@GF said in MU Peeves Thread:
@Prototart I can think of two off the top of my head. One is a hero, and one is Batgirl’s normie roommate, so I’ll assume no one is knocking players down in a rush to play her.
the only trans char either of us had ever seen played is Sera, Angela’s girlfriend who hasn’t appeared in, like, a decade
the entire thing is dumb and the whole “we hear you. you are valid. here are the six characters you can play.” makes it even dumber
@renaveleigh said in MU Peeves Thread:
I don’t want to ascribe malice, and, I don’t, but this is not a well-reasoned policy at all.
in the posts people made about ~continuity~ and rosters and inherited characters what i think maybe got missed about the place in question is that it’s literally a superhero fuck MUX that when i looked at it had a continuity that was literally “someone’s continuity is what they say it is, batman can be 20 and Nightwing can be 30”
it’s hard not to ascribe malice when it’s a place literally built on fucking and then sharing logs of your fucking that decided one particular kind of body was unacceptable for fucking unless it was completely hidden and unacknowledged
@Pavel said in MU Peeves Thread:
If you go back ten or so years ago, there were definitely places wherein if they discovered you had posted on WORA (or wherever), they would flay you alive, tar you, feather you, fire you into the sea, and then ban you.
it isn’t that this changed it’s just that nobody ever comes to dump things anymore
everybody either silently deals with it until they can’t or just leaves bc they know exposing like even the absolute worst behaviors won’t accomplish anything and literally no one will care who didn’t already
@schrodingerscig said in Bannings:
What I don’t understand is why we keep hearing again and again about how certain people did a thing to someone five years ago or ten years ago and how that makes them an awful person today.
if somebody shit on your couch you’d remember it, and you’d probably bring it up when somebody else talked about how that person’s going around shitting on couches
oh, hi there. i will be using big girl grammar and even capitalization for this one!
Before we begin, I’ll recount a bit of history. HAM - Heroes Assembled - is a splinter, or more appropriately a revenge game, derived from UH, United Heroes.
United Heroes was originally run by Claremont, a serial sex pest, had a wizard named Ditko who was an incredibly aggressive sexual harasser, and was filled with staff who knew that these things happened but actively gaslight, attacked, or outright banned anyone who brought them up.
This status quo persisted for several years, interrupted only when Ruby, Claremont’s chief attack dog and TS partner, decided she didn’t want to TS with him anymore. Claremont responded by undoing all the things he had let her get away with because of her position, which was a step too for. Sexually harassing players was one thing, but a friend? That won’t do, sir! THAT is unethical!
And, so, much of UH’s staff, until now not simply fine with how the game was run but willing to viciously attack anyone who aired their dirty laundry, their morals at last outraged, quit en masse and created a new game - Heroes Assembled.
HAM was in all but name run by Chaucer, someone who actively despises comic books and was never shy about letting everyone on this comic book game know if, God forbid, they wanted to do something from a comic book. He was demeaning and insulting to the vast majority of the player base, and complaints were routinely filed against him only to be ignored or for the person who filed them to be quietly kicked from the game for vague reasons.
Recently, HAM reached the same breaking point UH did. It’s fun when it’s done to players, but it’s unconscionable when it’s done to someone else. And, so, Chaucer was fired. Which triggered this series of posts:
I have been dismissed from Staff.
I want to make it very clear, to everyone, that I am not leaving staff because of you players. I love working with you. I love getting to help tell your story. I am greatly fulfilled when I help someone turn a rough idea into a diamond of a character. Or discover deeper connections to our lore than they knew their character had. You have been there for me through rough times, and I am truly grateful to have been there for you. Coming up with our IC lore and theme has been one of my proudest accomplishments as a writer. We have taken this game and built it into something totally unique. Not just a sandbox, but a coherentworld* where your character’s actions leave a permanent set of footprints in the sand.
