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kevintheradioguy

kevintheradioguy

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The lack of vitamins and probably the sun seems to be getting to me this year. I just feel very sad and empty these days. More of the latter. It's not the "comfort me, I want to cry" sadness, just this gnawing, nagging sensation of not feeling anything for a long time. And there I thought I'm too old for this.
The dog feels it. She's always been a sweetheart. Comes over, tail wagging shyly, squeezed her forehead to my hip. Usually, you need just to look at her and smile, and she thinks her job is done, happily trotting away. What a lovely creature.

It's just been so much work these days. Work and occasional gaming. Gaming isn't good. Although I am in the business of creating PC games, I never was much of a gamer myself, and when I get involved with a video game, it usually signifies something bad happening in life, and me trying to escape it. I blamed my father for the same thing, I recall. Now fell into the same trap.
I just want to do... something. I want to draw something, or make a cake, assemble that ship model of mine, but just cannot find enough strength to.

I feel like I need more friends. The kind of you can talk to, go out to have some coffee, or drag them on a concert or two, and not just have a simple, senseless chat of "Hi, how are you" on the Internet. It might also be a part of depressing atmosphere of these parts. Sometimes, I think I should have never moved to my lady, into this country. People are so unhappy here. And while abstracting is something I have been always doing quite well, I cannot but think that my current condition is in large empathy towards people around. How much shelled I am, I can't force myself not to overhear the talk outside, or read a few news and vents not unlike this one.

The day when I'm going to get myself a new tattoo is coming closer. I hope this would make things better. I'll meet someone new, walk to another part of town. It's almost as stereotypical as "a girl breaks up with a boy and changes her hair" thing, I must admit. But I've been waiting for this tattoist to come over to this city for almost a year now, ever since I saw the design he created, and called dibs on it. It will be starkly different from everything else I have, but it is on mostly unseen part of me, and it's just too fantastic to pass up.
 
Also, what artist? I'm curious. (I've been interested in tattoos for a while, but a) I've been too young to get any, b) I've never really seen something I've really wanted until recently, and c) i'm bad at making permanent decisions)
 
The most common thing I see with amazing roleplays around that are just stillborn... and I am ashamed to admit this I should've understood long ago, but didn't... Anyway, the thing is, a person/people creating it might have an amazing idea in their head. They write it down, like, there are elves, and there are dwarves, and there are evil orcs, and all the gods are dead, and corrupt , and bla-bla-bla... and it's all fun and well. And it really is, I saw a lot of amazing RPs with great lore, even if they beat the tropes. But the problem is, people make up lore, and few "canon" characters, and rules, and technology, and magic, and stats... and that's it. They do not have a plan on what to do with this universe after that. They do not have the story to be involved with. And that's the problem. People can come over, enjoy their work, art, literacy with which the author wrote their universe, but they cannot play in it. When you get a computer game, you don't get just a row of assets and an ability to script! You get a game! You play it, you go through quests and plots! It's not present in so many games, and characters just wonder.

There was this one time. I played my favourite rogue character, a goblin named Lim. It was a high-fantasy setting, with amazing politics and economy between countries. And I thought, great! I'll play a black market trade baron! And I went through discussion, and character creation, loads of feedback, etc., and waited patiently for a few days, then a week, then two. I saw people come, lots of people. And I wrote to the creators, guys, when are we going to start - I want to get involved with this! And they replied: what, do you want us to do everything for you? - We're not going to play for you! So they made all this work, all this amazing work, and just expect for people to come in, get what's in their heads, and play it out? Probably getting punches for the wrong lore, or wrong references, etc.? Back then I thought, it was just this one weird RP, weird admins, but now... I look through the games, and understand: this is a common problem. This is a common reason why people do not play your RP. Because there is no RP. There is just a wall of text and a bunch of pretty pictures. You didn't bother to make it a game.
 
So. We were going to the market. on our way back home, my girlfriend realized we forgot eggs and butter. So she decides to run into a store near our house. I say OK, and stay and wait for her for forty fucking minutes, I manage to read all my tumblr dashboard, all the reddit comments, write a RP post - the everything. Only to realize, she went home. Home! She imagined that I walked away instead of staying and even that I said I'd go home, while I didn't move from the corner of the store for forty minutes!
She didn't even write me with "where are you" when she got home, just went for petting the dogs. Only asked after I wrote her myself asking if everything is OK - I don't think any like in our store would take longer than forty minutes.
JFC, women!
 
