@rook You're right, of course, that MUSH is niche. I guess my point is that it could possibly be a little less niche. And that there are a lot of cool RPers out there who could take really well to it and bring a lot to the hobby. I'm not talking about trying to make MU* a huge giant thing with millions of players, but I do think there's plenty of fresh blood that could make the hobby better. So that's my concern.
Just -- the really good days. Like, I just had a lot of RP packed into one day yesterday with a lot of really exciting developments and I'm feeling pretty giddy and blessed right now.
@rook said in Alternative Formats to MU:
@Arkandel
I just don't see the difference between typing things out and filling out a webform, when it comes to making a MUSH character, other than the UI.
Except that UI is huge and is a big part of why someone chooses to put in the work to figure out any sort of website, program, app, etc. You can't just say "there's no difference other than the UI" as if the UI doesn't matter. It does matter. That's why there's a huge industry in developing UI.
I don't understand why you think there's literally no difference in "interacting with a website that behaves in a manner that's familiar" and "downloading and interacting with a brand new program using command line syntax that's entirely alien."
An incoming player dabbling around might toy with it, but if they aren't immediately hooked by the potential of great depth, the storytelling, the new venue in playing a game... the UI isn't going to snag them in, in my opinion. I may be wrong, I often am.
It's more a matter of the fact that someone might actually be a potential player who would absolutely be hooked in by all those things you mentioned -- but the UI is their first introduction and it's weird and unintuitive and offputting, so they move on. The point is that you're losing players who could be really productive and valuable to a game.
Once again I state: UI is not the barrier to entry, nor is the back-end protocol.
Once again I state: I have heard from lots of people that UI is the first barrier to entry.
MUSH is just not a venue for the short attention span, those that are lazy or those that have a very low motivation to learn something new. I put my money on that statement. You all disagree, and that's fine, I'm just stating repeatedly that I don't think that UI changes, protocol changes, or whatever, will fundamentally change MUSHing past some sort of invisible tipping point of ease-of-use.
All I've seen from your argument is that you personally find to be barriers of entry once people have invested a certain amount in the medium. I think you're looking at it from a perspective that's far removed from actually thinking about how a brand new player sees things upon their first introduction to the medium.
@Arkandel said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:
@Lithium said in Sensitive cultural/political/religious aspects of game themes.:
Theme is theme.
If you don't like the theme, don't play on a game.
To add to that, not all people will ever like a game's theme. That's okay, it's why different games exist instead of just one game that fits all players!
There's something really satisfying about telling this to a problem player (or potential player) who clearly wants the game to be something different than it is. "Well, this is what it is, but good luck finding the game you want!"
@Kanye-Qwest However, a millennia old lunatic is exactly who you want to keep happy when they instruct you to make out.
@Monogram said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:
@Sunny said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:
I find it frustrating to have it be implied that to be successful, you have to be online a lot, not have a life, etc. I am not successful because I have a time advantage (being on and being engaged are very different).
I delegate.
While I may be taking a short break from Arx, this is something I have felt very strongly in the time that I have been away from it. The game moves fast, almost too fast for my liking and at times it feels like there is almost a suggestion that if you don't dedicate the majority of your life to it, you're going to fall behind. And to note, I was completely one of those people who wanted 'all the clues ever' as unrealistic as that is.
Now, I know this probably isn't true at all, but the point is that it feels like it is. I'm hoping at some point the game decides to slow itself down to allow some to catch their breath, or at least feel like you're not missing out on a lot of things. It might be at the speed in which metaplot unravels, or the fact that the game moves at 3:1 time or a combination of both.
Either way, I know exactly what you're talking about. But again, even if I feel that, I don't think it's the case.
They've actually made some purposeful strides while you've been away to slow things down and give people a little more time to take thoughtful action. They've added a new +crisis system that lets people basically decide on actions to take for big metaplot stuff so it's not just like "I have to respond right now so the world doesn't end!!!" and "I have to respond first before other people get in there!!!" Now big stuff is given a certain timeline so people can see the earliest date actions will be resolved, and people have until then to figure out what they want to do (and each PC can only pick ONE thing to do). We haven't hit our first crisis resolution, but I think it's already been helpful in mitigating the whole sense of hyper-urgency in some quarters, and I'm really optimistic about watching things play out.
@icanbeyourmuse Okay, but to a certain extent it's just easier to let some amount of familiar terminology lie. They're not gender-specific roles, they're the same role with gender-specific names. That's not the same thing.
@Ghost said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:
@Roz said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:
@Arkandel said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:
@Nein said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:
@Roz I probably run in different mu subcultures, because I've rarely heard of PvP causing drama.
What?
That was my first response, too.