Shakespeare has informed me that we simply do not have ‘compatible visions’ for how to run a game. And to be honest, I have run out of gas. The last four years on staff have been a constant struggle. There have been too many times where I have seen her unapologetically lash out at players and staff because she is tired or upset or angry. I am tired of enforcing and explaining policies that don’t make sense to me. Of watching standards be inequitably applied, with Shakespeare’s buddies getting preferential treatment. I keep proposing ways to address the problems players bring to my attention but I have learned that changing anything, anything at all, starts an immediate uphill battle. Whether it is recognizing that policy can’t cover 100% of all concepts, or even something as simple as opening Space! up to you players, the biggest obstacle to change is always Shakespeare’s stubborn insistence that her policy is above criticism.
[6:26 PM]
At a recent sit-down, I (rather flatly) told Shakespeare my problem with her is how she hurts players in her fits of pique or anger. How stubborn she is and how hard she clings to policies that the players themselves disagree with. I came to that discussion in good faith, wanting to find a way we can work together. I realized right away that she came to that ‘talk’ not with the intention of finding a way forward, but to get me to resign from my position. I learned her problem with me is that I don’t just roll over when she insists her policies are inviolable and sacrosanct. That my sense of fairness, my judgement, has no impact on what she feels like doing in the moment; that there are no exceptions to her rules except the ones she allows. In years previous she has promised to change, to grow up, to share the load and work with me than against me. I have concluded that she never really intended to stick with those promises. I tried to tell her that she can’t just rule this game by executive fiat. To quote Shakespeare: “I do have final say. I have always had it. It is my game, and invited others to come help and be part if they wished to. That that hasn’t been accepted by you has been one of the biggest sources of friction.”
I feel like I am letting you all down, and I am very sorry for it. I feel defeated. That my ideas aren’t welcome as a staffer. Shakespeare says I am the problem, that I’m causing her too much stress and frustration. Still, I don’t intend to give up my characters. At the end of the day, I am a player here, too. This post is to ensure you folks understand that you aren’t the cause of my disaffection. I wish you all the best of luck, and I’m still here to help you with lore, chargen and storytelling to the best of my ability-- staff bit or no.
Yours,
-The Player Formerly Known as Chaucer.
Hey folks. I asked Chaucer to take a leave from staff tonight. We’re not going to ax grind about it, so I’ll give you as neutral an explanation as I can.
There has been ongoing friction for a very long time, over different views on the game. It is only getting worse. And it finally hit a point that it wasn’t healthy for anyone involved to continue.
I asked him to take a leave. He responded poorly. And that’s where it is. The game will continue.
I have a lot of respect for what Chaucer’s done even as we’ve had major disagreements. I wish it hadn’t ended up like this, but this is where it’s at. Thank you for patience.
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm< End +bbread 1/171 >mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Hello HAMmers, It's your friendly neighborhood staffer Coleridge here, saying goodbye. No, I'm not leaving the game, but I am stepping down as a staffer. Some of you are no doubt wondering if this is connected to Chaucer being removed from staff, and I'll get to that. First I want to say it has been fun. I've worked to help a lot of you on details of plots, or applications for new characters or +sheet updates, and seeing the ideas and imagination out there is great. I've tried to treat the staffing job as if I was an editor on a comic title, helping writers to integrate their ideas into the greater comics universe they are writing in and providing them a sounding board. We've got a fun bunch of writers here.
So on to the elephant in the room. Chaucer and Shakespeare have been the two biggest driving forces for what made HAM such a fantastic place to RP. As is so often the case, they complemented each other's strengths, and balanced out each other's weaknesses. Removing Chaucer from the equation was in my opinion a poor decision. It was also one that was done without consulting staff as a whole, and that was the worse decision.
Had Chaucer been removed by majority vote of staff, or just resigned (which was very likely) I might not have felt the need to resign myself, but I'd still be discontented with the situation. Since I started as staff a year and a half ago I have been pushing for improvements to policy, and it has been a struggle to get any traction. On top of that there have been a number of decisions lately that I have been unhappy about, but I won't go into details. Stepping down seems to me the best way to make it clear how I feel, in the hope that improvements will be made.
