BrokenPromise

The Status Bar

Sure. But then, if we go by that reasoning. It implies you mentioned strict negatives you do want others to agree with, yes?

@SleepingSilence

Nah, I figure everyone knows what's wrong with the status bar. It can be a sewer sometimes, we just disagree on how much of a sewer it is and if it warrants removal/changes. That's evident just reading the posts here. I don't have enough pride in my views to think I know what's best for the forum, I just wanna see people talk about it and see if anything comes up. There's already been some insightful posts by people who are addressing the problem instead of my opinion of it.

The Status Bar

Though there are people who are way too easy to offend who might as well be trolls. It's a vicious cycle.

The Status Bar

I mean the post doesn't even argue about trolling, or even those who spam there.

@SleepingSilence

Why would I "argue" about something we all agree on? I'm looking for insight, not an echo chamber. I'm sure we can all agree flame wars = the suck, yea?

And I know it's a pipe dream, but if people would just stop feeding the troll, they'll fade away on their own, what they want is your attention and some people are giving them exactly what they want.

@Izurich

For better or for worse, RPG has always been a pretty lax place where mods are chill and don't aggressively hand out ban sentences. And when they do, they are always appealed. The result is that there are no real repercussions for bad behavior, but also users can breathe a little easier and don't need to worry about rule lawyering mods unless they really ask for it. I don't think that's a bad thing, but it does become a problem when you have a system that can easily be abused such as the status bar. The much easier solution would be to hold users more accountable, but I don't see that happening.

The Status Bar

You remove the status bar, they’ll find other avenues for trolling, such as posting “venting” threads, are we going to remove the ability to post threads too?

@Izurich

Vent threads are banned FYI.

But a venting thread is like a poster, where a status bar is more like a chat overlay in an MMO that has no permanent off button. I can ignore a poster easily enough. A chat overlay on the other hand pushes anything interesting off the front page as soon as a flame war breaks out. I don't find them similar at all.

—and this would require Mahz to show up again—

@Kuro

Yea, which is why I think defaulting to hidden would be for the best, because anything beyond that is going to require Mahz to look over the code. Hell, even that might be beyond the capabilities of the mod team. But I'm more looking for people's opinions than a fix.

The Status Bar

Is the status bar a useful tool that benefits the community, something that’s just there, or something that actively hurts the community?

I fall into the camp of people who believes that the status bar could be made better, like default to a hidden state. While I do believe it has merits, it has doing far more harm than good.

I’m aware you can hide the status bar, but it reveals itself over time. Moreover, it's out there in the public eye. Someone who has yet to register for an account can see the status bar and everything that goes on there. This is why it would be good if it was hidden by default. At least that way people have to actively look for it.

People occasionally use the status bar for status updates, but I feel they don't need to be broadcast to the forum at large. They would be just as useful if they only showed up on your profile. That's where I'd look if you were slow to post. Barring that, you could also just write something at the top of your Bio.

What’s that? You want to advertise your new RP? Directly below the status bar we have two other bars that show the newest interest checks and roleplays. I can't speak for everyone, but I've gotten to the point where I don't know why I click on status bar RP advertisements. Half the time it's in a sub section I don't feel like participating in, and the other half it's something I'm not interested in. We have sections dedicated to interest checks, and are sorted by tags and writing level. But if you must have a status bar, a user interested in joining a new RP could just unhide it.

Some people say we just need mods, but the regular mods are our status bar mods. They've been doing a good job, but they have real lives and things do crop up in their absence.

But what are your thoughts?

Edit: The title has been made less click-baity, and I adjusted how I worded my stance slightly.

Grimoiric Heart

When you get older, you have other obligations. Meeting with relatives, writing cards, doing taxes, shopping for gifts, all that stuff kind of mounts and leaves less time for RPing.

Symphony of Espers

@Izurich@mantou Your job was to recover the client's daughter and slay "Tony" so that he no longer had to fear shakedowns from the mafia. While he has no obligation to pay you, he was pleased that you at least got his daughter out of that mess. He has agreed to provide the money, but did not relinquish the BMW. As weretigers are vengeful creatures, he's opted to use it to get as far away from Pax Septimus as he can.

Symphony of Espers

@ERode@Majoras End As a reward for almost locating a missing person, your next meal at "The Nerine Vista" will be paid in full! Just let me know when you guys feel like enjoying true elegance and style.

