Posts made by ThatOneDude

WHEN DO WE PLAY!?

@Ganymede said in Eliminating social stats:

@Arkandel said in Eliminating social stats:

During game design, one of the potential ideas for its systems is to eliminate all social mechanics from it. That means no 'charisma' or 'manipulation' mundane attributes and no powers that sway emotions or decision-making.

I like this, but --

The intent behind this is to cut down on incidents where social attributes like that are ignored either way ('no, I get you rolled six successes on lying, but...'), not have to deal with 'how much sway' a given attempt produced given I've never been satisfied with how social damage has been implemented before in the games I've played, but also to eliminate concepts that try to browbeat others into TS.

-- I don't think the motivation is correct.

I have always believed that the problem is using these powers to twist another into playing in a way that would otherwise be contrary to the choice they would make for their PC. The problem is depriving agency, not the use of social stats themselves. And it's never a fair trade-off: no one balks when a vampire uses telepathy to determine if someone's actually lying, but sometimes make a stink when a player rolls a set of dice to make people believe their character's lie.

If social stats are limited to how a character appears, I'd be fine with that. Rolling social stats to give the appearance of being charming, innocent, or honest when one is concealing true motives is important. In a way, it's almost defensive: a guard is suspicious that a knight is lying his way past, but that knight seems so honest and caring -- he couldn't be a liar -- so he lets him through despite his better judgment. The knight isn't twisting the guard's behavior; he's giving the guard no cause to mistrust him.

It's a hard thing to balance. I know that, in my own system, I've reduced the social stats down considerably to a single stat: Guile. Guile's important to have as a tactician as much as a merchant, and comes into play in combat and the economy.

But couldn't you /deprive agency/ with physical stats? IE: I grapple you and force you to stay when you want to leave. Or using force/violence I could make your PC do something they normally wouldn't. That's why to me it just makes sense to have a like for like system, that has like attack/defense. Then follow up with the "if you don't feel good with what's happening then fade to black or whatever."

I love the idea of a social monster (vampire form WoD VtR 2nd Ed majesty/dominiate/nightmare). Against players I hate it because I don't play the PC as I should because I know some people aren't going to be ok with being manipulated by dice in RP. But really, maybe the issue has to do more with how people associate with their PCs? In my earlier example I used being forced to give a guy oral. To me this isn't anywhere near anything I would enjoy or even dig watching. Just personal preference. But if my pc got forced into doing the do then it is what it is. I just don't want to write it

I mean I can get the impartant parts summarized to build off of later...

@Arkandel said in Eliminating social stats:

@Salty-Secrets I thought about that. The problem then is I would need to sell the traits at a steep discount, which seems to undervalue them, since they would be less bang for your buck than other skills.

If you can buy Punch with 5 XP and can then punch PCs in the face then I can't sell you Lie for 5 XP if you can't use it the same way.

If vs PC action is allowed then all things should be equal. As stated if you are allowed to punch someone, they are allowed a dodge action/defense/whatever mechanic for physical violence. The same should be true for manipulation, mind control, whatever.

The difference here is consent and our personal view on "things". As a player if my PC were PKed I'd be ok. If my male PC was dominated and then forced to go down on some dude, I'd be not ok. But it is something that could happen.

With that said I'd say in a situation like that I the player shouldn't be forced to play out the event and it should be faded to black. Just like I shouldn't be forced to play out my characters death; we just know it was the outcome (here I mean like screaming as the head is sawed off or some other grusuem event).

@Ganymede said in Fear and Loathing (Official Thread):

Wes here.

The vampire sphere just got a political bomb dropped on it. Luxor's been good with letting us do what we want. If you're hankering for some politicking, now might be a good time to choose a side. Selfishly, more Acolytes would be nice, but we've got a lot of Covenants that could use a boost.

Come take a look? Don't know how long it will last before something kills my PC, but, hey, it's a fun time.

I don't buy it.

@Thenomain said in Indicating Discomfort in a Scene (online):

@surreality

In our violently agreeing, you have missed the part where I very openly said that calling it 'kinks' was making me uncomfortable and would prefer to call it RP Prefs. It's also more technically accurate and removes a lot of baggage and connotation from the phrase.

Show us on this stop light your level of discomfort... I'm thinking its a mid-range yellow?

The Coldfire Trilogy would make for an interesting world for a mush. I don't know how popular the series was but it's a series that's stuck with me since I read it long ago.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coldfire_Trilogy

My answer to the original question on location would be "Anywhere where we're playing the game..." People can say all day you make your own fun, blah blah whateves but this is a game that requires story and more than one player. A lot of the games don't want to focus on that aspect which is fine. But I'd bet the metrics would show that's why they don't last.

Goals, story, conflict and the like are all things players mostly strive for (character growth, playing in the rules of the game, sessions, etc.).

The books say a lot I always feel like people skip over. I think the point that was trying to be made earlier on was in ref to passages like:

These are the Chronicles of Darkness, tales of a world like ours, but just slightly wrong.

