Posts made by Pyrephox

I'm not even so sure it's PVP, itself, as a blanket thing, but rather how PVP is organized and run within the game.

For example, when I played WoD games, it felt like the prevailing OOC opinion was that PVP had to end in the destruction or utter submission of one of the parties involved. I think there were even arguments on WORA at the time from pretty prominent players that there was no OOC reason to leave an IC opponent in any position to ever be able to fight back against you - which usually meant killing them - no matter how minor the conflict...because if you did, the OOC assumption was that they were going to get their revenge and destroy your character, and you'd kinda deserve it for not taking them out when you had the chance.

Which did seem to play into an OOC atmosphere in a number (not all) WoD games I was on that, no matter how rare PK was in practice, you always had to assume that any conflict with another character was going to eventually end in your PC getting ended unless you 'got there' first, or managed to make the PC largely invulnerable. So there was a whole lot of IC and OOC posturing about how tough your PC was, how well connected they were, how sneaky/assassiny they were - any sort of 'protective coloration' people could find to put out there. And when conflict did happen, people tended to assume 'this asshole is trying to end my character' and respond accordingly, IC and OOC.

Now, those are only my observations. But possibly the least toxic game I was on was Requiem for Kingsmouth, and I think part of that is because the methods of PVP explicitly expanded beyond 'murder the fuck out of that guy' and had interesting and satisfying mechanics for fighting for territory, etc. (Mechanics that I believe were adapted from LARP rules? Which was a good decision, I think.) There were also some notable de-escalation points of PVP, and reasons to spare people (you could grab a boon from them instead, etc.).

I'm not saying RfK was perfect. People still threw shit fits about stupid things, and there was certainly bullshit on the micro and macro levels. But it's one of the games that really tried to engage with wanting to facilitate a specific TYPE of PVP, and making sure that the mechanics made that feel powerful enough to draw people into using it, without having an end game of 'kill your enemy'.

I've come around to thinking that if you're going to have a game with PVP, you need to be as explicit as possible about the mechanics of those conflicts, open about potential consequences to characters at each level, AND build in 'de-escalation' points along the track that ICly and OOCly incentivize being a gracious victor and not pursuing an opponent's utter destruction.

@runescryer There's something to this, but I think it's largely a part of how the tabletop game has been translated to the MU* environment. The setting was really never designed to be used in a large group, persistent environment - a lot of the toxic elements, particularly rigid hierarchies and cruel superiors out to exploit everyone for what they can get, were designed to be the /antagonists/ to the presumed low-level, new/young supernaturals who are trying to maintain a spark of their humanity in a cruel world.

That's even made more explicit in Blood and Smoke, with the sidebar that points out that the 'inviolable' rules of vampire society get /violated all the time/. They're not supposed to be something that PCs are actually supposed to live; they're supposed to be invasive enough that the typical PC pretty much has to break them occasionally, because that's where plot and drama happens - how do you get out of this, this time?

Similar things are in all the game lines; they have taboos and terrors because it's assumed that the PCs are on the side of having to violate those for the greater good (or at least THEIR greater good) and the abusive hierarchies of authority are usually assumed to be NPC antagonists. But those archetypes have empowered a lot of players who just kind of want to be controlling assholes to feel justified in being controlling assholes.

Although I think the worries about One True Wayism also hint at another thing we can do to reduce toxicity: communication. Be open and honest about the game you want to run or play in. Be honest about the level of pvp you want, the character risk you want, etc. Not every game is right for every player, and people trying to force a game to be the game they want it to be can cause a lot of sourness between both players and players as well as players and staff.

More MUs really need an equivalent of tabletop Session Zero, where staff can talk freely and bluntly about the type of game they want to run.

Incentivize the behavior you want to see. I've always been delighted when games set up ways to make a player's enjoyment with another player clear in a mechanical direction. Not publicly - that has a tendency to become competitive. And not through XP/votes, because there shouldn't be a reward that people then feel entitled to or like they're losing out on getting. But, like, original Darkwater had a non-XP vote that just sent the person a silly message like "X gives you a PONY" and it was fun and a nice, small way to connect to people.

