Roleplaying: Is it only for writers?

[stray]

What is roleplaying really? And what are some other ways to facillitate and encourage people to be part of a game world other than telling them to script up a story for themselves, bind emotes, and chatting in a way that's consistent with lore?

For the most part, rping seems to be mostly about chat. Which, in turn, requires good writing skills (which I don't really have). Not necessarily good 'playing' skills. To me, "playing" is a "action" oriented thing. And it's about response to some stimulus, more than it is making yourself the stimulus that others must respond to (and writing and creating characters would fall under the latter).

In the real world, I'm a "roleplayer" of sorts. I'm an amateur actor, in and out of plays, theatrically trained....But I'm not writing the stories. I'm playing in them (I do improvise though, and you could call that "writing" in a way...But still, that's not the same thing). I'm not Ibsen, Chekhov, or Shakespeare. I'm just an interpreter of what they wrote.

Now, I'm not trying to make a complete comparison between the two, but I'm saying that roleplaying, in my mind, is from the point of view of a role given to me. Not one I create for myself. It also spans the whole gamut of human actions...Whether that be speaking, movement, etc.. In the computer rpg world, roleplaying just amounts to me creating my own role, and writing "I  take off my robe and wizard hat".

Why can't an online game tell me "who I am " and force me into a role, and in turn, cut down my options in how I'm going to respond to and see the game world as a whole (much like single player games handle player actions)? Secondly, if these are role playing games, why aren't there are more ways to express my actions besides chatting and "/emote dance14" ?

Anyways, this is a late night rant and all, so I hope the general point makes sense (and like I said, I'm not much of a writer to begin with  ).

[edit] Basically, I want to respond to things first, and told "who I am", before I decide to invest in the game world in which I'm playing. Additionally, I want more "ways" to respond (multiple choice quest dialog, for instance). Nothing too predefined for an mmorpg, but something a lot more specific than "You're a Warrior of the Orc race. Kill humans (but kill rats first). Zug Zug." That's too general. I like the idea of getting involved in the storyline of a game, but that's not enough to work with.

Once I am invested, however, and once I had more tools in which to express myself, you'd probably see a lot more "roleplaying" from me. Even in chat.

As for now, it's all about me maximizing my efficiency in terms of game mechanics, and not caring a damn thing about commiting (or not commiting) my actions by virtue of being "in character". Which is shame really, because I never play single player games that way.

[Arnold]

What is roleplaying really? And what are some other ways to facillitate and encourage people to be part of a game world other than telling them to script up a story for themselves, bind emotes, and chatting in a way that's consistent with lore?

For the most part, rping seems to be mostly about chat. Which, in turn, requires good writing skills (which I don't really have). Not necessarily good 'playing' skills. To me, "playing" is a "action" oriented thing. And it's about response to some stimulus, more than it is making yourself the stimulus that others must respond to (and writing and creating characters would fall under the latter).

I'm not quite sure if you understand what roleplaying is.  A lot of the so-called "roleplayers" from various games are exactly as you described, yet are not roleplayers; they are really just storytellers (and they get really pissed off when forced into RPing).  Hell, I'd consieder Og, from AC1, to be a roleplayer, and he was a PK who VERY RARELY spoke to anyone.

The sort of people you described just want to get in front of others and read their story.  They don't want interaction, which is what ropleplaying is all about.  Those people just want to act; they are drama queens.

[stray]

Thanks for explaining that. Even though I somehow stumbled upon and posted at Waterthread (and now here), I know little about the subject these sites revolve around (online rpg's and/or the culture surrounding them), nor have I played them for long. By your definition/guideline, I suppose that I could be an rp'er to an extent as well.

I said this in the WoW thread not long ago: I have no problem rp'ing and interacting with someone when the occasion arises. When they're good. When they're interacting with me. I love the idea of having normal conversation "in character". So it isn't the idea itself that I have problem with. It's how it's done.

That being said, this still doesn't solve the problem of the lack of game mechanics and options that encourage me to think and behave as my character would (other than some general description that I'm a part of this or that "faction" or whatnot). I want more detail. Personal destiny. Revenge. And different ways in how I can travel those paths. Something. And if I'm a part of, say, the Elf race, I want, for example, a whole slew of emotes and ways to interact that are Elf specific. Or if I'm Human or Orc, same deal.

