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Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title
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Ok so game's over. Thanks to everyone for participating, especially those who actually followed along and participated. I went through a lot having to run this, and I really do mean it sincerely and deeply that you guys made it a lot easier. So kudos to Panda, Doot, and PB for winning my arbitrary MVP awards. And Pancakes gets my apology award for getting a very awkward role that I had hoped would be a better fit than what it was.

I'm not attacking anybody who didn't participate since I know the format was awkward. The only thing I want to say is that I think it's really sad that the MAMA is basically treated as a joke in every game. There's also a difference between not participating and not doing the bare minimum by informing the GM you're not participating. The amount of people who did the latter was really disappointing.

While running the game, I had to deal with developing tinnitus and insomnia (around the Ch3 mark). This also forced me to travel back across the country twice since that's where my doctors are. This was on top of my full-time job. I really didn't want to stop or delay the game, despite the low participation. It felt like it would be completely unfair to the players who were enjoying it. So I really tried my best to trim the story down and move it along, but it just wouldn't work since there were like 2 posts a day. And then I decided to at least make the final mysteries easy to participate in for anybody who was behind on reading, but I guess at that point it was clear that a lot of people had given up on trying. I'm only sharing this so people on some level know what I was going through and how disheartening it was, rather than think I was disheartened because of the participation itself. It more exacerbated my feelings of frustration and constant irritation (which cause of tinnitus I don't think is going to go away for the rest of my life).

I don't want to make this a pity party. I'm proud of the story created and wanted to see it through. I had to change a lot of it as I went, but you can get an idea of how it started with the surveys linked. I really hoped that people would enjoy seeing their own contributions make significant waves (and as I went along I also gave the active people bigger parts still). I hope this PGT is about the actual story and characters (incendiary opinions welcome) instead of how miserable of a "game" this was. I understand that there was inactivity because this was an awkward format or people were just generally apathetic about the story, but I still think the opinion of this game would be very different if people were active regardless.

Anyway if you didn't participate but wanted to, I suggest formally reading the story instead of "making it up to me next time". If you did read the story but thought it was stupid, well I'm at least glad that you read it enough to have that opinion.

[Survey Responses]

Spoiler: Quicktopics
Primary:
Agnes: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/sTVYRf2SjWFq
Christof: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/rgW39vdVUyCY
Ingrid: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/SdkVMiNrmHb
Raphael: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/kK237rrZnQw
Erik: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/AtwBTAafj2y
Mia: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/yuGDqmeR6Dm
Lynde: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/3ZuthsMEakX
Angelo: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/FF2mWLBnxQyBB
Juna: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/KwAqyzCNVarg
Verrier/Albrecht: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/j4MwvcRds5TU
Juna: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/KwAqyzCNVarg
Edna: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/rLuYiuEvs3Q
Harley: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/ZsrAxBLkpYQ
Meta: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/FdBHji9VAcCZ
Fritz: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/qiQuXNaRuMmZF
Jolina: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/CvY458icRxwvc
Cici: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/v4fasffX7wEs
Heinrich: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/kDDJLiEbKPV
Julia: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/hpVnX2xRpQn

Groups:
**The Conspirators: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/rgwwDquAjE6h
**Lynde and Angelo: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/dUBt4V7dUg8qd
Lynde and Fritz: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/LHyk6Rv557g
Agnes and Gideon: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/gsUSCcCFxjh
*Ingrid and Gideon: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/dtxHcA9Bqbu
Edna and Gideon: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/hWAYXK7Zhs72j
Lynde and Gideon: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/HiWgC33AnYa2
Mia and Ingrid: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/uykYkX3qk6Mi
Edna and Agnes: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/UJjsDW7BFUQ
*Verrier and Gideon: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/hMmbqWHdBJt
*Juna and Gideon: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/h9UPgcBfD9b
Cici and Erik: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/CgPxUYtRQWdu
*Juna and Edna: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/Km7Sy398h4ed
Fritz and Gideon: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/K5ikfUyH3atf
The Servants: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/nJeHT4ED62p
Angelo and Julia: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/tkY8UPuY9AV

Other:
*The Tomb: https://www.quicktopic.com/53/H/f8Lqn237hGFd


Spoiler: FAQ
Wtf happened? What was the point of it all?
The easiest way to understand is that the story is mainly around 3 plots.

- The A plot is the conspirators covering up Gideon's death, with Meta using this opportunity to gaslight Edna and set the table for the overall story.

