Posts made by Lotherio

@Steven-Universe said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

Sometimes I'll log in when I can't play yet because I know in "x amount of time" I should be free and I maybe can line something up for later. This new person though is so thirsty that its kind of a turnoff

Regardless of the intent of troller, I do think this is the crux of the situation. Both are a turnoff, but feels like neither side is saying 'okay, how can I change to contribute to the community.'

The folks only on to chat with friends to line up RP for later is a turnoff for some that likes spontaneity, as much as the hyper thirsty new player always asking for RP can be. And I see nothing wrong with a player asking sporadically throughout the day, multiple days, on appropriate channels for RP - that's the purpose of the channel. I do see a little issue with, by judging the wiki of this PC, its determined they want 'special' rp is a bit judgey.

I do agree with what some have said, instead of just asking at regular intervals, that time could be devoted to researching other characters on the game and offering a hook for RP instead of 'what do you want to do today, I don't know, what do you want to do'.

Inversely, instead of writing off someone who asks for RP as special or different or needy, maybe the time lining up could be spent paging them as well 'I'm not available now, maybe we can figure something out to RP when I/we both have time.'

Otherwise, its a two way street with an island in the middle no one wants to cross. I've had some great RP with random strangers, where I've taken their 'anyone want to rp' and hobbled something together, as much as it was a real sinker. But same with lining up something, sometimes its a basic lets met, my char has a question about the murder case for you and its great in the end, but other times its like 50 pages of back and forth, well my char would do this, maybe your char should approach it this where, to the point it feels like we've basically concluded the scene and are just RP'ing it to fill in the words the characters would say already knowing the conclusion.

@Roz said in Game of Thrones:

@Killer-Klown said in Game of Thrones:

So, yeah. I've been considering a few things - some of which have already been mentioned:
***=Stuff and things and whatnot***

click to show

2- Arya. Arya's ending was not great, but at least it felt more earned than Brans. After Ned's death, she became somewhat rootless and bounced from thing to thing; first in Essos, then Westeros. She started with a list, ammended that list, then eventually just dropped that list. She's a character in progress, so her moving on made more sense than not.

***thar be spoilers ofc***

click to show

I didn't like Arya's ending, tbh. Like yeah, it'd be cool to see her running off and having adventures. BUT. I felt like so much of her arc over the course of the show was trying to get back to family, trying to find her pack once more. And then she got back and they helped each other and now she is...leaving to go be alone again? The lone wolf dies, the pack survives, so now I guess it's time for Arya to go off solo??? Idk, I disagree that it made more sense than not.

***=Agreed and maybe the writers broke her ending some***

@Thenomain Heh. I know I picked up a few new ideas and thoughts in the realm of non-XP incentives in the past couple pages.. I'm pondering how to make it all fit together. No promise what I'm doing is anything like a good game, but I think it'll have some resemblance of fun, somewhere I hope.

@Ghost said in Incentives for RP:

4500: Stephen Seagal
.
.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4Ao-iNPPUc

How dare you! Oh, not Steve 'N Seagulls.

@Thenomain said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

I’m going to rant.
Bar RP is not bad.

For the record, I agree completely, so I put it in quotes for those that disagree. I tend towards social first and foremost, then towards anything plotty with those that become IC friends.

@faraday said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

The more options you start packing into a single command, the less intuitive it is.

scene/start name/location=description/timeofday=event/posetimes=publicprivate/faction=scene runner/scene secondary ... is totally intuitive to me.

@Ganymede said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

@Lotherio

+Events were a great innovation that I think helped people get engaged. So group events are popular and should be.

We can think of other tools, and have, but I think this is a worthwhile topic to bandy about.

I support +events, including random social meet your neighbor ones. Despite the 'bar-RP is bad' these usually get good attendance. I honestly think people want more character focused stories over lets kill the monster of the week (that's just a mix into slice of life, like why are you hurt this week Lotherio, or if we're being honest, who kneed you in the gibblets this week Daithi).

I just meant at the +Event, I notice more (and could just be me) that players show up in pairs of 2 or plan to meet each other there.

@Ganymede said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

or such "spontaneous RP events" are less common these days. For people with anxiety, bumping into people IC on the Grid was an easy way to get RP without having to have direct contact with others, either via channel or page.

This makes me curious. It seems more and more 'spontaneous RP events' are attended by groups versus individuals. Like everyone shows up with a friend and sticks it out with a friend. Could just be me noticing that though.

Secondary a favorite thing to do in past as staff for me was, random event for groups that are out playing in public. Page the group, 'hey mind if stay-puff marshmallow man attacks your location?' or whatever and do something. But it seems more group scenes are organized or don't have time for the random stafferly event.

Rewarding of IC positions (fachead) and OOC positions (you get more permissions to alter the actual mu*/game, like building, etc.) are ponderance.

@Tinuviel said in Incentives for RP:

but at the same time I worry that we would be removing people from the pool of welcomers and RP-spreaders

This ^^ is a concern. Not just removing them from that pool but removing what they enjoy the most (or maybe not, just an assumption), the RP they are generating that is.

I much prefer this to random staff bits by applications, I'd rather give this as reward to players contributing to that which is being promoted; in this case RP.

@Roz said in Incentives for RP:

I wasn't clear to me that you were specifically looking for non-XP incentives.

