Posts made by Sunny

@bluebird

You're okay. Welcome back. It takes some getting re-used to.

@bluebird

I don't think pictures have transitioned to descs yet, though some people do just use links as their descs (it's a very limited number, and exists in about the same frequency as it did back in the 90s, so it's not a Thing). People have words on the games, and pictures on the wiki. Generally.

@ganymede

CONGRATULATIONS. I hope you have a good time, and I hope you get some time to genuinely relax.

ALSO another thing staff can do:

Turn idle timeout back on

(I think it's a terrible solution and there are reasons you turned it off to begin with BUT)

@lotherio

Okay, one -- springboard away, my good sir. Two, I agree entirely, and I apologize if it seemed like my suggestion to passive aggressively whine on the boards was even remotely genuine. I'm pretty mortified by the thought. That one was a firm tongue in cheek comment, because it WAS the preferred method of addressing this issue on many an oWoD game. It was stupid. It didn't work. It always made people just log in less.

I think it's important to understand that the blame for this sort of thing often lies at the feet of policies that weren't followed through to their logical consequences before they were implemented. You get the environment you build, and every bit of it can be catered to.

If you're building a game and you want a lot of public RP of a particular sort to happen, you build into your system ways to encourage it. It can all be done intentionally, and it's not even much of a mystery. XP policy and approval policy and what your +where looks like and how many ways people can indicate (without asking, with asking, BOTH) they're looking for RP right now. Do you give people a bonus reward when they flag themselves LRP, go somewhere public, and someone else comes to play with them? I mean, you can do that -- but make sure you follow that thought through to the ways that people might abuse it, and what kinds of RP it ends up encouraging.

@mietze

Oh, I honestly don't think that it's a reasonable expectation that somebody do it, and keep doing it, when they're the only one doing it. But it does have to start somewhere, and somebody has to do it. The ball has to get rolling, and none of the solutions to problematic idling are passive, unfortunately.

@lotherio

Yes. Yes yes. Doing these things has to not be 'until it gets better', it needs to be 'the life of the game' -- as soon as you STOP actively leading that culture, it will fail.

--

ALSO, a small list from the staff perspective:

A - randomly and publicly reward the behavior you want to see: HEY TOM AND JOE ARE PLAYING IN THE PARK I AM GIVING THEM 20 XP YAY

B - start scheduling public things happening that the people in question could join

C - help build connections between characters / players so they know more people

D - build systems to encourage engagement on the grid (reward new interactions with people they haven't played with before; give votes given in public more weight than votes given in private, whatever)

(private / public weighted votes is a BAD ACTUAL IDEA but a reasonable example of what I mean)

E - passively aggressively imply in bbposts on the game that the reasons people are bored is because they're idling in their rooms (I wouldn't include this, but it has seemed to be the go-to for sooooooooooooooooo many game staff out there, tho recent history seems to be better about it)

F - mind your own business

@chibichibi said in Idling all day on MU*s:

@lotherio I think it's a problem when there's more idling than RPing. The main question is how to get people to RP instead of just idling.

1 - invite them to play directly

2 - start scheduling public things happening that the people in question could join

3 - help build connections between characters / players so they know more people

4 - encourage a culture of regularly and publicly inviting people to play, including a premise and a hook -- 'hey I'm going to go RP seeing something weird in the ocean at the beach if anyone wants to join me' <-- the more people doing this, the more people will come out and be engaged

5 - mind your own business

@chibichibi said in Idling all day on MU*s:

Is it just me or do more people spend all their time idling in the OOC room or quiet room than actually going out to RP?

What's the point of even logging in if you're just idle? How would a MU* try to change this? How can we as players try to change this?

Thoughts?

What is the actual problem that needs solving?

Often, the idling is incorrectly stated as the problem, for example:

The problem is actually that people aren't out and playing on the grid in any number; they are instead sitting in private rooms doing nothing. The problem is attributed as "people idling in rooms" when really the actual issue is "not enough accessible grid RP is happening". You cannot solve the actual problem here by addressing the idling issue.

