Posts made by Thenomain

@WTFE said in UX: It's time for The Talk:

@Thenomain said in UX: It's time for The Talk:

This is me changing my mind and making a post just to point you out as someone who may know what they're doing but has no interest in helping the hobby.

The hobby has absolutely zero interest in being helped. Look in this thread: a bunch of grognards being told "you know, this could be made simpler" are frothing at the mouth about how it's ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL that there be bizarre prefixes in front of commands because ... REASONS! DIFFERENT, CONTRADICTORY REASONS!

It's easy to pick and choose what you want from noise. I've been picking and choosing more interesting iterations of discussions, watching movement made not on this thread but seeing how people react to the changes that have been made. You've specifically ignored my agreeing with you in order to wank all over the parts you don't like all for your own ego.

Grognard is you.

This hobby is dead.

Then get out of our way to plant flowers in its corpse and make something of it. You know nothing, Jon Snow.

So I amuse myself by poking at the grognards and watching them say utterly idiotic things from a perspective of complete ignorance. It passes the time.

As you've been a teacher, I find your attitude toward people making mistakes and learning from them reprehensible. If you're not interested in education, then get out of my attempt to find a solution and be a grognard in the Hog Pit where your attitude belongs.

@WTFE

You know, I just deleted a post that in part berated you for being unhelpful, using you as an example of what happens when people push for change via complaints then complain when people don't cater to them. Surprise! People don't cater to assholes, and it makes it harder to do the right thing!

This is me changing my mind and making a post just to point you out as someone who may know what they're doing but has no interest in helping the hobby.

When you get this way, you are no constructive, all criticism. Go you.

That is all.

@HelloProject said in UX: It's time for The Talk:

@Groth said in UX: It's time for The Talk:

The UX issue with MUSH starts right at step 1) when you're asked to install this really quirky client designed in the 1990's that doesn't even have proper window managers.

This actually raises a very good question: Why don't we ever see people coding alternatives to MUSHClient with more intuitive functionality?

What, you mean like Atlantis for the Mac? Like Potato running on Python?

Like, if I code such a thing will I get arrested?

If you want the love and adoration that @Sparks gets (well, from me at least), then yes, you will get arrested with attention. Windows needs an updated client so much that it hurts.

@HelloProject

<whispering>iOS is for the iPhone and iPad, not the Macs.</whispering>

@Collective

Excellent. Conan is about as low fantasy as it gets (with some Romans v. Celts themes maybe getting a bit lower). Best of luck with the project.

@HelloProject

My other point was that after certain complexity you need education beyond help files. I tried to play a Lords and Ladies game and I was not helped by anyone, and my frustration was called out as trolling. Only one person even tried to help get me educated, and most people were scoffing at the idea that the game could focus more on it,

Situations like this will happen no matter how good the design. I used to spend hours a day educating people on the iOS interface, more or less the simplest interface a computer has managed to get, and one of the most perfect examples of UX/UI. And still it was difficult for some people,

That's why UX is an entire degree program. Like Library Science, it is strange and most people don't know what it's for but if you're any good then you can make bank. I am not such a person. I wish I was.

The point of all this is that design can only go so far. I think you realize that, but I've started down this path and so I wanted to get to the end. That's it. The end.

Using a superhero system makes me think that what you want are high fantasy characters in a modern setting, yes?

@Auspice said in Dead Celebrities: 2017 Edition:

Adam West.

So long, old chum.

@HelloProject said in UX: It's time for The Talk:

@Sparks I actually had no idea. I thought +mail was just some shit people made up for no reason.

Do you have me on Ignore or something?!

Ahem, what I mean is...

@HelloProject said in UX: It's time for The Talk:

I'm gonna admit that I've never been able to figure out mail code beyond the basic function of just sending stuff to multiple people.

After that it pretty much turns into alien technology.

Mail had requests made of it. They were implemented. Not using a tool is not bad design; bad design is a tool that is not easy to use as intended.

If you don't want to use mailing lists, fine. If you do and have a vague understanding of what mailing lists do and still can't work out how to use it, that's a potential problem.

Or in other words: I complain about man pages all the time, but I realize that it's my not understanding the underlying technology, not the man page. I want a howto. Good luck learning Linux system administration with just man pages!

@faraday said in Separating UX from Functionality (Design Patterns!):

The complexity of supporting two independent views and making sure everything melds together is just... no.

Then expose the data through direct methods (external database) or an API.

Easy, now all someone needs to do is write MediaWiki plug-ins, right?

Right?

... Heeellloooooo?

@Tinuviel said in How Do I Headwiz?:

The main thing is distancing your emotional attachment from the project. Don't let whatever you're working on define you.

Yeah. You already define the project. You are the project.

On top of that, everyone notices. You may tell other staff or players what ethics are, what is expected of them, or how to play, but everyone will be watching you for the clues you give them. You cannot "do as I say, not as I do" in this hobby, everyone will attempt to do as you do, because if the Headstaff does it then it must be okay.