- The B plot is Gideon's tomb, and Lynde and Angelo's participation in it. It was meant to be a mystery created for Gideon's legacy, and this both influenced Meta and Juna so it connects the A and C plot.

- The C plot is Juna finding the headship ring and the murders she commits thereafter.

There's also a D plot if you wanna stretch it with the hit and run, but that was supposed to just be some extra drama/reason for Meta to go after the family. The actual victim isn't relevant.

I still don't get why Meta did it.

The original idea of the game was that it would be ambiguous whether an insane Edna or Meta was the main culprit, though the final chapter streamlines this and makes it unambiguously Meta. Anyway, I suggest reading Meta's QT and survey. The main thing is that it's not as simple to say "they're all evil and deserve to die huehuehue" and that Meta in part shares some of Gideon's madness.

I don't get the dead thread.

Whether you consider it an actual afterlife or not is up to you, though it certainly seems to affect the LT world. The idea is that the story is a fable, and this is exaggerated storytelling.

Any small details that smooth over the plot?
Glad you asked.

- Meta admires Agnes and her storytelling ability. This definitely had at least some effect on her actions, whether large or small. She probably had plans for Agnes after the murder plan ended, but we will never know.

- It was supposed to be obvious to the conspirators that Meta was the culprit since she wrote Gideon's letters for him from 1984-86, collected stories from Agnes, and also was behind the recordings (the recordings being part of the crimes was confirmed early with Mia's phone calls). Though these weren't picked up on.

- Something more emphasized behind the scenes with Juna is the idea that East Germans live under constant paranoia. So while she only had some reason to believe the family wouldn't let her have the inheritance, Albrecht attacking her and Raphael's statements years before were more than enough for her to think it to be a fact.

- Heinrich was a traitor to the nazis and saved a lot of Holocaust victims, hence the existence of the bunker.
Re: Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title
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Happy Maria

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GG guys. Not much to say on my part, I posted a lot of my thoughts in my QT already but I will say I did actually enjoy this game, there were a lot of cool parts to it and I really wish there was more activity throughout because I did really like the story and stuff. Edna was also a different type of character to play so that was fun. It was tragic how the game actually ended up being to GM and I'm very sorry to JM that you had to undergo so much pain.

This game at least is going to be the reason I play Umineko though so that's epic. I do feel like the game activity would've been a lot higher if we had more Umineko gamers in the cast but I guess that's just speculation at this point.
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Re: Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title
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gg

I don't really think JM has to apologize since he doesn't control my activity so I still feel bad. Though I think it would be unanimous to say Angelo was in a weird spot regardless of however many times I managed to get a post in.

I feel like we discuss the MAMA after literally every game except maybe F7 in recent memory. Sometimes I just feel like a game will have okay activity like F7 and Scooby Doo or it will flop for no real reason. If everyone is genuinely just uber-busy right now then we should probably just take a pause on forum games for the sanity of our GMs. We love everyone who has ever taken the time to host a game <3

I honestly wish I formed an opinion on any characters in the game but I wasn't in the living thread long enough and I didn't think I had to take any of the dead thread characters seriously so I literally have zero thoughts about most of the characters in this game lol. But honestly Juna vs. Albrecht was kind of epic.

And prayers for JM, too. Hopefully you feel better and nothing else but good comes in the future.

Also, just saying, but maybe the key to activity is more gays. There seems to be a link between player engagement and homoeroticism. Tell me I'm wrong.
Re: Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title
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Shy guy

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Overall I liked what the story was doing, I think the pacing was just off. A good long while was spent on setup, so it wasn't until quite late into the game that all the cool reveals of how the story was a lot larger than it first seemed began. The cool reveals were cool though, they were the moment where I went "oh so this is what the story's about. This is why JM was so excited for the story pre-game". Maybe in the novelisation things get spread out some more I dunno.

I don't think I have much to say about the characters really, various factors mean most never really got to shine. I get the impression I'd have liked Fritz some more if the game had gone better. Ingrid was easily the main standout to me, she just worked really well in the story and setting.

CaptainPancakes wrote:
Also, just saying, but maybe the key to activity is more gays. There seems to be a link between player engagement and homoeroticism. Tell me I'm wrong.


You're wr-

Dammit the words won't come out
Re: Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title
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This will probably be stream-of-consciousness since I don’t really know what I’m trying to say here.

