Edited the thread title because I have been soundly corrected by SOMEBODY, we are actually running far more like a mini-mush than we are an OTT, with the amount of roleplay and the like available. We are currently on a 2 week intermission; we will be out of intermission as of 01/23/2015, and I will be accepting Chaos characters at this time with the understanding that direct involvement with the other PCs may end up waiting until 02/01/2014.
Even when allowing alts in the various places (because both games I know of that were killed or nearly killed by a split of the playerbase in the last few years allowed alts in the different spots), splitting the playerbase is a bad idea.
Let people know if you need help with something. BUFFY. That could be precisely the change of environment/genre that I need.
I know of at least one game that already has a web based ticketing system. When I am not at work I will get that info put here.
So what we're going to be doing is supporting everything eventually.
Those things which aren't going to get a GMC update, we'll be working on long-term; they won't be ready by game launch. We'll be starting out with that which has already been published, and as new systems come out we'll be integrating them. Anything that's announced for a release we're not playing at game launch. Many of the things that aren't, we won't be playing immediately just because it's going to take a hell of a lot of time to do (and in at least one case, we're waiting on another game to finish their conversion of something because they have graciously offered to share). The plan is to ultimately support everything, hammered and bent as needed to get them to work with the group. Some things will take more hammering than others. It will all be updated to work with GMC before it ever touches the grid.
We will be building all of the splats into the game world and the story, and keeping the metaplot progressing for them alongside the rest of the game's so that it's mostly seamless when we actually allow them into play.
Oh, don't wait for me. I mull things over for forever. Just considering how the community could do more of a hybrid between OTT games and your typical persistent-world mush.
@ThugHeaven said:
Let me just say as a player of both rpi MUDs and mushes, both communities are equally dismissive of each other. There really might not be a common ground between the two. From what I've seen in this thread, certain points were brought up and weren't really addressed and hostility, passive or naked emerged.
It makes me wonder, why continue to post or update a thread where you're greeted with such opposition? I don't think being all "come at me bro" is going to be that conducive either. This is a derivative of the Snark/Wora board, but I think the questions and points brought up in the beginning were very genuine and were ignored...which brought on the reaction you have now.
So I'm also wondering, if you don't want to discuss what you're advertising and seeing how well it's going, why do it?
This sums it up very well, I think.
These interactions have been incredibly frustrating even to read, with the condescension, the assumptions, peoples' points being either dismissed out of hand as trolling when they were genuine questions or just straight up ignored (the assumption when this happens is that you simply have no answer for the question, or that you're cherry picking what to respond to to try and come off better), the defensiveness, and the continued statement that people are interested in engaging while completely refusing to do so (and that would be what the hell you're all lying about). Telling us how it is is not engaging, it's not dialogue, it's nothing but preaching to a bunch of atheists -- annoying as fuck. It's frustrating enough that it actually makes me angry with the now three of you. To say @Thenomain is just trolling...holy shit. If I could reach through the computer and slap you, I would.
Y'all can keep advertising here. We can keep rolling our eyes. Folks around here (@Thenomain and @surreality in particular, but it's not limited to them) have shown FAR more respect for OR than the representatives have shown the community they are coming in to advertise in. If you don't like us and think we're a bunch of asshole trolls, GO AWAY.
ETA: The thing that y'all seem to be missing is that this is a community that is of value to those of us that participate in it. It's not at all just a trolling/flame board, it's not about bitching, it's not about a lot of the things that the various forums have been about over the years. This is a good community with good people that contribute A LOT to one another, so the whole 'reaching out a hand to the savages' thing -- and yes, that's how a lot of this comes across you fucking pricks -- is beyond irritating.
Edited to add again: This is the MSB crowd's living room. To my knowledge, nobody's gone over there to troll / harass, AND YET you guys keep coming over here to do that to this community. You lose all credibility in that action.
(My news file rewriter has not yet gotten ahold of this; she will fix and simplify it for me, but! It's a 'basics' news file; if anyone has any major game-setup questions left after this notation, please say so so I can add things/)
People have differing expectations of a variety of things on any given game. We'd like people on the same page. So these are the Things to Know about Dust to Dust.
1: There is a metaplot, and it involves the God Machine.
2: Experience management is handled by caps; there is a monthly earning cap and a total spending cap.
3: The game will operate in year-long arcs, with both the metaplot and the experience cap. Every year, staff will evaluate the experience cap and the status of the metaplot and adjust as needed.
4: The story and game are focused on a local scope. The vast majority of the interesting things happening in the world will be happening in Bay City; the world revolves around this place. Actions and consequences from the PCs here will ripple out; there will be very little of the reverse.
5: We will never use a system to keep track of character knowledge, lore or otherwise.
6: We work on a review process, rather than an approval process. The goal is to reduce barriers to roleplay and character growth as much as possible.
7: We are using Fate Points; the biggest notation this needs is that characters can possibly come back from the dead as well as spend fate points in stories to twist things in their favor.
8: This is a cooperative game, IC and OOC. The PCs are assumed to be on the same team/side in general.
9: We encourage the use of OOC knowledge in some circumstances (detailed in another news file).
10: The game's mood is 'hopeful' with a minor focus on 'victorious'. The theme is 'every effort matters'.
11: Staff run plot will focus on neighborhoods and several factions at once; single-faction and individual plotlines will be handled primarily with PRPs.
12: Staff will not benefit in any virtual-material way from staffing.
