Zuma/Daimons

[Vellos]

Well, Silence obviously has some means of communication, as he (she?) is the one I sent the FORGED LETTER to.

Indeed.

I'm discovering that at least one daimon speaks in rhyme. All the time. Which though annoying, and makes me think the GM is toying. But, at least we can have some conversations, which removes some serious complications.

[Glaumring the Fox]

Im hardly rich, look at my family wealth and then my tax , and im not famous either, infamous maybe . I'm just a regular king , im lukewarm king version 1.0

[JPierreD]

Indeed.

I'm discovering that at least one daimon speaks in rhyme. All the time. Which though annoying, and makes me think the GM is toying. But, at least we can have some conversations, which removes some serious complications.

I have seen those messages, and just joined the RP. Honestly, it makes me think the GM is taking extra effort in playing his characters.

[egamma]

Might we try not attacking the other players characters OOC?

I didn't read that as an attack. Try re-reading it without a presumption of guilt.

[Indirik]

When I see "Has anyone mentioned the concerns of the army sizes in game? No. How do you know what response you would get? You don't, you just make assumptions", what this means to me is "You're not good enough to beat the game. Work harder."

My interpretation of this is that he's saying "As a player, don't make assumptions about what the characters will do. You can't know what the characters will do unless you go find out." Now, you may not want to find out. Your character may make any assumption you want them to make.

But people shouldn't come to the forum and say "Why should I go ask them? They won't tell me anyway."  That's an OOC assumption. Or, at least, that statement says that the poster has made an OOC assumption about what will happen if their characters were to go do something. If my character were concerned about the massive armies that the Zuma have (and Brance doesn't really know or care, the Zuma are too far away for him to worry), he just might go ask them why they feel the need to have such a huge army. After all, if your neighbor claims he wants to be your friend, or just wants to be left alone, yet maintains a unreasonably huge army, wouldn't you want to know why? So, why not ask? What's the worst he's likely to do, tell you it's none of your business, and you should GTFO of his land? And if he does start a war, then... hey... war! Woohoo! We need more of them anyway.

[Chenier]

Heh..haha...you're...you're joking, right? Like, OOCly, you are in fact, joking, yes?

I'd say the same thing.

Unless you were going out of your way to poke them with a stick, they were overall quite civilized. Merciless, sure, but otherwise quite handy allies who regularly showed compassion for our suffering.

As for the Zuma, Vates was a bit freeky, but definately looked like quite a nice guy. He was the first daimon *I* met, same for many others. Seemed like a good chap with whom we could build a strong friendship.

[Geronus]

I think you might be confusing "SMA" with "don't think too hard, stereotype like mad, and abandon all curiosity."

If it is in your character's nature to assume that all other Daimons will be like Screamer, then by all means, abandon all possibility of finding out anything more about the Zuma IC (but don't complain to us OOC about it).

If, on the other hand, your character has a shred of curiosity or critical thinking in him, he might just say, "Hm. Well, that Daimon was very dangerous to approach. I thought I'd heard about people getting actual information out of the Daimons, though? How could they do that if their brains were bleeding out their ears? Maybe there are Daimons who don't do that...?"

This is a question of style. Personally, I see Von Genf's point. If your character's only encounter with the daimons was with an inhuman horror like Screamer, why on earth would you ever try to deal with them again? Why wouldn't you simply try to get as far away from them as possible? Sure, as a PLAYER you can know that there's probably more to them. But if you take your character seriously as a superstitious medieval noble, SMA style, why wouldn't you be terrified given that RP? Continuing to try to interact with them after such an encounter is borderline *insane* from the roleplaying standpoint.

Ans seriously, why would anyone bother to *ask* another realm why they have such a big army? Isn't the answer self-evident? It's there. You know what that means. Enough said. When have armies ever been a subject of diplomatic debate other than in the context of surrender talks?

[Bjarnson]

Im hardly rich, look at my family wealth and then my tax , and im not famous either, infamous maybe . I'm just a regular king , im lukewarm king version 1.0

I disagree, atelast on the last part. For i know nothing about your family taxes...

ps. I still think the Daimons that rule the Zuma adds fun to the game.

[De-Legro]

This is a question of style. Personally, I see Von Genf's point. If your character's only encounter with the daimons was with an inhuman horror like Screamer, why on earth would you ever try to deal with them again? Why wouldn't you simply try to get as far away from them as possible? Sure, as a PLAYER you can know that there's probably more to them. But if you take your character seriously as a superstitious medieval noble, SMA style, why wouldn't you be terrified given that RP? Continuing to try to interact with them after such an encounter is borderline *insane* from the roleplaying standpoint.

Ans seriously, why would anyone bother to *ask* another realm why they have such a big army? Isn't the answer self-evident? It's there. You know what that means. Enough said. When have armies ever been a subject of diplomatic debate other than in the context of surrender talks?

If that is the character attitude, that there is no point to asking, which is fine mind you, then they sort of don't deserve any other resolution do they. Before hostilities with PeL we were regularly asking each other about why forces appeared on the border. At one stage I had massed our entire army on the border, but that was to go into Metten Dews to rid the region of monsters. As relations were terse we quickly received an inquiry into what our forces were up to.

