For those who have never experienced a God Game, they are truly remarkable and one of the few games which are best played in a play-by-post format. Through a simple line of words, players get to create and manipulate worlds of their making. Naturally, players feel protective of these creations and, sometimes, they forget that in a God Game their works mingle with one another. This is where problems can begin. Creation occurs and destruction follows suit and from this destruction more creation takes place. In this way the Void becomes complex and gains a history. The ability to shrug off a setback and adapt to a different, sometimes drastically different, circumstance than existed only hours before is vital. However, it never fails that someone will take something to heart, or make something personal.

I've seen it in far too many games where an offense, real or imagined, snowballs. The game suddenly becomes a feud between two players, neither of whom are having fun by this point, and everyone else starts to find themselves as collateral damage. Because I have seen these problems so many times in the past and in almost every game, I have made this thread to make my stance clear on these issues in advance.

Consider the issues below my pet peeves, testing my patience on these is in no ones best interest.

------

1st) Do not question Ao. Perhaps this sounds stern, or like a dictatorship, and that's because it is. As Ao, I will do my best to run things fairly. Occasionally I will make oversights about some previous Acts, by all means point these out. Do not, however, attempt to second guess me. Once an Act has been summarized, consider it done. The reason for this is that I do not want to dread every time I see a private message come up because I expect it to be yet another player complaining because something did not go their way. This rapidly drains my excitement. This whole game rests upon the notion that Ao is the ultimate law, if this idea is not followed, the game falls apart.

2nd) Do not state the phrase "Player X has been doing X and I cannot tolerate it anymore. Something must be done about them or I'm leaving." This does no good. If the action happens, it means it was permissible by the rules. Anyone signing up for this game should be creative enough and flexible enough that they can have all their plans ruined over and over, but still think up ways to salvage the situation or something entirely new. If you have one vision for your Game and will not see it altered, then this is not the game for you.

3rd) Keep conflicts in character. I have no problem with gods having feuds with one another, hell it makes things more fun. If the characters ill will spills into OOC then this becomes a problem. As a part of this pet peeve, do not ever state that you will now make your entire game goal be to undermine another player, I've seen it happen and it ends games. If your gods do get into feuds with one another, do not escalate every attack. You could even try being subtle and invoke a plan that takes several days to unfold instead of declaring all followers of said god turn to ash. If I feel a god has become overly disruptive, then I will contact them via private message and ask them to reevaluate their methods, but my definition of disruptive might be different than the players being disrupted. In the end, subtlety is fun, try it.

4th) Okay, this one isn't a game ender like the first three, consider it something that just mildly annoys me. You all get to be gods of things, that's a given. But at the start of a game, don't declare yourself a god of dragons, or fire, or death, or war, or anything else. In this game you are what you do so at the start of the game, you are nothing. Your actions will define what your god is known for. A player can claim they own trees, but if they never once spent an act on trees, their claim doesn't have much value does it?

------

My tone above is harsh I realize, but I want to get the disciplining out of the way and do it without having to speak with a player about it. I greatly enjoy God Games, its why I keep coming back to them over and over again, but the drama involved in them can quickly suck the joy from their wondrous complexity. In this game I will be taking a no-tolerance policy to players who try to ruin the experience of the game for myself or for other players. This doesn't mean you can't cause destruction, mayhem and cosmic changes, but do not make this a malicious game. If you feel someone is starting to actually grow angry then back down a bit, or reach out to them in private message and ensure you're both still remaining civil or your own fun, and the game itself, could easily be ruined. And for those who suffer bad luck, suck it up a bit, when you first read that update stating that all your followers became diseased and died, don't begin hammering away at that keyboard while you still see red. Take a breath and go take a walk, gain a bit more of a level head and examine the issue more deeply before you take an action.

Making this game work takes a dedicated and fair Ao, which I will attempt to be to the best of my ability, but it also relies heavily upon you the players. If you keep this in mind, and remember how much work one of these games requires to run, then we can all have a good experience.
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:42, Sat 18 Feb 2017.