Wanted: RolePlayers! Have you seen them?

Discussion in 'Roleplayer's Corner' started by Fei Akhart, Sep 28, 2019.

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  1. Fei Akhart

    Fei Akhart Avatar

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    Hello, guys!

    Although I have already made a similar topic to this one a year ago (this one), one thing I noticed is that it has become rare to find new RPlayers in SotA (and even the list of this other topic seems to be quite outdated).

    One of my big questions is how many active RPlayers we are currently in SotA, regardless of RP light or heavy.

    Do you know (or do) periodic Roleplayer group meetings to do RP (regardless of style)?

    Are you a lone RPlayer who can't find other people to do RP (because they don't know each other or because of different time zones)?

    Would you, as an RPlayer, wish you had a fixed time to try to interact with other players and thus develop the character stories?

    Do you want to do or are curious about RP and don't know how?

    I don't know exactly how many we are today, but I think it would be interesting to have some kind of meeting (IC or OOC) between all of us to think about future possibilities and maybe increase the interactions between "isolated" groups at SotA.

    If you can help me with these questions and try to bring up a discussion about the "SotA RP environment" it would be amazing and we can create new possibilities together. ;)
     
  2. Trinity

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    I discovered RP with the Black Sails Story with @Boris Mondragon and @CatherineRose among others.
    (I was a RP newbie before this event)

    One thing that is hindering this type of RP is the lack of the 'promised' --- 'Group on Group' or raid groups. It seemed it was going to be done immediately but has never materialized. Large RP groups in PVP combat was/is a disaster under the current 8 limit to a group. We ended up killing each other since everyone not in our party was flagged as enemy even with them on our team.

    Lately a change at my job has kept me from being very active in SOTA and I'm not able to RP much.
    This is just my 2c but don't base anything on my situation since being able to play more is likely far off for me.
     
  3. Boris Mondragon

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    We had something great going a while back and as @Trinity said the party limit size became the main detractor of the large battles we held to culminate an RP story on the boards. It was promised then avoided altogether. I gave up on RP and just stick to farming The Rise and selling in game gold from the proceeds. What we did was a successor to the Portalarium backed Travian Games RP that ended with the battle of Aerie back in October 2017. Perhaps one day they will see the mistake they have made by ignoring our request and then I may return to RP to stage something on a grand scale. In the meantime, "Fair Winds and Following sSeas" from a former RPer. R/Boris/El Pirata.
     
  4. Fiero Nord

    Fiero Nord Archived Account

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    I'm still down for some RP, but it always seems to be happening too late at night for me, or during my weekend naps. Neither of my characters is into fighting of any sort, so that seems to rule out quite a few RP opportunities for me. I do miss the tavern nights, and would like to see some more of these set times/days that are open drop-in RP.
     
  5. Bedawyn

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    I think of my characters all as RP characters, though I don't do much social roleplay. I AM roleplaying as I make my in-game choices, but as an Aspie on a laptop, neither my nerves nor my computer can handle being in real-time situations with a bunch of other avatars. I'm perfectly happy to participate in RP that doesn't require real-time interaction.

    Honestly, I'm most interested in building/decorating roleplay locations for others to enjoy, but I don't have the wealth in-game yet to do much of that. In the meantime, what I want most re: RP is simply for people who interact me with in-game to interact with the character immersively, not with the OOC person behind the keyboard. That seems to be a lost cause, though.

    The other problem I've run into, that has caused me to hold back on being more public with my characters (I put one up on RPOTA, but only one), is that my Perennial Coast family is firmly woven into a backstory that I developed while I was playing offline, only to find out when I came online, that they share a surname with one of the game's big backers. I changed their company name, but can't bring myself to change their family name. But I also don't want people to think my characters are hers, or trying to hang on her coattails. And the Aspie thing makes it very hard for me to resolve this.

    Because I've been splitting my time between multiple characters, they're also still all pretty low level, and I haven't wanted to do much roleplay with them until they were more firmly established. Haven't even got decent clothes for most of them yet, so I don't really want them seen in public! But just this past month, I've got all their houses finally established, so that should start to change soon. On the other hand, I'm also still learning the lore of this world, and trying to restrain my imagination before I go creating any more backstory that's going to be jossed when I learn more. I've already got a personal backstory for Ardoris that probably doesn't match the devs' ... which is fine as long as it's only in my head, but could cause problems if I share it with others (or when I find out the devs' version).

