On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

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Prism
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On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

Post by Prism »

Just because it was a topic that caused a bit of an upturn in conversation on the Game channel, I wanted to make a thread here on the BBS so anyone who had thoughts on it could chime in.

With the influx of new players, the ESP network has started to get a lot more crowded as of late. Which is great! It's really cool to see all of the different players interacting with each other in such meaningful ways. Whether it's just friendly greetings, pointed exchanges, or casual discussions on IC politics, there's been a lot of chatter, and a lot going on. It facilitates a lot of great RP.

That said, the topic of conflict over the ESP network eventually arose, and the opinions expressed were valuable ones. In general, they could be lumped into three categories, by my perception. That isn't to say that any of these opinions are right or wrong. It just seemed to be the way that most people were feeling in regard to conflict on the network. If we want to find a complimentary medium and keep our community relaxed, happy, and strong, it's good to make sure opinions get out there before they turn into arguments. And this is one of those topics that can get people a little fired up. So, in general, these were the vibes that I was getting from people as the conversation went on.

A) Conflict is a natural part of roleplay in any setting, but particularly in the lost lands. When it extends onto the ESP network, it's only natural. It's going to happen. If one doesn't want to be a part of that, they don't have to participate. If it gets too annoying-- one can always tune off of the gray network or remove their pendant for a time.

B) Conflict might be a natural part of roleplay, and it might be a natural part of the setting we're playing in, and that's okay, we have no problem with that. But sometimes, it just gets to be a little much. I know one could just take off one's pendant or tune off of the gray network, but then, it's more difficult to find roleplay with the people one *does* want to hear from and *does* want to interact with. Much as I get that conflict exists, sometimes, I don't want to deal with it, and I don't want to make the choice of hamstringing my ability to RP in exchange for peace of mind.

C) I don't feel strongly one way or the other in regard to this particular issue, but I don't like the idea of people policing other people's roleplay. If one is following all of the policies, and they're using a publicly available IC medium to facilitate that roleplay, whether conflict-driven or not, they shouldn't point fingers at other people who aren't doing things that they like to do, and vice versa.


So, all in all, with those opinions expressed, why do I post this thread?

I want to hear people's thoughts on conflict on the ESP network, and what they envision the future of the network and network chatter being like in the game as things grow and the faction system becomes implemented.

There have been discussions via the voice chat, BBS, and otherwise about each town having their own colored tuning (Shadgard already has amber!) and the gray channel being available to both factions for more general use. There was also some discussion about the idea of "ESP dead zones" where nobody would have any reception whatsoever for extra spooky factor. I believe it was Moreover that had also made mention of a suggestion regarding the ability for the twilight eye to perform a service that would allow individual hues to be "blocked" from the network (either temporarily or perminantly) for a set fee.

Personally? I think all three would go a long way to making sure things stay pleasant, civil, and relatively unclogged on the network for those who are concerned about such moving forward. I'm not entirely opposed to the idea of an IC "ignore" command, for lack of better terms either, but I don't think I'd use it, myself.

That said, all suggestions, , feedback, and opinions on the topic are welcome, encouraged, and here for all to witness! Thanks for hearing me out for a moment.
"The sky, above the clouds; A rainbow that fate has devoured
I gave up Hope
But I'm not going to be lost tomorrow; Even if it is hell
I'm gonna' crawl. "
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Re: On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

Post by Onasaki »

I'll say the same thing I said in the other thread. Ignore functions are counter-culture. They do nothing but facilitate twink-ignoring, and in my 15+ experience on hundreds of different MUDs I have never seen an Ignore function ever work as intended. It always became a weapon for players to use against people. To shut them down, cut them out, or force them to quit. It is not a function that I believe is beneficial to a game in which Rias has expressed the cultivation of cooperation.

I understand why people might want this function, but believe me when I say it's nothing but a tool to grief people. There are alternate ways to make people shut up (which is what this function basically does), that don't involve pressing a squelch button on our ancient telepathic stone toys. I also don't personally think ESP pendants are that pinpoint accurate to where they could be tuned to ignore specific personal aura colors.
I have two forces by my side,
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Which one's which I cannot tell,
This enigma is my hell.

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Lexx416
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Re: On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

Post by Lexx416 »

So, I'm a mixture of A and C, more than anything. I do genuinely believe kindness is an incredibly important trait to carry through life - but I also think that people frequently conflate "kindness" with "niceness".

