low key during official plots, etc.

@surreality Part of this whole issue is of course that no matter how well intentioned the staff may be, there's no pleasing everybody. And there's always someone who's either badly in need of a tinfoil hat, or badly prone to dramatics. I was accused once of setting up code to let me know when a player paged another in-game. I was a builder. I wouldn't have known where to -start-, tampering with MERC code like that.

@faraday said in Privacy in gaming:

If they don't complain, then they're not entitled to a status update about the complaint, IMHO.

Mind reading class for admins now commencing.

@Tinuviel One game I played on handled it fairly well by letting players know that their complaints had been read and addressed, and in case of larger infractions, a publically available note in the style of, "We have received reports about this and that behaviour, please be adviced that this is against rules, and that some players have been disciplined." No names, no details, but as a complainer, you knew that your complaint hadn't just ended up in somebody's spam filter.

@faraday said in Privacy in gaming:

Absolutely, but that's targeted to the person making the complaint. There's a HUGE difference between that and public shaming of a bbpost saying "Faraday screwed up and has been warned." If I saw a game doing that for every infraction, it would be a huge red flag to me. But that's just me personally.

Agreed. Public naming and shaming would make me pack up and leave very quick. I don't need to know who screwed up where and how. All I need to know as a player is that complaints are addressed and attempted resolved, not the specifics.

@JinShei said in Discworld: The MUSH:

@L-B-Heuschkel said in Discworld: The MUSH:

@JinShei Still got it. Yesterday, Jin managed to injure 2/3rds of the active players in one hour.

But not terminally...

Yet.

@JinShei Still got it. Yesterday, Jin managed to injure 2/3rds of the active players in one hour.

@DareDaemon said in Privacy in gaming:

Like that guy who was a great roleplayer but whenever he ran a PrP it was awful and created staff headaches.So eventually he got told in no uncertain terms that we appreciate him as a player but he wasn't allowed to run PrPs anymore.

Makes sense. Some people can't handle the responsibility of getting some level of perceived power over other players. Some can't handle it in character, some can't handle it out of. Same reason some people need to only be told in character what they know in character while other players happily exchange logs and giggles out of character. Seems a very sensible solution to me.

@Tinuviel That's my experience as well. Players need to know that their complaints were heard and considered, even if nothing visible occurs. "We are looking into it and trying to handle it, let us know if it happens again" will get you a lot further than radio silence, in terms of player patience.

@Arkandel Oh yes. I am aware. One of my real life friends is a GM at Blizzard. I'd rather marry a duck-billed platypus than take that job. I do think my point stands, though -- you send a signal as admins, on what is acceptable and what is not. Even if you can only give the illusion of fairness, you try -- and at least some players will buy into it. When you don't bother, then most players won't either.

@Arkandel said in Privacy in gaming:
I have the choice to play the game or not, that's fair.

Indeed you do. That's why I no longer play. That is, not the logging, but the decision to use the banhammer seemingly at random, and by doing so, enabling a certain kind of player to disrupt the game play of other players without actual evidence or cause.

@Ghost said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

@L-B-Heuschkel Meier and Carmila were amazing in Bloodlust

I'd have a party ripping off --- I mean, creating a character concept in Meier's style. Hell, I already did, in my first fan fic from 2009. Why has this not happened yet?

@Pandora Quite, but it does pertain to the perception of privacy in games, and to what mood you set as game admins.

Blizzard enacted a zero-tolerance policy to a point where someone claiming you did the nasty could be enough to get you banned for a while, evidence be damned. Other games I've played have been, anything goes, and in some cases, admins will be snooping, or even using admin commands to make their virtual girlfriends go down on them while the player is AFK.

It's not a code issue. It's a people issue. And in that, it's an admin issue. The policy you set as admin, the way you act and carry yourself, carries over to the player base. Players mimic the attitude of the admin team.

@faraday said in Privacy in gaming:

@Pandora said in Privacy in gaming:
From extreme examples of doxxing, stalking and spamming to the more everyday cases of drama, hurt feelings, and in-game cheating. These things have happened with reasonable frequency. That's why so many folks are touchy about it, even beyond the philosophical "privacy is a right" arguments.

One of the things that made me give up on World of Warcraft a few years back was the profound attitude among regular players that EVERY roleplayer must be there only for virtual porn. And that it is totally all right to follow them around, screenshot everything they do, and use any means available to sneak into their guilds, chats, and conversations, to prove that they are perverts who should be banned from the game. It got very, very tedious.

@Ghost said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

WoD set in the Vampire Hunter D universe.

Post apocalyptic vampires, werewolves, and all manner of monsters living with the Barbarois. Ancient vampire lords in castles that were once equipped with rockets to travel to a safe zone on the dark side of the moon. Wild west type towns with high-tech hunters taking on bounties to hold back the dark.

... I'd be all over this. I have most of the VHD novels, I've written VHD fan fiction. I'd be willing to learn the rules of WoD for the opportunity to play Nobility.

@Goblin said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

I always wanted a Discworld game set in Ankh Morpork.

I just spotted this and am now giggling. See you at the Drum tonight?

@JinShei already roped me back into online gaming with exactly the kind of MU I wanted to see -- a Discworld game set at the end of the novel series, and in MUSH format so I don't get sucked into grinding experience and money all day instead of getting any work done. I don't have a problem with getting sucked into that sort of thing, nope. Ahem.

Anyway, if I was to look for another game sometime, I'd be very open-minded. I can do fantasy, sci-fi, urban realism -- the biggest turn-off for me, honestly, isn't setting as much as it's the amount of infodump you need to digest before joining in. When MU descriptions talk game stats for RPGs I've never read, get all technical, or otherwise reveal themselves to have no shallow end in which to get started, I walk away. I'm happy to learn a new setting's lore, but no one is an olympic swimmer on the first day -- don't toss me in the deep end.

@Derp There will always be a segment of players who just don't think the restrictions of the theme applies to them. Cue catgirls in Victorian settings -- or just plain indifferent to the theme because they're there to find TS partners.

What you can control is indeed, as you say, what the game recognises as canon. What the helpfiles say. What gets added to the game wiki, and so on.

I am always inclined to be lax on players, and I am likely far more friendly than I should be -- which is ironic, given that I have on occasion been terribly frustrated with games that didn't bother to address strong theme deviations.

@Derp I read that as 'let them' as in, acknowledge what happened in their Discord sandbox as actually game canon.