MU Peeves Thread

[SpaceKhomeini]

@Coin said in MU Peeves Thread:

Losing players and not knowing why. Like, it’d be nice to just know if it’s personal, if the game isn’t jiving, if if if if if…

Also, the MU player trauma that makes them not talk to staff. Holy shit. It is really hard to convince people you want to help them out and aren’t annoyed or mad that they misunderstood or misinterpreted a scene set or something like that. Players will 100% delete a 500-word pose to write a “standing in the background” pose just to not incur some imaginary wrath.

Some people have been treated like shit and it shows, fuck.

I feel like I may in fact be one of those people, at times.

I can also point to a handful of experiences in the past that trained me this way but again I think it all just goes back to “If I don’t know you I don’t really want to fuck with you.”

[Artemis]

It’s annoying when I’ve just quit my longest standing MU and want to join and be involved with others, but the investment is difficult to build up and my mental state derails me half the time. There are so many new and awesome games out right now, that I want to support, while I’m simultaneously trying to work on my own and torn as to where to focus my attention, so I end up getting way less done than I’d like. Just kind of feeling like a flake rn.

[Pavel]

@Artemis said in MU Peeves Thread:

Just kind of feeling like a flake rn.

My pal, that’s all of us most of the time. You’re absolutely not alone, and anyone who chides you for it is both an imbecile and a hypocrit.

[Artemis]

@Pavel I appreciate you.

[Pavel]

@Artemis said in MU Peeves Thread:

@Pavel I appreciate you.

[Wuff]

Logging into an Ares game and seeing what looks like new activity in web. But it’s just your own poses because you’re not logged in as that alt.

It’s an async scene so giving folks time is expected. But ma hopes were up.

Edit: And switching to that alt just does the same thing with the alt you were just on.

[Gashlycrumb]

@Coin said in MU Peeves Thread:

Losing players and not knowing why. Like, it’d be nice to just know if it’s personal, if the game isn’t jiving, if if if if if…

Also, the MU player trauma that makes them not talk to staff. Holy shit. It is really hard to convince people you want to help them out and aren’t annoyed or mad that they misunderstood or misinterpreted a scene set or something like that. Players will 100% delete a 500-word pose to write a “standing in the background” pose just to not incur some imaginary wrath.

Some people have been treated like shit and it shows, fuck.

Yeah. My reaction to the ‘Staffing, privilege or punishment?’ question was that it’s neither, it’s housekeeping chores and a more intense manner of playing an RPG. But this trauma-response thing in players is an element that turns the online equivalent of GMing a game and vacuuming up the crumbs into something between a difficult task and an impossible seething morass.

[Pan]

@Gashlycrumb said in MU Peeves Thread:

@Coin said in MU Peeves Thread:

Losing players and not knowing why. Like, it’d be nice to just know if it’s personal, if the game isn’t jiving, if if if if if…

Also, the MU player trauma that makes them not talk to staff. Holy shit. It is really hard to convince people you want to help them out and aren’t annoyed or mad that they misunderstood or misinterpreted a scene set or something like that. Players will 100% delete a 500-word pose to write a “standing in the background” pose just to not incur some imaginary wrath.

Some people have been treated like shit and it shows, fuck.

Yeah. My reaction to the ‘Staffing, privilege or punishment?’ question was that it’s neither, it’s housekeeping chores and a more intense manner of playing an RPG. But this trauma-response thing in players is an element that turns the online equivalent of GMing a game and vacuuming up the crumbs into something between a difficult task and an impossible seething morass.

I think it can work out if you show you aren’t the staffers of the past. Consistently. We’re all spending a lot of time and effort as players and staffers and it blows to figure out you’re wasting your time as either. As a player being tossed aside like the time and effort that’s put in isn’t worth a thing is what to me makes dealing with anything in this hobby a chore.

A lot of staff seem to have issues with problem players too and it takes a lot as a player to prove you aren’t a problem player. So it cuts both ways.

[YetiBeard]

@Pan

I’m not really sure it takes a lot as a player to prove you’re not a problem. I think that’s maybe a bit too broad a statement.

While I get the desire to show that you are a reasonable person and healthy member of the game, the bar for not being a problem is really just not being a problem.

[tsar]

@YetiBeard said in MU Peeves Thread:

@Pan

I’m not really sure it takes a lot as a player to prove you’re not a problem. I think that’s maybe a bit too broad a statement.

