To what extent should RP servers be enforced?

[Train Wreck]

RP'ing on ER isn't exactly non-existant.  In spite of certain people claiming "it is gh3y to RP in a bliz game wtf?", when I actually pay attention to what other people are doing, it's at least half and half.  Basically, you have people that are focused on grinding quests/xp that don't feel like interacting with other players ATM, let alone bothering to RP, but when they're done they drop by an inn or something and have a go at it.

The Horde especially has a lot of RPing going on.  I guess it's a lot more fun to pretend you're a blood-crazed orc than a human mage.

[Paelos]

Yesterday was the first day I actually contemplated "grinding" in the game. I was level 48 at the time. At this point, I realized that I'm basically doing quests for items. If they are just for cash, unless its a huge payoff, I don't bother anymore. The xp gains from quests are now worth next to nothing. To me, this is a problem. It's not that I want it to be easy at the top. It's just that I would like the xp returns to be worth the hours of effort some of them take. For example, I can kill ten mobs at my level while rested, and I will get the same xp as a quest that takes me at least an hour and many deaths to complete.

In essence, I don't think they've scaled the quests correctly for xp gains at the top.

[WindupAtheist]

You are essentially talking about faction. WoW has that.  And, that wasn't in UO when I was playing.  So it's a recent addition. WoW has it at launch.

WoW has those little bars that fill up when you do quests from a specific city, and when they're full enough they'll sell you a horse for cheaper.  Whoopee.  Hell, even old-timey UO at least let you differentiate by going red and being unable to enter town, even if the actual PVP implementation was a nightmare.

I didn't miss the point.  They aren't the only ones you can do, but even in real life do you think a goody two-shoes could walk into a crack house and ask them if they want something done?  First they'd say, hi Mr Cop and second he'd find himself in a shallow grave.

What the hell are you going on about?  If you want a cops-and-criminals metaphor, fine:  In WoW, everyone is a cop, and no one is ever a criminal.  It is impossible to do anything non-heroic.  On the other side of the planet there is a faction made up entirely of criminals, and it's impossible for any of them to ever go straight.  These two factions can shoot at one another, but there is absolutely no potential for a story, since the two sides can never speak to one another or co-operate even clandestinely.  A hero doesn't mean shit because there are thousands of him and he never had a choice, while the villains may as well be AI mobs anyway for all the interaction you're allowed.

[Train Wreck]

Yesterday was the first day I actually contemplated "grinding" in the game. I was level 48 at the time. At this point, I realized that I'm basically doing quests for items. If they are just for cash, unless its a huge payoff, I don't bother anymore. The xp gains from quests are now worth next to nothing. To me, this is a problem. It's not that I want it to be easy at the top. It's just that I would like the xp returns to be worth the hours of effort some of them take. For example, I can kill ten mobs at my level while rested, and I will get the same xp as a quest that takes me at least an hour and many deaths to complete.

In essence, I don't think they've scaled the quests correctly for xp gains at the top.

You're being generous.  At level 14, my mage can kill four mobs while rested to gain more xp than from a completed quest.  The reason I do them is to see the content.  The rewards are often lousy, especially when they offer nothing my class can equip.  But it's not much effort to coordinate them with areas I would like to grind in, anyway.  Typically I gather all the required items while "rested", then head back to town or whatever to turn them in when my xp bar is back to purple.

Has Blizzard actually stated that quest xp was supposed to be an alternative to grinding xp?  It clearly isn't, but it helps. 

As a sidebar, I don't see how people can actually afford their skills and equipment without completing quests or getting handouts.  The only reason I'm not broke is because my blacksmith warrior has one item (out of about 30 recipes) that is in good demand at the auction house.

[MrHat]

Yesterday was the first day I actually contemplated "grinding" in the game. I was level 48 at the time. At this point, I realized that I'm basically doing quests for items. If they are just for cash, unless its a huge payoff, I don't bother anymore. The xp gains from quests are now worth next to nothing. To me, this is a problem. It's not that I want it to be easy at the top. It's just that I would like the xp returns to be worth the hours of effort some of them take. For example, I can kill ten mobs at my level while rested, and I will get the same xp as a quest that takes me at least an hour and many deaths to complete.

In essence, I don't think they've scaled the quests correctly for xp gains at the top.

You're being generous.  At level 14, my mage can kill four mobs while rested to gain more xp than from a completed quest.  The reason I do them is to see the content.  The rewards are often lousy, especially when they offer nothing my class can equip.  But it's not much effort to coordinate them with areas I would like to grind in, anyway.  Typically I gather all the required items while "rested", then head back to town or whatever to turn them in when my xp bar is back to purple.