    As for meeting -- I've thought about hosting a monthly IC social thing in Ardoris for Perennial Coast roleplayers, but the problems I mentioned above would all interfere (as well as the health issues I'm dealing with). I'd also be happy to attend an OOC planning-coordination thing, as long as it wasn't crowded enough to crash my computer. Also happy to help with coordination/story planning for others, in settings where my own characters wouldn't have a role, or to play minor supporting roles when appropriate.

    My definition of roleplay has only three required ingredients: imagination, one person, and a situation that might be influenced/controlled by either another person or by a computer. Anything else is extra. So I'm not sure why people think RAIDs are essential. :)
     
  6. Trinity

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    I'm sorry for your condition (Aspie).
    The beauty of SOTA is that you can play alone or with a group and still have fun.
    It is unfortunate you were not part of Black Sails RP story.
    90% of it was writing the story on the forum RP without in game actions.
    There were battles and planned meetups but it was not a requirement to participate.
    Many of those involved did not participate in any battles or even in game.
    Others only participated in the in game battles and events and never wrote a single word.
    I was a RP virgin and found it was very enjoyable.

    I'm sure that RP can be with one person, but 'sharing' the experience with others doubles the enjoyment.

    RAID's are not essential to RP.
    Most of Black Sails was written on the forum and not in game RP.

    In the Black Sails RP the storyline was about the conflict between Pirates and Obsidians. The storyline of this conflict naturally led to battles and encounters with each group. Although in game battles were not essential, they were a lot of fun for anyone that wanted to participate but was not required.

    [OCC]
    The Raid Groups promise was from a deficiency in the mechanics of SOTA pvp fights. We are only allowed to have 8 members in a party that can battle other 8 group parties. In Black Sails the groups were 20 and 30 avatars on each side. This resulted in a lot of 'friendly fire' killings since we could not easily know who was on our side of the conflict. The problem had very little to do with the storyline but just a mechanic that made the in game battles difficult.

    I do not mean to derail this thread so I think I've said enough on this topic.
    Back to the purpose of the thread which was to discover the interest in RP from SOTA avatars.
     
    Last edited: Sep 29, 2019
  7. kaeshiva

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    I don't see the combat/raid/group limitation thing as a significant impediment to RP - Roleplayers will typically "find a way." As has been mentioned, the story/character development often happens outside of the combat space completely.

    I've only had occasion to see a 'few' spontaneous roleplaying things happen in Sota: a guildmeeting held "in character" where everyone "attended court" , or running into a stranger who kept the conversation in character.

    I'd absolutely love to see more opportunities, but @Fei Akhart I'll tell you what the biggest barriers are, at least for me:
    • Protocols - should all RP be local chat/emotes? How to handle out of character statements? Most RP communities have some sort of protocol, like typing things in brackets or somesuch. Usually you can feel your way through this but in a one-on-one encounter it can be difficult to know what's appropriate.
    • Immersion shattering / what does RP mean to different folks? - once, someone wanted to buy something from me, and whispered he'd come to my shop and we could 'roleplay' the interaction, negotiating/haggling etc. I thought okay, cool that sounds fun. Then he showed up and after saying "hail shopkeeper", quickly dropped out of character and started asking me about what stats different armor types gave and the conversation quickly just became a normal conversation. I think he squeezed a few emotes in. To me, that doesn't really constitute roleplay. And that is where we run into a problem: RP (clearly) means different things to different people. Some people think talking in local and doing emotes while discussing some RL sports team is okay. And others think that if you are RPing, you should limit conversation to things your -character- would know and experience.
    • Story-shaping. In RP communities of old, through a web of interactions, held entirely in character, great plots and stories would emerge. I'm talking back before we actually had a 3d visual simulator sandbox tool but back when it was all text. I would love to be a part of something THAT epic, but often things interfere and its hard to remain serious.
    I've kind of had to be satisfied with light/playful RP which most people just smile and nod at, occasionally a few people play along, but mostly people ignore and carry on with their business. If there is a strong community of serious roleplayers here I'd love to take part, and I mean this as no disrespect to roleplayers, but most of the time when I go to do these things it is people sat around playing instruments just chatting about the weather. That wasn't doing it for me - if there's RP stuff going on that is more long-term/indepth - count me in.
     
  8. Vicious Malice

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    I'm a heavy evil roleplayer. That is why I do not play Shroud much anymore. It is lonely on the evil side. There is a handfull of goody-two-shoes that are roleplaying with each other. They are many, I am alone. Not a good basis for interaction.

