Best posts made by Roz

@Cupcake said in When To Stop Listening To Those Voices:

Medication is someting I do, and it's granted me a vast improvement - 5+ years ago I would not even be broaching this topic, I've now been on medicatin for the last three years or so. About a year and a half ago I lost my preferred insurance and was no longer able to utilize my mental health team, I haven't been able to find a therapist since.

I just want to drop in and be like GAH FUCK THIS SHIT I HATE AMERICAN HEALTHCARE IT'S SUCH BULLSHIT. I HATE how hard this country makes it for people to find good mental health care that works for them, and I'm sorry that insurance bullshit took away a thing that was improving your quality of life.

Keanu is also one of the Hollywood sorts who is apparently uncommonly kind and decent. Leave Keanu alone.

@Cupcake Heteroflexible?

@Sunny today i got mad that i live in an endless cycle of having to do laundry in order to keep wearing clothes

Some staffers really go above and beyond to keep the playerbase satisfied. <double rimshot>

@crawfish said in Health and Wealth and GrownUp Stuff:

ETA: The slightly uncomfortable: I'll have to raise my commission prices a little.

Your prices are already criminally low.

So my PC sexed an NPC once.

General sequence of events: the NPC was set out in a public place. There were a number of different PCs who rolled in to play with her, as you might expect! People were excited. The RP was generally pretty fun and funny as I recall. I think there were about 6-8 other PCs in and out of the scene, not including my PC or the NPC.

It was generally known (ICly and OOCly) that this NPC had access to some top-tier weapons. The NPC was there as a diplomatic envoy to reestablish ties, and a previous treaty with her people had indicated they would supply these weapons, so there was a lot of expectation that that would be a part of any reestablished treaty. My PC was a real flirty, extroverted, show pony type who totally wanted one of those weapons, so when he realized the NPC was there at his favorite bar, he set about trying to impress or charm her into promising him one of the weapons. He was generally dumb and reckless about it. In his attempts to impress her, he shared with her some secret info. It was dumb of him to share, because it was the kind of info that other people in the world might use as reason to get him killed, but it was early in his introduction to things. Why not use a dangerous secret to try and get a cool thing from someone who could kill him in an instant!! Sounds fun!! In the nature of group scenes, this was one among several other angles of conversation going on. For further context without actually revealing the entire secret, it was not 100% unique on the grid, but it would have only really been present for a few PCs.

The NPC had specific reason to be interested in what my PC shared with her. He didn't know it at the time ICly, and I didn't even really have an idea of it OOCly. Long story short, she became much more receptive to his general flirtatiousness at that point and took him to bed after several hours (as I recall) of the public scene. There was, indeed, some posing of sexual stuff before it hit a FTB point, mostly because of the late hour at that point. If it had been earlier, maybe it would have been played out? There was notable character stuff that certainly made it interesting.

In the end? He didn't actually get the weapon from her. She did intend to, but the diplomatic negotiations fell through with the actual people in charge, and she and her fellow NPC left town. However, she reconnected privately a while later with a different PC who she had also encountered in a public/open scene and who had impressed her into being quite fond of him. (In fact, I believe the PC specifically was telling off other PCs in the scene for being really rude to the diplomatic envoy NPC. Being interesting and not super rude to the NPC went a long way.) This other PC was given a number of the weapons to distribute to other PCs he felt were worthy of them and would use them in defense of the city and whatnot. He chose a variety of PCs from different factions of the game, the majority of which were commoners or lower-level nobles who he thought would have less access. My PC did end up with one of the weapons through this route. I am absolutely aware that there are players who were angry about this because they felt it was fucking his way into a cool weapon. (And, to be fair, he didn't make a secret of the fact that he'd slept with the NPC, because at that point he was particularly dumb about saying everything that popped into his head like an excitable puppy.)

So! Fast-forward...a while. There is now a kid from all of this. The kid was, in fact, the point of it for the NPC. I can't fully unpack it without revealing certain secrets that are still in play, but suffice to say there was specific reason rather than a more general desire to just get knocked up by somebody. The kid actually blew up quite a lot of my PC's IC plans, considering he was in a position where he wasn't allowed to have kids, and there was a lot of fallout before it was all settled. In the end, he had to be released from certain vows, and he gets to have the kid around half the year. (The other half, the kid goes back where his mom lives.) The kid is weird and creepy and delightful because he is growing up half his life in a very weird and creepy place with his mom's very weird and creepy people. His presence is generally limited to color in my RP for part of the IC year. There are multiple PCs who have really leaned into interacting with him when I've brought him out, so I think that's a benefit, and I try to just background him for people who aren't interested.

My PC and the NPC in question never hooked up after the one time; the limited contact they've had in the couple years has mostly just been about the kid, and at this point the NPC is largely out of play. I'd say that during that initial time, the NPCs were put into public spaces that were generally accessible for a lot of PCs to try and peek in and engage. I guess you could say that those PCs who sought out those scenes to engage had equal opportunity to flirt like idiots like mine did, and other PCs might have very well had different ways to make themselves of interest. It's true, however, that the NPC's source of interest in my PC in particular was relatively unique.

