I’m so glad there is a space for people to process their feelings, not only as individuals but together. We may “just” be an online community and some of the meeting places may “just” be a message board but it is a real community, and when stuff breaks down it can really hurt.

I don’t want anyone to misconstrue my quietness to mean I don’t care. I do, very much. It’s been hard to see my name invoked in things that are incorrect to me (though I can see why it was done so), or to back up things by people who were hurtful to me personally. But sometimes that’s what happens when people are arguing or trying to cope with what they need to cope with and I’m not angry about it.

I’m not a saint, or some great person and it makes me uncomfortable. I don’t think me being present during the blow up would have changed anything, I don’t and never did have that much power. For that same reason I don’t think anyone else could influence the decisions that have been made either, except for the people that are right now making them. I thought that stepping down would relieve stress (and it did), and that it would be enough (it wasn’t), because the minute I stupidly engaged in a discussion that I should have known how it would turn out, a lot of that hurt came right back to the surface and for my part in that I’m very sorry, it’s hard to not feel like that didn’t instigate something that shouldn’t have been. I thought I was getting to be over it, but I’m not.

It’s hard to lose access to a place that you once felt like you had a part in. Or to feel less welcome and safe. Regardless of justification but especially when it doesn’t feel like it was and it was abrupt. It’s hard to let go of that and stop looking/reading/whatever. It may not even be appropriate for some people, and that’s of course a decision that has to be made for yourself. I wish I could say something that would help, but I also know I can’t. There’s nothing to say. It did not happen for me on the boards this time, but I have experienced it elsewhere and it was bewildering and angering and made me feel more grief that I thought I should.

To say this has been a dark time for me would be an understatement. Yes, 90 percent of it is factors other than what happened, but what happened triggered some pretty serious things that I still have to be very careful about (as I discovered last night too). I guess I’m not over that either.

There have been several times in the history of “the community” where different boards have existed (and yes even rivalries–ask the dinosaurs, this isn’t the first time this has happened. I think it’s easier now to find/hang on to the friends that you want, and refind others as time goes on. I’ve had friends in this hobby that were close, and then a falling out ended things for years, and then we reconnected stronger than ever. And other relationships with folks that just…didn’t ever re-engage–and that’s okay too. Real life, right? It doesn’t make it less painful in the moment.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that I do really love you guys. I wish things had happened differently. I wish I’d been more capable, or it had been a better moment for a whole bunch of people. That things didn’t bubble up exactly the way that they did, because while I can see why people say it’d been building up for awhile, I don’t think it was the best for anyone how it happened. I wish that we all didn’t have so much other shit in our lives that sometimes makes stuff in THIS community feel like the last straw. I think whatever place you land at, and are able to settle into community is good. And yes, even if it’s both. Sometimes having an alternative that you feel more comfortable on and that becoming the new main (or the old main)–that’s a good thing. There doesn’t even have to be a comparison. I like what’s building here. I hope with more hands on deck both here and at MSB people will be able to build what they want. Hats off to the team here for being able to take something like this on board when a lot of the people are grieving at least a little. Sometimes that’s taking on some hard stuff that you don’t notice until later, but I think you are amazing.

There’s a lot of games I’ve been on over the years, so any omissions is more because I can’t remember the names (but I do tend to remember people/situations)

Current:
Arx: Edris, Karina past: Nurie, Ouida, Maren, tried Lailah but couldn’t mesh.
City of Shadows: Fiametta

Past:
Shadowrun Seattle: Nocturnis, Sakura Saito
Shadowrun Detroit: Milla
TCbTT (oWoD): Galatea, Niccola, Chai
A2A (oWoD): Arianwyn, Julia
Metro 2.0 (oWoD): Jade
A handful of other oWoD places, one set in Hawaii, one in Morocco, a few in US cities.
The Reach (nWoD): Ariadne, May, Fremont (changeling app staffer, then later Mortal/M+ sphere head)
CoFaB (nWoD): Gloria
Eldritch (nWoD): Toni (also at BITN)
Mystick Krewe (Buffy): Nanette
Star Crusade (Fading Suns): Naima, Verity, Samina
Battlestar Orion: Kostas
Battlestar Deimos: Enyo
RfK (CoD?): Nathalie
Savage Skies: Donovan, Enid
Liberation MUSH (new owod): Bastian

Brief appearance on Keys as the person who took Fable off the roster. Tried several other ares places at this time, but none of them took (not because people aren’t nice or I didn’t enjoy things, just it didn’t grab me like Arx has).

