ways_back_room | Gossip, eavesdropping, and other fun things to do in bar

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Gossip, eavesdropping, and other fun things to do in bar

So it came up in chat last night that sometimes characters know things that they have not necessarily gleaned from IC conversation, but have become "common knowledge" anyway. For example, I don't have a lot of time to have Jenny in bar IC, but I make the assumption that since she's dead and Bound, she has to eat and sleep and do things off-stage, and consequently, would have some knowledge of events like the Servete spell being deactivated, even if she is very sketchy on the details.

The question is though, what counts as "common knowledge" and what doesn't? My personal standard is that something has to have been a major bar event (Servete being taken off, the squid disappering in front of a large crowd, etc.), and it has to have been at least two weeks old (gossip may travel at the speed of light, but there needs to be a reasonable standard anyway). Anyone else have suggestions?

Also, how much can be said to be reasonably well known by all, since, you know, it *is* a bar, and therefore people do see and hear things not meant for them some of the time. Is it reasonable that Bruce can tell people that he has seen a Tonks (who he knows), the angel (ditto), and a man with black wings sitting together, even if he knows nothing of what they are doing together? The fact that they are all together at a table can be seen from across the bar, unless there is a concealment spell on them, so can I assume he's noticed this behavior?

I know there is a lot that happens in the bar that *isn't* public, and characters *couldn't* know IC without another character telling them, but it is also in the nature of a bar that things can be observed. I'm not expecting people to be ignorant of the Anakin-Leia fight last night, provided they were in bar, because it was in front of the door and there was yelling involved. It's reasonable that people saw it. So, where is the line?

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That's a good question, and I'm glad you've opened up a discussion, because this does need to be addressed.

You're certainly right to say that there are occurrences in the bar that will be observed by patrons not directly involved in the action -- your example of Bruce being able to tell people that he's seen Tonks, the angel, and a man with black wings sitting together is a good one, because you made clear that Bruce would not, in fact, be revealing any of what Tonks, Crowley, and Aziraphale were actually discussing. Likewise the Leia-Anakin fight, which would have been visually observed by nearly everyone, and heard by those within range.

The line is when characters do start to give away information that they have not directly received from another player in the bar. To follow the previous example, if Bruce were to tell someone that yes, Tonks, Crowley, and the angel were all sitting together, and that Crowley gave Tonks tickets to a Weird Sisters concert, that would be out of line -- because how could Bruce know?

The easiest thing to do, I think, would be to imagine that one truly is in the physical bar. Would you have learned that information if the situation were in real life, or not? If your character has had no direct contact with the other characters in question, or has not specifically learned the knowledge third-hand, then it would inappropriate to assume that your character possesses that information.

The bottom line is that using knowledge gained OOC rather takes the fun out of the game, and doesn't allow muns to spread the plot around as they wish. It isn't fair to the other players, and therefore we discourage it. But you're right that there are things that can be assumed to be "common knowledge"; I think MAJOR events (such as Sirius' healing of the bar) that would certainly have attracted a lot of attention would fall into that category.

Does this help?

Sort of. What counts as 'in range'? Is it possible for people to eavesdrop on others? Or are those things that need to be worked out between players and don't exist without consent? And how do we define MAJOR event?

What counts as 'in range'? And how do we define MAJOR event?

Well, let's look at it this way. If your character's standing at the bar, and another character also standing at the bar has a shouting match with someone, I think you can assume that your character caught at least the salient points, if not the finer details of it all. Eavesdropping on others, if they're just having a normal conversation, is completely out unless you arrange it with the other mun(s) beforehand. If you're not in that conversation, you didn't hear it.

MAJOR events, for me, count as things that one could NOT have possibly missed if one was in the physical space of Milliways at the time it occurred. So, these events would be rather rare. For example, the stealing of the bar -- there was, clearly, no bar there, and therefore your character would know. However, the stealing of the squid would not count as universal knowledge, because unless your character swims with the squid before breakfast every morning, there'd be no reason to assume it was anywhere other than the lake.

Overall, I would advise using common sense, and erring on the side of ignorance when it comes to what your character knows or does not know about the state of the bar at large. It's more of a challenge and, to my mind, more fun to force my character to figure things out for herself.

Hmmm. This is hopefully not a problem, but I should point out that my character has abnormally good hearing and does actively tend to eavesdrop on specific people. However, and this is a big however that makes things not problematic so far (at least to my knowledge), he's not likely to talk about it or act on it most of the time, he just uses it to keep himself informed on events.

So the things that he could "NOT have possibly missed" is broadened because of my character's nature and his various sharpened senses. Further, while Millitime is kind of wonky, I can play with that a bit to limit or broaden the track and therefore claim reasonable ignorance when necessary.

The ones he might act on or talk about, I contact the muns to discuss the matter and revise history accordingly. To my knowledge, this has not been a problem so far. Hopefully it still isn't...

Here is an example in the "major events" category. Tom hasn't talked to anyone regarding Bernard at all since last weekend - he knows Bernard is better, but he doesn't know that Crowley healed him. So when he "saw" Bernard up and about last night, even though he didn't speak to him, he made the comment to Crowley that he was glad Bernard was better.

He didn't say, "Oh, Crowley, I heard you healed Bernard - that's fab!" because there was no way he had heard this, even though it was a major event. Unless he hears otherwise from chatting with Tonks or Bernard himself, he'll just figure Bernard got better on his own.

