Discussion Mandatory Culture Change Demanded

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

Not really. I just wanted attention.

But there is something I would like to bring up.

I hear from friends about an increasing exasperation with unfinished threads, especially big, group, faction threads. It comes up all the time. And I call them whiney little babies and they need to get over themselves. This isn't true. I have no friends. It is just random people that complain about this.

Anyways. I have been operating under an assumption for some time now. Junction, Dominion, Annihilation, Populate? Yeah, plan a story around 5-6 posts long. Best to start in media res, and push the plot forward every post. You have to make things happen, even if people give you the dreaded UhWhat reaction.

What seems common is 1-2 posts of 'getting to the site', aura-farming and internal angsty dialogue about the love-triangle on Seti Alpha 6. Then blades finally cross in post 4, after post 3 is spent with the protag and antag saying some smart assy things to each other, or the antag killing some just created NPCs to give the protag some feels, and then we are off to the races.

But, you can see the problem here, hmmm? If we are getting post 4 and just then slappin' hamsteaks...posting frequency is starting to slow down. (Hey! I am guilty too. I am part of this problem, do you get me!?) We MIGHT get...2 or 3 more posts before things dry up and the forward plot momentum of our precious toons sees us lose interest in the scuffle over breakfast options that got to 6 posts in length.

Now look. I know you post fast, and you and your buddy get 20 posts out per event, but you are the outlier. This is so consistent that it is my reality now.

Why is this? How the hell do I know? I skipped that part of my education where they taught us to bring solutions when we found problems.

I do wonder if post length has something to do with it? Is there any way to see if posts have gotten longer in the last few years, because hells bells Nancy, we all seem to have become G R R Martin or Brandon Sanderson. We writin' chonks.

Don't make this all about post lengths though. Istg.

Have you all noticed this trend? Is it just because I am older? Is it because we are collectively, on average, older and less patient...and have less free time...and having three 800 word posts to read, take in, untangle, make sense of...and then reply to...? Or is this not an issue and I need to take my nosey self back to bed?

You decide, Chaos.

-- This post was written by AI.

 

[Grand Shepherd Burtch]

My two cents:

I find that when the OP includes some kind of thread reward, or some kind of goal based motivation, people tend to have a little more gas in the tank. The more thoughtful the reward is, the more invested the writing parties are.

 

[Credit Wizard]

Such slander.

If I don't introduce myself in the first three posts and have banter. How else will everyone know that I am Darth Murderous, Emperor of the 80th Sith Empire. Ruiner of Notions, King of Storms and Earthquakes. Melter of Lightsabers and voted most handsome at the Beach Party.

Did I just make that character one day ago. Naturally....

 

[Syn]

It can depend, some of the best staying power is when all are going in on the story. Lyra Ventor and Syn's thread was going to feel fairly average at first and in the idea but then it has grown a lot as we both add onto what is happening.

Others it helps when there is a goal and momentum. I will use it as an example but when dialogue and movement are almost separate posts... stopping in the middle of a situation to have a bunch of dialogue with no movement halts progression. West Wing that stuff, talk while walking and into the situation. In a fight, combat dialogue is as important as stopping every ten second to proclaim.

as for post length it can depend on the situation as well for massive threads where a lot is happening or a lot is needed to be responded to. At least 1-2 paragraphs to feed to your writing partners isn't terrible but other times you can do a lot with little.

 

[Ko Vuto]

I would certainly agree that post lengths and word count have gotten much larger since I first join the site. Something I've certainly noticed in myself at least. Although I'm not entirely sure if I prefer bigger posts or more posts. It feels like either one thing is getting highly inflated while the other isn't. I feel like the size and pizzazz of posts with graphics and divs has gradually created a trend of one-upmanship on Chaos. But a bit of peacocking is nothing new really, and I myself do like the added prettiness of modern chaos posts.

I know i'm fully guilty of thickening my posts with plenty of introspection for my characters and their perspective. I often like to write out the internal logic and train of thought of why they're do what they act or feel/think the way the do. Sometimes needing to go back and delete whole paragraph(s) just to keep my writing more cohesive even if I may feel a bit proud of what I wrote up.

