Posts made by Thenomain
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RE: Course Corrections
@Apu said in Course Corrections:
True. So I guess a character having a Hello Kitty item wouldn't be too horribly anti-thematic. It'd be more of a matter if pop culture would survive all those hundreds of years.
Malcom references Rime of the Ancient Mariner in Serenity, the First Laser Pistol is in the episode Trash, so while I'd cast serious doubt that even an advanced cotton/polyester blend would survive wearable after a few centuries, that some crazy great grandmother could have resurrected an image from stories. It's plausible in its anachronism as a rare cultural flotsam, because of its rareness.
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RE: RL Anger
Huge Pet Peeve: When in the course of a discussion someone brings up an example, then the discussion becomes about that example and not about the environment that example would come up in.
For example, a discussion about staff needing course corrections but all people will talk about is how it's reasonable if staff doesn't want gunpowder on their game. FOR EXAMPLE.
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RE: Suppressing "has left" in TinyMUX
You can set admin privileges on individual flags, so that a non wizard could not set or unset the Blind flag.
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RE: Finding MU*s
@Cupcake said in Finding MU*s:
The Advertisements board off the main menu has ads for a ton of games as well as running commentary on how good (or bad) they are.
You lie.
They're apparently all bad!
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RE: Course Corrections
@mietze said in Course Corrections:
What's wrong with staff saying "Clearly you've put thought into this and we respect that but it's not a direction the game is going to go, no matter what you roll, by our choice?"
Again, nothing. Just as there is nothing wrong with a player being excited to learn the technology level of their favorite fantasy world.
I wish more staff would say "no" this way, because it shows that they have an understanding that the player is trying to engage with the game, and that's the motivation you want out of players!
But a lot of staff take the attitude that this player is being a problem, and get short with them out of habit. It's a terrible staff habit, and even staff need course corrections.
If the player fights back then yes, there's absolutely a reason to direct them to the Great Egress, but staff aren't exempt from the expectations of people not being crude when they're being honest.
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RE: Course Corrections
@surreality said in Course Corrections:
This is definitely one of the harder 'no's to articulate but it's possibly one of the most necessary ones, not as a control freak trip, but in order to keep the game people signed on to play, well, still the game people signed on to play.
And yet we complain about games that don't allow players to make changes in the game world.
So let's take this and swing it back on topic: What about course corrections with staff? Is it okay to apply this concept to players but not staff?
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RE: Course Corrections
@Arkandel said in Course Corrections:
There was a guy on Arx who insisted on figuring out if cement was invented in that world. How were they making the kinds of buildings they were without it? How?
But that's not a very interesting question to answer.Didn't see this until @Pyrephox responded.
I love the history of technology. I revel in it. It is super-interesting to me. I have probably watched every James Burke BBC show, certainly every episode of Connections and The Day The Universe Changed. Maybe I want to start an industrial revolution. Isn't it plausible that I pursue it as a character goal?
Staff may not have the time nor education nor inclination to chase that theme. I feel exactly the same way when people press for more detailed crafting rules, but goddamn some people like themselves some crafting mini-games! It's okay for staff to say that they aren't going to focus on something, but it's certainly okay for players to think that it's interesting.
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RE: Course Corrections
I would smack that artist's player so hard for breaking the "you know what I mean" expectiation. As @faraday says, when does it end? Do you nitpick over the dialect? Over the idea of an artist daring speak back to a noble? I bet that artist arrived at the front door too!
We are modern people. We must make allowances, or be less snitty about correcting them.
[OOC] Artist says, "How about 'steel gray' instead?"
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RE: Course Corrections
@faraday said in Course Corrections:
I mean, where do you draw the line? Like @ThatGuyThere said -- what about 'tennis shoes' or 'aspirin' or 'kleenex' or 'okay', or 'getting to third base' or calling someone a 'casanova' or saying you're going to 'go postal'?
It lies somewhere between "the suspension of disbelief" and "you know what I mean".
