Discord/Tell/OOC Comms Removal Discussion

[Rothgar]

People seem to have strong opinions on this topic in another thread, so instead of having it be in a subject where it doesn't belong, I'm starting this thread for discussion.

The current discussion revolves around removal of the official TI Discord, removal of Tells, and the banning of talking about TI over Discord or other communication mediums. Those in favor, please say so below with your argument for why such communication should be removed. Those in favor of the status quo, please say so below with your argument for why such communication should be maintained.

Please discuss, attempt to stay objective, and be civil. Daily reminder that all accusations of metagaming should be presented with objective facts and evidence, and not baseless accusations. Thank you.

[Geras]

Don't do it. It's been tried before and just made it more cliquish as older players had means of communicating outside the game.

[The_Last_Good_Dragon]

Yup. Would be terrible.

[DeadHandsome]

I am strongly opposed. Because no one would be able to coordinate any RP

[Kinaed]

I played TI without tells back in Tam's time, and have mixed feelings about it.

On one hand, it was some of the best RP of my life because there were no distractions in game, no expectation that I engage with people OOCly, etc. I didn't feel like I needed community ties to be on equal footing with everyone else because community ties, even if they existed, were frowned upon.

On the other hand, parts of the game became unwieldy without tells. You couldn't discuss problems or miscommunications, only assist help files to one another. It was sometimes difficult to do some of the simplest things, such as the aforementioned RP coordination. And community ties are one of the things that makes people play games.

I've heard other RPIs don't have tells (or there was a group of RPIs that don't), but MUSHes actually do have the equivalent of tells, so I think the overall RP community standard is to allow direct, private OOC communication. The thing is, my personal experience of these are limited. so I'd view whether it'd be a long term positive or negative for TI as a major dice roll that I'm not sure if I'd be willing to make.

That said, when people start suggesting the removal of tells, etc, it indicates to me frustration with OOC behaviors and/or drama. To that end, I'd ask people who want to utilize those channels to try not to use them in such a way that would sway people to think it's a good idea to experiment with removing them.

[Starstarfish]

The alternative is those who find tells to distract from their experience can turn them off, from specific people or overall.

[Geras]

My issues with those days on Tam's TI Kinky is that you and I could still communicate via AIM, but a new player couldn't.

[Kinaed]

That's theoretically a downside, yes, but my personal experience with that was that I didn't need AIM, and instead of being expected to OOCly engage with every person I RPed with, I only really kept in touch with one or two friends. I personally didn't miss it. I imagine there are many people who would.

[LonelyNeptune]

OOC communication serves a purpose on TI and you'd only be making the game more annoying to play without it.