I'll still be around as Donna and Colette, and on Discord as Colette_1. I don't intend on airing any dirty laundry, but if you want to talk, I'm around. More importantly, I'm here for that lovely RP!
Lastly I'd like to remind everyone that this is all just creative differences. In this community we've seen all seen games go horribly wrong, and many of you will remember older games with problems that were far deeper and nastier than these. In this situation there are no villains; just good people who disagree how things should be done.
--------------------< Comment 1 - Added Mar 24 10:59PM EDT >--------------------
Shakespeare Commented:
I’d like to thank Coleridge for all she’s done for the game. She’s been a good voice in our discussions, and frequently made good recommendations on feedback on characters, events and theme issues. Staffing is never easy and brings on stress and extra work. I’m very grateful for Coleridge’s contributions, and appreciate the honest discussions we’ve had including today around her choice to leave staff. Thank you, Coleridge.
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm< End +bbread 1/172 >mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Hey Folks,
Rejoice!
For I am going to be stepping down from staff. I know that I have not been the greatest and if I ever did anything that upset you, please accept my apologies or hold a mush career long grudge, your choice!
I was really hoping that I could get myself to stay for the players and I just can’t.
I am nothing but stressed when I log into Stoker and it has been that way for the last couple of months. I come from a different style of staffing and I’ve felt like the odd person out at times on situations. Completely my hangup.
There have been a lot of missteps the last few months and those are also effecting my decision. There also seems to be no change on the horizon, so before I pull all of my beautiful hair out of my head, I will resign and focus on my characters here.
I will leave you with some parting wisdom:
https://i.imgur.com/N2gdXlZ.jpeg
Protect Your Mental Health,
Stoker (Wendigo)
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm< End +bbread 1/175 >mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
We can't +bbcomment on board 1 posts, so in the wake of her resignation (+bbread 1/175) I'm posting here to thank Stoker for all the hard work she put in over the years as a staffer.
Stoker had been helping the game from the start by running Happy Harbor, so she was a great choice to invite onto staff. She always more than pulled her weight in staffing duties, and if you've ever put in a +request for an app, a vacation or pretty much anything else there's a high chance she contributed. Even if you never saw the contribution she would often add informative and helpful staff comments to jobs other staffers were handling, and was active in the staff discord channel, trying to help steer HAM in better directions when it needed it.
Regret nothing, Stoker. Your hair is worth more than the frustration of trying to roll that boulder uphill.
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm< End +bbread 2/541 >mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Just as HAM began, Chaucer and his friends are busy making a revenge game of their very own, one that will even allow plagiarized apps from HAM and use the same, 500-plus page theme/timeline Chaucer has spent years writing to grind everything recognizable about Marvel and DC into a homogenous grey paste that appeals to no one but him and his friends who are written into it. Several of them remain staff on HAM for the moment, the better to recruit players and undermine Shakespeare.
Now, I was one of a number of people banned for filing a complaint against Chaucer. With all the right people seeming to be outraged, I figured - why not ask? (Okay, you know why, but I wanted to prove it to my friends.)
Well, here’s why:
You paged Shakespeare with ‘Hi, this is Prototart. I was, to directly quote your page, kicked for “past acrimony, including issues from games that predate HAM.” This happened after I filed a complaint against Chaucer for insulting me and telling me I was not worth his time over the last character I applied for prior to briefly claiming Raven, a character that had until then been played by a friend of his, an action I have been told enraged both of them as well as several others. Given that the people who have not been fired or resigned are explicitly remaining here to insult you to anyone who will listen and steal players for the revenge game they’re making during occasional breaks from non-stop badmouthing you, your character, and your intelligence in a Discord that isn’t nearly as private as they think it is, does that judgement still stand?’