Sorry, that's on me for not being clear. My brain mixes it up for me, makes sense to me, but confuses everyone else.

@Tinuviel said in Incentives for RP:

Having a simple system that makes breakages/cheating obvious involves less clean up.

It could be simple system. Player A runs event or just a scene, Players B and C join in and liked it, they +PRPvote Player A. They reach Tier 2 and instead of running common thugs, they can check out Magneto for a plot or whatever.

This is a simple overview and could be coded up in a number of ways to monitor it. Like an events system that includes votes by players that joined if they liked it. Or other @systems for those that like them. I am curious what sort of rewards may be out there that could incite RP that are not tied to XP/character advancement.

Let's pretend I didn't mention Arx, have of it feels defensive. I support Evennia and Arx development, I like what I've seen.

My question is more, must everything be XP oriented incentive wise or are there other incentives that could work that are less, well, gamey to me. @Tinuviel made a great comment, it takes more work and XP is easier to hand out.

Only curious, because when I MU, it is not game oriented to be honest, never has been.

@Roz Yes, my fault on wrong names there. But with my point, I don't want to see that level of game coded into everything else. It works for Arx, doesn't mean everyone wants it.

@Lisse24 said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

I do think that you can create a game culture where these extra tools are not needed. I think Arx is an excellent example of this. Arx created a game where players are reliant on each other. They've also pushed activity back to the grid, meaning that spontaneous/pick-up RP is easier to find. They've changed the game culture. However, most of the times when we have these conversations, game creators are very resistant to making the changes that Arx made.

I do believe there are some fundamental design philosophies that very between Ares and Arx. I for one would not want to see Ares adapt the level of in game tools/etc used on Arx. I think both are good at what they're aiming to provide. ETA Both have different goals/outcomes, and this is good and I support the variance.

@A-Meowley said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

@Lotherio said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

Ares is meant to be full web portal, client is for holdouts and older players.

Wait. It's supposed to be full web portal? How can we idly chat on channels on the web portal and stuff? Asking for a friend, because obviously I'm not so old that I can't immediately figure out a new system, that'd be absurd...

All ares pages have a 'chat' page that has the traditional channels. You can chat on channel (and read mail and bbposts and soon PM) all on the web portal.

Translation ETA:

All Ares Web portal/sites have a chat page that comes with basic setup. If they disable the link, its on the game/mu not Ares.

This came up in the thread on working hard for RP and made me curious. Could be better in that thread, but it seems good for a thread of its own too. I never know.

@Arkandel said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

@faraday I've found (and obviously YMMV) that the use of tools like those is cultural. In some games they are commonly employed and it's nearly a no-brainer, and in others few players even know that they exist.

One way to do it is to incentivize them. For example games like Arx explicitly make it 'profitable' to play with new people (they have a flag, basically, that offers free XPs if they +recc others).

But other times it just... happens, organically, and people use the tools coded for this purpose. I don't know why since the syntax is usually very similar and fairly simple in all those games.

Having followed some of the Arx Peeve threads (2 active, 3+ total?), I have seen folks complain how some players do try to game the system of incentives for RP'ing with new players. Is making the incentive to RP a bonus to XP or character development the right incentive?

Are there other incentives that might contribute to stimulating RP? What if people running scenes got RP points to spend, like double XP scenes for all who join, or extension of PRP Policy (you can now blow up major world banks in your plots if you wish, or major landmarks), or another system that is less gamey then trying to get +votes for being on the grid around other people actually RP'ing?

@Sparks said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

@Arkandel said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

@Sparks As @Thenomain often repeats like the cranky old man he is, code can't solve social issues.

The code facilitates, that's all.

Yes, agreed. But the point I was making was not that "code will solve all issues about finding RP", but that "I think that adding a +wantrp command which takes a summary of what you want to do in a scene does not actually facilitate finding RP in any meaningful way which the current Ares +scene code does not already provide." Given that the premise of the conversation was that Ares in specific needed such a system because +scene was insufficient.

ETA To quote this, its relevant to my pondering:
@Lisse24 said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

the test is whether on Ares people start to make that change, or whether they can be nudged to make that change,

I think using +scene to make a scene public, with a short title that could be changed and a summary that could indicate what is expected was sort of intended to go that way.

Though, I'm noticing on the active Ares places, its going right to where the OP was coming from. Even group scenes are being set 'private' more and more. Its more arranging the scene through some leg work, which I'm not saying is a good or bad thing. Just new tools for changing environment. Ares is meant to be full web portal, client is for holdouts and older players. Instead of +finger to see someone's hooks, its just checking the wiki, then contacting them. Hey you seem interesting, we should scene, I propose an impromptu checkers game at the cracker barrel which is interrupted by the arrival of a juiced up truck driver come to find his cheating SO.

I can't speak to adding a +wantrp, I know indicating timeliness of poses when setting up a scene was discussed at some point by that group (like 5-10 mins between poses or, slow work scene 30+ mins between poses, or super slow, once a day cause our times don't align scene).

@Tinuviel said in If you work hard, son, maybe someday you'll RP:

@lock/pagelock me=!*Arkande

Due to abuse of @lock, staff at Something Mu have disabled this command 'feature'.

***=Bruins will be swept in Stanley Cup Finals***

Yeah, spoiler and all that is coming up.

***=It was a good ending***