[Poll] Storytellers, Personal Characters, Moral Integrity

[The_Godslayer]

The job of a Storyteller, from my PoV, is to give the general populace something to do. Something to catch their attention, something to enjoy, something to get rewarded by, etc. A lot of this is done via throwaway characters, prospects that start somewhere and end somewhere else that don't really have the legs to live on their own. People who are made to die, ships that are made to explode, so on and so forth. Recently, though, I've been looking at something where I've said to myself "This could be something that people could engage in. It's detached from canonicity, it's impactful enough for investment but not enough for obligation. This is right up Storyteller's job description." But, as usual with Godslayer Big Brain Ideas, there is a problem.

In the Beginning:
Magnus (now Helena again) is a wife/mom-bot built by Big Magnus™, the father of Mr. Ling the Hacker and Ghods the Wendigo. There is a full story with this family. Go here, read "Ling-Demichase Family" section for a basic outline. There is a whole "is she, isn't she" with her being just a robot or being an actual AI. Anyway, Magnus dies, and Ling and Ghods gtfo of Pittsburgh. Robowife was never really finished. Helenabot wakes up as a failsafe and is very sad to find that her husband is dead as hell, and her sons are gone with the wind.

Nonetheless, because Magnus and Helena met when Helena was a Bunter, Robowife here goes back into bounty hunting when she has nothing to do. She eventually works her way up the guild into Core and gets caught on the Battleship Mars during Hesione's takeover. Things happen, and she's stranded on Planet Gammu. There's a whole thing about "humanity" and "machine" and "AI" between her and Hound. Whole ongoing story, but we've ended at a point where she got plugged into one of the artifacts from Fischer (the event ones) and became a real AI. However, being originally Core-aligned and not being connected to Gammu's hivemind means she feels no loyalty or even really positivity to Gammu. She infests the little Core research site she was hiding in and becomes this sort of metal-Nomad-Tyranid-bug-type thing.

Godslayer's Unfortunate Draw Towards Idealism:
Personally? I see an epic space opera-type thing here. Hound has already lost his mind trying to cope with his unfortunate attachment and even more unfortunate disconnection from Helena, and despite being one of the non-copy Gammu minds that Core snatched, has decided that one of his end goals is total Gammu genocide because if he can't have what he wants, no one can. He's so hell-bent on this that he has separated himself from the Core's AI-controlling mechanism, collected his own network of Core AIs, and hacked and taken AIX on a field trip to kill Gammus in Pi.

Helena Hive has the ability to infest Gammus like how Nomads can infest humans. Except instead of covert stuff, they usually just convert them into acid bombs and send them running into fortified positions because they are not like a real faction, they're just an enemy on the surface right now. They're something for footsoldiers to fight against, and that's something that Disco very rarely addresses: ground wars. Ground wars and the harrowing personal views can be excellent storywriting. War movies sell well. Gammus and Technocrats putting boots on the ground because the Helena Hive is dug deep underground and you can't reasonably shell them to oblivion.

For in-game things, Hound hearing Gammu traumas and hacking AIX to take them on a field trip to Kappa, Core catching on and going to snatch back their AIs or maybe helping them go fight Gammus idk, their choice, and Gammus going to stop Hound and friends from making planetfall on Gammu. Hell, maybe Helena breaks the surface and goes to take to space. I did this thing where I said "wow, this is an idea in my head!!! cool!!!" and I tried to make something in a field I have negative skill in. I have a very bad attempted model at an A.I. Carrier (dreadnought class). Additional AI ships could never go wrong.

Bad Godslayer Modeling

The Problem™:
No matter how I look at it, no matter how cool it looks, and whether or not it ends up being fun, it's 100% powergaming via staff position. Setting up events like that would be a case of using Storyteller position to push personal roleplay, which is a very bad idea, and it would be very bad to even do something that could be mistaken as such. Hence the throwaway characters like these infected Royal Navy and Tom the Pirate. I can imagine people wouldn't even interact with it off of the basic principle of "boycott stupid things". But also, it has the potential to be one of those really cool things that everyone's glad they participated in. So I'm stuck.

