2007-12-00 - Yoda's Rant about Pace - Please Read

This is most of the conversation from Yoda and a number of MUSHers online over Christmas break. Please read and take into consideration. -El
<Public> Yoda says, "We need to apply the emergency brakes to this MUSH in a major way. :P"
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<Public> Yoda says, "Because, half of the MUSH is in a frenzy to do everything quickly for a codewise advantage, and that leaves the other half of the MUSH panting to keep up and maintain some kind of balance between good RP and codewise response."
<Public> Yoda says, "Sure, you _can_ conquer half the MUSH in a few days through the code. But it's a terrible story."
<Public> Yoda says, "Unless you're RPing with half the MUSH over those few days for like, twelve hours a day."
<Public> Yoda is exaggerating, but not by much.
<Public> Yoda says, "The fact of how quickly planets change hands, and with what desperation, and how quickly everyone's attacking everyone else or avoiding attacking everyone else is becoming maddening to help the MUSH."
<Public> Eluriel says, "Poor Yoda."
<Public> Yoda says, "Not poor Yoda. I've frickin' stopped RPing for the most part. Poor PCs who are trying to RP their IC positions without a hope of doing so because ICly they should be responding to twenty things at once, half of which have been accomplished by the IC machinations of a sole player."
<Public> Yoda says, "This is the issue."
<Public> Yoda says, "We need to _slow_ _down_."
<Public> Yoda says, "You want to take over a planet? That's a big plot, which should involve lots of players and lots of time, even if the code let's you do it in fifteen minutes."
<Public> Yoda says, "The problem isn't the code."
<Public> Yoda says, "It is impossible to make code that can't be abused unless we have a +wiz-approve command for every coded action on the game."
<Public> Yoda says, "And then the game just dies."
<Public> Yoda says, "The point is simple: slow down."
<Public> Agrippa says, "Yoda: It is, at least, a sense of posessiveness over their character, their standing, etc. Which is why we're so desperate for things to happen."
<Public> Yoda says, "Lose it."
<Public> Yoda says, "Maybe I'm lucky cause I play a character who won't die. And who will, because of people's OOC conceptions, invariably garner respect from at least one pool of PCs."
<Public> Yoda says, "But I don't even RP very often. ;p"
<Public> Yoda says, "And I'd rather switch it for a character that was original, anyway-- but I don't trust anyone to run around my grid on level 90 as Yoda. ;p"
<Public> Yoda says, "But this is the point: if you are attached to your character's standing, you can't be attached to your character's story."
<Public> Yoda says, "And if you're too attached to your character's story, you can't be attached to the MUSH's story."
<Public> Yoda says, "If I play an original character, half my question is: is now the time when my character's death benefits my character's story and the MUSH's story the most? Is it time for me to make a new original character, to add something new to the MUSH's story?"
<Public> Yoda says, "My character's IC standing should be ranked at number zero on my list of concerns, except as it relates to my character's and the MUSH's story."
<Public> Yoda says, "Detatch yourself from you character, and if you can't do that at least do this: slow down. We're all guilty of it. Me included, as I try to respond to what's going on here."
<Public> Yoda says, "They are only tempting if you have too much of an attatchment to your character's IC standing and fate."
<Public> Yoda says, "If your attatchment is to the story, you realize when it would be absurd to burn yet another +escape on Cloud City to twinkishly leave Bobba Fett, Vader and the entire Imperial Navy in the dust."
<Public> Yoda says, "Why? Because the story has been them hunting you."
<Public> Yoda says, "You gave them the slip over and over again. They were clumsy, but now they've been clever. They have the whole Imperial Navy in orbit around Bespin, your best friend has betrayed you... it's time to suck it up and get frozen in carbonite."
<Public> Yoda says, "That's the committment to the story that we will require as players in order to make this MUSH good."
<Public> Yoda says, "And not: Hahahahahaaaaa! Vader's distracted with Solo. Now's the time for the Rebel 
<Public> Yoda says, "It's far too easy to lose sight of the story-- the larger world of NPCs and background that's going on around us. The news files and the thought of how the world itself will react as you invade. The notion that a token gesture of democracy may fool people half a galaxy away, but it's not going to fool people on the planet-- and if you're RPing on the planet, you ought to RP the people hating you."
<Public> Yoda says, "But the story is paramount. Not the code. Not the +bank accounts. Not the size of the fleet you +control."
<Public> Yoda needs PCs to be able to work together. I need the equivalent of our Bobba Fett and our Han Solo to be OOC buddies who +os I think I got you this time, you slippery bastard. +os Hahahaaa. Yeah, I guess so. You got Lando, Vader and the Imperial Army. I don't think even I can fast-talk my way out of this one. So, how long do you expect I'll be in carbonite? Jabba's going to be so happy.
<Public> Yoda can't keep up this pace of IC response, OOC duties, OOC smoothing things over and negotiating OOCly between IC enemies, trying to temper peoples' attatchment to their characters' standings and find people a way to balance between their codewise takeover and their RP. And if I can't keep up with this, this MUSH will start to disintegrate. So I need you, all of you all, to step it up. Sincerely. It's all our responsibility. No more gripes about how you're going to lose a planet, and no more sneaked +coded invasions, and no more moving thirty thousand miles per second, because that pisses everyone off somewhere. :P In fact, I might say that the only thing you should be doing without RPing +collecting your paycheck, +investing, and buying stuff. If it affects anyone, then RP it.
<Public> Yoda says, "Take the time to RP it."
<Public> Yoda says, "Even if that means it takes you two weeks to do what you could have done in ten minutes of +commands."
<Public> Yoda says, "No code modifications. They're the biggest headache, and they end up messing with you when you _are_ RPing."
<Public> Yoda says, "I could just @wipe the entire +system, and it won't matter. What matters is how we, as players, play."
<Public> Yoda says, "Everyone has a piece of this story."
<Public> Yoda says, "Figure out what piece it is, and how to win, and how to lose when it's appropriate."
<Public> Yoda says, "No one is innocent. I'm not trying to harp on anyone in particular."
<Public> Yoda has been frustrated at a number of IC events which took place so quickly that my Jedi who are RPing things out could not possibly respond when it would be fully IC of them to respond-- and in response, I took IC actions too quickly.
<Public> Yoda says, "But if I do that, it just enhances the problem."
<Public> Yoda says, "So everyone, cool your jets including me."
<Public> Yoda says, "RP different plots, even many plots, at a slower pace."
<Public> Yoda says, "And if I can't keep up with it, then this place will dwindle. Because if it took my mind and Gulp's to create what makes this place so popular and so consistantly good-- if we don't keep up, the goodness doesn't keep up."
<Public> Yoda says, "Because I have been told that this wasn't clear-- and how would it be-- find a new news file. 'news death'."
<Public> Yoda says, "This place is going to be so much easier post-Episode."
<Public> Yoda says, "Wait until you have time to do a good scene to do anything about a situation, and call other people on it if they aren't RPing out their maneuvers that you are trying to counter with RP."
<Public> Divak Tan says, "Over the line, Smokey!"
<Public> Yoda grins at Bo.
<Public> Yoda says, "It doesn't matter. Moral: we have to slow down. That's all."
<Public> Yoda says, "For now, just everyone read 'news System'-- it sums up the conversation fairly well."
Category:OOC Logs