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How much time is enough time?
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Happy Monday!
Discussion prompt. I have been having Big Thoughts about this lately, so I’d like to see where other peoples’ brains are.
How much time do people feel like it’s reasonable to expect both from other people and yourself to devote to this hobby?
For a single session?
Every week?
How often do you need to roleplay to feel like you’re still participating?
How long can you go without roleplaying, but still doing communications and other means of participation, without feeling like you’re sunk?
How do leadership roles change this calculation for you, if at all?
the entity previously known as Sunny
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I consider myself active on a game if I can get two or three scenes a week. Fewer than that, and I’m likely to drift away from it - it’s not entirely about being left behind (although that’s a part of it), but also about falling out of sync with the character and my ability to feel invested in the world.
My ideal scene is about 2-3 hours long. So I consider 6-9 hours a week to be plenty of time spent on a MU*, actively doing things. I will spend MORE than that if I’m having a good time, and finding plenty of fun RP.
Unfortunately, my experience is that I have to be connected about twice that amount of time just to find that much in the way of scenes. And I have to be RPing to feel connected. Mails and bboard posts do not scratch that itch. The only reason I do those things is to try and get RP. Ares and allowing vignettes helped a little; I do count vignettes as ‘RP’, on some level, although you can only do one or two of those before you should probably just go an write a novel.
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I honestly don’t have expectations of how much time other people should commit. I hope they want to play with me enough that they come around a few times a week, but I think of MUSHing like a book club: if they don’t show up, I will miss their presence, but it shouldn’t ruin everything; they won’t get much out of it if they only drop in once a month to say hi, but if that’s all they have time for, it’s better than nothing.
I’m about on par with @Pyrephox in terms of what I “expect” out of myself. Three good scenes a week seems to be my sweet spot. I do consider “good” scenes to be an important factor, though. If I’m playing three times a week, I want those scenes to have traction.
I don’t have the “need to be connected” problem that Pyre does. But I haven’t played on anything but Ares since 2018, so I don’t know how it is on Penn or Tiny these days. The amount of time I’m actually connected to the MUSH has zero impact on getting RP.
I do generally have to do the asking rather than getting asked to scene, but I think that’s a product of usually being game staff and people feeling weird about taking my PRECIOUS TIME.
Also, because MUSHers are MUSHers and get weird about asking people to play.
On the game.
That we both connected to.
To play.
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@KarmaBum said in How much time is enough time?:
Also, because MUSHers are MUSHers and get weird about asking people to play.
On the game.
That we both connected to.
To play.
GDI, stop looking at me.
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@IoleRae said in How much time is enough time?:
How do leadership roles change this calculation for you, if at all?
I go back and forth on how I feel about this one year by year.
I think it is pretty obvious that, no matter the game, having an active and invested leader makes the game, sphere, faction, house, family, insert subgroup classification here, flourish. While I appreciate that there are games which have gone out of their way to try to lessen the burdens on IC leaders, they still reward people who are active in various ways.
And that’s good! Maybe! You are generating things, story, plot, roleplay, stuff for people in your area; you are pushing their stories; you are enabling them. I have certainly felt stuck at times when I am not the leader, and actual leadership is very much NOT present.
But it gets to be A LOT, at the same time, and the pressure can be A LOT.
There’s that saying: reward the behavior you want repeated. No matter how much people try to build a culture with less pressure that is more forgiving of changing and maturing schedules, we still reward that heavy time investment, particularly for leaders, and players often expect it.
I wish we could calm down a lil bit. I wish it was less incentivized.
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Ideally, about 2-3 scenes a week to keep the mojo flowing - but there have been times when things get in the way (drama, RL, whatever) and the RP dwindles. In those cases, talking to folks about upcoming plots they’d like to see or doing other game-related stuff (building, tending the wiki, etc.) tends to help.
I probably put- idk, 10-20 hours a week into a game I’m active on, though that’s not purely RP time. I only expect people to put in whatever time they’re comfortable with - it just gets dodgy with folks who have leadership/ranking alts and do… nothing. Frustration sinks in when folks with ranked characters don’t even do the bare minimum.
If I find I’m not able to engage with the game (building things, helping others with their stuff, answering questions, whatever) for a few weeks, I feel disconnected and off. It takes a while to recover from that.
Leadership roles tend to require more focus (for me, anyway) and I’ve often found I can’t have more than one or two ‘leader’ types on a game before they all suffer. I’m not sure if I put more time into them per se, but I do make some effort to do more outreach when I can with them as my ‘face’.
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Depends on the place and the RP group, tbh.
I have my ideal, but usually I can tolerate things going pretty far afield of it.
