everythingWasBees posted:

hello. I'm probably going to permanently lose my account over this, but podima is probably not a good choice for an admin. they shouldn't even be a mod but he was well liked and spent months doing damage control so I didn't feel like stirring the pot.

on some of the games that they helped host and run, they have:

specifically designed the games so that people are forbidden from discussing for sharing concerns with one another because it "spoil the plot' and created situations where staff can't be held accountable for anything that happens. in doing so they basically go against every safety and community guideline for pretty much every modern RP community.

included themes of sexual assault without warning anyone, despite the game's numerous other content warnings, because " it would be a spoiler and threaten the sanctity of the game"

conducted an extended torture scene of a player done incredibly fetishistically, without the consent or knowledge of other players present in the game, and created a running joke in the community to make fun of people who were uncomfortable

has repeatedly refused to ban sexual assault and rape from games, but also refused to warn for such content, because in his eyes writers should be able to include content without limits. in doing so, he completely ignores the safety and comfort of players

this kind of person shouldn't be responsible for moderating the content of a forum game, much less the content of a forum.

Peachfart posted:

Was this stuff done on the forums or on Discord? It is gross either way, but at least we can have links if it was on SA.

everythingWasBees posted:

recruitment was done on the forums for each and all the games were done on discords.

because any ooc chat about the games was against the rules, people never really knew what was going on until afterwards when they compared notes, or if they were already talking with friends and debating leaving.

Endorph posted:

was it a game where the players weren't all together seeing each other's scenes? like a werewolf game or something where the person running the game would do one on one RP with someone and the players had to solve some kind of mystery relating to each other?

If the dude was using that to spring weird sex stuff on people, that seems very much like taking advantage of the game's format to be a creep.

Endorph posted:

was it a game where the players weren't all together seeing each other's scenes? like a werewolf game or something where the person running the game would do one on one RP with someone and the players had to solve some kind of mystery relating to each other?

If the dude was using that to spring weird sex stuff on people, that seems very much like taking advantage of the game's format to be a creep.

everythingWasBees posted:

recruitment was done on the forums for each and all the games were done on discords.

because any ooc chat about the games was against the rules, people never really knew what was going on until afterwards when they compared notes, or if they were already talking with friends and debating leaving.

because it was all on discord, a lot of people just wanted to wash their hands of it and not speak of it again. pod was just an ik and it wasn't on the forums directly and practice over the past few years has always been to ignore that kind of stuff.

genuinely only bringing it up because he was made an admin.

everythingWasBees posted:

included themes of sexual assault without warning anyone, despite the game's numerous other content warnings, because " it would be a spoiler and threaten the sanctity of the game"

conducted an extended torture scene of a player done incredibly fetishistically, without the consent or knowledge of other players present in the game, and created a running joke in the community to make fun of people who were uncomfortable

Endorph posted:

was it a game where the players weren't all together seeing each other's scenes? like a werewolf game or something where the person running the game would do one on one RP with someone and the players had to solve some kind of mystery relating to each other?

If the dude was using that to spring weird sex stuff on people, that seems very much like taking advantage of the game's format to be a creep.

Meinberg posted:

The torture stuff happened during the playing of the Riven megagame, which you can find a link for here: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3851229

The worst stuff did happen off site though. I’ll see if I can find anything, but I imagine that I’ve been removed from any discords that have any specific receipts. I can say, though, that in the second game where bad stuff happened, I was assigned this character to play: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1iqACiju_RoJtYaluMgI1ZSOzkZOtlT-AcX4KrtD0EW8/edit

Despite offering complaints in discord about the sexual violence of the character’s backstory, I was told to ignore the concerns and at the time I believed that was the best course of action, despite later events (as described above) leading me to regret that decision.

everythingWasBees posted:

there would be like 20 separate areas that players could move to each night. you could only see what happened that day. there would be dozens of days and it would be structured with secret roles like werewolf.

things like the torture scene or " this player has sex dolls of two of the other players. it's a core part of the plot that we can't spoil" were only revealed after the game.

I left the game I was in on bad terms for different reasons, but then when talking to others a bunch of this stuff spilled out when we actually compared to notes.

this is all like forum rp drama and it feels silly to bring up except podima was the moderator for the forum rp subforum. managing this was his responsibility, but he also directly ran some of these games

qnqnx posted:

Frankly this all should have been aired much earlier, and that ignoring the part that Podima was already a mod.

