Best posts made by mietze

I think that now that herd immunity is truly in danger adult boosters will be more promoted.

For example, I had most of my kids in my mid-20s. This was during a pretty big heyday of no vax but most people didn't seem to care. I was never offered a booster or anything like that while pregnant or pospartum. They didn't even ask about my vax status.

For surprise #4 last year jesus christ I must have been asked about my boosters like every visit. And I've been asked a few times since even for non child related medical visits. Even though I'd already had a Tdap a couple of years prior, they still wanted me to have another one plus an additional MMR postpartum. I belong to an HMO though, after two decades of shitty catastrophic care only coverage so I don't know that the message gets out through other healthcare providers.

I have run into a couple of 20 year olds and a 25 year old that got into mushing in the last 5 years (all through tabletop groups) but that's it.

I've enjoyed the Star Trek reboot a lot (my first fandom was the original Star Trek, though I wasn't even alive during its run) and it seems pretty close to the spirit of things. I thought the latest installation ran a little too long, it was fun, but I think some better editing would have done it well, but I still enjoyed it!

I really REALLY loved the new Ghostbusters movie though. I was pretty skeptical because Melissa McCarthy is super duper hit or miss for me, as is Kristen Wiig. But I thought that had the spirit (har de har) of the originals too, I loved the cameos, it was very enjoyable and fun from start to finish. And I loved that for once I was thinking "wow, I wish the movie were a little longer" rather than "jesus christ, when is this going to end!" (which has been my experience with the latest Star Trek movie, as mentioned, as well as Civil War, even though I liked them both).

I would play on a pvp place if Becca ran it, and if it had a system that encouraged not always lethal pvp like RfK did.

After playing on RfK with largely the same people who I'd seen in pvp situations elsewhere, including myself, I have realized how essential staff being able to connect with people and pretty draconian adherence to visible open ethics is. There are no mechanics that can replace that. IMO.

I dunno. I mean, male fear of vaginas, that is a common perception, but having had a lot of male friends, even as teens--the only time I remember a male getting all hysterical over a tampon and/or female anatomy was looked at pretty weirdly by the other guys too. I've never had a partner who wouldn't willingly go get me a tampon or pad out of the box if it was in a different bathroom (or who wouldn't pick up some for me while shopping, or run to the drug store or whatever). Hell, I never had a male friend or roommate or other man in my life (notably 2 youth pastors--and these were not liberal women can do anything churches) who wouldn't. The only guys I've ever seen make a big deal out female parts or processes were...well...really super duper assholes who were just taking another opportunity to show how big of an asshole they were. And I grew up with pretty much conservative, complementarian gender role believing men.

I too have tried spawns. For whatever reason, my brain just cannot seem to attend to them. I'm not sure why. (This may be why I also struggle with/rarely try to multiscene unless one person truly doesn't mind prompting me and/or wants a very very very slooooooooooooooooooow scene. I do have some favorite people who due to work/otherstuff pose in the 30-40+ minute range). Someone was very super sweet and walked me through setting up spawns on potato and it was a disaster because I totally lost channels and ooc communication for the night.

Maybe this is an acquired taste thing though, and if I trained myself to "see" it better it would be helpful. In theory I love the idea. In practice I think my brain is scattered enough that separating things out futher just isn't helpful to me. I do however really love and make use of name/phrase highlighting.

I'm a pretty awesome cook and usually don't need recipes/can figure out how to recreate a taste profile most of the time on the first try.

Though I suck at pie crusts. I think baking in general requires more attention to detail/science so that's my weakness!

Re: Policies

I dunno, I think I would just take out the first one. If you mean to encourage a climate of adults treating each other with respect, I don't think that's a very good start--the tone isn't the same as it is with the other two bullet points. Also, I think the people you really wish would take that kind of thing to heart are the ones that read "unnecessary attitude and general douchery" as something that of course doesn't apply what they're doing, and you may cause the nice/more timid people to worry about saying anything at all/asking for an appeal, ect, for fear of triggering it. (Just an observation over many years staffing/playing). It feels good to have pithy comments like that in your policies, it's tempting, but I think it's kind of a waste of space.

