@MisterBoring said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:

@somasatori said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:

Trophy tends towards the gritty fantasy

You forgot golf

I haven’t tried it, but that looks great

Perry Bamonte, the lead guitarist of the post-Disintegration-era of the Cure

@Ominous said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:

I think exploring other story game designs, such as Everyone is John, Dread, Microscope, Band of Blades, The Quiet Year, The Fall of Magic, Swords Without Master etc.

hell yeah weird little story game recommendations!

Also check out Lovecraftesque, either Trophy Dark or Trophy Gold, any number of PBTA games but especially Apocalypse World itself, Pasión de Las Pasiones, Worldwide Wrestling, Brindlewood Bay, and Urban Shadows.

Each of those really takes a stab at an existing genre of RPG and shifts it into a different mechanism of storytelling. Urban Shadows is probably one of the closest analogues to World of Darkness, but really does something unique with regards to how organizations and play settings are created. Both Pasión de Las Pasiones and World Wide Wrestling seem silly on their face, but are surprisingly impactful to play (one is a game about telenovelas and the other about the lives of professional and semi-professional wrestlers). Trophy (any iteration) is great for examining our relationships to fantasy roleplaying games. You can make it as high or low fantasy as you want, but Trophy tends towards the gritty fantasy – it was described once as “if A24 made a D&D movie.” I also may or may not be suggesting Trophy Gold because I have a credit in it. Brindlewood Bay has probably the best mystery-creation-and-solving system I’ve encountered, but it also takes a “the game is a conversation” stance towards it. If you find that you like Brindlewood Bay, also check out the game Public Access,

Lovecraftesque is very similar to Everyone is John, but everyone plays a facet of a Lovecraftian protagonist, which is fun when bits of the psyche start getting warped by the mythos.

@junipersky I have no idea who these people are but these sound like very cool plots. That Norwood one is very neat and more consequences like that need to happen on games.

It always seems like there’s an overemphasis on wounding a character physically, where combat is going to be the thing that has the big negative consequences (speaking for WoD games mostly here), but it would be great to have more of those plots where the consequence is some kind of moral injury.

@Pyrephox Oh, fair enough, yeah! I was mostly using that as an example where people might be good at handling the big stuff but might have issues with more minor inconveniences. Definitely not to excuse the behavior or attempt to convince anyone to engage in it, for sure. My point was that levels of reactivity might vary or be surprising based on what the stimulus is. I think I’m also perceiving this from the older school staffer perspective of “everyone gets to play” even if the person isn’t a good fit for the game (and also not from a player perspective).

I’ve met a handful of people who get really aggravated when small rolls in social scenes don’t go their way, but who can handle poor rolls in larger scenes. I feel like this maybe falls into the “mushers don’t like to be humiliated” point mentioned elsewhere in the thread.

@Pyrephox said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:

The only real way, I’ve found, to know is to see how people handle small failures in play, before trying to work through the big setbacks with them.

So, there’s this really interesting inverse effect that I have noticed clinically in many of my patients with large capital-T trauma: People who have experienced particularly traumatic events tend to react really negatively to very small events*, or what might be might be considered pretty minor-to-moderate annoyances by a lot of people, but on the flip-side they tend to be very blasé or even good when something major happens.

Not saying that every MUSHer who endorses this attitude has this going on (though surprisingly more than one would think), but I feel like my approach to someone saying this would be more to introduce a negative element and then slowly increase the tension. Alternatively, I would have them be witness to people who I know would react well to their characters’ lives getting ruined and seeing what their opinions and perspectives are on those events. I also tend to temper my approach to evaluate someone’s reaction to certain things, which is partially because my perspective as a trauma-informed clinician is that I must be aware that we all got something that’s a no-go.

*this is obviously an “it depends” thing and isn’t intended to be diagnostically relevant in this instance, where I speak about MUSHing; while it has some research on it under the term “trauma reactivity” it’s also very anecdotal in this case

@hellfrog said in Bad Stuff Happening IC:

And I do! I do not like the ooc assumptions that most often come with playing something other than 100% friendly

Exactly this, and I feel like due to this I often will take on a more affable demeanor because my characters can be assholes and I don’t want to be labeled OOCly in the same vein as my IC.

I put the top response because I do want it to happen regardless, but I think with the same caveat as everyone else. I also would prefer bad things to be done to my character by someone whose writing ability I respect, and who I think might have a plot or overarching theme in mind rather than just an arbitrary sniping situation.

