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| Welcome To The Night You find yourself in London on a dreary, foggy night like any other. But what lurks in the shadows is the stuff of fantasies and nightmares, far from mortal reality. This game uses the cursed and immortal vampiric condition as a backdrop to explore themes of morality, depravity, the human condition, salvation, and personal horror. We are a writing and roleplaying community dedicated to telling complex and engaging stories. Your fate is your own. Mingle among the ivory-tower elite in the Camarilla, join the fight of the discontented and chaotic Anarch rabble, or set out independently and attempt to survive in London's nighttime underworld. Anything is possible in our World of Darkness. Create Your Account! If you're already a member, please log in to your account to access all of our features: |
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| Call for Advice | |
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| Topic Started: Saturday, 28. June 2014, 20:33 (1,710 Views) | |
| Cid | Sunday, 29. June 2014, 23:54 Post #21 |
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Raise the retirement age?
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Here's my two cents. Put it in the vending machine, then immediately press the return button only to find out it doesn't work. The coins have been eaten. Stupid joke out of the way now... First, Dave - why would you not make alts anymore? What makes you think that's what anyone advises or is the best choice of action? Everyone seems to like Malia now, and she took a while for you to create; so halting the alts right now is not going to do any good. Only prevent striking gold/silver/bronze again in the future. Make more chars, please. It's fun. I read Anwen and didn't see a goddamn problem at all. It just needs to be punched up a bit and I think she's playable and worthwhile with enough effort. Now, I'm gonna say 'you' a lot and I'm not just talking to Dave (Dayne/Bolgron/Toran/Lynx/Malia/etc.). I'm talking to the whole board, since I expect more than one person to read this post. If someone thinks I'm talking about them, then maybe I am. But shove it anyway. Okay, a few things. I read the word blunt earlier and wasn't sure if it was really all that blunt. I'm going to try not to pull any punches now, cuz that's what I do when I give advice. World of Darkness. That's the game we play. Not World of Friendship, or World of Happiness, or World of Moderation even. It's meant to be played with/to extremes. Antagonist = good. Happy = bad. Evil = good. Darkness = good. Twu wub = eat a dick. Super happy funtime shiny characters = go fuck yourself. That goes for everyone. Honestly, some people don't seem to get that part. Darkness. If you want to play out fantasies of whatever the hell happiness you wish you had IRL, go find some board that's more conducive to that play. World of fucking DARKNESS is not appropriate to try and roleplay out happy little fantasies of power/family/friends/romance/sex/money/anyfuckingthing/etc. If you have a tendency to get attached to characters and get upset when bad stuff happens to them, then fuck off and don't play World of Darkness. The game's about Darkness and Horror and Terror, all that business. I had trouble accepting that initially, I think, but I got over it. I expect the same of anyone else now, too. It's not a big deal. Everything is supposed to be bad and dark and evil and extreme. That's what sets this game apart from others. This is one of the few, that I know of, mediums that deals with topics like this. Murder, death, necrophilia, rape, incest, suicide, religion, racism, loss of loved ones, metamorphosis, occult, demons, spirits, whatever, I don't know everything off the top of my head. If you can't handle those types of things, or are particularly 'trigger' sensitive, then you probably shouldn't be here. This is a game for adults. Mature adults. I don't know about individual traumas, though, and I'm not making a statement about that or triggers. I don't see a problem with overly sexual or overly racial characters at fucking all. It shouldn't even be a discussion. Those people exist IRL. We all know those people who's lives revolve around one fucking thing, whether it's sex or race or religion or politics. Whatever. Why should anyone be dissuaded from playing characters like that? Are we playing a game, or are we striving to perfect some fucking form of writing that not a single one of us gets yet? Life doesn't even work like that, so why should our game conform to such an unrealistic standard? Fuck picky people. Cliques are bad for Players, but (I think) fine for Characters. A character getting only involved with a certain number of other characters and sticking to a particular group makes sense. Good sense. Clan/Sect/Coterie, that kinda stuff. But if you have alts and you only play with certain Players (thereby mixing your alts and other player's alts together into a clusterfuck of confusion), are unwilling to thread with anyone else because you don't fucking vibe with everyone or whatever bullshit excuse; then you're a bad player most likely. Be a good player first. Good characters are secondary. I see a lot of people pulling shit like that over the time I've been here, so please no one assume I'm singling anyone out. I'm singling EVERYONE out. That I know of. If there's a character that should almost certainly cross paths with another character because they live close by or work in the same field or have the same goals or whatever, then there's really no reason not to thread that out. They don't have to like each other. Like has been said before, having a rival/antagonist makes for good story. Stories, being that this is a writing board for a game called World of Darkness, should take priority over fucking cliques and internet friendships. I dislike throwing random characters together for no particular reason other than just cuz the players want them to have a connection. But then again, that's about the only way some people can do that sometimes. I have a hard time with Agustin forming relationships with other characters, but that's how it should be. Even with all the random encounters, shit's never going to go well and that's how it's supposed to be. I dislike some players, and I regularly talk to some others, but I try not to be picky about who I play with just based on that. I dislike most, if not all, characters (including my own). I'll reiterate; fuck happy sunshine fun stuff. I, as should most of us, enjoy WoD for what it is. I don't want it watered down to MLP level shit. I enjoy the blood and hatred and violence, etc. Moar, please. Don't fucking dilute the game just cuz you (or someone else) is in the wrong place (here). In conclusion (I think) - God, I fucking hate cliques. If you're doing that shit intentionally, I fucking hate you. So, that's my input and opinions. Take it or leave it. IDGAF. Also, this thread should have been posted in Roleplay Discussions. /Endrant. And sorry for the vitriol. I hope no one takes what I've said the wrong way. Although if anyone does, I'm prepared to yell back at them. ![]() always with some love Cid, tired of everyone's shit |
