Past:
MUDS
LegendMUD - Lirra, Lark
MUSH
Tales of Ta'veren - Neri, Rennar
Cuendillar - Raemira, Kelsyn
Angreal Moo II: Kaelyn, Desmina
Tartarus - Katerine
Firan - Various Characters
Ithir - Darinel, Alexandria
Current:
Arx - Lou, Quenia
Spirit Lake - Maureen
Behold! Lou and her Backpack of Many Things!!
@Ghost As someone who has been an impartial observer since the schism, calling people fucking punks in a post that is trying to discuss being respectful and civil and repairing a community is neither genuinely respectful nor civil. Better word choices could have been used to get the point across and maintain respectful civility. Or, just reiterating the point:
People could create a topic on another forum where they don't have to be respectful or civil to one another.
Word choices matter, especially in a discussion about trying to repair a community.
@runescryer said in The Wheel of Time:
@arkandel said in The Wheel of Time:
@dvoraen said in The Wheel of Time:
This thread makes me want WoT MU*s to be a fad again.
The problem with WoT MU*s is that we as fans disagree on just about everything about how they should be done.
Yeah, I think the best way to go with a WoT game would be to sell it as 'a different Turning of the Wheel'; which is basically what the show is doing. Have a lot of the basics (The One Power, the Dark One, the Dragon, the Forsaken, etc.), but also make some changes for the game to be more playable (men can be Aes Sedai; both men and women can be corrupted by using the One Power, just not as severely as in the books...)
I played on AngrealMOO II, Tales of Ta'veren and eventually became staff there, and I ran Cuendillar. I was very young when I ran Cuendillar. I made a lot of mistakes. There's so much I would change in how I approached things now that I have more experience GMing and running a game in general.
However, the major theme all three games had in common is that they always approached playing them as a different setting than the books, not so much turning of the Wheel, because that was a possibility with the Portal Stones taking you to different dimensions that allowed for a different weaving of the same timeline. Even Tales of Ta'veren II, which took Rhonda's and Tabbifli's existing game setting and code base, did the same thing - but in their case they were a Portal of the original Tales of Ta'veren. We didn't want to follow the roadmap already presented in the books.
This allowed us to still have male channelers and even the Forsaken, and allowed us to create our own Heroes and/or manifest them to become the Dragon should we wish, without needing the major book characters as the main characters in our setting.
There's a whole LOT a person can do with a Portal Stone setting, where anything is possible and the events that happened on one 'dimension' may not necessarily be the same as the 'other dimensions' through the stones; and the same people might not even be alive.
I've tried Ares and it's just not for me. I'm not very big on web based products to begin with. If I can't have a client for something, anything, I really don't want it. I'd prefer to manage things on my computer.
As for my specific experience, Ares is a whole OTHER mindset of playing. Almost all of the scenes that were open were ones that were private and not open for anyone to joining them. That's very exclusionary. While they had a policy of just ask for RP, I don't want to have to ask for RP every time I want to go out onto a grid and play. I just want the opportunities to be there and have the chance to decide if I want to join or not with folk already out there. For someone who is introverted and has problems asking people to do things in the first place, it's also exceptionally intimidating.
I'm also very bad at async RP. If I'm not there in the moment, I lose sight of what the scene is even about and then lose interest. However, I recognize that it is a great tool to loop in others who can't match timezones and maybe want to RP with each other.
As a dinosaur to the MUing community, ultimately, change is hard.
Right then. If this is not a community, then it doesn't need repairing. There's nothing that can be repaired.
I had to skim through Eye of the World for reminders. It's been a long time since I read the books.
***=Book Spoilers***
I am FB friends with a lot of the authors I love; Tamoria Pierce, Mindy Klasky, Kelley Armostrong, Robin Hobb (aka Megan Lindhom), Kate Quinn, Lea Nolan, Kristen Britain, and several others. That's because at some point I used be part of the Maryland Romance Writers group, which was part of the Romance Writers of America. I attended monthly meetings with them because I had aspirations of writing at some point and then life got mired down in a big bog. From that attendance, I know some of them personally, and have either beta read their books or helped them with some research (Kate Quinn - The Rose Code - my husband gave her a tour of the car barn of Henry Petronis so she could see his his antique European Car collection and have Mr. Henry answer some of her car questions. Henry invented the screw on oil filter for cars.)
So, I follow them. See what they are reading, what they are releasing, learn about other places where they promote their books, or where sales might be going on, like Book Bub: https://www.bookbub.com/welcome -- where you can get titles either for free or for a cheaper price than the big box stores (or because the big box stores are using Book Bub to promote those sales). It's easy to try a new author through Book Bub with a lower risk of investment.
They will often recommend other authors because a lot of promoting your own books is also promoting the sales of others.