No one wants your death pose to be delivered by someone who can’t put together a decent goddamn sentence

@Faraday said in AI In Poses:

Good to be skeptical, but I don’t think it’s quite that bad. More like “5 out of 6 doctors agree!” advertising. It is a meta-analysis of studies that (as far as I can tell) were done by other people. There are still a host of potential biases in play. My general point was that even with all those potential biases, they’re still admitting that sometimes they’re only getting a “B”.

Good call-out here! I am apparently in Reviewer #2 brain these days whenever I look at any research work. It’s great that they discussed their limitations and identified that there will still be some cases where they’ll miss the mark. I completely overlooked that part of your previous post!

@Trashcan said in AI In Poses:

This white paper, published by Originality.ai, which concluded that Originality.ai is the best checker,

while I’m not disputing that Originality.ai is good as I’ve never used it, this is the same vibe as “we have investigated ourselves and found that we’re the best”

@Faraday said in AI In Poses:

forgets that she has a fan in her hand from one pose to the next

yes, uh, damn that forgetful AI, ahem >.> <.<

I appreciate the pose examples because I wouldn’t have thought they would look like that. There’s still a vague sense of uncanny around a couple of the lines there, like

“the sort reserved for moments that amuse rather than unsettle”

and

“the plain cut of a coat and the steady set of shoulders register in her mind as particulars to be filed away”

but it may be hard to recognize among a series of other poses if you were in a larger group scene.

@Muscle-Car said in AI In Poses:

@Tez So you call yourself a role player? [smirk.jpg] Name all poses.

What’s your favorite pose? Oh, heh. Yeah, that was okay. I prefer the earlier @emits.

@Tez said in AI In Poses:

@somasatori This is inaccurate to how they would actually respond. I was actually just saying this elsewhere, but the technology changes RAPIDLY, and we are fooling ourselves to think that is what it looks like, or that what we recognize now we will recognize in six or even three months.

It’s too bad, since it would be easy enough to just separate it out. It’s hard to imagine what the endgame of using an LLM to RP would be, since the implication would be that if you’re using it, I could be using it, so … what, we’re just having our LLMs RP with each other? Even the staunchest “LLMs reduce the mental load/writing barrier on the player to dig into the story” advocates have to admit that would be a useless future for the hobby.

I know that AI models are slightly more sophisticated now, but whenever I picture attempting to RP with someone using an LLM for their poses, I imagine me writing out a big scene set, and then someone responding with the sort of stereotypical AI bowing and scraping it does.

Just pulling from a scene I ran back on Fallcoast in like 2015 because logs are forever (names removed):

The Forbidden Gate is one of the more frequented Gates in Fallcoast, and with good reason. It typically leads to one of the more stable and easier parts of the Underworld to access and travel through, rather than some of the others, which lead to winding caverns and mazes. Player1 and Player2 are able to push their way through the Gate and get into the Autocthonous Depths, pulling themselves through the initial tight squeeze of the caverns directly beyond the Gate until they reach the larger mass of empty rock interspersed with pillars, the place where most of the Rivers tend to wind up being.

Like usual lately, this part of the Underworld is a quiet place almost devoid entirely of ghosts and the Unfettered. It seems bizarrely empty; not even the sound of something moving in the dark beyond the Sin-Eaters’ line of sight can be heard. Only the rush of some Underworld River in the distance, and the scent of stale, fetid water that’s been standing for some time.

Player1 glances about and says, "It sounds like you were referring to how few ghosts are around these days. You’re absolutely right! Now I notice that there are no ghosts at all—it looks like they have fled deeper into the Autocthonous Depths. It isn’t just eerie. It’s terrifying.

Rob Reiner, director of such greats as Princess Bride, my dad’s favorite movie (Sleepless in Seattle), Wolf of Wall Street, and This Is Spinal Tap was apparently murdered in his home with his wife.

Edit: Evidently, they were murdered by their son.

Some poor med student attempting to use GPT to write a paper for their ophthalmology class:

“The patient’s orbs glistened with lacrimal fluid like morning dew…”

though this non-MUSH-related thing also annoys me about AI and the techbro insistence that it must be in absolutely every product:

I typo’d “b and”. No one calls a watch band a “watch B&”. This is a very Hello Fellow Kids reaction, because if I had to guess it’s assuming that I’m using some sort of slang.

Yeah, I would personally never call myself a coder, just an extreme hobbyist (also my knowledge of code starts at Evennia/python and ends at Evennia/python, with a very minor knowledge of TinyMUX/MUSH functions from 13 years ago thanks to Cobalt doing a code class back then). The setting and story is where a game really lives and breathes for me. I have admittedly a million ideas for games, but those ideas often have very specific stories, locations, characters, etc. which/who I will generally feel the need to write out, for better or worse. I personally don’t think this is an abnormal perspective for MUSH developers, especially the ones who are driving the setting, or story if something like a metaplot exists. Obviously we all can’t make an Arx or write a bunch of setting lore like Empire or some of the WoD projects. However, even if you’re just coming in with a new game that’s completely barebones, aren’t you at least interested in seeing what happens based on how the world is developed by your players? That probably requires some investment in the creation process.

