Posts made by ThatGuyThere

The way I have done it was made them pick something specific that was something they learned about while Questing.
One the court question I left court Rivals general, but on Rival house made them pick a particular house.
No real Clue if either of these are the official ways to do it, but they worked fine for my groups.

Because you don't want to play a religious fanatic?

Yeah stat wise one the path the are the best for combat, but not every character is a combat character, and there is a fair about of social play drawbacks.
Though I will say at least one Brother Battle has been played in any table top group I have either been in or GMed for.

Zero, given the shitshow that was the comics version of civil war I am avoiding the trailer.
I will be there opening night to see it, but I dread it more then look forward to it, i hope the movie is great and believe it will by but I have enough of a nagging doubt that i don't want to feed it with trailers.

From my experience, I have noticed what @mietze about the same actual activity, and no real problem getting rp with I page people or ask on channels but the various ooc and channel chatter has really fallen off.

I think places are getting quieter but I think a big part of that is the time of year people are getting geared up for the holidays, thanksgiving in two days then the craziness of the Christmas season. Also I think games in general are trending towards the smaller right now which while the RP is still there tends to make less chatter which makes places seem quieter then they really are.
I mean there is nothing right now that approaches the number of connects that the Reach or HM even had in their heyday, but tit does seem like there are more choices.

Honestly the main feeling i got from some of the plots was that staff enjoyed playing against the players rather then telling a story with them.
And yeah they all felt pretty railroad-y. And the communication of what was happening in the crusade big picture felt very bland and random. Oh in the plot scene the PC won and everything was done right but somehow t=we still lost the big battle, which the player will learn about in a post in two days. Not that I mind the side i am on losing, but if you have the plot scene happen then have a post to reverse the result two days later why bother with doing the scene in the first place? I have better things to do with my evening then to play out a pointless scene that will have the result of it ignored.
This thread is starting to make me really not want a fading suns mush. I love the setting and would love any mush with an more adventure-y focus then the urban horror/ fantasy that currently holds sway, but would likely avoid an FS game if it had any of the staff from Star Crusade now that I am being reminded of the warts of the place.

WoD will likely get made and played most because it has become almost the default for MUSHes that uses mechanics. While i enjoy WoD even if I didn't there is not a lot of choices unless you want to go the traits route which i have on occasion but never really fully enjoy. I realize some (perhaps many or even most) people hate to have success or failure decided by chance, but I love the unexpected element that random dice bring to the story telling mix, so that severely limits my choices.
Part of this is the the MU heights of popularity also corresponded with the heights of WoD popularity. And now it is seen as an game to make that will at least get player to look at it. Being WoD doesn't guarantee success by any means but it gives you the chance. Just scrolling through the list above that Alzie compiled I see a lot of things on it that I have never heard of, so if i saw a game ad for would likely take no notice unless I knew someone involved with it personally; but I see a WoD ad even is I am not lookign ot join a new game I at least look at the wiki and have made caharacters because something caught my eye even when I had not original intention to. As the one person that said Castle Falkenstein I know plenty of mush players likely never heard of it. So if I was going to start a game despite me rather seeing a Cf game rather then yet another WoD game, I would more likely use my WoD idea cause hey if you build it you want people to at least look at it before deciding you suck.

I agree with that advice. I was not involved with he political stuff but it seemed to someone not dealing with it like a giant games of try what ever you want but this is what will happen. Same with the war stuff.
Also if you create systems for things not in the books, like the voting and fife management stuff on Star Crusade, play test the crap out of it first before shoving it live. And for the love of god don't chance it every couple of months. I had an ooc friend with a fife that i helped her crunch numbers on, literally in ht short time the game was running they overhauled the combat system twice and the fife management three times at least they were honest and said they did it that way cause they didn't get the results they wanted but still that seems like a shitty way to go about things.

I must have gotten lucky with the approval lottery I was honestly surprised how well statted out they made my Phoenix knight.

