RP nerd thread!

[proudft]

My only real roleplaying was also on Virtue.  I made some Soviet-looking hero (mind-control and radiation, of course) and was merrily moving around the city when I ran into another Soviet-looking hero named Communist.  We immediately joined up for a mission and this dude Never Broke Character Ever.  It was hilarious.  Every time we got a Nazi mission it was full on KILL THE FASCIST SCUM, COMRADE!, always shouting and carrying on.  We, that evening, made a Soviet-themed supergroup and it was glorious!  We gathered up ever Russian-looking hero we could find and held rallies at the Liberty statue and Communist was always leading the way.

And then, like a week later, he vanished off the face of the earth, and it all sorta fell apart.  They removed the Nazis later anyway, so I guess it was for the best.  On one of the welcome-back weeks, I logged in and our supergroup consisted of me and Communist [last login 500-something days ago].

I always wonder if the secret police got poor Communist.  I'll vouch for him!  He was a good party member.

[Tarami]

To be straight, I think it's purely idealistic to think that more than 5 RPers in one place is going to consistently work out, regardless of supporting toolset.

Wat?

You're talking about a different thing. What you're talking about is having a clique that plays together, much like my LARP analogy. The entire point of RPing in an MMO in my mind, however, is the spontaneous RP that happens with people you don't know too well. As long as the group is small enough, the "needs" of each player can be reasonably met through compromise in order for all to enjoy themselves, but as the group grows, this will become much, much harder.

I've had as many RP moments ruined in MMOs by RPers as by drooling retards. Most I imagine were well-meaning and just wanted to have some fun but their RP "style" has clashed horribly with the rest of the group (some want to play farmhands, others dragonslayers... these two things rarely mix well.) Someone on this board likened MMO RP to "an orchestra without a conductor" et c., which I've found to be true. It only really enjoyable when the group is small enough.

[Endie]

What features in an MMG do you find to encourage roleplay?

There was a discussion article on Massively about this last week, but the responses were largely useless ("Ventrilo voice fonts!" "toy items!").

There is a fairly well-known position held by many in Eve that just about everything we do in Eve is RP (I think that it is known by some in the Amarr RP camp as "The Aralis Doctrine" but I could be wrong on the name of the senior Amarr person involved there).  Certainly Eve has an unusually large and influential "formal" RP sector, and I've sat in enough alliance forums, IRC servers and jabber channels (friendly and hostile) to know that the way that people discuss the great 0.0 - and often lowsec and empire war - conflicts is essentially RPing.

So I'd say that formal tools are unnecessary if you have the little matter of a world where player interaction and combat actually matters.

[IainC]

RP in large scale isn't going to work casually. Big LARPs barely work and the players in those are all very motivated RPers as they've spent a lot of money, time and effort on it.

To be straight, I think it's purely idealistic to think that more than 5 RPers in one place is going to consistently work out, regardless of supporting toolset.

I help run a LARP system that runs a continuous, player-driven campaign throughout the year (and has done for over fifteen years now) that routinely gets 5000+ players at the main events. I was also an officer in a full RP guild on DAoC that numbered more than 100 regular players and would routinely have 50 or 60 on at a time, this was a guild with strict rules about OOC in open chats as well not just a 'you have to write a backstory to get in' guild, it was also on a platform that had no official RP servers.

[Tarami]

So, uh, we're agreeing?

For motivated RPers a chatbox will take them 80% of the way, as can be witnessed from simply reading this thread - people have RPed no matter how unsuitable the platform. I don't think that's the point. I'm looking at something that makes RP convenient and feasible with little preparation, i.e. fun for the less hardcore. Essentially, something that makes RP nearly as easy to do as running a five-man dungeon in WoW after the introduction of the LFD tool. To that goal, isolation is going to be a huge help, just like it is when dungeoncrawling. Which also was a big part of the success of NWN as an RP platform (no less than two people have recently pointed out how nice it was to be able to simply ban annoying people.)

Basically, OOC is a much more fundamental problem for consistent RP than lack of housing or any such superficiality is, because RP can't be efficiently enforced like game rules can. The fundamental problem with OOC in turn is that everyone has different ideas of what constitutes OOC. Add to that that some people don't want to RP all the time. I think enabling people to make their own "rulesets" through isolation is a good thing as long as it's non-permanent.