I’m always looking for new folks to play with/meet. If you’ve told me your alt and I don’t rp regularly with you (or honestly even if we do) chances are I will forget about it. So I’m almost always game for a background tie, ect.

for many reasons both mush related and not i’m really sick of the “keep sweet” mentality that is often pushed on people who push back when someone is being ugly. it’s honestly rather repulsive to me. i’ve had to deal with a lot of “be kind/put other people’s comfort above your own/shut up” through most of my life. i don’t feel particularly bound to be kind to someone who threw shade at a game runner about being irresponsible because the game didn’t last for the amount of time that they thought it would and then even insinuated that maybe they shouldn’t have made the game in the first place because of that. along with the ‘hmm if you’re not perfect maybe you shouldn’t say anything because you know you’re both not perfect’ stuff. that kind of stuff should have died in the 90s and i think it should be called out bluntly every single damn time.

Struggling with significant depression rn. I’m doing ok juggling most things I think. But a bit slower on the uptake/not very much energy right now. At some point maybe I will be less burnt out by life, but man it is really hard. I know I have lots of people right here with me tho.

“let’s all be nice” is a tool of silencing. i think it’s not always intended that way, but sometimes it absolutely is less about actual concern for others and more about that person calling for that being unable to tolerate their discomfort. i think that’s fine outside of the rough and rowdy section. but within it, i’m going to be just honest here with my personal opinon–i think pushing keep sweet on people is being an asshole here.

enforce respectful language. call out hypocritcal stuff. that’s needed. keeping sweet is not, and should not be. maybe my feelings are inappropriately raw for this. i am trying to be respectful, but i’m not feeling kind and i’m not a bad person for not feeling kind about this. IMO.

today was hard, but I made it through.

@CuriousGamer why are you involving me in this?

ETA: if i cared to comment on any thread on MSB, then I would. I do not know why she would want to quote me about anything regarding defending herself, as to my knowledge i’ve never RPed with her (or if I did it was unknowing or such a long time ago and unremarkable as to not really stay in my memory, so it was neither a bad experience or an ecstatic one).

So if she hates me or something, I really have no clue why, unless it’s just a flailing thing, in which case it’s certainly not personal, because I’ve never done anything to harm this person. And I can’t imagine that she could possibly say anything that would hurt me more than other whisper campaigns have in the past (and I have a pretty good track record of being vindicated with those nearly every time someone has tried it). The folks on MSB that would be eager to agree that I’m a terrible person already think that and she in no way could possibly influence that.

As Roz said. It is NOT a kindness to tell someone “hey, people are talking about you!” in a situation like this. I assume there are plenty of people out there who can say all sorts of mean things about me, and probably do. If I had to constantly be vigilant about that kind of shit then I would have even less energy for RP than I do now. I play several places, for the most part very happily, with people who are happy to RP with me, and I’d like to keep it that way.

The MSB split is very painful for me personally and it’s always going to be that way. That’s not your fault, but please be considerate and don’t tag me in like this for this kind of cross board stuff in the future.

Feeling like you are dropping every ball and letting everyone down sucks, even if you know life goes on. I feel like a crappy RPer anyway of late, but its frustrating to fall on my face right now in particular when rl too is just relentless.

There are no “receipts” that people accept in “our medium.”

Someone shows outside of the game communication? It’s always they shouldn’t have worn that dress and also unfair/not game related.

Someone shows a log? “The log was probably edited by someone with an axe to grind!” “Maybe you shouldn’t have been so sensitive. Gee, I would have been flattered and not taken that so seriously!” " Sometimes the person i could have seen as harassing me turned out to be a Nice Guy/Gal once I just talked to them a little more, so let’s give this awkward person a break and you should be more tolerant."

People take the information presented to them and make a decision. That’s always been the case. It’s just who tends to be “the most believable” is a little more diverse than it was during 90s mushing and a lot of “awkward” behavior is a lot less acceptable, and the culture has shifted away from rules lawyering about who “should” be asked to leave.

Reeling a bit from a mispage earlier in the day that kinda took the wind out of my sails.

On the one hand, I guess I know who to avoid in the future. But it’s coming at a really bad place of timing.

It really sucks to feel like you’re okayish enough to pass the time with RP wise if there’s nothing better to do, but you’re not of the caliber where it would be worth engaging in deeper RP with you since you’re just a lightweight bore and there’s nothing substantial there.

I do often feel (as do like 98 percent of the people I know) like i’m the always the unwanted/last person to be picked for the kickball team. I don’t /think/ it’s the reality (and hey if we were all the super popular kickball captains growing up maybe we wouldn’t have gotten into mushing or whatever so it’s just kind of a primal worry for a lot of people. But i’m feeling it super hard tonight.

