Best posts made by Rook

@Thenomain I dunno....... I kinda liked it.
Apologies to anyone who did not, I guess. By proxy. Kinda.

Back to the OP's conversation, as slanted as it might have come off...

Lots of games do small tweaks to things to make stuff look homogenous, as they can. But most games don't know how to dig into big systems like Myrrdin's BBoards, the +Jobs systems, and so forth, to truly rewrite interfaces. Myrrdin's BBoards have been around since before the turn of the fucking century, and (yes this is a peeve of mine) haven't changed in that time. They're great for what they do, don't get me wrong, but come on.

Most games still use SGP and repository packages that are drop-in, tweak and forget... and that is the extent of "coding" on their game. Many games just then do without other functionality because they cannot find (or trust, a whole other conversation) a coder who can create that system in the way that they want it, in the timeframe that they want it.

So game owners settle for what is quick to install, configure and get rolling... because honestly, people just want to RP. Which brings me to my last point: Most people don't care about the code. Believe me. I've spent months building systems that people look at and say "Meh, I'll stick with <old system X>". Why? Laziness/Familiarity - two words describing the same lack of motivation to learn something new.

Go ahead and rewrite systems for your upcoming game, and you'll see firsthand what people are telling you here. Not trying to discourage you, it is a very solid way to deepen your coding skills... but don't do it if you are after praise and recognition. Coding is not for you if that is your goal.

People respond much more lovingly to STs and Sphere Wizzen who directly enhance their RP .... far more than they do to coders that provide the system crunchies to get the business of RP support done.

Good conversation. Good points.

I am reminded of something I learned in the 8th grade:
"I am not who I think I am.
I am not who you think I am.
I am whom I think you think I am."

I think it applies in life, and I also think that this is somewhat changing recently to something like:
"I am not who you think I am.
I am whom I say I am."

German - Irish.

@HelloProject
I dunno. I disagree with your assumptions above, for a few reasons.

• I don't think many coders switch coding styles based on from-scratch or hacked/piled-on. You code how you code, and if adding functionality to a system forces you to a style, that's one thing... adding switches to a command, for instance.
• I think most coders I know code the commands to conform with the norms of the game, and make them as simple as they possibly can. When you're talking multiple optional switches, and have to resort to a huge regexp system to sort that shit out, it's no picnic. Coders don't just say "What's the way I can make this all-inclusive as fuck" and just dive in. If they do, I'd have to laugh at them and seriously try to show them that planning your crap out before just tackling a single command is totes the way to go.
• Having the skill and flexibility to code from scratch is huge, in my opinion. It's why it's the only way I work. I don't install other people's code, because my style is wildly different, but it's flexible, easy to debug/expand, and heavily documented. Personal preference.
• As for abstraction, there is a line between abstracting and complicating, as you suggest. I don't see much abstraction on games nowadays, for every WoD sphere has their own unique code, and +sheet systems to parse multiple race data tends to be a lot of @switches and so on.

^^^ Exactly.

Adult-rated games have adult-rated themes and events and RP.

If you cannot deal with a subset of those themes, it is on you to advertise somewhere, in explicit language, what you cannot, will not RP or be involved in. On a game where dark, horror like themes are the norm - maybe you should have a few notes on what your triggers are. On a teen-rated game, one wouldn't expect the 'norm' of RP to include butchery, rape, soul-ripping, whatever, (such RP may be explicitly against TOS/Policies, too) so it should stand to reason that people shouldn't have to have notices about those things.

The onus is on you for 50% of this.
The rest of the onus is on those that run scenes, scene with you, for the other 50%.

Oh and while I'm at it: waiving your rights by explicitly asking for a scene with someone should also waive your rights for complaint after the fact, if the scene generally went in the direction you asked for. Complaining after the scene should get YOU disciplined, not the person that you talked into your requested scene. That's some for of bullshit entrapment, and should rank right up there with falsifying logs to 'prove' someone was cheating in combat scenes.

Then gaming is dying and I am willing to let it go.