[edit] Another thing: Why do I even have to SAY "I take off my robe and wizard hat"? Why can't I just do it? And not only do it, but do it in a way that is as equally provocative and as animated as those words suggest? It's an action, but yet, most actions done in "rp mode" are done with text.

[stray]

Ok, just to clarify: I do NOT want to "take off my robe and wizard hat", nor do I think it's provocative or good writing. I hope that joke didn't throw anyone off and that they can see the real point there (That the actions/interactions of characters are almost exclusively expressed through descriptive writing.).

[Strazos]

One aspect about MMO's that make "rp" difficult is that there is really no reason, incentive, or even really oppurtunity to do it. As far as MMO's go, SWG may have been the best. Why? I'll tell you, but even I don't like the answer....

Forced Downtime.

This forces people to stop grinding out in the wilds, and sit around other people. While a lot of people will simply go afk during their Forced Downtime, others will actually talk to, and interact with....Other People. Sometimes even In Character!

Shocking, I know.

The only other game I have played in which you would see lots of RP is Gemstone 3  (or 4 now). That game had a lot a forced downtime. But then.....it's a Mud, and in a totally different zipcode than MMOs.

Simply put, the game mechanics have to be there to help you "RP". If they're not there, it simply won't happen.

[stray]

it's a Mud, and in a totally different zipcode than MMOs.

Ah, but that's a big part of my point. The fact that character interactions are pretty done through text tells me that we're just playing glorified muds. Actions are expressed in ways that are similar to novels, not in ways that are suitable for a visual/audible medium like video games. Example:

/Zarinn approaches you with a quiet demeanor, then extends his hand in greeting

"Thanks for watching my back out there. My name is Zarinn"........

Oh hell, scratch that example. I suck. Here's a funnier example (shamelessly stolen link from the "other" site):

I couldn't help but chuckle a moment and retreat back to the shadows from which I came. Had they seen me approach? From the looks of it no. So I watched intently.



Intrigued by this fantastic "roleplaying" experience, I felt it was my duty to perpetuate the general merriment of all. So I gathered my composure and began to engage in my own "roleplaying" theatrics.



Oh crap. Somehow they caught me. I was roleplaying hidden in the shadows... how the hell did they find me? So I did what any self respecting pervert would do. HIDE!



Unsuccessful with my attempt to roleplay, I figured what the hell. I might as well just start a dwarven sandwich while the getting is good. So I charge in gropes a blazing.

Now, my point is: Wouldn't it have been even funnier if Gedran really did make crow noises?

[Kail]

Why can't an online game tell me "who I am " and force me into a role, and in turn, cut down my options in how I'm going to respond to and see the game world as a whole (much like single player games handle player actions)?

I think that's actually the opposite of what a lot of other RPers want.  It's a gripe I've heard with World of Warcraft in particular, and to a lesser degree, other quest heavy games: that they force you along specific paths which you have no control over.  Thrall says "I need you to infiltrate the Burning Blade," you infiltrate the Burning Blade.  You're forced into that role, and the only options in how you respond to the game world are to succeed, fail, or abstain.  While it works fine in single player games, the point of multiplayer games is (allegedly) interaction, and if everyone's got scripted roles to play out, it kills that aspect of it.  If everyone's more limited in their available actions, the difference between a person and an AI henchman is harder to spot, and the reason for making the game multiplayer in the first place is weakened.

I think that a lot of the appeal for RPing is because players want to play their own stories.  If I wanted to play through someone else's idea of some great fantasy epic, I'd load up one of the eighty billion PS2 games that claim to deliver that.  While there may be some similarities between writing and role playing, they aren't really comparable.  Writing isn't a social activity, while RPing is, and for the most part, that in itself is enough to make a lot of people prefer it.  Also, RPing is more personal than writing is.  When I'm writing, anyway, I'm generally writing for someone else.  How will the audience like my story, will a publisher accept this novel, will my instructor give this essay an A, whatever.  It's aimed at someone else.  With RPing, generally, it's aimed at me.  If I'm having fun, mission accomplished.  Nobody's going to be reading over it later with a critical eye, nobody's going to appreciate my use of irony in the third act.  It's all about me having fun.  It's like playing with action figures when I was a kid; I wasn't writing harrowing epics of personal triumph in the face of blah blah whatever, I was just playing, and it was fun, and that was enough.