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| Sawyer | Monday, 30. June 2014, 00:19 Post #22 |
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Friendly Neighborhood Vampire
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One thing to amend to Cid's take on things- the world (of Darkness or otherwise) is not composed solely of monsters or of extremes. Circumstances are dark. Situations are dark. The inevitable outcome of relationships and friendships and fate is inevitably dark. But that shouldn't prevent people from creating characters who still somehow aspire to be Good People. A morally conflicted monster, a person striving to live an ethical life in a hellish world, a confused and average individual swept up in situations beyond their control- these are all potentially compelling characters. It's better in my opinion to see a well-rounded and human concept than an absolute monster. No monster is absolute. If they're absolute, they're no longer interesting. Extremes are difficult to find believable, and they're difficult to play believably. At some point, we can no longer regard them as humans. They become caricatures, action movie figures, larger-than-life cardboard cut-outs. Maybe those sort of characters are fun to play for some people- I certainly can't pull it off. But I know that I as a player have no desire to interact with a character like that. For one, they're predictable. For two, reading them will consistently and constantly break my sense of realism. They don't compel me. They don't interest me. They end up stale and provoke more eyerolls than awe. If I read a backstory and end up mentally groaning "like that happened", then I'm already giving up. I want to read about people- evil, good, or otherwise, people trapped by limitations and inflamed by passions, people who exist in shades of gray. People who are more than just the sum of their experiences, but whose narrative is theirs and theirs alone, told through their eyes, colored by their personalities. Is a bio the end-all-be-all of creating a character like that? I'd sure hope not. As you thread and write, a character should grow and change and evolve. They should see their ideals challenged, their passions crushed, their moral compass sent spinning. That's interesting to read about. The World of Darkness, whatever that means, is composed of personal horror, not horror alone. It's not just a relenting parade of the macabre- it's a direct challenge to each character, a resolute stomp on the face of every bug in London. There's no one-size-fits-all version of horror. But bad things will inevitably happen, a character's dreams will fall apart, and if you think there's a happy ending, then it's not the end yet. I would rather read about the sort of person I could meet on the street or at work or in a classroom and see that person put into circumstances beyond their control because that shit is interesting. Someone whose biography is full of unlikely, extraordinary circumstances makes me think "well where are they gonna go next?". I don't care about them as people- they've already lost me. How to make a well-rounded character? I don't know. Honestly, I don't. Draw from personal experience, maybe. Spend a lot of time writing in their perspective. Ponder their likes and their dislikes and their childhood memories and the sort of things they have nightmares about. Get under their skin. Learn who they are. Treat them as full-fledged individuals, even if you're the one tugging on their puppet strings. Know them as people before you start playing. And believe in them yourself. Second point that Cid's spot-on about: not everyone will like your character, no matter how good you think they are, or how much you like them. This is an inevitability. Friction is interesting. The way they come off in threads may be something you can control, but you can never control the other person's reaction. The relationship between two people that loathe each other, however, can be just as interesting as the relationship between friends- if not even more so! And just because one impression is established in a thread doesn't mean it will last- relationships change and evolve, just like characters. Loathing can turn into grudging respect. Mentors can turn into a target of resentment. Friends can turn into lovers who can turn into miserable ball-and-chains. Characters will ruin one another's lives. But in the process, they will hopefully shape them in interesting ways. We are, in the end, telling stories. Always keep that in mind. |
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| Dove | Monday, 30. June 2014, 07:23 Post #23 |
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Tramp
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Anyone ever make a post and tag it as OPEN? Shit, son. You failed at cliques. I'm so sick of seeing that shit flung at everyone in the hope it will stick. This board is full of opportunity for ANYONE to enter threads and do their thing, but if you have a character that joins a thread only to sit in the corner sniffing the wall for three posts before they make a quiet exit, then dayum. Guess what? Making no effort then leaving only to complain about cliques OOC is YOUR OWN FUCKING FAULT. There are plenty of open threads. USE THEM. Or alternatively, don't use them and whine about cliques. I can only speak for myself (even though I know others feel the same way*) but a sure way to ensure nobody wants to touch a character is the player whining about stupid shit like cliques. On another note. Dove loves fried chicken. Charlie Trobbytronka is traumatised by this because as a small child he had a pet chicken who was run over by a KFC lorry. Distressed, Charlie sends me a pm to tell me that he is upset about Dove's eating habits. Should I make Dove a vegetarian so as not to upset Charlie? Hell no. Charlie has a problem. Charlie should get help. If Charlie cannot handle a story about chicken on a board for vampires then there's not much I can do about it. This board is not real life. It is fantasy. (The clue is in the vampire part). Sorry Charlie. This ain't tumblr. If we have to start adding trigger warnings to everything just in case... I am not going to be at all happy. Not talking NSFW tags, those are just common sense. *So I guess they're my clique. olol. |
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We don't have to wait till the morning, the Sun will never go down. And we will be this way forever. Dove stuff! | |
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| Victoria Scott | Monday, 30. June 2014, 10:22 Post #24 |
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Unbowed. Unbent. Unbroken.
