Posts made by surreality

@Arkandel said in Sin City Chronicles:

In fact one of the big things I agree with @surreality about is that the big game-wide central metaplot idea is probably a bad one. Seasonal smaller arcs are far more manageable, modular, and have the fundamental advantage that if you don't like the current story then well... in a couple of months it'll run its course, then you can get onto something new.

I got this idea from @tragedyjones on Reno1, fwiw. I have shamelessly stolen it because it is a good idea.

It also means that later plots and major changes to the game world can happen fairly readily from major plot arcs like this: the outcome of one will understandably have an impact on things later.

...I am completely missing something here.

I thought about this when I saw the batshit crazy thread, and @Catsmeow's thread about things games do right reminded me it might be worth putting one of these up.

Games have +recc systems and means of pointing out awesome stuff when it's encountered, we may as well, too.

No back-handed compliments. No snarky vaguebooking. No arguing about how the thing somebody really is something you think sucks, or just wasn't good enough for you.

Just, you know, stuff you noticed, appreciated, and maybe would like to see more of. Names named instances of awesome (as character@game) for some credit where credit's due.

Could be an awesome pose that made you bust out laughing or moved you to tears, could be somebody who was being genuinely helpful to new folks, could be someone running an amazing and inclusive plot. Could be a staffer going above and beyond from helping you get situated on a game to coming up with a nifty new bit of code.

I'mma start this off with an awesomeness-spotting re: @Thenomain, because not only has he helped me out a lot generally with things (code and just being a decent human being) over the years, but because when I recently asked stupid questions about the weather code (that apparently turned out to be not completely stupid but were considerably more complicated than I had even thought), he took on the challenge.

That's going above and beyond like whoa, and it is much appreciated.

@Arkandel This is what temprooms are for. Seriously. And if the game may be potentially set up to be mostly temproom-based anyway, it's not a huge difference.

I dunno how long it's been since you've appstaffed, basically, but, er. There are some winners. It's been a while since I've been appstaff anywhere, and while I'm 100% down with temproom soft RP, there's too much crazy out there to not give things a passing look-over before they are approved for play.

For one thing, this trusts implicitly that no one will make one of those banned concepts anyway and drop it onto the grid, thinking they have the best reasoning ever and they're sure to be an exception. See the 4chan troll and his insistence on that in a variety of ways -- this is sadly not at all uncommon; there are people who app as elders and just assume they'll be handed a giant extra pile of XP for nothing because they're old and would be playing accordingly; I've had people come to me asking 'hey, can I play a Strix?' and stuff there aren't even PC templates for. Someone asked if they could play a cat. Not a werecat, not someone with a spirit cat, just a cat. Meow. Some of this stuff is harmless, but some of it is pretty breaky, and even things that'd pass with minor tweaks could end up requiring some major retcons (which are a pain for all involved). People are accustomed to that with the kind of off-grid softRP that almost every game I know of permits, but if something is on grid, generally it's assumed it's approved, and I'm not sure it's a good idea to lose that delineation entirely.

@Ganymede I'm talking about suggestions and alternatives coming from her, not that they aren't out there or in the works.

Instead of making suggestions, or volunteering to contribute to the story she claims she wants, etc., she's just throwing shit at the walls at this point like a child throwing a tantrum.

She's one of the prime examples of 'it's really easy to criticize; it is not so easy to put in effort, ideas, or put yourself out there in even the slightest way'.

I've not seen her do and of the latter even once. This'd be the perfect opportunity to volunteer to make sure those things are in place, contribute something, etc. -- even something so simple as, "I would like to see X kinds of storylines/management/things to do/etc." -- but even that ain't happening.

Just piles of bitching and passive aggressive horsefuckery about how shit just isn't good enough for her. Frankly, if there's one thing we have an excess of... it's that.

@Tempest Nobody's telling you to be quiet. We're just, you know, mocking you right back.

And I just wiki for them if they want me to. Story-wise, traditional staff-wise, and even 'make a character and play'-wise, I have no dog in this race. (So you can stop directing all the 'you's at me, anyway. It's like watching somebody throw a dart in a game in a bar and hit a bullseye... on the Target bag of the soccer mom unpacking her minivan in the suburb three streets over so far as your accuracy goes.)

@Tempest said in Sin City Chronicles:

@surreality When the people involved are going to put in 0 work beyond copy/pasting code from another game, why would they?

If it's that easy, why not do that up real quick, and then work up something different from it?

(Oh, because maybe it isn't that easy and doesn't do up real quick.)

Not seeing the cavalcade of brilliant alternatives forthcoming.

@Coin The way things are going this month, you'd seriously start to think people really don't want new games.

@Seraphim73 Even though it'd require the dreaded 'lots of reading', it wouldn't be too tough to make 'must post a log after use' a requirement for checking out an NPC (like a library book, you gotta sign the card so people can keep track of where the NPC's been), which would also keep a record of what they've been up to.

...I was just thinking about a thread like this for kudos for specific people, so much your way for this one, and I may be brave enough to do that later.

Reno1: Making a rule that said, in straightforward language, "Do not make staff care about your TS." This required a change to the way weresphere had been handled in 1e compared to 2e and was guesswork, but frankly, "Do not make staff care about your TS" is a rule I would really like to see propagate. I commend this rule heartily as it was very much a discouragement to starting drama on this subject, and that is very, very much worth all the internet hearts ever.

