Goonhub
04-12-2017, 07:35 AM
Really depends on the style of torture. If you're just being a jerk and bullying someone you overpowered, yeah that's no good. If you're being a jerk and bullying someone you overpowered in an interesting or engaging way, that's *so* good!
The defining feature of this engageristing sadism is that you're doing all this to the character and not the player. Rezzing someone into a limbless monkey with a vape-o-matic set to inject them with SR and omnizine any time they kill themselves, while hilarious and inspired, is just using game mechanics to throw the player into a shitty situation, fun for you but probably not for them. Now, mindslaving someone, asking them (or the crew) dumb trivia questions, and telling them to drink a glass of Discount Dan's every time they're wrong, that's a bit more engageristing because, while you are technically torturing them, you're including them in the process and making it engaging and interesting.
There's nothing wrong with gloating about outplaying someone, so long as it isn't just deriding them for being a n00b. Theatrics is almost a vital part to being a good villain, cus otherwise you're just casting Empowered Use Game Mechanics on a hapless goblin whelp.
So I say that it's okay to be a sadistic bastard as long as you aren't an ass about it.
The defining feature of this engageristing sadism is that you're doing all this to the character and not the player. Rezzing someone into a limbless monkey with a vape-o-matic set to inject them with SR and omnizine any time they kill themselves, while hilarious and inspired, is just using game mechanics to throw the player into a shitty situation, fun for you but probably not for them. Now, mindslaving someone, asking them (or the crew) dumb trivia questions, and telling them to drink a glass of Discount Dan's every time they're wrong, that's a bit more engageristing because, while you are technically torturing them, you're including them in the process and making it engaging and interesting.
There's nothing wrong with gloating about outplaying someone, so long as it isn't just deriding them for being a n00b. Theatrics is almost a vital part to being a good villain, cus otherwise you're just casting Empowered Use Game Mechanics on a hapless goblin whelp.
So I say that it's okay to be a sadistic bastard as long as you aren't an ass about it.