@thenomain I had to forward that link to my father for exactly that reason, because puns are the ultimate in Dad humor.
(Don't judge re: adult content, y'all. We had to both work at a mom&pop video store together one summer to help out a family friend that owned the joint, and we all know what makes up the bulk of rentals in those places. If it couldn't be joked about, somebody would have surely died of facial implosion due to blushing.)
I... wouldn't there be some other approach here than one this ridiculous?! o.o
...upvote for the actual spit-take just reading this quote.
@deadculture I ended up making a rule for myself that I wouldn't read any series until that series was complete (or as complete as it was going to be), in whatever doses it came in. (Sub-trilogy, sprawling series, standalone trilogy, etc.)
As a kid, there were the nigh-endless series like the Dragonlance novels, and as an even younger kid (we're talking 2nd and 3rd grade here) the Xanth novels*, and they just kept going... and going... and going.
I appreciate a good standalone novel for exactly this reason. The endless sprawl series style would get old well before it showed any indication of when it might be over, and that was unsatisfying and ultimately disappointing.
@deadculture said in Book Recommendations:
Lions of Al-Rassan's ending made me smile a little.
I was weirdly relieved at the ending! He did such a damnably fine job of cliff-hanging the individual chapters that the book was almost physically impossible to put down until I got to the end, and that there really was an ending that felt whole and complete was, oddly, comforting and extremely satisfying. (It was also the first of his books I read, so I was still fighting with the worry that it might end on the same sort of note, begging the start to a series that might never be realized.)
@faraday There's no intent to be condescending here. Just a response to:
@faraday said in Original Sci-Fi?:
I agree in broad strokes. The only place I think that breaks down is when you start talking about science.
...which read like science as an exception that is truly different and must be handled in a different manner and held to different standards than other subjects.
Edit: Further: I have gone out of my way to note that I do not believe you have negative intentions, have clearly labeled 'generic' you to confirm I am speaking generally and not attempting to attack you in any personal way, have refrained from ascribing nasty motives to you, or snarking at you with sarcastic cracks and accusations. I would appreciate it if this courtesy was returned, as it isn't the place for it, and it isn't the conversation anyone is interested in having here.
@faraday There's also just making a policy that states 'unless you are more than passingly familiar with tech and science, don't make a tech or science officer on this game' if it truly is that important to you.
What you're missing is that things like clothing -- or the comic book history of a character -- are just as important to those players as tech and science are to you. Your immersion isn't any more precious and special as any of theirs is, and just like they don't get a pass on making demands beyond an everyman-with-minor-primers-and-research understanding on the player level, neither do you.
In short, no, science and tech aren't any different from any of those things, and this is exactly the problem I've been trying to describe as a barrier to entry, and a genre in which the behavior that is typically called out as negative is instead embraced.
Again, I don't expect people to even know there was once such a thing as a 'sumptuary law', let alone what any of those laws were, or why they came to be, but to me, 'sumptuary laws are a thing' really is, internally, very basic rudimentary knowledge about clothing. My internal baseline for 'basic', however, is far afield of the average person. Being aware of this is actually important, and managing expectations based on it is even more important, because no game is all about (generic) you and (generic) your sensibilities unless you say so right up front.
@faraday Still, there's got to be a limit to what you expect people to know. Somewhere in the back of my head I have to think there's probably something out there from Neil DeGrass Tyson that would serve as a good basic primer, for instance, that could probably sum things up for a general audience in a quick and engaging way. (As in, I don't know of a specific thing off hand, but that's where I'd start looking if I wanted an everyman primer to link as reference.)
@faraday said in Original Sci-Fi?:
@surreality I really do think we're talking apples and oranges here. You're describing ridiculous levels of pedantry that, yes, would be obnoxious.