Why not just take the initiative and say, "Why, X, I found this scene charming and I really enjoy playing with you?" Because when you put a specific mechanic in, you're sharing part of the game's priorities. We care about this. Also, I may be alone in this, but it's often easier for me to essentially 'tell the camera' what I enjoyed about a scene or a character, when I have some chance to think about it, rather than immediately after/during a scene.

Also: have failure mechanics that prioritize making failure fun and rewarding for a player (even if not for a character). Remember as game runners that a character failure is not a player failure, and try to help players internalize this, too. A lot of toxic culture ultimately comes from players' anxiety and insecurity, and a feeling like their characters have to be 'good enough' or they'll get shut out of RP. There's fun in character optimization, but it can become hugely toxic if it isn't managed.

I think that's perfectly reasonable, yeah. And probably should be done more often, since some people think of async as 'once every couple of hours' or 'I have to go to sleep, but we can pick up tomorrow' and others see it as 'one pose every day or two'.

As a counselor, what @Cupcake says above is absolutely true. It's worth noting that research suggests that the factor MOST associated with improvement in therapy is the quality of the relationship between therapist and client, so if someone doesn't work for you, do not hesitate to try someone new if you can (I know that our fucked up healthcare system can make that hard). Look for someone who shows you respect, who is genuinely easy to talk to, who you feel safe being vulnerable with - and who challenges you appropriately.

Michelle West has an ongoing, endless series of epic fantasy that starts with a duology (Hunter's Oath/Hunter's Death) and hasn't really...ended. Despite the the fact that every single one of the now...12? 13? books is a doorstopper. It's a hugely intricate world where the great and epic magics are starting to awaken again as an exiled god tries to return to the world. I love it beyond reason, even though Sagara can't finish a plot thread to save her life.

She has a slightly less intricate second-world urban fantasy series under her other writing name of Michelle Sagara which has the same flaws, but I still love equally well.

@tiredewok said in The Challenge of 2020s:

@coin

Ah, glad to hear she isn't going to do that. Maybe she has more common sense than putting glue in her hair led me to believe.

Good on the plastic surgeon who was willing to help her out.

I think that if any of us were judged by our worst stupid mistake, none of us would fare very well. I know I wouldn't; it's sheer luck that I survived some of the stupid ass decisions I've made when distracted, tired, or stressed.

@lotherio said in Sensitivity in gaming:

@greenflashlight said in Sensitivity in gaming:

or are you just crafting ridiculous examples for the sake of being dismissive?

I ain't saying is hyperbole, but if I have to explain it ...

No, it sounds like hyperbole or being dismissive.

A better example is, breath as a trigger/squick. If I have part of the scene involving trying to hold breath while swimming, I haven't considered all angles. I don't know if someone nearly drowned or lost a family member to drowning recently. Its not a major part of the scene, but maybe I get into describing how long one has to hold breath and the dangers involved and without knowing, I hit someone's trigger without warning.

Does breath holding need to be added somewhere or where does responsibility lie for acknowledging its a trigger? Up front, so a player can leave, in the middle? Does the player leave or the GM alter after like 2 players have made their roles and entered the secret cave?

In my experience, something like more often goes:

GM: talks about the held breath burning in your lungs, the distance to safety, the pressure of trying to hang on for just one more moment as the gas is pressing in
Player: Oh wow, I'm having a reaction to this; drowning is kinda phobic for me, and this is hitting that drowning thing even though it's not water. Can we maybe gloss?
GM: Oh, sorry, man, sure! Take a stamina roll - succeed and you get through the other side with no problems, fail and you take X damage. Narrate that how it's most comfortable for you.
Player: Thanks!

And then play goes on. A lot of rare or specific triggers aren't necessarily things that anyone expects a warning for. They're just things to be respectful about if they come up! The vast majority of players /are not dicks/. They want to have fun as much as you do. They are not setting out to try and make GMs or other players jump through hoops just to see if they will. People with unusual triggers are, IME, very aware that most people don't see anything traumatic or disturbing about X, and will take it on themselves to say, "Oh, I have a thing about Y. Is Y in this plot/session/campaign?" if you give them the space to do that, and they trust you.

I've seen far more people insist that they're Totally Okay with something that they're not actually okay with, and then have a miserable time, because they're scared of being the person who 'brings the game down' than I've ever seen someone playing 'trigger gotcha'.