In regards to the increasing number of 'unfished threads' I feel like that's more so a symptom of folks creating threads without a clear end point or direction. I feel like a thread only really dies when folks actively choose to give up on it, or they've been unintentionally forgotten. Most threads that kind of just fizzle out I believe have often reached their natural conclusion even if it feels underwhelming OOCly.

 

[Braze]

People will have fun how they wanna have fun

 

[Kitter Bitters]

My two cents:

I think the issue is threads take forever so while you are waiting on thread #1 you join #s 2, 3, 4 and 5. Now you are in so many that you lose interest in #1.

My solution would be to offer speed type roleplay. Small plots with a word count limit or a whatever that stated commitment to posting quickly a few times. Things people can join at ANY time and that people will actually respond to. Like a bar, open training, lunch etc whatever. While you are waiting to post in # 1 you go chat about that love triangle on Seti Alpha 6 in this fast pace anything goes whose ever on post back and forth a few times. Then when it’s your turn in #1 you leave the bar, training room, dining hall, whatever and go post. That fast moving fun thread kept you from making 10 more so you’ve got gas in the tank.

But it requires people to post quickly for fun in a casual or no stakes setting while they wait.

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

People will have fun how they wanna have fun

Ngl, I don't even know what this means in relation to the OP.

 

[Alan]

Well ChatGPT can't account for everything people wanna write about. I'm seeing too much of it. It's not to my liking.

I got over the AI art and changed my mind about it- it lets people do stuff that they couldn't exactly get with other art. Fine, I get it, I've changed my mind on it.

But a lot of this stuff also comes down to "is this person writing this?"

And now, it's kinda weird to think that maybe, no, they're not. Thats a weird thought to think about as a writer. That someone just copy and pasted my fifteen-twenty minutes of work and a machine, not a person, wrote it back. It's getting more and more obvious of who's doing it, and it's getting more and more aggravating in the sense that they don't seem to care about the hobby the same way and it's almost insulting to me- saying that it's too much to sit down and give the same effort that I do.

But yes, I also think that people don't take time outside of their respective faction threads to develop their characters- the articles, diaries, journals, single stories, private threads to flesh out their characters. They want other people to read their character development. Which makes sense. But maybe not all the time.

I think people are also far too attached to the map game and major factions in some instances, and don't want to deviate from it because they see Chaos as a game as much as they do writing. In the next few months I'm going to stop posting so much on Major Factions and start to do one-off or small side stories, maybe pop in here and there. But overall I don't want to participate in a map game anymore. I've been there and done that and the next big thing is just a re-skinned faction of something else a decade on. There's only so many original ideas for invasions and Major Factions.

I want to write and tell stories, have characters and developments. And a thread that needs to reach x amount of posts or gets stopped because of judgement/invasion endings etc is getting less and less appealing as I get older and as I have less time. Same reason I don't really care about the factory anymore.

​

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

Alan

To boil your thoughts down: The map game encourages threads to be abandoned once they hit a certain threshold?

Not saying I agree, or disagree, just looking to clarify. But also I doubt that it is going to change even if it is the case. I have been trying to adapt to the the new meta and write complete stories within the confines of those few posts I know I will get in a larger group thread, but others still seem to write to the possibility of 20+ posts.

There is always the option of writing Duel threads if we want an extra long thread, and honestly...might be worth doing break away threads that are not tied to the specific faction thread in which they started.

Just spitballing.

 

[Alan]

Alan

To boil your thoughts down: The map game encourages threads to be abandoned once they hit a certain threshold?

Not saying I agree, or disagree, just looking to clarify. But also I doubt that it is going to change even if it is the case. I have been trying to adapt to the the new meta and write complete stories within the confines of those few posts I know I will get in a larger group thread, but others still seem to write to the possibility of 20+ posts.

There is always the option of writing Duel threads if we want an extra long thread, and honestly...might be worth doing break away threads that are not tied to the specific faction thread in which they started.

Just spitballing.

