Posts made by Thenomain

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

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

This isn't a coder issue, it's a user issue. It won't change overnight.

Well I mean, you've gotta code it that way for users to get used to it. It has to start with coders, there's literally no other way to do it.

You mean even you have ignored the twice where I've said I had, and gave you specific ideas on how to get people to transition over?

Just to be clear: I'm on it. Faraday is on it. Evennia is on it. This isn't just preaching to the choir, it's preaching to the Pope.

@Coin said in MSB MU*?:

@Faceless Some of the best conversations have come from us just talking smack about people without really meaning to. >.> I mean yeah, we're horrible people, but at least we have fun and don't take it further than that? XD XD XD

Like that time I said you could go fuck yourself?

Ahhhh, good times.

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(I still feel kind of bad about that.)

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

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

As to why + commands work, not only are we A) used to them but B) Nobody starts a pose with +. So it's a lot harder to accidentally run a fucking command when just trying to RP.

This is almost certainly a retroactive explanation.

Then let me explain from history: Because @commands.

I believe the very first +command was Firelizard Mail, an object-driven messaging system from before the days of a Master Room, before user-defined attributes. It was an amazing feat of coding in a limited system, and it eventually became +mail, especially when we got Brandymail.

So we have '@dig', '@link', and all those @-commands which have to do with server-changing functions. Then you have 'page' and 'move' and 'pose' which are all user-facing server commands. Perhaps '+mail' should have been one, but we created a third category: User-created commands.

It is unarguably good UX for users of an interface to be able to do whatever makes the most logical sense to them. '+command' meant 'softcoded command' for over a decade.

In part, I've invited this discussion. '+' is silly, but it's silly nowadays, not silly then. Things change. We should change with them, but getting people to change isn't as easy as saying things are wrong. This isn't a coder issue, it's a user issue. It won't change overnight.

"QUIT IT, you moron!

Accidentally forget the opening quote and ... oh, right. Nothing happens.

... I have no idea what you're talking about here. I suppose that no, this doesn't look familiar.

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

@Rook

I use numbers to roll.

Ganymede says: That's just how I roll.

@Rook

This is a true story: I once had a charbit on some Furry game, because about five people I knew said it was fun once I got away from the Furries. So I created a chimpanzee and basically acted like myself, just smaller. I got snarked at by a few people in the main landing room for not taking the theme seriously. I logged back out. I believe this was FurryMUCK, but it was so long ago that I'm not going to hold myself to that.

I am in the process of encoding Promethean.

Correction: I am in the process of considering the non-Euclidean geometry that is the Transmutation power system.

Take me now, Yog-Shoggoth, and we shall visit the King in Yellow together.

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

@Thenomain I'm just trying not to seem so much like, uhh, "THIS IS HOW THINGS WORK WHERE I'M FROM", like I used to be on WORA

Then explain more "why" than "how".

When I grouse about ANSI, I don't just say 'WoD Games Don't Use ANSI' (which isn't true), but that I believe color should be informative and not decorative outside decorations (like headers and footers). I explain that my frustrations are mostly selfish, but informed. I am not disheartened when people yell at me for being stern—it's the fault of my tone that they're seeing the stern and not the potential issue.

And it should look like this: ANSI, to me, is a distraction. I'm constantly looking for the encoded information that isn't there. I could probably acclimate to it, but it's important that the information being given to the people is precise and, ironically, redundant. The word "brown" that is also colored brown in a description may fit this, but it can also lead to confusion as the reader has to take more time unpacking the information.

But making the word "brown" brown is also fun. Doing things that are ugly can be technically difficult and hell, why not show off your skills? Showing off is fun. Enjoying one another's showing off is fun. Thenomain is a kill-joy. (This is a truism.)

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Okay, so let's look at command structure. '+roll'. God, why are we still hanging onto that +? Because people expect it. So how do we phase it out?

• Evennia is going to make command prefixes optional at the base level, but still lists all permutations of a command in the auto-generated help file. (edit and side-comment: This is noisy as fuck, and an unfortunate downside when creating an automated document system. I don't think I've ever seen one I've liked.)
• Thenomain has been making it optional for a while and has been hiding the '+' from all the help files, except '+help' because we cannot override 'help'. Yet.
• I've seen one or two bits of code that are snide if you use a depreciated system, which is off-putting but it works.