Has Blizzard actually stated that quest xp was supposed to be an alternative to grinding xp?  It clearly isn't, but it helps. 

As a sidebar, I don't see how people can actually afford their skills and equipment without completing quests or getting handouts.  The only reason I'm not broke is because my blacksmith warrior has one item (out of about 30 recipes) that is in good demand at the auction house.

I did quests on my mage till about 22, then I had a healer friend follow me around while I used AoE's to level.  That's faster than shit, was getting about 1 - 1 1/2 bars of exp every pull, about 45s of downtime between drinking and running to the next camp.  Murloc's for the win!

[Jayce]

What the hell are you going on about?  If you want a cops-and-criminals metaphor, fine:  In WoW, everyone is a cop, and no one is ever a criminal.  It is impossible to do anything non-heroic.

I wonder the same about you.  I don't care what metaphor we use, I'm just trying to get this point across: you are wrong when you say you can never do anything non-heroic.  You don't have to do any quests, ever.  You can go around saying (as unrealistic as it may be) that you are a bad paladin who never does anything his superiors ask him to, and in fact likes to murder small pets.  Or you can be an undead warrior who has a kitty cat and likes to go for long moonlit walks.

A hero doesn't mean shit because there are thousands of him and he never had a choice, while the villains may as well be AI mobs anyway for all the interaction you're allowed.

Here's some news:  in any MMOG, everyone can't be the hero, at least in a meaningful way.  The best you can do is offer the illusion (for RP purposes) that you are the hero of some storyline.  In UO, that's up to you.  In WoW, you have the option to play along with the backstory.  For some reason, most people choose to.  Maybe that's the more popular choice? 

It doesn't have to be your choice.  If that's the case, I suggest you find a board where the people discuss UO instead of coming here to inform everyone that their game sucks because it offers you the chance to play along with an existing story instead of inventing your own.

[Ironwood]

While not wishing to bash on you WUA, it does seem to me that you are complaining that WoW is 'not the game you want'.


Well, ok.

So what ?

Don't play it ?

[WindupAtheist]

I wonder the same about you.  I don't care what metaphor we use, I'm just trying to get this point across: you are wrong when you say you can never do anything non-heroic.  You don't have to do any quests, ever.

Wow, you've totally rebutted my point about the content being linear and leaving no room for differentiation of characters.  After all, I can just IGNORE THE CONTENT ENTIRELY.  Way to go.  Oh wait, the only difference between the questing and non-questing characters is a matter of varying advancement rates, so even that doesn't set my toon apart from others of his race/class combo.  Never mind.

You can go around saying (as unrealistic as it may be) that you are a bad paladin who never does anything his superiors ask him to, and in fact likes to murder small pets.  Or you can be an undead warrior who has a kitty cat and likes to go for long moonlit walks.

Yes, and I can also play Pac-Man while roleplaying an eating disorder and a homosexual crush on the pink ghost.  But since WoW is billed as an MMORPG, complete with RP-specific servers, it should really do a better job of facilitating roleplay than Pac-Man.

Here's some news:  in any MMOG, everyone can't be the hero, at least in a meaningful way.  The best you can do is offer the illusion (for RP purposes) that you are the hero of some storyline.

Which is a lot easier to do when the game doesn't have everything you will ever do and every ability you will ever acquire planned out from the moment of character creation.  Yes, I know you can thwart the game's attempt at predestination by stubbornly refusing to engage in any content at all, but let's be serious here.

In UO, that's up to you.  In WoW, you have the option to play along with the backstory.  For some reason, most people choose to.  Maybe that's the more popular choice?

WoW doesn't simply have you play along with a backstory.  It has the entire primary narrative planned out from the very beginning, and the only alternative you can suggest is that a player stuff his fingers into his ears and shout "LALALA! NOT DOING ANY QUESTS EVER! CAN'T HEAR YOU!"

It doesn't have to be your choice.  If that's the case, I suggest you find a board where the people discuss UO instead of coming here to inform everyone that their game sucks because it offers you the chance to play along with an existing story instead of inventing your own.

I sense the beginnings of a marketing blurb in there somewhere...  Let me see if I can pull it out... ah...

World of Warcraft, The Role-Playing Game Where Inventing Your Character's Story Is For Fags!

While not wishing to bash on you WUA, it does seem to me that you are complaining that WoW is 'not the game you want'.


Well, ok.