The science/tech stuff I was talking about wasn't "OMG you've got the wrong color dress for this time period" level of stuff, it was more like "OMG you're wearing jeans and a t-shirt on this Game of Thrones MUSH". It's insisting that Batman can fly (under his own power) or that morphine can cure the common cold. Some things are just egregiously wrong, and correcting people (politely) to maintain a consistent theme does not make you an elitist or theme dictator.
I completely agree with this, and this is the level of pedantry I'm describing and calling out as Not At All Cool.
Maybe my conceptual shorthand has been bad here -- but this is what I mean by 'baseline'. Baseline info would cover the things that are egregiously unthematic or deeply absurd for the setting -- 'there are no hand held mobile phones in the game, this is 1960', for instance -- without getting deep into the weeds.
For instance, for the historical game I was going to do a page on 'modes of dress'. What people would need to know could probably have been summed up in 3 short paragraphs, 5 tops, with links to external further reading if people wanted to dig into deeper detail if they wanted to specialize in that area for whatever reason for their character. That would allow them to avoid the 'why are you wearing a bikini, WTF?!' pitfalls and incorporate things into their character or descs based on that information without having to do a deep dive into sumptuary laws, how people dealt with corsets and which ones meant you were wealthy (with someone to dress you) and which meant you were poor (and thus had to dress yourself), and so on.
@faraday said in Original Sci-Fi?:
@surreality said in Original Sci-Fi?:
The difference is that I've not seen people call it out as elitist or 'theme dictator'ing in sci-fi.
For someone who was getting bent out of shape that I indirectly made you feel stupid for liking something, you seem awfully eager to call people out directly as "elitist theme dictators... (you) want to hit ... the enemies of fun" for liking the opposite thing.
I was directly quoting @Three-Eyed-Crow with 'theme dictator'.
@three-eyed-crow said in Original Sci-Fi?:
There are spottily-informed theme dictators everywhere (and people playing with zero adherence to anything resembling theme that make them feel empowered, also everywhere).
And yes, someone intentionally bullying or belittling others with the behavior we all know is problematic and elitist, nitpicking others in their area of expertise because they're an expert and someone playing the thing isn't and is just going by game information, is behaving badly and is stomping on someone else's fun to puff themselves up.
This has not even been a question before this thread in recent years. Everyone in the thread has confirmed the existence of this behavior in multiple genres, where it is deemed a bad thing.
There is not a question that people reaming people out for not remembering what Batman did in issue #327 of a comic (or knowing in the first place) published in 1960 that was a side tangent about how he likes his steak cooked to Alfred is being a nit-picking jerk.
There's no question that if I went to an L&L game and tossed out an uninvited public historical critique of someone's desc in the OOC room based on the fact that the color of her dress would have been illegal in that part of the world for her social caste due to the scarcity of dyestuffs on a game in which this is not publicized or enforced, I would be being a complete jerk.
There's no question that if a long-time RL nurse on a WoD game got up in someone's business about a log in which specific procedures for installing or maintaining a long-term IV or PICC line were mistaken or they missed a step, they would be behaving like a complete jerk.
This is the kind of behavior I'm talking about and only now am I seeing it being not labeled as problematic and invasive pedantry, which is kinda proving my point to me about this genre being the only one where this behavior isn't called out as being obnoxious, and is instead embraced and expected as part of the genre culture.
I have already said, repeatedly throughout the thread, 'a baseline level of knowledge is necessary', that games should set this baseline and make it available. All of these examples go well beyond baseline knowledge of a subject and are the behavior I am calling 'elitist'.
I don't think I'm wrong to do so, either, or am in any way saying someone who has no knowledge at all or can't even be bothered to read a wiki is not also an equally aggravating problem, since I've already said that is, in fact, also a real problem.
The middle is where it's at.
If you can't be bothered to get to the middle through reading the game files or doing at least a decent TV-level glance-over the subject matter, or if the middle isn't good enough for you and you can't contain yourself from expressing 'OMG this is so totally awful', however? (Generic) you are creating problems for others with your behavior.
