pvp vs pvp
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@Jenn Sure. First:
@Jenn said in pvp vs pvp:
This hobby is LITERALLY comprised of nothing more than dice and co-writing stories with each other.
That’s not true.
That’s what we primarily do. It’s not the entirety of the hobby. MUDs are included, RPIs, weird shit I don’t even know about are probably included too. Cybersphere was an example I used earlier, and that’s definitely a MU. It had/has RP, deep and meaningful storylines. It also had the risk of you just being gunned down in the street, using combat code without any RP, because someone wanted your shoes.
He/Him. Opinions and views are solely my own unless specifically stated otherwise.
BE AN ADULT -
@Jenn said in pvp vs pvp:
Could you expain how it’s possible to MUSH without collaborative storytelling because I’m super confused and not understanding what you mean.
There is no one true universal definition for what a MUSH is. For some it’s more TTRPG+some writing. For others it’s more storytelling with (maybe) some dice or cards or something. Different players and games fall at different points along that scale.
But even if we accept the supposition that collaborative writing is the core, how you collaborate is open for debate.
Think of an improv troupe. It’s more about going with the flow on the fly, not knowing detailed backstories and collaborating OOC about the details and stuff. I think that’s akin to an OOC Masq.
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I guess I should have been clearer. It was stated earlier we were talking about PvP MUSH’s rather than MUDs or other things. I’ve not encounterd a MUSH that wasn’t storytelling first and foremost, but. There a a lot of things I haven’t encountered, too.
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@Jenn said in pvp vs pvp:
It was stated earlier we were talking about PvP MUSH’s rather than MUDs or other things.
Unfortunately, as @Faraday said, there’s no clear distinction between MUSH and ‘other things.’ Does coded combat make it not a MUSH? Does roleplay make it not a MUD? Does a lack of furries make it not a MOO? There’s no hard line.
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And this is only anecdotal, but my experience of MUing earlier than the last decade… two decades… or so has been… less collaborative and more authoritative. Staff ran plot, and players reacted to it. Co-creation wasn’t really as important as it is now, sure it happened but it wasn’t the focus. So, storytelling? Absolutely. Collaborative? Not to much of my recollection.
As more and more places put the storytelling onus on players more than staff, player agency increased, and so co-creation became a requirement rather than an optional extra. So it certainly feels more collaborative than it was.
Though that could also be because we’re all fifty years older and we don’t have time to tolerate the bullshit we used to put up with.
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A few decades ago, we had more of a bell curve of gameplay styles among MUSH/MUX games.
TTRPG/often-PVP games on one end, full-consent on the other. One highly authoritative (through GMs or code), the other highly collaborative (at least until you hit a wall and someone picked up their toys and went home.)
Both extremes were (and probably still are) super popular among a subset of players, but had dramatic issues. TTRPG/PVP games became known for capricious behavior. Full-consent games often devolved like schoolkids playing cops and robbers. “I got you!” “Did not!” “Did so!”
So over time, we saw a shift toward the middle. Fewer headaches for staff, more agency for players to run their own plots (since GM staff became harder to come by), and a wider appeal to potential players (which became even more important as MU populations dwindled.)
That’s not to say you can’t make a successful game in the margins these days. I just don’t think the shift to the middle was random, or the result of PVP players going to video games or whatever. I think it was just collective experience into what kinds of games appealed broadly and weren’t nightmares to run.
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It definitely feels like Faraday’s the actual MU historian and my brain is wandering through ruins of memories like Philomena Cunk.
“At first, most MUSHes were ruled by mysterious figures called staff, who controlled everything like digital Roman emperors with slightly more access to @boot. These staff ran plots, awarded XP, and decided whose tragic backstory was tragic enough. Players were largely decorative.”
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@Pavel said in pvp vs pvp:
It definitely feels like Faraday’s the actual MU historian and my brain is wandering through ruins of memories like Philomena Cunk.
Lol, I think we just played on a different cross-section of games. My early experiences were at both extremes, between SW games (better have your +blaster +equipped in case you get ambushed in the town square) and historical ones like Maddock (barely an admin or GM in sight). I didn’t start out anti-PVP, I became so through experience.
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I feel like, as others have said above, there’s a difference between Player vs Player conflict and Character vs Character conflict. Yes, sometimes people get frustrated or upset and CvC becomes PvP, but most of the stress and toxicity I’ve seen from games on which competition of that sort was encouraged comes from PvP, where the egos of the players get involved and it’s less about losing the character (sometimes it is) and more about just losing.
I have no interest in high-stakes Player vs Player conflict. If I did, I would play PvP video games or play competitive chess or try to become a professional poker player. I love high-stakes Character vs Character conflict, when done with a player who you trust in search of a better story for all involved. I find it elevates the heart-rate almost as much as high-stakes PvP, and has a much better chance of a positive outcome.
I wish that there were more games that were open to CvC conflict (alongside PvE) but whose staff came down hard on any attempts to turn CvC into PvP. And if I had more time in my life, I would absolutely run the one I’ve designed.
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Reading over @Roadspike’s post, I want to pick out this line about CvC: “when done with a player who you trust”. I would kindly submit that this is rare less because games don’t allow it and more because it requires a solid underlying OOC relationship with the other player. This is not the dynamic we enjoy with most other players and not really something a game can be designed around.
I also want to pick out a few words that turn “CvC” (positive connotation) into “PvP” (negative connotation):
Frustrated, upset, stress, toxicity, egos, [dislike of] losing
These are the same pitfalls endemic to any competitive context, and these are things that we can design around. Healthy PvP requires the same things as “CvC” as described above, and there are things that a game runner can do to address them.
1. Trust/fairness (the belief that success is based on mutually shared controls, evenly applied)
OOC masque and private sheets came up earlier as things that make a game system more conducive to PvP, and that FS3/Ares is bad for PvP because it emphasizes transparency. A hot take here on my part is that transparency increases your odds of maintaining a healthy PvP environment dramatically because it helps address concerns of trust and fairness directly without relying on OOC relationships.
A more obvious thing is having referees who ensure that the rules of an encounter are understood and enforced evenly.
Other things game design can address in this space are stat bloat for older characters by limiting the amount of progression that can be made and access to “high caliber” gear. This is not to say that any advancement is bad, but the more advantages long-time (or “staff favorite”) players have, the less fair the playing field will feel and the more likely it is to incur OOC upset.
2. Sportsmanship (the practice of winning or losing graciously)
This one is harder to set up mechanics around, but you can easily design policies with it in mind. The expectation that players do not complain about the outcome of an encounter, that they do not engage in mean-spirited activity, that they maintain a modicum of care and concern for the fun of other players, applies in any competitive context and should be enforced. Referees in most sports can penalize players for bad behavior just as they would violating any other rule.
Why bother?
Even if your game has no PvP, PvE is not a panacea and the two points above still matter. The big difference between PvP and PvE is not that drama connected to these two things or the lack thereof doesn’t occur in one and they do in the other. It’s that in PvE the target of the upset is much more limited: one GM rather than a whole crew of opposing PCs. Designing and policing your game to promote Trust and Sportsmanship is still a good idea because even a PvE game is, fundamentally, a game.
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@Trashcan said in pvp vs pvp:
transparency increases your odds of maintaining a healthy PvP environment dramatically
1000% this.
