I admire that you're trying to look at this as seriously as one who has never RPed before can, and it's only natural that faux pas can happen. As you've probably figured out now, names are a touchy subject in character. Just because the meta game has a name helpfully floating above the avatars' heads doesn't mean you know it out right. I tend to be more lenient about that, but one way to look at it is conversation fodder. Simply asking someone's name can lead into an interesting interaction.
One piece of advice I can offer that'll really help is to try to stick with the context of the game world. Read up on Alliance race lore-- heck, even ALL the lore if you're really into reading. There's tons of it available. That'll help ground you in the context of your character's settings. That's not to say your idea of being a member of a cannibal cult of one is bad per se, but it's kind of out there. Reign it in a little since you're a novice at this, and don't try to be so "unique" that you come off as a so-called loller. That's one of the tactics of people who really are making fun of RPers. They go waaaay overboard on purpose to try to get a negative reaction. Basically trolling for attention. I can see how maybe some of the people reacted the way they did because they thought you were trying to set them up "for the lulz", as they say.
I'll be interested in reading your next entry. Roleplay can really be enjoyable if you find people you're able to bounce off of on the fly. Some of my best times in WoW has been in the Pig & Whistle tavern in Old Town just rattling off stories and otherwise interacting with other people who really got into their characters. That was on Wymrest Accord, so your mileage may vary depending on the server.
"You'll never win an argument with an idiot because he is too stupid to recognize his own defeat." ~Anonymous
Awesome post. It really makes me want to get involved in my games more in terms of role playing and what I do in the worlds. What I really like was when you said that it made MMORPGs seem more social again, like how they are suppose to be. When people start mimicking real life anti-social practices in games( i.e. looking at the ground as they pass by without saying hi or even a smile, or even being able to look at anothers eyeballs walking by) I start to lose hope in the world. What's the point of the unconnected self-conciousness? I am guilty of it too though. We all make this world what is and the same goes for virtual worlds.
WoW imho was always very limited on RP and their most of the few that did RP only interact with a select few and only during certain days of the week it seemed. I strongly believe that Lotro has the largest and most friendly RP community out there, specificly on the Landroval server.
Yes but the point was... he got treated this way OOC... Not IC. A very big difference in my mind.
Right. The rule in RP is to always stay IC, even if somebody annoys you or if the person doesn't fit in your storyline. So the Goldshire taverners were the real rule-breakers here.
It's great that somebody just jumps in and starts playing his character. It would create more variation and perhaps diminish RP elitism if more players would do that.
(On my EU server Goldshire is the retard/cyber pit, and it's in fact the place where people are 'allowed' to jerk around and be OOC)
I am happy to say that I am half way through that article and I can tell you, it isn't easy.
In regards to the comments that I was roleplaying a "Dick" in fairness I am new to this- I have researched it to an extent and as pointed out in the article, I approached it with a layer of humour in attempt to partcipate. This doesn't come natrual to me, the sillyness is just my way of dealing with something alien to my personality like this.
So in researching something you instantly take the most extreme anti-social approach to bring about negative responses from people? Your silliness is extactly why you brought about a negative response. People like to RP because they like to get away create another person not themselves that can function in the society of the world they are playing it. Be it an eccentric collector or scholar that has to stop and read every book, a gold hungry halfling that tries to steal everything, an undead looking for redemption, an orc looking for a human lover even. But in then end while flawed they are acceptable into the game because they are understood. You played a mentally handicapped wizard with psycho-social attitudes that instantly will make people think you (the person behind the keyboard) are mocking them or you really are socially handicapped. It is like in a non-rp world making a priest and telling everyone that you will only tank. Instantly no one will like you or give you a chance unless they knew you in the real world.
Rp'ing, which is a failed experience in games, is not about creating the most extreme personality and making others accept it. Extreme personalities in the real world tend to live lonely lives, the same as it will be in the game. Instead make a character. Create a background. Give yourself a flaw and work from their. Most people do not go around talking about their flaws. Instead let others try to figure it out. If you are going to make a psycho character people are going to treat you like they would a psycho in the real world. Would you stay in the room with a person that admitted to killing and eating their parents to "gain their power"? Probably not.
