Actions and RFRs
Posted by Apostate on 10/30/21
Originally I turned off all @actions for two core reasons: that staff was never able to keep up with the intense demand for responses, and secondly that because of that demand, we were pushed away from doing onscreen GMing and more proactive storytelling that I feel is extremely important. But I was never really happy about turning it off, knowing that the ability for player characters to interact with the world was far too limited, wasn't really happy with the cumbersome way RFRs were used, and I've been working on a compromise approach that will see a return to actions.
While I still need to do a lot of work on reformating the @action and @plot commands to get them more usable and where I want them to be, I'm ready to talk about what we're doing. Actions will be divided into two categories: Crisis Actions and Personal Story Actions. Personal Story Actions are actions that a player can do once per episode, to further a personal story arc- most likely for a character secret or a goal. This is done so a player can explore something unique to the character in ways that are best done with an offscreen resolution, or as a key part to moving forward on a plot that really needs a GM resolution. While this can be anything that's very relevant to the character, mechanically the only check I have right now is that it is associated with a plot that the character owns, and the expectation is that this is about something the character has been personally focused on. Note that this is once per episode by player- if a player has multiple alts, they'd just have to choose which character they take an action on (if any), and even if someone gives up a character/the character dies or such, it'll still count for the episode. I'm very much erring on the side of staff being able to keep up with this, and I don't really like how previous hurdles like AP worked at all, as it was a loose IC mechanism for a very OOC limitation of staff time. As such, AP costs (and the AP bonuses from non-use) for actions has gone away as well.
Secondly, there are Crisis Actions. Once per episode, an org can put in an org-wide action in response to a crisis. This does mean that if there are multiple crises per episode (and there will be), that orgs will have to choose which one they participate in, if they do. Participation for these actions will eventually be limited to org membership only. The default for being able to put in crisis actions will be rank 1 or 2 in orgs, but is the 'crisis' permission that can be changed with org/perm. I'm going to expect org leadership to be on the same page here and talk about it before putting in an action, and will not be going through the trouble of coding in checks for something that I'd expect people to be talking to each other about.
Technically, staff break is over, and things can be submitted now, though the commands are in a very much bare bones format with the new tweaks, and I'll be changing them a good bit in the coming days/weeks. If someone wants to do a Personal Story Action, feel free on a plot you own about something meaningful, and I can tweak it however later. Or you can wait for more QoL changes to come in, whichever works for you.
This does also mean that the goal/RFRs once per episode just related to story are going away- that was just an action stand in that I never really liked, mostly confused people, and I'll just probably be automating goal reviews shortly regardless to be XP rewards.
While I still need to do a lot of work on reformating the @action and @plot commands to get them more usable and where I want them to be, I'm ready to talk about what we're doing. Actions will be divided into two categories: Crisis Actions and Personal Story Actions. Personal Story Actions are actions that a player can do once per episode, to further a personal story arc- most likely for a character secret or a goal. This is done so a player can explore something unique to the character in ways that are best done with an offscreen resolution, or as a key part to moving forward on a plot that really needs a GM resolution. While this can be anything that's very relevant to the character, mechanically the only check I have right now is that it is associated with a plot that the character owns, and the expectation is that this is about something the character has been personally focused on. Note that this is once per episode by player- if a player has multiple alts, they'd just have to choose which character they take an action on (if any), and even if someone gives up a character/the character dies or such, it'll still count for the episode. I'm very much erring on the side of staff being able to keep up with this, and I don't really like how previous hurdles like AP worked at all, as it was a loose IC mechanism for a very OOC limitation of staff time. As such, AP costs (and the AP bonuses from non-use) for actions has gone away as well.
Secondly, there are Crisis Actions. Once per episode, an org can put in an org-wide action in response to a crisis. This does mean that if there are multiple crises per episode (and there will be), that orgs will have to choose which one they participate in, if they do. Participation for these actions will eventually be limited to org membership only. The default for being able to put in crisis actions will be rank 1 or 2 in orgs, but is the 'crisis' permission that can be changed with org/perm. I'm going to expect org leadership to be on the same page here and talk about it before putting in an action, and will not be going through the trouble of coding in checks for something that I'd expect people to be talking to each other about.
Technically, staff break is over, and things can be submitted now, though the commands are in a very much bare bones format with the new tweaks, and I'll be changing them a good bit in the coming days/weeks. If someone wants to do a Personal Story Action, feel free on a plot you own about something meaningful, and I can tweak it however later. Or you can wait for more QoL changes to come in, whichever works for you.
This does also mean that the goal/RFRs once per episode just related to story are going away- that was just an action stand in that I never really liked, mostly confused people, and I'll just probably be automating goal reviews shortly regardless to be XP rewards.