Armageddon Community should make a stronger effort to stop witch-hunting twinks.

[Qzzrbl]

The examples used are over a year old, as per the rules. They no longer apply, and are merely meant to serve as examples.

Explicitly the MUD claims to put RP first, but there's no mechanism for rewarding rp, and there's a ton of things encouraging code use. It makes for a schizophrenic, or seemingly hypocritical game.

Your reward for RP is being allowed to play.

This isn't true. You are currently allowed to play the game without rping.

Well shit....

[Salt Merchant]

I wouldn't begrudge anyone for spending an hour a game-day sparring, or three hours or four if their clan schedule calls for it. What I"m talking about, is when they spar, then sit and go afk/idle, then get up and spar again, then sit and go afk/idle, then spar, walk around the city, walk back, spar again, sit and go afk/idle, rinse repeat.

What would you suggest, when your character is caught in a relentless schedule?

You really have two choices. Be "good", which means your options are very limited. Often your character won't have much or any coin. Activities such as playing darts you've already done about a thousand times. After many days of being with the same group of people, you tend to run out of things to talk about and dramatize over. New events don't occur at a rate to keep everyone talking.

Or be a trouble maker and step outside the bounds. This too has been done about a thousand times, to the point where people are weary of it. Generate brief excitement, then get expelled from the clan or die.

I have a natural inclination to want to build things, but here you really run into a lot of resistance. Other people just aren't interested, it seems. Even if you have huge fistfuls of coins to wave at them, they're barely interested. Even if you get a few people onside, the staff will likely not be interested.

Maybe you can wave $ at the staff, I don't know, but I haven't tried.  

[Salt Merchant]

What really annoys me are the gemmers that do nothing but sit in a temple and spam-cast.  They never leave to go interact with people... to give people a chance to piss in their cheerios or even kill them as this character goes off to finally act like a real person, doing more than one thing in a day.... week... month.

To me, this post just says "I want more people to stick their heads in a noose to be my victims. Brainzzzzzz!"

Also, ask yourself, in roleplaying terms, why should gemmers -want- to go to a tavern to be abused? And where else should they go? If I lived in a walled community, and there was nothing but grief for me outside of it, I'd be tempted to stay within it too.

And then if gemmers visit a tavern as a pack (since they're the only ones that will talk to each other most of the time), people start bitching about too many gemmers.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

Players do this far more than Staff.

People as a whole should calm down and stop worrying about everybody else. Super-Twinks get got. Those who do not get got are not super-twinks, and their play-style falls within staff guidelines.

[Salt Merchant]

This isn't true. You are currently allowed to play the game without rping.

This isn't true. You are currently allowed to play the game without being a grand thespian.

That character that doesn't talk much to anyone and goes out to mine each day, then rests, is playing the role of a workaholic miner. The fact that he isn't brightening other players' lives with great drama and deep plots doesn't mean he's not playing a role.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

...when your character is caught in a relentless schedule...

You really have two choices. Be "good", which means your options are very limited. Often your character won't have much or any coin. Activities such as playing darts you've already done about a thousand times. After many days of being with the same group of people, you tend to run out of things to talk about and dramatize over. New events don't occur at a rate to keep everyone talking.

Or be a trouble maker and step outside the bounds. This too has been done about a thousand times, to the point where people are weary of it. Generate brief excitement, then get expelled from the clan or die.

I have a natural inclination to want to build things, but here you really run into a lot of resistance. Other people just aren't interested, it seems. Even if you have huge fistfuls of coins to wave at them, they're barely interested. Even if you get a few people onside, the staff will likely not be interested.

Maybe you can wave $ at the staff, I don't know, but I haven't tried.  

Very true.

[Ghost]

People will defend anything on these forums.

this here is the gold

[staggerlee]

This isn't true. You are currently allowed to play the game without rping.

This isn't true. You are currently allowed to play the game without being a grand thespian.

That character that doesn't talk much to anyone and goes out to mine each day, then rests, is playing the role of a workaholic miner. The fact that he isn't brightening other players' lives with great drama and deep plots doesn't mean he's not playing a role.

I don't want to get dragged down into arguments about definitions.
I'll simplify it for you:

I think that emoting and/or talking is essential to depicting a role.
Neither emoting or speaking is a requirement in order to play Arm.

If a scripted bot could play your role, you're probably not rping. But you're not necessarily breaking any game rules.

People will defend anything on these forums.

[Ampere]

Bullshit.  Roleplaying is interacting with your gameworld and fellow players as realistically as possible. The code plays a vital role as a mediator between opposing narratives, and while (thanks coders) elegant in its ability to maintain our suspension of disbelief, some use this tool to excuse their own shitty play.  It is a game, I repeat IT IS A GAME...we need to better facilitate the story --- not the tools that were intended to assist with continuity. This is the problem, people are relying on the code to tell their stories --- and while I can't speak for the coders, I was under the impression it was there to resolve conflicts --- not diminish our realism.