I have a DnD confession to make which might be interesting to someone, or past experience to the rest, maybe someone would say I'm an awful person, maybe someone will share their own.

I am a big fan of roleplaying. Not just hacking and slashing in my games, but actually turning into another character, adjust my mindset to them, interacting with a new, eerie, fantastical world the DM makes. As I like interacting, I usually create characters that eagerly interact with the world around and people: clerics, or noble knights on their crusade to cleanse the world of evil, or, - more often, - bards. In fact, I think playing a bard is my speciality at this point. And when I roleplay a bard, I do roleplay a bard. Not a warrior with a lute, or a singing barbarian (although it is a way to roleplay a bard, be it, for example, a scald, or an adventuring writer from the College of Valour), but a social, charismatic, sly and cunning artist who can charm and deceive, and isn't used to fighting. It is safe to say that not a single one of my bards, - and I do not exaggerate here! - had ever drawn a weapon in the campaign. It's been 11-12 years of D&D for me, and not a single one used a weapon for anything than cutting a rope or cooking a chicken. Last Saturday was the first time my bard character ever killed something by throwing a fireball into an Eye Tyrant, and only because he and a half-dead ranger were the only ones left standing. So, yes, my point being, I roleplay a minstrel - not a fighter with a set of instruments.

This leads me to the thing I am feeling guilty about. Playing a charismatic, strong-willed character means that I go full persuasion on both NPCs... and players. And very soon after it, being deceptive, persuasive, or anything else charming, I turn into a group's leader. Which makes sense: if a character can do nothing than manipulate, the character will manipulate. All the decision making also falls onto him. It comes to the point when in dangerous situations, being captured by an enemy, or devoured by a frogermoth, fellow players ask for this bard to help, although he cannot fight for the love of his life.

It makes absolute sense to immediately become the group's leader, and make decisions when others do not looking instead at you when said decision has to be made... and more often than not other players are fine with it, finding their own niches in the game. However, constant leadership and decision making makes me feel bad. Feel as if I am the only one playing, and other character and players are there just for my entertainment, and hate it. I want them to have fun too. I gladly step back and let them play, but with an established role of 'a guy who makes all decisions', the spotlight quickly switches to me, and I feel very uncomfortable, feeling that I get half of the time on myself even when I try to make it lesser, and another half is divided between four other players.

I love my role as a bard or a cleric, or an other social role, being kind of meh towards direct battling and attacking enemies, and preferring the social or tricky side to the game... but in so doing, I feel that I take too much from other players, even if they don't acknowledge it.
 
What was the fucking point in asking who is going to post to ignore it anyway? I am overly emotional at the moment, and I know it, but really, I hate coming over with a finished post only to see someone else reply that brings my work to shit. I did state I was going to post next, for fuck's sake, what was the point of asking if two people decided, ah, screw it?
Why would you ask who's posting next if you'd be ignoring this anyway? I spent time writing that reply - I don't post that often because of my character being all preppy and rather quiet, but coming over, happy to at last having something to reply to, warning, fucking WARNING others that I'm writing a post, to come back with the finished piece only to discover two people ignored this warning they asked for themselves, and replied, making my own post absolutely role-wise unneeded, is NOT what I see as appropriate. This is not interesting, I am not having fun - I am having a BAD TIME.
And it breaks my heart, because I have been working so fucking hard on that character, and looking for the game like this for so fucking long. And I want to throw this all into their faces, but it's two against one, and I can do math and see who's more important. And it's not this teenish "you don't care about me" - it's just that in a group play two people are more valuable then one - that much is a fact. So, since I am the only one unhappy, I think it's my time to leave.
 
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Some DnD venting. See this as a venting, just venting.

We had a huge drawback with RPing concerning one player. I am so frustrated. Not in a "I want to kill him" frustrated, but just... I feel bad, because I see how irritated other players are. He was a shy little guy, and for a good reason, when we started. He never played before, but his skill went up fast, him getting better and better in games, roleplaying a quite interesting, albeit obscene character. I allow obscene characters. One, people differ; two, he's a young lad, of course he has a constant case of blue balls! But today was something. I was looking around he table, and everyone were at their phones. I made such a bad decision.

