Ignoring Alts in Uptime.

[Ralph]

Before we get started, this conversation can get confusing so I'd like to make some definitions.
Prime character - The character you started the night playing.
Alternate character (or alt) - A character you have shelved and are not actively playing that night.


Recently I have noticed a number of players making the announcement at the beginning of game about how their shelved alt is still accessible by phone. That's fine. It is within the realm of the rules of the game, and some players really feel that they need their alt to be accessible. No problem.

That being said? I as a storyteller will (and have) avoid contacting a shelved character in uptime most of the time. I do this for several reasons.

First of all, I believe it breaks immersion. I know that some players can switch between their PCs without concern or preamble. It's not something I can personally do very easily, but OK. I get that. However, most of the time I have seen this used is when someone calls a player's alt while that player is engaged in roleplay with another player, using their prime character. It's one thing when that prime character gets a phone call, but quite another when it's the alt of that player. Further, I often see (once the call is finished) the player come back to the conversation and say "I was here the whole time. What happened?"

That breaks immersion. It breaks it for the other PCs, it breaks it for me, and like it or not, it breaks it for the player too.

For the record, I feel I should also say that I realize this happens to me all the time - I'll be playing one of my NPCs and get a call about something else happening in game that I need to deal with. I do my best to ensure that I disrupt things as little as possible, and I apologize for it happening. Such is an unfortunate aspect of NPCs and Staffing.

Second, it feels disingenuous to me. Say for example, a player has an alt that is a Sabbat hunter. Some Sabbat roll into town. If someone calls the alt, that alt should drop what they are doing and get stuck in the Sabbat fight, right? But the rules say you can't.

Now it's one thing if another player does it, but if I do it, as the storyteller, I can't help but feel like I am saying "See this tasty plot? Sorry, you can't have any." As much as I enjoy causing discomfort to characters, I don't especially enjoy teasing or saying no to players.

Third, it increases the chance of accidental metagaming - or worse - the perception of metagaming. Lets say I have some information that a player's alt might get (say something via an influence, or social network, or whatever) and I tell the alt. Then later, we discover that the prime character arrives at the scene. Perhaps they prime character got there by totally legit means. Perhaps they didn't. Either way, there can certainly be made the perception of there being some sort of meta-gaming. If I don't inform the alt until downtime, then that isn't so much a concern.

Along this same line, I have seen people accidentally blur the line between alt and prime due to this - they get a call with intel, but later can't recall if that was for the alt or the prime. That's a lot more rare, I think, but still comes up.

Lastly, I am kept very busy with the characters that show up. It's not an easy job to wrangle all 30-40 of you as it is... to also be constantly considering alts? Well, it's just easier for me to simply ignore them until downtime. Also, perhaps selfishly - I want to play with the characters that you are playing. There is a reason you are playing them, so they are who my focus is on.

Do I break these rules? Of course. Sometimes I really need to relay something to an alt, in uptime. However, I do try to be very conscious of when it happens.

What do you think? Do you disagree with me? Do you agree? I'd love to hear your opinion.

[Ralph]

Oh. One more thing I'd like to say here....

I love that we allow alts in our game. I think our game would not be as healthy or as much fun without them. It is just this specific thing I have issue with.

[MikeLG]

My perspective on alts in downtime is that if there is a back and forth, I prefer it in PM. This has the paperwork issue of establishing what my character does and does not know, and through messaging, it can suspend enough belief that any character I have can be literally anywhere, and is just responding to messages, thus allowing for a delay.

At least how I see it is that if your alt is out, they should have something preventing immediate contacting of them. Be it through being too far away to respond in a reasonable time, social obligations, or even just general "screw you all, phone's off, not going to respond to anyone!"

A thought on the example mentioned: If there's a Sabbat plot and the dedicated Sabbat hunter's away? Why not talk to staff and ask for an out? If you're known as a Sabbat hunter, wouldn't it make sense for the Sabbat to try to delay it? In that case, I don't see anything wrong with going to staff and asking if they can say that's what's preventing the character from returning if they're unable or unwilling to switch.

So in a way, I guess my stance is "Your alts shouldn't be in a position to be immediately available. If they're in the domain, there should be a somewhat decent reason why they're not able to respond immediately"

Admittedly, I'm a sucker for letter writing.

[Chase]

Communication is important to me in these cases.

