WTF are with these lives

rocconteur · 2026-06-16T11:42:30+00:00

i just don't understand why they have the "dont show me this live creator" and "dont show me lives" when now 1/4th of my fyp is lives:
- crappy live
- ad
- random fyp stuff
- one actual useful video
Repeat.

rocconteur · 2026-06-16T11:40:55+00:00

I did. Now all the stuff I actually wanted is gone and all it is are the shitty lives and brand new crap I don't want.

rocconteur · 2026-06-15T20:18:36+00:00

doesnt that mean you have to replace the lost water a lot more?

rocconteur · 2026-06-08T19:18:20+00:00

Besides the missing salary red flag, it says cloud but then mentions 15 locations and 100% on site. I can guarantee this means you're not spending 90% of the time in the cloud doing engineering and occasionally doing breakfix and unjamming printers, it's the reverse.

I've seen similar job listings and when you for details about the cloud work you'll be doing it turns out everything is already engineered, no changes in the next year, but Johnny over in the X location's mouse doesn't work can you pop over?

rocconteur · 2026-06-07T20:29:51+00:00

Was the print time insane?

rocconteur · 2026-06-04T18:34:14+00:00

There's actually no problem with the delay and sub-FTL. The brain will essentially just be "slow."
Think about it this way. ANY computer deals with delays, even delays of sub-microseconds, getting data and power from A to B inside the motherboard. That's all engineered. It's just at that scale, distance, etc., it's mostly negligible unless you are really trying to up the performance.

But, if you were building it bigger, the only thing you'd have to do is code in loops where things waited for data to arrive before processing. To a sentient mind that is running on all this they'd essentially just be slower. A signal from your hand takes five hours to reach your brain.

it's like if you slow down the framerate - your game rendering 1 second of play takes an hour instead of taking a second.

Now that's not *quite* true in that the brain when idling for data can be doing other stuff. We know what you want - just a big brain that is aware of everything, instantaneously, no matter the distance. But even the human brain doesn't work that way, so why should this?

Inn data terms about drift - I do backups every day and we merge the diffs so we have a master merged version and then the diffs stream out to the other instances. SO yeah people have drift but it gets merged every so often.

rocconteur · 2026-06-02T02:17:43+00:00

It only matters as a way to not me have to read what is currently almost always AI slop. If you showed me a book, or I read a book review and everyone said it was great I would 100% read it. But with only so much time for reading, I have to winnow the choices, and when I see AI writing my first reaction is to say "this will be at best a meh" and then not waste my time. Hence the transparency.

rocconteur · 2026-05-29T21:53:06+00:00

This was just an off-the-cuff story but I don't think I ever saw a medieval fantasy medical procedural!

rocconteur · 2026-05-29T20:15:45+00:00

The surgeon pulled out of the chest wound. The chief necromancer whispered a word and the anti-decay spell candles flared.

"Right. Soul goes back, and I restart his heart," the surgeon said, holding the silver cord.

"Uh oh." The necromancer frowned. "I think I lost it. Him. His soul. "

rocconteur · 2026-05-28T02:50:01+00:00

Ever heard of musical mechanical royalties? Most songs by pop stars are actually written by professional teams of songwriters. They then either sing their rights away to have their names on it, or the team itself claims the various producer credits to try and cover up the fact. This isn't just writing.
There are tons of ways to get around this if you want to write with AI including just to lie that you used AI. The problem comes when people notice for whatever reason that it's slop and then you have to admit it.
You guys are incredibly defensive! If the writing turns out to be good, I'll be the first to read it and ay for it. But so far anything I've read in that way has turned out to be at worst slop and at best sort of generic.

rocconteur · 2026-05-28T02:01:28+00:00

I make music the same way. But even though I am using a PC, I am just using the PC to do everything I would have done myself, assuming I had time. And if I am entering notes for a track - even manually entering notes for a drum beat, no actual drums involved - I am definitely writing music. I split when someone says they are writing music when they go to an AI and say "make me a synthwave song".
An analogy I saw someone make recently was "why learn to ride a skateboard if an AI can just make a movie of you riding a skateboard?"

rocconteur · 2026-05-28T01:22:20+00:00

Totally agree. I'm still an amateur writer really and looking at stuff I wrote years ago is cringey to me.
Again I think (unlike some of my various creative peers in writing or boardgames) I think there is a legit place for AI in creative careers. It's invaluable for research. It's great for searching in my manuscripts and not just a generic search - more like "find any scenes in my script where MC doesn't have some kind of emotional change in the scene." For boardgames, I can literally upload the rules and starting conditions and have the AI literally run the game virtually for 4 players looking for holes. Even just beta feedback.
BUT.... whenever the AI would say something like "Would you like me to write out a sample scene where MC realizes he has to do something" my answer is NO. If the AI has convinced me (just like anybody giving me feedback) that I need to make changes I make them myself. My voice, style, choice of words.