So what ?

Don't play it ?

Quick, look!  Rather than quietly accepting that a game is not for them, someone is bitching about it in a web forum!  Stop the presses!

[Calantus]

I've never understood why people need a game to facilitate their roleplaying anyways. Do RPers fall asleep as soon as they lie down and hit the lights? I don't know about anyone else but I roleplay in my mind while I wait for my brain to shutdown, and get more than enough of it that way. I don't need a MMOG to roleplay... neither does anyone else. When you roleplay in a MMOG it shows either a lack of imagination or the need for validation/drama queening amongst your RP peers. At least, that's my oppinion, feel free to deny it.

[Samwise]

If all your roleplaying is in your own head, it's purely masturbatory.  For a "real roleplayer", the fun of roleplaying is in having your character interact with other characters that aren't under your control.  It allows you to be entertained by the other person's "performance", and the actions/words of their character will often force your character to react to situations that you hadn't thought out beforehand.  Not only is this fun because it's like watching a story be written in front of you, it's challenging because it puts you through the mental exercise of thinking through a "filter" ("transformation matrix" would be more appropriate but we aren't all graphics programmers) to figure out what your character would do in that situation.

That's if it's done "right", of course, in my subjective opinion.  Most of the roleplayers I've seen in MMOGs are completely masturbatory anyway, and are unable to react to other characters in any sort of creative or meaningful way.  The most hardcore "roleplayer" I've ever seen was somebody in SWG who came into a cantina and delivered a long soliloquy about her mysterious and unique past.  She also engaged in what appeared to be pre-scripted (and completely cheesy) banter with her Arrr-Peee-er comrade - I can only assume that they had repeated this exact performance in other cantinas all over the galaxy.  My attempts to engage her in in-character conversation fell flat because her character wasn't a character at all, she was a story (and not a very creative one at that). 

Few people (other than improv actors) have ever experienced what I would call "good" roleplaying, which is why most people don't get the appeal.

[schild]

Anyone who was in Theed, Coronet, or hmmm some other city whose name escapes me at the moment, right before FFXI came out saw me roleplay. I put on the formal suit (blue and white leisure suit looking thing) and went to each cantina, stood in the corner and preached. I responded to every player as the evangelist. It was beautiful. I even, it would seem, got some people to switch over to FFXI when it came out. I very much enjoy playing "someone/something" else in a game for short periods of time, but there's far too many people willing to fuck up immersion. Hence, my previous statement stands, roleplaying is dead online.

[Jayce]

I wonder the same about you.  I don't care what metaphor we use, I'm just trying to get this point across: you are wrong when you say you can never do anything non-heroic.  You don't have to do any quests, ever.

Wow, you've totally rebutted my point about the content being linear and leaving no room for differentiation of characters.  After all, I can just IGNORE THE CONTENT ENTIRELY.  Way to go.  Oh wait, the only difference between the questing and non-questing characters is a matter of varying advancement rates, so even that doesn't set my toon apart from others of his race/class combo.  Never mind.

I guess we aren't going to agree on this.  I think giving the player some content that he is free to ignore is somewhat superior to not giving the player any content and telling him to find his own.  But then I don't really follow the game that I assume you're using as a model (UO - I could be wrong here), so I don't know what your comparison is. 

In my day, UO pretty much had no storyline, so the story of the world was the following:  there is no story except the conflicting stories of a hundred different lifeless drama queen elf princes who could often be found emoting *strokes his beard thoughtfully*.

Please to inform how, if you had WoW as a canvas, you would fix the supposed lack of any choices in the game.  I would love to know how I can avoid being a robot to the WoW designers' will.

[Calantus]

If all your roleplaying is in your own head, it's purely masturbatory.  For a "real roleplayer", the fun of roleplaying is in having your character interact with other characters that aren't under your control.  It allows you to be entertained by the other person's "performance", and the actions/words of their character will often force your character to react to situations that you hadn't thought out beforehand.  Not only is this fun because it's like watching a story be written in front of you, it's challenging because it puts you through the mental exercise of thinking through a "filter" ("transformation matrix" would be more appropriate but we aren't all graphics programmers) to figure out what your character would do in that situation.

That's if it's done "right", of course, in my subjective opinion.  Most of the roleplayers I've seen in MMOGs are completely masturbatory anyway, and are unable to react to other characters in any sort of creative or meaningful way.  The most hardcore "roleplayer" I've ever seen was somebody in SWG who came into a cantina and delivered a long soliloquy about her mysterious and unique past.  She also engaged in what appeared to be pre-scripted (and completely cheesy) banter with her Arrr-Peee-er comrade - I can only assume that they had repeated this exact performance in other cantinas all over the galaxy.  My attempts to engage her in in-character conversation fell flat because her character wasn't a character at all, she was a story (and not a very creative one at that). 