For example, I would react very differently to the following scenarios:

During a lull in-game, when I am not in a scene: "Hey, Justin, my character is trying to call Scarlet tonight but I don't want it to connect and force an hour-long phone conversation in uptime, can you give me a reason the call wouldn't get through, or why she couldn't have a lengthy conversation?"

Versus, say,

Post-game: "Hey, since Scarlet's shelved I just assume that my call doesn't get through and so I just referenced the consequences of that in character without talking to you about it."

The first one? HELL YES. I will gladly find a way to work with a storyteller (or PCs!) if I'm asked, for things like this. Hell, if the STs would like me to find a reason during any given game night for an alt to be unavailable, or make that request of all PCs? That's cool, absolutely.

The second one would upset me a fair bit, though. That shatters my suspension of disbelief and immersion way more than the first, and provides a sudden in-game confusion as several perspectives on recent events collide.

I'm totally okay with my alt being unreachable in uptime, provided I'm aware that it needs to happen for some reason. I definitely prefer to play my main character while I'm playing - sometimes I need a break from one character's headspace. I just don't want to get into the realm of "Well, they're shelved, so they're totally unreachable and a complete nonentity until they come back," with all the problems that can entail.

[Aoife]

I think it's fine to not deal with alts in uptime. Like Adam I'm a sucker for letters and pm's.

[dominic]

Agreed with all of the above. I'm playing my main right now, but don't try to punish my alt for being unreachable when you didn't even give me the chance.

[Colleen]

I am entirely ok with staff ignoring my alt in uptime - and by uptime I mean after listen up has been called.

Of course, unlike many other players who seem to want to keep their alts in the domain while not being played - I always find a way to have my alt out of town when I am not playing them so that there is a built in reason why she can not immediately show up, or possibly can't be reached by phone.

More than once, I've had to tell people - nope, sorry, I won't take a phone call for Aldona while I'm playing Colleen - or vice versa. I don't want that kind of dissonance in my rp on Fridays - there are already so many things pulling me out of character.


I think that the "getting punished" for absence or for alting however is an entirely different issue.

Over the years, I've both lost and gained power and position due to the absence of a player or character.

So, there is the argument that real life happens and a player shouldn't have their character "punished" because something comes up and they can't make it to game for a month. And I get that - I really do. Do I encourage targeting the characters of absent players? Absolutely not. However, shit happens. People bug out for a break because they're not having fun, or because life hits hard and for a long time - and often this is timed right as that character has done something stupid or gotten caught or gotten framed etc. Just as targeting an absent player isn't cool - neither is that absence forcing a large group of people to pull their punches or hold their plots and attacks.

I realize that's all basically player on player philosophy I've just talked about, but I swear, that leads into the staff bit - so, if a group of pcs go after an absent player/character and they take this group assault to a staff npc I absolutely do not think that the npc should try to defend the absent player/character just because they're not in play or at game.

Now... most of that reflects my opinion on ABSENT PLAYERS.

It all changes for me when you start throwing Alts into it.

Before I did my stint on staff - I only had the one character. I had no alt. This may have had a good part in forming my opinion on this. Now that I have an alt though, I still believe as I did.

My opinion is that if you are playing an alt, and something that comes up where your main is needed - than it is absolutely fair for the other characters to hold it against your missing character. Yeah, I know that it's not a popular opinion, but my view is that switching to a different character is a choice and isn't like real life hitting you to take you away from game altogether. My feeling is that if you are concerned about a particular character getting hit socially, or politically - that your best defense against that is to actively play them.

[Glen]

I agree with LIndsay in this one, to give support to what seems to be the unpopular opinion.

- - -

I would personally also add that (in my opinion) breaking away from a scene for an IG phone call, alt-phone call, or anything except for a quickly relayed OOG emergency: ("Hey guys, quick OOG emergency call. Soft RP hold, please?") means your character left the scene.

This means that you did not automatically follow the other PCs into the next scene, stop them 5 minutes ago from doing something, and cannot ever ask for a recap or recon of what you "would have stopped / would have done". This is not a game where your PC was easily "tagging along". That is not fair to the players who will act as if you are not there - because you are not there.

[IssaiahFalatini]

Agreeing with the un-popular idea...

Personally if you are missing something on one of your characters because of alting then that character is missing it; that being said you can be available in PM and downtime to assist other players that contact you.