[Malakili]

For motivated RPers a chatbox will take them 80% of the way

This is actually my main problem with RPing in most MMOGs.  Frankly, its probably closer to 100% (especially given things like what WUA said and using /g for in character stuff).  The game itself doesn't even matter anymore for most RP guilds because the game gives them nothing.  There are some exceptions out there, but they are few and far between.   When nothing that you are RPing is actually represented in the game world, it soon becomes tiresome, at least to my mind. When I look back at my RP in any MMO post - WoW I literally could have done the same things in an IRC channel.

[Lantyssa]

The reason I don't RP in WoW, and I'm less likely to bother in other mass games, is it's something which needs to be taught and these games don't encourage learning those skills all.  When everyone's idea of RP is "I'm the secret prince, son of Wrynn and Jaina, who battled Illidan to a draw at age 10" I shut down.

Case in point:  my old guild on Kirin Tor admitted a guy named Inuyyasha.  (The GM didn't know where it was from.)  One of our few rules was no character rip-offs.  He insisted up and down he wasn't, then proceeded to tell us how he was half demon, wore a red robe, had a big sword that turned into a rusty katana, etc., when asked to give a bit of background.  While the most extreme case I've seen, more often than not people fell into these lines.

It just seems it's the nature of things when nothing is done to encourage RP by the game operators.  Or actively discourage in some cases.  When I came back after a long break, the guild was all about raiding and RP couldn't be seen anywhere.  Unless you enjoy being the person who never breaks character while stuck in an out-of-place scene, it's disheartening.

[WindupAtheist]

So, uh, we're agreeing?

No, it's just that nobody can figure out what the fuck you're talking about.

To be straight, I think it's purely idealistic to think that more than 5 RPers in one place is going to consistently work out, regardless of supporting toolset.

Unless by "work out" you mean "randomly occur in every major population center in a large commerical MMO that lacks brutally enforced RP rules" rather than just "result in a satisfactory outcome". In which case, well, duh. I'd still rather be able to build my own tavern/city/whatever somewhere than be able to just suck Goldshire Inn into it's own pocket dimension for an hour.

[Simond]

A fun way to RP in WoW is gimmick characters. Make up a priest, wander into the Goldshire in and start yelling a sermon about the evils of unbridled fornication or what have you. Or a lowbie Stormwind ratcatcher with poor personal hygiene and terrible interpersonal skills. Or a teetotal dwarf. Or a draenei that is secretly two goblins in a mechadranei suit. And so on.

Sure beats all the Thee-ing and Thou-ing half-demon bastard sons of Arthas with glowing purple eyes and a scar on their face.

[proudft]

That's all fine and good, but if you wander into the Goldshire Inn on Moon Guard to sermonize, you better bring protection and/or Lysol.

 

[Ingmar]

Hazmat suit, IMO.

[Sjofn]

I love that the Moon Guard Goldshire inn exists. I also love that most of the Moon Guardians are all NEVER GO THERE IT WILL EAT YOUR SOUL.

[Lantyssa]

That's all fine and good, but if you wander into the Goldshire Inn on Moon Guard to sermonize, you better bring protection and/or Lysol.

I think that's true of all RP servers.

I was on my Horde server (regular PvE) when someone was mockingly suggesting Kirin Tor for people to join for awesome RP.  I commented about seeing through their evil scheme and then we commiserated about the quality of RP there.

[Sjofn]

It's true to some degree, but having wandered around on my share of RP servers, Moon Guard's seems to go above and beyond the call of duty. It's almost like it's a server-wide understanding that Goldshire Inn is a send up of all that is wrong with Goldshire Inns everywhere, or a piece of art used to drive off the weak of heart and ensnare the scary people in order to keep the rest of the server safe.

[Merusk]

Well shit, now you've got my curiosity up on a day my server's down for 24h.  Moon Guard here I come...

[Redgiant]

Enforcement of RP for all on the server. #1 by far as to why it often doesn't work since it's too easy for someone to ruin the atmosphere with no repercussions. People who like to be assholes won't stop, you just have to consistently and unwaveringly ban them. If an RP server is materially no different than a non-RP server, what's the point of even pretending to have one.

Persistant changes to a persistant world. RP is about immersion, and how immersive is a come-and-go reality? I mean, how do you continually RP "standing around in a camp waiting for a BG to pop"? Not realistic == not sustainable RP.