RP is about escaping. It is usually not about being an ass. People think it is elitism because they can not come in with their extreme personalities that would never work in the real world and have people accept them. Instantly they say "those people are pricks." When in truth you were the prick trying to have fun at their expense even if you did not intend it.
I have to agree with Horusa on this one. Just because it wasn't meant as an insult doesn't mean it wasn't. You wouldn't dress like a hasidic jew on the first day you asked about judaism. And if you did, then the community would be right to question your sincerity.
The easiest way to roleplay is to imagine what YOU would do in that exact same situation. It's already tough enough putting yourself in the shoes of someone that see's Orcs and the Undead every day. If a zombie clawed his way up through your office floor right now you wouldn't roll a dice to see what happens. No, you'd either piss yourself or you'd take your chair and go to work on his face ... or both.
As a real human, you do the first. But as a roleplayer, you look past the dice (or the random number generator in the game) because its result is no longer what is important. What's important is that you just saw a zombie. That your friends are under attack. And you have tools you've learned to help defend them.
But the good news is that you've stumbled upon a fact very few mainstream players ever realize. Players make it a game. ROLE-Players make it a world. And if it isn't a world, even the 'typical' player will feel like it is missing something.
One thing that everyone needs to understand is, Rping isn't this basement dwellers, weird, adult playing make beleave thing. It is an art of story telling, an art of the imagination. It is the art of improvising, improvising and synchronizing your true tallent with anothers artist imagination. To me it's like people playing beautiful music together. Perfectly synchronizing improvized ideas from feeling and imagination. It is a skill and a gift. This guy going into a game like WoW and telling people a goblin told him to eat his parents and then writing a story about how he rp'ed is poor journalism. It's like him saying, "hey im going to try playing guitar and write about how i made music". You didn't make music, you just picked up a guitar, hit abunch of strings at random, and made very insulting noises.
I know im going to get alot of people talking crap about my post, but im going to say it because people need to know what real RP is.
I am happy to say that I am half way through that article and I can tell you, it isn't easy.
In regards to the comments that I was roleplaying a "Dick" in fairness I am new to this- I have researched it to an extent and as pointed out in the article, I approached it with a layer of humour in attempt to partcipate. This doesn't come natrual to me, the sillyness is just my way of dealing with something alien to my personality like this.
So in researching something you instantly take the most extreme anti-social approach to bring about negative responses from people? Your silliness is extactly why you brought about a negative response. People like to RP because they like to get away create another person not themselves that can function in the society of the world they are playing it. Be it an eccentric collector or scholar that has to stop and read every book, a gold hungry halfling that tries to steal everything, an undead looking for redemption, an orc looking for a human lover even. But in then end while flawed they are acceptable into the game because they are understood. You played a mentally handicapped wizard with psycho-social attitudes that instantly will make people think you (the person behind the keyboard) are mocking them or you really are socially handicapped. It is like in a non-rp world making a priest and telling everyone that you will only tank. Instantly no one will like you or give you a chance unless they knew you in the real world.
Rp'ing, which is a failed experience in games, is not about creating the most extreme personality and making others accept it. Extreme personalities in the real world tend to live lonely lives, the same as it will be in the game. Instead make a character. Create a background. Give yourself a flaw and work from their. Most people do not go around talking about their flaws. Instead let others try to figure it out. If you are going to make a psycho character people are going to treat you like they would a psycho in the real world. Would you stay in the room with a person that admitted to killing and eating their parents to "gain their power"? Probably not.
RP is about escaping. It is usually not about being an ass. People think it is elitism because they can not come in with their extreme personalities that would never work in the real world and have people accept them. Instantly they say "those people are pricks." When in truth you were the prick trying to have fun at their expense even if you did not intend it.
I have to agree with Horusa on this one. Just because it wasn't meant as an insult doesn't mean it wasn't. You wouldn't dress like a hasidic jew on the first day you asked about judaism. And if you did, then the community would be right to question your sincerity.