Too many indie games nowadays prove that it doesn't take millions to produce good titles. I rarely if ever by AAA titles any more, and definitely will not do so until they get discounted. I'm happy to let Big Games die. Most of the Big Game houses run shady business practices anyway.

I scrolled through over two dozen posts just to say that, given that this has devolved into insults, I've lost interest in reading.

I mean no disrespect to anyone, and I mean that honestly... but why would anyone who has triggers to any of the common/possible thematic elements of a game play on such a game, regularly? At an extreme, it could remind of Ganymede's (I think) rant about cigarette smoking areas and non-smokers.

I totally get that those with these triggers have every 'right' to be on said game. Not arguing that, but.. if it were me? I'd have warning stickers on me. For self-protection?

I have stuck with Swiss Gear for most every purchase on backpacks that I've ever made. They wear well, carry a lot of weight, and are functional. The straps on mine are very nicely padded, have a chest clip (that helps keep the straps from pulling your shoulders open, which causes back pain). Plus, they don't break the bank.

https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_3_10?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=swiss+gear+laptop+backpack&sprefix=swiss+gear%2Caps%2C149&crid=15PBU9LE6DMUF

Quiet you. I'm making a point here!

@surreality
That's as stupid as bitching that one was denied entry to college to "those who cannot bother to take entrance exams or get good grades in school".
...or as fucking ditzy as complaining of a company not hiring someone completely unqualified for a job as "discrimination based on lack of merit and/or qualifications".

Point me to the idiots who bitch that shit at you. I'd have no shame telling them to nuke their character and get the FUCK out, and to take their friends with em.

https://www.amazon.com/SwissGear-17-Gray-Notebook-Backpack/dp/B005TPVTHO/ref=sr_1_26?ie=UTF8&qid=1508513110&sr=8-26&keywords=swiss+gear+laptop+backpack

@Derp

It's ironic, then, that the measuring stick for "quality" on most games is the length of a pose. Or, maybe... it is the tell-tale sign of desc-skippers? Those that pose one or two lines get bored after reading one or two lines?

Fuck, who knows.

@auspice
Well with a name like WARNER BROTHERS, no one would have seen THAT coming. AMIRITE?

To coattail @faraday

If you code something for a game, you should be playing with that very code, as an end-user in a real scene. It isn't for testing, it's for usability, it's for seeing first-hand the clumsiness, the lacking features, the places where you can streamline things.

If you aren't doing that, then you have no business being the head coder on a game. IMNSHO.

Sexual assault and sexually-themed violence seems to be a major, recurring issue talked about on WoD game threads here. Yet, are the one genre of game that have the highest levels of Consent, Privacy and Conduct types of rules in place.

The genre is designed from the 10,000-foot-view to be gritty and realistic in a modern-world. Gritty and realistic horror is not the life that most people who have triggers want to live, even as a character.

Like, duh.

@auspice said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

"We're running late."
"Well, that's fine, so long as you can still give me a ride to work."
"We can't, we have to meet people in Plano."

"Fine, get out, and don't come back."

You missed a perfect opportunity, Auspice. SRSLY. They wouldn't even blink, would instantly know WHY, all delivered with a very concise and apropos statement void of feeling or angst. Which, I hear, is the best way to have those quaint conversations with humans.

As a general note... this is the reason that I have checked games out in the past, found nothing happening, no friendly conversations, no RP hooks to pull me immediately into someone's plot/clique/group play... so after a few days, I give up and leave.

I am not alone. I have spoken to several people who did the same thing.

CharGen, especially on a WoD game, or any game that requires approvals, is a huge mountain to climb for the rare person that is coming into the three-decades-old game system. Most WoD games that I've seen are very much of the mind, publicly, that "if you don't talk the talk", you get ignored or left without help.

Is every WoD game out there so fractured and fragmented that there is stagnation? Is there literally no movement on the game outside of bar-rp or slice-of-life? I get it, it's hard to not have huge, earth-destroying types of plots long-term on WoD games, given the power levels of even mid-level characters in almost every one of the game systems (races)... but damn.

Characters seem so powerful that challenge is rare to find, hard to not overcome in a single scene or two, and tends to be very race-specific.