And thats the attitude Seatle and Denver both run off of.  Its not the job of the staff to make the world feel alive, its the players job.  Afterall its never been the GM's job to make the world the players play in feel alive...he's just there to do queues and make fancy descriptions, and make sure the rules are followed...

No that attitude has been proven time and again to not work.  It doesn't work now on Denver, or anywhere else I've played.  And it hasn't worked on Seatle in the past.

The GM's job, is to make the world come alive.  The STORYTELLERS job is to make the world come alive.  Players help out by getting in character, by becoming their characters and feeding off of what the GM's and Storytellers give them.  Everyone feeds off of each other, but it starts with the GM's and Storytellers.

Why does everyone think its not the GM's job to shape the world and show us the world.  Why is it the players job when we switch to a online environment?  Its not like anyone would ever consider telling the players its their job to come up with all the materials (plot, background, maps) for a plot for the GM to run.  That'd be stupid.  Its the GM's job to do that.

Great players will always help out with this.  But not everyone is capable of posing NPC's well.  Not everyone is comfterable posing NPC's doing this or that.  Not everyone's comfterable dropping a little scene on people to liven things up and make the world come alive.  And that should be OK.  We're players, its not in our job description to pose NPC's.  Its not in our job description to play the NPC's for a scene.  Its not in our job description to come up with the scenes that come up while we play our characters.  Thats the GM's job.  Thats the Storytellers job.

Most people will go to, for the easiest example mind you, a bar.  Its a place, provided by the GM's for us to roleplay.  So we head there.  You have a few people rping, a few side conversations, but thats not always enough.  What about the troll in the corner, or the 3 guys smoking and playing poker eyeing you up.  Maybe some young punk ganger and his friends come in and start shit.  Not everyone is going to think of those things.  Maybe we all should but its not going to happen.  And even if you do, you may not want to run it.  Me personaly?  I run stuff all the time irl.  I never get to be the player, the one who experiances the world, lives in the world, shapes the world the GM creates for us.  So I typicaly stay in my player role.  And I play my character.  Those gangers, the guys playing cards, all that adds atmostphere.  Why should we as players be the ones who have to create all the atmostphere.

Noor's clearly stated we're going for a paradgim shift.  We're going for a more roleplay oriented game.  Why is it so aberent for me to call for the GM's and Storytellers to facilitate this by engaging us in the story?  By engaging us in plots.  By bringing atmostphere to our roleplaying.  Honestly now.  How bout we actualy TRY the new philosophy instead of letting in it fall to the wayside and just let the players decide to do it or not.  Everyone's so big on trying the new awards system, but why are we so against trying to support it by having the storytellers engage us in the game they want us to play and enjoy.

If you want us to roleplay more, engage us in it.  Otherwise people are going to do what they've done in the past, and build a sheet, and the awards system will drag and frustrate because of the lack of karma.


Maybe the sweet spot is 17 karma.  Maybe its 10.  I highly doubt it mind you, but its possible.  Just like the sweet spot could possibly be 100.  They asked for a guideline of what we'd like to see in 6 months time.  I gave them mine.  I'm all for the system.  I had a concern, I've raised it, we're discussing it.  They've said they want to make it a roleplaying game first and foremost.  They want us to get away from just building a sheet up and get involved in a world, and tell a collective story.  And I challenged them to actualy do that.  To engage us in their story, to make it our story as well.  I think if people are engaged in the story, in the game, then the awards system with tweaking to awards and the cap, will perfectly support it.  But if the thing its designed to support isn't there....

The story's kinda like a computer.  Runs great, but with a little something more can make it into a beautiful machine.  The awards system is that kickass graphics card which will turn the computer into that beautiful machine.  Together the awards system supports the story and they make it enjoyable.  Without the awards system, the story's great but still lacking something.  Without the computer...you're left with a great graphics card that just frustrates you cause you can't use it even though you know what great things it can do for you...

I will make this sweet and simple

(1) Everyone will have different expectations of the game and enjoyment on different aspects. So what you feel is sooo very important, can be discarded and someone else wouldn't even care. So before you make generalized statements about how something is a fact, based on opinionated discussions, take a step back and remember it isn't to someone else.

(2) Testing always work better with tighter restrictions and slowly loosening them, then to give too much and try to tighten. Also, a more restricted system will give you much better feedback on statistics. Simple reason for this, people will complain and you will gain feedback Whereas, with a system designed too open for testing you won't get the feedback and not gain as much insight.

(3) Be aware that your opinions matter, but not omnipotent. Just because you feel something HAS to be done a certain way, it is for the staff to make that decision. If it is different then your desired view, then it's not because there purposely trying to go against you. It also isn't because they don't listen to you, but mainly back to point (1.) I have not been a part of this staff very long at all, in fact I am very quiet when it comes to Shadowrun discussions, as i havent played shadowrun since 2nd edition way back in Highschool over a decade ago. I am mainly here for them to tell me what they need, and off I go coding.

