Player retention and you: brainstorming

[Desertman]

Less snarky condescension on the GDB would be nice too.

My first thought on seeing this thread was "It'd be nice if we didn't have so many threads whinging about the game." I worry that it creates a self-fulfilling prophecy and overall negative atmosphere.

When was the last time we had a log posted and everyone reminisced over how cools things were? I found those threads inspiring.

Made one.

[BadSkeelz]

For actual in-game improvements, I agree with Laura that the game world should have an on-going plot... BUT! For new players, the focus should really be on getting them engaged with other players. They don't need to know about that big Metaplot as long as there are job offerings and plothooks for them to immediately get latched on to. They can be small, too, since these are new players. We might yawn at another sewer RPT, but a newbie probably isn't.

This engagement shouldn't be coming primarily from staff. It should be coming from leadership roles. Get newbies in to your clan, give them something to do, get them involved. The leader's job will be made easier if they're presented with a metaplot to "Hang their plots on", which in turn trickles down newbies and non-sponsored roles having jobs and plots of their own.

A less static gameworld inspires and motivates leaders. Inspired and motivated leaders engage fellow players.

[LauraMars]

For actual in-game improvements, I agree with Laura that the game world should have an on-going plot... BUT! For new players, the focus should really be on getting them engaged with other players. They don't need to know about that big Metaplot as long as there are job offerings and plothooks for them to immediately get latched on to. They can be small, too, since these are new players. We might yawn at another sewer RPT, but a newbie probably isn't.

This engagement shouldn't be coming primarily from staff. It should be coming from leadership roles. Get newbies in to your clan, give them something to do, get them involved. The leader's job will be made easier if they're presented with a metaplot to "Hang their plots on", which in turn trickles down newbies and non-sponsored roles having jobs and plots of their own.

A less static gameworld inspires and motivates leaders. Inspired and motivated leaders engage fellow players.

Solid +1 on that.  Energetic and happy leaders are a huge factor in keeping players around.

[nauta]

Two other smaller things, one brought up before, but I'll pitch it differently (and they are kind of related, maybe):

Find out IC is a double-edged sword.  We want to protect the mystery, both coded and lore, and that's a fun part of the game.  (The coded mystery for me isn't really that fun, but I lean more towards the MUSH than the MUD, I guess, although I've never played a MUSH, so...)  But sometimes it is jarring and immersion breaking.  The helper chat has been so useful here, but I think we could maybe have a look at some things (maybe a whole thread dedicated to it) that fall into the category of "my PC is not an idiot, I would know how to do that!"

Bugs.  This is probably just me, but I heard someone else bring it up: it'd be nice to get a notification on bug reports, when fixed or declined. I've sometimes received staff notifications or whatever IG after filing a bug, letting me know it isn't a bug.  That's nice, but spotty.

Oh, and I agree: I think a big part of retaining new players is retaining other players who are interested, excited, and enthusiastic about getting things going.  Which is why I think positivity is a big deal.  (Personal theory: a lot of people leave because they see so many NOs on so many levels, and not enough YESes, or No, but what about this...es.)

[Ath]

The kind of objective you described with the raider leader doesn't necessarily require a big admin RPT.  You could just drop a fortified 3-room encampment in the game, and have a trophy item on the leader that can be acquired for turn-in.  I know it might seem a little more like an MMO's 'quests,' but it's also something I'd like to see more of in the world -- more tools for us to go out and make our own fun.  Military clans in particular often stagnate because there's not really a lot of opportunities for them to actually go out and do military operations.  The warcraft/fort system that SoI has is probably too complex for Arm's engine as it stands, but I'd love to see neutral villages and forts that have to be captured or guarded every so often.