Agreeing with Lindsay, your decision to switch between characters should not "DESTROY" you; however if the character is unavailable for important events (and the player is) then loss of status or other actions could happen and should happen, especially if you are someone that would normally be required for the situation. Now if the Player is absent from game for an extended period due to RL and issues then that is another matter and they should not be affected outside of direct plot and action of those affected by that character's actions before thier disappearence.

Glen is completely correct as well regarding the "I was here and what did I miss"; I myself have walked away due to staff question or on several occassions an important OOG text. To combat this and enhance everyone's experience perhaps if you are walking away, come up with an ingame reason to remove yourself? this way you can have your needed moment and everyone else can RP your leaving in a manner that best pleases them.

[Katyusha]

So first, I totally agree that players should be have their PCs walk away if they're interrupted and not leave and then work the "I was here the whole time!" angle. Pretend you get a not-super-important phone call, or step on a nail, or have a bad feeling, or whatever might delay your character or pull them out of a scene entirely. I firmly believe that rolling with that kind of change without breaking a scene is pretty essential to RP, and to LARPing in particular.

But I think that's not the point of contention.

I'm averse to taking calls or being pulled aside for alt stuff between listen up and game down, and I think it's often more disruptive for everyone else than some players might realize. While I understand Justin's point that having people just make things up about why they can't reach you can be problematic, I feel like this is pretty easy to get around: tell people where you're alt is. If they wouldn't know where your alt is, tell them that they wouldn't know but can't get through. Then if they make things up, they're making things up IC and there will be IC repercussions, either for their fabrications or for your alt, all of which seems thoroughly appropriate to our game. This gives you OOC control over your character without venturing into trying to control the actions of other PCs. And as Lindsay said above, and others have echoed, I don't feel that switching out characters should inherently offer alts "protection".

(I want to add that I also feel that if you're going to seriously mess with someone's character, especially an alt, it's good policy to discuss it with them. Sure, yes, it risks metagaming, but it also enhances a sense of collaborative storytelling, which is kind of the whole point of the thing, yeah?)

Do people need an easier method of telling people what's up with their alts, to avoid inadvertent confusion and fuckery? We could always put up a "Swapping Out" forum, where people can signal that they're switching characters and what's up with the alt, including the known reason (if any) for their lack of availability in person and by phone. Something like:

"Switching out to Maud next week. Katya vanishes without a trace, and can't be reached at all."

or

"Switching out to Katya this Friday. Maud's in Edinburgh, searching for patrons. She's not going to answer her phone while she's charming the rich and powerful, but she's contactable through email and letters."

Would that be useful?

[Rallix]

As someone who, up until this week, both had two characters and had taken an extended absence from game, I feel like I can weigh in here.

When I put Sasha/Sesheta aside to play Aneirin, I expected the character to get shit on - she was already persona non grata, and cutting and running like that is cowardly. She's a paranoid Malkavian, it works. When she came back into town and was immediately treated as untrustworthy and suspicious by a former friend and co-primogen, that was awesome and totally appropriate. Sometimes penalties really DO matter for immersion. But there's a line there that I think is important to consider on a place by place basis.

As for the other issue being discussed here, I think it's really very important to keep in mind that, say, if you're on a phone call (as your main), you are on the phone. Not participating in the main conversation. You stepped off to the side? Great - if you try that for realsies, and get into an intense phone conversation, can you follow a conversation happening on the other side of the room? I'm trained to follow multiple conversations at once (field-work 101) and I struggle with that.

Taking phone calls as an alt should really, really be secondary to any RP as your primary. If you're in the middle of a scene and you choose to leave temporarily to take what is, for all intents and purposes, an OOG phone call, then you are making the choice to leave that RP. Coming back and demanding that other players change their night for you is self-centered and ridiculous.

[Rose]

I have seen people get in huge amounts of shit in character, and in one case lose status, over not being reachable when nobody actually tried reaching the character. They just said they tried and couldn't get in touch with anyone. This is very much not okay in my opinion. If your character calls another character, let them know. In many cases, a character won't be reachable, but they'll still see a missed call or get a message. In some cases, they might be totally reachable due to a lull in game or whatever.

My intention with announcing that Rose is still reachable is not to take long phone calls or such. In fact, in most cases, Rose will not be able to answer or won't be able to talk for long. But if I actually get a call or PM, then I can react in downtime. One character does not cease to exist when another is being played.