@Kanye-Qwest said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@Thenomain Oh, feel free. I support that entirely.

@Rook said in UX: It's time for The Talk:

Doesn't matter @HelloProject why the coder is coding, just that they are coding. The audience doesn't change - you're always coding for the users of your code, not yourself. That's the point.

And this is the answer. If you decide to make a game for the Anime crowd, you still have to look at your audience, whether it's policy, descriptions, layout, or code. The final part of the triangle is: Headstaff is at the mercy of players.

Not the coder. Not other staffers. But absolutely the players. Some games can get away with treating some of their players like shit because they are offering a limited product or there's enough people to keep them afloat, but that's the kind of symbiotic relationship that you want with your players.

But if players don't want to use a certain bit of code, they won't. Players will put code on themselves to turn 'where' into '+where' if that's what they're used to, or help people create macros for their client of choice. They will do this in spite of you or what you want.

@HelloProject said in UX: It's time for The Talk:

@Thenomain

I'm not saying you aren't, just saying that it's not really a player problem. Players are kind of at the mercy of coders.

And coders are at the mercy of players and staff. Do you think that a coder who says, "I'm going to code this way no matter what you think?" is going to have a successful game? There are better systems to code under and they are not anywhere near as popular, if they can even get off the ground. That is not a code issue, that's an end-user situation, a player issue.

@Kanye-Qwest said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@Thenomain you stab that straw man, if it makes you feel better.

What happened to "go fuck yourself"? I missed those days.

@Coin said in MSB MU*?:

@Thenomain said in MSB MU*?:

@Coin said in MSB MU*?:

@Thenomain said in MSB MU*?:

@Coin said in MSB MU*?:

[cough]CoverExperienceCoverSheets[cough].

In the middle of working out how to unspend stats properly so that the convoluted experience gain system didn't get fubar'd was not the time for that. Jesus freakin' freak!

How about the other two dozen times I brought it up, including those six months prior to opening when I was like 'dude, Demon's going to need Cover XP, and also different sheets for different Covers...'?

I'm working on it!

Kay, well, when you're done let me know so I can--oh wait, game's closed.

[snickers]

Yes, but I'll get it done anyway. Just because you couldn't be arsed doesn't mean I'm done with it!

... I mean, I was, but now you're working on another game that might need it. The things I do for you.

@Coin said in MSB MU*?:

@Thenomain said in MSB MU*?:

@Coin said in MSB MU*?:

[cough]CoverExperienceCoverSheets[cough].

In the middle of working out how to unspend stats properly so that the convoluted experience gain system didn't get fubar'd was not the time for that. Jesus freakin' freak!

How about the other two dozen times I brought it up, including those six months prior to opening when I was like 'dude, Demon's going to need Cover XP, and also different sheets for different Covers...'?

I'm working on it!

@Coin said in MSB MU*?:

[cough]CoverExperienceCoverSheets[cough].

In the middle of working out how to unspend stats properly so that the convoluted experience gain system didn't get fubar'd was not the time for that. Jesus freakin' freak!

@tragedyjones said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@Kanye-Qwest said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@tragedyjones said in How Do I Headwiz?:

Rule #3.5 - It is just a game.
Nothing matters in the end. If someone is so worked up they are seriously, seriously upset about a game matter, tell them to chill the fuck out.

This one makes me giggle. I remember once talking about staffing or requests or something and someone was like "what if it is an emergency?"

And I'm thinking, 'this is a game. It is impossible that anything occurring in this game is an emergency."

It happens. People get seriously invested. But anything IC, anything not related to OOC harassment or stalking etc? None of it is an emergency.

This is why I giggle when people demand my email address.

I have, when younger, been involved in a few phone calls phrased as emergencies. One of them was an emergency, most of them was people not knowing how to treat a game seriously but not too seriously.

Which is a thing. There is a social contract going on, which means that some people are going to treat that with even a little respect. Which is my advice:

• People are helping you run the game, from staffers to players. Respect their time and effort.

I think we've gone into that before, but it's my counter to people who say "it's just a game" means that anyone can do anything. When I see that, I have to ask them if they know what a game really is.

@Coin said in MSB MU*?:

You've never told me to go fuck myself in voice chat, though I'm sure you've thought it.

I cannot in good conscience or even in bad conscience tell someone to fuck themselves on voice chat or in text except for in two conditions:

1. This person is not even trying
2. I'm so far gone in caring that I am on the verge of hurting myself or others

Maybe when I'm joking. (Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure I've told you that under this condition, but you've forgotten because it was camaraderie.)

Now for those in the studio audience, Coin and I have yelled at each other in voice chat, but one of those usual cases where each person thinks the other person isn't listening so things get louder. Or he was drunk. Or his mom. Always his mom.