See, I have absolutely been that person (thought I have not seen that specific film). I have so been that person. But I will only let myself be that person with a like mind who is as amused as I am, and I would feel like a giant jerk giggling and pointing at things or grousing or eye-rolling about it around others who were just enjoying it for what it was.
I can sum up my tolerance/understanding/patience/complete unwillingness to go there thusly: I worked at a Ren Faire.
For any costume geek who has done the same, this does not require the translation: 'I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.'
(I just had to cross the streams like that, y'all, I could not even resist, I'm sorry. But only a little.)
@faraday That's definitely a thing -- it's why there needs to be a baseline. The baseline absolutely must be there.
Going beyond the baseline -- wherever that game sets it, and on whatever subject -- has to be optional.
The behavior exists everywhere. The difference is that I've not seen people call it out as elitist or 'theme dictator'ing in sci-fi. I do see that in other genres, though, and it's a difference that makes a potent... uh, difference. (Can I use the word 'difference' one more time in this paragraph, yeesh! o.o )
@faraday I don't think you had any intention of doing that -- you have never struck me as someone who would intentionally do so. Unfortunately, it does have that effect, in the same way the costume thing does.
It's just that most other genres, people will call this out as making things less enjoyable; since most of us are at least somewhat tech savvy (most of us have been doing this for so long we would have had to be tech geeks in yon days of yore, so we collectively like tech or have some level of interest) this one tends to fly under the radar of 'can be problematic', and it's just the most pronounced in the sci-fi genre.
@Three-Eyed-Crow As somebody actually trained in costuming, even I want to hit those people. They are the enemies of fun. 
Both of these things are why I think it's a good idea to set a basic level of detail with the 'can do' and 'can't do'; it sets a good expectation of what people should be willing to know/would or reasonably could know IC, and doesn't have creators chasing down every possible permutation of something a player might possibly try some time and fact-check tech that doesn't exist for plausibility -- but let players flesh that out further if they are experts to share with others who are similarly interested in exploring that area (and will likely have a comparable level of understanding of the subject as compared to Everyman Joe).
What @ThatGuyThere mentions about the tech having ten tons of detail people are expected to read and know, without a comparable level of cultural info, is another hurdle. 'Somewhere in the middle with room to grow' strikes me as a better way to allow for different interests, pretty much.
@faraday said in Original Sci-Fi?:
@surreality said in Original Sci-Fi?:
Some folks -- myself included -- are far more interested in telling the human (or not human!) stories of how people are affected by the danger and isolation of being in space, of how to handle matters of scarcity (The 100 is a great example of this)
That's where the problem comes in, I think. Because yeah, The 100 tells some great human stories. But the science/tech in them is COMPLETELY F-ING RIDICULOUS. That show is practically unwatchable for me because the writers don't even bother with the most rudimentary levels of plausibility.
^ And the level of vehemence, that feels not only like shouting down and egregious condescension, but misses the point of what someone else finds interesting about it, is exactly the experience I have had on every single sci-fi game I ever tried, and seen in every conversation about ones that exist or are being built, and turns me off so hard I have completely given up on the genre.
I am not trying to insult you or say you did something crappy there, but 'someone is going to vehemently make me feel stupid for liking something that has cool X stuff going on, and that I like that cool X stuff, and I have no idea what Z things they're complaining about because the Z things are completely irrelevant to me' is a shitty feeling to have.
Since this seems to be the #1 pastime of sci-fi games, I consider them an unfriendly environment on the whole, often to the point of active hostility and ugly condescension in the same way the people who are obscure comics lore experts railing about how so-and-so is 'doing it wrong' in their portrayal of a character are obnoxious, or it would be obnoxious for me to OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG SO STUPID DID YOU SEE THAT HEADPIECE?!?!?! WHAT SERVING GIRL CAN AFFORD THOSE PEARLS; THIS IS CRAZY! at people enjoying an episode of Reign, and modeling something they do on an L&L game on that dubiously accurate ensemble.