I think it might serve your purpose instead to state simply, "We want to make this a place where the broad spectrum of players feel welcomed and respected. If you behave in a way that diverges from that towards staff or other players, we will have a discussion with you about your fit in the community. Please remember even when you are upset or annoyed or have had a bad day that there are other people on the other side of the screen who may be dealing with the same. If you're angry, take some time out before you throw something down in a request, channel, or other communication. Ask for clarity before you assume what other's intentions are. Verbal abuse or harassment of any kind will not be tolerated." Or pare that down.

I find in communication online (and with teenagers and children in the flesh) you get more of what you want by saying what you do want "I want you to address me in a respectful tone of voice/not to yell in the house/avoid saying "fuck this shit" in front of your grandparents" rather than vague things that are highly subjective such as "Don't be a little bitch." I mean, everyone is going to slip up and go there, but when you are attempting to get out in front of things, and have an opportunity to be clear/calm rather than throwing around things that make people glaze over "who me, acting childish? No way, this is IMPORTANT and only a fool wouldn't see that!" or be on the defensive.

Glad to hear you are doing well!

I could see Ricky and Morty being fun where they run into other pcs after the same guys, or things like that. That might be fun now and then over time! But that's what I meant in my "off topic" deviation of pointing out that if that was played in a constant disruptive way very few people would be interested in playing and might be prejudiced against such concepts in the future. It only takes one time dealing with a spectacularly bad player for a lot of people to make assumptions about that concept every time going forward. In the right hands that could be super entertaining though.

Would I player like to see it? Sure, with the giant caveat that the players playing them aren't total ooc behavior blind asshats.

Unfortunately I don't believe it's that simple. I know many people that would prefer to preserve choice as much as possible while being uncomfortable enough with certain practices (gender-selection abortion, for one) that they think some restriction on personal choice is reasonable and should be put into place. I think there is a lot of grey area. I have been in the position of considering a late term procedure. I don't think anyone who hadn't been there understands the grey that is there.

While I am willing to swallow my discomfort and prefer that remain a private decision because of my experience and what I observed and went through, there are others who have been there and feel differently.

But yeah, abortion policy is only part of what is connected to "pro-life" in my eyes.

I don't fudge rolls or ignore them--but I do require when people make them that they include how they're going about doing something (unless it's just a straight up thing). Sometimes this gets me fussing from some players "What? I've never had to tell anyone how I'm going about investigating, I just want to make my roll and then I get information," or "I don't know how I'm going to persuade/intimidate does it matter? I just want to roll and be done with it." Not very often though. Most folks are happy to do that, because it means the response is personal. Creativity is rewarded--if someone can sell me on what they want to try, I'll let them, even if that means that none of my plots ever goes quite to plan.

If I'm having issues with the bad guys being too weak (I've never had the opposite occur) against the PCs, I will throw in other compounding circumstances. There's an unexpected hostage situation. One of the mundanes goes through an unexpected change under the stress. Things are booby trapped on the next floor. There are bystanders that hit in the feels. There's a new or several shinies that are discovered, so it's a matter of focusing/picking. A new layer on the presenting situation.

My ST notes are never linear (I don't think hardly anyone's are), they're more like a cloud map. There is a base story that the PCs know, I have my goals/aspirations/projected outcome for the scene listed in a box to the side (with lots of room for additional notes/changes). If something is a hard goal (like it's a becoming scene) then that is underlined and not waivered on--but that's always something agreed upon in advance with the person who's asked me to run the scene, and my own personally-generated PrPs /never/ have hard unchangable "forced" goals, ever. I will have personalities and motivations for all of the NPCs ran across as well as several otehrs on hand for crowd/on the fly ones. I will have stats for them as necessary. I have a pretty good cheat sheet (that I modify according to the players in the scene) so that I can handle pc thinking out of the box and just being able to roll with it instead of "you can't do that." However, if PC ends up in my scene that I'm totally not familiar with their splat (like Mage or some of the more fringe ones) then I will chat with that player ahead of time and let them know that some of their stuff may be unavailable if it would end things for everyone in 5 minutes, so I ask for their help in helping to avoid that, or I understand if they'd like to opt out. Since most of my PrPs are not really combat things (they may involve it but it's not the focus) and I have been given feedback that the quality tends to be on the good side, most folks seem to be okay with it. Even people with mages, if they didn't choose to drop out, and those folks have always been willing to walk me through some of their cool stuff so that we can figure out how they CAN use some of their neatokeen abilities without squishing everyone else. I've met far more people willing to do that if it means getting to have fun and contribute to fun than not.

