Social distancing / quarantine support thread

[Allison]

So here in Missouri (USA), much has been left up to local officials, and since I'm in the largest metro area in the state, we have the most restrictions (I think). The state governor did limit gatherings to 10 people or less and shut down restaurants to takeout only. He also closed all state government buildings to the public. Since I'm a state government employee, this has shifted my work to work from home, and we are not taking in new clients right now, which is my main job. So basically in a week's time, my job has changed almost completely. The GOOD thing is that we have this online learning platform, and that counts as "work." So for the past two days, my "work" has been watching training videos. Right now I'm doing one on making engaging PowerPoint slides, since I am known as the technology guru in both of my offices (yes, I work out of two) and am often called upon to make PP presentations for my coworkers. So I'm actually really enjoying that, but wonder how long that will/can last. I'm somewhat concerned that should this go on for an extended period of time that they will think that they don't need to pay me to watch training videos all day. But hopefully then I'll just be deemed "non-essential" and be furloughed. It's something I probably don't really need to worry about, but I do. *sigh*

I'm also concerned about my mom, who is 77. She's the gosh darn healthiest/fittest 77 year old I know (She walks 3+ miles a day on a regular basis), but she's still in the "at risk" category. My brother, who also lives with us is continuing work as usual, but he works on construction sites as a soil and concrete tester, so there's natural "social distanceing" there.

My church is going a great job of keeping people engaged with Sunday morning services, Monday night Bible Study (now called Monday School.... Ha!), Tuesday night youth group for the middle and high schools students, plus Thursday "Quarantined with the Krutes" (Pastor's family) on Thursday, which is a lighthearted time of stories from them. Like... Last Thursday, they had a game where they had to find something in the church that represented their childhood. And you could hear their mics as they ran through the church. And then the pastor's wife told us she considered trying to take the kitchen play set up the stairs, and it was all kind of hilarious. So I've been super impressed with that, but also concerned with how this will impact our kids' summer musical, which is my entire purpose of existence in the summers. (I kid, but man. It's HUGE for me.)

So I'm freaking out a bit, mostly over my job and what that will look like, but also concerned for my mom. And don't worry. I know we'll get through this somehow, but it's hard. I'm not really "more" concerned over my job than my mom, but we are taking the precautions we can with my mom, and she's healthy, so my job is the biggest change and what I think about more, if that makes sense.

[Gelquie]

Yeah, I am impressed with companies or places that are doing well with offering virtual group time. The office I work at even put together a virtual informal meeting where we could just shoot the breeze with others in the department, now that we can't stop each other in the hallway to go "hey, what's up?". It was nice.

I'm actually adapting fairly well to the virtual meetings. For some reason, making phone calls is stressful, but dialing in to a group chat with my video turned off is not. As soon as I turn on video, though, ho boy.
I guess it's sort of that it's a way for me to come in to the meeting without having to make my physical form known.
I still have no idea when to speak in group chat settings, though. Never could do group conversations well anyway. You get this thing where others are going on and you don't know how to chime in, and when you think you find a space, someone else takes it and the conversation moves on. I am getting better at forcing myself in, but I still mess up a lot. Particularly when I'm not so comfortable in a group for whatever reason.
...Anyway, this was supposed to be positive. What I was trying to say it, it's nice to do meetings without worrying about how I physically present myself. I do best at typing, but in a pinch, vocal with typing option can work (albeit more energy for me). Throw in a video, and cue all the stress of "performing."

...This was supposed to be positive. What I'm saying is, it's nice to have the options. And which ones I pick kinda tells me a bit more about myself.


I'm thinking about what sort of virtual/internet group meetings I can set up. I'm still pondering Togethertubes. Maybe in sessions to accommodate for differing tastes. But that's just watching stuff or listening to music. I'm still looking for more interactive things.

Something I really want to do is play board games with people, but that's hard virtually unless there's already a site set up for it. Otherwise one person will have to be responsible for dealing all the cards, and that person will have to sit out of the game, make the cameras work, and it just seems not that feasible. Which is a shame; I have a lot of games I'd love to play with people.

Lemme know if there's a site people like for doing such a thing, because I think it's been a while since I've played games like that virtually with other NTWFers, and I've been missing it, and it feels like a good time to do so.

