Alright yâall might have seen that this accountâs been starting up for the first time in a while. Weâre actually going around and doing stuff, cool.
Thereâs one simple reason for that, and this is me, Lexi, the one behind this whole thing talking:
Iâve decided to cut out all the toxic people in my life and extend my vetting for letting new people in.
(queue this music because Iâm allowed to have musical overlays on my textposts itâs tuesday! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_ohWuaNPWo )
If youâve been reading my other posts you can probably piece it all together, but in the last 6 months I found myself a decent friend group at college... at least I thought I did.
See, originally it was just me and this real chill guy who I wonât say the name of because internet, so Iâll just call him E. E and I met up near the start of the school year because E was just such an approachable person that even I could overcome my big NPC energy to talk to him. We got to talking, and decided it would be cool to start up a club for RPGs at the school, so that players and gamemasters could draw from a pool of people to make sure everyone got the experience they wanted. Then came D (again, not their name because privacy, but also yâknow, I canât resist calling him a D because heâs a d i c k), he was originally pretty chill, but almost immediately he ripped the club idea from my hands and decided all on his own without any input from me or E or anyone else that the club was going to include all tabletop games. Alright not at all what the club was supposed to be about, but okay.
So a month rolls by, and D has determined that the club is going to do RPGs at most once a month. You know, the thing we were designed around in the first place, not âeach campaign once a monthâ which I could vaguely see to prevent burnout but nah, nah he means âone official club campaign session spread across all campaigns per monthâ. What. The. Fuck.
Then itâs October, and Iâve got this cool idea, reverse trick-or-treating, you know that thing where you go door to door and give people candy? It was gonna be nice, and cool, and I told the whole friend-group about it at the start of October.
Other shit happened in October regarding people I look up to and the discontinuation of my absolute favorite show, so thereâs that.
But the important thing to this post happened on Halloween, that day when they all said theyâd join me going around giving people candy, and weâd all have a good time. Iâd arranged it for six... six rolls around, no oneâs there. I check the group discord, and Iâm like âhey, where is everybody?â only response is from E, saying that most people are at dinner and we should probably reschedule to later. I reply that itâs understandable and rearrange for 8. I get a message from B (only time sheâs mentioned) saying sheâll be able to show up for sure.
No one showed up. Only one person at 10 who came to console me because I kinda exploded in the discord server because Iâd been planning this all month and no one fucking showed up. Yeah I cried myself to sleep that night, donât judge.
So now itâs November, and I finally put into action a plan Iâd wanted to work on since the start of college: A larp league at the school, only problem is Iâm going to have to craft the system from nothing. Alright, Iâve got inspiration from said favorite show ever that was cancelled in october, Iâm going to base it around that. I then tell everyone in the friend group and they encourage me, I tell them Iâll be running a christmas event after thanksgiving break, they say thatâs awesome.
Thatâs when I realized Iâm going to need to make over 1200 abilities because each of the 40 classes needs 33 abilities. I asked them for any suggestions, got a grand total of 0.
So I worked my ass off, far more than is healthy, and got... absolutely nowhere because there was no chance in the first place. Right before thanksgiving break I tell them âhey, thereâs no chance of me finishing the whole system in time, weâll use a simplified edition iâll come up with nowâ they gave approval.
I made a whole mini-system on 3 hours of sleep. I went home for thanksgiving break and caused my whole family extra stress during their move by needing to make swords for this event.
So the day of the event rolls around, Iâve got everything set up, Iâm out of the field, waiting. The event starts at 11, and thatâs when i get there.
No oneâs there. âThatâs okayâ I figure, âtheyâre not exactly punctual, theyâll be here in 15-20 minutesâ.
They are not. At 11:30, E shows up, I ask him where the fuck everyone is. Turns out B is still asleep despite giving me confirmation sheâd be here last night, D and the rest of the group are at breakfast and have no intention of showing up despite being 25 seconds away, and E doesnât see anything wrong with this.
I waited until noon, still no one, so I gave up and headed back to my dorm, Iâd informed them on the discord that if no one showed up by noon Iâd cancel.
And I fucking seethed. These people didnât give a single fuck about me, or my time, or my effort. And after a few hours of calming down, past the tears, past the attempts at breaking things, I got onto the discord server, and I told them, in no indirect terms, that repeatedly encouraging people to devote time and effort to projects for the group, to get them excited for their events, to say that youâll be there, and then all ghost without a word was absolutely abusive and I didnât want that in my life. Instead of even a single attempt at an apology, or even a bullshit excuse, they all started yelling at me and kicked me from the server, the club, and the friendgroup.
So thatâs where I am. I donât give a single fuck about people who disrespect my time. I donât give a single fuck about people who think that just because someone has bigger problems than me my problems donât exist. I donât give a single fuck about people who bail on plans without a warning or remorse.
And I feel so free.
So Iâm turning all the effort on projects I was making for those toxic assholes inward, Iâm making the shit I love, and if you donât enjoy it, you donât have to be around me or use my stuff. Sure the first few apprentice games and such will be free, and the proof-of-concept for anything will be free, but if Iâve put in serious effort? If iâve put in 150 hours already (like on a certain larp system...) and itâs not even a tenth of the way done? You bet your left buttock that Iâm not giving that away for free. If Iâm going to make something I want to get something out of it.
So thereâs that.
And just because I know I need help here, I do have some open positions:
Sabrina needs a pilot, and thatâs the fancy lore way of saying I desperately need an artist, because my art is shit and while I have no idea how to make UI-interactive games, Iâm going to try my best to learn.
Elluwen needs a pilot, and thatâs still a fancy way of saying I need playtesters. Iâve been relying on my friend groups too much for this, posting a message about this new game Iâve got thatâs nearly done, and waiting 2 weeks to get a single person to even try to play it. Meanwhile Iâm playing it repeatedly to try to find bugs and their version is almost completely replaced.
and several more... honestly to just put it clearly: I need reliable people in my life, and if that means setting up a patreon for people to see sneak peaks and be playtesters through, wonderful! If I can find an artist willing to be on call for my projects, and of course still pursue their own endeavors, I canât afford a full-time artist, thatâs amazing.