Shakespeare (S) pages: I don’t have all the details of the incidents fresh in my head. But I think I recall that there I didn’t sense a willingness to work out a resolution, to where I didn’t expect there would be future problems. That’s a hard thing for me to overcome. Definitely for now where I am not fresh up on events anymore, I think the judgment would have to stand, yes.
You paged Shakespeare with ‘I mean, the ‘incident’ was me pushing back on Chaucer when he started to demean me in an app and him telling me he wasn’t worth anyone’s time and to never apply again. I can literally cut/paste the exact statement you made to me, if you’d like. There was a problem that couldn’t be resolved only only because of someone you fired for being abusive.’
Shakespeare (S) pages: It wasn’t a good situation from any angle I agree. But the resolution was as much about how it was handled. People have to be able to resolve conflicts and coexist and sometimes it’s necessary to just sever connections when that doesn’t seem likely to happen. And the way it went, that was the feeling I was left with that any future conflicts would not be resolved either. I’m sorry, but going to be sticking with the decision for the time being.
It might be worth mentioning, at this point, that they DID welcome back someone who was banned for sexually harassing female players, someone banned with a bbpost and all - one that simply vanished one night not long before that player’s OC returned to the grid.
So, remember: being a predator might be bad, but it’s way worse to follow the recommend steps for resolving conflict with staff.
A link to the last thread on HAM, which I didn’t bump because it’s been dead for over a year:
https://brandmuday.mythicus.net/topic/114/comic-games-are-fun
@allthecookies said in MU Peeves Thread:
Jill guest still making the rounds!
Annoying? Yes. Impressive?
… in a way, yes. It’s been fucking 20 years.
wake up, feed the birds, make sure your social security check was deposited, thank the grandkids for the birthday cards, then settle down to log into a random game as a guest and pretend to be a lifeguard to the first female name you see not idle
as someone who once upon a time tried to get rl friends into MUSHing my experience was that the problem is less, like, accessibility and the programs used or whatever and more just that most games are pretty bad and most people on them are pretty weird and off putting to people who aren’t from their very specific subcultures
@somasatori said in Underage Players:
For a long time I’ve wondered how people didn’t figure out that I was a 14 year old masquerading as a 19 year old when I starting MUSHing.
People didn’t notice I was a 9-year-old masquerading as a 17-year-old, people are dumb as fuck.
banning trans characters in the year of our lord 2024 is beyond insane, but doing it on a superhero fuck mush is truly something special
@Tributary said in Pern Dragon Colors:
I think I only read one of the books, and it had a white dragon. I don’t remember any of this.
apparently he was white because he was like this super special dragon who was every dragon color at once and he could time travel
Current: IA — Cir-El, Crush, Jubilee
Former
HeroMUX — Claire Voyant, Fairchild
Heroes Assemble — Claire Voyant, Knockout (but before New Gods were changed to some totally different thing so now she’s a TP Char), Crush, Mary McPherran
United Heroes – Claire Voyant, Fairchild, Ladytron, Illyana
Empire State — Nekra, Gertrude Yorkes, Fairchild, Tried To App Vamp-Blade But Got Yelled At
City of Hope — Missy Mayhem
I would be very interested in knowing the gender composition of the remaining MSB community.
i mean they banned like 3/4ths of the active female posters so
TBH I kind of hate how much stuff has already moved off-game, like, I hate how everything for news and help files always ends up hidden in some badly done wiki instead of just easily accessed in-game and I hate how many people either write like a one line desc or just don’t write at all
From HA (for the record, I’ve played four characters in four years, for four different people who wanted me to play there. One never finished their app, two quit outright, one is so burned out on the game she let that character idle out.)
Submitted by Claudine Renko.
Has been marked Approved by Chaucer
Consider my interest piqued. I think this would be a cool villain concept for people and it sounds like it has a lot of mobility that isn’t dependent on established canon or other events.