Alternately, the problem is "people are engaging OOC significantly more than they are playing". This can be attributed to people idling during the workday as the problem, when the problem is actually just how people are engaging with the game.

Each of those problems have different solutions, and then again there are differences between how staff could handle it, and how players could handle it.

The first step in actually dealing with the underlying problem (if there is an underlying problem, and not just zomg stupid idlers) is identifying it correctly. "People idle" is not the correct problem to address.

eta: those two examples listed above are just examples; there's a million and one other possible 'actual problems' here. None of them change the situation, though -- the ACTUAL problem needs to be identified before it can be addressed.

I have been hunting for a PB change for eleventy million years. Today, with the help of a friend, my character no longer has weird hair modelS (there were three pictures, and they were all different ladies) as her PB. It is like finally finding a stick long enough to get that really freaking weird itch on your back.

@greenflashlight

Nope. Caught toe of sandal on lip of bottom step, stumbled up three of them, caught it on the top step again and restumbled, grabbed couch and almost saved myself, shoulder went HA NO and that was that. I am counting myself incredibly lucky that I didn't break anything and that I have motion in my arm/fingers again.

@Wizz

I wish this had been my first big fall.

It was indeed quite humbling, though: I SKINNED MY KNEE. WHO FUCKING SKINS THEIR KNEE AS AN ADULT?

If the game is otherwise doing well and sources say this isn't usually the case, I am inclined to think that something happened. Somebody (or somebody's kid) got hit by a bus, work was particularly bad with a fiscal year switch over, or something else. While walking at a week and a half is PERFECTLY reasonable behavior / a perfectly reasonable reaction, I would caution against the assumption that it's their typical.

"Uuugh, guys, I was so jealous of Coworker1 being injured that I hurt myself 5 minutes before work start."
"LOL, did you fall up the stairs? You're such a dork."
"....yes. Actually. I did indeed fall up the stairs."
(insert plenty of much deserved laughter, here)

Caught myself as I was falling, shoulder gave out, finished falling. Had no range of motion yesterday all the way to my fingers and was in a ridiculous amount of pain. I seem to just be sore today, and can move my hand and arm and stuff again. That was so scary. ^^ Getting old (and clumsy) SUCKS.

@macha

I am not attacking you; I am pointing out that you were not as clear as you seem to think you were. I grok that it's not what you meant, and I'm not saying that you DID mean it that way, I am saying that as somebody who reads you through a pretty positive lens, I also saw what was mentioned. People can only read what you write, they don't read the intent behind it.

I'm not going to pick apart your words and explain why the weights of things came across like they did, but I do think it's important for you to realize that @Solstice did probably read all of the words of your post.

@macha

I understand that you intended to come off as you have related, but I read your statements too, and it definitely came off more weighted on "they deserve what they get" than I think you intended. I was actually pretty shocked to read something like I did coming from you, given how you generally conduct yourself.

@crawfish

Aaaaaaaah cute overload.

@crawfish

They are getting so BIG so QUICK.

@sugarrush

The biggest difference it's made for me is cutting out the low hum of my desktop box / monitors, and the traffic noise of the fairly busy residential street. I can still hear the air purifier. I don't really encounter like, chewing noises, so I couldn't say there.

So I got a pair of these:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B018WPOQSG

If I can get used to having them in my ears, this will pretty much be the best thing I ever did. I put them in and it cut a TON of the background sounds out (not everything; I can still hear the air filter a little bit) and I felt an immediate physical difference in my stress level, like it dialed it down two notches. I seem to have no problems hearing things I need to hear, it makes ME sound weird to me but I anticipate getting used to it.

@greenflashlight said in The ADD/ADHD Thread (cont'd from Peeves):

@wretched Wait, are we not supposed to do that? I thought telling relatable stories was the thing to do. Have I been selfish this whole time?

It's literally something that they teach in active listening exercises and in training classes so -- no, you haven't been. There's this weird meme going around that it's a bad thing, but...idk wtf is up with that.