Vansin

Congrats! What's your prewriting process?

No joke I taught ballroom dance for 5 years. So writers put out their best description and I impartially judge based on real life assessment.

Sorry I didn't realize your original argument had gotten so beat down over the conversation that all you were left with was "I hereby declare that people pilot their own characters". This is of course true and such a magnificent revision of your original point that I must concede that I was wrong. I thought you were making a complex argument badly when in fact you were making a entirely pointless argument elaborately. Enjoy your victory.

I saw this reddit thread today too. The correct answer is "never have I ever"

We're still having this conversation?! I'm not going to backread too much but What is this a video game? Where do these wacky ideas come from? And they're so fundamental to your arguments, these ideas that RPCs are like video game protagonists whose players can't write both how the character moves and how NPCs and environments around them react and change. You have the very narrow vision of what freeform roleplaying is that is just not in touch with the reality of how this hobby works.

This is like my RP religion in a single paragraph.

I know you were trying to be very basic with this but what you just said is essentially "If a character is not OP, it can't be OP" "Balanced" is the very term we're trying to dissect here. What is balanced? Don't answer, because whatever you do answer will be subjective and therefore not a good working definition everyone can use. At least, that was my previous point. I have to also seriously disagree with this: I think power scaling on the fly is actually THE solution, albeit perhaps not in the way you think of "power scaling" For most, power scaling means "sure kid, I may be a godlike force of nature but I'll limit myself to just sword techniques so I don't kill ya." Which, agreed, is lame as fuck. However a real RP artist can power scale with style by manipulating a situation around a character instead of having that character manipulate itself. "My godlike force of nature relies on the phases of the moon, and as it turns out our battle is taking place during a new moon, during which time he's barely more than a regular human in ability." This method is neither demeaning to your opponent nor a flex on the part of your character. The godlike character can be written to experience a lot of fear during those times, heightening the dramatic tension. The other, less powerful character might be extremely motivated to win this fight because he knows as soon as the moon reappears the comeuppance will be severe. All in all this method of adjusting situations instead of characters to create game balance is at the heart of what makes a great roleplayer. I think power scaling rocks, and should be used more often.

@Die Shize Extremely well said, I read your post after I made my own and there's plenty of overlap. I'm going to post it anyway, but you said it first! The conversation about OP powers always devolves into discussions of splitting hairs: "this is OP, but this variation of that is not" The variety and frequency of these comparisons shows that while they are the answer to Rabbit's question, they are not the answer to the most important questions: what is OP? How do I spot OP? How do I stop OP? And the very simple and actionable answer to those questions is: OP can be defined as "actions which infringe on the enjoyment of your fellow writers" Note that I specified actions and not abilities. Like the old adage "guns don't kill people, people kill people", we could say "powers aren't OP, people's usage of powers are OP" If we stop asking "hey, is this an OP ability?" and instead ask "Okay, what do you intend to do with that ability?" we can really determine if a writer intends to use their character's abilities to grief other players or simply enhance a story. Then we turn to the other players involved and ask "will this power ruin the fun you're intending to have? Will the power present roadblocks you don't want? (as compared to roadblocks you do want, like every story ought to have) In my time on Valucre I have pointedly and egregiously defied the mild powers rule. My major PC was a prophet through whom I gave myself access to unbeatable god magic at any time I chose, with no restrictions. And it was all canon. I have never once been accused of being OP. There's a reason for this, and it's that I never used those characters/powers to do anything aside from set scenes for other RPers to enjoy, and provide missions to other PCs for the purpose of creating storylines. Any conversation about my character's power level would be purely academic, because I never used the powers I awarded to myself for any purpose but to enhance other people's experiences in a consensual way. I support the mild power level of Valucre as a concept for the masses, because frankly the majority of people in this hobby treat RPing not as storytelling, but as an analog RPG video game with an informal rules framework they can exploit for...I don't even know what, honestly. Because of this strange but ubiquitous cultural truth of RPing, blanket rules need to be created and enforced until the day comes when all people write RP to tell stories and not to accumulate PC power out of selfishness.

I'm going to go on record and say that I'm not a huge fan of Fracture or fractal or fractured buttholes, so I would like to suggest a few alternatives for consideration which capture the spirit of your idea without being so literal: Pandemonia (inspiration obvious) Anomium (from Anomie) Anarchara (inspiration obvious) Maldiscor (Mal=bad, discor(d)) Balaur (The multi-headed monster of evil in Romanian folklore, a metaphor for Terrenus's many disparate powers) I picked terms that reflect with sadness on the concept of disunity because I feel the sort of scholar who would rename Terrenus IC would be someone unnerved by the breakdown of their society into factions and autonomous regions.

When I was originally under the mistaken assumption that you were interested in compiling a list I was of the opinion that care should be taken to separate colloquial war from real war. Now that you've informed me that isn't the objective of this thread, I think it's not my place to encourage any real guideline. However if someone does end up compiling such a list, I would certainly argue that only a state can foment war against another entity, with the sole exception of a civil war in which a state foments war against itself.

I think you should reconsider that. War is a political and legal term which rightly ought to derive from state powers. A mob, religion (unless that religion is the theocratic government), movement, race, or company shouldn't be able to claim the term "war" under its purview. However, if your thread really is just to list "conflicts" that have the scent of war, then I wish you luck and hope you find the right one for your character.

So a war, to make it to your list, must be declared by a formal state and possess all the trappings of a state war? Sensible, though I think that disqualifies some examples put forward in this thread. I'm glad it does! I think you opening up this question was like an irresistible lure that was about to attract every user who wants to brag about their "war" without having the real qualifications to do so. Good luck with your list. I look forward to adding a real war of my own to it in due time.

I see. Obviously while for practical purposes it's far easier to write a single battle and call it a war than actually write a war, I don't think that's really how it ought to be defined. I had a battle of 30 raiders attacking the small town of Coth once and while I could have called it a war it would have been pretty disingenuous if I'd done so. So obviously the factors to consider are scale, duration, and ramifications when declaring something a war worthy of your list. Specifically what should not count is someone saying "I called it a war so its a war"

My question would concern whether or not there have been "wars" as compared to "battles" Has anyone roleplayed a long term conflict over multiple threads, with moments of aggression, moments of reprieve, territory gained, territory lost, diplomacy in between? A plot that spans IC months? Takes long term tolls on infrastructure and population...etc? Or, as I more suspect, are most "war" roleplays on Valucre in fact just set piece battles?