Has been marked Revived by Chaucer
Approved Prematurely
Chaucer sent a reply.
Give me a day or two on this one? Sinister himself is a major villain in the plot here and as written, Claudine’s +Sheet is extremely formidable. We are going to need a plot pitch with a TPC-level villain, an arc or a story you’re telling with this character. If you want to make her a more full-time RP option, something you can use for regular RP, we may need to bring the poewr levels down a bit for game balance. The DC and Marvel wikis are pretty useless IMO, the power crawl for most characters in comics is insane.
Claudine Renko sent a reply.
As regards to Sinister, I’ve been careful to avoid anything that would interfere with anyone else using him for literally anything. Something he did triggered, very possibly without him even realizing it because he’s been setting up contingencies for 150 years.
In terms of power – Selene is a full-time RP character. Merlin is a full-time RP character. Lucifer was originally one, not a TP character. Jean Grey, with the full Phoenix Force - including mention of the White Phoenix, which is universe-scale wholesale reality rewriting - is a full-time RP character. Dr. Strange, Superman, Power Girl, Loki, Hellstrom, Blue Marvel. Doom! Even if approved with no changes whatsoever, Claudine wouldn’t be in even the top ten of powerful characters. Especially given that I’ve written this with some actual guidelines and limitations where there are approved, god-level characters whose abilities are written so broadly, so vaguely, and so passingly that they’re able to do literally anything whatsoever. (And as an aside, even that still isn’t actually unbalancing, because power is ultimately a meaningless thing on a game that has no systems and is entirely consent-based. Approve someone as the Judeo-Christian God, all-being and all-knowing, and the reaction of anyone to “I’m unwriting your entire existence from the timeline” is going to be “Uh, no, you aren’t.”)%
Has been marked Denied by Chaucer
Claudine’s not gonna be a good fit for us. We have been making a concerted effort to keep the game balanced whether or not you agree with the necessity of it. Frankly a sociopathic monster of her stripe as a primary FC would be a hard sell under any circumstance. There is no social play that’s a good fit for her.
Your activity level is a factor here as well. You played for just about a week in 2020, came back briefly, then dipped for most of two years. You’ve had one scene with Mary in three months. This is a pattern of a player not interested in sustaining the game through RP and Claudine’s too much of an investment of time and energy on our part. Thank you for your submission.
Tbh I think HA tends to be worse in that regard than a lot of places I’ve been
but - like, when I first started on MUs there was a comic place where a villain team got punished for doing too much and when somebody said at least they were giving people a reason to leave the lounge, the Wizard who punished them - who legit knew nothing about comics she played like some YA fantasy char - said, I will never forget this, “Well, that’s only because nothing fun has been happening in the lounge lately.” And I was like nine when this happened so it’s been, uhm, an ongoing thing w the genre
So it’s not uniquely weird, it’s just I think something that tends to happen when you get people who don’t really understand comics, don’t like comics (which is WEIRD, but it happens, there’s a wizard on HA who vocally doesn’t like OR understand them and will rant about how stupid they are any time something he doesn’t like comes up no matter how inappropriate a response that is to somebody asking ‘can I do Y?’ is) and/or people who really only like that one very specific power fantasy of winning and being popular and lauded
Glorified internet chat rooms always come last. It’s not remotely time sensitive, I just find that “made time” line frustrating - like, what? That just rubs me the wrong way. Nobody talked to me, I responded to a job and 24 hours later, when there wasn’t a reply, I asked about it.
And honestly, it doesn’t really have much to do with a “character issue.” Like - I spent, maybe three hours on that app? It’s an untaken character I was familiar with, with an aesthetic I like, that I could use to do stuff with my friends in the HFC. Not exactly a passion project. The total lack of consistency across apps is definitely an issue that they need to address, and it’s the kind of thing that bothers me - like, if I wanted some batshit insane powerful character there’s Blue Marvel, Exodus, there’s a ton of ultra-powerful characters on their roster I could have got approved in under ten minutes. It’s an issue, but it’s not the issue.