I think that the policies cover instances enough for reasonable adults, that that can and should be the guiding light for most interactions, or what's ultimately "okay" to do. While folks aren't always reasonable, or may have needs that everyone isn't privy to, the impact that one PC can have on another (mechanically) is pretty limited here - which I think is fine! You can't really force someone to sit through gory scenes, there's no private IC communication without a very specific spell (which also has limitations, and requires either consent or hard work).

The setting of the game, ultimately, is a pretty crummy part of the world to live in, and while I can absolutely understand some things that make IC sense being added to help folks avert specific content (like an IC means of temporarily ignoring a color on the Network), at the end of the day ESP is a communal, public, IC channel. Not every character (PC or GM controlled) is going to be nice, and that's okay. Unless something violates policy, we shouldn't be telling people how to roleplay - there may be things that folks do that I don't agree with on an OOC level, but it's not cool if I start telling people on OOC channels "Hey, don't RP things that way, because I disagree with it".

I think there's a lot of value to being empathetic towards folks, and that "this is a game, it should be fun" is very important, but it's also very easy to miss that that's a two way street. Conflict is part of the game, and the setting, and it's fine if that's not what a player enjoys doing. But it's a selling point of the game, and we shouldn't have to diminish that aspect of it to make the IC environment more comfortable IC.

I do truly believe there's value in respecting things like triggers, content warnings, mental (and physical) health, and valuing the general wellbeing of other folks. But at the same time, I think there's a legitimate reason to be concerned about the active policing of what types of PCs people can and can't play. Systems like ESP are totally optional and totally opt in - you have to wear an item to take place in the exchange, and if no one is actively breaking a game policy it's pretty unfair to OOCly tell them "hey, stop doing that thing in this system that I can choose to disengage from temporarily". Everyone has stuff they have to deal with - if I I'm playing an antagonistic PC (which is already a generally thankless but totally necessary role for narrative games) and am getting tone policed, why would I keep spending my limited time and energy doing that when I could just go read a book instead?
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Maina
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Re: On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

Post by Maina »

I don't believe any argument actually included attempting to police the actions or roleplay of others.

My position has always been very specific: if two opposing factions share a channel, that channel will devolve into toxicity quickly and constantly. That has negative knock-on affects for the community as a whole, and 'just tune out/remove your pendant' is not a solution because then it makes it harder for people to find roleplay outside of conflict, and eventually people who do not want to be on the front of that conflict will leave.

While conflict is fine and a core part of the game, it is not meant to exclude people who play a support role as crafters, farmers, etc.

And this does not mean we have to police the grey channel. That was never a suggestion, and I'm not sure how that's gotten mixed up into this. There is a simple solution which was the start of this discussion: simply don't have both factions on the same channel. No policing necessary.

This was never about 'all conflict on ESP must be banned' this was about 'let's try to avoid the toxic environment that is inevitable if two opposing PvP factions are in constant, public communication.'

As people from opposing factions won't be organizing hunting trips together, won't be seeking services from each other, and won't be organizing events together, the primary purpose of ESP is not served by having both factions on the same channel. There is no benefit and a great deal of downsides. But, again, the issue began - and never stopped being, for me at least -with the toxicity that will arise from having both on the same channel, not conflict on ESP in general.
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Zombilicious
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Re: On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

Post by Zombilicious »

Rias is going to split the tuning into zones, so I think we won't have to worry as much about overcrowding; that becomes a null issue, and I don't feel that it's valuable to keep discussing what may happen or alternatives to this, because I don't think it's valuable to have everyone easily accessible over the Network and then only have !Shad and Shadgard on their separate frequencies.

As far as conflict: I am strongly an A. Conflict happens in any game setting, it happens over the ESP because it happens in normal RP. I am diametrically opposite Onasaki's view that "ignore functions are counter-culture". There is no reason a player should be forced to engage with someone who is stressing them out. In real life, we are not forced to engage with human beings we do not want to deal with, and I feel that is no different in-game. The method is slightly different, however, because we aren't discussing a specific OOC ignore method. We're discussing a paid-for, in-character method of Character A not having to hear Character B, which will not affect Character B in the slightest unless Character A is a jerk and decides to flaunt that they have done this.