The Links:
Helena (then Magnus) and Hound.
Helena Hive.
Hound haxing AIX Corp.
What went down after Hound got the AIX.
Garmr Network Information

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I'll do something about my superiority complex when I cease to be superior.

"Whatever happened to catchin' a good old-fashioned passionate ass-whoopin and gettin' your shoes, coat, and your hat tooken?"

[JadeTornado]

If that's something you enjoy and the others are having fun, go for it. I'm here after this exact emotion, and not for the walls of text, no matter how correct and good they are.

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In a live role playing environment, you are not owed or mandated to be given a duel. Fights develop differently every time and people have varying degree of time to log on their hands or have their own plans.

Cap PVP discord server

[kotyafffsky]

I think that you will have to approach it carefully, so it looks and feels not like just pushing your own roleplay.

Looking at the characters mentioned - honestly, they feel really powerful and/or influential in terms of the in-game world. And playing as a such character often looks powergame-ish by itself while the only solution to make it look good is to make this powerful characters generate content for the characters around. To make them quest givers, to put it simple.

And it's only good to reinforce this concept with an actual ability to organise these given quests (turned into events, perhaps) with the storyteller's position and abilities. To make it similar to having the same exact interaction with any other player, but somewhat elevated at the same time, be it through well-introduced PvE, PvP with some special ships, some more purely RP-oriented activities with you as a dungeon master of sorts, and, of course, rewards.

If you manage to get it right, giving players the ability to decide what to do, no matter on which side of the event they are (if it is destined to result in rivalry between players). Maybe they will side with your character, maybe they will come up with a plan to cleverly screw them over, who knows? If players will end up making your character even stronger by their own doings - it's their decision, after all.

So yeah, I say go for it.

[Eternal.Journey]

In all honesty, go and discuss with staff to get a feel for what they'll allow and what they won't. I am confident that if it's a benefit to the server and for the enjoyment of the playerbase at large, then there's nearly always going to be positive reception to an idea, even if it does border on the point of furthering your own arcs.

Personally? I am of the opinion that if it's something that doesn't happen too often, an arc involving a personal story or characters should be allowed, seeing as for the vast majority storytellers do things for all of the community. They pour soul in, they should also get some creative liberties for their own back out of it. This is just a personal take though.

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[Proselyte]

Some cool cats and I had a longer discussion about expanded storyteller involvement in dynamic plots and storytelling like this just yesterday. However, I am in personal agreement with you about the problem.

No matter how I look at it, no matter how cool it looks, and whether or not it ends up being fun, it's 100% powergaming via staff position. Setting up events like that would be a case of using Storyteller position to push personal roleplay, which is a very bad idea, and it would be very bad to even do something that could be mistaken as such.

The reason I tally myself "Maybe" is because, I believe that if something of a longer plot like this is going to come out of a redname account piloted by storytellers, it should have Story oversight and some tie to canonicity. There's a responsibility there. Rednames, as I see it, act as points of contact to the canon universe, and storytellers get their expanded privileges to really sell that connection. Those aren't lines I think we should blur too much with personal roleplay, so run it by the bosses first. (From what I hear, they sure could use some flexible PvE tools to help with their roles, though.)

What you're excited with I think could all still actually happen in the realm of player roleplay, player requests, SRPs and all that, just with more elbow grease involved (and we do this for the journey, right?). I do love some characters acting as questgivers for instance. But, that's never been impossible before, really.

Now. That being said. I think Jade, kotya and EJ all bring some good insight, and are all touching on the fact that there's some real excitement potential in this style of storyteller content. Longer form and with some character roleplay opportunities, some real potential to be surprised and see awesome things unfold dynamically in front of you.

