Posts made by Sockmonkey

Oh god, I thought this thread was called 'Favorite Migraines' and I actually hissed at the screen and was like WHAT KIND OF MONST- .. oh.

Proceed.

Let's see!

I think the only MU* marriages I have had have been on Firan since marriage was such an integral part of that game. Diamia picked Lucas with her marriage prize and HOOBOY, that caused all sorts of drama (both IC and OOC -- the latter is what prompted Caroline to first start fiddling with the praise/diss code that ultimately got her kicked off staff but that is another story). Didn't actually end up marrying Lucas -- got hitched to Rikon instead which was a very solid relationship both in and out of character. I got along with the player really, really well and we are still friends to this day (I just got back from visiting him actually!) Lucile was married to Daranos briefly before he died; then she had a nice romance with Ryzen and was going to marry him before Custodius murdered him.

I like romance being a part of my RP (and omg, if it can be tragic romance, all the better) but not the whole of it. Its success is largely dependent on my RP partner and if there is even a whiff of OOC possessiveness, then the whole thing sours. Don't pull those kind of stunts, man. I am just here to tell a story, not to be some kind of online surrogate.

Goodness.

I threw this thing out here late at night and .. kaboom! I fully admit that I haven't read every single reply. Because I am a horrible person, probably. Also because I am a broad strokes kind of person and getting into the nitty-gritty details of math I don't understand is beyond me.

But..

My original proposal wasn't meant as an attempt to fix the nWoD system (even though I borrowed nWoD attributes). I'm mostly just trying to imagine an original game that I would like to play and what that would look like.

Attributes. I used nWoD as an example but I would probably come up with my own list. Still broken down in Mental/Physical/Social most likely.

Core Skills. These would be general life skills, broad subjects your learned in high school, etc.

Refinement Skills. Just a shit ton -- I mean a shiiiiiiit ton -- of finer detail skills. Partly because I want to toss out the concept of merits, also because I want folks to be able to design exactly what they want, also so there is a greater variety of the type of character.

+census. So everyone can see where everyone else are putting their blocks.

CG? I dunno. Initially I was thinking that there would be some rules around it but the more I look in on this thread, the more I think -- open CG. Just .. make whatever you want to make. If you want to make a nuclear astrophysicist underwear model genius super soldier who runs an animal shelter then .. go ahead. Perhaps, also, leave the sheets open always, do away with XP altogether. You feel like your character has learned something? Improved a skill? Change your sheet to reflect that.

Maybe in the beginning there would be a flood of OH I CAN DO ANYTHING?! characters but hopefully over time, folks would calm down and just make characters that are interesting to them. Or am I just being too naive and everyone would just max out everything forever and always?

I guess the key would be to -- and I forget who said it (edit: @Lithium! Thanks!), I will scroll back and find it on edit -- create an environment that doesn't incentivize min-maxing. Although I am not sure what that would look like. Physical/Social combat systems that have been broadly simplified? I like danger and risk, I like for RP to mean something -- so I wouldn't want to neutralize things too much. I do like +rolling but I usually do it so enhance my RP, possibly throw a wrench into it. Maybe incentivize failure? Like, it's not about winning, it's about creating interesting stories and sometimes fucking up creates really great and unexpected avenues for RP.

I dunno. I am rambling at this point.

I'm adding Carrie Coon to my list. Although it will be really hard to not just rehash her character from The Leftovers. So vulnerable, so broken, so barely keeping it together...

Should there be +census for attribute and skills so players get a sense of what the actually playerbase spread is?

Ahh! So many replies! Excellent! I'm at work so I can't reply specifically right now but, quickly...

I guess what I am trying to do is to create an environment where role-play is encouraged over roll-play. Where sheets are more like character overviews/guidelines than run-downs of stats. I suppose I am conceptualizing a super broad design that is low on complex systems (physical combat, social combat, etc) that ends up being much more freeform:

'Hey, your character is good at this stuff, your character kind of sucks at this stuff. With that in mind, here's the world: role play.'

The way I was picturing the sheet is that there would be attributes, core skills and then a shit-ton of refinement skills. I think I'd give everyone as many Average and Good blocks as they want; really, no limit on how many skills they could slot into that part of the bell curve. They would have a set number of Great blocks. Excellent would require oversight, probably needing to be offset with some Low and Weak blocks.

Or maybe not. Maybe I would just let people make whatever sheets they want to make. I'd likely make backgrounds optional on this hypothetical game that I will never make, haha.

Anyway, I will reply more thoroughly tonight when I am home.

I'm not a coder. I'm never going to be a coder. So this is purely a thought exercise that I have been kicking around this past week rather than something that I am actively working toward. But I thought it might make for interesting discussion so here goes!

Now, I haven't played on a lot of games so maybe something like this already exists. But something that has always bugged me is how, with forward-facing stats, players invariably become driven to min-max their sheets. I'm a player who tends to role-play rather than roll-play and even I min-max almost out of reflex; like, I see numbers and I naturally wanna optimize how they are utilized even if I know I will hardly ever lean on them. And with +rolls showing the amount of successes, it becomes this race to see who has the most ridiculously high exceptional success roll.

Anyway. So. Back to this thought I have been kicking around.