I find that ideally, I would love to have 4ish+ meaty or personal scenes a month to feel like I have sense of place largely on a game. This is an average–sometimes it might be 3 scenes in a week and then 2 weeks of rest up/downtime. And by meaty/personal I mean like–not generic large group scenes or standard meet and greets where you don’t get to really know or connect with another PC’s story/your own PCs story that much. (However, as someone who does a lot of public RP trawling, I would say that it’s not out of the question for even a first or chance meeting with another character to bump it to high quality/satisfying that desire for connection!). And sometimes in the space of 4 weeks there might be less than that and that’s okay–I’m just trying to put a number on my “average in general” for me to feel okay. For small groups (like family/faction/unit)–it’s a little trickier. I think the average over time is smaller (I would never expect a small faction to give me all of my sense of connection to a game, or a single person–in fact if that’s what happens, that tends to mean there’s some problems), but there is a point where I will start to feel adrift, but that can be highly situationally dependent too (And for me, making sure I have a satisfying broad connection to the game means that factions/individuals help drive it, but aren’t responsible for it, if that makes sense at all–and can often mean a lot of time pressure eases with those smaller, much more meaningful connections, and helps them last longer.)
For a single session–man, that too is so situationally dependent. I’ve had delightful, personally rewarding scenes that were short and sweet (a couple of hours of medium to slow posing). For me it’s often not it must be over a certain length and more running out of energy because it’s going too long (even if I love the folks and it’s engaging).
I try to not have expectations about time other people invest in RP with me. I don’t feel like it’s fair to anyone involved because like I said above, it’s hard for me to quantify that in concrete numbers vs. just kind of an average over time. I do start to feel a little down when I am turned down more often than not, or when there is little reciprocation, because even though I am probably one of the more outgoing types of MUSH people, it’s still hard to be the one to ask/encourage constantly but it’s also my experience that most people don’t reciprocate. I don’t think this is personal (a lot of people experience more anxiety than I do about asking, I get that) but it’s sometimes hard to not feel the blues about it/absorb it as disinterest. So sometimes that gets caught into a cycle of I don’t wanna bug this person–Do they even like RPing with me–Did I do anything wrong–Is it awkward/do I want to risk making it awkward if it wasn’t by asking if everything’s okay–I wish they would ask me to do something–I want to ask them to do something but shouldn’t bother them, if they wanted to do something they’d says so cycle.
I can’t speak to leadership stuff, because bothering staff or leaders causes high anxiety for me, and while I’ve gotten better about it (there’s actually a couple of staffly/fachead folks that I don’t feel panic asking if they’d like to join in on some RP with their PCs or asking other questions, and I’m totally okay with whatever happens)
I think usually I know there’s some kind of imbalance or uneasiness in me, when I start to feel “lonely” in certain aspects on a game. Usually when I can let that settle long enough to try and figure out where it’s coming from it does end up being a lack of quality face-time or interaction. But I tend to consider that more of a me-problem (as in I need to eat it/figure out how to cope) and am reluctant to draw the other folks into it, because the last thing anyone needs is another demand in their life.
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I try to limit myself to about 8 hours a week, but work-slow scenes on Ares are such an enabler, haha.
Game-runner of Silent Heaven, a small-town horror MU.
https://silentheaven.org -
I try not to judge another person’s time and availability. Life is hard. It’s not getting easier. So I try to be kind. I don’t always do it well, but I try. Whatever they can do, that’s great. Awesome.
Leadership can be tricky. I think if you check in once a week and communicate to those that need it. You are good. That’s just my thought on it though, it doesn’t mean it’s right.
My personal time investment? It really depends on so many factors that I can’t give one. It depends on how my mood is, my stress level is, my RL, how behind I am on IC events, if I feel unable to reach out to people that use to be my play group, if I’m uncertain about new people. Also, my ability to stay with a scene, etc. I try to be kind to myself too (which is FAR harder than to another person) and accept what I can give when I can give it.
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@Jumpscare said in How much time is enough time?:
I try to limit myself to about 8 hours a week, but work-slow scenes on Ares are such an enabler, haha.
I find it almost impossible to really estimate time because of this. When I was playing, I’d have a scene going that I picked at across the entire workday several times a week. I sure didn’t spend 8 hours on that scene, even though it spanned that time.
I’ve always multitasked as a M*er, but Ares has kicked that into high gear. I might pose once an hour for 12 hours, or pose once an hour for 3, then every 10 minutes for an hour, then go back to once an hour…
It’s honestly a lot of what I like about this hobby. Except for plot scenes, it can fit around my life and the other things I need to do.
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Leadership: I don’t think there should be any different expectations for leaders as far as “activity”. The only requirement of a leader is to not be an impediment to other people’s stories. The leader(s) should be available to provide money for something, or add new people to the org, etc. OOC necessities. If I’m doing that, I’m good. Leadership and storytelling shouldn’t be inherently connected. It’s not my job to make stories for other people, only to provide what they need within my purview to make their own.
