Are there any good listings out there for RP MU*s? I don't want a MUD, nor a MUCK or whatever, just Rhosts/MUSHes/MUXes, preferrably with a wide variety of themes, systems, etc.
Mudlist is okay, but maybe there is another good list that has some that haven't registered there or MudConnect?
Also, in the WoD genre, what are the better games out there, as ranked in lack of issues and bulk of players, activity and such?
Agree with @Arkandel - someone posing purely past tense when everyone else is using present tense is someone being either precocious or outright snotty. I've paged people in the past pointing it out, and after a few more poses, simply ignore them.
RP that doesn't mesh in a scene is something that is disruptive. Disruptive players are best dealt with (by other players) by ignoring them and their impact, after explaining OOCly what they are doing to be disruptive.
First, getting thrown under a bus by a co-worker in front of bosses. The next day, taking the high road and stepping in to bail co-worker's ass out of the proverbial fire.
Then having co-worker take full credit for saving things. Despite evidence to the otherwise.
At least it is easy to tell that you have good bosses when they spot shit like this.
@Arkandel, your post...
@ThatGuyThere No way. Every time I delve into youtube I lose my faith in humanity.
The outright racist, hateful things there... they're not even pretending to be decent human beings. N-bombs at each other, fat shaming, open homophobia... and over literally anything. It can be a random completely uncontroversial interview for a movie and WHAM full-on racism.
...and your sig line...
He who takes offense when not intended is a fool. He who takes offense when intended is a greater fool.
...make me confused. 
I learned a style, influenced heavily by the 'mentors' that I looked up to in RP as I started out my RP 'career' to be something of the following:
On pose pace -
This depends heavily on the complexity and pace of the scene. A lazy, daytime (while people are working) social bar scene doesn't really demand a fast pace. A gunfight with seven players, however, should. In large scenes with more than 3 characters (including NPCs if they are being posed separately), I adopt the 3-pose rule. After three poses by anyone else, it is acceptable for me to jump in with my next. In scenes where there are fragmented mini-scenes (think huge public events with knots of people NOT at Places), I only consider my 'group' within the larger scene for pose pace. To me, this is normally the guiding, deciding factor on how well a scene is going (unless there are RL interruptions). The more interested people are, generally, the more they are engaged with the pace, I have found.
On pose length:
I intentionally try to prioritize pace over length in most scenes, out of courtesy. However, with that said, I generally pose an entire paragraph of several 80-character lines, or sometimes two. Scene sets can be almost a screen full, especially if sandboxed or setting up a new plot, whathaveyou. In faster scenes, with faster action, I will cut this way back to keep the frenetic pace up. Sometimes down to two lines. I will intentionally break poses up if there is a point in my pose that someone should get a decision or action or a chance to pose a response, with the second half of my pose ready to go based on their decision. This is rare, but it has been met with smiles and thank-yous, in the past.
I have found that I can have several lines or just a few. There are times when the latter is more impactful and character-meaningful. It is the mic drop of posing, the silent stare and walking out after a confrontation and saying your piece. Sometimes it works to make your point more fully than a two paragraph pose can.
On content -
I have played with all kinds of personalities. Some that abhor any sort of non-visible/non-detectable elements of the pose transmitting OOC information (such as character thought, intention or whatever). Others actually will embrace that style of posing, as they find (and I admit it swayed me when I loosened up about it) that it can save a lot of misinterpretation (the idea being to 'translate' a bunch of real-world body language, inflection, etc into a text medium in a clear and concise manner). Sometimes this makes great sense, and is done very intentionally. When done right, it changed my RP style to include it. I now feel that this is more 'cooperative' RP to give people hints into motivation, intention and perhaps reactions.
Of course, this is a balance. It can be done wrongly, so very easily. I don't agree that including thoughts is a good example of this. But including things that can be inferred from facial expression, body language, etc, are.
Finally, my thoughts on clarity -
I don't go into huge detail unless I find that it is warranted, that the object or action of detail is the crux of the pose. If I am swinging a punch at someone's jaw, I am not going to go on for two sentences about how my glove is custom-tailored and lined in gold thread. I am going to wax poetic about the swing itself, the power behind it, yada yada yada. I, personally, find that when people expound on several things in a pose, granting heavy detail to multiple points of interest, that I can lose the grip on what they are trying to say.
To me, a pose should have a thesis, not four. It should have a central point that it is trying to make to those in the scene, maybe with a few supporting emotions, quips or minor actions.
Oh, and posing five different comments to five different people in a scene "just to keep up", to me, is scene overload. It happens to me in RL, if multiple people are talking to me directly (versus having a group conversation). I tend to answer in turn, and I do this in my poses. I find that it is much more realistic and manageable for me.
Now, back on track. For the record, I'm behind @surreality on this. I like what is being put down, both thematically and in regards to how the game will be run, what the players can expect, and so on.
No games out there are perfect, even the popular ones. I've already told @surreality to plunge forward with machete into the dense undergrowth, hack out a path and people will follow. People will come and help. People will bitch and so on, too, sure, but it's easy to spot those, pat them on the proverbial head and say "Duly noted, thank you." as you continue doing what YOUR VISION dictates.
As a blanket statement, any adult-rated MU* should be considered Adult-Rated (R or higher) in a fair majority of the areas, events and plots. Whether that rating is for violence, sexual content, or whatever. If the game states that you must be 21 or 18 to play or whatever, it's adult-themed!