    That is to say: I enjoyed our short interactions while they lasted. The storyline in Kahli was epic and a great way for my character to participate. I will never forget the battle we all fought the day Kala Sharee escaped from his prison, and how surprised I was at seeing Fei and a few others of these people join the dark side, even if just for the purpose of that battle. Sadly, at some point it all seemed to vanish into oblivion, or if the storyline is going on, I am not involved anymore.

    I also enjoyed the short interaction I had with Boris Mondragon in the context of his storyline, but sadly I didn't find a good way to get involved in it.

    What was both great and full of headaches was Cerus' Obsidian plot last autumn. As much as I enjoyed that big RPvP event and my involvement in that, it was hard to even organize a party of "evil guys". We filled the ranks with non-RPers that were willing to do some very low level RP for the sake of the event. For me, personally, as the player of a dark/evil character, it was a little frustrating to feel forced to lose just because a pre-written story script said so. I hope such events will happen again in the future. I also hope that then there will be more flexibility on the part of the story master.

    The other thing why I am not playing much anymore is the high PvP threshold. No use getting into that discussion anymore, but I'd just like to say that I don't enjoy PvE and therefore have trouble achieving a high enough level to have any small chance of success in what I really enjoy doing.

    I would start playing again if there were plots that have room for darker characters where they are not forced into an NPC-role that is bound to lose in the end.

    I as a player don't enjoy light/casual/social RP, and my character is something of a sociopath, so dance party/fishing event RP doesn't work for me. Elijah's tavern nights were a nice platform for me, even if they sometimes yielded no RP due to the way my character avoids mingling with the jolly crowd. I miss these events.
     
    Last edited: Sep 29, 2019
  9. Fei Akhart

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    From what I read from some answers, we have issues related to the game system itself (lack of Raid or PvP balance). That would be something we could not fix with our efforts, as it will depend on Portalarium.

    Nonetheless, I imagine that at least people who have responded this thread still have an interest in RP, otherwise they would not mind reading and responding.
    And even with the game's system issues, I still see great opportunities for interactions to "not let RP in SotA die."

    I participated in epic ingame RPs (like what @Vicious Malice quoted in Kahli for example), which didn't necessarily depend on the game system. I was able to create something a few months ago using the dungeon system that everyone involved enjoyed. @Lily Byrd recently did the same in a quest where you can easily roleplay with other rplayers because of the story.

    Forum RPs are also very interesting (and I must say I don't actively participate because English isn't my native language), but, in my opinion, it gets much nicer when merged with RP ingame too (and I've seen big RPs plots come up that way).

    @kaeshiva , what you said is exactly one of the points I am looking to bring with this topic too: Story-shaping. We may even start talking in a tavern, but this will lead to plots that will create much more complex stories later. Some people in Kahli already do this, but we are always looking for more people who have this desire as well.

    And Malice has brought up an excellent point for discussion too: It's very difficult for people to venture into creating evil characters without a "defined script." I particularly loved meeting her randomly in some regions of the game and trying to "hunt her down" (my character has already been paid to do this). It would be interesting to have more characters like that.

    Many here should know that in Kahli we have groups of people who do immersive RP (in this case, just ingame). Do you know of other existing ingame groups as well? We could think of creating some meetings, like the ones in the tavern that were held, to try to expand connections and do more RP as well.
     
  10. Helvig Ingvildsdottir

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    Personally, I don't think game mechanics are needed to make RP possible. RP, to me, is interaction in-game, and fighting is only a very small part of it. RP means to me to speak like your character would speak, say what your character would say, act like your character would act. It's actions, emotes, words... Yes, PvP ideally is part of it, but for me PvP is only fun in a RP context, where words and emotes have happened before, leading up to a fight that uses game mechanics.

    I am not playing as much as I used to. I think I am burned out, after two years of trying to promote heavy/immersive RP in SotA. The reason is that, while our small group in Helboer, Kahli is great and much fun to be with, I started longing for new people to RP with. Especially when a few RPers that I considered close friends quit the game or started being very rare guests. Suddenly, deep storylines happened less and less frequently. And like @kaeshiva I can only take so much every-day RP with casual chatting, music, drinking before I am itching for something exciting to happen. But I think what really killed my motivation was spending weeks to organize a big three days long event this summer, with the help of @Jay Nord and everyone in Helboer, to which then nobody showed up but Helboerians and close friends.

