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    Posts made by Wizz

    • RE: Tanika @Age of Alliances

      @Misadventure said:

      @Wizz said:

      explicitly set the plot to occur alongside the events of the movies

      I wouldn't do this. I would approach this like some approach time travel. You can be near events, but the end result will be the same. Better, you'll be somewhere else, where your stakes can matter to you and not affect the core canon at all.

      You are literally answering my question with the thing I am questioning, every single time. You keep saying "I would like a game where players can do their own thing but the story remains the same," and I ask, "WHY should that be?" And your answer is, "I would like a game where players can do their own thing but the story remains the same." WHY GODDAMN IT WHY IS IT SO IMPORTANT ANSWER MY QUESTION

      Why do I object so much? Because Star Wars, a cinematic heroic arc, depends on and endless string of events to arrive where they do, with massive stakes. I don't care if Aunt Beru and Uncle Owen die, or have to go into hiding, or were Vaders hidden babysitters and the bodies were locals meant to disguise their withdrawal. That has as little or as much at stake as you wish to create.

      However, trying to lay out a game that will try to play through the Battle of Yavin is foolhardy. Do you give everyone middle of the road rolls, so its pure luck if they manage to defeat the Deathstar? Do you give them awesome stats/Force Points so that they recreate it at will? Either you basically roll a a die and hope for that natural 20, or you are just fooling yourself. Why so binary an evaluation? Because, either you destroy the Death Star in time, or you don't.

      That's the point, that there's a choice and a possibility for change. That's why we're playing a game and, for the zillionth time, not watching the movie. I feel like we're going in circles here.

      Using a random system along the lines of D20/D&D etc, with movement rates, a map your players sorta know, and a zillion random rolls, I am 95% certain it will always end the Rebellion. The most exciting option there is not "Hey look I didn't do as I said I would and cover my squadron, I blew up and extra gun tower and now there is no Rebellion", but at best the end of the Death Star and the Rebellion.

      But it isn't a binary either/or. Like you said, for the story to reach the same conclusion there is an endless sequence of events, all of which are open to interpretation on a game, more so because you're involving a group of inventive collaborative storytellers instead of just one person and that exponentially multiplies the possibilities. That's what's fun about it, the discovery.

      It's such a binary for the entire setting. if you want the Rebellion to be trashed and take out some/most/all the canon characters, I see that better as a choice of story background, not some random rolls and effectively random player decisions. Unlike WW2, that particular moment is massively personal with galactic consequences, and no way to make a satisfying game out of it.

      Again, that's a massive assumption on your part, and I don't follow your logical leap at all. I think people can come up with fun and inventive things and work together on them without some condescending "director's touch," I've seen it happen. Even when it wasn't an outcome I personally wanted, I enjoyed the process. It seems like you don't enjoy the chaos of this medium, but I do? I don't know.

      Either you're going to fail, or you've been given your successes, and now everyone else has to deal with your personal choices as the basis of the entire thing they came to play through.

      Again, I don't follow your train of thought here. Maybe using the Battle of Yavin is a pretty dramatic example, but doesn't that happen anyway in any RP scenario? It's all about action-reaction. sometimes with enormous stakes. Either you find that fun or you don't.

      How is one players decisions backed by random dice and a system stacked either for failure or success better than one Staffers decisions?

      Because one option means the outcome is not entirely in the player's control, and in theory any and all players could potentially be in that same position and free to roll those dice, and the other option is arbitrary Staff fiat where one person's word is canon for everybody's stories, every time, period. Again, I ask you, how is that fun? In my opinion, even the illusion of choice and consequence means I'm playing a better game.

      I am all for player created content and consequences. I am part of the camp who doesn't think we should come to an agreement about what will happen, but I do favor looking at things above the round by round random dice rolls to create a coherent direction. That's the point of game design, a coherent direction, and since I want dozens of players to spend their time playing in and around and about these events, I'd prefer it have a direction too.