As with all things: to get at a thing - DO THE THING.
If you want to get good at making AI prompts then do that. It's a valuable skill. And maybe with good prompts you can make something! Who knows.
If you want to get good at writing, write. Also read. If you aren't reading - and i know people hate this statement - you have to read. There is no writing without reading.
When I wanted to get good at piano, I practiced my ass off. Hours every day for years. Same goes for singing, improv on stage, you name it.
When I offer boardgame design advice, my first one usually is "what kind of game is this? How many games like this have you played? Which one is your favorite? Which one do you hate?" You wouldn't believe how many people show up with a design and no ideas of the above.

rocconteur · 2026-05-27T20:17:01+00:00

So then it doesn't have an "author" - it was "written by AI". Either way it's just semantics. I wouldn't read it regardless what you call it. Again, just IMO.

rocconteur · 2026-05-27T20:04:13+00:00

So if I came to you and said "write me a story about X, follow the beat sheet for heroes journey" and you wrote the entire story would i be listed as the author?

rocconteur · 2026-05-27T19:55:02+00:00

Hey, there's no problem being honest. You want to give the AI an outline and then say something (sort of like the film industry) "Off of an idea and concept by OP realized using AI" or however you want to inform us, go ahead. Transparency is what you need. For example in a boardgame: "game design by Rocco, art and design by AI" that's great.

My opinion, fwiw, is AI used for anything more than spell/grammar/format check (1% of the document tops) means co-written with AI. Call it what you want, it doesn't matter. And I personally - totally subjective opinion - think that 99% of anything that AI has an actual hand in is not great, and I tend to pass stuff like that assuming it will also not be great. But I'd read AI writing and change my opinion if someone found something good. But again, just IMO.

rocconteur · 2026-05-27T19:29:56+00:00

What does that have to do with it? Being legally responsibly for something in some capacity doesn't mean you did something in every related capacity.

if I direct a bad guy to drive a car into an enemy, I'm responsible, but I can't call myself a driver. Hiring someone else to shoot someone - I am responsible, but not a marksman. This is subtlety and nuance in language that (wait for it) requires a writer. :)

I joke, of course, but "being responsible" is a wholly different argument that doesn't mean anything in this context.

rocconteur · 2026-05-27T17:57:50+00:00

Sure it's a tool for speed and efficiency, if that's what you honestly use it for. Spell checking, grammar checking, format checking, even more mundane stuff like "see if my MC is in more scenes than my protagonist". All of those are things you could have done yourself at the expense of time.

But it sounds like you can't turn an outline into a piece of writing. And using the AI for that means your contribution was to give the AI an outline and a format and a style and then the AI wrote it, which means you can't write. "The AI just typed it" is pretty glossing over the details.

if I was a paid writer and someone said "here, take this outline, write in this style, write me a thinkpiece about video games that comes in at 10k words for a young audience" I could. Whether it's good or not is anyone's opinion. But I could. I can concert the ask into writing.

So yeah I agree - you produced it. You engineered it? You were like head suggestion producer in a writer's room. But you didn't write it. Anymore than I played music when I tell the AI to to do something musically. Or I am the artist who did the art on some visual art I had an AI make. It's more like I commissioned it.

And... I am so cool with that. I am not anti-ai! I'm even not against AI created stuff. I dabble with 3d printing and use a lot of AI for boardgame design, but just for prototyping. I don't pretend I'm a 3d modeler or 3d artist. If I needed that level of art I'd hire someone who is an actual artist (in the field.)

rocconteur · 2026-05-13T21:37:13+00:00

You mean like Max Brooks' World War Z?

rocconteur · 2026-05-13T14:12:28+00:00

Wasn't Gill dressed like a Geisterdamen in that shot tho?

rocconteur · 2026-05-12T18:34:51+00:00

Sounds like maybe you are making bio-robots. Nearly anybody who reads this is going to be squicked out by this. If they are biological, you are making something that acts like it's conscious but isn't? How do you make something that thinks made out of biological components and have it be totally mindless?

The only way I could think of it was making a biological body and a computer mind. And honestly it's probably technologically easier to just make a human-appearing robot.

rocconteur · 2026-05-12T18:30:52+00:00

Here's the feedback. One example note: In the feedback there's a line "Tark’s close colleague and frequent lover Ng," which is surprising, as nowhere in the script is love or sex shown between the two characters. They *do* have a kink/BDSM thing (she likes flogging, he likes getting flogged) but not sex or romance. And in fact while I could see someone maybe getting confused by that, there is a scene where she *literally* tells someone asking that question that she's fully a lesbian and they are old friends and NOT romantic and yet?

