Reactions to the Noman

Fallen London
1

As requested by Alexis, a new thread to discuss the Noman content. Here’s what Alexis said:

[color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]There is an Arty Point behind the Noman content; there are interesting things to be said, I think, about whether I succeeded or failed in that effect.[/color]

And here’s what I’d posted in the other thread (other people had commented too, but it’s up to them to decide whether they want to copy their posts over here):

Suitov wrote:
[color=rgb(119, 119, 170)]I don’t think the Noman is made to last. Isn’t there a warning when you get it?[/color]

Indeed it isn’t; indeed there is. And pretty much all of the noman’s text (right down to its epically-long item description) reinforces the point that it’s going to die, not just sometime, but soon.

Regarding &quotnice little earner&quot in a previous post - I think that’s unfair. The fact you can spend expensive items on a futile attempt to keep it alive is artistically interesting, and I wouldn’t look for any more sinister motivation than that.

For example, right now, it really wants me to give it a pail of snow. But I could use that pail of snow, via a monocle and whatnot, to get myself a nice little hide-away by the seaside. In real life, would I sell my home, if it got just one more week of time for someone that I care about? I have absolutely no idea, and I honestly don’t want to think about it, but the storyline forces me to. This is a Good Thing.

What does seem a little cruel is the way that the combined effects of randomness appear to mean you can throw away numerous expensive items, and end up winning no extra time at all. Which, yes, is tragically the way it works in real life, but we expect fiction to be more clearly-defined than life is. The piquancy comes from thinking the noman’s fate is in my hands; it loses its effectiveness if too much is down to &quotthe bludgeonings of chance&quot.

NB. I’ve carefully said &quotappear&quot in the previous sentence, because none of us actually knows how it’s all going to end. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if more options show up as Noman’s Friend dwindles towards zero.

Cheers
Richard

Edited to change title - I’d given it the same name as another thread.
edited by Richard on 1/12/2014

2

I’m feeling rather torn. I don’t know whether working through the Noman content will lead to some interesting artistic conclusion - and so, if our Noman melts before we’ve reached that conclusion, we’ve effectively ‘lost’ and miss out - or if desperately trying to spend as much time with our Noman, in the mistaken assumption that there’s some sort of narrative payout that can be achieved other than the inevitability of death and grief, is in itself the intended artistic conclusion.

I’ve really enjoyed the content we’ve seen so far, so I’m not too terribly upset with either option - even by writing it down here, I’m making a certain degree of peace with the possibility that this is all a beautiful, tragic farce. But, I have to admit, I struggle with not knowing how I should be experiencing media before I experience it. I’m not saying I’m a slave to authorial intent, but I enjoy a story more when I have some grounding going in as to what’s going to happen, so I don’t spend the whole time wondering if I’m experiencing it right instead of just experiencing it.

(This goes double when the content isn’t necessarily linear - for instance, I once went to a sort of carnival event with lots of short shows being held in adjoining spaces. I don’t know how, but I managed to arrive at every show just as it was finishing for the night, and ended up spending the better part of the night staring at empty rooms, or locked doors behind which other people were having fun. To this day, I’m not 100% sure whether or not that was actually what they intended for me to experience, but I’m sure as hell not going to one of their shows again.)

Anyhow, none of this is terribly important - Alexis has explicitly said he’s going to be a closed book on this one, and I’m just one lunk among thousands. Really, I’ve just had a lot of Opinions about art this week! And, like I say, I’m enjoying Nomanning, and I’m sure I’ll have a good time either way. I suppose I’m just pondering the role of randomness in storytelling, and how other people react to it compared to m’self. What do you reckon?

3

It might just be parenthood, but like I said when I started it,

“Yes, let’s try to mold an ephemeral being into our own (preferred) image, knowing full well they won’t stay with us forever (and we’d only damage ourselves trying to keep them)! That’s not metaphorical of anything, no indeedy.”

So, I love it, but I have a particular perspective here.