See, I hated SoI's fort system, it was too disconnected int he sense of RP and was only there for the hack and slash players.  I was on staff for SoI when that system was around.  On the topic of adding a fort and adding NPCs and items, and leaving it there to be killed.  That to me is not in the spirit of Armageddon.  There is no RP there, that is hack and slash with a reward.  Now let me tell you what goes into what you're requesting here.  First, we have to come up with a Plot Proposal, this has to describe the plot, and give the goals, etc of the plot, to then get feedback and approval.  Next we have to build the rooms, get those approved, next we have to build the reward object, get that approved, then build the NPCs, and get that approve.  I could likely skimp a bit on the NPCs and use some generic raiders, but the Leader would need to be good.  Now, I could just plop this in and let them get killed, because the PCs will figure out how to kill them, but where is that fun for all that work?  Next we have to hook some players into going into this RPT, then plan for the RPT, and then execute the RPT.  Which likely will be 10 players or more showing up to kill a bunch of raiders and then the leader.  Very little RP.  I hope you see the issue here.

+1 for small time random and generally pointless happenings.

There doesn't NEED to be a reason for six gith in a "raiding party" to show up and start camping the Salt Road other than "This gith has decided he wants to do this.", that is where the story can end and it will still give people something to do.

There doesn't NEED to be a reason that a "flock" of eight silt-fliers has been reported to be swooping down in a group and terrorizing the mining fields west of Allanak. They just roamed up and there they are to get destroyed or do some destroying of their own...and the story ends there.

There doesn't NEED to be a reason "Gulgak the rinth dwarf was just spotted killing someone in the street and now he's on the loose for the AOD to chase down.". He may even intentionally put himself in harms way (staff decision, obviously Gulgak wouldn't know he was doing it, he would think he was being cunning or whatever) so the AOD can get their hands on him....and the storyline ends there.  

This is called animations, we already do it.  Maybe we need to do it more.  My issue here is when you animate, you run a risk of killing the player or all the players involved.  Making a fair fight on the fly is extremely hard to do when you animate.  I would be more than happy to animate more, I will try, but when you guys die due to animations, don't start crying that staff killed you on purpose.  Because I'll be honest, I don't like stupid killing, but if it is realistic, tasty tasty brains.  As for the dwarf idea, that could happen, but that requires a bit of prep work, sorta described above.  One thing I thought of is having each staff member try to come up with a few NPCs for their area that they can just animate.  Maybe this dwarf doesn't get killed, but he does pay up his bribe each time... stupid Gulgak causing trouble again, oh well.

Some more random examples of "low budget" encounter style events, that don't necessarily involve combat...mainly because I think the combat RPT's probably see the most attention now and days:

• An incredibly harsh sandstorm hits, and staff go around animating the world to show just how devastating it can be.  Kill off mounts, periodic HP damage to those who don't take cover, etc.
• Drop a single tiny nugget of silver in a random spot, watch the excitement and plots that come from it.
• A Red Robe of the Trade Ministry decides to make a spot inspection of the Kadian compound.  You have 1 IC day to prepare for their arrival....GO!
• A shipment of spice is lost in a sandstorm, and House Kurac tells the PC Fist unit to go ride out and find it before it's stolen. (Oh, and by the way, the same rumor is dropped to numerous other groups...just for a little competition.

I'm a big fan of some rewards, trophies, perks being available too for a successful outing.  It feels like Armageddon is incredibly stingy when it comes with rewarding PCs.

I wish it was this easy... item 1- That's possible, but that would require prep work, but pretty plausible.  I could damage the entire city of Allanak if I wanted to, but you mentioned if they don't take cover.  Hmmm, now that makes it more difficult, code doesn't let me determine either or.  I would have to walk around ALL of Allanak to watch for people not in doors, this would likely require several staff members to do this.  item 2 - None of you would ever freaken find it if I just dropped it somewhere.  I would sit looking at it for days, someone will likely find it, probably a newb wandering, it will go into a pack, and we'll never see it again.  I know, buzzkill, but I'm not trying to be one.  Oh, now if I hinted at it on the boards, well -everyone- would be out there, we're talking RPTs of 20+.  Though we do have some ideas brewing along these lines, but a bit more different.  item 3 - See, this would require two teams to coordinate and agree on doing it.  I could see this as being an easier to obtain one though.  Item 4 - Hmmm, could do this... not a bad idea.  Object hunt, maybe the NPCs are all dead or don't need animation or something.  *taps finger to lips*

Too many replies for me to get to all of them, but here is at least some replies to you guys.  I'll keep reading and seeing what I can come up with.