Factions, Guild wars, and generally any mechanic that let's you have more than 2 sides (and the same sides) all the time.

[palmer_eldritch]

RP in large scale isn't going to work casually. Big LARPs barely work and the players in those are all very motivated RPers as they've spent a lot of money, time and effort on it.

To be straight, I think it's purely idealistic to think that more than 5 RPers in one place is going to consistently work out, regardless of supporting toolset.

I help run a LARP system that runs a continuous, player-driven campaign throughout the year (and has done for over fifteen years now) that routinely gets 5000+ players at the main events. I was also an officer in a full RP guild on DAoC that numbered more than 100 regular players and would routinely have 50 or 60 on at a time, this was a guild with strict rules about OOC in open chats as well not just a 'you have to write a backstory to get in' guild, it was also on a platform that had no official RP servers.

Were you doing a lot of RvR?

[Numtini]

I very strongly agree with the notion that almost everything going on in Eve is roleplaying.

I played Underlight for a while. Not everyone's cup of tea, but fantastic roleplaying. And yes, it was enforced. If you didn't roleplay, you were invited to leave. It had a lot of other fascinating ideas, like advancement by fiat of other players who were designated as teachers and would craft tasks based on your interest and personality. At the time i was playing, they had just introduced "dreamstrike" a very limited and difficult to learn "art" that resulted in permadeath. I remember being at an overall city meeting and the tension that rippled through when someone who'd "struck" someone the week before (only 2 characters had the ability) walked into the room. I was part of a group that opposed its use or proliferation in any situation and one of our leaders was rumored to be on the chopping block. I also was evangelizing for my pet theory that the "nightmares" (monsters) in the city were actually the souls of people who were dreamstruck.

Generally in games where I've RPed, it's just been playing the game as normal and speaking and acting in character. As time has gone on, I've more and more avoided specific arpee communities as its become little other than a euphemism for cybering. That was always there, but now it seems like it's the only thing left.

[IainC]

RP in large scale isn't going to work casually. Big LARPs barely work and the players in those are all very motivated RPers as they've spent a lot of money, time and effort on it.

To be straight, I think it's purely idealistic to think that more than 5 RPers in one place is going to consistently work out, regardless of supporting toolset.

I help run a LARP system that runs a continuous, player-driven campaign throughout the year (and has done for over fifteen years now) that routinely gets 5000+ players at the main events. I was also an officer in a full RP guild on DAoC that numbered more than 100 regular players and would routinely have 50 or 60 on at a time, this was a guild with strict rules about OOC in open chats as well not just a 'you have to write a backstory to get in' guild, it was also on a platform that had no official RP servers.

Were you doing a lot of RvR?

Yeah, we routinely had 2 or 3 guild groups running and we'd contribute a lot of bodies to any relic attempt or serious siege campaign. We tended to keep in our own groups in the battle and we still RPed throughout. Sursbrooke was 'our' keep and we kept it claimed for several years, retaking it as necessary.

[Fordel]

Was all this on the Euro servers or something?

My DaoC had none of that GM run event stuff.

[Sjofn]

Yeah, I even remember a Herald post about how they caaaan't do GM run stuff because ... I think it was because people like it too much. Everyone logs in for them and crash the server, people who miss it get all angry they missed it, etc.

[IainC]

Yeah it was all on the Euro servers. We wanted to do it for WAR too but Mythic vetoed that plan.

[Paelos]

One of my guildmates in DAOC was constantly in character as an insane lurikeen mage who was obsessed with colors and trophies. It could be quite hilarious at times, especially when housing came out.

[Fordel]

The only RPing I remember distinctly, was on one of the official RP servers, some little Lurikeen declared himself the Mayor of Magmell (starter town for Hibernia), and kept in character for like, 5 years or something.


His only character even apparently, that never got past level 6 or something.

[Xilren's Twin]

I just wish someone one would figure out a way to monetize (even though i hate that word) the NWN concept so players could have the creation tools and be able to build their own worlds, with hosting and oversight by the co you're paying a monthly fee to.  Ideally, the company itself could lead the way with maybe one generic starter world they maintained, as a bootstrap to creation if nothing else, but still alllow players to to take that base concept to mod it to Hades and back.  A company allowing players, or the world builders, control over who is allowed to join their particular world server is a big step in relinquishing control im not sure they would be willing to take, but that's why i think you would have to have at least 1 company run and fully public world to anyone who sub's has something to play while they try to pass the invite requirements to the custom world servers.