(4) Stay optimistic, and friendly on the forums! This goes a long way. As a programmer, when I look at boards, for any game development, and notice a thread just turning into an argument, I just stop reading it and go to another one. Also, if any users have a knack for just putting down others ideas, without any idea on the practicle application of it, but just off assumptions or deduction, I tend to start ignoring that users input. This is for the simple reason that i encourage different, and even abstract, ideas and like constructive posts. Sometimes an idea that seems doomed to fail turns into a marvel to behold, likewise, what sounds like a flawless plan can become a source of nightmares.

I am slightly discouraged on how many people state how they will feel in SR4 on certain ruleset changes, when they haven't even experienced them yet. I am not saying it will work perfectly, as any beta wont, but lets give it a chance then change it after we see it in action. Instead of spending so much time trying to stop something that will be in beta anyways, let's spend that time trying to help better shape the game, or offer alternatives. Personally, I liked the idea from Mark(I think it was him anyways) on restricting the time to use the Karma, and allow free reign on karma build-up. It is an alternative, and still achieve's the main goal of resctricting karma use.

Just like most my post states, these ramblings are just, and only, my opinion. You are welcome to agree or disagree

*waves*

I liked Mark's idea as well. What I disagree with is as follows.

I dislike the diminishing returns on the awards as posted. What do you do with a value of X.Y karma? What good is a cap of 20 if you can never reach it. Is not then the cap 19? Because you cannot spend fractional karma. Karma should be rewarded at a value it can be spent at.

I do not like having to justify raises. All that requiring justifications creates is the potential for abuse and corruption. How many players have been told that they have to jump through a certain amount of hoops in order to have thier raises approved? Yet the same staffer then automatically raises requests for his/her roommate/significant other/(colourful metaphor). Karma should be spent as the player sees fit without having to pass the subjective viewpoint of another.

I was staff. The imo two karma spends that I approved that people bitched about the most were:
Player A wanting to raise Pistols 10 to Pistols 11
Player B wanting to purchase an adept power for 40 karma

Both players saved up thier karma, jumped through all the previous staffer's hoops, and did everything that they were told to do. I said enough bullshit. It's done. Have fun. No? one else in the past wanted to do it. They did not want to take responsibility for running the game as the posted staff requirements state they must. As for the few people that complained about it, I said if you do not like it, you? can remove it from thier +sheets and explain to the players why you removed it. Needless to say they did nothing about it, but whine on staff channels.

That illustrates the problems that have gone on with former staff. As Noor once paged me, "He doesn't have the time, and he really doesn't care."

If anyone still has a problem with those two karma spends or anyother I approved as staff, then I am so very sorry. I do appologise for doing my best to make sure that the players were having fun.

I do understand staff having a need to control how powerful a player can become. The last staff plot I went on, I did so because and only because another player (the only player that showed up for the plot) paged me and begged me to help him out. The staffer who ran that plot did a great job, he did not whine about my karma. Rather he let me play the support role so that the new player could have a high probability of surviving and fun while doing it.

Then how does staff keep the power level of players low? Eventually if a person plays long enough, they will have karma to raise skills and attributes. They will have gobs of cash to buy goodies and the contacts and friends to get thier stuff. I think as in my earlier post that instead of allowing someone to raise all thier attributes at once, let them pick one. Instead of raising all thier weapon skills, let them pick one. In doing so keep the time between raises short. No longer than once a month. Do what you can to prevent players from sitting here looking at thier +sheet and becoming frustrated because they think, "Damn I have all this karma and I cannot spend it. This place sucks."

So I'll give this beta period, this beta experiment a chance. However, at the end of it I do expect those responsible for it to stand up and say either "Yes this worked or did not work, I/we are happy/sorry for it, etc..." I expect people to take responsibility for thier actions and not to simply vanish, retire, quit and leave a mess for someone else to clean up as has happened so many times before due to someone "Not having the time and not really caring"

1.  Can we say Out of Context?  If you're going to bring up such a thing, make sure you include the rest of the conversation. 

2.  Former Staff.  You were Staff.  There's a lot of time in between then and now, Abs.  And whining about past staff and past actions is what we are trying to get away from.  Keeping grudges like that and constantly bringing them up is what gives Seattle part of it's bad name.  It's in the past, dude, let it go. 

Can someone with the power to do so, close this discussion?  It is quite obvious that there are those who want one thing, those who want another, and those who just want to see the game get completed to play.  None of those three agree, and they likely won't until some manner of actual testing is done.  So for now, staff will just need to decide to stick to, or alleviate a cap, and go with it without further player input.  If something 'brand new' comes up for discussion I'm sure there's somewhere we can post it.  But for now, at least, I'm done with this section of the forum and I urge those working on the game to press on!  I have too fast of fingers to be wasting on other games and wish to contribute to story making. 

Although I have little time, if you have small tasks, such as descriptions you need done please feel free to private message me and I'll send you what I can as I can.  If you don't use it, my feelings will not be hurt, if you use it, you need not accredit me nor praise me, cause I just do it as an aid.