Go away, morons

There's been a spate of morons posting comments in the mistaken belief they are being amusing. They're apparently too stupid to notice that their comments aren't appearing. The reason for that is that comment moderation is on for posts over 7 days old, mainly so I can spot when people post things. I've now turned it on for all posts so that we won't be bothered by them. Hopefully, their mommies will call them in for tea soon so I can go back to allowing unmoderated comments to be posted.

Roleplaying

The Roleplaying articles on UESP have been the subject of many attempts at cleanup in the past. Southern Belle gave it a try some time ago, and Arch-Mage Matt has had another go recently. Currently there is a huge, huge, huge clusterfuck going on about the subject. Although there's plenty of chaos on this subject, there isn't any hypocrisy so I hadn't intended to write about it, but having received a couple of emails asking what I thought, I decided to chuck my hat into the ring and offer my views.

The important thing to remember is that the games in the TES series are Role-playing games. Even the early games contained RPG elements, but it was only when Morrowind and Oblivion appeared that you could honestly claim to have a fully open game. It is therefore only natural that people want to write about their roleplaying ideas and their experiences. I don't think anybody disagrees with what I've said so far.

The problem comes with how the information should be presented and how much information should be included. Let's say you want to live as a farmer. Obviously you need to live on or close to some farmland. Should a roleplay give that tip alone, or should it specify a farm? A farmer will obviously need to harvest ingredients, but should a roleplay specify how and when or simply mention the idea? Almost all the existing roleplays specify classes, birthsigns and skills. Are these genuinely required for a roleplay?

Why should roleplays be so prescriptive? Why does a mage have to be a Breton or an Altmer? There might only be one relevant orc in the mages guild but why does that mean nobody playing a mage can be an orc? You may not get many Bosmer as fighters, but why not make the fight against adversity part of your character's backstory?

The best idea I saw in the debate so far was one that said Roleplays should be one or two lines. Farmer would be something like "Tend your crops and fight off wild creatures to guarantee a harvest. Take your produce to town and sell it for the supplies you need" rather than a huge list of crap that is of no relevance.

Yes, TES is a roleplaying series so UESP should have roleplaying articles. On the other hand, anybody that needs to have the hand of their imagination held to the extent that the current articles encourage really shouldn't be trying to play a roleplaying game at all.

So what do I think? I think the system under vote at the moment will be a disaster. Either people will ignore it or use it wrongly and the site will end up where it is now after a week's worth of pointless discussion. I think a system of one or two line roleplays is the way to go.

Now, can I go back to insulting Elliot please? :-)

See you in the Spring

Fun times on UESP last night. In the middle of another boring argument between The Great Deceiver and Whining Little Bitch, who should appear but Elliot the Obnoxiously Thick!

Despite having claimed to be "done" with the site, EtOT popped up to deliver what he evidently thought were a few well chosen words about TGD, in a post so transparently trollworthy that not one, not two, not three, but four different editors removed it. EtOT's edit warring led to WLB warning him, which of course, EtOT removed. WLB reinstated the warning with section protection, so EtOT did some whining of his own and had the gall to warn TGD for edit warring, twice - a warning removed first by TGD himself, then by Corevette789. At this point, Herschel stepped in and blocked EtOT for six - count them! - six months, with an email and talk page ban to go with it.

The message should be clear to you, EtOT (and I know you still read this): you are not wanted on UESP. In one evening, you managed to piss off SerCenKing, TheAlbinoOrc, Arch Mage Matt, Rpeh, RobinHood70, Corevette789 and Krusty. FiveFour patrollers and an admin. That's pretty good going even for you.

See you in March. I'm sure everybody on UESP will have a happy Christmas / Hanukkah / whatever knowing you won't be anywhere near the site.