Best posts made by ThatGuyThere

@Ganymede
If I do not enjoy RPing why would I play on Superhero games where there is not system?
I do enjoy RPing, I also enjoy the mechanics of game systems. Trust me I buy lots of them I know I will never play jut to take them about and gaze at the guts of the mechanics.
You can enjoy playing a character at an xp cap all you want but the very examples you use are the types of RP i do not enjoy.
I have played mentor/ students scenes on both ends and while I would be find having my character ICly be a mentor for someone, any and all teaching scenes would be glossed over to the extreme because I find them eye stabbingly boring. You also mentioned a political mini-game for folks at the cap to do, that is well and good but again not something i have any interest in. I have yet to see any political play on a MUSH be above the level of office politics.
And yes I think WoD has serious issues with things at high xp, there is no coincidence when PC hit the 200 xp mark that i take that as a sign to begin the wrap up of a table top campaign when I run them., yes even if I have story ideas unused.
In short I enjoy RP very much, but the type of rp I enjoy is the type that pretty much requires mechanical growth to go with it, adventuring, discovering new shit, etc; being a mentor or becoming politically active in a big picture is what I have my character retire to do after the end credits have rolled.
As I said I would play on a game with a cap just that once I hit that cap I would retire the character and start another. Just like I when I hit the end of the Franchise mode in Madden I smile and say that was fun, which team should I start up with now.

I would not really be comfortable with someone else posing out my actions, even the GM of the scene.
Not all characters fight the same, I have players characters with high brawl that had it high because they were semi-pro boxers, having the GM pose an attack from them as a kick or a knife hand strike or the like would be jarring as all heck to me even if the actual mechanical result was the same. Sometimes GMs in scenes will not have the familiarity with the chars to know details like that. It might take longer but I would prefer everyone getting to do their own pose.

@acceleration said in Cultural differences between MUDs and MUSHes:

@Lotherio

There are plenty of perma-death MUDs. RPIs are all perma-death and several RP-centric MUDs are also perma-death. Non-perma-death MUDs are typically considered RP-light with combat emphasis (like the IRE series and New Worlds) and probably not where OP is coming from given they seem more interested in figuring out if people on MUSHes are conflict-averse.

I think one of the big reasons people tend to be conflict averse on mushes as opposed to muds is that Mud have code that is likely unbiased. I mean you can write code that cheats but that is a lot of work and easy to discover by others with access to the code. On a mush especially one that uses tabletop rules conflicts are adjudicate by people. This is a feature not a bug but also raises the specter of favoritism, especially in OWoD where book rules were written vague on purpose by the designers.
I know on games where I trust staff I am much more open to conflict rp then on games where I am less trusting of staff.

@Kestrel
It seems to me from this thread the biggest cultural difference between MUDs and MUSHes is on MUD IC has primacy, things tend to me looked at mainly though the lens of IC.
On MUSHes OOC tends to have primacy, some aspects of this I think are positive some are negative.
The feeling I am picking up from MUD folks is that the game is meant to simulate the life of the characters in a very sim like fashion.
On a MUSH there is more of a focus on creating good fiction, one example is I was in a scene a couple of nights ago. It went well story got moved forward and it reached a natural conclusion. I am sure many like this happen on a MUD on a regular basis. In case we just decided to fade there, not wrap up no how folks got home just fading to the character chatting, much like a fade out of a scene on TV or in a movie. The scene had served it's purpose nothing more need to be said. From what I gather on a MUD those of us in the scene would be expected to actually pose out good byes and navigate the grid to our residences before logging out. Instead of +ooc then logging out.
If this correct? Not judging just trying to make sure I have things straight in my head.

I too like this idea. After all the purpose of backgrounds is to show the player has a clear idea of the character and that the character fits the game.
I think the concept of core memories/defining moments does that just as well as a story form bg would, and likely in less writing which makes the process quicker for both the player and the staff doing the approvals.

@Kestrel said in Cultural differences between MUDs and MUSHes:

@Lotherio said in Cultural differences between MUDs and MUSHes:

Even on a MUSH — if a player doesn't RP with me, I'd rather our characters just not have our stories be more intricately involved than, 'Oh hey, yeah, that guy John, I've seen him around'. I don't want that player sending me a page assuring me that John has been giving my character lots of personal one-on-one time if we cannot actually RP it out. Otherwise, it's as dull as solo-killing a player who's offline on a MUD and calling that 'story'.