CORRECT

 

[Judah Dashiell]

I want to write and tell stories, have characters and developments. And a thread that needs to reach x amount of posts or gets stopped because of judgement/invasion endings etc is getting less and less appealing as I get older and as I have less time

Same and I have seen this. Once it gets over the thresh hold forget about people replying. Unless its something I want to participate in (say, a planet I enjoy) I find myself staying away from map game threads. If people like them awesome sauce, just not my thing.

Personally, I've had a lot of dropped storylines over the past several months. Its frustrating. Not sure if folks don't want to put in the time for well-rounded character development, short-form videos have rotten their brain, or (most likely) maybe its just me. Finding those who want to tell a complete arc or a well rounded thread that pushes forward is getting increasingly difficult (more if you don't play the Jedi/Sith game).

 

[Braze]

Ngl, I don't even know what this means in relation to the OP.

I fully agree with the sentiments from both Ko Vuto and Alan .

'Fun' is subjective, and people will have different outputs based on what they enjoy doing. I find a lot of frustrations with what other writers do and don't do. I've been enjoying private threads far more lately because getting a plot finished in bigger threads like invasions just isn't usually in the cards. I can't really fault anyone if that's all they want to write and they're happy letting things peter off.

I just don't enjoy that. I can't dictate or make others do what I'd rather them do.

As for post lengths, I'm happy with a one-line sentence if it fits the story, and I'm happy with several paragraphs if that fits the story too. Length doesn't bother me unless it's just… length for length's sake. It's exhausting to read through ten site pages with twenty posts per page, each containing twenty paragraphs, just for five minutes of in-character time to pass.

That's not fun or engaging for me. That's a slog with barely any plot momentum. I want interaction and development. I can't get much out of something that dense, and it becomes a whole hell of a lot of work for someone like me who's dyslexic and has to process everything audibly, sometimes several times over, just to retain it long enough to craft a reply.

To me, it's dreadfully boring. It's not fun.

But I also understand there are writers who enjoy that kind of thing. It's just not for me.

I've tried the map game before, but I'm at the point where it does nothing for me. I've been focusing on stories with interactive characters, and it's so much more rewarding with writers I gel with who also want that genuine spark of connection. For me, that is fun.


The map game just isn't fun for me. I don't like the constant back-and-forth fighting that eventually dwindles into "who cares, so-and-so owns such-and-such today and now we're going to write this." It's not compelling. It breaks my suspension of disbelief with how often it happens, and in big threads or dominions, I find people feel less inclined to keep posting once the thread has reached its required submission length. I want to finish the scene.

The bounty hunting system is another place where I'm struggling to find any fun.

What's not fun is doing research on someone else's character, planning out a strategy, putting together a nice div, researching a setting, and then trying to communicate OOC about what they actually want story-wise… only to deal with writers who care more about ego-boosting than actual storytelling. They chase faux "reputation points" on a bounty they never intend for anyone to collect because it makes them look "cool."

It's not fun dealing with writers who refuse to communicate OOC at all, or who act rude, dismissive, or condescending the moment you try to get clarity.

Even when I offer to adjust my writing, suggest alternatives, or literally do anything to help tell a fun story, I still end up dealing with people who drop the plot, drop the scene, drop the thread, or act stand-offish… like they're somehow above anyone who tries to write with them.

Some people realize they can't write a compelling challenge, or don't know how to make their character come out on top, so they just leave and delete everything rather than put in the same amount of effort I put into setting up a bounty hunt. They run off to brag about how wanted they are and how cool their character is, all while facing zero consequences for their actions.

Maybe that's fun for them. It's certainly not fun for me. But I can't make them write a scene to completion. I can't make them admit they'd rather their character escape and ask for advice on how to adjust the story to make that happen, whether in my post or theirs.

You can't make people do what you want to do if they don't enjoy what you enjoy. And the reverse is true too.

I just want to be the change I want to see, and I've been trying harder despite my own social awkwardness to ask people what they want to do, like what they actually want out of a scene. Unfortunately, not everyone is going to mesh together, and that's okay.

Find the people you enjoy writing with, the ones who share your idea of fun, and have fun together. At least that's what I've shifted to try and do.

So yeah. Fun is subjective and people will enrage with what they find the most fun. People will have fun how they wanna have fun.