(Maybe it's also a good time for a forum event, but I have no ideas hashed out enough to make that work, beyond taking the old Mafia system and not expanding it much for the sake of getting a game out there. But I can't help but feel like several people have grown out of that. Correct me if I'm wrong. I'd love to moderate an event for real (besides that one time where I picked one up already in progress that needed it), I just don't know how to make it work at the moment.)

[Thorn]

I'd be up for a forum event! Maybe not the classic mafia-style game, but I loved the co-operative feel of Wrighton, for example! And in Hero City. It's nice being able to work together and trust your allies!

As for playing games online: I remember years ago we tried Town of Salem, but didn't have enough players for a whole room. Maybe we could manage that now?

Sparktater
Bards are so much fun! And I have a soft spot for half-orcs (used to play a nature cleric/ranger multiclass), so your barbarian sounds awesome too.
...as Celes said, I also run a group, which I failed to mention. xD But yes! I DM that one and am an ordinary player in the other.

[Gelquie]

I do like those games as well! Alas, they also take more set-up, and I've not really set up a game like that before. By the time I finish figuring it out and working out the wrinkles, quarantine-time may be over. xD
I'll have to think on it!

There are other forum events that could be cool... I recall Color Clash fondly. Though I still don't know how I'd set it up, or if I'd have permission to do so, since someone else ran the game.

(There is actually one idea I've had in mind for a couple years, but... the nature of the quarantine makes the game I'm thinking of kinda bad timing, because it'd encourage an activity that's less feasible right now, simply because it'd be harder to get supplies.)

I remember Town of Salem! I think I preferred Epicmafia because one could customize more and be less likely to be in a room with strangers. I had a bad experience with Town of Salem thanks to the whole random-person element that I'd rather not repeat, so I don't really want to play it unless I'm guaranteed to play with people I know.
I'm up for Epicmafia if enough people want to get back into that, though!

(I think Mafia games can be cool, but it is better when it's played short-term. It's easier that way to not get too attached to someone that dies when the games are 10 minutes long.)

[Thorn]

Ahhh see, I totally agree about mafia! You get attached over the days and weeks and spend every round worried this character you're attached to will die. I just don't think it's my kind of game all up (not to say others wouldn't play if you ran one, this is just on a personal level obvs.)

Yeah Town of Salem needs a huge number of players, enough to to fill a whole room, to keep out randos. Haven't heard of Epic Mafia, will look it up!

[Twillie]

I know I've mentioned having a forum event in mind since end of last year, but I haven't been in a very good way recently to make more progress on it. Definitely not something I'd be able to get done and put out for the current social distancing going on, alas.

I do know a couple online collaborative games like mentioned though that I've played with friends before! One of them is skribbl.io, which is basically like a game of pictionary. You can make a private room that can hold up to 12 people, and each player takes a turn drawing a chosen prompt of theirs while everyone else tries to guess. My friends and I would play this while chatting in Discord at the same time, either via voice or text.

I've also played Uno online, which I think only takes up to 4 players, but it'd still be probably be good for when there's a smaller group around wanting to socialize, and likely easy to set up.

Those are a couple suggestions from my own experience, and I may also check with said friends again to see if they know other online games groups can play real time!

[June Scarlet]

Remember too, "roleplay" doesn't necessarily mean an entire months-long roleplay event with PCs and NPCs and plot and the whole nine yards. We could just as easily (or actually, more easily) have low-key roleplaying things.

I mean, there were entire subboards devoted to different types of roleplaying on the forum. There were prose based roleplaying. There were Icy Taco roleplaying script format. I've seen roleplays based on forum events, on Neopets, on characters from different places suddenly interacting. There's lots of options.

I mean, I could say, start a thread right now, "Let's roleplay our Neopets!" I have a ton of Neopet characters that I love to share, but don't get the chance to do so. There's already a setting (Neopia), there is no plot, but we don't need one per say.

I've seen medieval roleplays in the past, and fanfics, and so on. Wrighton came after that seemed to be more of a thing, so it didn't get as many, but that's not to say we couldn't change that.

If you want something else low key, maybe Trick or Treat houses, but for Spring. Maybe call them Easter Egg Hunts. Let your imagination run wild.

This might be an excellent time for Spirit Week(s). That's an easy enough event to throw together.

The point is, we can still have forum events, they don't have to be this big production. We can do it.

