Reading Twilight Crap.

[Khalvin]

Prem.

I understand Asa's scale. But there is no conflict. Why? Not even NPC conflict?
that is not what broke me. O'ya-dessy did. it's over the top for an Elder. That is insane to me. Not even in object horror are toons this competent. They lack no resource. They are unbeatable. It is not hard to fix and I am not unjustified in pointing out the obvious.

So quite boxing this feed back and let DD hear what the players have to say. We aren't torching his house or anything; jeeze man.

I'm out of this thread now. I've said my peace.

[West]

I would like to point out that when I began playing Asa, I began networking. Within several weeks of my major snafu, I had repaired my relationship with the Seneschal.

Asa is powerful individually, but his main power lies in the associations he's built.

It is my opinion that no other character has worked as hard at forming relationships as Asa has.

Just food for thought.

[Lesingnon]

Okay, time for me to toss my opinions in. I’ll start out with the Asa issue. West is absolutely right; Asa is powerful because of the social network he’s built. And he hasn’t just built a social network; he’s built a social network of PCs. So in other words, Asa’s power comes almost entirely from PC to PC interaction. Sitting back and looking at some of the stuff he’s done, and is in the process of doing, it’s masterful. And again, built entirely upon interactions with PCs. Having an ST do anything about that would mean bringing in powerful enough NPCs to mess with the power structure of the most powerful PC vampires in the entire venue, which would cheapen everything the players are doing. Not to mention that it would basically be punishing West for good roleplay. I don’t think I can express how horrible of an idea that would be.

Now on to the main issues. I agree 100% with what has been said about DD’s plots. They take forever, and the PCs never seem to be able to solve them. Half a dozen vampires, hand-picked for their abilities at stealth and infiltration, went to check out Horizon Pharmatech. They left with absolutely no idea how to get through. Nothing, even the submerged portions of the sewers were booby-trapped. They left with no idea how to move forward. As has seemed to be the case for months the PCs were completely unable to find any way to solve the plot. And then Konstantin comes along and magically comes up with a way to solve the problem. In other words, the plot did not advance at all until an NPC came along to tell people what to do. And people do not role play so they can get herded.

Another thing that’s beginning to bother me is thread lengths. Site guidelines say that threads should be limited to two weeks. Yet threads seem to drag on and on, consistently eclipsing this mark by a significant margin until we reach the point where they last for months. And it was one thing when that happened for stickies, but now it’s spilling over into non-stickied threads and bogging down characters for months on end. Often with no discernible benefit at all because of the aforementioned impossibility of advancing plots. There’s a reason Wilhelm has not been in many threads that required ST narration.

Furthermore, what’s begun to bother me ever since I’ve become an ST is the lack of regard DD seems to have for other venues. I am sorely tempted to have Wild Sacramento level Horizon. He would, should, do it because it fits how a City Spirit would react IC. There’s no way he wants a bunch of mages toying with powerful abyssal entities in his city. But I don’t, because that would be interfering with another venue. And Inferno too. Even ignoring the other complaints that have been raised I fail to see why a Vampire ST is running a plot so heavily connected with spiritual stuff, when spirits are an aspect of nWoD that should fall under the purview of Mage and Werewolf. And really, all it would take is one werewolf to walk into that place and you’d have a whole mess of them showing up to tear it down. It’s a plot that werewolves would react to far more than vampires. It is not something that should be run by a Vampire ST on a site like this.

[Premsyl]

I'll only argue here that the Inferno idea is hugely based on a general WoD supplement. If anything he's fucking with MY venue, Les.

Edit: To expand on this, is it the general opinion of everyone that I should ask permission from the other STs before involving something supernatural in a Mortals plot?

[Benji]

Edit: To expand on this, is it the general opinion of everyone that I should ask permission from the other STs before involving something supernatural in a Mortals plot?

IMO, if you want to have a pack of vampires or vampire-related antagonists harass one of the mortal players, you need to clear it with the Vampire ST. If you want a Liche to eat the soul of an NPC so that one of your players can investigate why their friend has suddenly lost all morals, it needs to be run by the Mage ST. Same with things that can seriously impact the other venues.

[DaevaDude]

I'm not going to comment on most of what has been said here. Some of it's legit complaints, some of it just difference of opinion, some of it borders on reality-impairment. I appreciate Prem's comments, though, and suggest people give them some thought. That said, I do want to make a couple of comments.