The issue is a staffer using the Royal voice to insult and demean me as a representative of the entire game. And it’s not the first time he’s been wildly inappropriate with me - when I requested the character I have now he told me no, that I needed to go outside my comfort zone and maybe do something with the Titans (uhm, no), and then he immediately went Dark when I told him I was in fact a grown woman capable of making my own decisions. Frankly, that this is someone I was on relatively friendly terms with for a decade makes it even more inexcusable and indefensible than it would be on its own, and it would be entirely inexcusable and indefensible on its own.
It’s an ongoing pattern of behavior with him. Every single complaint I’ve heard someone make about staff on that game has been about Chaucer, both in the colloquial sense of “people complaining” and in the official sense of, people have issued complaints. He’s exploded at guests and players for asking if they could do things from comics he thought were stupid, each time prompting lengthy tirades about why the entire genre - and especially, what that person likes and wants to do - is idiotic. He’s made abrupt pronouncements on what is and is not appropriate for someone to play, and on HOW someone should play (IE, the character I apped could never do anything social - like, The Joker was being played until the Titans harassed him into quitting the entire game). He’s made sweeping changes to played characters without ever bothering to speak to the people playing them, which I know for a fact has led to people dropping them outright.
I don’t particularly give a shit about the character. I wiped all of the character’s traits and had Shakespeare take her off of my Account. It’s, whatever.
What I give a shit about is, is this kind of behavior condoned by the person who in theory runs the game? If I stay there, will I continue to get shit on by someone who’s only interest in being there, dealing with a genre he openly sneers at, usually appears to be writing an ever-expanding timeline everyone but the friends he writes into it ignores (including Shakespeare, who I truly believe has no idea how little in common the game has with Marvel and DC) unless they’re forced to drop a character because he rewrote their entire background to fit into it one day and occasionally making bizarre posts about The Right Way to MUSH or proudly introducing rules for stats the game doesn’t even have? If I try to play another character, will I get another tirade about what a piece of shit I am from someone who repeatedly and without prompting went over Shakespeare’s head to my benefit when he liked me?
That’s the issue.
literally no one in human history has been good enough at describing dick to put that much effort into
for what it’s worth, which isn’t that much, my limited interaction with Lithium was that they were enthusiastic and helpful and that most of the people I’m friendly with there spoke well of them until suddenly people thought they were DWOPP
@Testament said in Comic Games Are Still Fun!:
Guys, I don’t think comic games are still fun.
sorry but what’s not to enjoy about a culture where it’s totally okay for someone to explain in the OOC room that’s it’s fine to date teenagers because of some comics from the 80s
@GF said in Comic Games Are Still Fun!:
@renaveleigh said in Comic Games Are Still Fun!:
his love of treating people who were interested in taking inspiration from comic books like idiots
I know this is the least important thing anyone could ever bring up, but, like, it still drops my jaw when I think about his reimagining of Caitlin Fairchild from a friendless computer nerd with a dumptruck’s worth of self-esteem issues into a genius who routinely invents bleeding edge robots and spends all day barbecuing.
I was literally about to mention this. He made Caitlin Fairchild a devoutly religious Catholic promiscuous lesbian bull-headed jock super-scientist.
Most insulting of all, he used to tell people he did this because he was so impressed seeing me play her that he just couldn’t stand the thought of someone making her a sex kitten.
I’m happy to rag on Chaucer all day, but I think it’s important to recognize that he wasn’t a sole, malicious force that turned HAM into be a bad game with a poisonous culture run by abusive staffers. That’s a rot that starts at the very top. Everything he and his various friends did for years happened with the knowledge and explicit approval of Shakespeare. He isn’t wrong about her, it’s just that he’s also everything he accuses her of being. My very first interaction with her on HAM was her yelling at me for insulting someone who went on a misogynistic incel tirade in the OOC room.