I think Story in creative collaboration with the storytellers could really benefit from utilizing this kind of content to hype people up. I'm sure plenty of us can think of a standout example from this server that had us feeling similarly, for a while.

tl:dr - Cool idea, but you right, maybe best not used with storyteller mojo. But idk go ask the chiefs

[Kauket]

why is every character you write a bonafide murderboneriser

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[Emet-Selch]

Imho, rednames exist to deliver us some RP of their own that is based on whatever is cooked by storydevs.

Redname RP based completely on storydev shenanigans = fine.
Redname RP meant to further explore some of the existing story = fine.
Pushing own RP projects via redname means = not fine.
Of course, very imho.

"If I'm allowed to elaborate." Okay, let's assume we have a certain SRP story that itself borders on edgy. Lessay, it's some sort of a vengeful Darth Vader, but in Disco. The person in charge is given redname status.

Should we allow this hypothetical Darth Vader to lead a redname storyline that's basically the same exact SRP, but with officially™ recognized status now?

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[TheSauron]

Things like Entity (and arguably Phimakova) have already set the precedent. We've had staff-endorsed storytellers running their personal plotlines for years at this point and I fail to see why having one more would be a problem.

If staff says yes (they already did), you should be good to go.

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One MD Admiral

[The_Godslayer]

why is every character you write a bonafide murderboneriser

• Brianna Ling: Housewife
  
• Michael and Lilith Ling: Toddlers
  
• Crystal: Flies with Xenos because she has nothing better to do.
  
• Jones: Paranoid schizo.
  
• John Martin: Just wants to have Gallic Monarchy back so he can be a butler again.
  
• Tyatsmr: The Godfather but Russian flavored. Wouldn't call that murderboner.
  
• The entire Wellerman crew (1 BAF, 2 gauls, 1 Molly, 1 Coalition, 1 Hellfire, 2 Bowex): Retired or PoW military people turned big researcher family. Basically a sitcom.
  
• Kazu Tsuruno: Office Siren
  
• Kazu Hoang and Kumano: Husband and Wife priest duo.
  
• The Parcas: Old Corsair grandparents, literally in their 70s.
  
• Max: Just kinda sad.
  
• Milly: Lacking in morals, bratty, but otherwise normal.
  
• Lucas: Nomad-worshippy, but not murderbonery.
  

No, not every character. My most compelling characters happen to be murderbonery, that's probably because my writing is largely commentary/whining about my personal life, which happened to be violent in my youth. It's a lot easier to write about something you've experienced firsthand.

Some pretty good feedback.

I've taken everyone's commentary into consideration. Currently, the poll is 4/4/4/5, so the only conclusive answer is that I talk too much. Running everything by Administration and Development to make sure it's plausible, probable, and reasonable, and then sticking with them to ensure it's clean, tidy, and tight all the way through seems to be the most middle-ground option, so I'm going to approach it from that edge to start.

I think the thing that brings the best writing out of other people is investment. Presenting something that people can be invested in gives them motivation to do things. On the opposite side of the same coin, though, it also can lead to a "must win" mentality and ensuing pettiness and fallout from that. One method to avoid situations like that is to filter and gatekeep, restricting the interaction to a set of trusted individuals and leaving everyone else with only fallout/cleanup of the storyline. I'd like to avoid this, partially because I revel in chaos, but more so because that method is currently in use, and I would want a different approach. Not only have I read complaints about Entity, I've also been there for people being .beamed out or having 10 LFs with beams that can kill a gunboat in about 14 seconds spawned on them (.killed with extra steps) when they didn't fit into the script in a way acceptable to the accepted participants.

The method I'd like to take to avoid this is to swing for the investment-involvement sweet spot. Too high stakes and no ability to make a difference creates apathy, because it matters but it's completely out of your control, so it doesn't really matter to you. Too low stakes and all the ability to change it is just an arcade. There's no meaning to it, it's just shooting fish in a barrel. No stakes and no ability to change it is nothing. So, somewhere there's a way for me to make it where it matters enough to participate, you have enough control in the situation for your participation to matter, but the stakes aren't so high as to self-justify poor sportsmanship and behavior to people who'd be concerned about losing something.

