It really, really sucks feeling like it might be time to let go of something that’s been with you for a very long time.

Congrats, everyone! We have people joining just to toss around ambiguous JAQs and comments about echo chambers without making any concrete or direct refutes to the actual accusations, which means we’ve officially arrived as a MU* forum.

Meta peeve because it’s more about the forum, but.

Being snarky on ad posts. Just, man. It’s usually the first time people are putting something out there. It really doesn’t do the community any favors – especially with the constant worries about the hobby dying – to put out an immediate response of snark.

@Tez is basically my platonic life partner and is SO cognizant and concerned about being as fair an authority as she can, and protecting people who need protecting

@sao can invent a character out of THIN AIR in the space of a SNEEZE and they will be so vibrant and alive and real in just an instant

have you ever seen @Meg theorize about how a plot is going to go? she has a MAGIC ABILITY to either come up with the accurate answer, or something even more fantastic.

@deadscribe’s RP is ridiculously evocative and he is a chill motherfucker

@Third-Eye is one of the people that i use as a, like. chill barometer. she is more capable than most at healthily disengaging from bad vibes and bad folks. if you rile her up, i will raise my eyebrows

Eit is not here but you will never, EVER mistake her writing style for anyone else in the world.

@farfalla has such a strong sense of internal fairness and justice and does such good work trying to actively keep herself accountable, which is the hardest thing to do

@glitch quietly works in the background to do SO MUCH to support the community. he doesn’t like being perceived. but i see u

@Narson is a ridiculous motherfucker but good lord is he also a delight

@Pyrephox is such a vivid and specific RPer, and so consistently safe in her IC and OOC separation. that is the case for EVERY incarnation of hers, but i will forever treasure the specific delight of one particular RP friendship that was so rich

i hope @Rathenhope never stops making the jokes he makes because holy shit. playing himbos together is A+++

@hellfrog deserves more credit than she ever gets for all that she did to build Arx, its theme, and most especially its culture into what it is today

@Apos deserves so much credit for the amount of work and the depth of world-building he has done for Arx over the years

@ham is another who is consistently interesting and specific in his RP, but who i will always treasure a very particular PC connection we got to explore. it is rare to find people that you can safely RP through something ICly messy, unhealthy, and even a bit toxic, but i always felt safe playing that with you

@tsar is so conscientious about her positions, and such a warm and generous RP partner. whenever i’ve needed a sounding board, she’s always been a voice of reason

@Tat did something honestly remarkable in the design, build, and reinvention of the magic system of Spirit Lake

i cannot even remember the last time @Yam and i got to rp but she is honestly motherfucking hilarious and i love her even though she drinks crunchy milk

Tehom is also not here but, i mean. guys. the arx codebase. and the fact that he put in the time and work to make it accessible to others.

i miss playing faith family of that specific era with @Snackness but i’m so delighted whenever we get to play again

@Tori has built numerous guides and helpers for Arx stuff, specifically all her crafting work, that has helped a TON of people

@IoleRae is so open about mistakes and learning from them in a way that takes so much courage. we have managed to have big scuffles on MSB and come out on the other side

i want @Herja to drop meteors on me every day of the week. i want the richness of her trauma. but also, when one storyline hit too deep and too close to something difficult, she was so kind and generous about working around it

i don’t know if most arx folks have noticed the number of code contributions @dvoraen has made to arx, but i have

@crawfish draws the best fkn cats you guys. i am so excited for my tarot deck. and i’m so excited that she found the perfect audience for her art and seems to be enjoying it so much

@mietze is such a kind and warm RP partner, and i’m really excited to be exploring such an interesting character dynamic with her again!!

@helvetica is just. man. life goals amount of attitude. one of the most remarkable things i’ve seen her do is just – recognize when a situation was no good for her and walked away.