That being said, if there actually is an attempt made and a character is unreachable, then that character should totally have to deal with ramifications for missing something important. Playing an alt should not be, in my opinion, either a get out of jail free card or a social death sentence automatically.

Not having a specific character in game shouldn't change how the other characters react. If your character would call another, do something in game to show that whether or not the other person is there with that character. Simple as that.

[MikeLG]

One topic that came up in this is the "I was here the whole time, what did I miss?" aspect of dealing with that call.

I think this is it's own little topic on its own. Especially if someone walks in a scene, doesn't see the person, then assumes that that person is there. Related was an incident on Friday where someone was told basically, "That effect that's been affecting you all night? The past half hour it wasn't active."

Considering the person was RPing the effect that time, it's hard to act like it wasn't happening, since it shaped interaction.

[Rallix]

Not to stray too far off topic, but the specific instance you are mentioning was brought up to explain something that was actually happening, in plot.

To whit, when asked if the thing causing the effect could be interrupted, the answer was "Yes, it can be and was, by the way, you would have felt that". So, not exactly the same situation at all.

[Ted]

Personally, I'm a big fan of "make your best effort" and "try to give each other leeway" when it comes to honestly-intended IC/OOC confusions.

Weighing in on individual topics:

- Try to have some reason why your shelved alt isn't present, even if they would want to be. This could be leaving town, huddling in your home struck by a phobia, busy with a thing, etc.

- If you need to duck out of a scene for an emergency call, try to arrange that you're away ICly as well as OOCly. Sometimes this isn't possible (emergency call mid-combat, say), but saying "I've been here this whole time" so that others have to pause and wait for you puts a burden on everyone else that you could just avoid.

- On the other side of the coin, give a little leeway when someone steps away OOCly. It usually makes sense that your status-conscious Ventrue would probably be offended when a lowly Caitiff pauses a meeting with you to take a phone call, but if it's because the player had to take an emergency call in real life, try to let it go.

- Similarly, if someone is away because they're playing an alt, try to have your character give them space. This totally falls in well with the whole "a year is like the blink of an eye to the immortals" cliche. Give some leeway. This doesn't have to be infinite -- if someone really just doesn't play their character for a long time, it would be normal to react to their absence -- but you should try.

- Keep uptime interaction with shelved alts to a minimum, on a major-emergency-only basis. In real life, I generally avoid calling coworkers if I know they're on vacation, unless shit's on fire and they're the only one who knows how to put it out. I try to have my characters take a similar attitude. (I don't always succeed, but I try.) If someone specifically asks to be contacted, though, it probably means they're looking forward to people contacting them and that's a little more okay if you can manage it.

- Don't try to game this system. If you shelve your alt because you want to avoid bad consequences, well, expect people to notice. Often it makes for someone to make themselves scarce if trouble is looming, so I don't really fault people who shelve an alt because bad stuff is coming -- but if their character is conveniently available when it's advantageous, then unavailable again right afterward, it starts to look a lot like cheating.

- Don't say that you tried to contact someone if you didn't. Well, it's okay to have your character lie and claim to do so, since the Vampire world is full of scheming bastards, but don't assume it unless you talk to people. The exception to this is when someone's been gone enough that their character is inactive. Even in the case of such characters, don't make something up and assume; talk to Staff, who will probably have a standard answer already and may have made arrangements beforehand.

- Treat all other players' time with respect OOCly. The person playing a shunned outsider and the person playing the Super-Powerful Archon are both real people whose time is valuable and who deserve respect, even if their characters aren't.

- Communicate about stuff like this earlier instead of later, so that other people can make OOC plans to keep the game going (and, more often, to keep individual plots flowing.)

- Realize that different people approach this different ways, and try to work with people OOCly to resolve confusion.

- If you're having trouble, talk to Staff. We'll try to make it right.

[Ginger]

I just wanted to pop in and clarify a thing here.

Related was an incident on Friday where someone was told basically, "That effect that's been affecting you all night? The past half hour it wasn't active."

Considering the person was RPing the effect that time, it's hard to act like it wasn't happening, since it shaped interaction.

If this is related to my woogie plot, whoever said this was speaking out of turn. The only people who were temporarily freed from control were those in close physical proximity to the scene (because they were the ones in Sunnyvale) and they were all informed as the effects went on and off.