Character A can still participate in conversations, and Character B can still participate in conversations, and Character A is not forced to remove themselves from a situation and therefore be penalized for finding Character B irksome, annoying, troublesome, not worth listening to, whatever in-character reason they choose to mute Character B for. It does not in any way affect the PLAYER of Character B. It doesn't even affect the CHARACTER, because they are still allowed to speak freely: it's just that one person will not be able to hear them for a period of time.

In my 15+ experience in hundreds of different MU*s, this is valuable. It's unfair to force someone to choose if they want to keep playing the game, or get away from problematic behavior. The only thing not having this function would do is encourage perfectly good characters to stop engaging in society. This may eventually cause their players to not want to play, thus leaving Cogg for some other game, which would be incredibly unfortunate. No one should be punished for wanting to not have to listen to someone prattle on for two days when said character deeply irritates your character, or just you as a person.

No one is hurt in this mechanic. There is no griefing, because Character B is not silenced to everyone: they just cannot be heard by Character A, who does not want to engage with them anyways, and so nothing is damaged. It's also Rias' technology, and so it's up to Rias to decide if the pendants are or are not able to pinpoint accurate colors.

I almost exclusively play antagonists in some form, because it's not a popular role and a game requires antagonism to keep moving forward. Despite this, I can say definitively that the fun of all players is vital: both my fun, as an antagonist, and their fun as non-antagonistic characters. If that means they need to tune me out for a bit? So what? I block people on Facebook all the time just because I can.
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artus
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Re: On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

Post by artus »

I'm not going to try and be partial toward anyone here, not even myself. I just need a point to get across and be heard, above anything else. It's up to Rias and you guys in the end.

While rping "as my character would do" is a solid rp ettiquet, there's a line between "what my character would do" and "what my character would do that doesn't make others around me too uncomfortable". I'm generally scared of "what my character would do" myself, given there's a trauma associate to it when it becomes "what my character would do because me as a player want them to" or "what my character would do and I don't care what people think".

Conflict is normal. Lost lands is rough. I get that. But the game is supposed to be fun for everyone as a whole, not just me, you, anyone in particular to enjoy their chars while the others sit behind the keyboard crying from distress. It's not cool.

As a post stated:

In my 15+ experience in hundreds of different MU*s, this is valuable. It's unfair to force someone to choose if they want to keep playing the game, or get away from problematic behavior. The only thing not having this function would do is encourage perfectly good characters to stop engaging in society. This may eventually cause their players to not want to play, thus leaving Cogg for some other game, which would be incredibly unfortunate. No one should be punished for wanting to not have to listen to someone prattle on for two days when said character deeply irritates your character, or just you as a person.

Me, Artus, from an ooc perspective and from my 9 years of mudding experience, can second Onosaki without a single word of disagreement. It may look nice at the beginning until a player decides to block that person over and over and manipulates that feature in a way that they can control how people play. There are parts of the rp they may not want to miss and that part may involve them or drags them into it in the end without even realizing what goes on because they can't hear the character they block, +it's just a cheap and ineffective way to avoid, not solve, problems.

If nothing else, a policy regarding how this is handled may need to be in place if the opinion is too mixed and there's nothing we can come to the conclusion regarding this. All in all, however, as a player who wants to have fun myself, and as someone who sometimes just wants to log in and enjoy the game from all day long ooc conflicts, I encourage people to reach out if an rp is not alright for them, not to tell the other person/players how to rp, just to at least get your discomfort across so they can be aware of that. There are times I'm hard press for conflicts too if it's something Arty goes against big time. But at the same time, at least on my end, I keep it at the level people are alright with as much as possible. Not that I'm going to tell anyone how to rp with anyone else, not even me. I just need to keep that in mind. It's fun when no one else has fun but you.
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Lexx416
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Re: On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

Post by Lexx416 »

Maina wrote: Fri Oct 22, 2021 1:00 pm I don't believe any argument actually included attempting to police the actions or roleplay of others.

My position has always been very specific: if two opposing factions share a channel, that channel will devolve into toxicity quickly and constantly. That has negative knock-on affects for the community as a whole, and 'just tune out/remove your pendant' is not a solution because then it makes it harder for people to find roleplay outside of conflict, and eventually people who do not want to be on the front of that conflict will leave.

While conflict is fine and a core part of the game, it is not meant to exclude people who play a support role as crafters, farmers, etc.