@Mosephine has DEADLY ACCURACY in her detective skills and everyone should fear her

@Dreampipe introduced me to NOBLMAN, SWERV and he will die a hero for that

i once saw @kalakh face an IC situation that could very well have been the end of her character, and she chose to move forward ICly because it was what was true to her character. it was so great, and not everyone has the guts to fully own that

@moth flits in and out of my RP circles just like their username suggests and it is always SO EXCITING when it happens. we got to play one of my favorite character friendships

@MarsGrad and i have gotten to write some pretty delightful character pairings and is always open to talking stuff out

@Faraday just deserves a ridiculous amount of credit for Ares. and not just the huge amount of work, but i have such respect for her having a clear vision and intention from the start and staying true to it.

i legitimately have no idea who @pisscat is, i just know that every couple months i’d have a flood of upvotes as they clearly caught up on MSB posts, and it always warms my heart

@Tchotchke said in Liberation MUSH:

I’m not going to kid myself into expecting change, but I can hope.

Don’t. Like – this thread has pages of shittery, the MSB had way more pages of shittery. After pages and pages of shittery, you’re just fooling yourself. Just stop playing. These things don’t change.

#StopPlayingOnGamesWithShittyStaff2023

@anonymouse jesus that’s all fucking GROSS

I can absolutely see how his attempted OOC overtures with me a few years back would have lead down that road; it must have been me shutting him down so firmly that had him scampering off with his tail between his legs.

Basically my character mentioned something in a scene referencing a prior interaction from a good time prior. The player tried to intimate that I was remembering this detail because I must have been rereading prior logs. I’m not an idiot, so grasped the pretty obvious connotation that he was saying I was rereading his TS logs to get off on. I told him that OOCly sexual comments were absolutely not okay to make to me. He backed off and emphasized his good boundaries!! A few days later, he asked if he could send me a light-hearted “build a sub” meme. I said sure because I didn’t realize what type of sub he meant and I literally didn’t stop to realize this was gonna be about subs in the sexual sense of things. He sent me this meme (sexual joke, but no NSFW imagery or anything, for clarity for anyone who clicks) which, tbh, if one of my actual good friends sent it to me about my character or a TS scene or something, would have been funny. From a guy I barely knew that I had just told days before not to make OOCly sexual comments? Nope. I shut it down, he tried to apologize a bit later, and I said I didn’t want any contact with him.

Anyways here’s the full convo: https://pastebin.com/CwSr99Pj (This was with Michael; I censored the name at the time because I just wanted to show it to a friend to roll my eyes at the behavior, and at the time I didn’t feel like I needed anyone rallying to my defense in regards to an individual.)

I’m gonna say this as a general offer to everyone: if someone is getting iffy like this, starting to fish for OOC intimacy like this, and you want someone to be a sounding board or help you shut shit down? If you want someone to look at something and be like “no, you are RIGHT to find that weird, it is VALID to be uncomfortable, this person is trying to pull shit,” I will be that person. If they’re trying to hold some kinky TS over you or make you feel weird about boundaries because you RPed some weird sex shit? I absolutely don’t care. I TS! I RP weird sex shit! It’s okay to do this. If you feel weird or shamed because you feel like you were dumb for already getting involved or lowering your boundaries some? You’re not dumb!! You’re not dumb for connecting a little with another human being just because they abused the fact.

I am a pro at stating boundaries clearly and effectively, and if anyone EVER needs help doing this, I will help. Creepers deserve to be kicked to the curb. Fuck that shit, life is too short.

Over at City of Glass, we’ve had the great pleasure of getting to use a custom Ares plugin for Chronicles of Darkness made by the community’s one and only Glitch. He’s had to since leave the hobby, but the plugin has remained stable enough for three non-coders to continue using it and staffing with it without too much difficulty, minus a few hiccups. He also let us know that we should do whatever we thought was best with the code, and we figure the best thing is to open it to the wild.

We’ve done our best to pull together the necessary files on this repo: https://github.com/tezafofeza/ares-cod-plugin and https://github.com/tezafofeza/ares-ledger-plugin.