I think he has a point: I would equate drama surrounding PvP as rare due to the absolute rarity of players risking their character's lives to series of dice rolls. The last time I heard of a PvP death was on Fallcoast, and even then, I heard 4-5 staffers say things like "holy shit, a PvP death???"
So, yeah, unethical staff and IC fuckery channels far more drama than PVP, IMO.
My statement in no way argued that unethical staff doesn't cause drama. Also, PvP is more than just PvP death. PvP brings with it an intrinsically higher level of IC fuckery because players are literally being pitted into competition with each other.
@Nein said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:
This has answered my questions for the most part, so thanks to everyone that replied.
I've been on a non-superhero game run by Roz, Tez, etc, though I think Roz retired from it, so staff competency may vary. It was unpleasant and dull. I had at least two people trying to force unwanted relationships on me (no means maybe, apparently) and then watched half the playerbase ostracize a player for being male in RL.
I'm betting Roz's superhero game is probably much, much better. Players are usually not a reliable indicator of staff quality.
OH HILARIOUS I almost forgot who you were. I need to make a mental note somewhere.
Well, for the record, @Meg just started a player-driven cleanup of helpfiles with @Apos's blessing. So we're definitely in the midst of trying to help address this issue from the playerbase.
@Shayd said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:
First: Thanks for the kind and polite replies, I never know what I'ma get here.
@saosmash : I don't see it all the time; I'm just afraid to RP about sex because I keep thinking I'ma get it wrong per the game, despite me-the-player being an SJW libertine. Sorry about hitting the prostitution argument again. I think that's actually part of my SJW thing because I have known a lot of sex workers in my lifetime and the idea that they should be innately stigmatized bugs me, and I need to let go of that.
Are you saying that you think the profession would be innately stigmatized in Arx? Because that's not the case. Any stigma discussions have probably come up in regards to how deepset the stigma is in our society, which is one of the things that makes it a hard concept to integrate.
@Roz , @Cupcake : That'd be fine if there weren't (a) an anti-PVP community AND (b) players who seem to occasionally fetishize the idea of being pirates/capturing thralls/etc and support it. I get that some of them are roster characters chargenned that way. But if we're so enlightened about sex, one would imagine that beating the crap out of slavers would be right up there. Especially when Thrax is outnumbered by 4:1 and we've had a thousand years of internecine warfare with them.
@Arkandel : To be honest, I feel uncomfortable probably more because I think it's just me bringing up issues which are considered settled and overdiscussed and overargued. Also, I fucking hate slavery and thralldom A LOT. I don't want to look at it as an opportunity for roleplay when in reality if I discovered someone was holding thralls and had the weapons and political tools to stop it, I damned well WOULD, by force, and the idea that all the high and mighty noble houses that are "good" have been around for a thousand years and NOT rolled on Thrax like a Mack truck over a gopher makes all of those houses at the least complicit considering the fact that they're in an alliance. Which with the current threat makes sense to make uneasy allies, and that's how I'm roleplaying it; and willfully ignoring that for hundreds of years these houses have been sitting at the same table with a bunch of goddamn slavers.
Well, I mean, sure, all the other houses could try to get together and defeat the greatest naval power in the Compact by way of their own navies. They outnumber Thrax, sure, but do their ships?
But even just in a larger sense -- going to war with one of the other kingdoms is a big deal, and it basically sets up a dynamic where, like -- "if one kingdom doesn't like what another is doing within their own lands, we're going to gang up and steamroll you into destruction." It's not that it could never happen, but from a political and military standpoint that's not really the type of thing you want to do except for the most extreme of reasons. We're based in a system where a lord's word in their own domain is paramount, from baronies up through the high lords. This is a Big Deal. It's a Really Big Deal to try and mess in someone else's domain who is not in your line of fealty (and even there, politics dictate a certain amount of diplomacy).
It is absolutely heinous that Thrax has been allowed to continue doing this for hundreds of years. I think that's part of the point. But I think it's also pretty accurate to human nature in regards to how major political powers interact with each other.
@TNP said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:
@Shayd said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:
@Cupcake said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:
I kind of feel compelled to point out that this isn't a static issue. Thrax IS evolving.
Several members of Thrax and their vassals have either openly or quietly indicated their desire to remove the institution.
Political and trade alliances have been made to aid in releasing significant portions of the thrall population.
Vassals now have the ability to modify the institution in a variety of ways, such as no longer imposing the debt of a parent on a child, minimum age requirements to be placed in thralldom, etc.
The goal with this is to abolish the institution without destroying Thrax economically, as well as be able to guide those in thralldom slowly into their rights and freedoms. And it is happening at a measured rate. Whether it's happening fast enough for all parties is a matter of IC discussion.
Which I think is awesome!