 

[Roth Likonis]

I mean absolutely no offense to the Chaos community when I say this; I say this having written on other SWRP sites for years and years. You guys cannot keep threads alive. The number of threads that just get abandoned - in Public, Private, and in Factions - is honestly kind of staggering.

On some of my old sites, we literally had threads that were a hundred pages long. Some posts were just a paragraph, some were several pages long, but we kept those threads going for way, way too long. Personally I think it's the Map Game. Writing here becomes very goal oriented, very - I'm not writing, I'm playing, I'm gaming - and when that doesn't get rewarded quick enough with a dopamine hit, people tend to drop out over the long haul once the buzz wears off. That's also where a lot of AI writing comes in; you're not writing for the joy of it, you're writing for the game of it.

Minor factions were also a much bigger deal on other sites. They had their own cultures, own goals, own stories. They drove a lot of narrative plot forward because they had history going back years on their sites. It didn't matter that they weren't powerful in the territorial or military sense. Here...they're kind of an afterthought.

Just my two cents! I still love this community - it's around while others have died out a long time ago. Chaos is doing a lot of things right.

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

Same and I have seen this. Once it gets over the thresh hold forget about people replying. Unless its something I want to participate in (say, a planet I enjoy) I find myself staying away from map game threads. If people like them awesome sauce, just not my thing.

Personally, I've had a lot of dropped storylines over the past several months. Its frustrating. Not sure if folks don't want to put in the time for well-rounded character development, short-form videos have rotten their brain, or (most likely) maybe its just me. Finding those who want to tell a complete arc or a well rounded thread that pushes forward is getting increasingly difficult (more if you don't play the Jedi/Sith game).

Is it the case that some threads are 'scenes' for establishing or showing the development of relationships, and they get slotted into the list of completed threads, while others are long drawn out story lines. The first type of private thread I have great success with, the second type...not so much.

My OP was primarily about group threads, but I think there is an aspect that is true for both: dropped threads have always been a problem in RP.


I dunno. I revisited some of my old posts from back in the day where I was new to forum RP, and my posts were 200-250 words long each, but the threads were 10-12 pages long. Perhaps we have the same word count on a one page thread now?

I dunno. I am just saying words at this point.

 

[Aether Verd]

To anyone who posted the same thing you're about to read, sorry, I didn't read the above.

Disclaimer made, here's the two cents:

• Map game threads serve no purpose beyond hitting 30 posts. If you want to go longer than that? Ball out. But most of the time it's "hit minimum, submit, onto the next one."
• Regular faction threads thereby have to be really freaking good, or else they're just taking away from posts that could be dedicated to expansion.
• Have posts gotten larger? Yeah. It's almost like you're writers and you improve writing over time or something. (That or something being AI)

How do you "fix" the problem? Ask your FO to pick a "hexes for free" mandate or ask them to write more social/open style map threads. The site whines about beach threads, but then also dumps a truck load of posts anytime there's a party of any sort.

Yadie yadie yada, etc etc.

 

[Amz]

Deciding to quickly drop in to give my two-cents while I have a minute, for whatever that's worth.

Unfinshed threads, private, major faction, minor faction, etc. has been a thing since Chaos started and I think throughout the years there have been different reasons for why that is. Some of the main reasons I find that threads don't finish:

1. Not having a consistent writing partner. Having someone that you can bounce ideas off of makes a big difference, especially when you go into a faction thread which can feel intimidating for a lot of people, especially new writers. Most in major factions tend to be friends who have been writing together with one another for a while, which is not a bad thing, but typically means that most writers might already be paired off when you try to get your character introduced. Butting into someone else's interaction, in something that might have already been planned out, in an effort to try and crack your way into the system, can be an awkward and uncomfortable experience. If you don't try to approach anyone, you might not get any story whatsoever and be left to fend for yourself and/or ignored. If you do try to approach someone, they might try to make a quick exit since they didn't account for your character showing up, and ignore you anyways. I have seen this happen to writers on various occasions.

2. CHATGPT can't be used continuously. It doesn't understand nuances very well, doesn't really push the story forward, and can only go so far as the interactions get more complex. It does a good job of vomiting a lot of text, but not really saying a whole lot of anything.