Grimoiric Heart

The girl seemed to quiet down after Stripes spoke to her. This was an agreeable outcome. Often hostages that weren't entranced by magic would ask a bunch of silly questions like why a larger than life tiger could talk, wear a witches' hat, or any other silly question that might force its way into their panic filled minds. It wasn't something Stripes could empathize with. Even the first time she used her book to transform, she wasn't scared or filled with uncertainty. It was more like "Oh? So this is something that can actually happen." Stripes understood most magical girls thought their first transformations were a dream of some sort, at least when they were her age. Younger magical girls often had an easier time adjusting to magical life, but most older girls have an idea of how the world is suppose to be, and often reject their new reality because it doesn't mesh with the one they think they know and love. If anything, Stripes found the "normal" behavior of trying to justify it all as a dream to be strange. Who cares if turning into a magical girl is real or not? If it's real, great. If not, why ruin your dream by calling it an illusion? People put way too much emphasis on trying to be correct all the time.

With the girl's shirt in Stripe's mouth, the back of her head was pressed up against her pink nose. It didn't obstruct her breathing, but it was impossible for Stripes to breathe without also being reminded of whatever the girl washed her hair with. Unless she never showered WHICH IS REALLY GROSS OH MY GOD SHE PUT HER MOUTH ON IT! So long as she didn't struggle too much, this should be easy.

Unfortunately, she wanted to know her name. This was unfortunate because people only ask you your name if they want to learn more about you. What was following this question was any number of questions about the magical world, how she came to be, and a slew of other questions that Stripes had answered for countless other magical girls and refused to do again. Because when you give someone information, they start to see you as an asset they can make use of and talk to you more. But this girl had Stripes in checkmate. They had just met, and there was no reason for her to assume that Stripes had her best interests at heart. She hated to admit it, but she almost wished the girl was still swearing her head off. Annoying? yes, but it was the difference between listening to bad music and an estranged family member: Both were annoying, but one you had to listen to if you wanted to ensure your mother/boss didn't get upset.

"Stripes." She replied. Tigers couldn't actually talk, that was more managed with magic and such. Which was fortunate for the girl, as Stripes likely wouldn't be able to talk with her mouth full.

It was not long before Stripes spotted the glow of the grimoire. IT didn't look like a hard location to get to, but Captain Goody-two-shoes was marching herself and her collection of minions in the same direction. Given the way Stripes's power was divided among the number of nearby friendly combatents, she really couldn't think of a magical girl that she synergized worse with. Regardless, she could tell just by the changes in the girl's behavior that the grimoire was likely hers. Stripes should have known better. Who else would ask a one ton killing machine their name but someone eccentric enough to be a magical girl.

"I'm going to set you down soon, so be prepared to run for it." Stripes snorted into her hair. "Save your questions for later, please."

Stripes's last act as a majestic tabby cat was to create eight balls of light that hovered over her back. with a crack, they surged ahead and whistled through the air. Each one struck a different pageless, reducing their heads to black pulp. But after that, her form started to shrink. The future magical girl's feet would start to drag on the ground as Stripes's form shrank. For a brief moment, Stripes was in her base magical girl form, biting onto the back of the girl's shirt, but she promptly let go and adjusted her hat on her head. She wasn't going to be of any help here, in no small thanks to Captain Bad-Despair. That wasn't to say the cluster of other magical girls didn't sour the situation further. The sudden appearance of Ethereal Rose and her dark suitor were particularly troublesome. Anyone who wanted to make small talk while fighting was not someone Stripes could enjoy. Not that it didnt make sense for Rose, as her, uh, thing did most of the heavy lifting. The massive pageless in the distance was a tempting target, but there were enough magical girls present that she didn't need to risk her life for what would be a meager contribution. She couldn't even manifest spells right now.

But none of the events that transpired here really upset Stripes. After doing this for a few years, it became expected. There was no anger or sadness, just pure apathy towards the situation.

"Excuse me, moving to the back." Stripes walked past the magical girls that were rushing towards the monstrosity and the grimoire.

Symphony of Espers

Alright, so just a few quick notes:

-As you're likely aware, there have been a lot of melody note updates. Posting them here would be too tedious, but there's a full list on the discord. It's mostly been buffs to buff skills, reworks of redundant notes, and nerfs to prevent exploits. Modification notes need to be looked over, but they should be more or less fine until the player espers get stronger. I'm tempted to make [Blink]'s speed dependent on its rank, since I think blinking with progressively larger objects isn't really why people use [Blink] to begin with. But for the moment ima just let it ride as-is. I'll go over that stuff next downtime.

-Speaking of downtime, several players have asked for an extention, and the survey numbers are kind of low. I don't see any reason to kick things off first thing next year. Especially since I know my boy Dalton is going to be inebriated during the new year. So you guys have an extra week to finish writing collabs, reading collabs, wrapping up bounties, etc. Official operation start time will be on January 8th-9th of the new year, EST.

Till next year.