Meinberg posted:

The torture stuff happened during the playing of the Riven megagame, which you can find a link for here: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3851229

The worst stuff did happen off site though. I’ll see if I can find anything, but I imagine that I’ve been removed from any discords that have any specific receipts. I can say, though, that in the second game where bad stuff happened, I was assigned this character to play: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1iqACiju_RoJtYaluMgI1ZSOzkZOtlT-AcX4KrtD0EW8/edit

Despite offering complaints in discord about the sexual violence of the character’s backstory, I was told to ignore the concerns and at the time I believed that was the best course of action, despite later events (as described above) leading me to regret that decision.

renessia posted:

It was aired and summarily ignored.

Arivia posted:

Where? I didn’t see anything in Trad Games (the forum he modded), QCS, or here.

Endorph posted:

Okay, so, let me get this clear. Podima advertised for a Discord game of some variety on these forums, you joined. You were given a character with a giant backstory about sexual assault without your input (by Podima?) You were told (by Podima?) to ignore your discomfort with this. The fact that anything like this would be a part of the game was not mentioned to you before you joined. Is this correct?

WarpDogs posted:

Was it Podima specifically that wrote up a 18 pages of backstory about an evil autistic kid who builds sex robots of his female roommates because they won't return his advances? and then assigned it to you?

EorayMel posted:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1iqACiju_RoJtYaluMgI1ZSOzkZOtlT-AcX4KrtD0EW8/edit posted:

When your housemates came down to the breakfast table, you were there waiting for them. You told them what you had become, and you called up the Machine World so that they could see it. They were stunned and a bit frightened, which was not surprising, because demiurges had done so many bad things and had such a bad reputation. But they were also very supportive. They said that they knew you were a good person, not a monster, and that they had faith that you would find a way to use your powers in a good and constructive way.

As a grand finale, you showed them the Dolls.

Look! I made a mechanical version of you, and of you, and of you. They are all clockwork, underneath the skin. You can open them up and see it. See? They talk like you and act like you, in a lot of ways. But I can understand them, because they are just machines, and not unpredictable like real people are unpredictable. They will be my girlfriends. I designed them that way. Now I do not have to be sad that I am alone, and you do not have to be sad that I want something from you that you cannot give me. We can all have what we want. We can be happy friends, with no awkwardness between us.

everythingWasBees posted:

things like the torture scene or " this player has sex dolls of two of the other players. it's a core part of the plot that we can't spoil" were only revealed after the game.

I left the game I was in on bad terms for different reasons, but then when talking to others a bunch of this stuff spilled out when we actually compared to notes.

WarpDogs posted:

Was it Podima specifically that wrote up a 18 pages of backstory about an evil autistic kid who builds sex robots of his female roommates because they won't return his advances? and then assigned it to you?

everythingWasBees posted:

specifically designed the games so that people are forbidden from discussing for sharing concerns with one another because it "spoil the plot' and created situations where staff can't be held accountable for anything that happens. in doing so they basically go against every safety and community guideline for pretty much every modern RP community.

included themes of sexual assault without warning anyone, despite the game's numerous other content warnings, because " it would be a spoiler and threaten the sanctity of the game"

Meinberg posted:

The worst stuff did happen off site though. I’ll see if I can find anything, but I imagine that I’ve been removed from any discords that have any specific receipts. I can say, though, that in the second game where bad stuff happened, I was assigned this character to play: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1iqACiju_RoJtYaluMgI1ZSOzkZOtlT-AcX4KrtD0EW8/edit

Despite offering complaints in discord about the sexual violence of the character’s backstory, I was told to ignore the concerns and at the time I believed that was the best course of action, despite later events (as described above) leading me to regret that decision.

Arrhythmia posted:

why was there rape in a riven roleplay

Arrhythmia posted:

why was there rape in a riven roleplay

Meinberg posted:

correct

Podima did not write the characters. He simply refused any edits from their original writeups, which were designed for a game of much shorter length and presumably one with some manner of safety tools and ideally content notes about the sexual content. Said game was one he had played in and thought was cool.

quote:

Look! I made a mechanical version of you, and of you, and of you. They are all clockwork, underneath the skin. You can open them up and see it. See? They talk like you and act like you, in a lot of ways. But I can understand them, because they are just machines, and not unpredictable like real people are unpredictable. They will be my girlfriends.

lobster shirt posted:

everythingWasBees posted:

he " edited and rewrote it to remove some of the more potentially problematic content"
it was based off of a larp that was run at a few conventions. some of us talked to players and it turned out that this specific game repeatedly had a lot of problems and concerns about this stuff which was ignored.

That Little Demon posted:

You are asking a lot of good questions... first let me start of by asking YOU a question - Why is there Multiple Sex Dolls of Posters in the Riven Roleplay