He didn't attend the sessions for a very long time. He had a boyfriend in the same party who introduced him to the game, and then they broke up, and the guy took it very hard. Took some time off, before managing to return, although I wouldn't mind if he'd say he didn't want anything to do with the party from now on. His roleplaying dropped a ton, and he was mostly playing via dice rolls. Note that my party is very much roleplay-heavy, so just rolling an octagon is not a thing we really appreciate. So I thought, he needs a moment to shine. And they provided for it.

You see, there was a small quest I came up with on the spot, as the party went off the rails. A couple from a nearby town: she, a young noble kid in love with with him, a tradesman, but promised to another noble family as a wife for their son. The priests of the town would not get this couple married, as they fear the wraith of their parents, and so, they heard that there is a clan of druids travelling to some ritual sire in the deep woods nearby. And they think, they can join this tribe, travel with them become druids, get married, and never stay in one place for long enough to be caught up to by this girl's parents. They search for a druid site, when they find our players who scout for the same druids, looking for some magic only they can provide. Two of five go in for scouting. When the find a site, and a half-pertrified druid in it. Half-petrified from the waist below. She says that there's a sacred stone ring with a large cave underneath it. The stone ring is a sacred stella, while caves with a few rooms in them were used for druid groups to stay in when they visited this sacred ground, but now something lives there, something that petrified her... but only partially. It was supposed to be a tribe of troglodytes who escaped Underdark through Waterdeep's Yawning Portal gateway, roamed the outerworlds, before they found a "totem" for themselves. In one of the shore caves they have found a small bull statue which they decided to make their new symbol in this new world, leaving it on a tall pole wherever they made their new home,travelling slowly by night. After a few days, the statue came to life. It was a gorgon cub, petrified by water, but the troglodytes thought it was a sign of some god (or demon), and started taking care of it. They saw it was scared of water, so they travelled into deep forests instead which they liked because of the lack of sunlight which could not go through the large tree crowns. Finding a stone circle, they thought it was another sign. Stone bull comes to life, the bull turns lesser beasts into stone, stone circle, etc. So they made their base there. And that is when the druid clan comes over. Few people scout ahead to check if any wild animals took the cave to ask them away, or ask to live with them for a while, when a gorgon attacks. The gorgon is young and small, so it does not petrify them completely - only where its breath touched its victims. So most people got petrified from the waist below, other, reading the tracks, go their heads turned into stone... And the troglodytes, which the gorgon sees as its mommas, finish up the rest, and serve it to their totem gorgon calf as food. And themselves. The last druid standing is a good offence mage, so she fends off thus far, but she didn't take a good look on what it was - just that is was big, scaly, and blueish.

One of them two decides to fetch some help, and leaves the player alone to watch over the cave, two kids, and the half-petrified druid. That is when a storm starts, and the wind blows their scent into the cave. A couple of troglodytes walk out, thinking there's fresh and young meat here, and they attack. I think, this is where he'll shine. He's a lvl 4 fighter, troglodytes are CR 1/4. The kids will get into trouble, he'll save them. hell say there's a group of troglodytes to the party when they come over - it all will be very cool. And this was my mistake. First thing he does, is running. So the kids in love run as well. Problem is, he is a dwarf, and he runs slower. So he is caught up by the troglodyte hunters first. one of them attacks, and manages to grapple him, as he tries to bite his head off, but only succeeds at somewhat lifting the dwarf abode the ground. What do you do, I ask. And this is where things went south. He does nothing. We go back and forth in a dialogue akin to:

"Can I maybe... oh wait, I can't."
"What do you want to do?"
"I thought if I would've ran before they showed up, would they be able to find me?"
"Well, probably not if you'd hide far enough or not from the wind's side, but now you're being held up by two giant froglizards. What do you do?"
"Uh. I think I... wait, no..."
"Okay, so, do you do anything? At all?"
"Yes! Give me a moment."
"So, what do you do?"
"I'm thinking..."
"Am I right to assume you want to skip your turn?"
"No, I am doing... something..."
"Right, okay...? Okay, so while you wait, the lizard thing..."
"Wait! I'm doing something!"
"What? What do you do? Come on, say something, and I'll tell you what to do mechanically!"
"Okay, uh... I'm... I don't know."
"Okay, so the lizard thing hisses, and..."
'Wait! No! I'm acting! I'm acting!"
"How?"
"I... don't know..?"
"You're inside the mouth of a large frog-like creature. I'm sure you can guess what an ordinary person do in this situation."
"Yeah."
"So, you do..?"
"I don't know..."