[Riev]

On the surface of what Ath is saying, it sounds like to do anything takes so much "authorization" that likely comes from The Big Three that any ideas are going to require RL months of background prep for what might amount to "you staff suck railroad plots I'm going back to Harshlands etc etc etc". Which I get, because why would staff want to put in months of effort for what might likely fizzle out into nothing?

And while I would LOVE to see more "railroad" plots with only 1 of 2 outcomes, I would rather see more of what was mentioned about an "overaching plot". I know there is one (THERE IS!) but nobody would ever know about it.

What if Arm had literal "seasons" like TV, where each "Season" was plotted out to be an overarching plot, with a couple subplots but the general goal has only a couple endings. Bad guy loses, good guys gain fame... or Bad Guy wins, resources are harder to get for a while and Deus Ex Tektolnes comes into play. I don't know. It might be better to advertise "Next season in Armageddon: Sam the Defiler is back, and he wants butts!"

[BadSkeelz]

While bureaucratic approval has something to do with it, I think a lot of us grossly underestimate how much actual command-entering in-game work it takes to get something done staffside.

[Ath]

While bureaucratic approval has something to do with it, I think a lot of us grossly underestimate how much actual command-entering in-game work it takes to get something done staffside.

This.  Approvals are in place for a reason, so that fairness stays in tact and it is is realistic to the game world and vision.  It isn't as bad as Riev makes it out to be to be honest, but it does take work.

[wizturbo]

I'd target the maximum amount of fun, for minimum amount of work.

For instance, in the gith encampment example...  Why create a bunch of rooms and boss man Gith NPCS?  Just load up some gith, give them orange bandanas to signify they're part of the dreaded orange bandana crew...and spawn a tent with some random stuff raider's might steal from virtual merchants.  Then go out, have some dinner, watch a movie, come back and see if anyone has raided your encampment.  You don't even need to animate anything...although it would be cool and add flavor, just having the encampment itself does that.

If no one finds the encampment, or if you want to try and encourage players to find it while you're available to animate, have an NPC wander in and mention something to hint at it.  Local taverns are great for this....or just make a rumor board post, without any NPC wandering in at all if you're short on time.

If players manage to kill themselves fighting the gith...welp, welcome to Armageddon, you didn't have to ride out there and fuck with them.  This is especially true if you go the dinner and a movie route, where you aren't even giving the Gith some kind of special control to make them more dangerous.

As for my silver nugget example...doh...don't just drop it into a truly random room!  Take all the random players online at a given time (lets say 50), drop their names into excel, and ask Siri on your iphone "Random number between 1 and 50".  Whatever number Siri says, follow that player around for a little while and look for an opportunity to drop the nugget in their path.  No favoritism, just random good luck (or horrible, horrible luck...if you consider what many people will be willing to do for even a tiny nugget of silver).  Granted it might be more complicated than this...silver nuggets shouldn't be lying around the streets of Allanak for instance...  But you get the idea.  Maybe you have a table of "city rare valuables" and a table of "outdoors rare valuables" and you draw from that once every few months, depending on who "wins".  I cannot stress enough how "winning" has the potential to go horribly, horribly bad for some of these characters...  heh

[BadSkeelz]

Gith camps already exist in the game. It's on player leaders to draft up a warband and try and take them out.

[seidhr]

Desertman mentions a Byn plot a year or so ago that was involving killing raiders and I just wanted to chime in on that, from staff perspective.

