How is a newbie supposed to know that the stats of the pistol there DON'T represent what the game says it does? They are a newbie. They dont know the system. They have no frame of reference for comparison. Or are we all supposed to just magically intuit this, or be able to crunch the EXTENSIVE numbers required to come to that determination...in our heads, the first time we look at it?
What?
every choice in building a game -- every single choice -- has 3 possible consequences towards any specific thing:
encourages
neutral
discourages
+meetme code discourages walking the grid by being an easier way to get somewhere
Okay, so now we have a bunch of choices:
a- do nothing -- as a result, this piece of code discourages walking the grid
b- remove code -- but that's a convenient thing man, people really enjoy it!
c- compensate -- do something that means that NOT using +meetme provides some benefit somehow
d- ensure other policies strongly encourage walking the grid to the point where the small SMALL discouragement that +meetme provides is outweighed by what other policies or code are offering
If you never stop and consider what impact +meetme has, you automatically do a. That's how code creates culture.
ETA:
+meetme code encourages OOC cooperation by allowing people to go right to pre-arranged scenes
+meetme code is neutral on character creation by not having any relation to a PC's stats
The +meetme code here is an example, rather than 'this is the issue' -- this is an illustration of what I mean when I say that the end goal/priorities are REALLY what all of this needs to build to. Once you've identified your priorities, you know what questions to ask. If you literally do not care about encouraging grid based roleplay, then A is for reals the right answer! If you're more interested in the 'OOC cooperation' metric than you are the 'encourages walking the grid' metric, then that is the metric you need to be evaluating by. Yes, it gets super complicated and hard when you have competing metrics, but that's show biz.
Doubleposting because this doesn't belong in an edit:
1 is required because of step 2:
These two steps are what is required to start down this road of bringing new folks into the hobby. There might be other ways to go about it, but this would have the highest success rate with the largest chance of actual retention. I used to participate very heavily in OGR. It was a LOT of work.
ETA: MSB does not and will never qualify as #1. It has a higher chance of turning people away from the hobby than bringing them in.
I was super against both Evennia and Rhost (in different contexts) and the new and different things...and Potato too, really. And then I tried them. I am now a diehard fan of all 3. I will likely be as much of a fan of AresMUSH once I get my grubby paws on it, now that I have stopped being old and grumpy and afraid of change.
The more it's talked about the worse it sounds. Also, discipline on a game is part of running a game, so ideas/discussion regarding discipline are ideas/discussion related to running a game. Thus, definitely the worst idea I have ever heard for running a game.
There you go. There's a breakdown, even.
Specifically:
So apparently it didn't take digital books into account.
@Tempest said:
The majority of MU-players (at least on WoD-esque games) are not the sort who just want bar-and-relationship-rp.
This bears repeating. People will do the bar-and-relationship RP, yes. Some of us even enjoy the purely social events. But most folks would at any given time be way happier to be playing something more substantial. They're just not sure of how to get it, and you cannot teach an introvert to be an extrovert. You can teach them to mimic it, but it's never going to be entirely comfortable.
People who have every reason to be involved in an ongoing plot (and often, actively have people trying to engage them), yet do nothing and complain about there being nothing going on, have to be one of the more annoying subsets of players.
Most of the time when this is going on, what they're trying to say is 'I don't know how to get involved, and I know you think you've thrown me clues, but I don't see what I'm supposed to be doing with them and now I'm getting frustrated.' They don't/can't articulate it that clearly, and yes, absolutely, it's annoying as fuck. They aren't (usually) being as much of an ass as they're coming off as, they truly don't get it.
As players, there's been such a stigma about OOC influencing IC for so long that it's spilled over to things it shouldn't. 'I can't tell you how to get involved in the plot, you have to find out IC RP with people' is not healthy for any game, and it's not helping anyone's fun. But we do it and do it and do it again.
Nobody is actively responsible for anyone else's fun. It's not my fault if people are bored because I go away for a week. Really, yes, they should be making their own fun, but at the same time, if I can take ten minutes to give them a week's worth of stuff to RP about, I should.
Agreed. The nitpicking that goes on is...more than a little flat out stupid, and often lacks any sort of perspective.
