Empire Discussion Thread
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@Warma-Sheen said in Empire Discussion Thread:
I cancelled a bunch of others cause having a bunch of actions open that we’re being addressed was really making me feel a kind of way.
you complained that job 18 had been open longest and she points out that it hadn’t even been 5 days? that is looney toons, dude.
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@Wizz said in Empire Discussion Thread:
you complained that job 18 had been open longest and she points out that it hadn’t even been 5 days? that is looney toons, dude.
I have no connection to this game or any of these people, but I’m kind of puzzled by this take. WS said:
“having a bunch of actions open that we’re being addressed was really making me feel a kind of way.”
As staff jobs go, that is the mildest of mild complaints, and easily handled by a simple: “We try to handle jobs within X days, you can expect a response soon.” Even better if you have a policy to point to on job response times. Personally I always tried to respond to jobs within 24 hours, 48 at the most. MUs can be fast-paced, esp if players are playing multiple scenes a week. I don’t think a polite follow-up after a few days is unreasonable.
The back and forth about the scene logger is a bit more perplexing. Ada seems to expect some evidence of RP (“I haven’t seen any substantive RP…”) yet does not clearly state how that evidence should be provided. Are they, in fact, expecting a log? An explanation in the job? A confirmation from the other player? I can understand WS’ frustration on the lack of clear instructions. But it sounds like maybe there was some prior history there (re: “we wrote out long explanations the last time, you said…”) so there might be more to the story.
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canceling a bunch of other jobs out of frustration because one hadn’t been responded to in less than a week just feels like really entitled behavior in 2025, and definitely doesn’t feel like a polite follow up to me, but ymmv.
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@Wizz We don’t have all the details, but I read that more as they chose not to submit more jobs when there were already a couple open. The job systems I’m familiar with don’t really have a player-driven “cancel” feature. If this one does and they +job/cancel-ed a bunch in a fit of pique, that’d be different. But even then, cancelling a job because you’re impatient is hardly something I’d consider a bannable offense. (Though staff is obviously free to ban anyone they like for any reason, or no reason.)
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it wasn’t just canceling the jobs, it was that entire exchange. as Ada called it, getting browbeaten like that over something incredibly minor, to me, reads like a big red flag for what was only going to be an escalating series of headaches and selfish behavior down the road, and showing a player like that the door early really doesn’t seem like a bad move to me.
if you want a GM at your beck and call, just to be frank, there are professional paid online tabletop services that offer that you can go and find very easily. they’re advertised everywhere.
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@Faraday said in Empire Discussion Thread:
The back and forth about the scene logger is a bit more perplexing. Ada seems to expect some evidence of RP (“I haven’t seen any substantive RP…”) yet does not clearly state how that evidence should be provided. Are they, in fact, expecting a log? An explanation in the job? A confirmation from the other player? I can understand WS’ frustration on the lack of clear instructions. But it sounds like maybe there was some prior history there (re: “we wrote out long explanations the last time, you said…”) so there might be more to the story.
As I understand it, scenes connected to actions are meant to be logged using the in game
@scenecommand so that Ada can review the logs and make sure the RP matches the intent of the actions. I’m pretty sure I saw that in the game’s documentation somewhere. -
@MisterBoring said in Empire Discussion Thread:
As I understand it, scenes connected to actions are meant to be logged using the in game
@scenecommand so that Ada can review the logs and make sure the RP matches the intent of the actions. I’m pretty sure I saw that in the game’s documentation somewhere.Ada explicitly contradicts you.
You page Ada: We’re supposed to send logs?
Ada pages you: No, but there is a scene logger. That notwithstanding, have you actually done scenes with Sophia?
That’s makes it seem pretty clear that logging of scenes is not required for submittals, only that you can log scenes if you want.
With no other context, I am with @Warma-Sheen. This is giving me red flags as an over-the-top punitive reaction to a player trying to get some insight into how things operate.
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@Warma-Sheen said in Empire Discussion Thread:
Ada pages you: It shouldn’t really, but the proposal to hand over all of Kournis’ resources is the only action submitted which I cannot discern an in-character rationale for.
And this contradicts that earlier statement. It reads to me that no, scenes don’t need to be submitted because of the automatic scene logger. Also, Ada is trying to find an in-character rationale for an action which would only be provided by a log.
Also, in this day and age, the only people who would see this as over the top punitive are the kind of folks that need a one and done approach to problem removal to get the point through.
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@Wizz I appreciate the POV. I didn’t know that was how it was coming across.
Its a new game with not a whole lot of documentation and systems that were constantly changing so I was just trying to find out how things worked and I had gotten different answers previously so I was confused.