The code includes support for Mortal/Mortal+, Changeling, Mage, and Demon, along with the M++ templates Atariya, Dreamer, Infected, Lost Boy, and Psychic Vampire. (We only use Atariya and Psychic Vampire on CoG, so those are the only two I can fully attest to.)

This also includes the Ledger system, which is technically a separate plugin entirely, but one we’ve used extensively on City of Glass to manage locked notes. Ledger is fully customizable and flexible, so people can freely use the config files for it as just a reference for other stuff they want to do with it.

Here’s the catch: none of us are coders. We are not offering this with any form of support. This should be considered abandonware: nothing in it is going to change or be updated, and the documentation included is all you get. I might answer occasional questions about usage, because I love answering questions, but I make no guarantees.

This is also not packaged like a traditional Ares plugin. You will have to be familiar enough with Ares to know where to put these various folders and files.

ETA: Thanks to @Faraday, these have both been packaged as proper Ares plugins! It’s possible they may still require fiddling, though.

As this is being released into the wild, we fully expect there to be people forking off their own copies, and maybe someone will continue to develop it and package it into a proper Ares plugin. We just ask that anyone who does so to please credit Glitch for the foundation. He did some really amazing work.

@Testament said in Bannings:

Banning someone on a game is kind of a, well, it’s not all that effective. Or I guess, it’s effective, to a point. Unless you want to get into IP banning, and even that can be mitigated if you’re really determined and/or feel like paying the money for a NordVPN.

Thinking about it, and how I view it, if someone was banned for really shitty behavior and then they eventually sneak back on unnoticed by any and all who they might’ve wronged. It tells me one of two things.

Either A, they’re sociopath who lacks social skills to realize they aren’t wanted and simply doesn’t care. In this case, their behavior will eventually show up and they’ll be caught, banned, rinse/repeat. See; Cullen, DWOPP, etc etc.

Or B, they realize the error of what they were doing wrong, did some kind of self-evaluation and changed their behavior. In light of B, that doesn’t make them coming back to the game right, but unless you get really draconian about tracking people, it’s just something that most games have to deal with.

Bans – especially public bans – do have an additional value to a game or community beyond the immediate “get rid of the person doing the bad thing.”

They also make a public show of what a community will or won’t tolerate. They provide evidence to regular players of what behaviors won’t fly, which helps make it easier and safer for players to report bad behavior – which, as we all know, is always an ongoing struggle.

Bans aren’t technologically foolproof, and we all know that. But their value to a community, I’d say, goes far beyond that.

Man, so. My serious of thoughts rattling around in no particular order.

MSB staff can share whatever they want of their justification for my continued ban. I don’t care.

–

BMD is not a protest of MSB. Nor was it made in response to the Hogpit on MSB being renamed and having a new Code of Conduct issued for the site. BMD was made before that happened. It was made because a bunch of folks were banned and a bunch of other folks lost confidence in MSB moderation, so they made a new community. At most you could call it a vote of no confidence in MSB. But the repeated idea that a bunch of people were just mad at MSB saying everyone has to be nicer, that all these people just wanted the ability to be cruel and so they left, is bullshit. The timeline doesn’t hold up. People left because…

–

The social contract between administration and a large portion of the active userbase was broken. Pretty much every other time I can recall an MSB staffer asking folks to chill out, move threads, take a breath, etc., it’s been respected. Or if it hasn’t been, people haven’t been affronted at seeing others get warnings. So why was this instance different? The popular answer I see trotted out on MSB is that it was all about Derp’s appointment, that people couldn’t stop arguing about Derp. Except, if you go back and reread the actual thread, that’s not what happened. Sure, some people were making quiet exits, because they didn’t trust Derp in an administrative capacity. But the reason people started getting vocally angry was one single ban that appeared to be entirely without merit. Two users had what could at most be called a tiff over DMs, they yelled some Last Words at each other over their shoulders, and then one side – the one who opened and continually extended the conversation – decided to report this under the guise that it was some sort of harassment. So you had someone who, at most, got a bit snarky in their exit, now being presented as someone guilty of actual harassment, and the community takes harassment pretty seriously. A number of people, myself included, had access to the log of the conversation, and found it a wildly out of touch response on the part of staff. And, when frustrations were voiced, staff doubled down.