With regards to MMOs, though...

Personally, I like roleplaying, but I don't know that it's really feasable on a massively multiplayer scale, at least, not in the way most people think of it.  I personally do a bit of roleplaying in single player games; it's kind of wierd, I'm sure, but I find it fun.  I don't do it in multiplayer games, for a number of reasons, largely revolving around the idea that you look like a complete fruit roleplaying in a game that doesn't support it (and few do).  Offline, that's no big deal, but online, with other people watching, no thanks.

It would be different if there were mechanics there to support it, but every MMO I've played have been games first, and realistic worlds last.  You can't have a game server, population ten thousand, where everyone gets to be Frodo; it isn't possible.  Most MMOs try to swing it by throwing realism against the wall so hard it bounces, which works to preserve the gameplay, but kills the idea of it being a world.  If you want roleplaying in an MMO, you're going to need to design a realistic world where ten thousand people can all coexist, and that means the characters are all going to be blacksmiths and carpenters and things, and that's aiming at a very niche audience (ATiTD, I hear, does this).  If you want realistic human interactions, you need to make a realistic world, and that means that the players are going to have to play realistic people, and that all the Super Sayans capable of punching dragons to death are going to be(realistically) extremely, extremely rare.

As for forced downtime, I think that's a bit of a band-aid solution.  People don't interact in games because they're busy fighting things, which takes concentration.  A lot of modern MMOs don't even allow the player to do anything besides kill, which (obviously) is going to sink any attempt at roleplaying anyone other than Kratos.  Forced downtime is one way to get people to interact, but if the other mechanics don't support it (and, in general, they don't), you're still not going to get more than a tiny fraction of the populace roleplaying.

But in general, I agree that the mechanics are the major problem.  I don't, however, see any easy way to fix this.  In most games, everyone wants to be badass ninja warrior number one.  If you make the game very open and allow the players to drastically change the environment, they're going to blast the game world into a howling, ghost filled wasteland within a week.  If you make it a static, unchanging world, you're left with World of Warcraft's brand of rather pointless RPing.

[Strazos]

I think one of the huge difference in RP'ing in a Mud, and in MMOs, is that in a mud, Everything is Text; All the information, actions, and RP, is coming at you in the same medium. You may have a picture in your head of what your surroundings look like, and then the text of everyone else and their actions kind of getting filled into that same space.

Not so with graphical MMO's, where you can see everything with your eyes, but have to read if anyone wants to do a non-standard action (ie /emote); it breaks immersion, and really doesn't make sense in the context of a graphical game.

Granted, I'm not a great "roleplayer", but I tend to naturally try a bit when in a mud and stay more "in character."

[Alkiera]

Why can't an online game tell me "who I am " and force me into a role, and in turn, cut down my options in how I'm going to respond to and see the game world as a whole (much like single player games handle player actions)?

I think that's actually the opposite of what a lot of other RPers want.  It's a gripe I've heard with World of Warcraft in particular, and to a lesser degree, other quest heavy games: that they force you along specific paths which you have no control over.  Thrall says "I need you to infiltrate the Burning Blade," you infiltrate the Burning Blade.  You're forced into that role, and the only options in how you respond to the game world are to succeed, fail, or abstain.  While it works fine in single player games, the point of multiplayer games is (allegedly) interaction, and if everyone's got scripted roles to play out, it kills that aspect of it.  If everyone's more limited in their available actions, the difference between a person and an AI henchman is harder to spot, and the reason for making the game multiplayer in the first place is weakened.

I think that a lot of the appeal for RPing is because players want to play their own stories.

