Comments on: Promoting Roleplaying (hopefully!)

by: nass

Wed, 26 Mar 2008 16:25:55 +0000

Fascinating read, Matt. It’s a problem I actually often grapple with on my MUD - we have a set of guy who run the roleplay department. Whenever they say they want to get “stricter” because it’ll make for “better” roleplay I use the line “there are no RPIs that regularly hit more than 100 players online simultaneously”.

I think you’ve hit on the right answer though, manpower. In my experience, what the roleplayer wants above all is attention, and that usually involves admins acting out parts and/or tinyplots and/or making objects to run those and so on… all of which takes manpower.

Titles and names are also a problem - your non roleplayer might be attached to some name that’s clearly “inappropriate” but this upsets the purist roleplayer. I’ve lost count of the number of times that I’ve thrashed over this one, both defending it and attacking it.

Nass

by: Matt

Fri, 12 Jan 2007 21:02:37 +0000

Well, we do have rules about OOC titles. Sexy Pants isn’t an OOC title though. It’s just a silly one. Sugar Ninja would be OOC insofar as there are no Ninjas.

The problem is that silly to one person is fun to another.

by: crashaddict

Fri, 12 Jan 2007 20:58:47 +0000

IMHO, Matt, I think it is entirely feasible to expect something more from your players. Sure, they are paying customers and you want to keep them happy. But I don’t think it is RP Nazi of you at all to tell someone not to have a silly ooc title. Personally I think it’s only going to make it worse for you in the long run if you don’t enforce some sort of standards.

Even just having your guild patrons encouraging their members not to have those kinds of titles would take it a step in the right direction. You’re not forcing it on them, just suggesting it.

by: Matt

Fri, 12 Jan 2007 19:26:44 +0000

That’s not really feasible unfortunately. We’re not going to be in the business of playing RP nazi. It just doesn’t work past a very small online population (note that there are no RPIs that regularly hit more than 100 players online simultaneously).

by: Larkin

Fri, 12 Jan 2007 19:19:22 +0000

If someone gets mad because you don’t want them titling themselves “Sugar Ninja” or “Sexy Pants” (or a whole host of similar such titles), you don’t want them in your ROLEPLAYING game! I’d even go so far as to remove titles of Lord/Lady/Sir/etc from people who are NOT Lords/Ladies/Knights/etc. I earned the right to the title!

by: Anonymous Mudder

Fri, 12 Jan 2007 18:10:55 +0000

Here’s a good place to start with encouraging better role play: ban idiotic titles like Sugar Ninja and Sexy Pants or whatever else the player base comes up with. Sure, it will make a lot of people mad at first, but it will be SO much better for the game’s atmosphere. Write a post in Announce or Public news stating that THIS IS A ROLE PLAYING GAME, NOT A CHAT ROOM. YOU SHOULD FEEL LIKE AN IDIOT FOR HAVING THE TITLE OF “SEXY HOT STUFF.” Then, have someone (*cough* the RP Producers you’re hiring) go and smack around said anti-RPers, shoving some sort of help scroll in their faces explaining what a RPG is, since they obviously have no idea that Achaea is supposed to have RP, or even that it’s a game.

IRE has the best MUDs available, and it’s a shame to see Achaea in this state.

by: MiniWuffy

Tue, 09 Jan 2007 23:54:14 +0000

Know what’d drastically decrease the amount of, um, un-RPing? No loitering in the Ivy-covered Archway to Minia…. I occasionally travel there and hear people talking as if they were in an IM conversation, that totally ruins the mood. :’(

by: Larkin

Mon, 08 Jan 2007 19:40:02 +0000

I left Achaea because the playerbase was growing more and more immature, partially because roleplaying wasn’t very well encouraged (and partially because any game of this size is bound to start bringing in its share of troublemakers). However, I also saw the environment in Achaea as lacking in substance in several areas. When you have people asking why Maim smokes cigarettes in a medieval fantasy world or why the names and histories of many characters and areas seem to be taken straight out of other works of history and fiction, you have a problem on your hands.

I hope your experiment with these new hires works well. I’d like to see Achaea head in a positive direction and become a great roleplaying game once again.

by: Ronald Watts

Mon, 08 Jan 2007 08:03:29 +0000

That’s pretty cool. Might dust off the old fart over there and see if I can get back into playing. Let’s see.. He’s 227 now! Aww, and my Blue Cord of Wisdom decayed

by: Laotsu

Mon, 08 Jan 2007 05:59:45 +0000

This makes me very, very happy. While in the end the respnsibility for roleplaying falls upon the players, this will hopefully provide some encouragment to those who don’t roleplay much. And it ought to provide some fun events for those of us who do. Very well done Matt!!