@Apollonius
Laughs that first sentence came pretty close to the last table top group I ran for. Though with a completely different plot but still made me smile.

Honestly I would love a Fading Suns game that ignored the political stuff. What i love about the setting its the ability to do planetary romance adventures. I want to ride a horse and swing a sword while ray gun beams glance off my plasti-steel armor. Save the day, rescue princesses.
Maybe it is just my table top roots but I have ran three and played in two Fading Suns campaigns and they were never political heavy even with noble heavy pc groups. Sure the state of politics provided a back drop and motivation but the focus was on the action. I would love any Fading Suns game but would really love one that focuses on adventuring rather then having my adventure knight character be the odd exception.

My view on the situation is I don't care about religion I don't care about culture someone hits you you hit them back, preferably harder if you are able to.
In this case France was hit, now they are hitting back, still not sure why we have a dog in the fight beside providing logistical support for our fellow NATO member, which we are doing.
I am all for understanding others and respecting their rights to live how they want to but that understand end immediate when they make the call to blow things up, then it becomes not a matter of who is right but who will be left.
And lets face a basic human fact of existence people from Europe and people from Southwest Asia a.k.a. then Middle East, will clash violently and repeatedly. It is one of the main recurring themes of history going back ot the Greeks and Persia, or to most modern folks, the 300 movie war.

Since the is MUSoapbox i have to make this snarky comment,
You do realize that in the shows they violate this prime directive all the freaking time? Including many times when in dialogue they even admit they are doing it?
No real comment on the actual issue.

Honestly for me it is usually the game itself not having specific kinds of drama or the like that get me to leave.
I honestly can't remember the last time I dropped a character that wasn't due to IC death or me leaving the game, except for cases where the game closed, or became completely dead.
Well that is not true there is one I can remember. RfK my character left town when his regent left town and then I ended up not making another but in that case the leaving the game was independent to dropping the character but I didn't make a second there.

@Misadventure
On RfK I was not funny or original. For my beats I wrote up a sentence sometimes two about each scene or source for beats for conditions etc. That was always enough and often got me extra beats when I would miss counting aspiration beats which is did a lot on the long term ones my char was working towards.
It was hardly like writing a BG.

While plot does not equal metaplot, just like a plot the metaplot should not remain static. to use the TV show analogy very few shows are at the same point in metaplot after five seasons then they were at the beginning. the only ones I can think of off the bat that were are sitcoms and even some of those have movement.
though my definition of plot vs meta plot differs, I see plot as what drive an episode or individual story where meta plot is what drives the game.
In some cases a static meta plot could be used to make a point but that should be a conscious decision.

@thebird
OMG the voice mailbox thing. I had that happen to me this summer.
I found out rather quickly cause my mom showed up worried since she could not get in touch with me for a couple of weeks and being paranoid thought something had happened.

In general I am for meta-plots, even once that I am not a fan of from a story perspective make the game seem like a whole. MUSHes especially ones of moderate or greater size can fracture to small games pretty easily and while some of that is a good thing it quickly can turn a game into a collection of sandboxes that share a grid rather then a whole game.
When done well they can give you a reason to stretch beyond your normal play group and give a common history that can help with the the getting to know you RP when meeting a new character.
The big down sides for them are tat with staff turnover a lot of time they end up never being resolved or just left to linger without much movement.

reads the thread and then chuckles
Wow if this keeps up WoD edition wars will be almost as amusing as watching people complain about which version of comic continuity is the best.

On a less snarky note even though I vasts prefer OWoD to NWoD I two am in the keep publishing both camp. Both are fun in different way and both have issues, but it all depends on the different flavor you want for an individual campaign or MUSH.

@Trundlebot
That would be the best of all worlds but I don't see it. At least not soon. For one thing they still have cash to milk out of NWoD 2.0 before moving from it.
though there is hope D+D 5th messed what i consider the best qualities of the previous editions so maybe WoD can find that magic as well.