The easiest way to roleplay is to imagine what YOU would do in that exact same situation. It's already tough enough putting yourself in the shoes of someone that see's Orcs and the Undead every day. If a zombie clawed his way up through your office floor right now you wouldn't roll a dice to see what happens. No, you'd either piss yourself or you'd take your chair and go to work on his face ... or both.
As a real human, you do the first. But as a roleplayer, you look past the dice (or the random number generator in the game) because its result is no longer what is important. What's important is that you just saw a zombie. That your friends are under attack. And you have tools you've learned to help defend them.
But the good news is that you've stumbled upon a fact very few mainstream players ever realize. Players make it a game. ROLE-Players make it a world. And if it isn't a world, even the 'typical' player will feel like it is missing something.
That isn't RP, that is playing make beleave.
Rp must be much different today than it was from the days of Textbase MMOs. Maybe that's why people feel it is a joke nowadays..
In some ways you are more limited in your RP when the visual is provided. You have to work in the constraints of what you are given. There are only so many ways you can make your character look in modern MMO's and that look might not fit what you wanted. Also the roles are more defined and less flexible. Back in PnP games you could be a wizard with only illusion spells and be very kick ass if the game master or DM worked with you. You really can not do that in the constraints of games today.
Interesting to get a non RP-ers take on things. I have RPed a bit in WoW. Not much to be had, but the few times I got to, it was pretty fun. Had a great Forsaken Rogue that I never got to RP...
I have to agree with Horusa on this one. Just because it wasn't meant as an insult doesn't mean it wasn't. You wouldn't dress like a hasidic jew on the first day you asked about judaism. And if you did, then the community would be right to question your sincerity.
The easiest way to roleplay is to imagine what YOU would do in that exact same situation. It's already tough enough putting yourself in the shoes of someone that see's Orcs and the Undead every day. If a zombie clawed his way up through your office floor right now you wouldn't roll a dice to see what happens. No, you'd either piss yourself or you'd take your chair and go to work on his face ... or both.
As a real human, you do the first. But as a roleplayer, you look past the dice (or the random number generator in the game) because its result is no longer what is important. What's important is that you just saw a zombie. That your friends are under attack. And you have tools you've learned to help defend them.
But the good news is that you've stumbled upon a fact very few mainstream players ever realize. Players make it a game. ROLE-Players make it a world. And if it isn't a world, even the 'typical' player will feel like it is missing something.
That isn't RP, that is playing make beleave.
Rp must be much different today than it was from the days of Textbase MMOs. Maybe that's why people feel it is a joke nowadays..
In a MMORPG? Essentially, yes. When there's no dungeon master or set parameters that define a character's personality (stats like Charisma, Constitution, etc.), you pretty much have to play it off the cuff. I'd love to see a more structured RP environment in a MMORPG, but I just don't see how it'd be financially successful. A game needs to turn a profit, after all.
NWN persistant worlds are about as close as you can get to a Computer RPG experience that mimics the good old days of Pen & Paper.
"You'll never win an argument with an idiot because he is too stupid to recognize his own defeat." ~Anonymous
Wow's RP is a fleeting thing, on a server where the RP is good expect it to last a year before it starts to degrade, its worse now because of the "Ease of content" means people who previously would Play and Role play now have more to do when "Playing" so less time to spend Role playing.
I would agree with this statement. I have played WoW on RP server and is was alright for about six months, then it slowly turned into a OOC mess like any other normal server. I think part of the problem is WoW lore isn't that deep anyway, and the players who sub for the game long-term just end up playing it as a social kind of thing.