I'll say:

I've been in gaming for over 20 years, and I've been GMing for a lot of that time. I've dealt with problem players and disruptive players, and plain icky players (like the guy who came to his first session and wanted to have me narrate him raping NPCs when I was a 16 year old girl - this was also his last session).

And I've never really had problems with 'sensitivity'. I've run some absolutely horrific scenes, too. One of my favorites was an series of events that led to a PC having to talk other PCs through cutting his arm off. Even on MU*s, I find that just taking a moment when you're pitching a plot to people to ask what they don't find fun, or if there's anything that they particular do not want to engage with right up front by itself cuts out 90% of problems.

You don't have to aim for 'not offending anyone', because you're never GMing for EVERYONE. But I feel like you should try to respect your actual players as people, and that's all I try to do. I don't want my players to have a bad time - and I don't want to game with people who enshrine 'telling their story' over people having a good time together. I always ask for feedback after running a scene, because that's good GMing. I want to make sure people had fun, I want to know what worked, I want to know what didn't work.

It's not particularly burdensome, because the outcome is something that I very much WANT: I want people to have fun playing in the world I make, or the plot I run. I want all sorts of people to have fun doing that - not everyone, because nothing's going to be for EVERYONE. But for as wide an audience as is appropriate for what I'm doing, and is feasible.

It's not even about 'empathy', primarily. I don't consider a game successful for myself as a GM unless everyone walks away having had a good time. Doesn't mean a perfect game. But if there's something that has actively worked against 'having fun' I want to know about it - for MY sake as much as anyone else. I want to be a good GM. Which means understanding what you're putting out there, and how it's landing. And when it's not landing.

@arkandel I want to have fun, and I want the players at my table to have fun. Of course I'm going to be sensitive to their needs and wants from this game we play together - I consider it the bare minimum anyone should expect of a cooperative activity.

Now, a big part of that is communication, and the recognition that sometimes, some people just aren't going to fit well in the same group. The players I play hardcore horror with are a different group than I play light-hearted fantasy adventure with. If something comes up that someone finds unexpectedly icky or unpleasant, then we talk about it. If someone discovers that our desires or styles are just not working, then that's not saying that either one of us are bad, but maybe we don't play the same games, or at least not games the other person is GMing. But part of that is being very open about people being able to bring their discomfort to you and knowing that you aren't going to get angry, or mock them, or try and 'reason them out of it'.

I don't have a lot of squicks in gaming. And I don't mind - and even enjoy - exploring a lot of 'problematic' material in games. But I don't spring those things on my players when I'm GMing without giving a heads up either in the beginning-of-campaign organization, or right before a scene (I particularly do that with descriptions of gore/trauma - just say, hey, does anyone have any issues with X, and then work from there), and if we unexpectedly hit something that a player didn't realize was going to affect them, then we...talk about it like adults and tweak things so that the game is still enjoyable to everyone at the table.

It is not going to ruin a game for a player to say, "Hey, I'm not going to enjoy the game if X is included." I'd much rather tweak a game to not include X, or make sure that the player knows this particular game isn't going to be for them, than have a player miserable at the table but feeling pressured to go along with it.

EDIT: Also, wow, that video is so full of shit, filled with dishonest cherry picking and white boy flailing about how using the pronouns someone prefers is JUST TOO HAAAAAAARD.

@bear_necessities I think it's worth noting, too, that 'beta' and 'alpha' mean different things to different people. It's probably best that if you're opening a game in alpha or beta, you explain to players what that means.

Like, if I opened a game in beta, I'd be expecting to do hard system testing and revision, and early beta would probably involve XP wipes and rebuilds as systems were broken, re-developed, and redeployed, so I'd want players to know that before they got invested.

I think Maine has that sort of interesting combination of not being a place many people know intimately, but also being a place where people have vaguely positive feelings about. Like, no one wants to put a game in North Dakota, because no one wants to even pretend to live in North Dakota. (Apologies to North Dakota.)

Whereas, Maine at least sounds like somewhere that you can imagine someone living and enjoying themselves, but is much less likely (although not immune from) to have a great many people who want to tell you how you're Doing Maine Wrong, unlike a lot of the more 'iconic' places.

Which is not to say that I wouldn't love a resurgence of games set in iconic places like New York, or LA, or even Atlanta or Austin or St. Louis.