Personal: if I’m getting 2-4 scenes a month, and engaged in reading story updates and such, I feel active.
as previously stated, good day.
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Ideally, in my mind, a “leader” character should just be a character who is oriented towards a different field of play than, say, a fighting or research character. Leaders should not be expected to be bottlenecks or “permission granters” for other PCs to do their stuff; controlled hierarchies really should not be an OOC expectation in games - they breed resentment and strangle activity, both from “leaders” trying to control what other PCs do lest they be judged for it, and from non-leader PCs constantly trying to get “marching orders” from leaders that match up with what they really want their PCs to do (but may not match what the leader thinks the PCs should be doing).
PC over PC authority is prone to both inconsistency and micromanaging. I much prefer it when it’s expected that the PC playing a CEO will, largely, be dealing with their org in a high end, policy/driving focus level, but have as much day-to-day control (or knowledge) over an individual PC’s actions beneath them as Amazon’s CEO has over a guy in a warehouse somewhere.
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The more disillusioned with the majority of people in this hobby I become, the less inclined I feel to spent a large amount of time within it. The outright tribalism that I see from how vehement or capricious people can become, especially in today’s current climate, the less and less I feel like I want be around said entities and interact with them even less so.
This is partially why I moved into more of GM and administrative role than that of a player. I still enjoy telling stories for people. I still enjoy playing various NPCs as a vehicle to nudge players regarding this lore or this plot point or this potential McGuffin. I still enjoy making other players feel like their efforts and energy matter, but now I do so on my time when I like I can contribute. Running an event every other week(or every week if I’m feeling energetic)is good for me, Setting sessions where I play an NPC for a player in a one-on-one capacity randomly during the week. It allows me to set my own boundaries. I as staff do not have be married to my game, which also means the players don’t feel like they’re constantly missing out. Because they’re not, when you operate on schedule that’s built more for players that’re older, have jobs, kids, and other obligations. I don’t expect you to be on every waking hour, I think that would be unhealthy otherwise.
Rarely do I wish to operate as a player, as I simply don’t have the time or perhaps more honestly, inclination, to operate on that kind of level. Otherwise, I would likely play once a week or potentially less. As for my expectations of others? That’s far easier. If I’m running an event, I will try to schedule it so as many people as possible can show up. But if one or two can’t? Well, there’s always next week. The game isn’t going anywhere. Your life is your own, so you don’t owe me anything beyond what you’re able or willing to give. The same is said of myself.
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My take on this is game policy (probably because all three of us agree on it):
Keys is a social game. We want players to feel welcome — including those who can’t actively play much. Whether due to work, health, or other reasons, it’s okay to just hang out. There is no requirement to participate in scenes and role-play every so often (though why would you want to miss out?). Characters who log in enough not to be purged will retain owned residences and shops. We may review this position for individual characters who do not participate on a social, OOC level either for extended periods of time, but taking a break is not going to get you or your properties wiped the moment your back is turned.
People have different amounts of time available and they have various levels of interest. Some people want to be in the middle of everything and some are really looking more for an online social circle than actual roleplay.
It’s not my place to tell one that they’re right or wrong. As long as people are getting what they want, everything is fine.
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@farfalla said in How much time is enough time?:
Leadership: I don’t think there should be any different expectations for leaders as far as “activity”. The only requirement of a leader is to not be an impediment to other people’s stories. The leader(s) should be available to provide money for something, or add new people to the org, etc. OOC necessities. If I’m doing that, I’m good. Leadership and storytelling shouldn’t be inherently connected. It’s not my job to make stories for other people, only to provide what they need within my purview to make their own.
Personal: if I’m getting 2-4 scenes a month, and engaged in reading story updates and such, I feel active.
This this this ^^^^^
Before kids/kids activities and when I could sleep five hours/night and still function, I was able to play probably every weeknight for a bit and a lot more on the weekends. Then the kids got older and DID THINGS, like school projects and sports and all that, so I just didn’t have the time to be around as much. Now they are in college, but I am old and tired and working 50 hours/week, so am basically a weekend rp’er. If I get a good scene or two over the weekend, yay! If not, I’ll craft or something that keeps me feeling engaged. I def keep up on boards and all that, too. I have a leaderish character and I think I do well with that in regard to keeping things organized - people have their allowances, which get reviewed often, rooms, etc and so on. I am not a storyteller and just never will be - it’s never been my thing.
Sometimes I wonder if it’s time to hang things up again, since my contributions these days feel very tiny, but I don’t know. It’s nice to feel connected to something even if I’m not changing the world.
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I haven’t logged on to my main game in over a week because I was on vacation and then came back into a work shitstorm so just reading this thread has made me want to roll into a ball like a hedgehog.