Oh, and just as a square is a rectangle, but a rectangle need not be a square---good roleplayers emote (part of the whole interacting with the world thing), but that doesn't mean all those emoting are good at roleplaying.

Excuse me while I go drink more scotch.

Edit: Cleaned it up some.

[Salt Merchant]

Good roleplayers emote (part of the whole interacting with the world thing

I think that emoting and/or talking is essential to depicting a role.

Alright, maybe the key word here is "depicting". Certainly emoting will add color to a character's existence, and speaking will make him or her potentially more interesting. But I don't label them as necessities for roleplay. You can stay absolutely true to the role you have in mind without doing either. Staying true to concept is the definition of roleplaying to me. You can emote all you want and still be a poor roleplayer.

[Comrade Canadia]

That character that doesn't talk much to anyone and goes out to mine each day, then rests, is playing the role of a workaholic miner. The fact that he isn't brightening other players' lives with great drama and deep plots doesn't mean he's not playing a role.

Using that kind of logic, you're basically redefining roleplay to suit whatever unrealistic, code-focused way of playing suits you. Bravo.

The defense of way things are, which LIzzie and Marshall seem to be heind, at least makes sense to me. Let's try addressing that.

On the other hand: I don't want my hours played, and determined effort to spend time IG to be completely wiped out by something entirely arbitrary, like someone putting in their background "most awesomest warrior in the -world-".

That's not what I'm getting at here and you know it. I'm talking about realistic characters, not silly exaggerations. Most awesomest should totally be earned in game. But I'd love to see the game move towards a system which assumes competence. The great 'born yesterday' subguild joke illustrates this perfectly. We're completely stuck on the idea of characters starting super weak with their goal to become strong. Because of that, people will focus on becoming strong rather than pursuing more individual, character-oriented goals.

The 'balance' which has been talked about sways far too much towards the hack & slash side of things. If I wanted freeform RP, I'd go to a roleplay chatroom or play by post or whatever, but I don't. Roleplay does need structure and rules. The problem here is that the rules are more important than the roleplay. The problem I see is that not only is powergaming possible, but it's preferable and in my mind and is the best way to play armag. Find the limit of how much code you can spam before the staff get mad at you, stick to that, throw on some emotes and thinks so tha tit looks like you're in character, and spend the rest of your time roleplaying and doing stuff you actually enjoy.

What I'd love to see is a system that makes assumptions on virtual practice. That is, if my character is logged off, it can be assumed that he's spending some time working on his swordplay or spells or whatever. The reason for this is that if coupled with some harder restrictions on skillups when in game, it would discourage people from code spam, and let them do more interesting things. This will never fly, because we're completely stuck in a "earn everything in game" mentality and rewarding those who play twelve hours a day, but I hope it's a decent indication of what I feel would be more in the spirit of good roleplay.

[Salt Merchant]

Using that kind of logic, you're basically redefining roleplay to suit whatever unrealistic, code-focused way of playing suits you. Bravo.

Look, there are plenty of people in real life that live this way. Basically as worker drones. They eat their breakfasts, go to work, come home, do chores, watch TV and go to sleep. You could write bots that would describe their lives pretty accurately.

Does that mean these people are fake or powergamers? No, it just means they're not very interesting, to you.

I am not defending players that are, for example, every PC's best friend but kill NPCs at every chance the law code allows them. Nor am I defending insane crafters who produce a gazillion things in one day. What I am defending against is the apparent notion that you have to be some sort of social wizard in game to be a worthy player. This is what makes Arm different from MUSHes; the code base gives you other things to do!

[Comrade Canadia]

Look, there are plenty of people in real life that live this way. Basically as worker drones. They eat their breakfasts, go to work, come home, do chores, watch TV and go to sleep. You could write bots that would describe their lives pretty accurately.

And yet they're still going to be unique, and require some fleshing out in order for them to actually be characters. I've known plenty of people with lives like that, and they're all different from one another - even in subtle ways. They will move, speak, think, and just -act- in a way which only they do, no matter how many people share similar lifestyles. The armag miner is going to require thoughts, feels, emotes, and possibly even a bit of speech in order to be a character. People are people, no matter how boring their jobs are. Seriously, your argument for what defines roleplay coudl apply to every videogame in the world. Do you write Pac-Man fanfiction?

I doubt that spam-mining obsidian is a clever commentary on the alienation of modern life. It's just twinking.

[Marauder Moe]

I challenge you all to continue this discussion with the following words, phrases, and their equivalent conjugations, abbreviations, and variants forbidden:
twink
role play
witch hunt
straw man (I don't think it's come up yet, but it's a horrible catchphrase on these boards)
spam
power game
immersion
loophole
exploit
realistic
balance
hack 'n slash

Seriously.  All those words are loaded, oft-misinterpreted, ill-defined, and/or too broad and I think it's muddying the discussion.