All that said, no one's really interested in hearing my inside take that I thought it generally felt reasonable, because my opinion is obviously biased and will generally have to be seen as someone who is looked to have benefitted from all of it. Most of this took place largely a couple years ago, but the effects are still continuing throughout the game.

So mostly I thought I'd share an actual story as a potential example for people to pick apart! For me it did not feel gratuitous or inappropriate, and I think I would have felt the same even if more of the sex part had been played out, but obviously this is like the very definition of YMMV. I just thought it might be interesting to toss out an actual scenario that happened. My general opinion is that healthy NPC play lies somewhere between "NPCs have no business messing around with anything sexual with PCs" and "NPCs can spend their whole day TSing the same person forever and giving them all the free loot." I do also think it's the case that players will always make assumptions about what exactly is going on behind closed doors and that our assumptions are probably more often inaccurate than the reverse.

Why do guys always find it so hard to believe that events exist outside of your experience? Why is it that it doesn't matter how many women talk about these issues, there are always guys lining up to talk about how we're exaggerating?

Here's the reality: women have so much more to gain by being silent. Talking about these issues inevitably ends up with more ugliness, either to mild or horrific degrees. The only thing women have to gain here is hoping that eventually we can speak up enough that things will be better for future generations after we take a whole lot of bullshit, skepticism, accusation of lying, harassment, and death and rape threats.

Is that really the sort of attention guys think women are making these claims for?

@tek I call them RP crushes

If someone feels absolutely no remorse about telling someone to kill themselves, I absolutely want to know it so that I can know exactly what kind of person they are.

@Ghost I think you missed what he's saying. The point (as I saw it) was that if you want to keep everything purely IC, you have to integrate it into RP. That is: when people cheat, there are usually some sort of signals or evidence left in its wake. If you are engaging in a playstyle where everything is IC and no OOC discussion happens, you have to basically play fair with it by giving IC indicators of stuff the other character would reasonably be witness to. As opposed to playing unfair with it, which would be to give absolutely no indications -- or even play in such a way as to aggressively project the opposite, even if it's not actually at all feasible. If your PC is hooking up with lots of people on the side but you are RPing with their SO as if all that time is actually being spent with them, you are basically being purposefully misleading on an OOC level. Hence the comparison with a DM not giving their players information about a thing that was visible right in front of their characters.

@Tinuviel said in MU* Gripes and Peeves:

@Roz said in MU* Gripes and Peeves:

@Tinuviel said in MU* Gripes and Peeves:

@Wizz said in MU* Gripes and Peeves:

Like...you should care? It matters? How do I even need to explain it to you? It was, yeah, eye-opening about the community at large and even (very unfortunately) about people in my own life at the time.

Eeeeh. When it comes to fictional races... I don't really agree with you. In general I mean, I don't know about the specifics of WoW's races. But if you've got 'human' in your list of races, not letting them be all the colours under the sun is kind of stupid.

If all the fictional races of the world you made up just HAPPEN to be light-skinned -- that's notable.

Oh, absolutely.

ETA: Or worse. Everyone is X-colour, except the bad guys.

bUt It'S a FaNtAsY wOrLd It'S nOt RaCiSt

@Tinuviel I think you're conflating a few things. One, having a fantasy setting decide to basically forego racism as part of the theme doesn't mean that all the players and the OOC experience will suddenly be free of bias, because OOCly we're all still brought up in this system.

Second, I think you're conflating "this experience was valuable for my personal learning and I think others could find it valuable, too" with "all games must provide this specific experience in the same way." I mean, I already don't think that the MMO examples are going to apply the same way to MU*s for all of the reasons that have been mentioned on this thread already. (The visual/graphics component being the most relevant.) But it does remind me of the instances I've heard of where a male player has decided to play a female PC and experienced, for the first time, how the OOC tone becomes different. And how that helped them better appreciate and empathize when female players would be frustrated at being targeted and harassed by creepers.

I felt like the overall message was just, as I said, "I found this illuminating in regards to better understanding some small piece of the difficulties those different from me face." Honestly, I don't think you have to play out IC stories of oppression to experience some benefit of broadened horizons. A lot of the time, deconstruction of these internal biases start with just experiencing more stories with diverse characters at all. It helps to break down our default assumptions.

A setting wherein racism and sexism don't exist may not be educational on the ways in which these forces work in the real world, but they do provide a place to explore characters as equitable players in a common story, and that in and of itself is valuable.

No one has said that bad behavior due to emotional bleed should be celebrated, allowed, or go unquestioned or uncensured.

The point is acknowledging that most or all players experience emotional bleed at one point or another, but that having the feelings themselves doesn't need to be shamed, as this can actually make things worse. When someone feels shitty about something that it's not appropriate for them to act on, if they also feel shame for experiencing those emotions, it actually compounds the issue. It will make negative, destructive, or toxic behavior more likely.

That's why the point of the thread was "what are the good and HEALTHY ways to deal with and process bleed." I said "don't shame people for having feelings" specifically because I think it's more helpful to just accept that people are going to have feelings, and instead focus on the resulting behaviors. How do we process those moments of bleed so that it doesn't become an issue in our actual gameplay or end up on someone else's lap? It's not about allowing bad behavior resulting from bleed.