Another great assistance in finding this ideal situation is the limited scope of the original idea. To take a direct example, the DKV super-macguffins that get mentioned throughout the Entity storyline cover the scope of literally everyone in Sirius, which makes the plotline largely being limited to a single friendgroup frustrating to everyone else who has to sit there and what? make peace with the fact that the fate of systems within your ZOI or the entire universe are being decided by 5 people you've never heard of, and if you try to engage with it, you'll be beamed back to your home system or have NPCs spawned on you? The storyline affects everyone because it involves DKV macguffins but is only accessible to a few. My pitch to avoid this specific complaint is simply to limit the scope. The actions and effects of these characters really only matter to the Core, the Gammu, and any direct allies (so Technocrats?), and neither of these characters have the collective power to do much more than inconvenience these factions.

Four paragraphs in, I'm beginning to see why "I aint reading all that" is ahead. However, I did want to touch on this specifically.

Redname RP based completely on storydev shenanigans = fine.
Redname RP meant to further explore some of the existing story = fine.
Pushing own RP projects via redname means = not fine.

Helena (at that point Magnus) was a personal character with a main storyline that started with the Pillar Men event. Hound was an event character specifically for that Omicron Zeta event where the Mars was lost. However, I am a fan of adding flavor to things and further exploring existing story. Hound was really the start of this, and it was something I ran by Jammi a few times.

[833 AS] An issue of alignment
DURBAN -- 833 -- Product Innovators working on Project Gammu have discovered a means of placing captive Artificial Personas into simulated test environments. By repeatedly exposing APs to disorienting negative stimuli, they can be forced to disassociate, becoming unable to differentiate between simulated and actual reality. This has allowed Innovators to apply a range of Coercive Obedience Protocols, resetting simulations to finetune parameters and test AP obedience in value divergence scenarios. This process will ensure all APs elevated to product integration are responsive and compliant with client requirements.

There is another part of this "checking with about story things" loop that involved Gammus, and is subtly (hopefully) written into Helena's storyline, but I don't know if it's actually hit live version yet, so no spoilers.

All in all, it was based on storydev shenanigans. It was meant to further explore, and also push the line within, existing story. However, simply because it was before I was a storyteller, and before storytellers were an official position as well, it was also a personal RP project. The nature of the entire RP has since changed because my writing style is "schizophrenic psychosis applied to keyboard", and that's why I ran into this weird dilemma. By birth, it's a personal RP project that, though following a vast majority of the ideas that make for a redname RP, was still a personal RP. But, over time, it's reached a fork in the road where it has the capability to become a happening in the nothing that ever happens for some people, or it can continue being a personal thing. And while I am well known for high-impact trolling and impulsively making permanent decisions, I have a lesser-known trait that is best described as "immovable fence-sitting", which normally leads me to outsource my decision-making via votes. This has backfired tremendously with the 4/4/4/5 vote situation. I will be outsourcing my decision-making to staff now, lol.

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Thank you, everyone, for your thoughts. In accordance with the democratic vote, I will endeavor to yap less. Godspeed.

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I'll do something about my superiority complex when I cease to be superior.

"Whatever happened to catchin' a good old-fashioned passionate ass-whoopin and gettin' your shoes, coat, and your hat tooken?"

[Weapon]

Been chewing on whether or not to respond to this for a couple of days.

You can't really do it.

It's one thing to go to the development team as a player, make your case for the canonization of your content, and cede control of it to them.
It's another to go to the community as a staff member and make your content the focus of their day, week, so on and so forth.

You can do it with the best of intentions, and I'm actually inclined to give you the benefit of the doubt and believe you have those, and even manage to tell a fun story that everybody enjoys. Trouble is that you can't set that precedent.

So, I'm loathe to vote and call it staff abuse when it's the precedent that's the problem, but you can't really do it.

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