Obviously not all OOC references are created equal, but in general, is it considered bad form to refer to real world historical or artistic figures and works in game? Off the top of my head I can think of a few admin-sponsored references that seem to be well received. For instance, Chairman Adom and his Collectivist Manifesto (which happens to be sold as a little purple book in Hallifax). His little doll makes a Starcraft reference, even.

Do people tend to appreciate these things in Lusternia? Do you just snicker and think 'clever' and move on, or do you roll your eyes and wish so-and-so wouldn't disrupt the atmosphere with OOC crap? I realize everyone will have a different... tolerance. I'm just trying to test the waters before I botch something and ruin my character's credibility. Thanks!

As a character, don't do it. Please!

I think they're cute, as long as they're not done over and over all the time. Taking something OOC, twisting it to fit Lusternia and dropping it in once in a while, that's fine. Makes me giggle. But, when every other thing someone does is that, it becomes annoying.

There's a doll that makes a borg reference that makes me laugh out loud whenever I see it. But then... I'm a big Trekkie.

To me, it entirely depends on the thing in question. I think one of the dolls says something about pylons, which is too obvious as a Starcraft-reference (and has little or no Lusternian connection at all), and that one I semi-hate. Then there's the one where (I believe) they say "all are equals, but artists are more equal than the rest" which I think is rather cute, since it's entirely possible a Lusternian could've said that (which is from a book I believe is called "The farm" by Orson Welles, although I could be completely wrong on both title and writer)

I think it's a bit passe to complain about dingbat items - they are, by their very nature, frivolous and silly.

Beyond that, I rarely see an issue with 'lusternia-izing' things that are viewed as 'ooc concepts' - elsewise you wouldn't see things like Wicca, Nihilism, Druidry, etc etc etc. It's simply a matter of how well it is done.

And I haven't read the Collectivist Manifesto - but, in my opinion, having very little to do with either city now, it's sometimes good to utilize things that call to mind OOC connections. You hear 'Collectivist Manifesto', and you already have a general idea of what it's going to tell you about Hallifax. Much as when you hear 'wicca' you think it's going to involve nature and possibly spirits.

Just my two cents, however.

See, I don't know what a pylon is so that one doesn't bug me at all.

It's all relative.

Animal Farm

As for the references the Crirk Doll makes, you will not ever find quotes that obviously made to be funny to be used outside of dingbat items. As it is, the doll makes quotes from many different sources, you should try tracking some of them if you're ever bored. That said however, the dingbat items are meant to be lighthearted, funny and nonsensical, you will never ever find me making a quest that involved the collective asking for additional pylons.




No sir.




He'd be asking for additional generators.

My gold standard is, would someone who isn't familiar with the reference find it appropriate, mystifying, or obviously an allusion? And would it yank you out of the setting? If it works on its own, and it's subtle enough that it feels more like a tip of the hat than an inside joke, you can use it, with caution. By that standard, about 3/4 of the ones we have shouldn't be there, in my opinion. Including in dingbat items.

(That said, the problem with those dolls is you can't easily make a gag trigger to catch all of them. About 1/10th of them are funny the first time, but none of them are funny an hour of spam at the nexus later. Influencing is more entertaining to watch; at least it's rarely heretical.)

I think it's fair to count the dingbat dolls as an exception, since they're so obviously meant to be silly.

Eventru said so, but I don't agree. They're meant to be silly within Lusternia. I don't think that gives them carte blanche to be egregiously OOC, too. If it does, then we shouldn't have them, because that's the kind of silly that the game shouldn't need or have. Immersion and adherence to the world and what the things in it mean is tenuous at best. It doesn't need more subversion.

Example: the fickle finger of the Fates. Annoying as it might be, it's well done. It's very obviously an OOC allusion to the Magic 8 Ball, uses the same text. Yet it's also been retooled to be explicitly Lusternian. If you've never heard of a Magic 8 Ball, it works perfectly fine as a Lusternian thing. That's the model to which "silly and whimsical" should aspire, IMO.

I'd have to agree with this pretty much in entirety.

I prefer my easter eggs less common, and not spammed for half an hour at a nexus. But I do not mind it, besides every online RPG has them.

I had this discussion in relation to WoW with some former friends who were absolutely die-hard RPers. Not that I'm not, but I'd like to think I'm not an elitist about it.

Personally, my take on it is, if you reference it in an IC manner, it's no longer OOC. It is now part of the game world. The references Cririk makes and the Collectivist Manifesto may be OOC, but when they're used in the IC environment, they then become IC references. We can chuckle at them OOCly and appreciate them as being a part of our world, but to our characters, they're a part of that world alone.

And that way of thinking is why certain people I used to be friends with in WoW are no longer my friends. Because I'm more open-minded about RP, and that's terrible.

The pylons quote is the only one that has been even a vague issue for me, really.

Why?

Definition of Pylon

It's not the word "pylon", it's the entire quote. I had to look it up -- I'm not familiar with the source material -- but the mere fact that that quote was made the way it was made me sure it was an allusion (becuase it made no sense in any way on its own), so it was either an IC or OOC allusion. Turns out it's not an IC allusion. The quote is one of those things that gets recirculated, like "all your base are belong to us" (and will probably be funny about as long as that one was, and about as cyclically as that one was).

A dingbat doll (or even a player) saying it in Lusternia doesn't wash it clean of its ability to yank people out of the world, nor does it make it part of the world. That's why Visaeris's combat song can't be Hamlet's soliloquy. It doesn't come down to being more or less "open-minded", it comes down to whether Lusternia's supposed to be an immersive, complete-in-itself world. I've got about fifty pages of history and quite a few Estarra interview quotes that say the latter. I don't think a few dingbat doll jokes repudiate that.

But it's not a big deal. We washed off "Weeky Peedia", we can wash off a few dingbat dolls making references to Pac-Man if we really have to. Doesn't make it good, just means it's not bad enough to make a fuss about.

If this is the major issue of contention for the playerbase than the game has reached balance nirvana.

I dislike the OOC references. It annoys me even further that it's done by the admins in the creation of artifacts, and uses that fact as an excuse. This all but puts the admin seal of approval on OOC speech and behavior in-game, undermining the purpose of HELP INSANITY. Admins: Don't use OOC speech. Announce: New dolls with OOC speech funnies now on sale.

I can understand the notion of dingbats being off the wall. That fits the setting, working with the theme of gnomish inventions (however heavily borrowed the idea is from Dragonlance). But there's a difference between appropriately goofy and out of character goofy.

But then, I'm not all that fond of the goofy aspect of the dingbats, either. I wish there were a less inane version of the pig nose.

I'm not sure all of this is worth raising a fuss over... but I figure most game designers want to know what their customer base thinks. This was my 2c. In my experience, Lusternia has gone steadily downhill as far as RP immersion, and replaced that with OOC in-jokes, friends helping their OOC friends despite enemy statuses, and gimmicks to induce humor as a salve for whatever problem players might have with the game. And I find that unfortunate.

I'm not bothered so much by the OOC as I am the hypocrisy that Eldanien mentioned of the admins saying no OOC, then doing it themselves. But eh, doesn't bother me that much anyway. I mostly only like the no OOC rules because they prevent leet speak and horrible abbreviations. Makes for a much less annoying MMO experience

This has always existed, but has steadily shifted in one direction more than the other. Whether you want to blame dingbats or not is up to you. It's stopped bothering me now, and the important part is still what Acrune has mentioned.