Of course, if this is NOT related to my plot, please disregard this post.

Edited to add:
This is a really good example of an (off topic) point: That its important to know what is in character and what is out of character. So please disregard, since this has been addressed up-thread.

[Isabella]

To whit, when asked if the thing causing the effect could be interrupted, the answer was "Yes, it can be and was, by the way, you would have felt that". So, not exactly the same situation at all.

If this is how it was said in character it sounds as though the character was making an in character assumption. Now if the person went out of character to say this that would be a different matter.

To change gears: I'm also of the opinion that if you walk away from the conversation to do anything (go to the bathroom, take a phone call, sit down, etc.) you walk away in character. Even if your just using auspex to eavesdrop guess what? Your too tuned in to that other conversation to hear the one going on next to you. If your not standing there it makes no sense that you would hear anything.

And no. Swapping out to an alt is not a get outta free card and never should be. If your character is in deep shit they're still going to be when you aren't playing them. The difference is that you won't be able to combat it in up time or through down times.

Regarding contacting altar not in play my philosophy is that unless I really really need to do it at game I wait til I can send a pm. I dislike having my night interrupted by having to basically go out of character to slip into my alt to answer a question that I can answer during the week and so I try not to do that to other people. Yes, sometimes it can't be avoided but a lot of the time it can wait.

Also, I like Ari's idea of a Swapping Out thread. It could help ease confusion and you don't have to put a lot of info there if you don't want to.

Just some thoughts.

[MikeLG]

Even if your just using auspex to eavesdrop guess what? Your too tuned in to that other conversation to hear the one going on next to you. If your not standing there it makes no sense that you would hear anything.

If you're using auspex to eavesdrop and a conversation happens next to where you're standing, then the conversation next to you should be that much louder due to the boost to hearing, which should pull you out of that. If spirit's touch is used, the wording of the discipline implies that only sight is granted, and that participating in any conversation ends it.

[Ginger]

If you're using auspex to eavesdrop and a conversation happens next to where you're standing, then the conversation next to you should be that much louder due to the boost to hearing, which should pull you out of that. ...

sure, but here we get into the reality that, if i am irl standing "there" listening to something, it's not practical to say that something "here" that I actually cant hear irl will pull me out of auspex. I think a more practical interpretation is that it sharpens your hearing, allowing you to focus on the far away conversation at the expense of any nearby one. Also, i (personally) tend to imagine that the eavesdropper looks kinda distracted and super focused.

[Ted]

I just wanted to pop in and clarify a thing here.

OW MY EYES.

*Rotschrek*

Sorry, off topic.

[Ted]

I think the takeaway lesson from all of this talk about contacting alts during uptime should be this:

Never go to the bathroom again.

[MrLennet]

No.

If you are not capable of positive metagaming, then work on it. We are here to have fun in a LARP, not to get punished for being absent in said LARP. We have piles and piles of shit consequences to plant our foot firmly into. We don't need our RL issues, preferences, jobs, illnesses or whatever else adding to that pile.

[MrLennet]

It was pointed out to me that I was not clear, given the intense sidetracking that occurred in this thread.

I agree with Ralph's general eyeballing of things here, and I think he is on the right track. It is fine to ease back from an alt when events show up in order to maintain verisimilitude (fine example: Lennet has no reason whatsoever to be absent from Extremely Important Court, but I can't switch out, so it is generally overlooked).

I do not agree that absence of a character alone is enough to warrant punishing the character, especially with a heavily restrictive rule in place to prevent character swapping.

Thank you.

[Aldona Piast]

Yeah - I'm all for seriously turning a blind eye and being cooperative when a player can't switch to the needed character not because they choose not to but because something came up after they've already switched and now they can't switch back due to our alt rule.

Just like you shouldn't use the rule to get out of consequences - neither should the rule itself be the sole cause for consequences.

To me that's entirely different than the other examples that were given of say - getting left out of a sabbat hunt plot with your sabbat hunter because you were playing a different character at the time.

[Rose]

I would like to point out that characters who have made promises or agreements with another character, especially if the communication was through PMs in the first place, are not off the hook if the other player switches to an alt. If you say you'll get info to someone and don't, that person has a right to be upset and/or press the issue, whether or not they are around on a Friday night. Just because someone is playing a different character, it doesn't mean their alt doesn't exist anymore.