And this does not mean we have to police the grey channel. That was never a suggestion, and I'm not sure how that's gotten mixed up into this. There is a simple solution which was the start of this discussion: simply don't have both factions on the same channel. No policing necessary.

This was never about 'all conflict on ESP must be banned' this was about 'let's try to avoid the toxic environment that is inevitable if two opposing PvP factions are in constant, public communication.'

As people from opposing factions won't be organizing hunting trips together, won't be seeking services from each other, and won't be organizing events together, the primary purpose of ESP is not served by having both factions on the same channel. There is no benefit and a great deal of downsides. But, again, the issue began - and never stopped being, for me at least -with the toxicity that will arise from having both on the same channel, not conflict on ESP in general.

The discussion isn't unique entirely to last night, and I've seen folks attempting to police people's RP on #game over the course of the game - it's very uncool, and I think it's important to bring up on the larger scale discussion (which is what I assumed this post was for - not JUST to discuss last night, but the larger topic of Conflict and the Pendant Network).

Similarly, internal faction conflict can happen, and should also be considered. Especially since, as Rias has stated, that factions will have their own ESP Zones.
"You hear the Woses, the Wild Men of the Woods... Remnants of an older time they be, living few and secretly, wild and wary as beasts."
Prism
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Re: On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

Post by Prism »

Zombilicious wrote: Fri Oct 22, 2021 1:02 pm Rias is going to split the tuning into zones, so I think we won't have to worry as much about overcrowding; that becomes a null issue, and I don't feel that it's valuable to keep discussing what may happen or alternatives to this, because I don't think it's valuable to have everyone easily accessible over the Network and then only have !Shad and Shadgard on their separate frequencies.

As far as conflict: I am strongly an A. Conflict happens in any game setting, it happens over the ESP because it happens in normal RP. I am diametrically opposite Onasaki's view that "ignore functions are counter-culture". There is no reason a player should be forced to engage with someone who is stressing them out. In real life, we are not forced to engage with human beings we do not want to deal with, and I feel that is no different in-game. The method is slightly different, however, because we aren't discussing a specific OOC ignore method. We're discussing a paid-for, in-character method of Character A not having to hear Character B, which will not affect Character B in the slightest unless Character A is a jerk and decides to flaunt that they have done this.

Character A can still participate in conversations, and Character B can still participate in conversations, and Character A is not forced to remove themselves from a situation and therefore be penalized for finding Character B irksome, annoying, troublesome, not worth listening to, whatever in-character reason they choose to mute Character B for. It does not in any way affect the PLAYER of Character B. It doesn't even affect the CHARACTER, because they are still allowed to speak freely: it's just that one person will not be able to hear them for a period of time.

In my 15+ experience in hundreds of different MU*s, this is valuable. It's unfair to force someone to choose if they want to keep playing the game, or get away from problematic behavior. The only thing not having this function would do is encourage perfectly good characters to stop engaging in society. This may eventually cause their players to not want to play, thus leaving Cogg for some other game, which would be incredibly unfortunate. No one should be punished for wanting to not have to listen to someone prattle on for two days when said character deeply irritates your character, or just you as a person.

No one is hurt in this mechanic. There is no griefing, because Character B is not silenced to everyone: they just cannot be heard by Character A, who does not want to engage with them anyways, and so nothing is damaged. It's also Rias' technology, and so it's up to Rias to decide if the pendants are or are not able to pinpoint accurate colors.

I almost exclusively play antagonists in some form, because it's not a popular role and a game requires antagonism to keep moving forward. Despite this, I can say definitively that the fun of all players is vital: both my fun, as an antagonist, and their fun as non-antagonistic characters. If that means they need to tune me out for a bit? So what? I block people on Facebook all the time just because I can.
I made this thread last night after the discussion kind of hit it's peak on chat, so yeah-- the cleriffication of intent for gray network zoning came after the fact.

That said, I'm inclined to agree with this for the most part. I don't think having the option to temporarily ignore someone IC on the network's going to be -that- detrimental. Particularly if you can still see their color appear, without hearing what's actually being said on their behalf for a temporary amount of time. Hence my suggestion for the timer of such being around a bell-- so one can institute it on a bell-by-bell basis.

Lexx416 wrote: Fri Oct 22, 2021 1:11 pm
Maina wrote: Fri Oct 22, 2021 1:00 pm I don't believe any argument actually included attempting to police the actions or roleplay of others.

