[OOC] Titans Beyond

[Lady Seraphina]

@ProPro@rocketrobie2@Skwint You guys still with us?

[ProPro]

Of course I'm still here. No idea what to post, though. We just got shunted forward in a rather janky way, so it's really quite jarring. I'm going to try to get something up by lunch if I can.

[Skwint]

I'm here. Life has been giving my ass a thorough kicking, but I'm still around.

[rocketrobie2]

Sadly I've kinda lost interest in this which sucks because I've been waiting for a Batman Beyond Rp for a while now.

[Demon Shinobi]

@rocketrobie2watch some stuff. Listen to some music. We can make this happen man TT__TT

[Lady Seraphina]

@rocketrobie2 Well you've only really gotten a chance to put up your intro post and an undisclosed amount of the GM fight scene post (I'm guessing about two and a bit paragraphs) so it's not surprising that you're not that invested yet. My suggestion would be to go watch some Batman Beyond (I find Return of the Joker and Babel particularly engaging), get yourself immersed in the universe some more then come back to this with a bit of a fresh face and let's see if we can get some good old fashioned character interaction going. I think why activity and subsequently interest in this is waning a bit is cause we don't really know what we're doing as a whole. We've only just started so their isn't really a sense of the direction the RP is going yet or a sense of us and our characters as a cohesive group which I think is aggravated a bit by a trend I've noticed that's got me worried.

Condensation so the page doesn't look bloated

@Member 00492 You've posted three times and each of those posts (with the debatable exception of the opener) has included a time skip. First it was when the team was engaged in a dispute on how to get to the scene of the crime. That all felt very good, and it sort of gave us a sense of how our character's view each other, G-Man being completely disregarded, character's feeling different ways about Katty's willingness to break the law. That sort of thing, then BAM we were yanked out of that and suddenly we're in the middle of a fast paced and overcrowded group brawl with stuff flying at us from every direction. I wasn't thrilled about it but since we only skipped ahead a little ways and we probably would have gotten to the scene in another round of posts anyways it wasn't a big deal. Then once we'd found our footing at the fight it was again some really good moments for our characters. It gave a sense of how each of the approached battle. Accel grudgingly admitting that her condition makes her more viable at support than direct confrontation, Phantom Girl dealing with the threat completely isolated, Red Arrow going for the tactical solution. That all felt nice and then BAM the fights over it all ended relatively well, no causalities, a tongue lashing by Commissioner Gordon and the sense that nothing we did at the scene actually mattered in the slightest.

There's a serious problem in that which spawns a number of other problems. I realize that at the moment for whatever reason you are very busy. As a result you don't want your lack of posting at certain times to hold up the majority of the group. That I understand and is commendable but I think the group would rather be held up for a few days than have to deal with the time skips that you're using to compensate for your absence. Every time it happens it feels like narrative whiplash and stalls people's ability to know what to do next to the point that I think it would take less time to wait on you to be able to post normally, however infrequently, than the delay that us trying to recover from a sudden time jump results in.

In addition though it causes another problem. When a timeskip is initiated, at least how you've been doing them it essentially decides the results of our characters actions. Like the first time skip, as I said before Katty would have preferred the stealthy approach so my post was seriously delayed while I tried to figure out an explanation for what happened that fit with Katty's personality and tactics. In an RP I am perfectly aware that nothing will ever go perfectly and we're not always going to succeed but this version of design is significantly different and much less enjoyable than other options. In most RPs the GM will present the characters with situations, get them to react then tell them the consequences of their actions. In this your basically presenting the situation, telling us the consequences then asking us how we reacted to make those consequences happen. The enjoyment of writing in an RP, at least for me, is the element of uncertainty. I'm given a situation and I'll try to think as creatively as possible to resolve it. But being given that situation and then being told that no matter how creative I write or what I come up with not only will I fail but the end of the situation is set in stone takes both the fun and the entire point of writing for that section away from me. As it stands there is nothing that I could write for Phantom Girl in the fight scene that would change the outcome you've put in your last post, so if I can't change anything why bother trying?

I know that sounds like a long winded whine and I'm not trying to be unkind but I feel very much like the timeskips are a big part of the reason that the initial excitement over this RP has collapsed to the point that the RP is nearly dead. I'm not trying to blame you or anyone I just want to make it clear why I feel this way and why I feel it doesn't work how I believe you intended it to. That way we can move forward from here and hopefully make the RP more fun and successful in the future cause I love this idea and really don't want it to die.