Beyond control, the other problem of course is in the whole "how do i make money" part.  Everything about this screams smaller populations and smaller amounts of players.  Making money in mmorpg's today is all about getting big numbers of players.  It would have to be a very different business plan.

I've even wondered if even providing access as a player for one price, and a DM/creator level for a higher monthly price would be worth it.  Not everyone wants to/can create, and by sticking a real cost on it you might filter out some of the more obvious "penis world 2.0" designs people make for shits and giggles in just about any other commonly available toolsets.

Heh, with all the steam sales recently, i've kind of been hoping we eventually see the whole NWN1 suite go up just to get back into that for a while :)

[Malakili]

I just wish someone one would figure out a way to monetize (even though i hate that word) the NWN concept so players could have the creation tools and be able to build their own worlds, with hosting and oversight by the co you're paying a monthly fee to.  Ideally, the company itself could lead the way with maybe one generic starter world they maintained, as a bootstrap to creation if nothing else, but still alllow players to to take that base concept to mod it to Hades and back.  A company allowing players, or the world builders, control over who is allowed to join their particular world server is a big step in relinquishing control im not sure they would be willing to take, but that's why i think you would have to have at least 1 company run and fully public world to anyone who sub's has something to play while they try to pass the invite requirements to the custom world servers.

Beyond control, the other problem of course is in the whole "how do i make money" part.  Everything about this screams smaller populations and smaller amounts of players.  Making money in mmorpg's today is all about getting big numbers of players.  It would have to be a very different business plan.

I've even wondered if even providing access as a player for one price, and a DM/creator level for a higher monthly price would be worth it.  Not everyone wants to/can create, and by sticking a real cost on it you might filter out some of the more obvious "penis world 2.0" designs people make for shits and giggles in just about any other commonly available toolsets.

Heh, with all the steam sales recently, i've kind of been hoping we eventually see the whole NWN1 suite go up just to get back into that for a while :)

There are still NWN persistent worlds running because there really hasn't been anything better (even NWN 2 didn't match it for a variety of reasons).  Hell the server I used to play on lets see...8 years ago, is still running.  http://lwnsql.lfchosting.com/index.html (and by the looks of it they've even continued to develop their PW).   

[Stormwaltz]

I just wish someone one would figure out a way to monetize (even though i hate that word) the NWN concept so players could have the creation tools and be able to build their own worlds, with hosting and oversight by the co you're paying a monthly fee to.

Wasn't that Raph's Metaplace? Or am I misremembering?

There seemed to be two tracks in the answers to my question about features that encouraged roleplay. One could be boiled down to "reactivity" (game experiences crafted to meet specific players, persistence of decision results). The other was enforcement of standards. I have a follow up on the latter.

Which do you believe would be more effective:

• A small number of staff GMs with the power to enforce RP at their judgment.
• A coded system that allows the player community as a whole to enforce RP by assigning each other "white marks" and "black marks".

In both cases assume the penalty is being "voted off the island" - the player (account, not a specific character) is booted from the RP server, but gets a free transfer to another server.

Oh - in case anyone was assuming, this is personal curiosity. Nothing related to my day job.

[Malakili]

I just wish someone one would figure out a way to monetize (even though i hate that word) the NWN concept so players could have the creation tools and be able to build their own worlds, with hosting and oversight by the co you're paying a monthly fee to.

Wasn't that Raph's Metaplace? Or am I misremembering?

There seemed to be two tracks in the answers to my question about features that encouraged roleplay. One could be boiled down to "reactivity" (game experiences crafted to meet specific players, persistence of decision results). The other was enforcement of standards. I have a follow up on the latter.

Which do you believe would be more effective:

• A small number of staff GMs with the power to enforce RP at their judgment.
• A coded system that allows the player community as a whole to enforce RP by assigning each other "white marks" and "black marks".

In both cases assume the penalty is being "voted off the island" - the player (account, not a specific character) is booted from the RP server, but gets a free transfer to another server.

Oh - in case anyone was assuming, this is personal curiosity. Nothing related to my day job.

GMs, for sure.  The other is just too susceptible to griefing. 