It's moving the thought process from "If you have any feelings of bleed, you're bad" to "If you have feelings of bleed and let them impact others or the game, that's shitty." Assume that everyone is likely to experience some bleed at some point. Take that as a given. Focus on what they actually do in response to it.

@kestrel The short answer? My client still provides certain levels of functionality that Ares doesn't. I'm someone who is generally not particularly resistant to change, I love technology and exploring new tools and whatnot. The Ares web portal most definitely makes some significant improvements in the experience, and I've been a cheerleader for it since early on.

Is it possible that someday a web portal like Ares might make so many improvements that the things I get out of Atlantis become entirely redundant? I suppose so. But right now there is still significant functionality that I have come to rely upon for my play experience that isn't available in the web portal.

Granted, the bulk of my RP over the past 5-6 years has been on Arx, which isn't on Ares. Evennia does have a web client, and some improvements have been made to it over that time, but it's nowhere near the functionality of either the Ares web portal or my MU* client (Atlantis).

But generally, clients generally come with more customization tools to tailor the client to the user's preferences. I think the idea that people are just resistant to change is a much smaller part of this than just that people want to be able to engage in a way that's unique to them, and that the client provides that functionality.

@devrex said in GMs and Players:

@greenflashlight I think you are being unfair. I think you took that straight to the most extreme hyperbole possible. It certainly doesn't match up with the reality of how I have seen Derp handle people who need help. If you meant it to be a demonstrative example, or to get your own back somehow, then we've moved far afield of the point. We have gone from a civil discussion about principles and best practices and the pros and cons of two approaches to basically just attacking Derp. Heck, a few folks have said this is now just about attacking Derp for some past threads, and we have now moved so far past "constructive" it's not even funny. I have watched Derp be the first to jump in and defend people who need help.

I just want to clarify why I initially brought up that people's opinions of Derp's posts are colored by prior interaction. Not because I was saying, "Oh, Derp and I or Derp and others have gotten into tiffs in other fights, so people just hate whatever Derp says and wanna be jerks to him because of it." What I meant is that myself and others have seen Derp be dismissive numerous times on this board to these very sorts of issues, including one instance that wasn't even remotely connected to MU*s or games but was just someone talking about some unsettling RL interactions. What that means is that, for some people, he's not someone who has engendered trust or confidence in this particular area. I am very glad that Reimesu's experience with your game was one that was so swiftly positive, I honestly am. I am glad that your experience of Derp is one who will jump in first to help defend people, and I sincerely hope it all works out well on your game for you. Just understand that others have a different experience that make it difficult to always take his words on this particular topic at face value. I would not feel comfortable playing on a game he staffed, which I'm sure is not at all an issue, because I imagine he has no desire to play on a game with me either, so it's honestly the best result for both parties.

Setting that aside, I think this topic as devolved pretty dramatically to just a cycle of hyperbole on both sides. No, says one side, we are not advocating for acting on every single complaint that comes our way without any judgment or due diligence. No, says the other side, we are not advocating for refusing to act until we have a signed affidavit as evidence.

In practice, I imagine the distance between the two sides is smaller than any of these arguments is going to really illuminate; it comes down to probably a bit more extension of trust in some areas, a bit more skepticism in others.

In any case, you're not wrong that the thread as a whole has likely moved beyond "Mildly Constructive" so I will largely be tapping out of the central debate. Or trying to, at least.

@WTFE You can actually find staff's response to Custodius joining earlier in this thread. Way earlier though, probably. But it came up and was publicly responded to.

@Tempest He plays Max. (He definitely wasn't ever Leo.) And yes, he should most definitely be gone.

@buttercup said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:

I hope other players who currently feel the same way will at least make it known and it's enough of an issue to do something about it but I recognize that my current solitary case is not likely warranting of action.

Your single solitary case may not be, but as you say here that you hope other players who feel the same way make it known to staff, so should you. I'm sure there are a lot of people who are doing the "This one instance I've experienced probably isn't actionable enough" but enough of those and I'm still choosing to believe that if there's a giant enough pile of behavioral pattern they'll eventually have to do something.

Welp. Custodius/Max/Branan just got banned!

@faraday said in Alternative Formats to MU:

@sparks Right. The thing that turns off newcomers is the immediacy and the requirement to set aside multiple hours per night several nights a week to play effectively. This is a huge turn off to casual players.

That's not actually been my experience. I mean, it may turn off some newcomers, but there are also a lot of other options out there with much slower pacing for those people. My experience is that there are people who are ready to dive in to the kind of pacing we have on MU*s, but their turn off is the technology. They have to download a client and connect to this game and figure out commands and learn all the lingo that everyone already knows. When I was on staff at Transformers: Lost & Found, we got a lot of these kinds of RPers. Their experience is maybe somewhere like Tumblr, and there's a really high bar of education that a lot of us don't really think about.

So for me, a new web-based system isn't about adjusting pacing. It's about adjusting user-friendliness.