Then say no when they page about the one on one time. There no rule on any MUSH I have ever seen that says you have to go along with with the other player suggests. Just be polite and say that you prefer to have important interaction on screen or however you want o word it and move on to the next guy person who plays the style you enjoy.
I was resentfully paged by someone asking me to if it was alright if we said that my char was teaching hers a skill. My answer was no he wouldn't teach that to anybody. Other player player said No prob and went on to find some one else to handle the IC teaching.
Yes for the MUD folks reading this, all this could have been handled ICly just as well. And honestly in this particular case I have no preference as to how it gets handled save that the OOC way was a bit quicker.

@Ide said in How does a Mu* become successful?:

With all due respect Theno I don't think you can say in good faith that mu*'s have already tried the changes Kestrel is talking about when those changes are locked behind the basic UX of mu*'ing itself. Look at a game like Storium or whatever it was called. It attracted huge interest and was a half-assed attempt at mu*, but with a contemporary UX.

Storium for me would never be a replacement for a MU. Yes I could get the rp there but the mechanics that were baked into the platform were Meh to me. And sadly to RUn a game there you had to use their mechanics. With a MU* you can use whatever mechanics you can find or write or have written code for.
It might be my age but I have gotten used to user interfaced being horrible. This happened when I was putzing around on a Tandy. I can handle a bad UX far more then poor mechanics in an on-line RPG.

Edit to Add: @Kanye-Qwest Oh hells yeah, I think Neverwinter Nights could be a great base for a MU*.

@Kestrel said in Cultural differences between MUDs and MUSHes:

See, to me, this is a lost opportunity. I personally would so much rather have my character approach yours and say, 'Hey, can you teach me this thing?' To which yours would respond, 'No, I would not teach that to anyone.' We can then try and haggle with one another, or enter a political discussion about why your character is restricting the education of this, etc. If the goal is story, and not to just game your way to a win, isn't trying to control things first OOCly counterproductive?

To me the game is about story, but the story does not get added to much by the asking and the refusal. Like I said in the initial post I would have been fine handling the request as a scene. In this case the main difference would be the pages took about 2 minutes the IC would have been likely 30 minutes to an hour.
If I have the choice I will use that time on more meaningful scenes or rather for scenes with a higher potential for meaning since I actually have had characters lives changed by hey person I don't know lets meet scenes. In fact that is how my current PC met his best friend.
If the player asking would have said I really want to RP out the request cause I think I could ICly convince you. I would have done the scene. That could lead to interesting things possibly, but the Other player was like that's cool, and the matter dropped which is equally cool with me.

@Kestrel
Since you are so new to mushing to help understand hte openness i will give a thumbnail of what was before the openness.
Back in the day there was an Official OOC Masquerade on most WoD games. Meaning you were not allowed to talk about what you were, and by extension what anyone else was. This was done to promote mystery and IC secrecy. It failed mainly because it provided benefits to those willing to blur IC lines to come up with the answers they already knew through alts and the fact that in general humans are bad secret keepers, the other big effect was it monetized OOC knowledge, since the info about who was what could and was used as a bargaining chip on an OOC level.
So as a result it has been changed. How on a lot of other genres secrets still exist and happen. And keeping a secret is still doable on WoD you just have to actually keep it a secret. Expecting others to keep secrets about themselves however is likely not going to happen.

I don't really consider Shadowrun crunchy I would put it like WoD in the medium crunch bracket. When I think High crunch I think things like, Traveler, GURPS, Champions/Hero, and anything GDW published. (Games Design Workshop). and then for the truly crazy level of Crunch Tri-tacs hit location chart, which starts with rolling a percentile to determine which general area of the body you hit then another roll to get which part of that part you hit. On the human head there are 36 possible hit locations in the system. (Note I never actually played this system though the game I bought that used it i did love the setting for. )
While Shadowrun and WoD can both go more crunchy if the person running things uses a lot of modifiers neither tends to be played that way.
I will say SR is generally perceived as more crunchy but I think that has a lot to do with its focus on action, where WoD even in the table tops I have been in has more of a culture of a lot of rp while minimizing the actual use of the system and more of a focus on scheming and manipulation that while there are systems for that the tend not to be used as rigorously as systems in Shadowrun for things like rigging or hacking.