Originally posted by Horusra He got treated that way because no one took him seriously. He came off as someone making fun of RP and they treated like someone mocking it. Who goes around saying they ate their parents in real life without being locked up. Then he says he is going to start emailing the person about his "mental issues". He mocked the whole purpose of RP to create a realistic character that fits into the gaming world. Instead he created a dick personoa of extremes and then expected people to treat him in a realistic RP fashion. In the World of Warcraft setting if some guy said he killed and ate his parents because of a demon goblin....well quests in the game to kill people have been done for less. I would not give that kind of crap the time of day and I would treat him like crap for his percieved mocking of RP.
geeeeze!!!!! calm down horusra!!! first time rp'ers arent all knowing when it comes to the art of roleplay. and if you have read the online comic LFG then you know wow mentalities can be of that nature. ive tried rp'ing a few times and its hard as fuck to get into if you havent been doing it since you were 15 in your parents basement playing D&D. and myself and others usually do create kinda off kilter personalities for our toons when we do try to get into it. not to mock your precious rp'ing but to try to get ourselves into while still finding fun in the fact. so take your smug stick out of your ass and dont be such an elitest. especially in WOW, a demon goblin thing could make a mage eat his parents for power. hell i would!
I can concede that this is a first-time RPer, and as such would not know the niceties of such behaviour. But please be serious. Every example of interaction noted in the article is a prime example of someone acting like a giant dbag. Anyone who has played Warcraft, of any fantasy based game, should be well-aware that anyone that admits to doing the kinds of things Adam's character admits to, or even just throwing fireworks into someone's face, is going to be regarded as an unpleasant person. I had a character in WoW long ago. She was not righteous, really, but if she had encountered someone who claimed to have eaten their father at the behest of an imaginary (or invisible, such things are possible in WoW), I would have RPed extreme hatred and would probably have let fly more bile-laden comments that did the person Adam encountered.
If you say you are doing something in the name of journalism, perhaps you should understand that before you go undercover, or try to fit in with a group that already exists, you should do some research so that you have at least a base understanding of the concepts involved.
What you did, Adam, because you had no understanding of the RP world, was make yourself look like a moron or a jerk. And the fact that you say you enjoyed this so much makes me very concerned. This behaviour, and the results, have nothing to do with role-playing, and everything to do with you making a fool of yourself, deliberately.
Edit:
I thought I was done ranting, but apparently I am not. It is downright infuriating to me that someone that professes to love MMOs as much as Adam does (and thus we are to assume knows something about them), who actually writes in a relatively coherent way, and an Englishman to boot!, is so obviously and painfully ignorant of the most basic of precepts for an entire relatively large subset of the MMO playerbase. I am bursting at the bolts with this. I cannot fathom such ignorance. I have to hope this is an ill-conceived joke of soem kind on Adam's part.
Edit:
I have now read the thread through, and I have to say, Horusra is taking a much more moderated approach to the upbraiding than did I, and I agree with the points made.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it." Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
The best RP community is by far the one you find on Argent Dawn (EU). As with everything in WoW you will find a huge amount of kids who seem to think WoW is made is made for them solely but that realm has a lot of good RP guilds and many events.
If it ain't dead you're not pressing 2 hard enough.
He must have been on Wyrmrest, Wyrmrest Accord and Moon Guard are the only RP servers that are still alive (others fall apart from in fighting and big time leaders quiting) and Moon Guard is known for having lots of ERP'ers in Goldshire, which he would have no doubt commented on.
To anyone who does try RPing, if you go on Moon Guard, stay away from Goldshire and Stay away from the inns in Silvermoon, you'll get a bad experience.
Like many of the others, I hadn't seen that kind of thing in the RP servers I tried. Trade chat was just as bad as PvE servers, names and even guild names still broke the ToU shamelesslessy - they were a mess. I gave up on RPing in WoW.
Perhaps, though, I gave up to soon! Thanks for the article, I have a bit of new hope! Not that WoW is a great background to support RP, the lore doesn't hold together under much scrutiny. Of course, we have TV to train us not to expect a universe to make sense one episode to the next anyway, lol so that's not totally unlivable.
Have played: Everquest, Asheron's Call, Horizons, Everquest2, World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online, Warhammer, Age of Conan, Darkfall
I have to agree with Horusa on this one. Just because it wasn't meant as an insult doesn't mean it wasn't. You wouldn't dress like a hasidic jew on the first day you asked about judaism. And if you did, then the community would be right to question your sincerity.
