@Apos if I did this it would turn into

… Alright now that we’ve gone over the extensive history of the Nox’alfar,

‘let’s take a few calls’

And it would turn into an audio gossip rag, confirm or deny, where did you hear that, no that’s not true, that is absolutely true, please stop asking about mangos or the bathtub incident, I wasn’t staff then, what Skald does in his alone times is his own damn business, nobleman swerve.

Sounds fun though. You should definitely think about it.

ETA: Definitely being facetious if not outright sarcastic.

Do people have favorite clues? Did someone already ask that?

@kalakh When you included Joscelin and Petraea’s thing in there I legit got weepy.

So many of these secrets made it into cat drawings and the tarot deck and I had to be so careful.

@Roz

Player who only played male characters, reminiscing: “… Yeah he was such a lovely guy, he was so nice to me.”

The Rest Of Us: “-are you serious? No, he was a dick. He was a sexist, manipulative douche who only gave plot to female characters he wanted to bang.”

@GF I mean I get it. If we don’t laugh sometimes, we’d cry. Right?

A reminder to everyone:

Just because you’re an adult doesn’t mean you can’t be victimized. Just because you think you know better doesn’t mean you’ll always listen to the red flags. Just because you’ve handled shit before with grace doesn’t mean you always will. Just because everyone in a community says ‘oh man, so-and-so is such a good dude, you should ask him for advice/insight/resources/whatever’ doesn’t mean he can be trusted or he’s without flaws, or that if he sends you an unsolicited dick video that ‘you should be flattered’. It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t speak up or no one will believe you. And just because you flirted back because ‘really, everyone says he’s such a great guy/leader/whatever, the problem has to be me’, doesn’t mean you were not victimized, or that your feelings about being victimized are not valid.

I don’t know if this is the right place to put this, but I hope it reaches the people that need to see it. We have got to stop blaming ourselves for other people’s shitty behavior.

@sao it was hot

@Third-Eye Fighting a male PC with a female PC:

Me, roll exceptionally well in spar combat.

DudePC: “Ugh God I thought my stats were good lol I must have shit rolls or something.”

Me, having worked hard and made good choices on my stats, silent.

Me, watching it all pay off as I stomp DudePC into the floor.

DudePC: “Ugh God my armor and weapons need an upgrade, clearly doing something wrong if a woman is beating my character hyuk hyuk smh sad face lol”

Me, done: “Or maybe I know how to play my character and I’m good at it?”

DudePC, doesn’t understand why I’m ‘suddenly being a bitch’ to him.

Me:

@MisterBoring Most players don’t do what the mentioned PC did. Most players do communicate and ask questions and work with us. We didn’t write this PC off, she stopped logging in.

@hellfrog Right. It’s never ‘welp lets just do THIS to the PC’.

It’s ‘Alright, so this has happened before, we’ve warned them, they aren’t getting the message. Lets do XYZ, I think it would be a great challenge for them but also drive home what they’re doing is unacceptable. I think if they do these other things and work around the XYZ, they’ll get through it and solve the problem with some acts of contrition and RP. I don’t know, what do you guys think?’

Cue general approval, some suggestions to tailor the consequences, and some ideas about the acts of contrition.

‘Okay I think that’ll work! Here we go!’

We never make these decisions in a bubble, as long as I’ve been staff we’ve pretty consistently brought these things up with each other and hashed out the details, it’s never just one person going ‘I’m gonna do a thing’, it’s nearly always ‘I’m gonna do a thing, what do you guys think about it?’ Even in the heat of Herja’s insane amazing 50+ people battle scenes, we’re sitting in Voice going ‘okay this person rolled, I wanna do something, what do you guys think?’

Unless staff says, ‘Hey, PCPlayer, this is probably going to result in character death’, there’s been a way through whatever obstacle that’s set before a character. It might be hard, life-changing for the character, but those lead to the best growth and IMO the best stories.

Okay, crustacean off the soapbox.

@kalakh My favorite part was when she broke out in Quebec French with insults. IC.

@catzilla There was no abuse of power. Many warnings were given and IC actions have IC consequences, especially when dealing with an evil NPC, or in this case, several. Someone fucked around and found out, and rather than have a conversation OOC or otherwise about it (the condition was temporary), they stomped off. That message was the first time we had heard anything from them since.

Strangers are buying the Cats of Arx Tarot deck on Etsy. I’m trying not to get excited. I’m trying.

@SpaceKhomeini I don’t know how to feel but I’m laughing and crying at the same time

ETA There are relatable names echoing in my head for every one of these wheeze

@kalakh we have already dipped our toes into insane. Ankle deep is next. Kneecaps, here we come.

@bear_necessities Apparently playing him and romancing Karlach is a stellar experience.

So of course I’m rolling as Karlach and coming at it from the other side.

I got 2/3rds through the game (I was in act 3) when the patch came out and I realized I was pretty irritated at my Tav, so I restarted as a Dark Urge Assassin Monk and oh fuck oh boy I am having such a good time and I’ve only just started (about 10ish hours in). Also a few moments of “WHAT THE FUCK” already. God damn what a good game.

@bear_necessities I’m finding it’s easier to get along with Astarion as this chaotic bundle of darkness. It’s already the most fun I’ve had in the game and I’ve had a lot of fun so far.