@SpaceKhomeini I started a new run as a Solo rather than my usual Netrunner build and I got this flak for “not putting in effort” from Regina for the first time. I had the exact same reaction.

@Kestrel said in Getting and Staying Connected on New Games:

@imstillhere said in Getting and Staying Connected on New Games:

@Kestrel said in Getting and Staying Connected on New Games:

like there’s an established pecking order and I have something to prove.

Can you elaborate on that some? I’m not sure I track what this means.

This is a difficult one to elaborate on beyond saying it’s a “vibe” and you’ll know it when you feel it, but I’ll try.

Games tend to fall into these natural social hierarchies, which and of itself, I don’t have a criticism of. It’s normal to have friends and favourites, and I honestly don’t expect people to pretend they don’t. But typically it’s staff at the very top, “staff clique” one rung below, staff clique’s clique & TS partners slightly lower, and at the very bottom people who’ve already started stepping on toes and are one shady page away from being shown the door.

If the game has a skewed gender ratio, then playing characters whose gender’s in higher demand confers a slight social advantage as well. This is especially true if you write well, but honestly, I’ve seen pretty abysmal personalities given a social pass to be abysmal on account of gender ratios despite that.

Where it becomes a problem for me is when, as a newer player or unknown personality, you start to feel like you’re constantly being tested, other people are waiting for you to fuck up, and are more interested in protecting their pecking order than being inclusive. There’s a constant vibe of mild hostility & jealousy where some established players will act like they’re being charitable for taking you under their wing and because they’ve been here longer, your gratitude should be propping them up and mostly staying out of their way. This isn’t everyone everywhere, but … it’s a thing.

A memorable instance for me involved being invited to join a private yet meaningful scene with people who were fairly well-known/established on a game. It had the potential to be a lot of fun, and I was in fact flattered they’d asked at all. But in all honesty I didn’t think that the person running it was super clear on the details of what exactly we were supposed to be doing, and I made a few missteps in interpreting instructions and/or following the expected conventions of how to roll or use my skills. They could’ve simply clarified and said “no worries” when I apologised, but instead the OOC vibe turned hostile, temperamental and shamey. They were pretty upfront about expressing open frustration with me. I fucked up, but I still think this was unreasonable when it was an honest mistake that I was immediately apologising for and could’ve been easily corrected. It just felt like being put in my place by a scolding teacher who still wanted me in their classroom, but with my head bent.

After the scene, I apologised again, then ghosted.

I’ve noticed that, for me, this is more difficult when I’m trying to integrate into an older game with a lot of players who’ve been around for a while. Also, whenever I’m transitioning back into MUSHing after a long period of time I feel more apprehensive about asking people I don’t know to RP.

@Faraday said in Getting and Staying Connected on New Games:

@Coin said in Getting and Staying Connected on New Games:

Nothing makes a game feel more dead than constant and consistently quiet OOC channels.

This is the case for me as well, but that is admittedly personal preference rather than a value judgment.

I don’t see this as something that has to be either/or for a game, though. You can create separate OOC channels that people can opt into or not as they desire. Though that does require staff to nudge convos to the right channels (so someone doesn’t feel obliged to stay tuned to the OOC chatter channel for fear of missing Important Stuff).

Also seconding this. I’ve left my bit connected to games where no one’s said a word on an OOC channel in days. That’s the extreme, though. If people are occasionally chatting on OOC channels, it feels like a more lived-in space. If not, it’s sort of like playing Skyrim or Starfield and expecting an MMO. Vast swathes of emptiness and potential.

All hail Grazer, Queen of the Bears!

712d22dd-de07-4cb7-87c2-81c44423d44e-image.png

See you next year!

Giving Concordia a try, hopefully RL doesn’t gobble me up too soon.

On Silent Heaven, I’m open about the fact that everything is logged, and only I have access to logs. This is primarily so that I can zip up someone’s logs and send them to the player once their character has finished their time in Silent Heaven. I don’t look at logs unless there’s cause for concern raised by a player and I’ve received permission from that player. It’s been an invaluable resource when dealing with problem players.

When you launch a new game, your playerbase has little to no trust in you. They’ve been burned countless times in the past, so why would they? It’s only through repeated acts of goodwill on a near-daily basis that players can gradually begin to trust. And one wrong step can erode that trust. All you can do is apologize, take the loss, and focus on doing better.

Overall, my recommendation is to build in whatever security features you feel most comfortable with. While full logging can help in some instances, the most important thing is to be responsive to your community. When they first come to you with a problem, they’re taking a huge leap of faith that you’ll respond to their issues in a positive manner. And that’s what matters most. Even the most robust security features are pointless if you’re not out there caring for your players.

And now I have more than thirty seconds.

As Pyrephox said above, Keys is pretty casual-friendly. Most scenes run async or are pausable as the players agree on. There is ‘live’ roleplay, pick-up roleplay happening in the spur of the moment, but a lot of things are geared towards people with busy real lives, people with chronic illnesses, and people not in US timezones – or all three of the above.

We’re urban fantasy though not your ‘classic’ vampires, werewolves, and fae running around downtown. Everyone’s human now – but not everyone started out that way. We have been called the ultimate fanfic game by some and that’s honestly not quite wrong when you’re travelling in and out of infinite realities where everything is possible somewhere.

Anyhoot, feel free to come give us a peek if that sounds like something that might be worth your time. 🙂

Small update. I’m not rping that much currently, but I’ve been tinkering around with ares-related code stuff. Still not quite in a space to open another game.

@Rowan After my time! IN MY DAY, you were a little child object. Who did what you were told.*

[Citation needed]

I’m glad they’re mad.

Age is particularly relevant for those of us in estrogen-dominant bodies as we start feeling the effects of perimenopause in our (sometimes) 30s and (more often) 40s, too.

Telgar K-Krew for Life. 😉

@Shelbeast Hey, welcome back! CoD pickings are slight at the moment. You can check out a decent list of active games at https://mustard.mythicus.net/ (also linked at the top of the page, with the little curled page icon), but there’s not much to choose from, alas.

hornets nest

Here’s where we noticed it first:

https://jamesmendezhodes.com/blog/2018/11/10/best-practices-for-historical-gaming

I really love the idea, and love that it’s catching on. I think it’s great for keeping players from being blindsided either by something happening in a scene that they weren’t expecting, or from having their characters chewed out ICly for something that’s just part of the game world.