[Ampere]

Good roleplayers emote (part of the whole interacting with the world thing

I think that emoting and/or talking is essential to depicting a role.

Alright, maybe the key word here is "depicting". Certainly emoting will add color to a character's existence, and speaking will make him or her potentially more interesting. But I don't label them as necessities for roleplay. You can stay absolutely true to the role you have in mind without doing either. Staying true to concept is the definition of roleplaying to me. You can emote all you want and still be a poor roleplayer.

If you don't think emoting is vital to rp on a text based rpi, perhaps you should find somewhere else to get your geek on --- it is NECESSARY ... Emote doesn't add just add 'colour', it's the GAME (along with all the other narrative tools (think, say, etc)).  Everything else is there to provide some semblance of consistency...just in case some retard wants to come in and crash your party as though this were some lame ass mush.  Really, if you want to just run around and farm, feel free to pay blizzard $15/month...however, if you want to play the gruelling role of some ragged miner, working hard in the hopes of getting enough glass to pay for next month's rent --- well that sounds like a story.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

The truth out of all of this is that Armageddon is a number of things to a number of people. As varied as Armageddon is to those varied people, so is their view of right and wrong also varied.

Realistically, Staff should be the end all of things. Players should mind their own business and forget about reporting anything but the most outrageous infractions. There are too many examples of 'reports' that lead to nothing, because there was a misunderstanding in the observation or assumption.

Staff watches, and staff disciplines, and I think they are at just about the right balance at this point in time.

[Salt Merchant]

Do you write Pac-Man fanfiction?

Our little miner's player could be enjoying the game perfectly well. Probably is, since he keeps playing the game. As long as he's staying within the bounds of realistic play, where's the harm? Oh. He's not entertaining -you-.

Sorry, while your point about adding dimensions to the character through emotes and speech strikes a chord, I still don't see the harm in having such characters about, nor the need to label them twinks. Also, I still find they add to the game, even if it's only as a stranger in a cloak that you watch ride past and wonder about.

EDIT: also, it's a stage of playing the game. After it's over, the player will either leave or graduate on to more thorough roleplay. Or maybe he'll even fall back on it now and then, between bouts of inspiration.

[Salt Merchant]

If you don't think emoting is vital to rp on a text based rpi, perhaps you should find somewhere else to get your geek on

I've been playing here just about since Arm began (in fact, I remember Nessalin, the only original founder left, from when he was a player of an LPMud and just looking to begin Arm). I've got a fistful of karma and I've even spent time on staff (more than a decade ago).

So I don't really appreciate being invited to leave by some snot-nosed rookie.  (For the humor-impaired, that last reference is a joke. The sentiment is not, though).

[Malken]

Our little miner's player could be enjoying the game perfectly well. Probably is, since he keeps playing the game. As long as he's staying within the bounds of realistic play, where's the harm? Oh. He's not entertaining -you-.

Yah, I've been playing this game for over 15 years, now.

I'm code-oriented, and I've got more karma than your mamma does.

[Eloran]

Moe, you forgot 'jarring'.

[Lizzie]

This whole thread is jarring. It ruins my immersion because of all the twink role-players who insist on adding straw men to their witch hunts. If I wasn't so busy power-gaming, I'd do something realistic, like maybe eat some spam. As it is, I know you loop-holes will exploit my balance if I even try to hack-n-slash my way through a can of the stuff. Thanks for nothing.

[Synthesis]

This whole thread is jarring. It ruins my immersion because of all the twink role-players who insist on adding straw men to their witch hunts. If I wasn't so busy power-gaming, I'd do something realistic, like maybe eat some spam. As it is, I know you loop-holes will exploit my balance if I even try to hack-n-slash my way through a can of the stuff. Thanks for nothing.

Someone really ought to sig this.

[Eloran]

I tried. It wouldn't fit.

[Marauder Moe]

Moe, you forgot 'jarring'.

Very well.  Add it to the list!

Sometimes I think it would be nice if we banned those words from the entire board.  

[Comrade Canadia]

Malken, you're sort of illustrating my point. Chances are you know your way around the game RP and codewise, and because of that do comfortably well for yourself. You probably also recognise that you're all about knowing how to work the code because it's extremely beneficial.

I'm arguing that it shouldn't be - at least not nearly to the extent it is. I think the game would be more focused, and dare I say enjoyable if code spam wasn't such a large part of most characters' lives. We talk big about roleplay, but the game itself is big about code. If twinking is bad according to staff policy, then the relaunch of the game should be designed in a way that makes twinking undesireable and instead rewards the kind of play the community wants to see.

And Salt Merchant, I'm not personally offended by people who spam-mine obsidian and never said I was. Frankly, they're doing what the game is indicating they should do - mine obsidian, buy loot, profit, whatever. However, it's still not roleplay according to any definition I've heard of, but yours. If roleplay means code-spam with no character development to you, then all the power to you. Shine on you crazy diamond.