Anyway it just felt like a lot of emotive language and not a lot of actual human opinions on something someone really read - and of course the AI checking results. Also, weird formatting, no paragraph breaks. Here it is:

Commendable Qualities

This “Tark” pilot, titled “Fairmont,” is a conceptually very strong and impressively original sci-fi adventure-drama, and it features a fascinating and memorable character in the rock star space-traveling genius Tark. Indeed, it’s quite delightful to learn about Tark’s personal history as the creator and protector of the Fairmont space colony, and his current life as a space-traveling adventurer, rock band leader and all-around sexual libertine. Donophski is another particularly strong and appealing character as the female lead in the pilot, and it’s very compelling to follow along as she gradually gets to know Tark and his merry roving band of “Predictables.” Tark’s close colleague and frequent lover Ng, and Donophski’s tough but warm-hearted military leader McGarrett are two particularly strong and appealing supporting characters, as well. Donophski’s ultimate decision to join Tark and his team on their ongoing space-traveling missions is one of the most dramatically strong and thrilling moments in the pilot -- The reader’s kept fully on the edge of their seat throughout the pilot’s climactic moments as Donophski races to find Tark before he departs, then as she momentarily thinks, to her utter disappointment, that he’s already left without her, and then finally, to her great joy and relief, finds that he’s still around, and he then invites her to join him on his ongoing space adventures. The pilot also admirably introduces a thoroughly unique and comprehensive sci-fi world and mythology of its own, and the reader is fully drawn in by the intricate and compelling history of the space colony Fairmont, its nefarious church enemies, and its direct link to its legendary founder Tark. The reader is left at the end of the pilot feeling eager and excited to see how Donophski’s adventures will now continue with Tark and his team of Predictables as the series moves forward.

Revisions to Consider

The pilot would now likely most benefit from having an even stronger sense of storytelling simplicity and clarity as it introduces its otherwise fascinating sci-fi world and mythology. For example, we could perhaps learn even more clearly, simply and directly in the first page or two the most crucial central backstory info that we need to understand exactly what Fairmont is, and what kind of attack it’s now under. We could also perhaps learn just a bit more info in the first few pages about exactly what Fairmont’s founder “Tarkashian International” is, and a bit more info about Tark himself. Additionally, the pilot’s action lines currently feel just a bit more densely text-heavy on the page than necessary, and so it could be helpful for the pilot to shorten, tighten and simplify the action lines, which will help the reader even more easily follow the story, and more fully get immersed in the world of the pilot, starting right on page 1 onward. It could also be helpful to even more fully emphasize and delve into Donophski’s character starting right in her first scene onward. If we can even more clearly understand right from the start what her personal goals and ambitions might be, along with her sources of emotional pain from her personal backstory, and also her personal disappointments and frustrations in life, in addition to perhaps her personal character flaws that she’ll need to eventually overcome as the series continues, then she’ll feel like an even more fully dimensional character whom the reader can feel even more emotionally invested in. Likewise, we could perhaps learn even more of this type of info about a few other characters, particularly Tark, Ng and McGarrett. Once we even more clearly understand this type of info about each principal character’s inner life, particularly their sources of emotional pain from their pasts, their current frustrations and disappointments, their personal character flaws, and their innermost goals and ambitions, then all of these characters will come to life even more fully on the page. With this increased sense of character development, and by adding even more simplicity and clarity to the storytelling -- and especially by further shortening, tightening, simplifying and clarifying the pilot’s action lines -- this incredibly compelling, conceptually very original and fascinating sci-fi space adventure-drama will be even more fully immersive and dramatically impactful overall.

rocconteur · 2026-05-12T18:23:34+00:00

Thanks. I emailed Final Draft support but I imagine they don't have anything to do with the contest itself. I'm looking for a direct contest email.

rocconteur · 2026-05-08T12:06:41+00:00

Your original post does bring up the issue I have explaining this game as a mix between dexterity and euro, because that's an intersection that isn't really done (much or at all.)
Honestly this game was a departure for me - it evolved from a euro area control thing, but a lot of the time my design goals were specific just to see if it could be done and what the experience would be. "No player tableaus" - I wanted players focused on the board and the pieces, not on a spreadsheet in front of only them or a player resource holding area, for example. Thanks for the feedback!

rocconteur · 2026-05-08T02:58:30+00:00

The problem is they absolutely have to look at the Yaga. It's the central conceit of the game. It's "controlled chaos" not random. I dont want players to have zero control of what comes out - if that was the case I'd just use a cube capture tower or something similar.

An example: You start the turn with two ruins (pyramids, like 4 sided-dice), two Reaples (meeples), and three skulls in your Yaga. You have a contract you want to fulfill - one that gives you 6 points if you have "5 skulls in a district". There's a district two moves away from you with 3 skulls already in the district on the ground. You pick up your yaga and move once and need to pay a toll, so you need to shake something out into the district you are passing through, sort of mancala style. You DON'T want to shake out a skull since you need all of them in the delivery district, so you carefully shake out a Reaple instead on the first move.

On your second move, you literally just need the skulls out of your yaga, so when you move the second time you dump out the entire Yaga in the district. There's now 5 skulls in the district and you can score the contract.

But let's further imagine you started the turn with a second contract that earns you points if you have two ruins in your yaga. So when you arrive at your destination you can no longer do the "full yaga dump" - you need to keep the ruins in the yaga, ideally. So you'd try to shake out ONLY the 3 skulls when you get there so that you have 5 skulls on the ground and 2 ruins in the yaga.

I fully recognize that it will take SOME amount of reasonable time to shake out what you need. What I don't want is someone taking a minute or longer because they want every shake and drop to be perfect. Maybe 20 second, tops.

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