      And it still can. That's the whole point of role playing, it's not set in stone. You can have a larger direction but to me the mark of a good GM/ST/whatever is to be ready to roll with the punches, even if sometimes that means the players jump the rails and do something unexpected. It's maybe arguable that in a MU* environment not everyone (or anyone) is in it just for the fun of everybody and that some players are going to do stupid or selfish things, or things that don't make sense to you or your idea of what the story should be, but you still have more control than they do and can tug the reins when it seems like things are going to get too out of hand. I just don't like the idea that Staff are so worried about their precious vision that that little tug becomes a vicious beat-down until the story is hammered back into what they wanted it to be. For fuck's sake, go write a book if that's what you want.

      posted in A Shout in the Dark
      Wizz
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    • RE: Tanika @Age of Alliances

      @Misadventure said:

      @wizz I answered the question already. If you are only speaking of this specific MU*, I'd say don't bother with playing through the story that's already established. Again, whole galaxy of action, with years of undefined events to play through. I think it is a poor choice to allow the canon character, in the canon events for RP.

      That's all I'm really railing against.

      Put another way: You are Luke. It's down to you, Biggs, and Wedge. You have time for one run on the exhaust port. What do you do differently that is such an amazing expression of your creativity? Do you demand Wedge stay with his injured ship? Spend your Force points to save Biggs somehow? Ignore the idea of using the Force when suggested? Maybe not spend any Force Points on making that shot? Turn on Vader to finish him now? Fly away to to fight another day? WHAT DO YOU DO THAT IS SO DAMN IMPORTANT?

      OH MY GOD THE POSSIBILITIES ARE ENDLESS, IT'S ALMOST LIKE IT'S UP TO US TO DO SOMETHING INTERESTING AND DIFFERENT AND PLAY OUT THE CONSEQUENCES, AND IT'S ALMOST LIKE THAT'S MORE INTERESTING TO ME BECAUSE I'VE ALREADY SEEN IT PLAYED OUT ONE WAY AND WE ARE PLAYING A GAME NOT WATCHING A MOVIE.

      Edit: To use your hypothetical, what if you're Darth Vader in the trench and you roll a natural 20 or whatever, meaning according to the rules your shot just blew your son to smitheroons! HOLY SHIT EVERYTHING JUST-- no wait, Staff steps in and says "Yeah no, Luke's photon torpedoes make it, Vader you get knocked aside by the Millenium Falcon, OK GUYS LET'S MOVE ON TO EPISODE FIVE." Does that really not seem pretty asinine to you?

      You've got how many years to RP whatever you like before the Battle of Hoth, or you could off Leia, let Han and Chewie go off with their money and not prove themselves, and so on. There is a story there that drew people, why alter it?

      Because that story has already been told, how is it even remotely fun to just tell it again? That is what I was asking you, but you still aren't really answering and I feel like it's maybe because we're really on the same side of this argument and something is being lost in translation, so to speak.

      I cannot, in all seriousness, think of why I would let a player decide on the course of the entire setting that has drawn players in the first place.

      Because they're players, not an audience?

      If I wanted an altered timeline, I would design it for its story value, announce it ahead of time, let players know that whatever will be different. I'd rather have players vote from offered choices and their own suggestions so design can matter for the long run, than hope the players will randomly prove that dice and their own designs will do anything coherent for everyone elses benefit without them being handheld constantly.

      I do think playing the canon characters isn't a good idea. I do think allowing for more Force users is a good idea. If I was doing anything with Star Wars, I'd either change things up explicitly and with purpose, or find a place for my players to do their own thing, where they can affect the course of events, live or die by their own choices, and so on.

      Yeah, we're on the same page for the most part.

      Perhaps it would help to realize that since this is a Shout thread, i don't feel required to restrict myself to this one games approach, but rather to address wider questions related to it AND other possible places.