Few people (other than improv actors) have ever experienced what I would call "good" roleplaying, which is why most people don't get the appeal.

I used to hate playing GI Joe with friends because I couldn't control what went on (I'd do it because you still get interaction with friends which makes up for the actual play being crap). I have never, and probably will never enjoy anyone else's input in my "playtime" unless it is co-operative (team/group game), competitive, or aesthetic (ie. they don't really affect me, they are just there doing their own thing and their input is just conversation/company). I've never enjoyed playing a role... when I play by myself it's always either a game, or me creating my own story and seeing it either played out in my mind or action figures (in my youth... though I imagine if I had access to GIJoe figures I probably would play with them). When I play with others it's always a game. So I guess my personality just completely clashes with the appeal of roleplaying.

[Samwise]

probably will never enjoy anyone else's input in my "playtime" unless it is co-operative (team/group game), competitive, or aesthetic (ie. they don't really affect me, they are just there doing their own thing and their input is just conversation/company).

Actually, I'd consider the input of another roleplayer to be a combination of "co-operative" (you cooperate toward the common goal of defining your characters and enriching the world that you're both a part of) and "aesthetic" (your characters and the story between them is, IMO, a type of art).  It can even be competitive to some extent - it can be lots of fun to play your character to the hilt, in defiance of metagame restrictions (for example, doing something that OOC you know is dumb but that it's perfectly reasonable for your character to do), and thereby challenge other players to follow suit rather than using "metagame thinking" and backing out.  (This is a good way to seperate the achievers/munchkins from the roleplayers.)

The thing that defines a roleplayer, I think, is thinking of roleplaying itself to be a "game" the same as any other, and to fit within that cooperative/competitive/aesthetic sphere that you describe.  The tricky thing is that roleplaying does not have clearly-defined rules and arbitration, which is why it's almost impossible to represent in a computer game, and why "RP police" like the ones who inspired this thread always come off looking like douches.  Even in a PnP game, you can't "enforce" role-playing, you can only encourage it.

To take an example from outside the realm of what most people consider "games", consider the improv exercise "freeze tag".  There's no way that you could make a computer game out of that, but damn is it fun.

[WindupAtheist]

Please to inform how, if you had WoW as a canvas, you would fix the supposed lack of any choices in the game.  I would love to know how I can avoid being a robot to the WoW designers' will.

Branching quests with multiple solutions, even if it's a simple "talk vs kill" choice.  Mutually exclusive quests.  Person X wants you to kill 15 foozles, but person Y wants you to kill person X, things like that.  Let me buddy up to the Defias and do some work for them.  Prevent Alliance and Horde from grouping, but let them learn each others languages.  Allow guilds to declare war on one another, even if both belong to the same overall faction.  Let me pickpocket NPC townsfolk and have the guards chase me.  Give me something, anything, to do that will cause the world to treat me a little differently than someone else.

[Jayce]

Please to inform how, if you had WoW as a canvas, you would fix the supposed lack of any choices in the game.  I would love to know how I can avoid being a robot to the WoW designers' will.

1 Branching quests with multiple solutions, even if it's a simple "talk vs kill" choice.  2 Mutually exclusive quests.  Person X wants you to kill 15 foozles, but person Y wants you to kill person X, things like that.  3 Let me buddy up to the Defias and do some work for them. 4  Prevent Alliance and Horde from grouping, but let them learn each others languages.  5 Allow guilds to declare war on one another, even if both belong to the same overall faction.  6 Let me pickpocket NPC townsfolk and have the guards chase me.  Give me something, anything, to do that will cause the world to treat me a little differently than someone else.

I took the liberty of numbering them so that I could respond to each without insane quoting.