Yeah, actually. I have been an emergency foster parent to pregnant teens or parenting teens. It's not the easiest thing in the world. I would never suggest that everyone do it, or adopt for that matter. Most people can't. So yeah. I do walk the walk, and support many nonprofits that do it--but it's not enough. Housing issues are very horrible. I have also been a volunteer at those organizations. I am a member of the local buy nothing group and have offered assistance directly to mothers and families. I have contributed to financial support and driving to prenatal appointments of a woman who was pregnant in one of the local homeless encampments. My very liberal UU church does a crapload of stuff like that.

Beyond pregnancy, which is only a very small time period after all, I've also helped get a local family community kitchen program off the ground that's still running 5 years later. I contribute financially and in kind to a local shelter/program for homeless lgbt teens. While right now I have to concentrate mainly on my own family due to the young age of my youngest, once he's in school I'd like to start volunteering with family support orgs again. I have volunteered with the stateside equivalent of remote area medical teams.

I have the training, temperament, and skills to do this. I do not begrudge people who don't. But yeah. I put my time, treasure, and tears into this. Considering that I spent most of my teens protesting abortion clinics and being part of an extremely gross sect of a religion, I have a lot of atone for and blood and suffering on my hands to make up for.

Also I hope that if the report of "my partner doesn't like you doing that" is taken with...hmmm. A little bit of salt. I've seen a lot of people fall for the "you are my escape from this awful controlling man/woman". I do know one person who'd ask her partner to please put a lid on certain interactions, and he would court/cultivate them in response. (I've seen that in online partnerships plenty though too). I've found it best to stay away from people engaging in unhealthy power play like that. I don't want to be the source of some ass getting off on poking at their partner.

I love the squishy noob/human larva stage! Probably because mostly I've had cuddlers. I love toddlers and teens the best though.

Risk is a really really broad and slippery category. I think it is assumed to mean only chance of death or some other physical removal from play. But I think it's more of a nebulous thing than that. I have had people who bragged and bragged that they love risk totally flip their shit when they were involved in something where a choice they made or were presented with forced a clarity/morality/what have you roll because of the chance their PC might have to change some and have impact beyond the all or nothing of death/life. Or similar situations where maybe they lost a prop important to them or where they couldn't save the day, ect.

I share an enjoyment of risk--all kinds--with an awesome st and opportunity for reward too (not a fan of railroading) but when I'm STing I'm careful now to ask people about risk enjoyment and specifically what kind.

@Arkandel Actually I had a hotlink on my phone to register people to vote in my county. Every single person of age I talked to of which there were many had already registered. Our political party organization for the county had over 100 people ready to do the same as well as some in possession of the paper forms--to the same result.

Please don't buy into Trump's bullshit.

I was an election observer for my county. We had the biggest earliest turnout ever. It was amazing to see. I spent about 15-20 hours a week there as an observer for 4 weeks straight. Over a million votes just in my county and Trump was steamrollered like whoa.

Please don't buy into Trump's bullshit. It's not a fair assertion (because lets you and me be honest with each other, he wasn't really asking a question.)

Even post election the numbers showing up to my legislative district meetings keep growing and growing with people eager to get involved, from all walks of life, sacrificing time to be there. I and several newcombers ran for and got seats on the executive board for my LD. The county meetings are packed. We are expecting a record turnout at state just from observers,because so many citizens are eager to put pressure on leadership of my party and our elected officials to fight.

Please don't buy into Trump's alternative facts bullshit.

It is fucking amazing what's going on, and it's going to continue. Happy to talk in private since I don't want to spam here but...

Don't buy into his bullshit.