My position has always been very specific: if two opposing factions share a channel, that channel will devolve into toxicity quickly and constantly. That has negative knock-on affects for the community as a whole, and 'just tune out/remove your pendant' is not a solution because then it makes it harder for people to find roleplay outside of conflict, and eventually people who do not want to be on the front of that conflict will leave.

While conflict is fine and a core part of the game, it is not meant to exclude people who play a support role as crafters, farmers, etc.

And this does not mean we have to police the grey channel. That was never a suggestion, and I'm not sure how that's gotten mixed up into this. There is a simple solution which was the start of this discussion: simply don't have both factions on the same channel. No policing necessary.

This was never about 'all conflict on ESP must be banned' this was about 'let's try to avoid the toxic environment that is inevitable if two opposing PvP factions are in constant, public communication.'

As people from opposing factions won't be organizing hunting trips together, won't be seeking services from each other, and won't be organizing events together, the primary purpose of ESP is not served by having both factions on the same channel. There is no benefit and a great deal of downsides. But, again, the issue began - and never stopped being, for me at least -with the toxicity that will arise from having both on the same channel, not conflict on ESP in general.

The discussion isn't unique entirely to last night, and I've seen folks attempting to police people's RP on #game over the course of the game - it's very uncool, and I think it's important to bring up on the larger scale discussion (which is what I assumed this post was for - not JUST to discuss last night, but the larger topic of Conflict and the Pendant Network).

Similarly, internal faction conflict can happen, and should also be considered. Especially since, as Rias has stated, that factions will have their own ESP Zones.
Yeah, basically this. Thanks as usual Lex. You read my mind on this one.
"The sky, above the clouds; A rainbow that fate has devoured
I gave up Hope
But I'm not going to be lost tomorrow; Even if it is hell
I'm gonna' crawl. "
Ephemeralis
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Re: On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

Post by Ephemeralis »

artus wrote: Fri Oct 22, 2021 1:09 pm If nothing else, a policy regarding how this is handled may need to be in place if the opinion is too mixed and there's nothing we can come to the conclusion regarding this. All in all, however, as a player who wants to have fun myself, and as someone who sometimes just wants to log in and enjoy the game from all day long ooc conflicts, I encourage people to reach out if an rp is not alright for them, not to tell the other person/players how to rp, just to at least get your discomfort across so they can be aware of that. There are times I'm hard press for conflicts too if it's something Arty goes against big time. But at the same time, at least on my end, I keep it at the level people are alright with as much as possible. Not that I'm going to tell anyone how to rp with anyone else, not even me. I just need to keep that in mind. It's fun when no one else has fun but you.
Not to sound trite or aggressive here (and if I do, please excuse me, I don't mean it to be), but what would this hypothetical policy be for exactly? Not playing or acting the way other people might want your character to act? There is no way a policy like that could ever end well - not for the people it is supposed to protect, and definitely not for the people trying to police.

Any other use case for a policy like that should already generally be covered by the existing policies, which broadly boil down to "players should endeavour to not be assholes to one another. For any breakthrough cases where a person's character might be rubbing a player the wrong way over ESP or whatever, there will (hopefully) be limited muting/ignore options for others to use for their own sanity.

This all seems like a vastly overcomplicated issue with very simple solutions. Between ESP range/layering and the ignore functionality being discussed in other threads, I think things should be fine.
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Re: On ESP Conflict, and how ESP will function as things develop

Post by Zombilicious »

"I'm talking about when some people have something nice to talk about on the Network and like, two or three other people bicker around just provoking [REDACTED] for the sake of it and the conversation floods everything else."
This was said on the #GAME channel last night, and was fairly pointed based on who it boiled down to. This is an example of trying to make people feel bad about the RP that they do because you, as player, dislike it -- thus, attempting to police their RP, even passive-aggressively. It's definitely something that's been happening lately, and has been discussed recently.

As someone targeted by that statement, I will say that it was kind of rude. What is "something nice" for other people is not always "something nice" for everyone and bickering happens. This is just more reason it'd be nice to have the ESP tuning as an IC choice, so that either the individuals who dislike the bickering or the people who dislike the happy Kumbayah circles, can diffuse instead of having to remove themselves entirely from chances at RP.
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