[ProPro]

@Prince of Seraphs I know I've likely come off as passive aggressive toward you previously, but damn if you did't hit the nail on the head with that analysis. I honestly just didn't want to waste my time with writing it all out. Good on you for bringing up the major points that I've had issues with.

[Demon Shinobi]

@Prince of SeraphsI gotta give it up for that.
I've partially been unsure myself, because I wrote my post in a way that I put an outcome that I felt would match with Red's skill level and the things he did, but also left the majority of the battle up to the rest of the group and their/your decisions, because, well hopefully ou read him being a little out of it at the end of his action.

And I've been trying to figure out if I'm supposed to just be back at the cave. Awkwardly congratulate everyone... Be... all "Well what do we do now?" I understand more or less what has been attempted at here.

Regardless, if @Member 00492 will be gone or busy, maybe the rest of us could interact or build more using the the rest of this day, or by jumping ahead to a point where it's a bit more fresh.

And we could always figure out something for @rocketrobie2, or rather the character, if they would rather not continue.

I know I had an idea of Red patrolling Bludhaven for a bit after he left the Titan's hide out. And that private moment could be used to give an idea of what he does, or have another teammate join him. I figured he might invite them under the pretense that they should get more face time given how they have been a team for at least a little while now. What was it? 2 months?

[Lady Seraphina]

@Demon Shinobi My vague plan after figuring out whatever it was that Katty did during the battle was to have her go off on her own with little explanation. Give me a chance to show what she's like on her own and I figured that one of the teammates that doesn't trust her could follow leading to some good one on one interaction.

[Omega Man]

When it comes to timeskips, I try to only use them when it looks like nobody knows what they're doing. It took nine posts after my first post for anybody to even get us out the door. When the vehicle was given a burst of superspeed, I wanted to make sure it didn't take us another nine posts to get to where we were going. And if anybody had any specific plan they wanted to act out.... then they should have explained that in the OOC or IC a little better. I'm fine with character development but too much exposition is too much exposition.

When it comes to actual fight scenes, I probably wasn't clear before... I'm not the type of GM who wants to spend all of my time writing the reactions of every villain, goon, or supporting character. Don't begin an action and then not pull the trigger. That goes double with what happened in the car.

In the beginning of the RP I was asked several questions, and despite people assuming I wouldn't try to answer them I still did to the best of my ability no matter how irrelevant I thought they were. I drew out an HQ layout, found a map of Gotham I liked, even separated the thing into boroughs and police precincts. An active OOC is just as important as the IC after all. After the initial timeskip to get us to the battle, I was criticized for name dropping the Dee Dee twins and using them a few years into Terry's Batman career. Then I was quoted two days after mentioning I was gonna try to post something like I was somehow holding back your scenes that you had all began? Again, too much exposition and nobody pulling the trigger.

Originally I was just gonna assign one of you as a Co-GM so you could have the 0th posts to change whatever you may need to keep this going. If R2 is out there goes my other Wonder Twin, and of the other four players two of you are talking about doing stuff solo and leaving Accel and G-Man to their own devices. And after criticizing my timeskips, THAT'S part of your solution? Seriously?

I think everybody just wanted different things in this RP. As it stands I'm not gonna move forward with it because to do so would require completely changing my character or bringing in a new one altogether. This was dead when everybody stopped posting in the IC and then the OOC and didn't voice any concerns sooner. Even a single PM would've been more than what was being done in the thread. My apologies to anybody who had high hopes for this RP, originally I did also. I don't generally do smaller casts and was hoping for something a little more solid. This time it just didn't work out that way.

-00492

[Demon Shinobi]

@Member 00492Alright so a few problems I have here.

Firstly, you say you only timeskip when it looks to you like nobody knew what they were doing. So, at a point, for example, the first skip was brought on because you weren't happy with the pace that'd been set even though for the most part everyone was more or less feeling okay with it and it was actually giving a good insight into what the characters thought, felt and saw in each other. At least to me. I repeat that, because a lot of the problem I'm seeing here is the subjectivity of it all.