1 - I think that's a good idea.  Quests that can "go bad" are a good one too, where the quest npc attacks you for choosing the wrong option.
2 - Probably a good idea, but won't happen.  Too easy to confuse Joe Newbie.  "Why can't I kill person X now that I've done foozle B quest?"  Think of WoW as a beginner-friendly MMOG and you've got it.
3 - I think that would be damn cool.   I hold out some hope that this might one day be in, because even as it is now, there are some neutral goblin factions (Booty Bay etc) that you can raise or lower your faction with.
4 - Never going to happen, and for good reason.  DAOC got that right at least.  Trash talk can be an art form if done right, but most retards don't do it right.  "You can't handle the trash talk!"
5 - Once again, I think this would confuse the newbies.  You should be able to get all the PvP you desire fighting the other side.  It's not like there's a shortage of them.  And if you think guild wars will encourage RP, you've never played AC1 or SB (for example).  It's ALWAYS about out-of-game and ooc reasons, NEVER about rp.
6 - Something like this happens in Booty Bay.  If you attack someone in town, the bruisers go after you.  But PvP stealing will probably never be in. You think missing items in your pack doesn't generate support calls?  Not economical.


So I agree with you in theory on a few points, but a few ain't gonna happen.  I suppose though that those aren't game-breakers for me.  If they are for you, fine.. different strokes.

Try looking at it from the perspective of WoW being beginner-friendly, and UO for the more advanced roll playah.  Things make a lot more sense then.

[WindupAtheist]

2 - Probably a good idea, but won't happen.  Too easy to confuse Joe Newbie.  "Why can't I kill person X now that I've done foozle B quest?"  Think of WoW as a beginner-friendly MMOG and you've got it.

It's not confusing at all if it's done logically.  "Why won't the director of the museum give me the quest to recover their stolen artifact?"  "Because you did a quest yesterday to rob them!"

4 - Never going to happen, and for good reason.  DAOC got that right at least.  Trash talk can be an art form if done right, but most retards don't do it right.  "You can't handle the trash talk!"

Why not mute all players then, and eliminate all insults?   

5 - Once again, I think this would confuse the newbies.  You should be able to get all the PvP you desire fighting the other side.  It's not like there's a shortage of them.  And if you think guild wars will encourage RP, you've never played AC1 or SB (for example).  It's ALWAYS about out-of-game and ooc reasons, NEVER about rp.

It works well enough in UO, at least on my shard and with the set of RP guilds I deal with.  In any event, this and the item listed above guarantee that you never have an enemy who means shit.  They're all just silent mobs with better AI.

6 - Something like this happens in Booty Bay.  If you attack someone in town, the bruisers go after you.  But PvP stealing will probably never be in. You think missing items in your pack doesn't generate support calls?  Not economical.

Doesn't need to be from players.  Let someone steal from an NPC, and if they get caught, they can't come back there for X hours without getting hammered.

[Samwise]

4 - Never going to happen, and for good reason.  DAOC got that right at least.  Trash talk can be an art form if done right, but most retards don't do it right.  "You can't handle the trash talk!"

Why not mute all players then, and eliminate all insults?   

I know you're being deliberately obtuse, but it's because "trash talk" only really happens between people that are on different sides of the conflict.  The fact that an Alliance player can't kill another Alliance player eliminates the possibility that an Alliance player would kill another Alliance player and then engage in moronic trash talk to add insult to injury.  Hence, Alliance players are allowed to talk to each other because the amount of intra-Alliance trash talking that goes on is pretty damn low (if it exists at all), and is far outbalanced by "positive" conversation that happens along those channels.

However, if Horde and Alliance could talk to each other, the predominant form of communication that would go on would be trash talk and hate tells - either the winner gloating about winning, or the loser whining about losing and flinging cheater accusations.  Neither is condusive to fun, so they took it out.

Muting all players is not necessary toward this goal because not all players can kill one another (I know this is probably another one of your complaints), which means that not all players are trash talk targets for other players.  See first paragraph of this reponse for an explanation of why this is so.

Have I made this sufficiently clear?

[Ardent]

Anyone who was in Theed, Coronet, ...

Speaking of the lovely SWG, WoW will soon be implementing funny-pages-like dialog bubbles as well.

[Train Wreck]

Hence, Alliance players are allowed to talk to each other because the amount of intra-Alliance trash talking that goes on is pretty damn low (if it exists at all),

Oh, it exists, and is alive and well.

[Ardent]

Hence, Alliance players are allowed to talk to each other because the amount of intra-Alliance trash talking that goes on is pretty damn low (if it exists at all),

Oh, it exists, and is alive and well.

Official forums!

It burns! It burrrrrnnnnns!

[Train Wreck]

They're more amusing when you're not standing in the middle of the shit-fest.

As for me, it gives me a good idea of how these people are when I see them in-game for the first time.

[Ardent]

Requirements are as below.

-Minimum level of 58.

Heh. Tells you everything you need to know right there.

[Train Wreck]

I think Uthanak, a lvl 58 orc, said it best:

POWER GAMERS! Go back to your PvP servers!!