I was thinking of a sheet that, instead of having a number of dots assigned to attribute/skills/whatever, it would be something more broad:

Low - Weak - Average - Good - Great - Excellent

So, going off WoD attributes, instead of dots, it would look more like this:

Intelligence: Good
Wits: Average
Resolve: Average

Strength: Average
Dexterity: Good
Stamina: Weak

Presence: Average
Manipulation: Great
Composure: Good

(I didn't worry about proper starting-dots balancing for this example; I'm just dropping in random designations)

Staff side of the sheet, there would be numeric associations but it would be a range, not just one number for each category (low =1, weak = 2, etc.). So something more like this:

Low: 0.01 - 1
Weak: 1.01 - 2
Average: 2.01 - 5
Good: 5.01 - 8
Great: 8.01 - 9
Excellent: 9.01 - 9.99

This way, players have a sheet that is less about numbers and more just a guideline of 'you are good at this thing' and 'you are not so great at that thing' and can use it to steer their RP. +rolls would just tell them that they failed, they succeeded, they exceptionally succeeded rather than spitting out exactly how many (I'm still trying to work out how it would work when you are rolling against another player; I'm guessing it would involved MATH)

I dunno. Would people just HATE this? Would they still find a way to min-max? Do people like min-maxing and would be endlessly frustrated if they couldn't? Should I just go to bed and stop typing at 2:17a on a work night?

@Wretched I hate you.

Updated because I remembered that I played on Keep Austin Wyrd! Man, they had such awesome Hedge code there.

Also, I am sort of back on staff at Fallcoast. Sorta. To help with some build stuff down the line.

@thenomain said in Good TV:

No joke on The Good Place. There is not a single episode that is not positive. I haven’t felt this hopeful for characters since Pushing Daisies.

It's too soon. It's too soon to talk about Pushing Daisies. I'm still too upset about it being canceled.

When they canceled the show, there was still a few episodes. They ended up showing them (I think in the summer that year) but I went to the Pushing Daisies panel at PaleyFest where they showed the remaining episodes. Before they showed the episodes, the panel discussion with the actors was absolutely heart-breaking because it was really clear that they loved working together, they loved the show and they were all really upset that the show was canceled.

Hopelessly Devoted To You

Olive cries as Digby, the Golden Retriever, comforts her by licking her face.
Narrator: While Olive considered how much she loved Digby for paying attention to her while the Pie Maker would not, and Digby considered how much he liked salt..

@Auspice Oh! I will look into this! My husband mentioned CBD oil as something to look into for my migraines. I didn't know there was CBD gel. Because at this point, in addition to the Bengay, I am using a prescription anti-inflammatory, icing, swearing under my breath a lot and sometimes leaning on Percocet just to get some sleep at night (the knee pain is so bad that I wake up periodically in the night because I just HURT) which I don't like doing because .. PERCOCET.

And I'm in CA so yeah, legal weed stuff!

I have really crappy knees and they have been hurting like WHOA lately. So tonight, I enjoyed a nice hot bath with some epsom salts and then, afterwards, I was like 'I bet some Bengay would feel good'. Oh no. No. NO.

So I put some on and it was like ....

Oh, this feels good. Wait. What? This is more intense that usual. Haha hahhaha hhaha oh ooooh AAHHAHH NOoooOOOoOOOoOOoOOOoOo!!!!! MAKE IT STAAAAAP!!!!!!!!

I thought my knees were going to burst into flames. In hindsight, of course it made perfect logical sense that one shouldn't use Bengay after a hot bath and I wish I had used my brain for, like, even one second but..

LESSON LEARNED THE HARD WAY.

Oof.

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

@kanye-qwest said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:

@apos you have to take a Buzzfeed "which dog breed are you" quiz in your app.

Which quiz?

What kind of dog are you?
What kind of dog would you be?
What kind of dog breed are you?
Which Uncommon Dog Breed Would You Be?
Take This Quiz And We'll Tell You Your Dog Breed And If You're A Good Boy
Take This Quiz And We'll Tell You What Your Spirit Dog Breed Is

Welp, I know what I am doing for next hour...

@sparks said in [Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning]

(Of course, I need to actually finish Atlantis 2.)

Pleeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaasssssssseeeee...

@Three-Eyed-Crow I know, right? Wallace

***=Probably not a spoiler but just in case...***

Black Panther was great! But I must admit..

***=Silliness***

Tomkin

@Three-Eyed-Crow Yeah, I knew they had short seasons. I just hadn't been paying attention to the episode count. Plus, I'm greedy and I want MOAR JANET.

Sadness.

@Thenomain Wait, that was the finale? Noooooooooooooooo!!!!!

GOD DAMMIT. This is why I hate watching shows that are currently airing. So. Much. Waiting.

@Lithium Well .. I'm not going to completely derail the RL Lovefest thread but I will say that Sweden has its problems as well. Still! It's nice to know that I have options. If I was single, I would move (at least to give it a shot) but I am fairly certain my husband would have a hard time over there (the Swedish reserve/conformity/rules would be a difficult adjustment for him while I would be like 'I would embrace you, my Introverted brethren! But .. we don't do that so I will just smile inwardly as I ignore you from over here while obeying all these very sensible rules aaaaaaaaahhhhh yuuuuuuuuus sweet, sweet bureaucracy')