I agree it was a super neat plot and I got to be one of the major people (there were several of us) pulling the levers behind the scenes to make it come to life.

But I will just say that while this wasn't a big plot that changed the world, it still took a ton of work from our side to get done.  We wrote up about five new rooms for the game, a new camp object, some neat reward objects, and about 10 NPCs - all of whom had backgrounds, personalities, and so on.  Since this was a combat-heavy RPT, then we had to assign skills to all of them and try (emphasis on TRY) to make them challenging but not super overkill deadly for a big group of battle-hardened PCs, where we didn't know how many exactly would be showing up.

(Incidentally this is nearly impossible to do with any degree of accuracy, up-front.)

Doing plots like that now and then is awesome and I dare say that we as staff enjoy them as much as the players do, but it's also a boatload of work and takes the efforts of multiple staffers over the course of a couple weeks (at minimum) to get set up, not to mention the brainstorming up front.

In this case the camp got burned down or destroyed and all but one or two of the NPCs are dead as a result of the RPT, so it's a lot of investment for a one-time thing.  

[wizturbo]

Gith camps already exist in the game. It's on player leaders to draft up a warband and try and take them out.

They exist, but they aren't threatening the norm.  They aren't really "raider camps" if they're in the same place, and there's a viable route to take to avoid them.

Move one of the camps, or create a makeshift one in a different spot, and you've created something players might respond to...  and if they don't, okay, no worries...  if anything the world is just fresher as a result of this.

[BadSkeelz]

Gith camps already exist in the game. It's on player leaders to draft up a warband and try and take them out.

They exist, but they aren't threatening the norm.  They aren't really "raider camps" if they're in the same place, and there's a viable route to take to avoid them.

Move one of the camps, or create a makeshift one in a different spot, and you've created something players might respond to...  and if they don't, okay, no worries...  if anything the world is just fresher as a result of this.

They're as threatening as you RP them to be. If a PC Templar recruits your character to fight a war against the gith, that you spend a few RL weeks training and interacting with your fellow soldier PCs before, and then when the big day comes and you ride to battle, are you going to tell the Templar "Hey man, this camp has ALWAYS been here, what gives? This isn't what I signed up for!"

It would be nice if gith camps rotated like other tribal camps, but there is nothing stopping us from roleplaying with them as they are now.

Players need to exercise a little more imagination and creativity on their part and stop asking Staff to bend over backwards for them.

[Mordiggian]

Sometimes we try to throw leaders (and other PCs) plot threads to pick up on and they just don't.

Sometimes they will, and we'll get a dozen requests saying "what do we do next?"

And then we reply with the equivalent of "well, what do you do next?" because we don't want to railroad PCs, and we never hear about it again.

[nauta]

Sometimes we try to throw leaders (and other PCs) plot threads to pick up on and they just don't.

Sometimes they will, and we'll get a dozen requests saying "what do we do next?"

And then we reply with the equivalent of "well, what do you do next?" because we don't want to railroad PCs, and we never hear about it again.

I'm not sure how it would work, but a feedback system might be nice.  In any case, did you follow up with them on it?  Did you try to figure out why they had dropped it?  Was it because they thought it wasn't interesting enough, or because they had other IC reasons to not pursue the plot hint?

EDITED TO ADD: I didn't mean that to sound harsh -- I meant it to be more of what the 'feedback' device would give answers to.

[Ath]

See, the issue here we don't want to just give away plot details to the player OOC.  We want the players run with a hook and go with it, but just like in D&D, the DM may have a great plot hook, but the players won't catch it or go with it.  The issue with Arm and plot hooks is if the players don't catch the plot hook, the plot can fizzle and the effort can be wasted.  Now, on this note, most plots that are being run now have consequence or action taken if the plot is left to it's own devise.

[ibusoe]

Sometimes we try to throw leaders (and other PCs) plot threads to pick up on and they just don't.

