Posts made by Sunny

ytmnd is on the interwebs again, maybe has been for a while. so happy.

Cats are cats. They have figured out where their food is coming from, and if there is no food, they will come and "ask" for it.

Yeah, they came and asked for food yesterday when they could see the bottom of the bowl. Cats.

I am so sorry.

@SinCerely

Oof I am so sorry. There are few more terrible feelings, combining the hormonal issues themselves with the loss of control they bring. Double helping of suck. You have my sympathy.

@Atticus

Staff can be trusted and they handle creepers. The setting/story being fantastic is icing on the cake, imnsho -- as mountainous as it is, it is also very good. However, it is VERY important that you manage your own expectations going in. I get not wanting to be the FNG but some of us have been playing for years and still do not know even a quarter of everything. The figuring-it-out is part of the game/story, and so if you go in holding yourself responsible for knowing something it isn't possible for you to know, or if you go in thinking you are going to be able to keep up with all fifty plotlines (spoiler: you can't), you're going to get really frustrated with yourself. Being aware of it going in makes it a LOT easier to adjust to.

Totally agreed on the newbie guide, though. I used to have one but it's out of date so much as to be useless, these days. IDK if somebody else has one floating around or not.

@Atticus

There's some of the culture shock I mentioned.

None. People will help. You will NOT be expected to be an expert in game lore, even if our natural reaction is to expect that we should (since that is a cultural expectation that we 'grew up' in mushing with).

There are basics to get down and some initial reading to do, but it's less material than your average RPG sourcebook (though it's about as well organized as a 90s rpg sourcebook, soooo). In a nutshell, it's a low-fantasy society going through an upheaval in the direction of high-fantasy society, with nobles but a slightly different serfdom situation and a lot of RL -isms removed (sexism does not exist, genders are generally seen as equal).

My mom got worried about the feral cats in our area and started feeding them, on the downlow so it wouldn't make my dad mad. He found out about it. He went out, bought giant bag of cat food, and took over feeding them. We talked about eventually doing catch/spayorneuter/release when we can, and it sounds like my mom is going to get the stuff setup for beds that will let us do that with as little trauma for them as possible.

When they left to go camping, my mom told me to feed them once in the morning only because otherwise the racoons get into the food. He pulled me aside and asked if I could also feed them some before dinner time, early enough that the racoons won't come.

I went out this morning to feed them and some of them came running. None of them came anywhere NEAR close, but they def realized I was feeding them and swooped in as soon as I left. Yaaaaaaaay.

@Atticus

There are a surprising number of new players and "spring chickens" running about, actually. We've seen a fairly significant uptick in new players the last few years to like, 'noteworthy' levels.

Arx info can be found at https://play.arxmush.org/ -- it's an original theme game. It will be an enormous adjustment for you as an old timey WoD player, but to me, it is 100% worth the growing pains / adjustment. Just be prepared for some culture shock and that it's kinda something you have to learn to play like you would a video game.

I played on most of those. Welcome around into these parts! Always good to see more dinos kicking around.

Civ 6 is free on the Epic launcher through the 28th.

@Ominous

Linked on the gofundme that I linked, this article answers those questions:
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2019/10/04/twin-cities-mosque-on-edge-after-opponents-start-filming-children

A link came across my feed that an old mush pal posted (I don't even know if she plays anymore lol) and I wanted to share it, and also realized we could probably use a thread for posting not-us places to give (not to discourage the in-community giving, because I hope all of you realize how much good you do) for those that might be seeking places. Especially right now! If there's already one of these threads oops sorry.

SO!

Minnesota
Kids need a playground because adults are taking pictures of them on the public playground they use for recess:
https://www.gofundme.com/f/Help-protect-children-from-harassment

Puget Sound region, Washington
Homeless Backpacks is a charity that feeds kids. Usually primarily homeless kids, right now they're feeding any kids with food insecurity, which is a significantly larger number. $20 feeds two kids for a weekend.
https://homelessbackpacks.org/

ETA: also if you're local-ish HBP REALLY needs shoppers right now. People to go buy the tunafish and stuff with the money that gets donated.

@mietze

Right there with you.

I don't think this conversation is particularly healthy for anyone involved.

Putting up with somebody's abuse is not a reasonable accomodation.

@Xetetic

Yeah, I get it? But the point of bringing old friends in is to have a security blanket while you make new friends, not to have them occupy the entirety of your time. Intending to occupy your time with just old friends completely defeats the purpose of bringing them in in the first place. So maybe answer that question with 'Meet new people and expand our social circle so we all have more fun down the road'.

ETA: My suggestions are to be taken as training wheels for when you're coming in flat cold. They're a temporary measure, something to keep you connected to Somebody while you do the work (yes, it's work) of entrenching yourself / making new friends. If someone is helping you with this work (even just by being there to chat so you don't feel completely isolated), it's easier work to do. Once you've established yourself on any given game, you won't need any of these tricks -- you'll have people to play with, and will be able to get started.

@Xetetic

Coming in cold in the hobby these years is almost impossible, regardless of game. If you don't know anybody at all it requires LOTS of luck to just stumble into something by happenstance, and that just...doesn't happen. No matter where. No matter what tools are in place.

HOWEVER.

Use tools like this place, or staff, or -- Facebook, or Google, or -- to find people first. "I am interested in playing X on Y, I know nobody, would anyone be interested in being a contact / go to person for me? Can I play something in somebody's group that they're looking for?" -- it may not end up being a character you stick with long term or whatever, right? However, what it will do is start you from a position of knowing that you have a person (or people) that have straight out agreed to help you meet other people / etc. -- and it keeps it from being a cold start.

Will you always get a bite or whatever to reaching out like that? Nope. But these years, 'I am out of the loop and am looking for a volunteer to hook me back in' is probably the most effective thing you could do.

ETA: If you already have a specific game in mind, hop onto it, look at the wanted board, and page people up front. 'Hey I see your post wanting X, I'm interested, but caveat I'm a new player to the game and know no one, and would need a bit of extra help. What do you think?'

ETA2: Contact old friends who also quit mushing. DRAG THEM BACK KICKING AND SCREAMING. (spoiler: this is what I did.)

@kk

That's a good list of rules for erryone in this hobby, up there with JC's guide to staffing. Well done.

@Groth

Nobody is making light of a disability.

ETA: Expressing shared frustration, even if you don't feel like somebody has a right to that feeling, is not making light of something.