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IC OOCicisms
IC ways to 'explain' OOC situations

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Prior to playing on Sindome I played various other online M* games. In those games, it was common to OOCly mention things that prevented you from engaging in IC activities.

For example, Character A ICly says, "There's this great 'plot thing' going on tomorrow night."

Rather than coming up with an IC excuse, it would be normal to "OOC: I'd love to, but I have to watch the kids."

GMs explained to me that doing that kind of OOC thing on Sindome is frowned up / forbidden. It breaks immersion.

The suggestion was to come up with an IC excuse for having to be out of the sector. For example saying something like, "I have business to take care of in East Red." There is an unspoken understanding among the player base that an 'out of sector' excuse means that you have RL obligations.

In the discussion thread on Vehicle Transfers, it came up that doing that requires GM intervention. At the same time, the GMs encourage players to figure out ICly what is involved in transferring vehicles, such as by asking on SIC.

Someone mentioned that every time they see someone asking for help on certain subjects, they wish that they could SIC - You need to xhelp for that

Obviously, you can't SIC 'you need to xhelp for that'

But that got me thinking. What else could you say, kind of like "I need to be in East Red", that communicates to players that they need to reach out to the staff?

Maybe something like, "You better pray to the Gods for help with that." or "Better call in a favor from the Withmorian Overlords."

Am I overthinking this? Do these things happen so rarely (as opposed to have RL conflict with IC time schedules) that it's not worth coming up with creative phrases?

By Hek at Jul 21, 2019 9:45 PM
In other RP environs I've engaged in, for the sake of immersion, people have generally nudged others toward staff with something along the lines of 'You should think about getting in touch with someone in the government', 'Have you dropped a line with the city office?', and so forth. I don't think it'd be hard to to SD'ify similar IC nudges as a sort of shortcut for such situations.
By Jameson at Jul 21, 2019 10:19 PM
Honestly? If I'm in the same room as someone, I usually just tell them in local OOC that it's something they had best xhelp about, especially if they’re a new player. I find that coming up with an IC way of saying it is often confusing, and sometimes- especially where policy is concerned- it’s important to flag that a GM ruling or intervention is required on a certain matter.

Without going into too much detail, a former IC job of mine sometimes required GM intervention, for which there were often delays. In that case, I would typically mention in local OOC that I'm waiting on a GM and apologies for the delay. If they then happened to be too busy to take the request, I’d make up an IC reason for having to do it at a later date (i.e. NPC was too busy).

By Adea at Jul 21, 2019 10:25 PM
I want to clarify one point here. Needing GM intervention does not mean needing to xhelp. I suggested people learn about vehicles and ownership changes ICly because there are IC ways to do this. The OOC process has been clearly defined and documented along with the IC interfaces available to characters.

There is one exception to this when it comes to cars and that is when your character has the skills and knowledge to do this themselves and in this case, yes, they would just need to engage us OOCly to let us know what they are up to so we can run the magic commands for them.

There are many ways to interface with GMs. Some are OOC like xhelp and xgame and email. THe best ways to interface with is is via IC means. Namely NPCs. There is very little you can't get advice on or help with if you find the right character and give them the right motivation.

Yes. That means a puppet request instead of an xhelp but we prefer that as it keeps things IC. And yes, there are some things that just have to be handled OOCly. But as a rule it is pretty simple. If it is IC info/help you need, use IC interfaces to engage the GMs. If it is purely OOC, you can try to use OOC interfaces to engage the GMs.

By Mobius at Jul 22, 2019 3:25 AM
So the short answer here in my opinion is that 9/10 times the right way to do it is to point them to the character who can help them (PC if possible, NPC if not) if you know who that is or to give them the advice to find a character who can help them.

If it really is one of those rare cases where they have to xhelp and can't interface with staff via IC means, you can let us know and we can reach out to them if needed.

By Mobius at Jul 22, 2019 3:28 AM
"If it really is one of those rare cases where they have to xhelp and can't interface with staff via IC means, you can let us know and we can reach out to them if needed."

Just highlighting this as it could get lost in the conversation.

Once or twice in the past, I've xhelped on the behalf of someone else who is explaining a situation that sounds really sketch OOCly.

Something like: "This is what I saw. Just bringing it to your attention because it sounds sketch. No need to tell me anything about it. Thanks."

By ynk at Jul 22, 2019 7:46 AM
Yep, ynk, I've x helped to ask staff to contact another player before and they were really helpful.

All I will add is make sure it is something you really can't convey to the player IC first ;)

By UchuUsagi at Jul 22, 2019 8:58 AM
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