13: We do not use the sphere structure for staffing. No sphere is an island; the game is operated as a single sphere would be in this model; all staff are facilitators of the whole game.
14: In addition to experience points and fate points used for the game, we will be using player points as the reward for contributions to the game. These can be used to purchase a variety of rewards, and are attached to the player rather than the characters.
15: As we are using experience caps, we will be offering alternatives for experience spending (aka XP dumps) that are not permanent improvements to a character's stats.
16: Various supernatural races are treated as factions, as are families and influence groups.
17: Because we will be working on review rather than approval, retcons may happen. Staff will do their best to avoid these and mitigate the extent via story explanations as necessary, but sometimes some things may simply have to be rewound. It is an option that will remain on the table.
As an approval staffer I use the bg for two things. One in particular is important here, and core memories instead would be just fine for both, I think.
Do they understand/demonstrate understanding of both the setting AND their character as they have them sheeted? I staff somewhere with a pretty obscure theme, and it is really important to make sure particular concepts get particular aspects of it. Otherwise shit goes to pieces.
I do also use it to gatekeep on stats -- does the history match the sheet? That's also part of understanding what the character is as presented.
Yeah, I really wanted to try and make sure to get as many of the make-or-break points into a bullet list like this so that people can just look at the tin to see if it's a game for them or not. We're doing a few things that I know will turn some people off, so stating it all up front is in my opinion a necessity.
@icanbeyourmuse said in Character Rosters:
@acceleration I know lotsa people who would prefer not to CG on a new game until they get a feel for the game and don't look for the 'important positions' until they get a feel. Might be just the types of people/places we roll with.
Why bother asking people what they think when you already have all the answers and are just going to respond like this?
Yeah. While I hope they do learn from their mistakes, and I really do hope they figure out how to be more inclusive, I am glad that they made the game, and I very much hope they go on to make another.
Incompetence isn't a forever failure. You learn, you have experiences, you adjust, and you try again. They're nice people. I really think they just bit off more than they could chew.
Certainly neither of them is Spider levels of asshole. They don't even come close to the bullshit that KD's staff pulled. They tried. They even succeeded in a lot of regards. They made some bad decisions and messed some stuff up, and they definitely played more starring role than support, but it wasn't on purpose. They could have benefited GREATLY by having someone else involved...but that doesn't mean they shouldn't try again. Geez.
@Pyrephox This is personal preference, not fact. Your way is not objectively better, nor are the 'truths' you're spouting universal. It's great that you recognize it's opinion, but this topic is a lot more nuanced than you're treating it.
If I tell someone to play what they want, it may just be because that's exactly what I want them to do. If I'm running a vampire game and end up with twelve former policemen Nosferatu, this... isn't a problem. Not for me, not for my players.
I say it's bad storytelling if you can't be creative enough to give similar concepts things to do.
@Misadventure said in The 100: The Mush:
I'm pretty sure pillowfort is a loaded term for some folks here.
Yup. And it's actually QUITE apt in this case, too. 
@ghost isn't wrong. He's being an idiot about presentation, but he isn't wrong.
Making a rule to deal with a single (or a few) problem player(s) rather than actually dealing with the issue itself is bad staffing.
I have not yet seen a problem with 'alts' presented that is not just a symptom of some other issue that people are too fucking lazy to bother addressing.
@tek said in The 100: The Mush:
@Ghost You're bringing out the dictionary! How quaint.
Please read what I actually write, dumpling.
What the actual fuck here, @tek. What the actual fuck. I am genuinely stunned by your behavior and think you need to check yourself REAL fucking quick, here.
What you say, no matter how many times you say it, no matter how loudly you say it, will never be as important as what you do.
@GirlCalledBlu said in Leadership, Spotlight, and PCs of Staffers:
@Kanye-Qwest said in Leadership, Spotlight, and PCs of Staffers:
@GirlCalledBlu said in Leadership, Spotlight, and PCs of Staffers:
Yolo is a Staffer on a game, and he also has a character. He is good about not having his character in scenes he runs, and he tries to make sure someone is always his back-up in major metaplot scenes where his character shows up so there's someone to GM his actions if necessary. He is also, while on his character, telling a pretty intense story about an NPC family member being murdered, and there's a handful of other characters participating. It's dynamic, has lots of character building stuff going on, and there's quite a few logs about it. Some other players think that Yolo is making it so his character is in the spotlight because his character is a pretty important character to this plot about the murdered family member.
Is he?I think this goes back to what @Roz was saying about balance. If Yolo is trying to make sure his character isn't a major lynchpin in the metaplot, but has decided to run this story for his own character's development, is he balancing his role as a Staff with his role as a Player? Or should he have not run this story, because he is the main character of that particular storyline even if it he's running/telling the story as a Player and not a Staffer?
I've been give the impression that the example above is an example of a Staffer putting the spotlight on his character despite the story not having much or anything to do with the metaplot, and the story is being entirely run/told from the Player of the Character not the Staffer of the Game.
Additionally, is Yolo being an irresponsible Staffer because he decided to take his character and others through this story arc (about a murder in the family) instead of running this the story arc as a Staffer for someone else?
Is he running this story as a player-style storyteller, or is this part of the larger plot? I lean towards never being GM/storyteller in a story I'm also trying to be a player in. They're really two entirely different mindsets.
Player-style storyteller is my vision for this scenario. So the way any PC would run a storyline.
I do not think anyone should be part of a plot that they themselves are running, staff or player.