No, folks, 'I prefer dogs' does not actually mean I want to put all cat owners to death, and 'I disagree with that' is not an insult or a personal attack or slinging shit.
Really.
I am focusing on the topic. Your suggestion doesn't work for the same reason that the condemns didn't work. This information is relevant and important. You're not considering a major angle of importance, and this is a problem.
Like, the problem isn't maliciousness, it's thoughtlessness. The exact same thoughtlessness you're displaying by claiming that staff would just need to punish the problems, without bothering to consider that it's not the outliers or the extremes that are the issue. Your reaction to criticism on this topic is the EXACT same problem that existed with condemn: thoughtlessness as to how this might impact the people RECEIVING the messages.
I have a similar story, save it was my grandfather's and it was not only a naked woman, it was a framed naked woman FUZZY painting. Like the black parts of it and the background was made of the same stuff the old marker posters were made of. I think it's felt but it may not be, I don't know. I had it for many years, until my brother in law's friend (he was helping me move) saw it and thought it was the greatest thing in the history of things. So it's in his garage now getting the love and respect it deserves.
@admiral
While I do agree that more folks can behave maturely and in a relaxed fashion than can't, I don't agree that it's always due to favoritism issues. I think that it's just that most people are not the awful beasts we make them out to be a lot of the time, and if you have high expectations, people tend to meet them.
I don't care how much I am not physically being actually, genuinely harmed IRL: people refusing to respect my boundaries is a massive problem when it happens, and it happens all the time. I have had to block no less than 5 people over the last OOC year from communication with me due to their inability to respect that I do not want to be asked for nudes, that I do not want to TS, that I do not want to have someone pester me about who I am playing with instead of them. These ARE problems, and they are NOT just minor differences of opinion, and they happen ALL THE TIME. Just having a "heart to heart" with these people absolutely does not begin to solve the problem, and in many cases is literally what these jackoffs are LOOKING to force.
I'm gonna step out of this conversation and not deal with you. Cheers.
Emphasis mine. I noticed, too.
Also, make it about you, not them.
'I do not like this' NOT 'When you do this, it makes me'
Keep it subjective. If it's about your personal tastes/boundaries as a person rather than an objective observation of someone's behavior, it doesn't challenge their reality as much to be asked to stop something. If they are a reasonable person and not a creeper, then this will help you and the other person recover on the other side of the conversation.
There's also (again) less to challenge you about, because it's not about whether they are RIGHT or WRONG, but instead whether or not you LIKE it, which they cannot legitimately make a case against.
(ETA: This soapbox edition brought to you care of the two nasty creepers I've had to put out the airlock in the last 6 months or so. I am SO BAD at setting boundaries, so I have to work at it really hard, but this is where I go from when this bear does finally get woken up.)
Emailed professor to apologize in advance for missing class tonight. Prof responds, gives me an extra day for homework turn in (what a nice guy).
Get homework turned in on time anyway. WHOO.
Flu: 0 Sunny: 1
I am confused as to what problem people are trying to solve.
@Arkandel said:
Fridays.
Fuck yes.
Another thing I love: Getting to call a customer support agent's supervisor to be able to genuinely say that the agent went so above and beyond in being helpful that I felt the need to call back after the call and make sure her supervisor knew what a good job she did. She said it was going to be documented and put in the young woman's file as a best practices thing, and I was assured that she would be appropriately recognized for her outstanding customer service.
It was hilariously funny though, because none of the people I spoke to in trying to get said young woman's supervisor initially believed they were hearing what I was saying correctly. I guess people don't call in to say 'good job' enough, given how startled they all were.
@Prototart said in When To Stop Listening To Those Voices:
@surreality said in When To Stop Listening To Those Voices:
@Kanye-Qwest ...at least, thankfully, with few exceptions (eta: I'm thinkin' Vault Girl and Elsa here), we haven't seen much of this since happening in the hobby since the 90s, either. So I'm all for leaving the term and what it represented in the rear view, and am glad things are moving in that direction on the whole
alternately maybe it's as bad as it's always been but just there are less people willing to complain about it and the community's no longer as receptive to having bad behavior exposed
As someone who was around in the hobby 25 years ago, I can tell you with absolute, complete certainty that this is not the case.
Fucking yay. Hooray for actually getting help. Hooray for breathing. Y'all rock.