While I get the desire to show that you are a reasonable person and healthy member of the game, the bar for not being a problem is really just not being a problem.

Yeah, agree. I think if you’re at the point of staffing where all the players exhaust you and you need them to prove they’re not guilty of something before it even starts, it’s time to put down the gloves.

[Gashlycrumb]

@Pan said in MU Peeves Thread:

I think it can work out if you show you aren’t the staffers of the past.

Oh, it can work out.

“Staffers of the past” though? What, like, last Tuesday?

Yep, the bar for not being a problem is not being a problem. ‘I won’t interact with you until you prove you’re not a problem’ is a catch-22, as you can’t prove you’re not a problem without interacting. Such treatment is liable to create problems as players go, “Hey! Lookit me!” with increasing intensity, or decide to do dumb shit for something to do.

The other cuts both ways thing is how an unsympathetic “don’t whinge, vote with your feet” has been the community’s standard advice for years now, so yeah, of course it’s bloody hard to figure out why people are leaving. Also the thing where I, as a player, actually do keep an informal exit poll in that I ask why when people I know tell me they’re quitting, BUT I don’t share this information with staff unless it’s something beyond their control, like players having new jobs. Experience says that if six of the eight people I’ve spoken to have told me they’re quitting because SuperStaffer blows off their concerns and keeps feeding all the plot to the Kewl Cids, telling SuperStaffer so will probably just get me labeled a liar and a problem player. So I won’t say unless I plan to leave myself, and then it seems like a petty parting-shot.

[mietze]

When I say vote with your feet, it’s with the assumption that the behavior has been observed enough as tolerated, or its clear that staff can’t handle complaints based off of channel rants, snippy responses, ect. Because it is useless to complain at that point.

But I also think honestly that if anyone feels uncomfortable or disengaged for any reason they are allowed to leave without giving input unless they want to. If I find a game is not to my taste, why would I want to tell staff that? I can say bye and thanks without also adding "I was bored/wasn’t into it/i can’t get in to the time rhythm here/whatever else personal thing that staff has absolutely nothing they can do about it unless they dump everything that works for the people actually playing here to cater to my whim.

Just because I don’t care for certain things or it is not grabbing me doesn’t mean I should shit on what they do like and I’m tired of people acting like gamerunners can or should cater to every taste. I just say I’m going and thanks for putting this out there/wish you the best of luck. You never know what kind of day someone has had and hearing that someone doesn’t like this thing that you’ve invested so much in and working hard on might be taken personally.

And we have probably all seen the person who makes a bit on a game and then spends all their time whining about what it is and how they don’t like it. I don’t want star wars, why can’t this be star trek instead, you’d only have to change one of the word. I don’t like this historical time period I would like it to me this other one. Why is this in the city, the city is boring why didn’t you make Rednecks by Night instead at least that would be original. What do you mean I can’t play a whore, what kind of place is this?/What kind of game is this that you CAN play a whore?!

Some things are worth sharing with staff on your exit out. Some things will just be wasting your keystrokes because staff are determined not to see problems or they’re assholes who don’t care. Some things are unnecessary to say to nice people who like different things than you.

[IoleRae]

@Pan said in MU Peeves Thread:

A lot of staff seem to have issues with problem players too and it takes a lot as a player to prove you aren’t a problem player.

Can you elaborate on this a little bit? I don’t think I understand what you’re saying, and I’d like to.

Are you talking about when you first join a game, proving yourself?

Are you talking about when something has happened/there’s been an incident, and now you have to “prove” that you’re not this thing that you did?

Are you talking about something else?

[Gashlycrumb]

@mietze Well, yeah. Players are not at all obliged to explain themselves when they leave a game.

But game-runners are also allowed to be frustrated at not knowing what, if anything, went wrong. Very reasonable if they want to improve.

And it really is comical in a grim sort of way when staff laments and even directly asks why people have left but lose their shit at answers that are actionable.

I don’t feel like that many people act like gamerunners should cater to every taste. I feel like a lot of gamerunners respond to every criticism as if it’s a demand and take a “love it or leave it!” position. This isn’t consistent with reality. Faced with the love/leave dichotomy those who want to stay will feign love, but probably almost every player is liking it and lumping it.