And yep, me and my oldest (who is 15, made their sign and asked to go with no prompting or guidance from me) were marching with our chosen family (which includes Cupcake).

I think the discomfort for a lot of people comes from the intrusion (in their own mind) of OOC knowledge that makes them feel uncomfortable.

I think it's safe to assume that a lot of MUSHing folks are partnered. (Hopefully we've moved beyond the stereotype of weird can't make real friends people living in their relative's basement by now) So yes, in a sense if you are TSing someone you are very likely TSing someone else's partner. But most people don't think about that that much (Except if they engage in casual friendly OOC chatting with people, so you might hear about something neat that happened or an anniversary or something like that, occasionally) because they know there's some separation there.

If it's on the same game, I think for a lot of people there may be a bit of worry that crops up. Not because they think horrible thoughts about the two people, but my god have we not all seen the craziness and destruction that can happen with jealousy over play partners that are online only. I do think it's not unnatural to worry a little about having to deal with more ooc drama as well if things go south, or to be used in the event of OOC drama between them, ect. It's another layer of discomfort to deal with, potentially. Reaching out just in the context of online play partners is often pretty hard to get started (I've never had an unfriendly or unapproving response to it, only positive though, and it's still hard for whatever reason to take that 'risk' but it's important for me to do so). I think there would be a greater degree of awkward in approaching someone because you worry about the OOC relationship, because that might make them feel weird or seem intrusive.

I have never experienced it, but I can empathize with that angle. Not sure if that's what @flahgenstow and @Warma-Sheen necessarily find odd. Whenever I get involved in any kind of IC household with someone (which does not necessarily have romantic aspects to it) I prefer to talk to everyone else in the household so that I can be sure of my welcome and also to let them know I'm looking forward to playing with the whole group, not just a specific individual and am just tolerating the rest. I'm not sure if I would feel the same need to OOCly check in with a spouse I knew about, as I don't know that I've ever come across a partnered pair RL that I wasn't playing with both or they weren't both very open about the fact they were cool with things or I didn't know them RL or from other games.

The only thing that makes me feel uncomfortable in regards to RL marriage and MUSHers is when someone badmouths their partner to me inappropriately. Especially if it's clear they're trying to connect with me OOCly using that. It squicks me when people do that with their online play partners, too, though.

Health issues suck. I don't have time for this but who does, really?

One thing I do not do is leave a player hanging when I ask them for an explanation of their approach. Especially with non cut and dried actions like investigations and the like. I do not ask professional PCs to roll for basic competancy in a crime scene investigation, for example, unless for some reason there's a strong chance they might miss something (active interference, a professional cover up, they've been affected by something else that might impair them). Yes, I respect when people have social skills that they've purchased rather than just bullshitting through them. I favor those PCs myself!

However, if they want to check for /more/ than their level of competency, or outside of the box thinking (and certain PCs want to do that all the time, because they may not fit the stereotypical mold but would still like to take a chance to find something), if they want a check of "I have this nuts idea, could I make it work," and it's something that I wouldn't usually think would occur but it's not totally impossible, but unusual--then I feel that they should be allowed to roll.

Also, and this is usually something that happens in group scenes, there will be someone who says "I can't do anything" because they don't have the precise Investigation skill. Will they be able to uncover the same kind or perhaps quality info as the person who does? No--but they can retrieve different info, depending upon the scene and if the investigator shares that info within the party, or clarify it, with occult, empathy, science, medicine, ect.

I find a ST who just says "tell me how" to be just as annoying as the ones that say "gimme a roll. Oh, you don't have the exact stat+skill I am looking for/used to? Nah sorry, you're out of luck." I have a gut-level aversion to making people play "guess what the ST is thinking to solve things" games. Not fun for me. Though if someone does enjoy that type of scene (which there's nothing wrong with), then probably our styles aren't going to mesh. If someone was struggling with that, I'd adapt for them. That's part of the role of a GM, IMO, you're responsible for the group enjoyment but also the /individual/ enjoyment of the players (unless they are being Brat Princesses Me First ME ME ME Only people). This may also be why for real STing scenes I prefer groups of 5 or less, so that I can give adequate personal attention to each person and keep things moving in a timely manner.