I’ll work through it (or disappear) but damn. I’ve done my share of mispages but it’s been awhile since I got one and i have to say it kinda really did hurt this time. Even if if it’s from someone that I really don’t even care about!

@junipersky i’m sure you’ve tried something similar to this so I’m not sure if it would work but I’ve now trained (for the most part) the preschoolers to 3rd graders at my school to hand me their name strips (everyone has a laminated first and last name strip of paper they can put on their table/on floor work they’re leaving in place, ect) when they need me. It helps me a lot too, as I have people in order and I don’t forget (which in the children’s defense I did do a lot before instituting this). One of the lower elementary teachers does this in her class and I was skeptical but I’m a believer now. Once the kids realized that I would not get sidetracked (except for blood, poop, or vomit) and they could trust me to come to them, it worked well and I didn’t have to constantly say “give me two steps back/mind my bubble/I don’t want anyone’s hand in my pocket but mine” or accidentally bootybump some poor child to the ground or step on them if i took a step back or turned around.

@Roz flashes orbs

pneumonia sucks. It’s been a hard week. Missing out on a lot of stuff but you know you don’t feel good when there’s no pang of fomo. Hoping to finally be on the mend soon.

I feel that. Was finally able to eat solid food at dinner tonight for the first time since last Saturday. And of course now dreading logging back in to disappointment (yes I know its stupid and nobody really minds but its what plays in my head).

The nasty ass sore throat virus going around (its not covid, flu A or B, or rsv!) Is awful. Still can’t talk and still don’t feel great but I think it’ll improve now that I can have real food instead of protein drinks.

Why is it so hard to get back in the saddle when everyone gets punched in the face sometimes so its not like people don’t know what its like.

@Snackness i hope its not the sore throat one. i have never woken up all through the night even in nyquil induced sleep due to painful swallows before. that seems to finally be edging off now but I’ve lost my voice completely. going to just mask 100 percent of the time at work now until after spring break i think.

lots of nasty non-covid illnesses going around. I got punched in the face by one over thanksgiving (but usually I am semi-sick during any holiday due to my job anyway). if you haven’t already gotten your flu shot i recommend it. but mostly man i would like to not feel like crap on a freakin’ cracker.

@Warma-Sheen To be clear. Most people shouldn’t and don’t care about that person. It would be foolish to solely blame him for less traffic so I wouldn’t wallow in that tbh. It’s just that tere’s nothing going on on the game and I think especially during a busy time people won’t rush to jump in without trying to find out more about the runner, what kind of scenes, ect. But as far as getting the bum rush that this forum can be famous for on a game it does help when one of the champions of it hasn’t in recent memory shown their whole ass. I’m sure that is why the game runner drew attention to the inevitable that this guy got banned for his typical behavior with less time to reach that decision than previous folks? But that’s just an indicator of a decent level of common sense not necessarily something that will make people rush to play.

A known problem person on staff will drive people away but their absence won’t cause an interest that wasn’t already there.

Also this is a one sphere niche game with an original setting. That also can take a bit to chew on. There’s nothing wrong with that, I personally adore those games and play on them often. I did check this place out but I don’t get excited about mage as a system/sphere and have had mostly meh experiences when giving it a chance elsewhere. But I do like the setting. Its probably not enough for me to give it a whirl, too much of a reach. But I am not the target or ideal participant for this place so no one should care/worry about that.

ETA: wasn’t the game runner that drew attention here but posting of the ban post by someone else. But still. People play on the same games as people they don’t like all the time and at least this staff didn’t hand him the keys when they heard something disconcerting and they also took action when the meltdown occurred that didn’t involve coddling. Its a point in their favor not because of the specific person involved but that they did it.

@Warma-Sheen usually they don’t open with that many but word gets out especially on a forum and then there’s a spigot of crazy activity that then falls off a cliff about 6ish weeks in when you get the real sense of the actual playerbase.

It’s probably helpful when things don’t happen like that.

Also helpful when the initial introduction isn’t by or involving someone who shuts down someone else’s game while in a rage/tantrum.

@MisterBoring this is so indivdual I’m not sure I can even answer really.

I do think that at some point either in numbers or personality too many staff can lead to even more dropped balls than when there’s just 1 or 2, like how easy it is for people to drown in a crowd because everyone thinks that other people are watching out.

@Alveraxus i think that there are folks who would happily play a pvp game. 15 years ago I would have maybe but these days I just don’t have the time. I suspect that’s true for a chunk of people.

If you’re excited about it, do it. Trying to attract “everyone” means a waste of time for everyone imo. Do what excites you. That’s going to be more manageable for you than trying to appease people who are never going to be actie on your game anyway.