Asa love-fest? Seriously? Get real. He's the Prince. Things are going to focus on him a lot because of that. Yes, he's powerful, but mostly because a) he's been in play for a long time and b) the real reason is, West plays him very, very smart. I don't always agree with him, but West plays smarter than 99% of the people I've ever seen RPing, myself definitely included. There has been some NPC vs. Asa conflict here and there, mostly subtle, but it hasn't amounted to a lot, mostly because West/Asa has figured it out and disarmed it, because he is a very smart player. There's more, but I'm not going to comment on it because it's not currently my place to do so.

For what it's worth, though, West has thought I've fucked Asa over on occasion, so think of that what you will.

I had Konstantin come up with the idea in a current thread because so many people had been complaining about the Horizon subplot and I'd been asked by West to bring it to an end ASAP. So, yup, that's herding, because a bit of herding was the easiest way to move that along. But even there, the "herd" springs from the actions of a PC (Elanah).

Whatever I think about some of the points people have made here, the important issue is that a substantial number of people are unhappy with how I'm running the venue. That's not a good thing, so it appears it's time for a change. Someone else, maybe one of those who thinks what I've been dong rally sucks, will get their chance to try to do it better, because I'm going to step down as primary Requiem ST - or step down from STing completely, if that's what most people want - pretty soon. Whomever takes over, I wish them well. It's been rewarding and fun, but it's often a huge pain as well.

I've been planning for awhile to cut back from being the primary ST to just running a couple threads as a Co-ST because it's taken up a huge amount of time and effort, and some of that time and effort can be better spent in other areas of my life. I originally came to TV to play, not be a ST, and I'd like to largely return to being mostly a player in the near future, and to have a lot more time for other things.

However, I don't want to leave someone else to clean up after my mess - I've been there, it's not fun - so I guess the question is, do most prefer I just hand over the reins as soon as someone acceptable to Frost and West steps up to the plate, and let them do what they will with existing plots, or do they want a hopefully-smoother transition with me playing some things out and handing the game over bit by bit?

Either way, I'm not going to be on much for the next couple days. Real-life stuff, hellish-busy-work stuff, stepson's birthday on Saturday, etc.

[Premsyl]

I hope, whatever happens, that you do stick around as a player, DD. I don't think anybody wants anything less than that.

[Khalvin]

DD, I was intentionally inflamatory. For that I'm sorry.

In nothing I've said did a wish for you to step down. But if you feel you must, that doing so would be best for your time. So be it. I'd rather the change be how things are handled.

If you did decide to step down. We would remember your gifts rather then flaws. Considering the Past STs on this site you are certainly no slouch, haveing held the venue for some time and gain a bit of respect reagarding the stories you tell.
Proof of that is how quick everyone was to give feedback. I was the most cutting, and I know I was over the top.

[Frost]

I would like to know, if I may, what it is people would like to see more of regarding the Requiem venue. I'd like to be able to have the venue go in the direction that is prefered by the players, but I need to know that direction first.

[West]

Well, I know I've been somewhat silent as this unfolded today; if the will of the people was to be heard, so be it.

-However-

Some things I did not agree with... but I did not voice my disagreement so as not to be 'admin slapping' the unhappy, not because I agreed. So, rather than sending a PM, I'll post my 'response' publicly in contrast to my earlier silence.

Ideally, I'd like to see you stay on as a Co-ST. There is a place for 'personal' plots, and I think that you are very good at engaging players who might otherwise find the 'venue' plots uninteresting. I think that personal attention went a long way to building Requiem back up.

Let's... revisit that. Building Requiem back up.

We've had our differences, and I don't blame you at all if you think I'm an overbearing ass. To me, you'll always be the guy that helped me keep this place above water; you, sbad, rnt. It was you and I that burnt the interwebs up with emails and PMs to keep TV alive.

You're also the guy that took a venue with seven characters and turned it into one with over forty.

You're the guy that figured out how to 'save' the old characters; and I don't just mean Asa for me, but other characters that fleshed out the venue which I loved.

You're also the only other person besides Frost that I could really talk to about my character, and encouraged me when I doubted my 'interpretations' or role-playing.

You've been a person that supported me as admin as a friend, and the site as a supporter, aside from the time you put into it.


Maybe some of the stories didn't work out as they were conceptualized. Maybe you had a dick looking over your shoulder driving you nuts. Lotta maybes. Buuuuut... it's undeniable that you've put a lot of your personal time and effort into Twilight Valley, and 'thank you' is far less than is deserved.

It's important to me that the people who were not here last year know these things; that there is much, much more to DaevaDude's tenure than what has been previously said in the posts in this thread.

So... yeah. What Premsyl said.