Let me put it another way, if the force in question is a single unit, owned by the region lord. Now suddenly do you think there might be OTHER reasons the force is there?

[Carna]

Zuma doing police work? Why didn't we realize it before? Their army isn't meant to threaten half the continent, its there to do police and civil work. Damn decent of them, but we do know they've an unhealthy fondness for the tribes in their claimed lands.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I feel much relieved.

Finn.

[De-Legro]

Zuma doing police work? Why didn't we realize it before? Their army isn't meant to threaten half the continent, its there to do police and civil work. Damn decent of them, but we do know they've an unhealthy fondness for the tribes in their claimed lands.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I feel much relieved.

Finn.

I would think some of the Lordly duties that require ones presence in the region would probably be more likely, but then perhaps the Zuma are trying massive civil works to try and get the region producing. Of course that is if we are approaching the situation from a game mechanics view.

Now if I'm approaching it from a role play angle, there are PLENTY of reasons for a lord to be in his region, along with his troops.

[Geronus]

If that is the character attitude, that there is no point to asking, which is fine mind you, then they sort of don't deserve any other resolution do they. Before hostilities with PeL we were regularly asking each other about why forces appeared on the border. At one stage I had massed our entire army on the border, but that was to go into Metten Dews to rid the region of monsters. As relations were terse we quickly received an inquiry into what our forces were up to.

Let me put it another way, if the force in question is a single unit, owned by the region lord. Now suddenly do you think there might be OTHER reasons the force is there?

If Anaris is going to call someone out for not continuing to stick their hand in the fire after having been burned, I'm going to point out how silly that argument is.

You might indeed ask why someone has their entire army massed on your border, but you're not going to ask why someone has a big army in general. As for the Zuma, whatever. I think we get the point you're all trying to make. 'Why don't you try talking to them, and if you do it just right, it will be cool, we promise; the Zuma make sense, really; there's a reason for everything, just try a little harder.' Right. Ok. Message received. Only it seems a lot of people really aren't that interested and/or are frustrated by the results of the efforts they have made. And no one really seems to care about that.

[De-Legro]

If Anaris is going to call someone out for not continuing to stick their hand in the fire after having been burned, I'm going to point out how silly that argument is.

You might indeed ask why someone has their entire army massed on your border, but you're not going to ask why someone has a big army in general. As for the Zuma, whatever. I think we get the point you're all trying to make. 'Why don't you try talking to them, and if you do it just right, it will be cool, we promise; the Zuma make sense, really; there's a reason for everything, just try a little harder.' Right. Ok. Message received. Only it seems a lot of people really aren't that interested and/or are frustrated by the results of the efforts they have made. And no one really seems to care about that.

Why not, if a neighbour of mine suddenly doubled their CS, I would certainly be making inquires as to why that may be.

There is a big difference between not caring about the complaints, and not being convinced that there is a problem that is both significant enough to warrant code changes on shared/interlinked code that covers all NPC realms and a reasonable fix exists for. So far the answers seem to be, restrict the Zuma to only acting within their own borders. Such suggestions are being forwarded to Tom, and if they fit with what he is trying to do we might see some chances. Realise that the members of the Dev team responding here don't know enough about why the Zuma exist to go making radical changes to their mechanics. That will have to be Tom's call, and so far he seems pretty happy with the Zuma GM.

[vonGenf]

Such was not at all my intention. I have great respect for von Genf's player.

I was giving him suggestions for how he might proceed, and a clarification of SMA—couched in the same level of sarcasm his post that I replied to was written with.

No harm done. I did manage to get a response... and maybe I shouldn't post-while-jetlagged.

You might indeed ask why someone has their entire army massed on your border, but you're not going to ask why someone has a big army in general. As for the Zuma, whatever. I think we get the point you're all trying to make. 'Why don't you try talking to them, and if you do it just right, it will be cool, we promise; the Zuma make sense, really; there's a reason for everything, just try a little harder.' Right. Ok. Message received. Only it seems a lot of people really aren't that interested and/or are frustrated by the results of the efforts they have made. And no one really seems to care about that.

Thanks, that is pretty much my point.

[Anaris]

If Anaris is going to call someone out for not continuing to stick their hand in the fire after having been burned, I'm going to point out how silly that argument is.

Except that that's not what I'm calling him out for.

I'm calling him out for hiding behind SMA for what's actually a character decision.

I don't see any problem with a character who meets Screamer and is then too scared to go meet any other Daimons.

However, I also don't see a problem with a character who meets Screamer, and then says, "Ow. Well, maybe some of the other Daimons are less inimical to my ears."

Look at it this way: I don't know how much von Genf's character knows about the Daimons, but I do know that Alanna, who has never gone nearer to the Zuma than Mattan Dews, and never deliberately sought out information about the Zuma, knows that people have talked to them and gotten useful and interesting information.

Based on that information alone, I would think that someone attempting to follow SMA would, after encountering Screamer, think, "Hm. Well, I guess that must not be the Daimon people talked to to get information. There must be some other Daimons around who are less dangerous just to be near."

I'm not talking about using OOC info IC. I'm not talking about having a casual recklessness for one's own life. I'm just talking about very simple critical thinking skills for our characters. SMA does not, in any way, shape, or form mandate that we abandon such, and I get angry when people try to claim that it does.