That said, I am hoping I can get the Knows quality up to 15 before it vanishes to just experience it fully, because Know All the Things is basically my operative mode as a player.

4

There’s nothing sadder in a parent’s life than when their children melt and have to be shaken out of the parlour rug into a bucket.

(A sideline of speculation: I wonder if this is in any way designed in hope that we’ll lower our Quirks, so that they’ll fall below the caps, and the higher levels can be reserved for story content. …nahhh, probably not.)

5

(Just use the Ambition: related option, then?)

6

Nah - I’m not going to get in the way of potential story content. Plus, I don’t know whether there are any invisible qualities recording what I’m teaching my Noman, and discussions about morality and identity are probably better for him than petty snooping and filching!

7

Unless this is their first implementation, doubtful. Although magic devtools can retroactively apply qualities based on what you’ve played, I think. But that seems unlikely to get a use, I think, if teaching the Noman was to give a quality I think it’d do that already. Also there’d probably be way too much possible content to write given the wide range of Quirks.
Quality transparency is cool + rad so I /hope/ there aren’t any mysterious invisible qualities at work, either in this content or future. I mean there’s stuff like Airs of London where the actual value isn’t directly presented to the player but at least you know that stuff is changing.

alright that’s enough mechanics nonsense back to the artsy stuff. I have no idea what art is, because I’m a robot. Bloop.

8

Without commenting about the rest of the noman content (I can’t do so properly until I buy one and I want to wait until the next time the healer comes before I get my mayfly, and it’ll give me time to farm another tear), I would like to apologise for the ‘nice little earner’ comment. It was unfair and presumptuous of me.

9

MY first thought about this - as I haven’t got me a Noman yet; I’m waiting for Time the Healer to strike - is that the doubts expressed in the thread are the main reason I got a Noman last, after the Lodgings options were settled. I want to have the freedom to decide whether to put all of my remaining lacre in this venture or to spare some for next year (I already decided to go with just one of the new secluded Lodgings as I saw little reason to get more, and treasure the extra lacre and PtPT).

10

I’m going to do everything I can to make sure my Noman survives until the end of February; all I want is for him to live to see sunlight. Last year, there was that one glorious moment when light shone again in the Neath, and it completely passed me by. One day, I may achieve the immortality needed to walk the surface again, but the Noman does not have that luxury. I feel very strongly that he should see sunlight before he dies. I owe him that much.

11

[quote=Sir Frederick Tanah-Chook]I don’t know whether working through the Noman content will lead to some interesting artistic conclusion - and so, if our Noman melts before we’ve reached that conclusion, we’ve effectively ‘lost’ and miss out - or if desperately trying to spend as much time with our Noman, in the mistaken assumption that there’s some sort of narrative payout that can be achieved other than the inevitability of death and grief, is in itself the intended artistic conclusion.[/quote]Quite so. And for that reason I think I shouldn’t say too much at the moment, in the same way that I wouldn’t write a review of a play during the interval.

That’s not going to stop me talking about generalities, though!

[quote=Sir Frederick Tanah-Chook](This goes double when the content isn’t necessarily linear - for instance, I once went to a sort of carnival event with lots of short shows being held in adjoining spaces. I don’t know how, but I managed to arrive at every show just as it was finishing for the night, and ended up spending the better part of the night staring at empty rooms, or locked doors behind which other people were having fun. To this day, I’m not 100% sure whether or not that was actually what they intended for me to experience, but I’m sure as hell not going to one of their shows again.)[/quote]Having seen (and reviewed) a fair few things like that in my time, I’d say it’s very unlikely it’s what they intended. Interactive theatre poses logistical challenges which are every bit as great as the artistic ones. Predictably enough, companies often put more thought into the artistry than the logistics, leading to experiences like yours.