The easiest way to roleplay is to imagine what YOU would do in that exact same situation. It's already tough enough putting yourself in the shoes of someone that see's Orcs and the Undead every day. If a zombie clawed his way up through your office floor right now you wouldn't roll a dice to see what happens. No, you'd either piss yourself or you'd take your chair and go to work on his face ... or both.
As a real human, you do the first. But as a roleplayer, you look past the dice (or the random number generator in the game) because its result is no longer what is important. What's important is that you just saw a zombie. That your friends are under attack. And you have tools you've learned to help defend them.
But the good news is that you've stumbled upon a fact very few mainstream players ever realize. Players make it a game. ROLE-Players make it a world. And if it isn't a world, even the 'typical' player will feel like it is missing something.
That isn't RP, that is playing make beleave.
Rp must be much different today than it was from the days of Textbase MMOs. Maybe that's why people feel it is a joke nowadays..
You, sir or madam, are a rather arrogant being to make such a statement. Roleplaying is not just your narrow-minded, rarified view of whatever you think it is.
As well as developing a broader concept of play style, perhaps you could also learn how to spell, if you want your opinion to be respected. The roleplayers I know do care about spelling, and if you cared a wit of the amount you intimate about the details of harmonic RP, you would too. I suspect though, all is the proverbial hot air, in your case.
Have played: Everquest, Asheron's Call, Horizons, Everquest2, World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online, Warhammer, Age of Conan, Darkfall
I play on PvP servers but I like a bit of RP (silly RP that is).
I once had good fun while sitting in the goldshire Inn... I pretended my butt was glued to the seat and any one who walked in and played along I would send them on a quest (I would make it up on the spot) to collect some ingredients to make a solven to unglue me. One guy I sent out and got some stormwind bree another I sent to westfall to get some eggs. It was a fun 30mins.
Now maybe these low level toons did it for the 1gold I promised them or maybe cus they thought it was cool.. I dont know.
I have to agree with Horusa on this one. Just because it wasn't meant as an insult doesn't mean it wasn't. You wouldn't dress like a hasidic jew on the first day you asked about judaism. And if you did, then the community would be right to question your sincerity.
The easiest way to roleplay is to imagine what YOU would do in that exact same situation. It's already tough enough putting yourself in the shoes of someone that see's Orcs and the Undead every day. If a zombie clawed his way up through your office floor right now you wouldn't roll a dice to see what happens. No, you'd either piss yourself or you'd take your chair and go to work on his face ... or both.
As a real human, you do the first. But as a roleplayer, you look past the dice (or the random number generator in the game) because its result is no longer what is important. What's important is that you just saw a zombie. That your friends are under attack. And you have tools you've learned to help defend them.
But the good news is that you've stumbled upon a fact very few mainstream players ever realize. Players make it a game. ROLE-Players make it a world. And if it isn't a world, even the 'typical' player will feel like it is missing something.
That isn't RP, that is playing make beleave.
Rp must be much different today than it was from the days of Textbase MMOs. Maybe that's why people feel it is a joke nowadays..
You, sir or madam, are a rather arrogant being to make such a statement. Roleplaying is not just your narrow-minded, rarified view of whatever you think it is.
As well as developing a broader concept of play style, perhaps you could also learn how to spell, if you want your opinion to be respected. The roleplayers I know do care about spelling, and if you cared a wit of the amount you intimate about the details of harmonic RP, you would too. I suspect though, all is the proverbial hot air, in your case.
Insulting me for misspelling and then making no sense.. My narrow-minded, rarified view of whatever i think? Well if you read my previous post to that (which i bet anything you didn't read) if YOU actually knew what rp was you would agree with it. Yes, children running around "OMG ZOMBIES ARE ATTACKING ME, HELP SWAT THEM OFF!!" is just playing make beleave. Role playing is playing the role of a charecter which usually follows with a story.
WOW is great for role playing. You can pretend you are not a 13 year old virgin who never has and never will see a girl naked.
You can pretend you have real life friends....and no skin problems. You can roleplay that you are not a chronic masterbator... and that you are not a loser.
Great role playing fun.
It's better to lurk in forums and be thought a fool...than to endlessly "Quote" and remove all doubts.