[Huntress]

I've said somewhere before that the Mafia format isn't really suited for a long drawn-out roleplay the way it's developed on the forum. It's one thing that people get attached to their characters, but the format itself gets actively in the way of people's gameplay. Like, you have your character, their arcs and developing interactions, you're trying to flesh them out and work towards your personal goals, BAM, suddenly you dead and unless you then write yourself into a really active ghost, all your plans and venues of action get cut off. Not good for activity. Fine way to force out people who would otherwise have been active.

However, that's indeed a pretty recent development. I've run a plethora of smaller, shorter, more varied games over the years. Let me scrounge up some old links, never know when this might spark some ideas in people :3

- Goosh's Halloween Party (a fine 2008 vintage). True confessions, I never actually read it very thoroughly, I was only in it to draw comics, as usual. But it was a simple weeklong roleplay, and it was Mafia-esque in that someone mysteriously disappeared every day, except the disappeareances were all NPCs and the players were trying to figure out what up. In the end, nobody died, they just got lured to another party.
(...and then there was the stinger.)

- Game of Skill - Fraze and I ran that in the Guilds in 2012, it was basically a set of four different minigames with four different formats for group-solvable puzzles. Shows how much can actually be done to bring boardgames into forum format, and some of it was later recycled to become Wrighton puzzles. We had a maze, a simple snakes-and-ladders, and a jigsaw puzzle by way of using a jigsaw site I was kindasorta addicted to at the time.

- Gold and Destruction - also a me-and-Fraze-in-2011 (in case you ever wondered what our relationship was primarily built on). It was a pretty classic boardgame, where players submitted their turns and then we'd tell them what they got, some with more severe/wackier consequences than others. That also got recycled into the Wrighton tunnel-exploring later on, but Gold and Destruction had much more leeway in what could happen to players (transported elsewhere? awaken an angry god? get demonic koalas on your side? not knowing is half the fun!)

I never had a chance to take part in Color Clash, simply because I had no idea that it was happening until it was nearly over, but if anyone was to re-run that, I'd be game ^^

[doctortomoe]

Our university just added another 2 weeks to our department to stay closed, so not really sure what I'll be doing for money in the short term.

[Sparktater]

I'd be interested in roleplaying. I was never really into it back in the day but I'd like to give it a try now.

[Gelquie]

I never really had a problem with the death mechanic of the Mafia formula because I always found the ghost part easy to work with as a way to keep the character involved in the story even if they're out of the meta mechanics. And I figure that so long as people know going in that their character might die, then they can at least be mentally prepared for the possibility. I'd never want to surprise people mid-way through with "oh, btw, this game has death mechanics". But roleplaying has always required at least some degree of flexibility, and possible ghosting is no exception. I've gotten some really good roleplay opportunities or character development from what I didn't expect or from my character getting ghosted.

But I do find that Mafia goes better short-term than long term. (Speaking of, lemme know if people want to get together for a game of Epicmafia, because I feel in the mood for it. I can start a thread for browser games like that with enough interest.
Although I think I recall that site requires an account, so something to keep in mind if people aren't comfortable with that.)

(Maybe we should get a running list going of the games suggested. =3 Don't wanna do it in this post as this is long enough, but maybe another one when I'm not working. Or maybe someone will beat me to it. But I'll probably get to it.)

Though yeah, I would still rather run a game that involves as many people as possible and not play contentious games that people don't want to play. Which kind of cuts out some of the old mechanics with limited players, and makes me more inclined to run a game where there's no sign-up slots. That way people can go in and out as they please. There's pros and cons to each, just that may be what I try to run for.

Though of course, if people want to do just straight-up roleplaying regardless of mechanics, I openly encourage it! I missed the roleplaying. There may not be an open thread for it anymore, but anyone who wants to start something is welcome to start up a thread in Splatterboard. Heck, if there's enough active ones going on, we might even be able to justify bringing the Roleplay board back. But if not, that's okay too.


Huntress - Thanks for the links to the former games! I may or may not have stayed up super late re-reading them. As for Huntress' hoping it sparks an idea in people...

Y'know, it kinda does.

I still have to work out logistics and a story thread. And I don't wanna be the person who goes "here is my VERY UNIQUE GAME" when I'm obviously inspired and going by a format that's been done before. But I wonder if I could get something together for it. Albeit for a short run, but I think that works for the nature of the game.

[June Scarlet]

I'm kind of tempted by several of the ideas I posted, and I have no time to host any of them.

However, I did have an idea for another event, more of a pre-event, really. One where we brainstorm and vote for the next event.