I mean, as another relevant example, let's say that you were trying to try and make a game where you were safe against modern social abuses, but people just could not get their brain around your explanation as why there's no history of selling functions of your body. An issue like this probably breaks either "the suspension of disbelief" or "you know what I mean". And in this particular example, it breaks one for some people and the other for other people, creating a situation that is beyond exhausting. There may be a right answer here, but there's no easy answer.
Writing is a skill, but when you have people of a billion skill levels all creating their own stories then further expectations need to apply. That is exhausting, but it's part of the give and take that we need to do what we do.
This is a very long and somewhat meandering way to +1 @Maira; changing cultural expectations doesn't happen overnight, and the person coming in needs to both be welcome and willing to change.
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RE: Course Corrections
@kitteh said in Course Corrections:
Maybe they really were legos. This has happened before.
I mean, nobody here is complaining about five people hearing a Bob Dylan song 30,000 years before he was born. Sir Terry Pratchett (RIP) said he tried his hardest to not do things like this, but the idea of interlocking blocks as educational building tools shouldn't be the problem; calling them Lego should be.
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RE: Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?
@Arkandel said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:
@Thenomain I thought you didn't read comics?
I read them, I just don't like them. I know this because I read them. Sometimes under great duress, when @Coin bugs me for the fifteenth time that week.
Mostly, tho, it's the superhero comics, but since 99.995% of the time when someone says "comic mu*" they mean "superhero mu*", I just assume that people forget that there are other amazing illustrated serials out there.
Like Fables.
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RE: Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?
I will just leave this here:
Fables.
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RE: Strange Game Dev Inquiries from surreality (condensed)
@Ghost said in Strange Game Dev Inquiries from surreality (condensed):
As far as I'm concerned, people should post what they RP. The good the bad, the ugly, the sexy.
As if I need more reasons to avoid RP. Knowing that I'm being logged hits some of my stage fright and performance anxiety. I've been lucky to be able to play with some really very amazing writers, and every line I type I feel like I'm letting them down. Exposing this to everyone? Hello introvert.
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RE: Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?
@Botulism said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:
@Thenomain Far more people have read American Gods than MU*, though. Just saying among the MU* subset, WoD is more widely known.
Yes, I knew that. It's still a crying shame.
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RE: Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?
@Botulism said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:
more MUers probably play or have played WoD than read American Gods.
Thus predicting the downfall of literature. This should be fixed right goddamn now.
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RE: Cheap or Free Games!
Witcher For Free from GOG (and Ars Technica).
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2017/04/ars-and-gog-two-great-tastes-that-go-great-together/
Enjoy!
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RE: Innovations to the form (Crowdsourcing?)
@faraday said in Innovations to the form (Crowdsourcing?):
@Thenomain said in Innovations to the form (Crowdsourcing?):
So someone will create another client for real-time communications with the server, one that might not be web-based. I actually think "web based" right now to be still pretty limiting; look at the number of people who use Skype as their game-enhancing system of choice.
I don't understand why you're equating "web based" with "not real time".
It was an example. I know that with AJAX techniques we can do pretty much magic (Google, everyone!), but we as a forum specifically keep saying "web-based! web based!" as if it means anything. I see that mantra as another way of backing ourselves in a corner because we're parroting one single technology group and not what you can do with that group.
Technology Is Not Application. Or in other words: If all you want is a hammer, you'll end up thinking of only hammer-based solutions. Or in other other words: I don't want to trade one box to get into another; I want to think outside of it.
That is, we are agreeing now.
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RE: Innovations to the form (Crowdsourcing?)
Dial-ups, multi-line dial-ups, role-play forums, play by post, play by email, play by snailmail, IRC, Skype, Roll20, Tabletop Simulator, not one of these are "web-based".
I'm complaining not that I would never play on something that's not telnet-based, but that many of these technologies can be folded into web or even telnet. I'm complaining that "web-based" is poorly defined and a poor metric.
We can do better.