There’s a social contract in every community, and when one side is seen to break it, it has a destructive effect on the community at large. That is why you saw such a strong reaction from a lot of posters who have never caused issues before and who only engage in debate rarely on the board. (I’m not talking about me here, as I know I’m argumentative, but people like tsar, Third Eye, etc.) If you lose the confidence of your userbase as a staffer, if you are no longer trusted to treat people fairly, then it is no surprise when your requests for silence aren’t respected. When people are angry about staff misconduct, then requests to not speak about the staff misconduct will be taken as silencing tactics.

That is what happened.

Had that first ban not occurred, I do think you would have seen some people leaving MSB due to not trusting Derp in an administrative position, but I don’t think it would have shaken out the same way.

–

People who don’t even know Mietze, who aren’t even friends with her, should stop using her name as some sort of tool or proof or justification. Her name isn’t a weapon for you to wield, and it makes it very clear you have no idea what’s going on there.

–

It is very, very clear that the decisions of who to unban were not based in any reasonable justification. The reasoning for not sharing anything about why some people were unbanned while others weren’t – and no, a general “we made reasons based on things” is not a reason – is thin enough to be transparent. If Derp had shit on me, he’d share it. There’s been talk at other times about keeping out the “line-pushers” now that MSB has a new Code of Conduct, except you can’t possibly make that argument for the vast majority of those who remain banned.

–

The fact that MSB staff openly asked people what they could do better and then disparaged the responses before eventually splitting the thread (fine, makes sense) and locking it (not fine) just makes a public declaration that offering criticism of MSB staff is unwelcome and will be treated with hostility. If you actually want to engender trust, you are doing the opposite.

–

You have not managed to cultivate some safe, polite atmosphere. There’s open snark over there, most particularly from the mods. Some of the people talking about how safe they feel now do so because the people who will call out others when they do shitty, creepy things are now gone. VulgarKitten changed her username to Hella and slipped right back on the board. She had previously disappeared after it came to light how she had been lying about her identity on Arx for months, manipulating others, and engaging in romantic and sexual RP with players who had NCOs against her. The safety she praises you all for now is the safety of a predator who knows that a lot of the people who would publicly point out their egregious behavior are now gone, so she can pretend everything’s fine and slip back in (to eventually do it again).

–

Refusing to talk about any of the offending DMs of the banned parties, but then sharing a random anonymous DM talking about not liking three people speaking up, and then acting like it’s not about the three people who had been talking critically about MSB that night is – wow. Hugely manipulative.

Moreover, as indicated in the above point, the people who might feel safer are those who would prefer an environment where they are not held accountable for their actions. This isn’t actually a healthy environment. It is a pretense at civility. It’s surface deep.

–

Also, if you’re going to hold the position that you “can’t speak to” the idea that Derp is bad at “women’s issues” because you yourself are a man, maybe you should listen to the numerous women who have said it? Maybe?

–

Finally, good lord, if you are going to repeatedly harp on the necessity of irrefutable evidence and the ability of people to doctor logs, you cannot also then be confused as to why ANYONE would EVER hesitate to report ANYTHING to staff, Jesus Christ, please use a modicum of logic.

–

Okay. That’s it. I am done. I have just had all these thoughts writhing around in my brain since last night.

Even if I want to yell at someone about how they’re being a total shitty asshole, I want to yell at them with the right pronouns.