For some reason, it seems all the Alliance vrs Alliance trash talking has something to do with The Keepers of the Keg.  It's too bad they wasted such a fun and festivial name on a power-gaming guild.  That's my only beef with them though, as I my world consists of little more than Silverpine, werewolves, and bear adds.

[Paelos]

Wow, min 58 and must be on at these hours or have an excuse?

Officer: You've been neglecting the raid hours. You've missed the last two days in a row. What do you have to say for yourself?
Member: Uh, I went on vacation, with my family.
Officer: Family? That is unacceptable. We have to make sacrifices to the guild in order to achieve.
Member: Dude it's my family.
Officer: Nonsense, we are your family now. Report to your gaming station at 21:00 hours or suffer the consequences.
Member: Consequences? This is an online game. What are you going to do, thrash me on the forums?
Officer: I will not suffer your insubordination any longer. Your membership is terminated, effective immediately.
Member: What are you, 12? Get laid you freak.

[Calantus]

and bear adds.

Bears are KoS in Silverpine. Follow this and you will go well.

[Train Wreck]

Yes, and I spend all my time killing the stupid things.  Every fight I enter ALWAYS has at least one bear add.  They must multiply like rabbits.  Motherfuckers.

[Calantus]

I like to cast Shadow Word: Pain on rabbits in passing.

[WindupAtheist]

I know you're being deliberately obtuse, but it's because "trash talk" only really happens between people that are on different sides of the conflict.

So enemies can never speak, and all humans in WoW are the magical kind that never fight amongst themselves.  If you happen to like MMO Diablo 2, then good for you, but can anyone seriously claim this is an RPG?

not all players can kill one another (I know this is probably another one of your complaints

I am the biggest carebear on earth.

[Samwise]

I know you're being deliberately obtuse, but it's because "trash talk" only really happens between people that are on different sides of the conflict.

So enemies can never speak, and all humans in WoW are the magical kind that never fight amongst themselves.  If you happen to like MMO Diablo 2, then good for you, but can anyone seriously claim this is an RPG?

In other words, completely open PvP is a requirement for something to be considered an "RPG"?

[WindupAtheist]

Who the hell said anything about open-pvp?  Go read the thread again.

[Jayce]

Who the hell said anything about open-pvp?  Go read the thread again.

You did:

all humans in WoW are the magical kind that never fight amongst themselves.

That sounds like a complaint about the inability to fight amongst themselves to me.

can anyone seriously claim this is an RPG?

Yes.

[Ironwood]

I sense an imminent semantics argument on the horizon.

[Llava]

Wanna know why Blizzard put up RP servers when they game wasn't designed for RP?

Because the players demanded it.

Anyone remember how they originally weren't going to put up RP servers?  Then we got a huge petition from a ton of people, some wanting to roleplay and some wanting a safe haven from stupid names, asking for roleplaying servers.  Blizzard caved, but they weren't exactly going to redesign the game.

No, the game isn't great for RP.  I can't really come up with a decent backstory for a character and anything interesting that you could inject into the backstory just doesn't make sense in their world.  For example:  My guild has a Night Elf who was found abandoned near Ironforge and was raised by dwarves, thus expressing their mannerisms.  But if you read up on who the Night Elves are, where they come from, etc etc, that really just plain doesn't make sense.  Most Night Elves have been around since before Ironforge anyhow.

All I can do for my characters is come up with a general concept and just keep it to myself.  I can't express it in the game because I can't customize how my character looks or what he wears (EQUIPMENT DOES NOT EQUAL CHARACTER CUSTOMIZATION FFS, LOOK AT COH AND LEARN) and I can't really make a backstory that isn't just a slightly different version of the same crap we've heard a thousand times because the world doesn't allow for it.

The game's not designed for it, and Blizzard said it themselves in their reluctance to support RP servers.  If you manage to actually RP successfully in World of Warcraft, you're one of the best RPers in the world.  Not only are you handling it in the already handicapped MMOG environment, but you're doing it in a game that doesn't have any support for it except putting the letters "RP" next to a server's name.  And changing names, every now and then.  Though I still saw Drizztz last night, among other more offensive "joke" names.  Yes, you're very funny for including the world "douche" in your name.  I wonder why no one has thought of that before.

[WindupAtheist]

Remember this?  You numbered it as item five on our little list.

Allow guilds to declare war on one another, even if both belong to the same overall faction.

That was my only mention of a change to the PVP system.  Thank you.