    Still, though, you are welcome to come hang out in Helboer any time @kaeshiva. Even when we don't have big stories, we talk about more interesting things than the weather. With a new person or two around we may even feel motivated to pick up some big storyline again. @Vicious Malice is always welcome to get involved, but sorry, due to former happenings the KoS order stands as far as I'm concerned. I just wish for more conflict and more diverse groups to interact with. Coming from a rich and diverse roleplaying scene in UO, I miss (hostile) interactions so much!

    @Bedawyn: I understand you don't want to be in crowds. If I can help 1:1 with some skill gain or with finding an outfit you feel comfortable in, please send me a message. I'm just your very common introvert, but I enjoy 1:1 RP best, apart from events. Would be cool if we could meet up one day!

    I also wish that there were more "drop-in" opportunities for RP, like @Jay Nord mentioned. I sadly don't feel up to the challenge of organizing these myself at the moment. Perhaps someone is going to feel the calling? A time and place where RPers of all flavors can get together and see if they can get something more serious started? Would be lovely!

    Meanwhile, everyone that enjoys such things is invited to Helboer every Saturday at 3pm NBT, where we gather and usually go for a RPed hunt, often followed by some tavern or campfire RP. If you are late or cannot find us, message Ashyeena Marsh, our mistress of the hunt, or myself if I am online. Through that you could also gain the OOC-information of where we are, so you could stumble into us and let things evolve naturally. :)
     
    Last edited: Sep 29, 2019
  11. Gorthyn

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    The RP community is always a small % of any games population and SOTAs population is too small to sustain an RP community of any size within it sadly with the consequence set out above by Helvig and others. It's the same now as it was a year ago when I finally lost heart with the game and the prospects going forward.
     
  12. Bedawyn

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    ??? Good intentions acknowledged and accepted, though the sentiment is rather bizarre. :) I don't consider it something to be sorry for or something I'd want to change. I just want the rest of the world to stop being designed for neurotypicals only. :)

    Black Sails was before my time, I'm afraid.

    Some of y'all have touched on another problem that, although a strength of the game overall, makes SotA more difficult for roleplayers. We have such a diverse geography with distinctive cultures, that just begs for characters deeply invested in those cultures. I've heard from lots of people who sound like people I'd be interested in sharing RP with -- but they're in Kahli, or somewhere else far from me, and I'm on the Perennial Coast, and there's just no logical in-character way for our stories to coincide. We'd need the OOC planning sessions to work around that, and my main characters aren't travellers. If we were talking only written RP on the forums or elsewhere, I'd be happy to pop off some side characters to support other's people's stories elsewhere, but again that would require more OOC planning (and more lore than I currently feel I'm properly versed in).

    Ditto on the need for protocols. I fall on the chat-is-always-IC side. OOC, avoided in real-time unless essential, and then it takes place in whispers. Whispers, in my mind, are always OOC and thus rarely welcomed. Forum threads and PM are my preferred place for OOC, though in-game mail will also work if the subject line is tagged as OOC.

    I too have little interest in purely social events. However, I do see them as an important tool for gathering background information that can lead to more interesting storylines. Sort of a necessary evil.

    @Helvig Ingvildsdottir, thanks for the offer! I will be visiting Hellboer one day, just have been busy this summer with my Perennial folks who've got no business there. You'll see my South Paladis characters eventually, just haven't given them much attention lately.
     
  13. Trinity

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  14. CatherineRose

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    Yes, The Black Sails, we are still active but very quiet at the moment. Like @Boris Mondragon said, the promised group on group for not just our epic battles RolePlaying the Pirates vs. Obsidians around the whole world of novia never came to pass. It is very hard to plan a very large battle which involves many people all around Novia and then to not be able to really play the battle because we can not see on the battle field who is who. Hopefuly someday that will be corrected and we will again have The Black Sails RP on paper and act out the battle and other parts of the story again.

    I love the RP aspect of having a goal and watching it develop. Kahli has a great place for many RP activities and interactions. @Elgarion has done a wonderful job of providing a place where RP can grow. @Helvig Ingvildsdottir has always been open to others participating with her. @Fei Akhart has done the same. Many have become discouraged but after a rest hopefully will once again become excited to participate in RP once again for after all we are in a game where we can be anyone we want. I am a very introverted person and shy in real life. My insides get twisted into knots when face to face with others and yet have learned how over the years of living to participate. We all face people in real life in one way or another yet in our game we can be free to face each other without the knots. RP gives to us that great opportunity to be good , to be evil, to be beautiful, to be ugly to be anyone .....anyone at all.

    Everyone can participate in anyway. All RP is the right way....all are just unique that is all.

    Fei, please call on me as you go forward with your ideas. I would like to participate.
     