Comments
I admire that you're trying to look at this as seriously as one who has never RPed before can, and it's only natural that faux pas can happen. As you've probably figured out now, names are a touchy subject in character. Just because the meta game has a name helpfully floating above the avatars' heads doesn't mean you know it out right. I tend to be more lenient about that, but one way to look at it is conversation fodder. Simply asking someone's name can lead into an interesting interaction.
One piece of advice I can offer that'll really help is to try to stick with the context of the game world. Read up on Alliance race lore-- heck, even ALL the lore if you're really into reading. There's tons of it available. That'll help ground you in the context of your character's settings. That's not to say your idea of being a member of a cannibal cult of one is bad per se, but it's kind of out there. Reign it in a little since you're a novice at this, and don't try to be so "unique" that you come off as a so-called loller. That's one of the tactics of people who really are making fun of RPers. They go waaaay overboard on purpose to try to get a negative reaction. Basically trolling for attention. I can see how maybe some of the people reacted the way they did because they thought you were trying to set them up "for the lulz", as they say.
I'll be interested in reading your next entry. Roleplay can really be enjoyable if you find people you're able to bounce off of on the fly. Some of my best times in WoW has been in the Pig & Whistle tavern in Old Town just rattling off stories and otherwise interacting with other people who really got into their characters. That was on Wymrest Accord, so your mileage may vary depending on the server.
"You'll never win an argument with an idiot because he is too stupid to recognize his own defeat." ~Anonymous
Awesome post. It really makes me want to get involved in my games more in terms of role playing and what I do in the worlds. What I really like was when you said that it made MMORPGs seem more social again, like how they are suppose to be. When people start mimicking real life anti-social practices in games( i.e. looking at the ground as they pass by without saying hi or even a smile, or even being able to look at anothers eyeballs walking by) I start to lose hope in the world. What's the point of the unconnected self-conciousness? I am guilty of it too though. We all make this world what is and the same goes for virtual worlds.
WoW imho was always very limited on RP and their most of the few that did RP only interact with a select few and only during certain days of the week it seemed. I strongly believe that Lotro has the largest and most friendly RP community out there, specificly on the Landroval server.
Right. The rule in RP is to always stay IC, even if somebody annoys you or if the person doesn't fit in your storyline. So the Goldshire taverners were the real rule-breakers here.
It's great that somebody just jumps in and starts playing his character. It would create more variation and perhaps diminish RP elitism if more players would do that.
(On my EU server Goldshire is the retard/cyber pit, and it's in fact the place where people are 'allowed' to jerk around and be OOC)
So in researching something you instantly take the most extreme anti-social approach to bring about negative responses from people? Your silliness is extactly why you brought about a negative response. People like to RP because they like to get away create another person not themselves that can function in the society of the world they are playing it. Be it an eccentric collector or scholar that has to stop and read every book, a gold hungry halfling that tries to steal everything, an undead looking for redemption, an orc looking for a human lover even. But in then end while flawed they are acceptable into the game because they are understood. You played a mentally handicapped wizard with psycho-social attitudes that instantly will make people think you (the person behind the keyboard) are mocking them or you really are socially handicapped. It is like in a non-rp world making a priest and telling everyone that you will only tank. Instantly no one will like you or give you a chance unless they knew you in the real world.
Rp'ing, which is a failed experience in games, is not about creating the most extreme personality and making others accept it. Extreme personalities in the real world tend to live lonely lives, the same as it will be in the game. Instead make a character. Create a background. Give yourself a flaw and work from their. Most people do not go around talking about their flaws. Instead let others try to figure it out. If you are going to make a psycho character people are going to treat you like they would a psycho in the real world. Would you stay in the room with a person that admitted to killing and eating their parents to "gain their power"? Probably not.
RP is about escaping. It is usually not about being an ass. People think it is elitism because they can not come in with their extreme personalities that would never work in the real world and have people accept them. Instantly they say "those people are pricks." When in truth you were the prick trying to have fun at their expense even if you did not intend it.
I have to agree with Horusa on this one. Just because it wasn't meant as an insult doesn't mean it wasn't. You wouldn't dress like a hasidic jew on the first day you asked about judaism. And if you did, then the community would be right to question your sincerity.
