Posts made by surreality

@lithium Oh lawd, is he still trying? (Apparently, the new block feature doesn't even show that someone has posted. I suddenly lurve nodeBB like it gave me a box of chocolates.)

Even the 'baggy clothing' argument is such bullshit. The 80s were the era of the tee big enough to serve as a dress. Super huge shirts and baggy jeans are still a thing. There's plenty of loose clothing that can be used to conceal quite a bit. Peasant blouses and hippie skirts can hide a lot, but I don't see anyone trying to ban those. Plus, any formal dance? Bwahahahaha. Skirts to the floor, everywhere. Some years, most of them are tight enough to hide nothing (much to much chagrin), but most years...

In '87-'91, the ancient days of my high school years, trench coats were actually the territory of the preppy crowd for the most part. They tended to be the ones able to comfortably afford different coats for different weather more than most others, and heavens forfend somebody's newest The Limited outfit got damp.

Granted, my senior year was also super weird and no one was allowed to have a non-collapsing (the ones that stay full length all the time rather than collapsing down to purse size) umbrella, for fear someone might try to stab someone with it. To this day no one's sure where anybody got the idea anyone had that idea to begin with, with the prevailing theory being 'somebody killed someone with an umbrella on Murder She Wrote or Matlock and the principal saw it and panicked'. Nail files, also banned that year; even the cardboard ones. (Meanwhile, half the guys in school wore swiss army knives on their belt loops openly the entire time I attended with zero incidents, and no one ever brought that up as a potential issue. The proto-gothy dude with the biker jacket with a pair of brass knuckles adorning each shoulder strap didn't get any attention, either.)

Maybe there is something to this whole 'fashion accessories are the actual lethal weapons' approach...

...to complete idiots.

@rizbunz
https://youtu.be/SneCkM0bJq0
https://youtu.be/l3LFML_pxlY
https://youtu.be/4zLfCnGVeL4
https://youtu.be/oxHnRfhDmrk
https://youtu.be/A7Xm30heHms

Some older ones.

@lotherio said in Earning stuff:

It would be great to find a solution that could reward random/social without unbalancing scales; without becoming code heavy/staff reliant.

This is another reason I am still getting butt-splinters from fence-sitting on dev again.

I am a big fan of social RP. Especially when it in some way relates to the broader events going on in the game.

I am also a big fan of wiki forms, and so help me, while the test run for this is gods-knows-where in a backup, I had a form that'd let people upload their log, who was in it, etc. It also had checkboxes for incentives and similar. This included things like 'relates to <plot> <links to plot>', for incorporating specific game themes, for playing in an on grid location <link to location page>, etc.

These were all small, incremental things, but the way it was set up, it'd tally those up and spit them out so staff could process any XP earned from the log easily.

It also would link up 'things that go on at <place>' to the page for <place>, so people would have a good idea of the kind of things that happen there. (Helpful, when you're looking for where to do something and want a certain atmosphere.)

It would link those downtime scenes (marked as such) to the plot they reference, if they did so, and give the plot-runner a small XP kickback as well, because they generated story beyond the event(s) that they ran in a way that gave people something to do during downtime.

And so on.

All designed to give people a carrot for 'downtime stuff that's story-related' vs. 'well, we're bored, I guess we can just screw until the next event'. It also is a chance to bring other people into a storyline/plot that weren't able to attend the event(s) directly. It gives people incentives to explore the themes, lore, etc. of the world.

More importantly, it concretely demonstrates in the system itself that social play is considered to be of value on the game, especially if it is in theme and engages with ongoing story or aspects of the world. It isn't 'just filler'. Most games treat it as 'just filler', and considering how much of actual game play it is for most, and how that game play is what sustains a game in the vast majority of time when someone is not running a specific event, I think that underestimates its real importance and value.

Don't even make with the dares about sequin tights, because I don't care how fat I am, I still have sparkly mermaid-scale leggings because I refuse to be an adult all the time. And some things you just can't unsee, people. Some things you just can't unsee.

I think we're working on chill, y'all, and we don't hate each other or anything -- let's try to let this simmer down?

@auspice My post was simply 'we'll just have to disagree about the terrible'. Totally peaceable. And I was told I was in the wrong for having a different opinion than him.