      Again I don't think we're really arguing two separate ideas here, but there's still something that I don't think is coming across to me very clearly. If you were going to create a Star Wars game where there is inherently an element of chance in the system you're using and explicitly set the plot to occur alongside the events of the movies, what is it that drives you so bonkers about the idea of something different happening? I would think that's a feature, not a bug, to borrow our favorite phrase here.

      posted in A Shout in the Dark
      Wizz
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    • RE: Tanika @Age of Alliances

      @Misadventure said:

      @Wizz Why? Because if the definition of the RP freedom needed is to alter the set story, which for me is only what is on screen, then I feel you are either very oversensitive to how something that is on the far side of the galaxy is affecting your RP,

      What are you even talking about? If you're playing this Star Wars game, you're not playing "on the far side of the Galaxy" from the plot. You're part of the First Order or the Resistance. AoA is not set in some backwater solar system, you're encouraged to app in with feature characters that are explicitly on-screen.

      I don't know if they micro-manage the "canon plot" here the same way the game I remember did, but that one followed the same formula and it was that weird "The Canon Is Sacred And Inviolable" attitude that I found so weird.

      If you're going to wind up on the Death Star just in the natural course of the game, why is it such a bazonkers idea that your actions could have some impact? I'm here to play a game of make-believe, not watch somebody masturbate about how much better they could have written the novelization of the script. If I wanted to watch A New Hope play out literally the same way it does in the movie, for example, I'd fucking watch A New Hope.

      or you want to specifically alter that canon. I have little interest in catering to those approaches.

      Great! Why?
      I really don't see how in a WoD game, having someone run a scene that is clearly on rails is so universally reviled, but in a Star Wars game it's expected.

      posted in A Shout in the Dark
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    • RE: Tanika @Age of Alliances

      It hearkens back to some really obnoxious rationalizations I've heard for special slots and "needing" players to fill the lower ranks, which usually just turns out to be a cover for the staff and their buddies to have their own little power-fantasy sandbox where they can order everyone else around.

      posted in A Shout in the Dark
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    • RE: Tanika @Age of Alliances

      @Misadventure
      Why?

      posted in A Shout in the Dark
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    • RE: Tanika @Age of Alliances

      Out of curiosity, is this one of the Star Wars games that is firmly on rails? I'm not sure which one it was, but I remember being discouraged from applying at one when the policy basically stated that PCs could do certain things but ultimately the story was not going to deviate in any way from canon. I found that stupid beyond reason.

      posted in A Shout in the Dark
      Wizz
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    • RE: RL Anger

      @BigDaddyAmin said:

      @Wizz

      Well then...

      Give us a homeland where we can be our own CIS Gendered selves.

      The fuck? Newsflash: You live there right now.

      You all can I guess...try and breed?

      Hey, because that's the end goal, right? (PS: I'm a fellow heterosexual white male. I'm just not an asshole about it.)

      @Groth said:

      @Wizz said:

      Read: pervasive racism and sexism. If you really want to drag this down to semantics, fine, whatever, yes, he will encounter fleeting moments of "racism and sexism" by one of the literal definition of those terms outside of the context of this discussion.

      Derp will face pervasive racism and sexism. Benevolent racism and sexism is still racism and sexism and has it's own issues. For instance it will most likely continue to remain hard for Derp to gain access to support groups as the social expectation is for him to be able to take care of himself

      That is not what pervasive means. And...what do you mean? Are you claiming he wouldn't qualify for welfare? Or are you saying that there are no support groups for adult men, because that is bullshit.

      @Wizz said:
      Assuming Derp is telling the truth, then Derp is doing worse then the typical member of any western social group you can care to name. The typical, as in statistically median member of most social groups is doing just fine.

      ...Yyyyyeah, I'll call your cards on that one, hombre. What axis are you even referring to? Financial?

      posted in Tastes Less Game'y
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    • RE: RL Anger

      @Groth said:

      That's just not true. Just like everyone else Derp will face both sexism and racism, it just takes different forms and is on average more beneficial.

      Read: pervasive racism and sexism. If you really want to drag this down to semantics, fine, whatever, yes, he will encounter fleeting moments of "racism and sexism" by one of the literal definition of those terms outside of the context of this discussion.

      @Lithium said:

      Racism works both ways. Racial slurs exist on both sides, and I /have/ been called them by black individuals in the past. I've experienced violence, because of this us vs them mentality that is fostered so often.