A place we recognize, but where our fears take on lives of their own.

The Chronicles of Darkness Rulebook is the key to exploring that world, a guide to storytelling encounters with the uncanny and a foundation for tales in which the monster becomes the hero.

I always liked the way VtR broke it down:

This World of Darkness can be said to be our own seen through the looking glass darkly. With regard to barbarism, the world of the vampires is like our own, but with a significant upturn in violence and decay. The streets are more brutal, with the desperate eyes of the unfortunate ever watchful for someone more privileged from whom they can steal something to make their own bleak lives more comfortable.

Gangs are more active and violent; vagrants are bolder or they obliviate themselves even more. Even those with vast resources are more fearful of those who would harm them — or more jealous of those who rival their own wealth or power. Their actions can turn fierce with the slightest provocation.

@Sparks said in Gamertags:

Steam: Packetdancer
Origin: Packetdancer
PSN: Packetdancer
XBL: Packetdancer
Twitch: Packetdancer
Discord: Packetdancer#4441

I'm consistent.

Why have I never thought of a name like this >.<

@PuppyBreath said in General Video Game Thread:

@Coin said in [General Video Game Thread](/topic/1210/ge

I don't actually know what Ark is.

Ark is a PVP survival game. With dinosaurs! You build bases, form
tribes with other players, tame dinosaurs, die a lot. Fun times.

This is another game that is a guilty pleasure of mine. I love playing it but in a lot of ways it makes sense to me. Pvp is a blast even when or more so when there are those bully players that try to punk you on servers. It's great drive to get stronger to come back and give them a beat down.

@Ghost said in General Video Game Thread:

Hooray for new Diablo 3 season!

Hooray for addition of Nighrcrawler to the Marvel Omega PS4 roster and them giving him to me for free for being a VIP member!

Hooray Red Stripe
Hooray for beer.

I don't know why I enjoy Marvel Omega on the PS4 so much but man I love that game. Night Crawler is pretty dope but Deadpool is still my #1 pick.

Most hosting services will be similar. Console/SSH/SFTP whateves. I'm curious what the web based mu* is. Are you talking Evennia that has built in "browser support"?

@Bobotron is this how LARPING works?

Wait, no it's this:

I always liked the idea of the alternate rules for "shapechanges" in War Against the Pure. For me it would be the most interesting to keep the "others" close to what a werewolf is (four forms, etc). But then change some of the stats and such based on animal type. With a well defined "template" for animals it could drop in with CofD / Werewolf the Forsaken 2e and be fun.

@Tinuviel said in RL Anger:

@mietze said in RL Anger:

I am going to put my eldest on a plane to New Orleans from Seattle tomorrow until Sunday

That is a rather long flight.

@Tinuviel Mine flew from SF to Kuwait alone... Easy money.

There needs to be reasons to RP with the random person more often than not. The easiest way for this to happen is to have plot, things that are talked about, worked on, planned for. To me its the best way to make things move in a game where there is no dedicated ST like in a Table Top setting. Reward people who want to run and push plot. Reward people for joining in on plot and events. Its the easiest model to keep things flowing with what most staff wants, near 0 touch management.

@Thenomain Does the old TinyMux let you work with some more advanced level action? For example a basic / entry level Python exersise is to work out question and response logic.

Player types: xp/sp gno=4 <enter>
Print to screen: How much regular XP will you be spending?
Player types: 0 <enter>
Print to screen: How much Arcane XP will you be spending?
Player types: 16 <enter>
Print to screen: <more stuffs>

Or something like that? You then could type out the whole thing with a predefined syntax like: xp/spend <trait>=<level>/<type1=cost> <type2=cost> <typeN=cost> (or whatever) or you could run through prompts...

Or change the command/alias to xps (or something) and do the operator(s)/flags in the front?

xps/arcane Prime=4, 16

xps/normal/arcane Prime=4, 8/8

The Black Company series by Glen Cook would make for a fantasic mu* setting. There would be so much that could be done story wise and with names like Croaker, One-Eye, The Limper, and Moonbiter... how could you go wrong?! It looks like they are in talks to bring the whole thing to TV as well.

If you don't know the series you should check it out. I loved the story and writing. I could read though all the books on deployments and never get tired of Croaker's narriation or Goblin and One-Eye and all the magic pranks they'd play on one another.

http://www.tor.com/2017/04/24/glen-cooks-the-black-company-series-coming-to-television-to-star-eliza-dushku/#

@HelloProject if you like coding and you like money then the easy answer is DevOps. Knowing Ruby/Python and/or any number of scripting languages and using them for automation will get you PAID.

I'm not sure what kind of background you have in the IT world but if you ever worked in the field reading something like "The Phoenix Project" will be a game changer.

URL below for some context on pay:
https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/devops-engineer-salary-SRCH_KO0,15.htm

If you interview for a gig like the ones listed in the link you need to say stuff like, "Making improvements to something inconsistent is like wrestling a pig: It's messy and you probably won't win."