Second, I'd like to take a second to examine your comment about pulling the trigger. I'll use my post as an example. I had Red Arrow react accordingly to getting a power up because of Accel. It isn't too much time and to take out every Joker present would be a ludicrous feat for a fairly new hero. Still, I set up a few immediate threats and attacked the leader of the Jokers. I had each arrow its mark and said what happened to each Joker that was hit with each arrow. And then in your next skip, focusing solely on J-Man, it was disregarded anyway.

Third, I feel like you're focusing on part of our messages and not the entirety of them. The solution was to try to post and have a few interactions while you were busy. One route I could have employed was having Red Arrow check patrol his city, he is gonna need to go home at some point. But also likely inviting another character to join. In my mind, the current order of best to least choice, barring the Wonder Twins, was Accel, Phantom Girl, G-Man. Accel could help him get home quicker, and they could talk throughout the travel and while patrolling for short bursts while he was under the influence of the speed force. Patrolling with Phantom Girl could give more one on one time and help build more trust. Patrolling with G-Man could be helpful in G-Man seeing why somebody else is heroing and have the two take a good look at each other and themselves. We're a team, but a team is the sum of it's parts. We still need to work on the characters individuality and the relationships that make up the team.

I generally love the ideas you have. I love the roleplays you make. I'd like to hope that this doesn't strain any friendship between us. I know you're going through a lot. But I think, looking objectively, it seems that more or less you wanted something differently from this RP and you weren't/aren't getting exactly what you wanted from it.

Still, I'd like to use Red more. I'd like to build on him. With your permission, I'd like the shot to use the concept to this point and maybe run Titans Beyond myself. Obviously I wouldn't even try if I didn't feel anybody would join me. But if anybody would like to, I'd be happy to work more together.

[Omega Man]

If you wanna take it and run with it that's fine. No harm no foul. At this point I don't even know where I was going to take it. I did however ask a couple mods to close this if that was something that they could do. I'm not salty, I just feel like I did a lot of world building for nothing.

I'll PM the mods and tell them to nevermind. I'll go ahead and assign you as Co-GM after this.

-00492

[rocketrobie2]

@Demon Shinobi I think you guys making your own BB RP is a good idea. I mean clearly you guys and @Member 00492 have different methods to your RPs and different views of what's important most in a post so going off on your own seems like it'd be the best move in this case.

[Omega Man]

I PM'ed the mod, I'll just give it to them. A lot of the images though early on were lost with my photobucket stuff. I haven't went back and removed the dumb photobucket500 image from a lot of the other posts.

-00492

[Lady Seraphina]

So if the GM and rocketrobie2 are bowing out do we want to restart the RP and see about finding two new people to replace them or just continue on from where we are and edit their characters out of future events?

[Demon Shinobi]

@Member 00492thank you, still felt best to ask.

@Prince of Seraphswe should begin again. Cause otherwise it'd be weird. We basically just need to find like 2 people. Upper limit 3 cause I don't want the team to big. I'll also need a co-gm. We'll all be working together, so we're all equal in terms of opinion, but sometimes I go off the grid. And a person in a position of power to watch over things is essential.

[Lady Seraphina]

@Demon Shinobi I'd be willing to CoGM if you're amiable. Though I should say that you might have to put me back on track at certain times. Case and point, the whole J-Man/Dee Dee argument. Looking at it with a level head it basically bothered me because it seemed like name dropping something from the show for the sake of name dropping something from the show cause aside from those names they were in every other way standard jokerz. It wasn't actually a problem in any real sense beyond the fact that I found it really annoying.

Other than little things like that which crop up from time to time cause of my OCD I'm usually pretty good at keeping people on track so if you're okay with it I'd be happy to CoGM. If not then I think @ProPro would be the other good choice.

Do we want to launch an interest check now to replace the two leaving members? I can do it if you're busy.

[ProPro]

Definitely not me. All the major life events I listed previously still apply to me now, and I'm about to launch a One Piece RP on top of everything. I couldn't take the responsibility of coGM here.

[Demon Shinobi]

@Prince of Seraphssounds pretty good to me. I am a bit busy. So if you're willing you could totally do that. I did just get a pm from a potential applicant.

@ProProooooooohhhh one piece lol

[Lady Seraphina]

@Member 00492 I'm trying to gather together the relevant information from this RP to use in the reboot and I would like to ask permission to use your design of the Titan's HQ. If I have your permission could you send a copy of it to [e-mail]? I believe your Photobucket is dead and I don't want you to have to set up a new one just to send me one picture.