The easiest way to roleplay is to imagine what YOU would do in that exact same situation. It's already tough enough putting yourself in the shoes of someone that see's Orcs and the Undead every day. If a zombie clawed his way up through your office floor right now you wouldn't roll a dice to see what happens. No, you'd either piss yourself or you'd take your chair and go to work on his face ... or both.
As a real human, you do the first. But as a roleplayer, you look past the dice (or the random number generator in the game) because its result is no longer what is important. What's important is that you just saw a zombie. That your friends are under attack. And you have tools you've learned to help defend them.
But the good news is that you've stumbled upon a fact very few mainstream players ever realize. Players make it a game. ROLE-Players make it a world. And if it isn't a world, even the 'typical' player will feel like it is missing something.
One thing that everyone needs to understand is, Rping isn't this basement dwellers, weird, adult playing make beleave thing. It is an art of story telling, an art of the imagination. It is the art of improvising, improvising and synchronizing your true tallent with anothers artist imagination. To me it's like people playing beautiful music together. Perfectly synchronizing improvized ideas from feeling and imagination. It is a skill and a gift. This guy going into a game like WoW and telling people a goblin told him to eat his parents and then writing a story about how he rp'ed is poor journalism. It's like him saying, "hey im going to try playing guitar and write about how i made music". You didn't make music, you just picked up a guitar, hit abunch of strings at random, and made very insulting noises.
I know im going to get alot of people talking crap about my post, but im going to say it because people need to know what real RP is.
Well said.
That isn't RP, that is playing make beleave.
Rp must be much different today than it was from the days of Textbase MMOs. Maybe that's why people feel it is a joke nowadays..
In some ways you are more limited in your RP when the visual is provided. You have to work in the constraints of what you are given. There are only so many ways you can make your character look in modern MMO's and that look might not fit what you wanted. Also the roles are more defined and less flexible. Back in PnP games you could be a wizard with only illusion spells and be very kick ass if the game master or DM worked with you. You really can not do that in the constraints of games today.
What server? I dont see a Trevorr on any RP server, Maybe he deleted?
Interesting to get a non RP-ers take on things. I have RPed a bit in WoW. Not much to be had, but the few times I got to, it was pretty fun. Had a great Forsaken Rogue that I never got to RP...
In a MMORPG? Essentially, yes. When there's no dungeon master or set parameters that define a character's personality (stats like Charisma, Constitution, etc.), you pretty much have to play it off the cuff. I'd love to see a more structured RP environment in a MMORPG, but I just don't see how it'd be financially successful. A game needs to turn a profit, after all.
NWN persistant worlds are about as close as you can get to a Computer RPG experience that mimics the good old days of Pen & Paper.
"You'll never win an argument with an idiot because he is too stupid to recognize his own defeat." ~Anonymous
I would agree with this statement. I have played WoW on RP server and is was alright for about six months, then it slowly turned into a OOC mess like any other normal server. I think part of the problem is WoW lore isn't that deep anyway, and the players who sub for the game long-term just end up playing it as a social kind of thing.
Glad you tried RP. I've wanted to but the intimidation factor of either standing there going ahhhhh or getting told to GTFO, has made me not try.
Look forward to reading more.
Proud member of Hammerfist Clan Gaming Community.
Currently playing: RIFT, EQ2, WoW, LoTRO
Retired: Warhammer, AoC, EQ
Waiting: SWToR & GW2
/signed
People are pretty funny, aren't they?
I can concede that this is a first-time RPer, and as such would not know the niceties of such behaviour. But please be serious. Every example of interaction noted in the article is a prime example of someone acting like a giant dbag. Anyone who has played Warcraft, of any fantasy based game, should be well-aware that anyone that admits to doing the kinds of things Adam's character admits to, or even just throwing fireworks into someone's face, is going to be regarded as an unpleasant person. I had a character in WoW long ago. She was not righteous, really, but if she had encountered someone who claimed to have eaten their father at the behest of an imaginary (or invisible, such things are possible in WoW), I would have RPed extreme hatred and would probably have let fly more bile-laden comments that did the person Adam encountered.