I don't. That is, depending on the extent of what happens. I find it ridiculous that after many centuries, an ingrained institution is suddenly changing because the game opened and players' OOC beliefs on slavery are 'it's bad' and want thralldom abolished.
I think believing anything else would ever happen on a MU* would be wildly optimistic.
@Tempest said in MSB: The meta-discussion:
@WhatInTheSun said in MSB: The meta-discussion:
How many people are active on here? In the few places I've read, there's a smallish group that's vocal, then another layer of semi-vocal.
This is something I've noticed that's different from WORA.
Like yeah, there might be a decent pool of people who post here and there, but MSB is mostly like...the same 5 people from the WoD-crew circle-jerking each other all over the board about how they're the only people who know how to 'MU right'.
Um excuse me I am noisy as fuck and played a WoD game for all of like three scenes. 
@Seraphim73 said in Strange Game Dev Inquiries from surreality (condensed):
@surreality said in Strange Game Dev Inquiries from surreality (condensed):
I do not believe in considering downtime between formally organized PrPs, plots, or even pickup GM'd scenes to be 'lesser'. ... This includes scenes like dressing wounds after a battle, discussing how some things worked and others didn't in IC terms, going off drinking to celebrate a particular victory, reuniting with a long-lost family member that finally arrived in the area, and so on -- all of these scenes can have a major impact on the characters involved.
Oh god yes. I agree 100%. I wish very much that more people would keep RPing after the "end" of a GM'd scene rather than just being like, "Welp, we killed the bad guy, and even though we're at the bottom of a collapsing mine, knee-deep in acid, with wounded to carry out and prisoners to rescue, we're gonna log out for the night and not worry about it." (I exaggerate, of course, but you know what I mean.)
While I love aftermath scenes SO MUCH, let's be real on this: a lot of the reason for signing off at the end of a big GMed scene is exhaustion. I want to do aftermath, totally, but I usually want to do it -- the next day. Because a lot of GMed action or adventure type scenes have already been a couple hours, and they tend to be more intensive than RPing other types of scenes for that long.
The fact of the matter is that at least airing issues in public allows for the opportunity of debate. Airing issues privately in whisper campaigns allows for nothing to get contradicted. Having dealt with both public airing of grievances and whisper campaigns, I'd much rather the former. I also don't think that repeatedly conflating WORA and MSB is at all useful here, because there's a pretty stark difference in how they have/do operate. I think that bringing up the words "witch hunt" whenever multiple people agree on a player being toxic or problematic is actually a pretty harmful silencing tactic for information that could be actively beneficial to the hobby at large.
@Bananerz said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:
@Pandora I'll message you a private response because I'm irked with a bit of your response.
Stats: It's very easy to gain a lot of XP per week, and there are significant gainers per week. Look at the reports that are posted. We're nearly at the 200xp a week realm.
That's -- not true at all. There was one week where there were cron issues and XP got duplicated into weird numbers that topped a hundred. The norm is the top weekly earners are in the 30s.
@Sparks said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:
@Kanye-Qwest said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:
So make people desc their own, in shops! that was a key tenet of the shop design.
I try!! People say that, no, they were really hoping for a custom piece that would surprise them. And I do like seeing people happy when they receive them. I need to learn to say "no" better.
Story of your life.
@Aria Aaaaaaaahm. Be cool? The game's only taking apps for roster PCs while staff is on a break until August. However, there are a ton of characters on the roster. If you pop on at some point and have particular types of PCs you like playing, people will generally be able to help point you at some suggestions on the roster.
If you app, ask about the @randomscene command, cause you'll have access to a two-week window where you can basically collect a nice amount of newbie bonus XP.
Probably one of the hugest strengths of the games is the depth and mystery of the lore and metaplot, and IMO it does benefit from not sharing OOCly the many secrets you'll come across ICly. (This was hard for me. I am used to games where literally every log gets posted.) Arx actively sets up its systems and structure so that you only have OOC access to things your character would have IC access to/knowledge of, so I think it works out better when you lean into that.
There are dangers on the game from both NPCs and PCs, but it looks like you've been around the WoD block, so you probably won't have the adjustment shock I did coming to realize some of the PVP elements. (That said: those elements are pretty carefully controlled. Players are not given leeway to go murder whoever they want just cause. I say that as someone who's been pretty critical of some of the PVP structural setup and advertising both on this forum and to staff directly.)
Whatever character you pick up will have family and/or org connections, so utilize those! There's a pretty strong welcoming vibe on the game, helping to acclimate new folks instead of giving them a hard time for getting a title wrong or something. There is an Info channel that I lurk in wait on that is great for asking questions after you have an approved PC.
Okay! Those are some things I feel like I'd want to know coming in. Speaking with the experience of having at one point done the opposite of some of them and redirected.
