The state of roleplaying in Ryzom

[jamela]

I've long meant to start a thread about the metachannels, myself. I cringe every time someone calls for more channels, remembering several brief weeks in EQ2 where dozens of players constantly mill silently around each other on the streets of Freeport, the silence only broken by inane NPC chatter.

Ryzom is far more vibrant in around and region channels, with only a fraction of the number of people. This spreads some consistency in the way we all see our virtual world, while I've the impression that roleplay only in private channels creates little pockets of people with some surprising notions I think it's great to stop and chat in around, in natural language, when I bump into someone. I swear the torbaks do too, it must be like a fluorescent "Special Offer" sign popping up above the herd of boring yelks.

I'm not sure people have much problem with light and strong strengths of rp. I think what can make someone ... okay, me ... feel uncomfortable is when another player's vision of Atys seems different to my own, especially the parts that are purely imaginary since they may not have a place at all in my Atys.

I think a lot of GM events have suffered with a combination of two problems - purely imaginary bits, and an inconsistency with a generally accepted view of Ryzom, not that I would try to pin down just what that is Touting a character as an important and significant person, though, when they are almost never seen about town or hunting or digging, is a major inconsistency with our world view.

[ladattas]

I have to agree that RP is a hard thing to implement in any MMO, even Ryzom. The biggest hurdle isn't the game mechanic, such as communications and such, but rather what individuals feel a need to do. Thus, you can have it the most RP-enforced server with no tells, regional channels, or the freedom to invoke OOC references if players don't want to RP they won't RP. Personally, I think it would be more interesting to have metachannels restricted in their range, like the group channel, not for RP purposes but simply for command and control purposes. Like, why does a down'n'out player, recently killed in combat, really need to be spammed with group leader orders? I think RP will come naturally as the chat system becomes more flexible with more features, not necessarily more channels.

-- Bridget

[petej]

Edit: Hell, I spent 2 full days mapping every single mission mat in Fleeting Garden.

In addition, as comprehensive and useful as BM is, I would say they have barely scratched the surface on Atysian knowledge.

Would realy like to see your FG mission mat map , I like tracking myself but theres no way im gonna do every mission mat in every Region

Agreed thats why sharing through a site like BM is usefull there realy is an awfull lot out there

[marct]

Would realy like to see your FG mission mat map , I like tracking myself but theres no way im gonna do every mission mat in every Region

No tracking for mission mats. This was the old green flash method. You could have followed me all the way through FG by following the green bubble trail.

Sadly, this is all just map markers atm. I will need to convert it to a map sometime. I have all the Nexus mission mat locations, but never bothered to write down the types at each location.


No enough offtopic.

RP, it's hard to stay in character, and starting out, it is sometimes more work than fun.

[kostika]

4) GM events. While they are good to bring people together they aren't very interactive. There has been events that I thought was scripted. I think that's why kitin fight events have such a good name, the players feel included in the event.

It would be kinda hard to run an event without scripting. Me and my guild have run several events. Ya gotta script to some extent or you're gonna make a mess of things. It's a necessary evil.

But that said I don't think just the invasions are interactive. I personally like the escort missions and the rumours of late. I think that involves me to the extent that I can be involved. Of course I can't be in the crpted bits for various reasons, but I get to interact and do what I can as a player to be involved, and I like that.

As to the RP thing...I do with I can when I can. I'm notorious for faling outta character. But in general I try to keep my comments in context to the world at least so they can include both RPs and non-RPs. I think alot of others do the same, even if they don't realise it.

[cloudy97]

Scripted, maybe it's me using the wrong word. I mean like in 'automatted'. Naturally they write the lines before.

I remember when the Guild of Elias was announcing its view on the temple wars. After the disappointing statement many neutrals raised their voices asking questions. But they marched out, ignoring all questions.

Lately, the events have improved. I agree

[katriell]

GM events: I think the problem with "scripted" or "non-interactive" events may be that the event team (or whoever controls the PNPCs (played NPCs ) ) is not very adaptible. I would suggest to them that they get to know the character(s) they control and roleplay them more dynamically. This would allow them to answer questions and such within the context of the character, and improve event attendees' impression of the interactiveness of the event and the depth of the characters involved.

Again I wish we had the option of GUILD-IC and GUILD-OOC channels. Currently it's more or less an all-or-nothing situation for a High-RP guild: either everyone roleplays or no one roleplays. You can't have an immersive, RP-supportive guild chat with half the members RPing and half not. But once the guild is High-RP, you might still wish non- or semi-RPers could exist non-disruptively in the guild. Non-RPers could chat away in the GUILD-OOC channel. RPers in non-RP guilds could also use their guild's GUILD-IC channel to RP without interruption by OOCness. And semi-RP guilds who don't use brackets could RP within their guild chat without confusion as to what's IC and what's OOC. However, this might have an interesting impact on the meaning of RP-stance, if every guild had the potential for a high but more or less limited level of RP. I guess then it would just depend on how much they use their GUILD-IC channel, how many RPers are members of the guild, whether they have RP events, etc.

