HOW'S THE GAME?

[paradisamods]

HOW'S THE GAME?

It's been awhile! It's time for another round of Game Discussion, also known as "How's The Game?"

Here we come together to discuss the game, its plots, the settings, and just about anything we can think of that we'd like to talk about, expand upon, improve, change, etc.

This is not an HMD for players and their characters; this should be about the game's function as a whole and not the people in it. If there is something you feel is absolutely necessary to address that involves a specific person, please IM a mod first to discuss it. We can be reached at terraqueous orb (Kayla), end title (Fudgey) or a great fanfare (Jenn). (Though Jenn is on hiatus right now because her laptop is broken, so Kayla or Fudgey would be best for right now!)

Anonymous will be left off for this round (see first section).

Here are the sections that we've come up with. Add your own and we'll edit it into the list.

Anonymous: Why is it turned off?
What do the mods/helpers do, anyways?
How is my activity being monitored?
Activity check changes
Applications/turnover rate
 → Test Drive Comm
Abilities on the application
Villains & Heroes
 → Recent Villain Activity
 → Upcoming Villain Activities/Plots
Death
World Plot/Paradisa Lore
 → Concrete Resolutions, etc.
Canon Updates
Mini-plot Planning
Changes since last HTG
Plots in General
Regular Plots?

How's The Game will now be held quarterly, in order to avoid excessively long stretches in which there is no outlet for discussion.

Comments

i'm in the wrong account but this is valerie/soopagrrl

[wwanderful.livejournal.com]

The additional permanent loss is already in effect going forward.It may take a while for them to discover the additional loss or they may not associate it with their death, but Paradisa is all about toying with them in that manner. ;)

[teds-up.livejournal.com]

Thinking it over, I still think additional permanent losses isn't the way to go. If there are other muns who plan on having their character die more than once, feel free to jump in, since personally I have never really exposed my characters to death.

I think additional permanent losses has the potential of going into the 'breaking the character' zone. A permanent loss is something that's supposed to deeply affect a character. Something precious has been taken from them. If a character dies so much as two times, that's three things they held important gone. That seems like a lot to deal with, especially for a character who's only died twice. (I'm not saying that multiple deaths for one character is practical, but in a place like paradisa, especially for residents who stay a long time, dying twice doesn't seem so unlikely.)

I know that Ted is a pretty resiliant character. If he died and came back knowing he had now lost two important things, he'd be quite a bit upset, but he would be able to rebound after awhile. But three things? I don't think even he would be able to deal well with that. I know for certain that if -I- had three very important things of mine gone, I would feel extremely lost for a very long time.

Maybe an additional permanent loss after two deaths would be better. I think the experience of a first death for a character, with a death mark and weakness, would be enough of an emotional deterant, at least for awhile. When a character dies the second time, they'll be not exactly 'okay', but less apprehensive of the experience and fear. It's the new permanent loss that makes the second death scary. And it'd definitely be enough of a deterant for dying a third time as well. I doubt any character would easily sacrifice their 'third strike' when the potential of dying in Paradisa is quite a bit higher than in one's regular world due to all the powerful beings within it.

And I think it would be best if the character knew, upon being revived from their second death, that they had something else taken from them permanently. They don't have to know what it is, and it may still take them quite awhile to figure it out, but their gut tells them that they lost something else valuable to them. I understand that Paradisa likes to screw with them by making it mysterious, but the point is to make death scarier, and frankly, if they can't associate between the two right away, it will take a long time for characters to figure it out. Not knowing exactly what their new permanent loss is is plenty mystery enough, I think!

[dusk.livejournal.com]

I think the problem here is that .... from the start, Paradisa has been presented as a castle that feeds on souls. The energy that it takes basically taking their body, making it work again, healing up everything that was wrong with them to kill them requires a price in exchange, not unlike when they're first pulled here. It's simply not feasible for them to scrape by without a serious consequence of that manner, whether it's the first, second, or fifth time.

On top of that, Paradisa does not really care how lost or upset the character feels - in fact, it's probably glad that they do. It also thrives on emotion of the resident and freaking them out in whatever way it possibly can is the best way to incite that.

While there's some OOC issue there with what happens to the character after dying so many times ..... I don't think there's been more than one - maybe two - characters in the entire history of the game who have died more than twice. I honestly don't really foresee it being an issue - and like you said, it could take them awhile to figure out what it even is, so it wouldn't be like, wake up and WHAM GUESS WHAT YOU LOST SOMETHING SUCKS TO BE YOU that they have to deal with right away. It'd give them time to deal with the death itself, and then they could find out about the loss later.

[teds-up.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know that Paradisa feeds on negative emotions. I'm just saying, three permanent losses seems like it would start getting into the character breaking point. Even if there haven't been a lot who have died more than twice, there have been quite a few who have died twice, correct?

I absolutely agree that there should be a heavy price to pay! And maybe there could even be some sort of compromise-- like having the option of tacking on another permanent loss on the first death, and having it be required for the second death. Adding on another permanent loss... I think for some muns, that would be really dissuasive. Especially for those who play characters with less screentime/info who might not have anything really apparent beyond their first important thing. Not giving an option seems... a bit strict and unfair.

And again, I think they should at least have a sort of gut feeling to go off of. From what I know, characters don't die in Paradisa too often. I haven't seen any deaths in the three weeks I've been here but asldfkj I could just have skipped over it rofl. That being said, it would take a good, long while before characters started associating death with another permanent loss. Which is all fine when its in the castle's nature to screw around with them, but it won't make death seem scarier, which is the point of revising it in the first place.

+1 /unpopular opinion :/a

[liadrin.livejournal.com]

I am in the minority here, I know, but I do not at all like an additional loss being tacked on. It's difficult enough to think of a loss the first time around, much less the second. In terms of a game environment, I liken it to a game like World of Warcraft where the idea of dying is mild (durability loss, oh no. How awful) but builds over time with a time limit in place.

If I play a villain or a hero who is in conflict, dying might HAVE to happen at some point. Do I want them to suffer another PERMANENT loss on top of what they've already given? No. Do I want them to be traumatized enough to NOT want to go through that again? Of course I do!

This just feels like it will make people want to avoid conflict or confrontation, or that the flow of more dire situations will be forced to be unnatural. But then again, this is just my opinion, and I realize that I am in no way the majority here.

[teds-up.livejournal.com]

Minority non-withstanding, you're still a player and your opinion should be taken into consideration! And I completely agree with you. If there was an event to happen where a lot of characters would die, I think there would definitely be some muns that were reluctant to give up that death so easily when they'd have to tack on another permanent loss.

I think that an option would be the best-- the first death having it be optional whether or not to get another permanent loss, and the second death loss being mandatory, with every other being optional/mandatory. For those who don't get the permanent loss the first time around, they should still probably suffer similar in intensity. I don't know if an extended temporary loss would be enough, but... it's a start.

[dontpatr0nizeme]

You aren't the only one to feel that way. I rather strongly opposed the idea when it was first brought up. As it is? The 2 weeks has kept me dancing around ways to keep Wash from ever dying. This? Just makes it more likely I'll keep doing it.

Though it doesn't hurt that his major canon rival was apped in neutered anyway.

And I will say this much: Even with the dancing? A year and I don't think I've missed out on a single thing I wanted to do because of my OOC dancing. The people here are that accommodating with workarounds.