      And yes, there will be a finite number of times in his life where he will experience real hostility or negative bias. There is still just no comparison to the kind of life typical to a person who doesn't check two arbitrary boxes.

      posted in Tastes Less Game'y
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    • RE: RL Anger

      @Derp said:

      You can't say 'you don't qualify for X thing based on your race and that's okay' by backing it up with 'being white shields you from so much other bullshit that it just balances'. The same could be said for the other side, in that there are inherent advantages to the color of your skin and things that white people have to deal with that people of other races are legally shielded from.

      Derp, I'm not saying that your struggle to go to college is justified, by anything. For the 3rd time man I am not saying Affirmative Action is awesome, parts of the reasoning behind it are flawed and many institutions do kind of shitty things with it. Yes, we are all agreed.

      But in the context of your entire life how difficult it is to get into college is really pretty fucking small potatoes compared to the quality of the remaining 60+ (or whatever) years of life you will have where you don't have to deal with pervasive racism and sexism because you were born with a penis and you're pale. Just saying. It's not even a contest, there IS a universal disadvantage there.

      posted in Tastes Less Game'y
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    • RE: RL Anger

      @Derp said:

      @Wizz said:

      I am going to 100% guarantee you that no one has thrown a bottle at your head or screamed a racial slur at you for just trying to buy groceries. Or just for walking down the street. No one has denied you fucking housing, or told you or your partner to leave a public area because you held hands.

      I think my partner, Will, would disagree with you. Racial slurs, no, I'll grant you that much, but race isn't the only category that happens in. But sure, let's turn that into a race war, instead of shitty humans being shitty.

      Genuinely my bad for assuming. But you're absolutely right, it's not the only category, and you then have the experience to know that. That's what we're talking about here, is that being white and a dude means that you are shielded from so much bullshit. It's crazy to not admit to it, for real

      @Derp said:

      The whole thrust of your argument is "Affirmative Action is bad!" Yeah, maybe. It's a gray area. You had to struggle a little harder to get into school? Aww man.

      And if I were a black person being denied scholarships based on the color of my skin? Would that be outrage-worthy? If we're going to talk equality instead of revenge, then at what point do we actually step up and start saying that it shouldn't happen to anyone?

      You weren't "denied" a scholarship for being white, you didn't qualify for the scholarships that exist. That maybe sounds pedantic, but it's an important difference, because (in part) Affirmative Action was a response to systematic denial of service, extreme cultural inequity. And again, I'm not saying that in some senses Affirmative Action has not been taken to an extreme in some interpretations, or that it's some sort of permanent solution to the problem. You're not arguing with anyone here, so far anyway.

      posted in Tastes Less Game'y
      Wizz
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    • RE: RL Anger

      @Derp said:

      See, I'm going to have to call bullshit on this. Being a white dude has never, ever given me any sort of special advantage. If anything, it's been detrimental to me in a number of ways, because I don't qualify for some of the things that I otherwise would if I were of a different race, gender, or ethnicity.

      The whole thrust of your argument is "Affirmative Action is bad!" Yeah, maybe. It's a gray area. You had to struggle a little harder to get into school? Aww man.

      But please, prove me wrong. Tell me how being white has bettered me in some way above and beyond my peers?

      I'm not financially better off than anyone else. I fall well below the poverty line. I'm not academically better off than anyone else, save in situations where I've worked my fucking ass off to get there, devoting upwards of sixteen hours a day to school, and everything I've managed to do has been on student loans and pell grants, plus whatever I can scrape by working the minimum-wage job for the school I managed to land because I work my ass off academically.

      But yeah, I'm just ballin' based on nothing more than the color of my skin. So go on, show everyone how.

      I am going to 100% guarantee you that no one has thrown a bottle at your head or screamed a racial slur at you for just trying to buy groceries. Or just for walking down the street. No one has denied you fucking housing, or told you or your partner to leave a public area because you held hands. This is DAILY for some of the people in my life.