I agree.  I think a lot of the RP crowd wants to start with the 'generic' background the game lore provides with their race/class/skill choices, and then refine that with their own ideas to form a 'personality' for the character.  Their own motivations, foibles, character flaws, etc.  I also agree that the average game's quest structure doesn't tend to allow much leeway... most quests in WoW, or EQ, or EQ2, for example, are entirely there as exp and magic item dispensors.  If you want that magic item, then you have to do that quest, in only way provided by the quest designer.  EQ2 does have a few quests with choices, where you can do A or B, which is a slight improvement... but it isn't used enough. 

It would be different if there were mechanics there to support it, but every MMO I've played have been games first, and realistic worlds last.  You can't have a game server, population ten thousand, where everyone gets to be Frodo; it isn't possible.  Most MMOs try to swing it by throwing realism against the wall so hard it bounces, which works to preserve the gameplay, but kills the idea of it being a world.  If you want roleplaying in an MMO, you're going to need to design a realistic world where ten thousand people can all coexist, and that means the characters are all going to be blacksmiths and carpenters and things, and that's aiming at a very niche audience (ATiTD, I hear, does this).  If you want realistic human interactions, you need to make a realistic world, and that means that the players are going to have to play realistic people, and that all the Super Sayans capable of punching dragons to death are going to be(realistically) extremely, extremely rare.
--snip--
But in general, I agree that the mechanics are the major problem.  I don't, however, see any easy way to fix this.  In most games, everyone wants to be badass ninja warrior number one.  If you make the game very open and allow the players to drastically change the environment, they're going to blast the game world into a howling, ghost filled wasteland within a week.  If you make it a static, unchanging world, you're left with World of Warcraft's brand of rather pointless RPing.

Part of this is server populations.  If you reduce the number of players per server, you have a more believable ratio of heros to zeros.  In CoH, for example, the city is thick with heros... but it doesn't feel as odd because there are loads and loads of NPC city-folk walking down the streets, running from bad guys, and being attacked/robbed/threatened by bad guys.  In a fantasy world, take a world like Warcraft's, and then have many fewer people.  Sure, the nature of the game will have to change a bit... away from 40-person raids, since 40 people is now a non-trivial percentage of the server population.  Might also want to do something like the server-clustering that DAoC does for PvP battlegrounds, if your setting is as warlike as WoW's is supposed to be.  But I think the advantages of fewer heros per world are very helpful.  The community will be more tight-knit, as it'll be possible to know a larger percentage of the people, and thus crazy things like 'player justice' become more possible.

Alkiera

[brian]

Now, my point is: Wouldn't it have been even funnier if Gedran really did make crow noises?

So you want unlimited built-in emotes?  C'mon, we all know why that's not going to happen.  More animations, more sounds, more commands, more programming, all costing more money.  That means resources siphoned away from the slot-machine style “game play” that is the core of graphical diku muds to improve features that do not lend themselves to marketable bullet points. 

Ain’t gonna happen.

You want the flexibility of text emotes in a graphical world.  The people who pay to build graphical worlds don’t care about role playing.  They gave up trying to implement it long ago, and now have the excuses for their lack of interest down pat.

- Brian

[stray]

Hell, if they don't want to do the work themselves, surely there could be a way to give users some basic animation tool?





Eh, scratch that. Bad idea.

[Trippy]

Hell, if they don't want to do the work themselves, surely there could be a way to give users some basic animation tool?


Eh, scratch that. Bad idea.

Too late, Second Life already allows that.

[stray]

Double edged sword, I guess. Might as well roll with it.

I suppose CoH's character creation falls under the same category too. You might get your fair share of birthday suits, but for most part, it's a great tool to aid the player in expressing his or her character's role in the game world.

[Evangolis]

It is a matter of interactivity with the world.  Quests with fixed storylines don't allow roleplay, because they are just a complicated form of reading.  Roleplay requires adaptable game elements that can be co-opted by players to become part of their own stories.  Like hats you can take off.  Yet to maintain coherency for the general population, those elements must have their own thematic integrity that prevents the player from warping the game world out of all recognition.  There are also technical limitations to how many objects you can have in the world. This problem is HARD, but it is being pursued in many places, because whoever gets it right has a fair shot at getting their own collection of money hats.

[Yegolev]

Funniest thing I have read in months.

Star for you.