Overall I liked the story, but it sucks that it feels like it got drained of a lot of plans. I felt several members of the cast got held back by circumstances, while other interesting characters just barely posted at all. Ingrid was definitely my favorite, and I’m sure I’m not alone in that regard. I also liked Edelfäude a lot. Since it’s sorta related to this, I want to mention I thought Meta dying was a little strange. Even though it made for a clever mystery, it meant we barely got any dialogue from her after she was outed as the killer. That made my uncertain what to make of her character, though that might have been the intent.

The mysteries were pretty clever, even if I generally sucked at solving them. Even the ones I was supposed to know right away sailed over my head. At least it’s IC cause Fritz is pretty dense. The solution to the letter thing was really clever, and I feel like not enough people talked about that. Other than that I think Mia’s murder has my favorite solution.

Thinking it over some more, I think the biggest problem I had with the story was a general lack of action from the characters. Most of the story involved discovering things—either finding a body or solving some murder. I figure that’s standard fair for the genre, but my favorite scenes in the game were those like the Albrecht and Juna battle and Fritz’s tomb shenanigans, the scenes when characters took direct action (even if it wasn’t the players).

In that regard it’s a shame that the story was less played-driven than it was meant to be, though I’m not really surprised. I’ve found that usually too much freedom can be overwhelming and even inhibit creativity.

Also I might be alone here but I definitely didn’t expect the game to be so Umineko going into it. I’m just not a huge fan of supernatural stuff in general though. I am starting to play Umineko again cause of this game, but I haven’t made much progress.

Anyway that probably felt like a lot of negative stuff, but I did enjoy playing the game and I enjoyed writing Fritz. There’s definitely a lot of potential in the story for something else where everyone creating it is invested. Emphasizing the German split more for that definitely seems like a good idea too. Anyway that’s all Igot right now, time to check the surveys
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This CYOA follows Vesti Gates and Lauren Tehra, two detectives who search for the truth, whether in their own dimension or otherwise.

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Re: Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title
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Sock

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This is an edit added to the start of the post because I realize I wanted it to start positive even if I say it later in the post: The story here was really good and I enjoyed it very much, and while I brought some bad activity to the table I'm glad I got to impact it in some way by writing one of the characters in it.

In the middle of the game I was incredibly frustrated with a lot of things, but I'm still trying to sort out if they were flaws on my end or not. So I'm not really going to mention much about this, but I did mention on the Discord once that I was under the impression that the game was going to be more like Umineko in a way, where after each murder there'd be a debate every player would participate in. Instead the first murder, which was probably still fresh on everyone's minds and had the best activity, was pretty much just Albrecht and the other demons. I really wanted to contribute and post stuff trying to solve it, but I wasn't able because I wasn't dead and that felt kinda lame.

That aside, though, looking at the story in its whole I'm a huge fan. I was in on most of the Meta twists (though I didn't know it was Meta until near the very end, or that she was the one talking to Agnes for the period after Gideon really died until near the very end) and usually I'm not a fan of big things being spoiled for me but I still really really really enjoyed the story the game was telling. Putting aside any frustrations I did have that are more likely just personal faults, the game had some incredible moments near the end, even though I didn't hype up as much as I should've. Moments like Ingrid facing off against Gideon near the end, or the Purple text stuff, or Juna vs Albrecht, or James walking out of the Dead Thread. All of those were super super cool. It is a shame that a lot of characters totally dropped off, especially ones that were never really relevant in the first place since I would've liked to have seen more from them, like Julia or Jolina, for example. But that's more of an activity issue than an issue on the game's part.

But I'm gonna parrot what Panda said here and say that the pacing was a little off, with the start feeling very slow and then murder after murder with little time in between.

I'm starting to think MAMA is just something some people blindly agree to without reading. I'm also really frustrated at myself for continuing to fall into the same bad habits with activity as well. I don't think there's any way to better enforce it, but maybe we should try a new set of rules that we all make? I really have no idea.

JM definitely should be proud of what he wrote here, it's incredible. I apologize that a lot of health related issues also happened during this time and I hope you don't end up associating this game with them and end up having a distaste for it. Hoping things work out better in the future for these issues.
Re: Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title
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> I'm starting to think MAMA is just something some people blindly agree to without reading. I'm also really frustrated at myself for continuing to fall into the same bad habits with activity as well. I don't think there's any way to better enforce it, but maybe we should try a new set of rules that we all make? I really have no idea.