I don't care if he loves or hates it. He can have any opinion he wants; that's what 'we'll just have to disagree' means. I have not told him he is wrong for having his opinion. He has explicitly done so to me.

At which point I went to Netflix to watch the end of Thor.

When I came back, specifics were being discussed. Presenting different perspectives is not the same as telling someone they're bad, wrong, or anything of the kind. It's presenting a different perspective that also exists. Nowhere am I claiming his perspective and experience is invalid.

It's just not the only perspective or experience. Nowhere have I claimed mine is the only one, either. At all.

In my view, yes, it was excellent. And a very hard thing to watch at the same time.

@surreality said in RL Anger:

@arkandel It is still impressively well done. It's not an easy watch, even for an adult, but it is incredibly well done. For a lot of us who grew up before the age of cyberbullying, it's certainly an eye-opener. It isn't just teens doing this, too; it's interesting to see how many of the issues we have in the hobby are reflected in that series in some form or another.

^ That. I am not telling everyone and their grandmother to go watch this right now, or that it's the best thing since sliced bread, and everyone should run off and go watch it right now.

I also had no damned idea that none of it had any disclaimers at all in Australia -- how in the blazes am I supposed to know that? I know the US version for S2 has them for all episodes, and S1 has them for select episodes. I am not in Australia to know what Australian marketing and content labeling consist of, or that they didn't have the information we do in the US.

Nor do I object, anywhere, to the idea that it should be labeled. It should.

The examples used, however, of meth overdoses on Will & Grace or someone being shot dead in the middle of a sports game were absurd on their face and a perversion of the point being made, so, yes, I'm going to argue those as being absurd on their face.

@Ganymede Note the big bold italic caveat, if you like. It's right there in the quote.

@ganymede Not getting the reference there.

@tinuviel Uh, no. That is a complete mischaracterization, with a fair bit of role-reversal at play. I said this:

@surreality said in RL Anger:

@tinuviel We're just going to have to disagree about the terrible part.

@tinuviel said in RL Anger:

@surreality Well yes, given that those terms are subjective. And you're wrong.

@surreality said in RL Anger:

@tinuviel I'm wrong a lot, but as somebody who has been suicidal for over a year, that show helped chill me out quite a fucking lot on that front, as that result is anything but terrible so far as I'm concerned, and I'm sure as shit not wrong to feel that way. So, bluntly, fuck you. Your snark routine is uncute and grossly misplaced in this case.

@tinuviel said in RL Anger:

@surreality It's not a snark routine. That you find it helpful is great. That so many find it unhelpful to the point of actually causing problems is not great.

Given that not one but two rapes of young girls occurs, and a scene of actual suicide appears on screen (except in Australia) is evidence enough for me that it is not great.

It's fine for you, well done. It's not fine for everyone.

@surreality said in RL Anger:

@tinuviel Bluntly: I disagree with your opinion that it's terrible. You can tell me I'm wrong for having a different opinion all you want, obviously, but it's just making you an asshole in this case.

You were telling me I was wrong for having a different opinion, after peaceably saying we'll just have to disagree about it -- which you could have simply left be, but you didn't; my reasoning didn't matter for shit, I was simply wrong for having a different view than you.

I told you why I had a different opinion. A very personal why, at that. And you kept on banging on about how I'm wrong for having a different opinion about it, despite it being one of the reasons I'm still here to type shit in the first place.

You seriously don't think that's gonna get a 'fuck you, pal'? Really?

@tinuviel See the edit above. Again, I have zero notion of what their disclaimers or marketing are or aren't in Australia, only what I've seen in the US. The US version has disclaimers as described above. If Australian Netflix doesn't, yell at them, not me.

@tinuviel I have no objection at all to them adding advisories. I already said I was surprised they didn't for the first season, and only added them for the second. (A few episodes of the first had advisories, but only a few.)

I think saying 'this is about <X>' should pretty clearly imply that's going to be depicted. I expect it from the synopsis and consider myself warned that I'm probably going to see that.