Shangrila: +kinks is a brilliant idea. Forget the content, because one could fill in whatever content they wanted into the code framework, and focus on the purpose. Giving people tools to help find exactly what they're looking for, and avoid the things that make them uncomfortable, entirely on their own, is genuinely helpful.

I'm always willing to wiki things, but that's not day to day staffing in any capacity.

@Bobotron Even the basic rolls have so many modifiers based on character type and merits and environmental factors that it becomes hard, though. For instance, I'm looking at something that would just be, say, +roll/task punch=<target difficulty number> without much of a need for modifiers if circumstances were generally default. (You could mix/match components, too, with a more complex thing for corner cases, but the goal was to get all the basic tasks accounted for in a form that simple so almost anybody could run a thing on the fly without needing to know the ins and outs.) The system's designed to make things easier that way with the target difficulty number rather than, say, a stack of +/- mods, which are allll over WoD and nWoD and CoD, and that's before you get to things like defense or all the various merits and widgets it would need to check for. One or the other of those and it could be feasible (and it would super simplify things!), but for CoD... yeah, this is a big reason I meandered away from it.

@Bobotron In fairness, this is partly why I'm just writing up something new with a quickie method of preset rolls and whatnot rather than using CoD. There's a lot of material and corner cases to learn in CoD, and that can be daunting for a novice ST, which gets a lot of people antsy about starting to run scenes or taking on that responsibility. I am the worst person to ask on this front, pretty much. I've staffed CoD and I still don't always feel totally comfy running stuff in it. (And I've purged so much from my brain at this point to make room for new stuff I would say I am totally not qualified for it, to give you some idea.)

If you could do something similar -- set up some roll presets, that is -- I think it could help in a pinch for the basics. That strikes me as being... not so easy, either, though.

Grid Design: I like old-school sprawl grids, so my preference is opposite here. I think you can split the difference somewhat, however, by: instead of building a traditional grid grid, and a temproom nexus, build a very small grid where the 'grid rooms' describe a very large area, and allow people to spawn temprooms from there that would be locations in that area. I considered doing this for a multi-planet grid: 'planet' would have been a single grid room, and people could spawn locations from there as needed. Now, granted, it's a little more relevant to know what planet someone is on than what major area they're in, this can be relevant if some major staff-led event goes down. Having a few built and stable-ish sphere locs as needed can also be a benefit. You can basically split the difference here, is what I'm saying: strip the actual 'grid' down even further, then temp it from there. (Strip, burbs, desert, mountains, whatever, done, for example.)

Social RP: I think it has value and gives context to things. It's good for downtime. I don't think you need to treat every birthday party as a major plot (because that is silly), but you also do not want to bash the shit out of it to the extent that people feel ashamed to be seen RPing something casual or social ever, or like the game view of that RP is wrongfun. That's a quick recipe for people doing more nothing in their downtime than many already do.

Homework: I don't consider a minor background a big deal. I think a general character overview that mentions anything extraordinary is maybe better than the standard 'tell me more about your mother... ' that always sounds like a first appointment with a novice shrink. Depending on how much you're cool with having public, I may be able to help with a log form, and may be able to do some other submission stuff like that as well. People are iffy about that, but some stuff is possible. I was able to figure out how to get a log submission form set up that'd calculate XP per player based on the metrics I was using, which also included some of the CoD stuff like breaking points and aspirations filled in scene. It makes it more time and effort to submit the log, but it did all the calculations for you and could spit out a script for staff to just paste into the game after looking it over with a total for the ST and an individualized breakdown per player. If you're sticking with just the basics of CoD and maybe some kind of <time period> or theme incentive, that can be reproduced pretty easily if it sounds like it would help out on the homework front.

Making things matter: Mrr. I'll get back to you on this one. My ideas in this vein are weird and trended toward a different sort of game model lately so I'd have to get back to you about it.

@tragedyjones I could whip up something like BITN's again, probably, yes.

(By which I mean I still have most of that code if not better versions of it I can kinda just drop in somewhere.)

@tragedyjones said in Sin City Chronicles:

as well as those who know Forsaken 2E better than I do.

As much as I love you to bits...

...not it!!!

(Been there, done that, burned the tee shirt.)

@Bobotron Yup. It seems like a world filled with nigh-infinite weird. Hell, all three of those suggestions are, really, in their own ways.

Is it obvious yet how much I miss the Tzimisce? IS IT?! <pines>

Oh, shit. How I forgot this one I do not know: Vampire Hunter D. Deeply weird, surreal as hell, futuristic and strange and full of bizarre things, but with the nifty gothic vibe going on.

Nightbreed. ALL THE FUCK YES. (The weirdass homebrew system I've been working on was originally to make a game along these lines.)

Necroscope. On earth, off earth... either way would be badass, though off-earth would be pretty fucking epic.

Another one I would think would be neat: League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. It would be hard as hell, but it could potentially be pretty neat for a smaller game.

The Catspaw series by Joan D. Vinge. Futuristic, a little bit cyberpunk in places, very strange, but neat.

A world based on Clive Barker's Lord of Illusions.

Big Trouble in Little China. (Still hoping that project gets off the ground, @Lithium!)

The Haven TV series.