      EDIT: This originally ended with an insult and that's not appropriate. I am really sorry.

      posted in Tastes Less Game'y
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    • RE: RL Anger

      @Derp said:

      The sheer saturation of this idea is astounding to me. Just because you're white doesn't mean you're somehow better off.

      Dude, I really am sorry because in my experience it's not something that you can be told and you have to wait until you see it for yourself, but you really fucking are. I know people tell you this until they're blue in the face and I know you're probably sick of it, but if you're not aware that just being a white dude gives you some inherent advantages, it's just because you lack the life experience to know better, which to be honest is kind of a blessing in itself in a weird way.

      Full disclosure, I am a white dude myself, but a lot of my immediate and extended family isn't and once it's there in your face you can't un-see it.

      posted in Tastes Less Game'y
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    • RE: RL Anger

      @BigDaddyAmin said:

      @Cirno

      Really? Is that so? Seems like every time I turn on the news I am being told to feel guilty because I am white, heterosexual, monogamous, breed other white children, and I identify with the gender that was assigned to me at conception.

      You know what? I hear this a lot, but seriously, this is so fucking dumb. Nobody (outside maybe a small fringe?) is literally telling anyone to feel guilty for being CIS-white-whatever, you're just being exposed to the disadvantages of anyone who isn't and feeling guilty, and because you don't know how to process your guilt you decide "outrage" is the correct response.

      posted in Tastes Less Game'y
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    • RE: Coming in 2016 - Bump in the Night

      SO MUCH EXCITE

      link text

      posted in Adver-tis-ments
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    • RE: Would you play a MU* replacement?

      @skew said:

      What I have in mind would be a webapp that is by and large a big chat window (not unlike a MU). Throw in a dice roller, character sheets, windowed (?!) channels for chats and pages, and a few other features.

      I haven't done much else with it beyond the initial few tutorials, but this basically exists in the form of Roll20. All of the features are built into the web app, as far as I understand such things, and you can build a table with multiple "layers" that are kiiiiiind of the equivalent of rooms.

      posted in Mildly Constructive
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    • RE: Eldritch - A World of Darkness MUX

      @Arkandel said:

      For starters, Mr All caps, REAL ROLEPLAYERS USE ASTERISKS FOR EMPHASIS

      DEATH TO THE ASTERISKERS :neckbeard:

      posted in Adver-tis-ments
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    • RE: Eldritch - A World of Darkness MUX

      @Arkandel said:

      @Apos said:

      @Arkandel What the? Wiki code in poses? I don't think I've ever seen that, but now I'm honest to god curious what that looks like.

      @emit Some guy looks at Apos and chuckles, "You've ''never'' seen that? I see it all the time!"

      ...wut

      REAL ROLEPLAYERS /SLASH FOR EMPHASIS/

      posted in Adver-tis-ments
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    • RE: Eldritch - A World of Darkness MUX

      @Derp said:

      Could be a fun game though!

      PbP games will prove you so, so horribly wrong.

      posted in Adver-tis-ments
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    • RE: Pick Your Poison: A Chronicle of Darkness Interest Check

      @tragedyjones said:

      @Wizz said:

      @Arkandel said:

      You could run a game set in an outbreak of some sort, or following a world-changing event, or set in a different time period (or an alternate history with a steampunk theme), etc.

      I'd kill for a Prohibition-era multisphere game. With Mummy, because FUCK IT IT'S COOL GODDAMNIT

      Prohibition era games are so 2012.

      DO YOU KNOW WHERE I CAN BUY A TIME MACHINE????? I AM ASKING FOR A FRIEND 😢

      posted in Adver-tis-ments
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    • RE: Pick Your Poison: A Chronicle of Darkness Interest Check

      @Arkandel said:

      You could run a game set in an outbreak of some sort, or following a world-changing event, or set in a different time period (or an alternate history with a steampunk theme), etc.

      I'd kill for a Prohibition-era multisphere game. With Mummy, because FUCK IT IT'S COOL GODDAMNIT

      posted in Adver-tis-ments
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