@KarmaBum said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

@Roz said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

i wasn’t asking what types of RP she dislikes

Thank you for clarifying, as I also read it that way, and was like… damn, I tried to explain that it just doesn’t hit me as fun, and people were like NO I BELIEVE YOU DO LIKE IT!!!

what i really meant is that — i think social RP is a fairly broad category, and it’s moreso that i think there’s gonna be stuff under discussion here that myself and some others are going to categorize as social RP. so it’s more just like. “i don’t believe people hate all social RP ever because i think the category is broader than they’re suggesting”

• YES - Action, adventure, travel, cool scenery (and then generally something theme-specific, like “dark magic” or “rebel alliances” or something)
• NO - Slice of life

i’d count a lot of “travel” and “cool scenery” stuff as being social!

and slice of life is another hugely broad category for me tbh. like in talking about fiction in various forms, it’ll get applied to everything from “high schoolers getting into comedy hijinks that’s entirely fluff” to “following a family’s life in the aftermath of a serious loss as they deal with the process of grief.” so again, it may just be a question of definition

• Always enjoy playing weird NPCs for story purposes, so currently enjoying storytelling with some friends; historically enjoyed lots of scenes on GH where I got to play the weird creatures.
• The whole zombie arc on Crimson Compass.
• On Horror2 where we used the holy water in the stupidest possible way, which I think was just a 2-3 scene arc?
• The training montage on LA (even though I wasn’t actually in that scene).
• When my character exploded himself as a weyrling on HT.
• “Travel” scenes are always fun for me, especially travel to a surreal or impossible place. Preference for me is as a storyteller, but I’m down to be along for the ride.

some of these i just don’t have enough context for cause it’s just referencing events on games i’m not familiar with. but stuff like training scenes, travel scenes, etc.? those are social to me. hijinks with items just for fun is social to me.

playing NPCs, doing a zombie plot arc (i say just from assumption without context), etc., sounds like it’d just all fall into the ‘plot RP’ bucket for me

Hopefully, this helps.

i do legitimately appreciate you writing it out, thank you

@bear_necessities i’m trying to determine how people are defining things. my point with your example was just that it was a specific premise of social RP. i didn’t argue about people disliking very specific types of social RP. the same way people will dislike very specific types of plot.

i am asking what other types of RP she enjoys because i want to know how people are defining what is and isn’t social RP. i wasn’t asking what types of RP she dislikes, i’m asking what types of RP she likes. because i think for me and some others, social RP is largely the vast majority of RP that isn’t super directly plot RP. and if that’s not the case for others, then this is an argument about semantics. i’m asking what people think of as “types of RP” that aren’t plot and social. not specific scenarios, but overall types.

@KarmaBum said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

@Roz said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

lol you didn’t even quote my entire point???

Sorry, that’s more an issue of replying on my phone.

My entire point is just that I know what social RP is, I have enjoyed it in the past, I do not enjoy it anymore. I do enjoy many other types of RP.

i’m actually curious what the list is! i mean that sincerely. because for me, the types of RP are pretty broad categories. like i think of social RP, and then plot RP, and i guess i can put smut/TS/whatevs is a category. but those are the big buckets for me that i can think of.

which comes back to my earlier point of “i think people are just arguing about different definitions”

@bear_necessities said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

@Roz said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

i don’t actually believe anyone would eschew a social scene with a new character that turned out to have great chemistry and was an awesome time. i just don’t. because everyone loves fun, engaging RP. and social scenes can turn out to be literally anything.

Except there are some scene premises that are just inherently not fun for me so I would truly not have a good time and would not be engaged. Case in point: movie night scenes. I absolutely do not like scenes where we sit around with 20 other characters, or even 2 other characters, and pretend to watch a movie. It’s not fun for me, and has in fact on three occasions killed my enjoyment entirely for a game despite being in those scenes with people I have actually good chemistry with and enjoy roleplaying with.

This is one example but surely if you all need others to accept that we can all actually enjoy different things, I can keep going.

i mean…yes, sure, that is a very specific premise you don’t like. that is not the same as someone claiming they don’t like social RP across the board, considering that social RP would include a huge swathe of interactions. talking about very specific premises don’t actually run counter to my point at all.