It surprises me that we recognize that the latter two examples are absolutely jerk behavior, but the first, which is exactly the same things, is instead the cultural norm that is embraced and insisted upon for another genre.
@golgoth This is really just what I can't get into. There's a certain level of detail that's handy for the reasons @faraday describes: answering the questions 'can this be hacked to/reverse engineered to/etc.'
That answer doesn't need to be technically figured in advance and available as easy reference when the game opens. It needs a 'yes' or a 'no', and either the creators can come up with a how to add to the tech info, or allow the first player to perform this feat to come up with something and add that.
Players are the exceptional characters in a world, sure, but not all players are interested in telling stories all about the tech. Some folks -- myself included -- are far more interested in telling the human (or not human!) stories of how people are affected by the danger and isolation of being in space, of how to handle matters of scarcity (The 100 is a great example of this), of first contact with aliens or alien relics or societies (any number of films and television series), and so on.
I have yet to find this in a sci-fi game, because the tech -- and the arguments springing from the tech, which are for some reason about ten times as grating as any rules lawyering game system argument -- becomes such a hyper-focus that it drowns out everything else. Firefly was not a story about tech, for example; the tech is not the primary reason why people loved that series. The Alien series of films is not about the tech, either. Tech is featured in these things; it is not their primary focus, and that's where most sci-fi games end up failing me in terms of my personal taste regarding anywhere I'd like to play.
Trek, to me, is a great example of handwavium.
How do these people get their food? Uh, from a magic box that takes food orders. (We'll figure out how the magic box works beyond the very basics later or the fans will fill that in.)
How do people get from place to place without shuttles? Uhm, they teleport! Cool! (We'll get the basics down, and anything specific doesn't need to be known from the start of the series and wouldn't even be known to most of the characters who have used these things all their lives beyond the basics we'd think of as cautions to drive a car: wear a seatbelt, don't exceed this speed, this is the safety feature people would be familiar with: the airbag... )
...and so on. This gets the nitty gritty of the technical trivia out of the way of the actual story people want to tell, and it's important, because without some measure of handwavium, all you're doing is sitting around like Gune, wondering what that thing was you built last night in your sleep.
This is really not everybody's brand of fun and I really wish there was a sci-fi game that didn't fetishize the tech so hard.
This looks fantastic at a glance. I hope it goes well and will peek more after errands and the holiday chaos. Good luck! 
@tinuviel I know, I am old. Though I was a late adopter of anything resembling a mobile phone. My first and only is barely a year old.
@tinuviel Exactly.
Hence the phone example. For most, 'it can make calls, send text based messages, and use little widgets, and you need to recharge it every so often, is breakable especially if dropped in liquid' is all someone needs to know about 'phone' to get by day to day, really.
@tinuviel said in Original Sci-Fi?:
@auspice On the one hand, sure. Not knowing exact names and doses is whatever. But not doing any kind of research whatsoever... at least watch some Greys Anatomy or ER if you want to play a doctor.
This is much more reasonable in the modern day, when those actual answers exist.
When you're talking about a sci-fi setting, you're talking about tech that doesn't exist yet, and may not even be theoretical. There is no reference book or Dummies guide for how things work in 2354AD. This means someone has to make the answers up.
It's entirely reasonable to set a maximum level of detail for those answers past which handwavium (which can be recorded for later for consistency), or 'it doesn't matter' (because sometimes it doesn't) applies, or staff will be spending an exponential amount of time explaining the nuts and bolts of how and why communicator circuits work even through lead walls that ten people will immediately pick apart and scream, "That isn't real science!" about ad nauseam.
If you want a recipe for staff burnout at light speed, it'd be that.
@tinuviel Mine is an iphone. Clearly it runs on cider. Gods, don't you know anything?
<ducks and runs>