Tom also spoke for the first time ever to Anthy last night (I'm not sure how it had taken so long) regarding the cookie incident with Gavroche (Natasha had mentioned Anthy might be responsible) I figured Tom would have seen her around and heard her name, even if they'd never met or he'd never discussed her in a thread, because after all these months of Anthy-ness, it would make sense he vaguely knows who she is.

It can be a pretty murky topic, and I know we all make mistakes sometimes about what we know, as opposed to what our characters know. It's always best, as Meg says, to err on the side of ignorance. Tom is in the House of Arch a lot, and when he's in the bar he's busy talking to friends or dealing with angst, so he doesn't notice a ton of what's going on around him. He is not an all-knowing, all-seeing character, just because I know a lot about what's going on in other threads, and I try very hard to play him as such.

I think it's always smart to make sure the other people your playing with know what you're going to have your character know or not know, especially if you don't interact with their characters a ton.

On the topic of eavesdropping, I think you should post in the thread you're getting your knowledge from or otherwise indicate to the muns involved. And if they don't want to be eavesdropped on, I think respecting that is important.

I've noticed quite a bit of people knowing things they couldn't know IC lately, and it's been bugging me--nothing to do with my character(s), but just stuff I've seen.

--John

Actually, this brings up something that I've had trouble with as a noob.

There's all this random Stuff related to the bar that isn't listed on the main page (at least that I've seen) or anywhere else: waitrats, people being Bound, the Bar giving food (well, not anymore), basic things like that. Granted, my CHARACTERS wouldn't know, but it was very confusing to me as a player.

Is there a place where this kinda info is made available? Might be useful to the uninitiated.

Iffen ye want, I can

millipedia it. In fact, I should.

::goes off to spelunk for links::

Aaaaand, we've updated (http://www.livejournal.com/community/millipedia/2200.html)!

Dudical! Thank you so much- it's very helpful to those of us who haven't been around forever. -_^

We seem to have had a failure to communicate.

I've always figured, since a bar is a public place, that at least snatches of conversation could be overheard, unless a post was entitled "Locked to" only certain people, it was a post in an in-character LJ, or it involved OOC knowledge of canon.

If I'm reading this correctly, unless: 1) it's your post or a thread you're posting in, 2) you were positioned at the table, bar or booth, 3) you got the word from someone else, 4) it was a scene in front of the bar, such as the Anakin-Leia fight, or 5) it was a major bar event, you can't be aware of anything done or said within the bar. And any eavesdropping would have to be done by specific arrangement.

Would that be an accurate assessment?

"Aware of" seems maybe a little restrictive.

Like, Will could be aware that Tonks and Aziraphale and Crowley and Bernard all talk together a lot, without any of those criteria being fulfilled. But he couldn't know their names without being introduced or having them pointed out, and he couldn't know what they were talking about unless a) he was at the table with them, b) they were shouting, or c) I either arranged the eavesdropping beforehand or dropped a post in the thread saying something like "from a nearby table, Will listens intently."

There have been a couple of occasions where I've arranged with someone to mutually assume that something happened even though we didn't RP it -- to assume that Will mentioned something minor even though neither of us can remember if he did, or to assume that someone caught a glimpse of his scar at some point when his sleeve rucked up, or something. But I think those things should be by arrangement between the muns rather than just assumed; for one thing, it helps to make sure that the other person wasn't assuming quite the opposite, and to make sure that it's not actually something important to them.

Plus, as others have said, I think it's just more fun to err on the side of ignorance. Makes for the plot fun of silly mistakes, and makes the characters figure things out for themselves.

I've had some trouble recalling what, precisely, Snow knows about some things. Bits like how she mentioned to Raph that she heard magical brooms were expensive. The sort of thing that, after over five months of conversations with all the patrons, including many from the wizarding world, would likely have been mentioned in passing, but I sure as hell don't feel like digging through it to double-check.

Generalities about worlds that your character has at least met people from are fine, and I'm hoping Snow's reaction to the 'D' word is embedded in the collective subconcious.

Things that would be immediately obvious to one who looks around the room or goes about a daily routine with food and stuff involved can likely be taken as a given; knowing to order food from rats as Bar isn't working can be picked up through trial, error and observation. Mr Julia's absence might be noted by someone who likes to jog around the lake and occasionally tosses a fish to him or something like that. Anything that had a note pinned to the bullitin board over it can be considered public knowledge.

Erm, clarification: 'D' word being 'Dwarves'.

So, ourt of sheer curiosity, how would snow feel if the seven guys showed up?

. . .

It would quickly become a question for Security to decide how to handle the situation.

You may have noticed that I'm prone to have

md_donighal know, by that sort of osmosis, things he'd be likely to know (and which would be handy to know in the context of a conversation), but which he's not actually recorded as having learned from direct discussion. Do I need to stop?

Probably.

not!mod.

I'm confused about this as well. I don't manage to get Gil into the bar everyday and actually there aren't that many characters he speaks to - Richard-mun, David-mun,Angelo-mun and Asar-Suti-mun tend to be online when I am but otherwise it's sheer chance. Also all the cool stuff happens when he's not there.

I have had to make certain assumptions about what he would have noticed - for instance he mourns for the squid's absence [because he DOES swim with it every morning before breakfast] but has no idea that it has a name and nobody has told him how it disappeared. Otherwise I'm fairly arbitrary and assume that if something has happened to a staff memeber that will affect their work he might be told, a staff member's personal matters he wouldn't know unless it was the sort of thing people might gossip about and customer's business he tends to hear reported in very garbled forms by the wait-rats and he ignores most of that as being unreliable.

This, means he's probably the most ignorant person in Milliways.

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