@KarmaBum said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

@Roz said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

i don’t actually believe anyone would eschew a social scene

I’m fine if people don’t actually believe this.

lol you didn’t even quote my entire point???

my point is that sometimes a social scene is nothing but meaningless fluff. sometimes it is a scene where two characters hit it off in some fashion and end up having extremely meaningful interactions that build character connections and offer meaningful character development. both of these are social scenes. my point is that “social RP” encompasses a hell of a lot of stuff. it doesn’t stop being social RP when it turns out to be incredibly meaningful.

@Wizz said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

@Roz valid! some people just don’t like it, that’s absolutely fine. sorry if I made it seem like it wasn’t when I responded to you earlier, I was just trying to be a silly goose.

lmao not gonna lie, i don’t even remember what you replied to my first post. that was like. a week ago!!

i was just responding to the post i quoted. because i feel like it’s pretty relevant to acknowledge that people not liking async is usually because they simply — don’t like async. not because they just haven’t found the right async partner or instance.

@KarmaBum said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

@Yam said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

I definitely agree with this, which is why I’m always baffled about why people declare no bar RP/no social fluff.

Hm. Are you equally baffled by people who declare no smut? Or no lords and ladies?

People like different things.

lords and ladies is a specific genre, and smut is a very specific type of RP with pretty obvious reason why some people would choose not to partake.

social RP is literally just — the act of building relationships between characters. it is foundational enough to the development of characters that whenever people say they don’t like social RP, i honestly just assume it’s a matter of people defining things differently from each other.

ETA: i think that what people generally mean is that they don’t like RP that turns out to not be fun. which is universal. social RP can have a slightly higher hit or miss rate in terms of how fun the scene ends up being, and i do respect people saying they have less time to roll the dice on that. but every other type of RP is also hit or miss at varying levels.

i don’t actually believe anyone would eschew a social scene with a new character that turned out to have great chemistry and was an awesome time. i just don’t. because everyone loves fun, engaging RP. and social scenes can turn out to be literally anything.

what people don’t like is boring RP. which happens with every type of RP you can imagine. boring RP happens in plot, it happens in smut, it happens everywhere.

@Wizz said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

I get this and I do sympathize with it, and I’m just gonna suggest that exploratory ventures into a style you don’t personally enjoy are probably going to be colored by that bias, in addition to the simple fact that, again, there are a lot of people who are just bad at this period, lol, whether that’s due to inexperience or whatever else. it’s not just that playing a different way is worse.

i can say that my dislike of async has zero to do with the writing styles people may or may not utilize while playing. it has zero to do with the actual pose content, because that’s entirely variable

it has everything to do with the timing and rhythm constraints that ARE inherent to async. i’ve done plenty of async scenes with a bunch of different people over the years; it’s incredibly difficult even with people whose RP i love. it’s entirely about the nature of async itself

if async has no haters it means that i am dead

@Yam said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

@Roz said in RP Safari - Pacing Styles:

I actually remember a big argument on MSB about it at one point years ago, with someone saying that they felt insulted to get the second alt for a scene.

I love this because it implies some kind of sloppy seconds with RP partners.

it was literally absolutely that. they were mad at their perception that they were being placed in a secondary status, and they found it deeply offensive that someone might agree to a scene without revealing that they’d be playing another scene in parallel.

@bear_necessities Idk, my experience is that we were RPing multiple scenes at a time on MU*s from way back when, just using alts. (Either literally playing the alt as that character, or else spoofing Alt A via Alt B and playing two Alt A scenes at the same time.) That was definitely a common thing I saw on lots of games since my childhood.

I actually remember a big argument on MSB about it at one point years ago, with someone saying that they felt insulted to get the second alt for a scene. (This was a minority opinion, not a common one, but it just sticks in my head because of how funny the conversation was. Whoever it was was honestly REALLY offended.)

ETA: That said, it did still limit how many scenes you could do at once. You were limited to the number of character bits you could have, AKA limited by the game’s alt policy. And maybe more difficult to manage on games where stats and sheets and rolling were prevalent. Those limits fundamentally don’t exist on codebases like Ares now. If you’re playing 5 scenes at once, you pretty much have to be doing them async.

Eric Dane