    Last edited: Sep 29, 2019
  15. Helvig Ingvildsdottir

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    The same counts for me and the Helboerians and many other RPers I interact with. But personally I feel no need for a protocol. I always stay in character with people in local chat, even if they do not. If I interact with someone that doesn't RP at all, I often do all conversation in whispers. Whispers, party chat and guild chat are OOC, unless specifically noted otherwise. Parenthesis if it is necessary to address more than one person that I'm not in party with in an OOC manner. "((Sorry, have to go afk 2 min")).

    Forum RP is the one kind of RP I do not feel comfortable with, as it is not real-time and thus requires everyone to also RP the characters of other players a little. But there are forum posts here where you probably could get involved, like the one Trinity mentioned.


    You are welcome. My character does travel, so if you'd like to meet up, I am sure something can be arranged. Just let me know. Not intending to be pushy. :)
     
  16. Vladamir Begemot

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    The "you teleported through a laptop" bit has left me with indentity issues since the start.

    I would like to encourage anyone who is running RP events to pre and post post stories about them on The Avatar Express. Hopefully this draws more to attend your event, but more important (in my opinion) is that we start to have a website where role play and Shroud of the Avatar are seen in one location by search engines.

    Very few people want to visit the forum of a game, if they can even find the posts here that indicate Shroud has RP. But since the Express is hooked in with better search engine optimization, we can hope that with enough keyword laden posts, future RP'ers, searching behind their laptops late one night, get the Express (and thus our game) as the top of their search results when they look for "What MMO has good RP".
     
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  17. Boris Mondragon

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    For those not familiar with the "Black Sails" experiment which led to the first in game RP big battle on 03 December 2017, it was my brainchild as something we did in Ultima Online a long time ago. What made is special back then is that we had a large group of RPers who wanted to give the stories we created life and action. We, usually I would come up with a reason for a fight which we had every 3 weeks or so, start the Rp drama on the forum which would lead to the fight. We would take a break and put our heads together for another RP Story and another fight. I am talking about a group of 40 RPers from 4 different guilds. We had "Good Guilds" and "Evil Guilds". Knights of Mythndale and Knights of the Eternal flame on one side and the "Evil we had "Clan of Vampires" and "Wraiths". What was important here is this was my initiation into RP and the friendships formed based on mutual respect. I came here to SOTA with the dream to re-create these events and friendships and was blessed to find great people here that helped me succeed.

    Its not all lost. I am sure a group of antagonists can be created and more RP created. If you want a battle to culminate each chapter that can be done with 8 vs 8 groups. Who wins or loses is not important as a great story has many chapters and most importantly they are created by "YOU" as you became part of it and contributed. All it takes is for a motivated group to start or continue with Catherine started on the currently stalled thread and if you want a battle it can be done preferably in a no loot town in case others come in to spoil the fun. We did not have that problem in our big battles as we had Antrax's Army, House of Mangar, Shadow People and others. Will we be able to duplicate those events again, I do not know. If you guys come up with anything interesting let me know, I left Boris in the Rise looking for some items to reduce the imaginary power of the Obsidian Artefacts. He will come out of there at some point but could have them stoles so its up to you guys to create the scenario if you want and hopefully either start a new story or continue where the Black Sails saga left off. R/Boris/El Pirata/Black Sails Forever.
     
  18. Vicious Malice

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    Really? Less than a dozen RPers? That's all? Seems I'm not missing out on any fun if I'm not playing.
     
  19. Trinity

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    Too bad you can't see behind the scenes.

    The Black Sails is alive and well but preparing in private chat between the RPer's.
    (today there were 8 new posts in the private planning chat)
    Preps are being made for the 'Raid Groups' and new plans by @Chris .

    RP is similar to PVP in that it has been neglected in the past.
    With the new owner, that could change quickly.
    (no promise yet but looks as if there is some interest brewing).

    Speaking of brewing, I think I will have another. ;)
    Perhaps @Boris Mondragon and @CatherineRose will join me in the dry dock tavern in Dragomir Mori
     
  20. Fei Akhart

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    One of the reasons for this thread was this. I realized that lately it's hard to find new RPers ingame.

    RPing in the forum is cool, but with such a complete platform for RPing ingame (not only for pvp, but for creating content and developing characters), it's sad to see so few RPers.
    I thought I just couldn't find them, but it seems not to be the reason.

    What seems to me is that RPlayer community also decreased even more recently. I don't see any new RPers showing up and the ones here are stopping playing. :(
     
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