[Zhiroc]

First I want to say that one of the big problems when people complain about "roleplaying" is that it isn't specific enough. It's like saying "I like to watch drama" and then complaining that Titanic isn't like James Bond So, what I'm going to say here relates to the kind of RP I like.

These days, when people say "RPG" they mostly mean the MMOs or maybe the MUDs/MUSHes. For me, "RPG" will forever be what started it all, the paper-and-pencil face-to-face RPGs (well, I'll grant that playing "make-believe" as a kid might be the original RPG, but whatever...) Yeah, the D&D, C&S, Traveller, Space Opera, etc. games. Perhaps the first few games we ran were somewhat like the current crop of computer games: run in, fight, get loot, and come out. And yes, I had fun for a while. (And by the way, every game was permadeath, none of this "you wake up at home" stuff.)

However, we then went on to do more interesting games, where one gets into the psychology of their character, the most intense of which for me was an Amber Diceless campaign. But there are others like that out there, like the World of Darkness games. Or others were heavily cinematic, where we were integral to some plotline.

As I've migrated from MMO to MMO, this is what I find so disappointing--that none of them come close to capturing that feel. They are all just shoot-em-ups. At least if they had the feel of an RTS, that would be something, but I don't even get that satisfaction. The worlds are as hollow and lifeless as that old (and pretty bad) Star Trek episode "Spectre of the Gun" where they were in an obviously fake western town--it's all window dressing, and you can't interact with it at all.

And one thing that has amazed me to no end is how simplistic computer games are. I had more complicated rules to manage in the paper-and-pencil games than they use when a computer could keep track of it all (run a Space Opera or Rolemaster combat sometime  ).

So yes, I next tried a MUD, and found it to be a little better, but only a little. Most seem to concentrate on the "bashing" end of RPGs, though I see a lot more attention to RP there.

So finally, I tried a MUSH, and it's come real close to the F2F gaming, at least the one I play in that is consent-based (there's no combat system, everything is RP'ed out, and there's no NPC farming since there's no NPCs, except what the characters make up). There's also permadeath, but since it's consent based, you have to agree to die. What makes it "real RP" to me is that the game's only constraint on you is to keep it "in-genre", you can make up just about anything you want, including real game objects and rooms. This gives the players to tell their own stories, where everyone is a GM. That's both a good and bad thing, as you can probably guess.

So for me, the future of my RP is in MUSHes. I know people tend to poo-poo them though. But text gives everyone the chance to express their character as they wish, and if you think about it, there's little difference between typing it all out, and telling your playgroup the same thing in a F2F game. And while you're typing, you have time to reword, rethink, etc. and if you're into scenes with high emotional content, the anonymity is very liberating.

[WindupAtheist]

I always had a hard time trying to roleplay in a shiny 3D game.  The more real the avatars get, the more apparent it becomes that when you type "/e taps his foot" your guy just keeps standing there in his default idle animation.

[Llava]

Double edged sword, I guess. Might as well roll with it.

I suppose CoH's character creation falls under the same category too. You might get your fair share of birthday suits, but for most part, it's a great tool to aid the player in expressing his or her character's role in the game world.

Give a person the ability to move their hand when they were unable to before, the first thing they will do is grope their own genitalia.  This is what I have learned from the Internet.

Hell, people draw cocks on the little minimap in Guild Wars.  They're little simple minded animals.

Not to rely on a platitude or anything but:  We can't have nice things.

[Mesozoic]

Roleplaying is very hard when a significant number of people around you are not roleplaying.  One person can wreck an RP event that has dozens of participants. And the non-RPers are there because the games reward non-RP actions.  Computer games only know how to deal with numbers, and so games are all about doing X damage to a mob with Y hitpoints, earning Z experience to reach level A+1.  The number-crunching machines invite people with no interest in RP, and those players in turn wreck RP for everyone else. 

What the traditional RP crowd needs is a  3D MMO roleplaying game (probably historical medevial or fantasy to garner enough subs) without levels, classes, loot or experience.  Lots and lots of wardrobe options, available to everyone from the get-go.  GM tools allowing a multitide of events.  Combat would all be voluntary tournament-style pvp.  If AI mobs were present for players to beat on, they would drop nothing and offer no XP.  And even then GMs would need to have a permaban-gun with a hair trigger and management that backs them up when they kick someone.  Basically, the game needs to be vehemently anti-achiever, relying on the social networks to retain players in lieu of character investment. 