@crawfish Speaking as someone who makes jewelry, that's art too! So no moonlighting anything going on for you 
@Macha said in Health and Wealth and GrownUp Stuff:
@Derp That's what I keep telling myself. But I still keep thinking "Shit, I need to take Logan out." Or think I see him from the corner of my eye. I know this is all completely normal, when the mainstay of 9+ years is suddenly gone, but.. ouch.
I lost my boy on October 30, 2020. I didn't plan on getting a new dog right away after he died. I also did not anticipate all of the routines that I would miss that were a part of my life for the 9 years and some change I had him. After a couple of weeks, I couldn't take not having those routines and so in my grief I over compensated and got 2 dogs instead of 1 almost immediately.
Your grief is real. Just be kind to yourself and allow yourself to process it and figure out what your new normal is without him in your life.
Right then. If this is not a community, then it doesn't need repairing. There's nothing that can be repaired.
@Ghost As someone who has been an impartial observer since the schism, calling people fucking punks in a post that is trying to discuss being respectful and civil and repairing a community is neither genuinely respectful nor civil. Better word choices could have been used to get the point across and maintain respectful civility. Or, just reiterating the point:
People could create a topic on another forum where they don't have to be respectful or civil to one another.
Word choices matter, especially in a discussion about trying to repair a community.
I am FB friends with a lot of the authors I love; Tamoria Pierce, Mindy Klasky, Kelley Armostrong, Robin Hobb (aka Megan Lindhom), Kate Quinn, Lea Nolan, Kristen Britain, and several others. That's because at some point I used be part of the Maryland Romance Writers group, which was part of the Romance Writers of America. I attended monthly meetings with them because I had aspirations of writing at some point and then life got mired down in a big bog. From that attendance, I know some of them personally, and have either beta read their books or helped them with some research (Kate Quinn - The Rose Code - my husband gave her a tour of the car barn of Henry Petronis so she could see his his antique European Car collection and have Mr. Henry answer some of her car questions. Henry invented the screw on oil filter for cars.)
So, I follow them. See what they are reading, what they are releasing, learn about other places where they promote their books, or where sales might be going on, like Book Bub: https://www.bookbub.com/welcome -- where you can get titles either for free or for a cheaper price than the big box stores (or because the big box stores are using Book Bub to promote those sales). It's easy to try a new author through Book Bub with a lower risk of investment.
They will often recommend other authors because a lot of promoting your own books is also promoting the sales of others.
The trailer for The Sandman is very good.
This is such a difficult piece of work though. Even though I'm happy to complain about other adaptations of my favorite works into TV series, but I'm not going to blame the producers in this case even if it doesn't translate well.
The original series uses amazing prose, inspired lettering, great - often moody - art... subtleties and wordplay that I have no idea how they can pull off on a TV screen. My hat's off to these folks if they do succeed, but I wouldn't hold it against them if it falls short.
Authors don't generally get a say in how things go, even when they are hired as 'consultants'. Usually, It's to shut them up. However, in this case, everything I've read seems to suggest that Neil Gaiman is heavily involved in this adaptation, so that might be promising considering he penned the prose.
Gaiman also co-wrote the script and is producing the show.
You may also want to look into Care Credit, if you have not already. See if your vet will take it. It is one of those credit card programs that you can use for both veterinary costs and regular personal medical costs. If your vet takes it, they have programs where you have something like 6 months to a year to pay off the debt with 0% interest. If you default paying it off, you accrue all of the interest, but if you pay within the terms - it's entirely interest free. Or, they'll offer a lower percentage rate. I signed up for this when my I took my dog to a neurologist in 2020 and it was really a lifesaver for me to help him get the care I felt he needed.
I am so, so very sorry your dog is going through things. I ended up losing my guy in the end; the tumors were aggressively eating his spinal bones and crushing his spine, and had broken his back.
I kinda bombard folk in the MUSH with my gardening enthusiasm. It's a great way to take my mind off of other things. I had such pretty, pretty seedlings this year that died because my kitty got sick and died. 
I was taking care of her, so I've had to source some plants and some are being started from seed directly in the garden.
@misterboring They make grow bags that are fairly inexpensive that do the same thing as the raised beds! The grow bag is only $19-$20 on Amazon. The one I got this year is this model:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07CYMWQFJ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
It is 4 ft round, which means you're not really missing a lot of space out of the grow box that was in my earlier pictures. I wanted more boxes, but my brother-in-law who made it for me passed away last year. It would have only cost me the materials, but the bag makes up for it, kind of.
I grew tomatoes in grow bags last year, and they did very well. You can find the 10 gallon bags for pretty cheaply too. This is my garden from last year which show beans and tomatoes grown in bags.
This is my garden so far for this year:
https://imgur.com/gallery/C89ETo4
LOL. Also deleted my other post because I saw you were already doing my recommendations!!
I had to skim through Eye of the World for reminders. It's been a long time since I read the books.
***=Book Spoilers***