My own opinion, which is by no means universally held, is that it’s the creator’s obligation to guide the participant towards a take-away message - or one of a range of messages, if it’s a branching narrative. So, it’s fine to leave the participant feeling frustrated or angry or sad, but only if you’ve done it on purpose. A few years ago in the UK, it was briefly fashionable for theatre-makers to create some kind of environment, throw an audience into it, and essentially just see what happened; that was always abdication of responsibility, in my view.

[quote=Sir Frederick Tanah-Chook]Anyhow, none of this is terribly important - Alexis has explicitly said he’s going to be a closed book on this one, and I’m just one lunk among thousands.[/quote]Oh, never think that. It took me a long time to learn this, but I promise you it’s true - the vast majority of experienced creatives would far rather hear a debate about their work, than just have people tell them it’s great. (Obviously, debating it and concluding it’s great is an even better outcome!)

Cheers
Richard

12

I like my Noman, I even gave him a precious vial of Tears of the Bazaar, unfortunately it didn’t do him much good so I will feed him mu quirks and see what happens as time passes. I don’t even know if I will use The Sense of an Ending if I feed him enough of my quirks to get that far.

13

[quote=Richard ]]Oh, never think that. It took me a long time to learn this, but I promise you it’s true - the vast majority of experienced creatives would far rather hear a debate about their work, than just have people tell them it’s great. (Obviously, debating it and concluding it’s great is an even better outcome!)

Cheers
Richard[/quote]

I’m always up for a good debate - I just don’t want it to seem that, by talking at such length about my very personal reactions to certain kinds of storytelling, I’m complaining about the mechanics of Nomannery being mysterious, or insisting that it be changed, when Alexis has said that that mystery is an intended element of the work! I like to have a broad idea of what’s going to happen in a story, so I can focus on appreciating the details, but I’m well aware that the audience is a lot bigger than just me!

14

[quote=Sir Frederick Tanah-Chook]I just don’t want it to seem that, by talking at such length about my very personal reactions to certain kinds of storytelling, I’m complaining about the mechanics of Nomannery being mysterious, or insisting that it be changed, when Alexis has said that that mystery is an intended element of the work![/quote]At risk of being pedantic, I don’t think that’s quite what he meant… I just read it as saying that the author is dead (metaphorically!), and so he’s not going to explain what his intentions actually were. That’s not the same as being deliberately mysterious within the fiction.

Point taken, though. And one of the interesting things about this thread is to see that people have layered some quite different personal reactions onto the text.
edited by Richard on 1/10/2014

15

That’s a beautiful sentiment. I hope you will succeed. I missed sunlight myself last year, will try to stay awake and see it this time. No hope for my Noman, since I don’t have any tears(

Also, I would love to raise my own Homunculus in the game. If I could keep one, I would pour all my resources into supporting and teaching him. I am sad this is not a permanent feature. As it is, I know my mind, I will calculate the optimal way of keeping my Noman alive for as long as I can, but I will not get attached to him, since I already know he will die soon.
edited by Fhoenix on 1/10/2014

16

[color=#009900]This! I just don’t want to be all up in your shit while you’re talking about my shit.[/color]
[color=#009900]
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[color=#009900](edit: bite me, curse-words filter)[/color][li]
edited by Alexis on 1/10/2014

17

I’m getting something out of the Noman content purely by deciding “creating a short-lived creature is cruel and I’m not going to do it”, then peeping at what other people do with theirs.

18

A short life does not necessarily need to be a cruel one, even if the noman does appear to both be aware of it’s own mortality and highly desirous to avoid its fate. Maybe by the time it reaches level 15 it will be happy to have lived and satisfied with its fate enough to not guilt trip us for creating it in the first place. Too early to tell.

19

My Noman… is sadly inactive, as I have seen the card only once (from which I discovered that she likes shooting Blemmigans, of all things!). At this rate I will only be able to allow her to have maybe 3 actions before melting… sic transit gloria aqua frigia.
edited by Ewan C. on 1/10/2014

20

I don’t think it’s a bug that Hedonism is the one quirk that grows by spending it… although I, in my function as the irrepairable idealist, want to say the same should be true for Magnamosity.