It'd work like the first part of Spirit Week or picking the next NT Collab idea. There would be a period of submitting ideas and brainstorming, and then a period of voting by poll. Depending on how many ideas we get, there may be another tie breaker round. And then... I guess an event happens.

Not sure how to handle the part where we'd need people to still host and plan the event we choose. But I'll go ahead and throw the idea out there. Might work better for events that need little planning on the host's part, to get things going quicker.

But I'd be both willing to run the event prelude thread, or let someone else run it. I already have the master of events rank, I don't mind giving other people the chance to rank up. It's a lot of fun.

[Huntress]

Mar 30, 2020 19:06:36 GMT -5 June Scarlet said:

It'd work like the first part of Spirit Week or picking the next NT Collab idea. There would be a period of submitting ideas and brainstorming, and then a period of voting by poll. Depending on how many ideas we get, there may be another tie breaker round. And then... I guess an event happens.

Not sure how to handle the part where we'd need people to still host and plan the event we choose. But I'll go ahead and throw the idea out there. Might work better for events that need little planning on the host's part, to get things going quicker.

Wouldn't this enforce the notion that the forum is only permitted to have One Event At A Time, No Others Allowed, Thou Shalt Wait Thy Turn Until Current Event is Done, though?

Which is how things have, rather unfortunately, morphed themselves into being on the forum event front recently, but that is absolutely a bug, not a feature, and has become actively detrimental to the forum event culture as a whole. That's how we get big lumbering blockbuster events with a whole lot of FOMO because people who don't actually want to take part in the current blockbuster event (be it because the mechanics don't suit them, or time, or setup, or whatever) have no choice but to stay out altogether, thus getting excluded from the Current Big Thing and the hype thereof, or grit teeth and suffer through participating. Back in ye olde days I linked, there were always events running concurrently - in 2011, with Gold and Destruction, we also had Mafia, Karmageddon and the Superlatives. And then there was the fabled year of 2008, when we had Guild Wars 2 (ran for half a year and was about as long as Lord of the Rings) and Mafia Wars running parallel. I was consistently active in the former while drawing all the comics for the latter and I legit have no idea how, that was my second university year so it's not like I had a lot of free time :'D

Ideally, forum events should be an organic territory: people want to run something, pitch their idea, get interested players together, thing gets run for a week or a few weeks or a month, however long works. The smaller and less involved they are, the easier it is for people to keep up with several and gravitate to those they like best. I reckon catching up with and writing a big ol' mega-essay of a roleplay post would take about the same amount of time as reading up on a boardgame and posting a move, reading up on a smaller roleplay and posting a line, chipping away at Warm Fuzzies, pitching in on the next NT collab progress and playing a round of Random Crap Poker (hoy, when was the last time we even used the dice option in a forum game? I had to check to make sure we still had them). And if it's popular, it can be rerun, that's how we got the bunch of Mafias, Karmageddons, Spirit Weeks, Superlatives and Warm Fuzzies. It would actually take comparatively little effort to rerun Gold and Destruction, I'd just have to recreate a game board.

(no, my brain totally didn't spend half of yesterday running away with brand new ideas for a Gold and Destruction sequel comic, stahp, overambitious plans aren't good for keeping things simple >.<)

[June Scarlet]

Huntress I... actually had no idea that events could run concurrently. Which I guess goes to show how entrenched the idea has become in recent years, because I've only joined in recent years.

[Gelquie]

I think the reason I don't tend to go for concurrent events is because people have only so much time and attention span, and I don't want to be the person that makes someone's attention too divided. (Especially since several of us still have to do work from home. But also because I'm one of those people who can get distressed if I try to do too many things at once, even fun things.) But on the other hand, you have a point. As fun as the blockbusters were (mainly for the roleplaying/story element, but there were cool game mechanic things as well), I do recall they were also isolating for other people who weren't so into them or had some issue or another, as pointed out. So maybe it'd be better with smaller events. For example, would Mafia games run better, if there were (say) 2 smaller ones running at the same time by different people? ...Or would that just cause more story fracture or drama from comparison of the two? I don't know. xD

I think asking people may just be to get a sense of what people want, not so much a promise. But I also agree that oftentimes, an event is put out there, and people will go for it or they won't. I don't really have a stance, just thoughts.

I'd totally be up for another Gold and Destruction event. Or something similar. It seems like a flexible system for storytelling.