Over and over again.

He ended up skipping, because it took him fifteen minutes, and I said, look. Here's a timer. i'll be rolling initiative every ten seconds. When it rolls 10 or fewer, that means you were too surprised to see the insides of a froglizard's mouth, and you skip your turn.

He ended up skipping it.

He also ended up fighting and defeating one of the troglodytes, while the other fled with just 1HP left, but not without stealing his bag of supplies beforehand. But during this time I roleplayed all the hisses and quacks they made, and how in their stupid little eyes a realisation occurred that there in the supplies is some magical food that heals him and that maybe if they take away his bag they'd be able to defeat him. And he went on with "I attack" and "I can I use parry manuver?". And each time I ask "How?", because on a successful roll I always ask to describe my player's attack, he only replied "with a hammer". At this point, the rest of the players are down in their phones, chatting with each other on FB, as I have learned when I got online this evening, they do not pay attention, and I already give the troglodytes fewer HP and lower their... let's say, AI, so the fight is faster. But the player becomes slower and slower. He ends up fighting two small-time froglizards for almost an hour by just thinking long time and only rolling the dice. And all the while he tried so hard to establish daring adventurous and sassy personality. I thought he'd be happy to save a couple of lovebirds and be the one to tell the party what creatures hide in the cave, and what to expect from them. And this was the biggest mistake I have made in a very long time. RP-wise.
 
Today's beautiful discussion about a comic page.
"You spread racist stereotypes, because you gave that black woman racially stereotypical wide nose!"
"You're uncomfortable with noses? Why didn't you comment about how that white lady had a long hooked nose?"
"Nuh-uh, it doesn't matter: white women often have hooked noses!"
Roll credits.
 
Pulling another all-nighter to prepare for the next DnD campaign. Gonna throw a guiding NPC into the bunch this time by the name of Elvira, because the party is overwhelmed with the freedom of an open world, and needs someone to point them into the plot. Elvira it is!


561868​
 
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I get a decent amount of hate in my PMs for my preference in threads and dislike to PM roleplays. Nothing I'd like to report, mind you, I generally just deem the other person an asshole and move on, however... However! I have no idea why one wouldn't be using threads. I try to keep my roleplay openly public for the number of reasons I think most people would find quite appealing.

For one, they sere as a good example of length and skill I can present to you. You wonder if I'm literate enough for you - you just visit any of the RP threads, and see what I can offer. Do we click as writers? Do you like the amount of paragraphs I write? Do you like the style? Do you enjoy the plot? It helps; it really helps to get to know the possible partner like this. In fact, my usual way of deciding whether or not I want to reply to an ad, would be going through the posts of the person that created it, finding their games, and having a look through them. This helps enormously to decide whether or not we'll click and might have a good game. I have a general understanding of what posts the other person expects too. I can see their style of roleplays, and realise I will/won't fit it.

Secondly, I don't ghost. I never ghost people, and I can prove it this way. I have never had a person who'd actually admit they flake off often; when it comes to disappearing, every partner I had gasps and claims, no, under no circumstances, I would never! And then, they end up disappearing. So, I think, if you are such a good roleplayer, and you don't drop games, why would you be scared to play in a public place? You have nothing to lose and everything to gain - show people that you're sticking to the game until the arc is finished, or if you don't feel like it, you end it naturally, wrapping up the game in a post instead of just poofing on a partner. I mean, I don't do that, and I have proof to present this way.

Thirdly, PMs are messy. When you get dozens of PMs from friends and people responding to ads, it's much easier to lose your game in all of this. Besides, I personally had very bad experiences with PMs, and generally see them as a beginner way of RPing. Someone who doesn't really know how to do that, and thus, shyly hides before getting into the spotlight. Tasting the waters, so to speak.

Finally, I want to brag about an amazing thing I have and throw links at people who want to read. That's more of a flaw, but I do love my partners, and I do want to show off that I have them. Sure, some might not like it, and I always ask before linking, but is it easier to throw a link and maybe add a player to the website, or just make screencaps?