The tone I would really like to see is more action-adventure type, kinda pulpy.
I know you are not wanting systems so instead I will state that has and uses a system is a definite plus for me. I enjoy comic games and can have action-y stuff happen on them but the last of randomized resolution tends to leave me missing something. It does not have to be a complex system just some sort of randomizer, so that an action scene doesn't feel like hey lets goof around with these villains then when it stops being interesting finish them off. In my action scenes I want uncertainty as to result. I am fine with pre-set limits like no hospitalization nor death if it fits with the mood of the story, but don't want a this is how it will end going into it.

@Arkandel said in Interest Check: Single Sphere VtR Game:

@Kanye-Qwest said in Interest Check: Single Sphere VtR Game:

But will there be shocking racism?!

I've seen way more hideous crime on MU* (murders, disembowelments, ritual sacrifice, mind control, you name it) than I've seen common real life douchebaggery. No one minds playing a vicious serial killer but they won't play a racist white supremacist or wife beater.

It probably means something but I don't pretend to know what.

My guess is that we like our horror to be things that are safely in the real of the unreal. Yes serial killers exist but they personally impact the lives of very few of people. Where the racist and the wife beater are present everywhere, either someone has experienced it or they know someone personally who has.

@Nausicaa said in Making a MU* of your own:

. The art of knowing when to say No is very important.

Not only the art of knowing when to say no but also the art of knowing how to say no, is likely the most important quality to have in a staffer.

@Auspice said in Auspicious beginnings:

It'd be a really neat plot... but it would require starting in media res. So I'd have to control things to the extent of 'Things happened and now you're in this situation.' I've been uncertain about doing it because I don't know how people would feel about it.

I have found this works best if you just ask the players before the scene starts, hey for this to work I have to get you guys all t this point anyone mind? It lets those players that object opt out with out a fuss and lets the plot start as needed.
It is also polite, I know that is asked before hand i would have no issues but if a storyteller started a scene with something like out of the blue I would nope right out of there.

I don't think having a large number of players is all that important though I do feel you need a minimum level to get a critical mass both to keep RP moving and fun and to provide a base for new people to add onto, while I think what number this base is might change based on opinion I know if I log onto a game and only see a small number of people on and always the same ones I will likely not join opposed to someplace else that seems more alive. In my opinion the necessary number of players is somewhere between 10 and 20 total, not necessarily logged in at once.
Note my number is based on players not characters.

@Kanye-Qwest
As some one who mostly plays on WoD games I wholeheartedly support the not have an OOC room position.

@Kanye-Qwest said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:

@WTFE said in Coming Soon: Arx, After the Reckoning:

But no amount of repeating the mantra "just use a temp email" is going to change the fact (and yes, it is actually a fact) that requiring email for a pretendy fun-time game is an idiotic decision from the get-go. Especially given, again, the history that is paired with such requirements.

So do you promise that an email requirement will keep you away? Asking for a friend!

That's some high quality staffing right there.

I voted the medium grid with easily created temp rooms.
Although I am in accordance with the rest of the voices here. I think a grid is absolutely critical both in providing the setting and in setting the tone. Think of going to a stage production, yes you can absolutely put on a play with out sets, I have seen some excellent productions done that way but for the most parts sets improve the experience.
Temp rooms are also essential in my opinion, both because no matter how large the grid you will not be able to cover every scene location, and two it lessens the need for on -grid housing. My characters rarely have many scenes in their living places, however there are many times when there is info to be shared that public locations do not work well both for IC and sometimes OOC reasons, if temp rooms are not available I will get a place either apartment or small build to have that option with temp rooms that save me and build staff the effort.

@Catsmeow
As someone who runs a Rifts TT the mere thought of trying to automate and code that monstrosity of a system makes my head want to explode. Hell, the data entry for the skill list alone would be brutal since every book adds more skills.

@Gilette said in Where's your RP at?:

@ThatGuyThere

Man, you said it yourself: you go to games because you can play a certain character you want to play there, not because the game itself - the setting, the rules, the atmosphere - attracts you.

Then we have a much different definition of snowflake. To me a snow flake is someone who decides that the rules don't apply to them or that they should be the only one allowed to have certain things.
In my case my char was built fulling within the c-gen rules and I fully acknowledge the right of every player to make the same choices I did in c-gen.
I am a firm believer in no one being a special case.
As to someone's motivation to play a game I fail to see how that is important in the slightest as long as they obey the rules of the game.