Call it Renaissance Festival Online.

[Merusk]

Roleplaying is very hard when a significant number of people around you are not roleplaying.  One person can wreck an RP event that has dozens of participants. And the non-RPers are there because the games reward non-RP actions.  Computer games only know how to deal with numbers, and so games are all about doing X damage to a mob with Y hitpoints, earning Z experience to reach level A+1.  The number-crunching machines invite people with no interest in RP, and those players in turn wreck RP for everyone else. 

What the traditional RP crowd needs is a  3D MMO roleplaying game (probably historical medevial or fantasy to garner enough subs) without levels, classes, loot or experience.  Lots and lots of wardrobe options, available to everyone from the get-go.  GM tools allowing a multitide of events.  Combat would all be voluntary tournament-style pvp.  If AI mobs were present for players to beat on, they would drop nothing and offer no XP.  And even then GMs would need to have a permaban-gun with a hair trigger and management that backs them up when they kick someone.  Basically, the game needs to be vehemently anti-achiever, relying on the social networks to retain players in lieu of character investment. 

Call it Renaissance Festival Online.

Sounds a lot like Second Life, actually. And people use that to RP all the time... for sex.  RP is all about the sex for 75%+ of the computer RP population anyway, so bonus.

[Mesozoic]

Sounds a lot like Second Life, actually. And people use that to RP all the time... for sex.  RP is all about the sex for 75%+ of the computer RP population anyway, so bonus.

What it sounds a lot like is the internet.  People use the internet all the time for sex.  How much bandwidth is used for porn, compared to all other uses? 

[Pococurante]

In the "Eeriely Does History Repeat Itself" context this was exactly true for the telegraph when it was first introduced.  Hell, Thomas Edison and his future wife notoriously juiced up their relationship over wire.

http://www.reason.com/0001/bk.ba.the.shtml
http://www.victorianlondon.org/women/gossips.htm

[stray]

In the "Eeriely Does History Repeat Itself" context this was exactly true for the telegraph when it was first introduced.  Hell, Thomas Edison and his future wife notoriously juiced up their relationship over wire.

http://www.reason.com/0001/bk.ba.the.shtml
http://www.victorianlondon.org/women/gossips.htm

Cool stuff. Thanks for that.

[Evangolis]

Porn, the leading edge of technological innovation throughout time.

[Resvrgam]

IMO, that seems to be shared by a few others in here, MMO video games are just not the proper medium to facilitate "acting."
RPGs, Role-Playing Games, are essentially the precursors to videogames (all genres included). Doom = players assume the role of a space marine, Age of Empires = players assume the role of an ubiquitous general assigning his forces basic instructions & World of Warcraft = players assume the role of a courier, menial-task completer and monster-slayer; all roles are played by the players in these games.

Instead of relying on one's imagination to piece-together the visuals of a narrator's (GM, DM, etc.) descriptions, hardware-acceleration draws what we're supposed to see and soundcards pump out the aural ambiance.  Our actions and interactivity are limited by the keystrokes/mapped buttons and scripted responses programed into the software.  Instead of being powered by the limitless potential of a human mind that's capable of  "on-the-fly/make outcomes up as plans are exceeded" reactions, videogames offer us a set list of variables. Other players cannot re-shape an entire game to suit the player's "role."  The rules placed upon everyone interacting with the game are constant and unyielding (legally, anyways).

So why do very few players attempt to transcend the rubrics firmly placed by the developers by acting out fanciful embellishments? Simply put: there's no mechanical reward for doing so.  In a sense, "acting" in videogames is an anachronism:  the sensations that were once evoked by colourful adjectives and verbal nuances are now coated in cold, apathetic lines of code and spoon-fed to players through flashy visuals and unchanging sound files.