Shyness? Oh, please! No one really reads other people's games: there might be around ten people on the website that do, and even then, there are hundreds more RPs out there than them. Chances are slim. Besides, even if someone writes better than you, this does not diminish you in any way. Sure, you have a lot to aspire to, and feel intimidated by someone better, however, how does it harm you in getting out there? Getting better? It really doesn't. There's so much to gain and nothing to lose. So, yes, basically, those are my own reasons for doing something that hurts no one, that bring a lot of swears, and huffs and puffs in my inbox.
 
I told this story in PMs recently, but I thought I'll share publicly.

It happened in ukraine I lived at the time (and planning to move back soon, because I loved it!). I had a friend who worked at the stables during summer periods, and thus, had good relationships with the owner. The owner rented horses all the time, and said friend and her girlfriend occasionally took a horse or two, rode to the city and into the park, and attracted kids for a ride for a few bucks.

It was New Year's Eve when I was invited there. Cannot remember the year, but Assassin's Creed was popular, which will come in play later. NY is a big thing in post-USSR, Ukraine included. Bigger than US Christmas, I think. Very bright, very loud, very juicy. We didn't have much to do at home, and the girls, being younger than I, wanted action. I bailed off, because it took me five hours to get to their city, and I just wanted to have a nap. They in the meantime, decided to drive outside town, to the stables, take a horse each, dress as assassins from Assassin's Creed (they did have respective coats, and tight pants and high boots are easy to find in a wardrobe, and entertain the crowd. They figured, since it's New Year's Eve, there will be a lot of people who'd like to ride a horse, and they will get some good money (I think half of it went to the stable owner, so, you know, the more - the better). And so they did.

What happened next I was only told - I just saw the results. As they said later, what happened was, they did everything according to plan. Except for one thing they didn't expect. It was cold. Really cold. Coats weren't warm enough. So when local guys saw two young girls working during NYE in cold instead of having fun, they'v decided to change that. No, nothing malevolent - people over those part are genuinely nice. They just decided that they need to warm up... with alcohol! So every time, someone brought them a kid to ride, they also brought some alcohol from the nearest bar or a cafe. A shot of vodka, shot of whiskey, mulled wine... that sort of thing. And the girls... the girls didn't eat that much. I know, as I was the cook. They just had some potato salad. Before midnight, they were so drunk, they did not remember the rest of the night.

While I slept in the guest room of their apartment, I did hear doors slamming open, them walking around and screaming like elephants, but since I was tired and I dislike interacting with drunk people, I have decided to just pretend I was asleep, and not bother them. And I did not bother them. I just waited until the ruckus went away, and fell asleep again.

So, the morning comes, I come out of my room, look around and it's an absolute mess. Everything is thrown around the apartment, broken, in shambles. I think that the girls must have had real fun! I decide to check in on them, before I go to the bathroom, because I'm a good friend. However much I hate not having my teeth brushed, if my friend needs a glass of water and an aspirin, that's my priority, right? So, I knock into the bedroom door, and slowly open it. And I see absolute chaos in the room, and a giant pile of... something in the bed. Then, this pile moves, and a head emerges... and a horse looks at me with "what the hell happened?" expression written all over her face. Where her head was lying, face-down in a pillow snores one of the girls.

Okay, i think, slowly close the door. There's a horse lying in the bed. Fine, we'll deal with it. As I am slowly dragging myself out of the shock, and think where the fuck is another girl, I move to the bathroom. I open the door, and see... a horse. Standing on its knees in a bath. Bath curtain under her, mirror broken, on the floor. It looks at me with shock. I look at it in shock. I close the door, and realise I have to find the second girl and bring them both to senses.

Apparently, they got so drunk, they have decided that they didn't want to ride all the way to the stables! And that they'll get the horses to spend the night at their place! In an apartment complex! On the sixth floor! I have no idea how they managed to get them up, but getting them gown was a real quest. A horse... can get up the stairs, but down? Ooh, boy. One of them ended up with broken ribs, as the was trying to steady the horses as they were getting down the stairs, but poor things could only kind of run\fall off the stairs, and they were squishing her between their heads and the opposite wall. And this went over and over again, with two horses and I think twelve staircases? He look on an old lady's face when she went up the stairs after walking the doggo and meeting two horses in the well! Geesh.

Anyhow, this is my only story about horses (other encounters were peaceful), and this is probably the most epic thing that ever happened to me.
 
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