Ok...ran off on a bit of a tangent for a while...

Metachannels: I don't mind the long-distance/private channels. They don't break my immersion at all because I know there's a perfectly acceptible IC excuse for them. However, I have had some very nice experiences with spontaneous, public RP sessions. For example, starting to RP in Around in a public place with one or two friends. A passerby or two joins in, and I contact other RPers and let them know there's RP going on at <place>. Pretty soon you have some really fun RP going on which anyone can join in.
So in conclusion I don't think there's any problem with the "metachannels" themselves. As with most things, I think it's just a problem of how people use them. Every RPer is perfectly capable of taking the RP into public...they just don't exercise this capability as often as they maybe should.

As for the overall state of RP in Ryzom, I think it's a wonderful game for RPing in. Such a deep, complex and intriguing world. And dynamic. Though people who don't RP might not get to see as much of that dynamic as people who do. Some of the dynamic is in relatively small things: political, economic, and social fluctuations can be caused/triggered/controlled by the actions of a few, for example. And things like this, you have to be able to see the big picture (and be able to appreciate how each individual can/does affect it) to see.

Though the subject of "olde English" and similar vocabulary hasn't really come up in this thread, I'd like to comment on it. I've seen some very interesting "accents" used by different characters. Fyros that use a kind of chopped-up, almost pirate-ish vocabulary and accent...Trykers that use something similar but different...a mute Zoraï...and recently another Zoraï who seems to speak in a partial old Zoraï dialect. Anyway, I don't know "olde English" and I don't know thou from thee from thy. It would probably be appropriate for a very Matis character. Language/vocabulary doesn't need to be overly modern in a science fiction setting - look at Teal'C and other Jaffa on Stargate SG-1...
Most of my characters are from the old lands, so I assume the chaos of post-civilization nomadic existences would result in a blurring of racial accents, and perhaps for a Matis a vocabulary lessened from the aristocratic and formal "olde English"-type they might once have used. This is how I've RPed Jelathnia and her sister - they have decent but informal vocabulary. Their parents taught them what was necessary for more or less eloquent communication. But they were not taught traditional Matis grammatical formality and frills. The resulting speech and vocabulary tendencies used by Jel and Kasarinia are fairly modern.

[petej]

I remember when the Guild of Elias was announcing its view on the temple wars. After the disappointing statement many neutrals raised their voices asking questions. But they marched out, ignoring all questions.

I realy hate events like that , if they run them as if im not there im going to make that happen for them

[apb47]

1) Personally, I sort of role play. My char has a personality, so close to my own as to be indistinguishable, I suppose - appart from his like of grubbing around in mud and killing stuff . I don't really have a back story, but then again, no-one's ever asked me for it. If they care more about killing the gingo that is eating them, and how much skill I have at constructing things than a tale of my youth, I don't dissappoint them.
And then, it gets tricky when you only part-RP. You want to find out things about a person (eg, which country they are from -> will their play times match the rest of the guild) and if they answer IC, you get nowhere. OOC, and they don't expect you to start IC. Had two simultaneous conversations with someone the other day, one IC, the other OOC. slightly muddled by the end though.
But as others say, if someone talks IC with me, I'll talk IC back.

2) Have to use them to talk to friends unless hunting/digging/whatever with them. Though yes, this can make the world seem a bit quiet, I couldn't cope without them.

3) My name is Merc, and I...I...I'm a BM site user.
Especially lately - I've had not much time ingame, and wanting specific materials in specific lands. Grinding, and didn't want a huge trek to and from the tps, so I used it to find where to go dig. Mind you, once I found out the spot it gave me in PR was under an aggro spawn, I wandered off to find my own mats. I do agree that it can be abused by the new people, but only if we older ones keep mentioning that it's there!

4) Again, due to time, I've not been to the recent GM events. Been to some I've liked, but found a bit odd. Agree that it's hard to want to find the killer of someone important when you've no idea who they were and you are just wondering where you left your mek...
Whilst they are scripted, and need to be, I managed to get one of the event team to wander far enough away from the safe, cosy existence of their scriptland that they eventually broke RP to concede that they'd just told me a giant whopper, which we both found out due to other things happening that blatantly contradicted it. Mind you, that was a while back during a murder at a fyros party (iirc).

hmm, strange. when it's late, I just can't seem to stop writing. Must stop...must stop...must st

[katriell]

And then, it gets tricky when you only part-RP. You want to find out things about a person (eg, which country they are from -> will their play times match the rest of the guild) and if they answer IC, you get nowhere. OOC, and they don't expect you to start IC. Had two simultaneous conversations with someone the other day, one IC, the other OOC. slightly muddled by the end though.

This is why I think putting [brackets] or (parentheses) around OOC chat (or IC chat if you are usually OOC) is very useful and helpful...leaves no room for confusion.