I mean we can't really create a new rule for "be active." It's pretty implied in any game. At a certain point it just comes down to the player, I think.
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Sock

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CaptainPancakes wrote:
> I'm starting to think MAMA is just something some people blindly agree to without reading. I'm also really frustrated at myself for continuing to fall into the same bad habits with activity as well. I don't think there's any way to better enforce it, but maybe we should try a new set of rules that we all make? I really have no idea.

I mean we can't really create a new rule for "be active." It's pretty implied in any game. At a certain point it just comes down to the player, I think.

That's true, I just more mean if each game has its own rules instead of "Agree to MAMA" it might mentally make some things different for everyone? It's probably stupid though.
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Well, GG! I'm really unsure of what to even write in this post but trying to figure it out has only stalled me until now so bear with me for a moment

i think the biggest thing in my head rn is that i'm really glad ingrid was received well in the end. this might sound slightly pathetic? but midway through and onwards i was just really busy and worried about my activity and how i was doing and hearing i did good after all just makes me feel a lot better

as far as game "game" things go i'm not quite sure what to say. i do think some of the awkward "find corpse, react, find corpse" thing and maybe some players just having the wrong idea about what the game would be could be things that influenced activity? honestly in my eyes these games are simply more art than science and it's really hard to tell just how much feedback from one game you can apply to the other. i could try but i feel like a lot of what i think are just wild guesses (maybe limiting how separate from the family characters could be? because it seemed to me like a lot of inactive players drew the short straw on stuff to do by virtue of being more than two degrees separate from gideon. the cast itself also seemed maybe too big for its own good and that contributed to things being stretched too thin despite jm's best efforts? idk, i'm talking way too much for someone who just said she has no idea what to say and that what she says might not matter anyways)

but i did still like the plot and the characters. i've seen some praise for the reveals but i also think a lot of the setup and atmosphere in the meat of the game itself was really good! i would call edna and verrier the character highlights for me but the tomb scene with fritz with agnes was also great. i'm just kinda sad that with a lot of stuff i'm just not comfortable discussing in a public forum going on during the game i end up feeling like i ended up not appreciating this game as much as i could while it was going on. or. idk. this is getting very rambly. i think i'll cut it off here. gg guys gg and very much thank you jm
Re: Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title
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I will at least say that in my head there was value in keeping the living thread disparate from the dead thread, and I wanted players to come to deliberately wrong conclusions to create drama since they didn't have access to red. Which is kinda a thing in Umineko--"Obviously a servant must've made a copy of a master key! As if I'd accept there are only 3 master keys!" I get that it wasn't helpful to say you could do "whatever", but I still expected more drama, arguments. Maybe a fight over whether or not to open the tomb. Anything but apathetic silence.

And I get that reacting to corpses could get old but to me it all happened in three different instances that were supposed to invoke different moods. And besides Albrecht all the murder discoveries are in Chapter 2 so while I do agree that "find corpse, react" was awkward I don't really think that was the problem when there was at least other content. Idk I think from the surveys I was more excited about how certain characters would be able to interact with the cast even if they weren't "important" but most were just inactive.

Also this MAMA is different from others and has different bullets. I do think this game is an extreme outlier but it's very obvious that the same people are always inactive. And the bar was so low in this game that I didn't even care about inactivity as much as people not communicating with me period.
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just here to say that i am also part of the ingrid fan club
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Last one to post smells like rancid gravy
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Re: Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title
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Thanks for running this JM, sorry it was so rough

Uh I guess I don't have too much to say that I haven't already but yeah, I can tell a lot went into this, might have been a bit too ambitious a project? idk, it sounds like something like half the plot was dropped and I feel like I don't even get half of what was there as is so

Also yeah I don't see trying to rewrite the MAMA as changing anything, it's already about as basic as you can get: do your best to be active and don't ruin the game for everyone else


well I guess I'm the one that stinks, okay that's FINE
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Re: Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title
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Franzise Deauxnim wrote:
well I guess I'm the one that stinks, okay that's FINE


Nah I mean last person in the game cast to post in the PGT. Wouldn't want to discourage discussion after all

So there's def a lot of stinkers right now
Vesti and Lauren's Interdimensional Investigations
This CYOA follows Vesti Gates and Lauren Tehra, two detectives who search for the truth, whether in their own dimension or otherwise.

Avatar from over here probably
Re: Ghost Fables Tea PartyTopic%20Title

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PB just trying to draw attention away from the fact he's totally the gravy stinker now
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hold on
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