If "acting" was enforced upon players in order to obtain mechanical rewards in a game (players would have to manually type certain lines of dialog, perform certain "emotes" or some other deviation from the "attack, kill & loot" series of actions), these actions would also conform to a mechanical recipe.  There would be websites and forums littered with the "In order to get past X scenario, all you need to do is emote /laugh, /hug, /hug, /smile, /celebrate, /laugh and say "Yes, dear. That girl is a crazy bitch and of course you look hotter than her."

I agree with Arnold's opinion in that "RPing" is more about eliciting attention with melodramatic performances than actually trying to immerse oneself into the game's setting.  The latter would come naturally and wouldn't require any form of forced emphasis.     
 

[lamaros]

I RP most MMOGs I've played. Most people don't realise I'm RPing, they just think I have a specific personality and interests - ones which if they same me play other games or different characters they would realise are made up by me and how I'm choosing to act within the game world.

Most often I RP myself, I think most people RP themselves when they play a MMOG; they do what they want to do under an assumed name and assumed identity. Whether or not they talk in stupid English or not is not the point role-playing is a really big idea; it's not one just restricted to acting like a specific fantasy cliche, or making up 'role playing' events outside the games context, in fact in a way that is less role playing. If the game does offer the player those options then you're just 'acting' to make them up, not playing a role consistent with the world around you. Role playing to me, most simply, is just about playing the game in accord with what the game seems to be trying to do, and doing it in a consistent manner - which most people, not roleplaying/playing as themselves, do.

In an MUD I used to play that encouraged RP I ended up having a game event take place with the help of the Gods. They created and controlled a NPC for me and we acted out a scene with many others watching. The game encouraged things of that type, and events like it often took place. Ii was to further the history and life of my character, and it was fun. But then there were many other things about the game that were fun too, and if you take away that specific event then the approach to the game was pretty much the same as WoW. WoW doesn't have that kind of system in it, so if I were to put something like that on in WoW then, besides being impossible, it would also be incongruous. If you're trying to become something that the game world doesn't naturally want then you are acting, and that kind of acting role-playing is what most people seem to think role playing comes down to. But it isn't.

In WoW I was just as able to play the way I like to. Granted, there were more people around who played in a way that wasn't at all RPish (we call them retards), but mostly they did. It doesn't matter if it's a conscious decision to put on another persona, or just you being yourself, if you play the game you are usually RPing in some way. If I want to go do a quest and I go around asking people if they want to come with me then my role is a guy who's looking for quest buddies. If someone says no because they want to explore then their role is that of the guy who likes to go off and explore. Seeing as we're all playing the game the way we want to we're all playing the game in specific roles. Hence Role-playing.

People playnig the game in the spirit of the game creates a community of role-players, intentional or not. You don't have to do stupid things like use a lot of emotes to role play, and in fact it's often more stupid if they do because it seems forced and not natual, and good RPing is always a natural expression. What is good RPing in one game can be awful in another, and the fact that some dramatic people cannot grasp that in games like WoW where they are out of place does not mean RPing is all you have said it to be.

[WindupAtheist]

Necromancy for the win?  I'll quote something I wrote on the UO board a couple days ago, and continue from there.

Anyway, the way it's done on my shard is to have all affiliated RP guilds declare endless wars against each other, to create a limited community within which everyone can attack everyone else.  Not because everyone's a warmonger, but to keep things sane and avoid power-emoting bullshit.  If you walk into the tavern and loudly declare yourself the greatest warrior who has ever lived, someone just might ask you outside to prove it.  If the people roleplaying town guards take exception to your brawling, they have the option of laying the smackdown if you don't cut it out.  And so on.

As little use as I have for open-fragfest PVP as general gameplay, in the context of this little carefully controlled sub-community the ability to beat the shit out of each other does wonders to minimize asshattery.  Between that, the ability to actually manipulate object and put them on the ground, and the text emotes^*, RP is mostly what keeps me playing UO these days.

^* I'd rather see "chuckles quietly" over your character's head in UO than watch your WoW character give me the "bored sigh" idle animation with their dead-fish eyes while I read your emote in the chat box.  And under no circumstances do I want to hear that stupid "ho ho ha ha" laugh.  I dunno, the low-res graphics and isometric view make everything seem kinda abstract and thus make it easier for me to suspend disbelief.  I'm weird.