On the wait times we were told on channel that using the action system would get a response within a day or two, so that was my frame of reference. And up until recently, that had been true. That had been my experience. Without some sort of reference, I never know how long to wait before asking about it. I know on some games its reasonable to wait a month. On this one, she was specific to saying using the system the turn around would be fast, both because the game was new and the player base wasn’t big. So when I stopped getting that kind of response, I wondered if it was me that was doing something wrong. And I had asked previously, as mentioned in the page and I was told I was putting too much information in the job and that was slowing things down. So I corrected and put less information as she requested.
But then without any kind of correction or notation or anything like that, the jobs just stopped being answered. So I asked. And I felt weird about having a bunch of open jobs cause I thought maybe I was being too much of a burden, so I closed a bunch of them down. And the reason I felt weird because discussion amongst some of the players was that Ada wanted more activity from the players so that’s what I did. I got out and talked to more people and got actions going to keep people engaged… but then I saw the opposite response of what I was expecting.
I was just getting a bunch of mixed signals from her and maybe from other people too. I didn’t mean to be complainy about anything, but really just point out that I was being sidelined for doing what she specifically told me to do.
But if that was coming across harsh, I will own that as my fault and move on and try to address things more politely in the future.
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@MisterBoring said in Empire Discussion Thread:
@Warma-Sheen said in Empire Discussion Thread:
Ada pages you: It shouldn’t really, but the proposal to hand over all of Kournis’ resources is the only action submitted which I cannot discern an in-character rationale for.
And this contradicts that earlier statement.
Yes, thus the confusion on the part of @Warma-Sheen. It seems like Ada is talking out of both sides of their mouth. “Do I need to submit logs to justify the action I requested?” “No.” “Can you tell me if I am missing something from my request?” “I am not seeing any logs that I just said you don’t have to submit to justify an action.”
I would be fucking confused too. I mean it seems to me like Ada was being pedantic. “Do I have to submit logs?” “No, you don’t have to submit logs. The system will accept your request without them. However, if you want me to do something on your request, I will need logs.”
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam
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just for the record, that kind of context paints the interaction differently and would’ve been important to have, but my impression isn’t entirely changed. in your op, you said:
@Warma-Sheen said in Empire Discussion Thread:
That’s the log in entirety. Nothing left out. That was it, completely. So be careful if you’re there. Don’t ask questions about policies or procedures. And definitely don’t communicate if you receive mixed messages and are confused.
And no, there were no other incidents that preceded this. It was just this from start to finish. One and done.
so yes, it did initially come off like just out of the blue you got very upset and impatient over small delay, which is not reasonable.
having your expectations set to a different standard and then watching them not be met with no explanation can be frustrating, I’ll give you that, but it was still only a difference of a few days, and this was the first time it had happened? so the way you approached it hit me as very unpleasant especially given that it was, like you said, your very first conversation about the issue.
try not to miss the forest for the trees, like. life happens you don’t have context for, this is something Ada was providing out of pocket at no expense to you, a little friendliness and patience goes a long way.
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@Warma-Sheen I don’t remember why I’ve marked you as a problem person (I think it had to do with you complaining about staff interaction with LA2043, wherein you were being a huge dick), but I chock this up to it being a You problem.
I have nothing more to say than that. Thanks for coming to my TED talk.
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From reading the log, I think @Warma-Sheen comes across as a little disrespectful and impatient toward the staffer. Had I been the staff member in that situation, I would definitely have asked them to go away, come back, and try again after an attitude adjustment.
However, Ada does also come across as a little thin-skinned here. It does feel like she has jumped to the nuclear option very quickly. If that is her definition of brow-beating, she should prepare to feel that way a lot with the average MU crowd, honestly.
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Especially in light of the extra info provided later, where extra detail had been provided superfluously, that’s not how I read Ada’s no about submitting logs.
I read that interaction as no, logs don’t need submitted with the job, because the @scene function should have already provided them. But since no scenes were auto-logged, she was asking if there was any OTHER verification for the RP she was expecting to have happened to go alongside such a large request for resources - including even just a basic confirmation that RP had occurred between the person who would be given the resources and the person making the request for them.
No, you’re not supposed to SEND logs, because the mechanic is there that will track them. Since I don’t see them tracked, can you tell me more about why this NPC should give you their ENTIRE pile of resources, and what RP has supported such a major ask being made, much less granted.
It’s text, so tone is always a guessing game. But that’s how I interpreted Ada’s responses.
When she made that request, she was accused of ignoring a player and accused of being frustrating, by a player who despite not having followed the game systems was still being given a chance to explain the request anyway. I saw a busy staffer offering to help a new player on a new game find a way to do what they wanted in case the game’s setup had been confusing and RP happened that somehow hadn’t gotten logged.
And instead of working with her so they could do that, the player came in hot because it wasn’t just an unsubstantiated approval.
I’m not going to say what is and isn’t worth banning on someone else’s game. That’s not my energy and time investment to navigate. But I don’t see Ada acting in bad faith in that interaction at all.