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Alright, I too will give my two cents. Please Dave, read what everybody is writing as an advice, which is what this thread was made for. Why don't I thread with your characters? Because last time I tried to thread with a character of yours he scurried out of the Tripper first post Tory told him "Nope". And that wasn't even a personal attack. Believe me, Tory says nope a lot. Tory will never. EVER. Make a friend first thread. I cannot think of a single character -apart from Pisces- that haven't hated her the first time they met. Because she's blunt. And a bitch. As Jhael said, I cannot ever think of fast paced relationships regarding Tory. If this is what your characters need, then we simply are not made to thread with each other. I've read you and I've seen you follow this mechanics more than once. Seriously dear, you give up way too easily and I know what I'm talking about. Remember Tory made a good amount of antagonists and no friends in her first weeks here? Hell, even Mac was suspicious when they met again in London! And they had saved their asses more than once in New York, they fought together in Sabbat-swarmed warzones. I would retire her if I were to take first impressions as points of no return. Some PCs need their time. What I'm trying to say here is please, don't give up so quickly. Now to the rest: I agree with what Sawyer and, I can't believe I'm saying this, Cid wrote. Think of those cyberpunk movies and novels of the 80-90 decades. Think Blade Runner or Neuromancer, even Ender's Game. The gloomy setting, the decadent society ruled by technology and power where friendship and love are not entirely possible without a good dose of tears, shredded souls and challenge. The eternal conflict between machine and natural life. A biological being and an artificial one. Ever thought of vampires that way? Our characters are all individuals that, one way or another, were denied their continuity in the path of natural evolution and thrown into a pile of monstrous, artificial superbeings surrounded by string pulling elders. How can they not fear themselves when they now prey in what they once were? Every step they take draw them closer to what they loath because, either they die -which is not easy to accept, with a survival instinct stronger than ever-, or they become paranoid, voracious monster that will one day pull the same strings they once tried to shake off. This is a game of personal horror and hell. I'm pretty sure I'm on the right if I say this is a way for all of us to fight our inner demons and fears, our most traumatizing experiences, through our characters. Triggers will be there for all of us because we live vicariously through copies of ourselves. Once we press the 'Post Reply' button we become the string pulling monsters. We take the same creatures we once lovingly created and throw them in a pit of ravenous lions to see how they -we- would react. In a way this helps us overcome those things. This will sound crazy but I can clearly see how I evolved not only as a player but as a person in the 9 months I've been writing here. Happiness, love and joy will be there of course, but mostly it will be pain. In my own opinion, if you can't feel your character seethe in rage, pain and anguish inside of you, if you can't join and fully embrace this feelings, then you are not doing it right. ((Disclaimer: But carefully here. Bleedings are a tricky thing. Never forget that your character is a piece of yourself but also has her own esence (and it's important that you give them their own traits regardless yours). Wanting to ravage another character because it disgraced your baby is cool. Wanting to kill the player and feeling like all this things were against you and not your PC is wrong.)) Aaand... That's all. Sorry if I didn't make much sense. I'm definitely not a morning person. |
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| Lynx | Monday, 30. June 2014, 12:45 Post #25 |
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Lord Torchwood
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Thank you all again for your feedback. |
color code 00CC00 #BC8F8F: Japanese ![]() “if you consider a woman less pure after you've touched her maybe you should take a look at your hands” Permanent Fangs - Flaw Sharpened teeth from fangs back - Frenzy Mark | |
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| Jason B. Dahlgren | Monday, 30. June 2014, 18:12 Post #26 |
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För Kung och Fosterland
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-written, edited, rewritten and deleted after about ten different tries-
Edited by Jason B. Dahlgren, Monday, 30. June 2014, 18:12.