If you say you are doing something in the name of journalism, perhaps you should understand that before you go undercover, or try to fit in with a group that already exists, you should do some research so that you have at least a base understanding of the concepts involved.
What you did, Adam, because you had no understanding of the RP world, was make yourself look like a moron or a jerk. And the fact that you say you enjoyed this so much makes me very concerned. This behaviour, and the results, have nothing to do with role-playing, and everything to do with you making a fool of yourself, deliberately.
Edit:
I thought I was done ranting, but apparently I am not. It is downright infuriating to me that someone that professes to love MMOs as much as Adam does (and thus we are to assume knows something about them), who actually writes in a relatively coherent way, and an Englishman to boot!, is so obviously and painfully ignorant of the most basic of precepts for an entire relatively large subset of the MMO playerbase. I am bursting at the bolts with this. I cannot fathom such ignorance. I have to hope this is an ill-conceived joke of soem kind on Adam's part.
Edit:
I have now read the thread through, and I have to say, Horusra is taking a much more moderated approach to the upbraiding than did I, and I agree with the points made.
"Gamers will no longer buy the argument that every MMO requires a subscription fee to offset server and bandwidth costs. It's not true you know it, and they know it." Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet, 2007
WTF? No subscription fee?
The best RP community is by far the one you find on Argent Dawn (EU). As with everything in WoW you will find a huge amount of kids who seem to think WoW is made is made for them solely but that realm has a lot of good RP guilds and many events.
If it ain't dead you're not pressing 2 hard enough.
Well at least the OP isn't trying to speak middle english with his RP!
He must have been on Wyrmrest, Wyrmrest Accord and Moon Guard are the only RP servers that are still alive (others fall apart from in fighting and big time leaders quiting) and Moon Guard is known for having lots of ERP'ers in Goldshire, which he would have no doubt commented on.
To anyone who does try RPing, if you go on Moon Guard, stay away from Goldshire and Stay away from the inns in Silvermoon, you'll get a bad experience.
Like many of the others, I hadn't seen that kind of thing in the RP servers I tried. Trade chat was just as bad as PvE servers, names and even guild names still broke the ToU shamelesslessy - they were a mess. I gave up on RPing in WoW.
Perhaps, though, I gave up to soon! Thanks for the article, I have a bit of new hope! Not that WoW is a great background to support RP, the lore doesn't hold together under much scrutiny. Of course, we have TV to train us not to expect a universe to make sense one episode to the next anyway, lol so that's not totally unlivable.
Have played: Everquest, Asheron's Call, Horizons, Everquest2, World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online, Warhammer, Age of Conan, Darkfall
Have played: Everquest, Asheron's Call, Horizons, Everquest2, World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online, Warhammer, Age of Conan, Darkfall
I play on PvP servers but I like a bit of RP (silly RP that is).
I once had good fun while sitting in the goldshire Inn... I pretended my butt was glued to the seat and any one who walked in and played along I would send them on a quest (I would make it up on the spot) to collect some ingredients to make a solven to unglue me. One guy I sent out and got some stormwind bree another I sent to westfall to get some eggs. It was a fun 30mins.
Now maybe these low level toons did it for the 1gold I promised them or maybe cus they thought it was cool.. I dont know.
Insulting me for misspelling and then making no sense.. My narrow-minded, rarified view of whatever i think? Well if you read my previous post to that (which i bet anything you didn't read) if YOU actually knew what rp was you would agree with it. Yes, children running around "OMG ZOMBIES ARE ATTACKING ME, HELP SWAT THEM OFF!!" is just playing make beleave. Role playing is playing the role of a charecter which usually follows with a story.
WOW is great for role playing. You can pretend you are not a 13 year old virgin who never has and never will see a girl naked.
You can pretend you have real life friends....and no skin problems. You can roleplay that you are not a chronic masterbator... and that you are not a loser.
Great role playing fun.
It's better to lurk in forums and be thought a fool...than to endlessly "Quote" and remove all doubts.