I’m not saying that it’s okay to hang about on the Star Wars game complaining all the time that it’s not Trek, or anything like that, just. Let them lump it where they lump it, y’know.

[SpaceKhomeini]

@Gashlycrumb

Examples
Seem
Concentrated
Around
Longtime
Unpleasant
Staffbits

Not to keep dragging up that particular creature but after you’ve had someone jump down your throat for requesting a rules clarification around, say, a particular splatbook you don’t own and have never seen, that shit can stay with you and you start just asking yourself, “What’s going to happen if I ask this question? Is it even worth it?”

[Aria]

@SpaceKhomeini said in MU Peeves Thread:

@Coin said in MU Peeves Thread:

Losing players and not knowing why. Like, it’d be nice to just know if it’s personal, if the game isn’t jiving, if if if if if…

Also, the MU player trauma that makes them not talk to staff. Holy shit. It is really hard to convince people you want to help them out and aren’t annoyed or mad that they misunderstood or misinterpreted a scene set or something like that. Players will 100% delete a 500-word pose to write a “standing in the background” pose just to not incur some imaginary wrath.

Some people have been treated like shit and it shows, fuck.

I feel like I may in fact be one of those people, at times.

I can also point to a handful of experiences in the past that trained me this way but again I think it all just goes back to “If I don’t know you I don’t really want to fuck with you.”

This is not just you. In the (gags at own age) 25 years I’ve spent in this hobby, there are definitely a handful of staffers I can point to as contributing to my general skepticism and wariness.

It does not help that I have also had at least two staffers point out to me that it’s really obvious when I’m hesitant of staff on a game, assured me they weren’t like that and I could feel comfortable around them, and… then turned out to be exactly like that, but worse.

I waffle between feeling like I need to be more open, more trusting, more willing to take risks versus sitting back and wondering WTF is wrong with humans as a species that brings out this tendency to, like… “I have a modicum of authority over other people. Time to be a petty asshole!”, whether it’s staff on a game, the president of the PTA, or the night manager at a restaurant who has decided to rule over his empire of waitstaff with an iron fist.

[mietze]

To be clear, I also don’t think gamerunners are under any particular obligation to make things more efficient, or do things differently either. Even about things other people might deem actionable! Hell, if they want to go on player-bashing tirades on a chan or bite people’s heads off when they get annoyed at questions or whatever, and there’s people that don’t care/silence all OOC so they don’t hear it anyway, then whatever!

I don’t know why people would expect perfection for them on any game that they don’t run themselves. So yeah, I mean to varying degrees you ARE liking it or lumping it no matter what. I don’t think this is a really a problem. It is a bummer when there’s no games that really are ones that you want to spend time on. I’ve been there and it sucks, but while I am willing to maybe give something a try due to an invitation or a friend group, if it doesn’t click it doesn’t. Most of the time it’s me just not enjoying the genre or setup, and not a quick fix thing even if I like the runners and the other players. I don’t want to yuck their yum.

I think IF a gamerunner wants feedback, they can make it clear, Have a little exit survey on the wiki or something and make it known that they INVITE people to fill it out even if they didn’t even make it past CG. Do semi-regular surveys of the current players. My experience is that very seldom has any critique (constructive or otherwise) has been that helpful unless it was clearly asked for. But you’ll sill only get a relatively low level of responses, IME. But probably you’ll get more than you would have by not inviting it at all, maybe.

Anyone can be frustrated with anyone else about anything. People feel how they feel.

[icanbeyourmuse]

I’m really bad for just leaving a game with no word. Except, maybe, to someone I talk to a lot or my leaving could affect peoples stories. Sorry to those that don’t like it. If it helps, I generally leave a game because I stopped having fun or what I feel is ‘bad’ outweighs the stuff I feel are ‘good’ about a game.

Though, I’m not a fan of saying a person is ‘forever awful’. Yeah, some people stay crap people but from /my/ experience it is not hard to show people you’ve changed as a player, unless a REALLY long history of unpleasantness. As a staff sort it seems considerably harder to redeem yourself.

If you’re using here as a place to judge things as being hard to show you’ve changed I wouldn’t. The purpose of this board, and its predecessors (though on different levels) is to vent. It 100% can be used for catching predators and such too.

[Roz]

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.

[Artemis]

@Roz I’m glad somebody said it. I wish them and their game the best.