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Swedish - English - French - Latin Amber wolf eyes - Permanent fangs - Claw-like nails | |
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| Malia | Monday, 30. June 2014, 19:52 Post #27 |
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I'm a Queen
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So. I made this thread asking for advice on a toreador concept. That was what I was looking for. I got a little bit of feedback in that regard and a great bit of feedback on other issues that I wasn't looking to go into. I'm not going to lie. My feelings got hurt. They did. I was upset. I found some of the things said to be very frustrating. To the point where I started wondering if I was doing the right thing by playing on the board. Because it felt like "I the player" was under attack. Then I reminded myself that a lot of people are socially awkward and have trouble phrasing things. I reminded myself that I have a tendency to take everything in a very negative light because of my depressive syndrome and my own poor communication skills; and I reminded myself that it was just a game. So I chose not to let it make me more of a depressed wreck than I am normally. I also asked those people who knew I was upset not to get involved because I didn't want to see this turn into a he said she said situation where people felt compelled to defend each other and turn things into a raging argument. I don't articulate myself well over the internet. I have a tendency to state things in a very assertive manner. Normally my tone of voice and body language reveal that I'm pretty insecure about things, even when I say something in a strong manner. It is not my intention to sound like a butthurt whiner, or start any fights. That is not my goal. For this reason I sometimes have a very hard time having a dialogue on the subject of my strengths and weaknesses because it gets emotional and I just end up flailing around. That doesn't really HELP me develop my skills as a player and a writer. Nor does it help me make and keep friends. There were a couple of things that frustrated me. Building a character relationship from a false start only works if people are willing to put the person into more than one thread with a person. Yet time and again I've tried to communicate with players about setting up more than one thread, and been giving a number of reasons why they are unavailable for threading. "I have too many threads." "That thread doesn't interest me." "I don't have an time right now." Or, more often, no reply at all. PM's and Skype messages simply vanish into the mist, never to be replied to again. I try not to take it personally, but it does bother me on some level. So while it CAN be interest to develop characters who start off on the wrong foot, it's only possible to do so if both players are interested, and I have rarely found the OTHER player to be all that interested when I've tried to do just that. In fact some story ideas that I've had that have been accepted have been sidelined for months of IRL time, which leaves me feeling like the other players have no real interest in picking up the potential plot hooks I've tried to work out. I am fully aware that Vampire the Masquerade is a dark setting. But I've found that not many people are interested in actually having an antagonistic relationship between characters. Not if it involves there characters being actually HURT or suffering loss. I've asked people about it and gotten zero positive feedback in that regards. I've also had to deal with PM's from people who got upset with me and bent out of shape simply because my character didn't appear to LIKE THEIRS enough. Demanding to know why my character didn't get along with theirs. That has made me extremely hesitant to consider trying to develop a relationship in which my character is actively malevolent towards another persons. Several of people have said they don't thread with me, have no interest in threading with me, then gone on to state why. Well, that's a pretty self-defeating way to give a person "advice" because you started your statements by explaining how I wasn't worth the time to interact with to begin with. That makes it pretty hard to actually take your feedback as anything but a looked for opportunity to dig into someone you didn't like. I'm choosing to believe that that was not the intention of the feedback offered and that these people genuinely felt that by telling me they didn't want to thread with me and why, they were giving me what they perceived of as advice to change. For all of that, some of the advice was useful, some of it wasn't. I am an impatient person. It is a serious character flaw and I've been working on overcoming it. This impatience does bleed into my characters, though I've also been working on reducing that bleed. But I can't show that I'm growing as a player and overcoming these tendencies if people aren't willing to give me the chance; and one of the main things I've come away with from the things that have been said in this thread, is that people don't seem to think I'm worthy of that chance. That could well just be my tendency to take things negatively, and I'm going to let that feeling go because I don't think it's one I SHOULD take away from all of this. I'm choosing to think that it was just a collection of people who felt they were offering constructive criticism that may have accidentally hurt my feelings. That is how I'm choosing to take it, and how I'm going to attempt to process what was said. |
English Norwegian Spanish I'm bad, and that's good. I will never be good, and that's not bad. There's no one I'd rather be than me.![]() | |
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| Jane Marlow | Monday, 30. June 2014, 20:49 Post #28 |
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Vampire Damage Control Professional
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Good job, love--that sounds like a really constructive and healthy approach to take. Criticism can be extremely difficult to take, even when presented perfectly and even when you're not struggling with depression, and soliciting it and responding to it constructively is a sign of great maturity. I hope you're doing okay. Based on the stated wishes of the thread starter, I'm going to close this thread. |
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8:30 PM Jul 11