[Stormwaltz]

GMs, for sure.  The other is just too susceptible to griefing.

GMs are a "single point of failure" regards corruption and rash decisions, and their decisions are always angrily questioned. That's why I ask.

Assume a community system would work under something like the following core rules (which I made up):

• A white mark offsets a black mark, and vice-versa.
• Having more than X black marks (after adjustments for white marks) gets you booted.
• A player can only grant one mark (black or white) to a particular player once per month.
• A player can't receive more than Y white marks and Y black marks per day (to prevent lynch mobs).
• Marks expire after one month (because people have good days and bad days).

[Musashi]

Stop making rules that limit people's imaginations.  That's how you can design a game that will help foster RP.  Chaotic Evil is not just a Snydley Whiplash accent.

[Lantyssa]

GMs, if they're generally even-handed.

A mark system could be interesting for review, but people are more likely to award negative marks than positive ones, and even with controls it is ripe for abuse.

[Malakili]

]

GMs are a "single point of failure" regards corruption and rash decisions, and their decisions are always angrily questioned. That's why I ask.

Indeed, but at least they have some sort of accountability.  Sure, its possible some GM could fly off the handle and ban an entire guild because his wife left him, but the chances are pretty slim, and GMs that do that are either going to 1 ) be fired and replaced or 2) if we are going by the privately owned/run servers model, just aren't going to have anyone playing on their server(s).

Their decisions will by questioned for sure, don't get me wrong, but thats because their decisions CAN be questioned.  Some group gets together and decides they are going to get some guy booted (and if they really want it to happen, a limit on the number of marks per day will only delay, not stop it), there is no recourse that I can see.

[Koyasha]

Yeah, as far as enforcement goes, only a dedicated and responsive GM staff that constantly patrols will work. The trouble is when you come into differing definitions of roleplay.  You would have to somehow set an entire standard and explain, precisely what the standards of roleplaying are, which would be somewhat difficult.  What about the person who's trying, but really horrible at it and therefore still disruptive to the majority of the players, etc, etc.  It's hard to set solid policies like that.  A private persistent world can just decree by fiat, 'because we say so' but such an attitude would drive customers away from a commercial game, or discourage them from buying in the first place.

As far as monetizing private servers goes, I could see a few ways to do it.  One would be to reduce the cost for creators and DM's based on number of people playing in their area.  So players pay X, DM's pay Y, and that gets reduced by number of people playing in your world or whatever.  This way content creators can be rewarded with reduced fees if their content is popular.

As for actual tools once you're in, I would have it be very much like NWN.  It has to be simple enough that people that aren't good at everything can still make something.  NWN's tile system was one of it's real upsides, because it meant that even though I couldn't make decent terrain if my life depended on it, I can still make a zone by laying down tiles.  This was one of the reasons I never got into NWN2's editing at all.  The editor was so inscrutable to me that I never made anything.  It should have all these complex options, sure, but it also needs defaults that a less experienced person can use simply and easily.

And more than anything, the active DM tools are the most important, in my opinion.  This was one of NWN's bigger failures, in that they never seemed to concentrate much on the DM tools.  They did the editor really well, and they polished up the player client, but the DM client was always buggy and lacked all sorts of common-sense options that a DM needs.  Like being able to see a player's character sheet wasn't a default option for a very long time after it was released.  How can you make a DM client that doesn't have the ability to pull up a character sheet for any player?  I don't see how this could possibly have gotten past any form of testing without being glaringly obvious.  If the DM client is good, the scripting doesn't need to be that good, cause the DM can just do things manually.

[Lantyssa]

A private persistent world can just decree by fiat, 'because we say so' but such an attitude would drive customers away from a commercial game, or discourage them from buying in the first place.

"You're in Our World Now."

[Typhon]

GMs, for sure.  The other is just too susceptible to griefing.

GMs are a "single point of failure" regards corruption and rash decisions, and their decisions are always angrily questioned. That's why I ask.

Assume a community system would work under something like the following core rules (which I made up):

• A white mark offsets a black mark, and vice-versa.
• Having more than X black marks (after adjustments for white marks) gets you booted.
• A player can only grant one mark (black or white) to a particular player once per month.
• A player can't receive more than Y white marks and Y black marks per day (to prevent lynch mobs).
• Marks expire after one month (because people have good days and bad days).

lol, you just invented "Survivor: The MMO"