I’m reminded of this comment that I read, or maybe was highlighted in one of the writing youtuber people that I watch, where someone was saying that LLMs allow writers to bypass having to work out the prose to get to the plot. This defeats the purpose of writing, in my opinion. I have like no physical artist bone in my body, so it could be that I’m reacting in the same way as my artist friends do when they see AI art.

I’m not trying to start anything, but a lot of this description is kind of why I shied away from Berem (aside from losing all time to do anything outside of work, family, sleep).

No shade for anyone using AI in code; to be clear, I don’t know if that’s the case here. Also, I’m not even sure if they actually used AI in the setting writing, but it just hits 100% of all of the hallmarks described above, including the use of emojis.

And the text itself:

The Town’s Growth

Berem was carved from wild woods and stubborn fields. The founders built it where river met forest, shielded by cliffs and watched over by a shimmering lake. They poured their remaining magic and wealth into it: a stout Town Hall to govern, a Marketplace to trade, an Inn for wanderers, and a Temple so Berem’s spirit would be forever honored.

Word soon spread across Mystara’s Known World — not of a bustling metropolis, but of a place where young heroes could find their first footing. Here, a novice could earn coin protecting caravans, clearing nearby ruins, or rooting out trouble in the thick woods. Berem’s Tavern became famous for its worn quest board, where calloused hands posted cries for help — and new legends were born.

The town’s location remains a curiosity. Some maps mark Berem near Darokin, others whisper it lies close to the edges of the Five Shires, or in the misty borderlands beyond Karameikos. Berem itself cares little for such speculations. It belongs to the world, and to those bold enough to find it.
️ A Beacon for Adventurers

Berem today remains what it has always been:

• A starting point for wanderers, outcasts, and dreamers.
• A resting place for those who need healing or hope.
• A memorial to courage — not grand, but real.

Its harbor welcomes merchant ships. Its smithy forges the blades that will one day sing in distant halls. Its temple bells toll for the fallen and the triumphant alike. And every so often, beneath the light of the high tower’s beacon, a new band of adventurers sets forth — hearts full of hope, blades newly sharpened — carrying the spirit of Berem into the wide, wild world.

They say if you stand quietly at the town’s entrance when the mist rolls in, you might just hear Berem’s laughter on the breeze — urging you onward.

I’m not sure why I had such a visceral reaction to it. Generally speaking I don’t care if people use AI in code, and I will usually have a kind of ‘meh’ reaction to seeing AI art (especially the piss-filter images on the NPC pages on the Berem site), but the writing just took me entirely out of it.

If I had to guess, it’s because I can see my own motivations for using AI code or something to help facilitate a location where I can tell a specific story. If you use AI for everything altogether, then I wonder what the point of having a writing-based game is, or why you would create a unique location in a world at all. Berem is not, to my knowledge, part of the Mystara canon, so if you have an idea for a cool little adventurer town, why not write it up yourself? Idk. This also is likely not completely on topic, since most of the discussion is on AI in the real world rather than in our corner of it.

No one asked about this but one of the reasons why Luddites are so maligned as just anti-technology morons is because of pre-Marxist class struggle, which was won by the burgeoning industrialists and capitalists of the early Industrial Revolution period. Many of the luddites, as labsunlimited mentioned, were professionals who knew their craft well. Many of them had probably grown up being taught the craft by parents who had apprenticed them to other expert crafters, and had a great deal of generational knowledge about a specific handiwork. The Luddites weren’t protesting technology, they were protesting the development and financing of machines that created cheap, replaceable, and easily manufactured versions of handcrafted things. I think the main contingent were weavers, but I could be misremembering that. On one level, you could view it as bourgeoisie vs. petit bourgeoisie (industrialists/capitalists vs. small business owners), but many artisan crafters of the turn of the 19th century often lost their business due to cheaply manufactured goods and ended up working in those same factories. Or they wound up in poorhouses, I guess. In the US they probably just starved to death because we’ve always been who we are.

Engels talks a little bit about this in The Condition of the Working Class in England, which is a good historical reference regardless of one’s personal opinions on Marxism or socialism, as you can see elements of this same conflict between the advent of new machines to perform traditionally human labor in our current conversations about AI.