@auspice Actually, I love the concept, or else I'd do what I do with ninety percent of the games that get talked about, which is nod, go, "Sure, I'm sure someone would like that," and then move on.

My questions are mostly meant to try and clarify what sort of game it actually is. For example, I do think that 'commoner' alts whose only real purpose is to 'fill out the world' are a bad idea if your focus, the thing that /excites/ you about it is the upper class balls shenanigans. Judging by the effects of 'mortal alts' on WoD games, that ends up with a lot of throwaway characters who get locked out of most of the things the game is about, and you'd be better off filling out the part of the world you actually want to play with PCs who fit that world.

If you want to have entertainers, I would suggest let people app in at entertainers who have already reached the level of ton-engagement, /or/ provide very clear systems for how a commoner character is supposed to 'ascend' to that height. Which Ares doesn't really do well. The social divide between those with entrance into the lords and ladies side, and those who don't have it, is sufficiently wide enough that it's basically running two separate games.

But I'm sorry for harshing your buzz, and this'll be the last comment I make regarding the game. Good luck with it, and I hope you have fun!

@auspice Right. But, well, would a seamstress character even be approved, when the game isn't set up for that sort of character to have a lot to do?

@auspice said in A Regency MU (Conceptual):

Gambling halls and the like would be present, but characters populating them would be alts as opposed to someone's primary pc (reason being it's not the focus of the game and I don't want balls with 75% commoners because 'but I wanna go!')

I'm not quite sure what you mean, here. The nobility went to gaming hells, and commoners did go to balls and participate in the Season - the daughters of naval and military officers, physicians, clergy, and barristers could all be presented at Court, and as those were considered aristocratic professions, they were definitely part of the social whirl of London. Any sufficiently wealthy person could be invited to the events of the ton, or any sufficiently /exciting/ person - high class courtesans and entertainers often went to balls, even if they wouldn't be invited to the most rarefied venues or to intimate gatherings. Rather famously, Beau Brummell, one of the most influential figures of Regency fashion, was not a peer, but rather a middle-class fellow and military officer who caught the eye of the Prince Regent.

@krmbm If it were me (and it isn't) I would likely age everyone up. Not just debutantes, but just sort of glazing over the fact that a lot of the men with military and naval experience would have gotten those experiences starting at, like, 10-12 for naval sorts and not much older than that for army soldiers.

Thinking about it, I would also move away from 'large, well-populated' families, and instead outright encourage no more than 1-4 PCs per family; a title holder, heir, and a couple of younger siblings. And then other family connections being cousins/through marriage, because most of the ton was distantly related to each other /anyway/. Because the Regency plots most people go for aren't really about intra-family politics, but rather inter-family drama/romance/conflict. You want a lot of title-holders/heirs for people to chase, and having a lot of title-holders/heirs also allows you - if you want - to introduce light political drama through votes in Parliament and political maneuverings among the Whigs and Tories. There were actually several high-impact votes around this time period that could be inspirations for background plots (I wouldn't use the real world votes, nor be beholden to how those votes turned out). Also, the sons of Lords could (and did) stand for seats in the House of Commons, so Parliamentary drama wouldn't just be for title-holders.

@krmbm That...is a good question. Especially if you're having debutantes as a focus. Girls were presented as young as twelve, historically, although fifteen to eighteen were more common, and usually married between 1-3 years of their coming out.

Will the game engage with the underside of Regency London, at all? Gaming hells, the rookeries, riots, Bow Street Runners, brothels and actresses/mistresses, etc? It sounds like you're going for a very lighthearted take on it, but at least including gaming hells might allow for some tension and scandal that isn't entirely manners-based. I admit, I mostly read Regency romances, but the gambling-debt-dodging lords (or ladies who must marry Well to buy their families out of debt their fathers/brothers acquired) is a fairly common trope.

I'd also suggest including at least a couple of gentlemen's clubs (for male characters), and regular salon/charity organizations (for female characters) to gather outside of balls/etc. It might be worth thinking of things, especially, to engage women outside of the social scene, since activities that don't imperil a debutante's reputation were somewhat restricted. Even if you lean into the idea that PC ladies are all Originals and the good kind of eccentric, giving an idea of what that looks like could help people consider what their characters DO in a Regency environment.

That does sound very cool.