Also, seriously, no one is forcing anyone to watch it. If any television was mandatory watching? Different issue. But this is a very clear instance of 'if you don't want to see things about these subjects, you don't have to watch it'. Lords knows if we were required to watch things, if sporting events were on the list, I would have opted out of breathing long ago.

ETA: Your argument seems to be more about Neflix Australia refusing to label things than it is with me. The US versions of season 2 had disclaimers for all of the episodes with specifics, and for a few of the episodes in season 1. (The actual suicide episode, and I believe the rape episode.)

@tinuviel Those examples are patently absurd.

A sporting event is not about people getting shot.

Will & Grace is not about meth addiction.

The series we are talking about is about someone being bullied to the point of suicide; expecting to not see bullying and suicide represented in a series with that specific premise is as foolish as watching a sporting event and being shocked that people are playing sports on your screen.

@tinuviel Here's the thing about that.

These confrontations are forced on people in the real world all the time. Nobody gives them a warning. There's no disclaimer.

Frankly, the 'if you need help, go here to find a list of crisis resources' is wise of them. The 'go to an adult' has the problems shown in the show itself. Suggesting actually trained crisis folks to contact is good, though, and they do.

@tinuviel I get that. And that's fair. It's also helped others.

Frankly, I think it's much more important for adults to watch than kids. They're the ones with the power to do something about it more actively, and the ones who aren't seeing and experiencing this day to day.

The role of technology in the film is key, too; parents today did not grow up in the same environment. Face some of the same issues? Yes. But the new tech makes it very different, and sometimes different in ways that are invisible to the authority figures who were not raised in a social media world.

@tinuviel Honestly, 'You are not alone' is an important message, too. I haven't seen the marketing around it to know if that's the targeting, but that is valid.

I was pretty shocked they didn't warning label the shit out of the first season (maybe they have since), because they should have.

@tinuviel Sure. But here's the horrible part: the things that happen in that series really happen. They happen disturbingly often, and people don't want to see them. And the don't want to see them often causes them get swept under the rug and not addressed properly when they happen in the real world.

It is not something to watch lightly. It is incredibly hard to watch. It's a very unflinching look at these subjects, with all of the conflicted emotions and complications that come with them.

People can't 'don't want to see it' out of happening in the real world. Yes, it's jarring as hell to see 'this is what that actually looks like, and it's fucking horrifying', and people generally don't want to see that.

The problem is, more people need to see something on TV in graphic detail these days to recognize that it's really something that happens. Is that also fucked up? Sure. But it's like refusing to show the bodies coming home from recent wars in the US for so long: it supports the sort of denial of reality that enables horrors to continue, because no one has to look at them.

@tinuviel Bluntly: I disagree with your opinion that it's terrible. You can tell me I'm wrong for having a different opinion all you want, obviously, but it's just making you an asshole in this case.

@arkandel said in Managing Player Expectations:

• People who're just off doing their own things completely. Maybe they're running PrPs for each other, idlying in a room to harvest automatic XPs, or they're just TSing. Whatever it is, this is usually viewed in a negative way.

So far as I'm concerned, if they are not breaking theme and not negatively impacting others (which, if they never leave their room, they are unlikely to do), I don't care.

And really, my take on this from staffer brain is the same: if they're not breaking theme and not negatively impacting others, it's not anyone else's business to care or kick up a fuss about, either. Their fun is stepping on no one's face, and they should be left in peace to have their fun just like the person inclined to whine about it should be left in peace to have their different kind of fun, provided it fits the same 'doesn't break theme' and 'doesn't negatively impact others in an unreasonable way' criteria. (The 'in an unreasonable way' part is necessary here since they would be interacting with others broadly, and that may negatively impact others in ways that are totally appropriate, in theme, etc. for that game, whatever it is.)

@tinuviel I'm wrong a lot, but as somebody who has been suicidal for over a year, that show helped chill me out quite a fucking lot on that front, as that result is anything but terrible so far as I'm concerned, and I'm sure as shit not wrong to feel that way. So, bluntly, fuck you. Your snark routine is uncute and grossly misplaced in this case.

@tinuviel We're just going to have to disagree about the terrible part.

@arkandel Quick double: S2 gets into some of the issues of sexism more than even the first. It's a different set of issues, essentially, and not focused purely on the suicide.