3. Everyone on the site is getting older. A lot of us have been around here for a while and a good majority of us have busy lives now. Jobs, kids, parents who are getting older. It's getting harder to keep up here, especially with the inclusion of chatgpt making it easier for people to rapid-fire post, while you're spending maybe an hour or more on just one - when they've already written maybe 10-15. The story moves on faster than you can keep up with, you lose the plot, and at a certain point it starts to feel useless.

4. Faction threads are competitive, and I'm going to go with the extreme example and say, if you have 1 character in each of the major factions, that's at least 7 faction threads to be apart of, at minimum- not accounting for the sometimes multiple threads that one faction can put out in a week. Add onto that private threads, which most people feel they get better character development out of - and it's a miracle some people write as much as they do.

5. I think it's just part of the nature of RP. People lose interest, want to do something new, and have the attention span of a goldfish. I remember having a similar conversation with you ( Brandyn Sal-Soren ) 10 years ago, on the other rp site we were part of, about threads not often finishing and having to resort to headcanon. There is something special when you can say you wrote something to completion, but 9/10 times you're likely not going to get that, and trying to find solutions to a problem that seems infinite might just be more discouraging in the end.

Anyways, back to my void I go. <3

 

[Vazela]

Unfinished stories suck. The best thing about forum roleplay is that you can write a post and log off for a week to come back later to the story and engage with it again. That is if you want to. I love the people I write with but sometimes a private thread, or even a public one, doesn't work out. The story is crap in execution or something like that so we move on and find something else we want to write in. That is how I roll.

The only threads I think that you should be posting frequently, as like an obligation, are Invasions or Annihilations. It is literally against the rules to be a slow poster if you are writing in such threads so I like to post fast and frequently to them when I have things to reply to.

btw if you are feeling "guilt" because you haven't replied to something yet then touch grass. Respectfully.

 

[Alan]

Going into a discussion and saying you didn’t read other writers responses, which maybe would take less than a few moments to read in their entirety, could be an example of what people are discussing.

 

[Srina Talon]

Similar conversations pop up like this all the time, but I actually think Braze had it right the first time:

People will have fun how they wanna have fun

What qualifies as a "worthwhile" and "completed" thread will vary from person to person. There are times when I get everything I need in three posts, and I can call it and move on, or use a blog to drop it in one go. There are a lot of different reasons that threads go unfinished. It happens, it's going to keep happening, and it will always happen. We're all drawn to the next thing, just trying to keep up so we don't get left behind.

For the most part...Gone are the days when we 1 v 1 with "one line" posts that we can fire off with half a brain cell and our thumbs. I can't remember the last time I saw a one-line post on this website outside of the famed:

For me?

I've got a full-time job and 60-hour work weeks, and I come here to relax. I reply to what I can, when I can, how I can, and as much as I can. I've always written long-ish posts, and I'm a fan of descriptions. I like reading about what a character is thinking, feeling, and about the setting that we've arrived in. I like their thoughts about things that have happened before because I may not be in the know. But, I know that style isn't for everyone.

Best thing to do?

Be honest with your writing partners up front.

If you don't have the patience to wait for them - Perhaps it's best to cancel those threads until they have time or the bandwidth. SWRP is a hobby, and the moment it starts feeling like a chore, the less engaged people will be.

If you don't like Dominions because they end too soon, as it was pointed out, talk to your MFO and A.) Request more faction threads or B.) Suggest swapping mandates to passive expansion gains so the story can be focused on more or C.) Make threads independent of your faction with a small core group. A smaller posting rotation can allow for faster returns... Start polls to see what sort of threads people WANT to do. It's all about engagement and having a story that people are really invested in, with respect, to the time and IRL of those you're writing with.

There are a dozen ways to skin the cat, but they all require work, time, and patience.

People will at the end of the day have fun how they want to. I think the only person I've "finished" a thread with on this website IS Brandyn Sal-Soren , and I've written...A lot over the years. I DO have a thread that spans from about October 2018 till about 2022. But that was our choice to keep it contained there, and several stories/scenes rolled into one.

That doesn't mean I've enjoyed my threads any less - Just because they don't have an ending.