Encourage people to not use '+'. When I hear someone say, "Type +news blah," I always reply, "You don't need the +!" Phase the '+' out of all references. Maybe depreciate it entirely, though you will get the occasional kvetch as people have to use it on some games and not others.

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Etc.

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p.s., @Rook is a Furry.

Everything said so far by @Faraday, @Sparks, and @Rook.

(Even when I said it first.

@HelloProject: In a less kind way as to what Faraday said, don't assume. You don't need to pander to the WoD crowd, and we'll beat you to death with pedantic facts if you try.

I've been away for a few days. Sorry for the double-post.

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

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

I really think something developers writing games nowadays should do where possible is make a standardized, generic UI library. A standardized method of headers, of footers, etc.

I dunno... in my experience the headers/footers are one of the first things people want to customize when they take my stock codebase and make their own game with it. I don't really see how this will help - especially when dealing with such vastly different codebases.

All Mush-likes should have three soft-coded functions:

header()
footer()
divider()

Then all a game has to do is change it in one place. Hell, Evennia or other Mud-likes should probably have these as constants in some generic file, because goddamn Muds are all over the place for formatting.

A standard that can be tweaked for personality, IMO, the best kind of standard.

Responding because I was quasi-summoned:

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

I don't even know what you're getting on when it comes to a CoD game. Is it so tough to ask the other player for their Defense, and then typing +roll Strength+Brawl-Defense?

My roll code includes a system called 'action'. It's essentially a macro system, and it works like this:

&action.box me=/again=9 strength + brawl
+action box - defense

No, WoD/CoD is not set up for every instance (though we're trying) because many situations are...situational. Muds and For-Online RPG Systems have the luxury of tailoring everything around the code. PnP RPG Systems do not. It's possible to come up with solutions, but it does take the time that Muds (et al.) are spending on making a system from scratch.

Tomayto, tomahto.

@Ganymede said in MSB MU*?:

@Thenomain said in MSB MU*?:

You absolutely do not to consider before posting any more than you do in posing. Just how much deep thiught do you think I gave before posting this?

Very little, given its poor grammar and spelling.

Exactly! I can post halfway buzzed from a bar and not notice autocorrect yelling at me, and still make a point.

@Catsmeow

Let me have my hill to die on. UX is as important as the fun stuff.

@HelloProject

You absolutely do not to consider before posting any more than you do in posing. Just how much deep thiught do you think I gave before posting this?

The benefit of an archive system like forums is the topic bleed is vastly minimized. I don't think Discord is good enough.

@Rook said in MSB MU*?:

Why does MSB not have a MUSH/MUX to hang out on?

I have a more informative response to this: Because I can't keep up on conversations happening live on a non-archived system like a Mu*. I have a job that keeps me away from a computer, and it's far far far far easier to catch up in a forum format than the cramped, repetitive nature of a Mu*. I'd rather an IM system like Skype or Slack, which would be the best of both worlds, than a Mu*.

@HelloProject

Meh.

I'm not going to say it's going to decrease the forum, but it almost certainly will fragment discussion further. Someone says there are popular generic Mu* games out there, though besides Gateway I can't think of any, and even Gateway isn't that commonly used.

I simply have a "why?" question echoing through my head when trying to work out the utility of a Soapbox Mu*.

@Rook

Meh.

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

I like crafting with rainbow vomit. I admit this.

):<

@Runescryer said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:

Space 1889: Classic Steampunk adventure before Steampunk was even a thing.

You can bypass the "steampunk" label and add so much depth to it by calling it what it is: Verne.

Its tag-line is even more descriptive: "Everything Jules Verne should have written. Everything H. G. Wells could have written. Everything A. Conan Doyle thought of, but never published because it was too fantastic." Bam! You are there!

edit: Or for Fantasy Victorian, Castle Falkenstien (preferred for originality) or Victorianna (aka Shadowrun 1889).

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My issue with the "steampunk" label is that it doesn't describe setting or theme or time-period. It describes technology, and only just. It describes fashion more than it describes anything else. It's like a bunch of 90s kids started running around in ripped jeans writing stories about being poor and unhappy and saying that makes the story "grunge".

@Tyche said in Date Thenomain:

Tyche's fortified bunker is located there?

Hey, I was being self-demeaning, which gives me my quirky charm. I don't want to give people legitimate reasons to flee Ohio.