Since the dawn of WoD, it seems, that people are routinely surprised by Evil Characters acting Evil, even when there is a lot of evidence (perhaps subtle) that they plan to do so. No, I'm not talking about surprise buttsex trauma, I'm talking about watching an IC event in a public location, with a timestop dropped (remember the days) and people reading a BBpost to get in... and someone complaining about the violence in the scene.
If you are on an Adult-Rated game and have ANYTHING that triggers you in very horrific ways, I would sincerely hope that you have some tidbit of information on you somewhere that warns potential STs, Staff or RP partners that even starting down that road has the strong possibility of killing your involvement, interest or whatnot. Even if that note is an OOC statement at the start of meeting a new partner in a scene, or whatever.
What I'm saying here is that: 1) Players should expect Evil, Twisted things on a game where Evil, Twisted lives and thrives. 2) STs and other PRP runners should not 'surprise plot twist' as @surreality says, at least OOCly. Give warning that Evil, Twisted things are not just possible, but imminent, here's your warning, please leave now kthnxbye.
This should be an ingrained part of our culture, don't you think? Doesn't this fall under Respect Your Fellow RPers? Maybe. Surprisingly, this is the EXACT reason why we need News files so explicitly and agonizingly worded.
It's the MU* equivalent of the sticker warning on your clothes washer expressly telling you that no, it is not safe for you to wash children in the machine, FFS.
Of course, my coder's brain is suddenly envisioning a Squick/Rating system that players can set that can match locks on entries to areas, barring them with a warning... that's a neat idea.
@Three-Eyed-Crow said in Strange Game Dev Inquiries from surreality (condensed):
That's a long TS file and is the kind that just makes me shake my head. Long TS files tend to do that, because it twigs my, 'If you're spending this much time explaining Tinyfucking, you must really care about Tinyfucking' light in my brain. Which is never a positive for me.
I am one of those that takes the opposite mindset: Clearly they have had some idiots -cause- them to have to have this length of policy, damn.
I don't care what people do on a game, or don't do, but don't artificially limit valid roleplay no matter what your bend is. There's nothing more laughable than the games out there who have policies of "No TS! EVAR!" where banning was the result of such, even in private rooms.
Damnit, @Thenomain!! Now I have that song running through my head!
DOUBLE DAMNIT. Sorry. I now (accurately) blame @Arkandel.
I agree with @Thenomain here. Trying to 'size up' to some amazing writers can cause a lot of stagefright. Logging for the wiki might also be a scary thing, and would make me balk at doing any completely reasonable NSFW RP that might otherwise happen naturally.
Other than those two things, I'm all for people doing thar thang as they wish.
Alright. I'm convinced. ("And yes, Rook, too much cane-waving.")
What is wrong with just a simple OOC request that someone do a little paged playback? That was always the way it was done before...
(Am I waving my cane too much? Just say so. I can believe that's what's happening here.)
@Thenomain said in New Start Databases:
@RnMissionRun said in New Start Databases:
MUX has SGP and MUXcore
Nnnnnnnnnggghhhhhhhkkkiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnnda? I've yet to see a Mux project where someone hasn't essentially wanted to throw SGP to the curb, and I keep forgetting that Muxcore exists which just a slightly cleaned up version of same. SGP is absolutely better than nothing, but that's about all I can say about it.
I have to admit, never have I seen a SGP/Muxcore survive the coder joining and starting to build. Non-coder mu* owners install it to get themselves started, or to tinker, and then realize just how complex some MU code can be, and then redouble their efforts in finding a coder.
Coders just rip that crap out anyway. 
And I say that because I feel that every coder out there worth their salt want things done Their Way, not that the SGP/Muxcore package is 'crap', just that it is from the standpoint of some of us arrogant coder types... if that makes sense?
@krmbm Uh... what is 'MUSH' in regards to server?
I once built a scene logger object that was useful in place of timestop code (this was a decade+ ago) that only allowed scene participants to use (for security reasons). They could add people to the scene (which would then roll initiative for them if the scene was 'in rounds' so to speak) and that person could use the commands until they were removed. The players so added to a scene were alerted, and had to run a command to 'accept' those terms of the scene being logged (else they were not involved). It bears mentioning that this functionality/object was an offering for players, not a requirement (so that people were never forced to use them).
The point here was that the object @tel'ed to the last person to leave the room, or to the person to run the 'close scene' command. After that, only that person could run the 'regurgitate' command which output the stored poses for logging/posting purposes.
Nothing was stored on the room, the room wasn't listening, etc, was the point of using an object in the room. The room parents DID have a check for such objects, and when a new player entered the room, they saw a bright red @adesc warning on the room description.
EDIT: However, this did not have any poseorder or repose functionality.
Is there somewhere that a part-timer interested party could pitch in? Building or something? Would like to help with limited time, if nothing more than to get re-acquainted with the game system.
My Notifications keeps showing the (2) badge. I click it, it says No New Notifications. I clear it, it goes away. Next page loads, it's back in the same strangely-empty-but-showing-2 state.
Halp?
I am in the same boat as the OP, left the genre about a decade ago due to angst and woe, and never really looked back until recently when daytime work boredom makes me want to find a place to contribute to again on a casual player level. Now, however, the whole slew of options is compounded by there being ten different 'versions' of WoD to know and understand, with Old and New being entirely different.
Plus, I'm not a min-maxer, so conversations about such immediately shut my brain off, or turn it to a station of nothing but white noise, and I tune out.