Sometimes they will, and we'll get a dozen requests saying "what do we do next?"

And then we reply with the equivalent of "well, what do you do next?" because we don't want to railroad PCs, and we never hear about it again.

That's how it goes, though.  That's a sign of the system working as it should.  I mean, you still have to get Pa a Father's Day card every year, even if it's not his thing.   You still need to poke the players now and then, even if their response is lackluster.  

I think staff misunderstand sometimes when they're in the zone.

Edit: spelling

[BadSkeelz]

I kept accidentally killing plot-hook staff animation NPCs, and then when I got to sit down with one she turned down my offer to fite and ran away.

y u no giv me plotz staff

[LauraMars]

Sounds like a pretty good plot to me.

[Norcal]

Player retention means different things depending on the type of player you are hoping to retain.

To retain brand new first time players I would suggest these things:

- Make char gen for first timers much easier, perhaps even automated.
  For these types of PCs you could allow them to start without a ldesc. They would have to come up with one within say 5 days. If they do not, then they can no longer log in. Get them in the door and playing asap.

- Expand the start areas (near the starter shops) to include some tutorial rooms.

- Set up a newbie chat channel. I know this is kind of anathema, but I think it would really help new players avoid quitting in frustration. Have helpers from the player base who could supervise it.

- Animate for them. Arm is the most realistic MUD I know of, so capitalize on this. Make the world come alive and it will hook the newbs into logging on again.


Now, how to hold onto those newbs that have logged in a few times, yet might be getting bored with the slow pace of skilling up, and the super steep learning curve that we all had to face.

-Keep that newbie chat option open to them for a little longer.

-Make sure there are ample and relatively -easy- opportunities to get a job! If you want to retain players, then let them work.  I remember when I started, I used the helper chat on the web page. I asked "How do I survive" the response was  "Get a job". I said "Well how do I stay alive when I am trying to find one?"  "Look for food outside the walls" was the response.  

Not only were these responses very Spartan, they did not really tell me -how- to go about doing either of these things. So make a certain set of jobs very easy to get and quite obviously available, so that I can answer the questions for myself.

For the folks beyond the fresh newb category, I think some of the suggestions I have been reading about above are spot on:
- More action and interaction, rpts.
-More plots that we can get involved in easily.
-Acknowledge good play in this category of players.  Staff should -initiate- communication in this sense. Send an email to say to Suzy Salter "Hey! I see you have really improved!  Great job!  If you need anything let me know!"  Wow...that would like  totally inspire a deeper commitment to the game.

And for the vets?  
This is quite important.  Loosing a two day player is not good, yet loosing a five year plus player is very bad. Those make the backbone of the game.
-Help us avoid burnout, keep it fresh and active.
-SHOW THAT YOU TRUST THEM.
- Open up more sponsored roles, or send some plot ideas our way and let us work with staff on them.
-Do not be so stingy with karma. I mean really.
-Allow them a greater role in making long lasting changes to the game world.
-Acknowledge them somehow. A perk. Maybe an extra CGP or two.
Let them store and unstore PCs. If they get bored they could store, and then come back to it a year or so later.


Honestly, there is not another MUD around that even comes close to ARM. I also think that in the four or five years (I think) I have been playing, staff have done an amazing job of making things better and easier. I hope we can do even better in the next five years.

Cheers

[Desertman]

This is called animations, we already do it.  Maybe we need to do it more.  My issue here is when you animate, you run a risk of killing the player or all the players involved.  Making a fair fight on the fly is extremely hard to do when you animate.  I would be more than happy to animate more, I will try, but when you guys die due to animations, don't start crying that staff killed you on purpose.  Because I'll be honest, I don't like stupid killing, but if it is realistic, tasty tasty brains.  As for the dwarf idea, that could happen, but that requires a bit of prep work, sorta described above.  One thing I thought of is having each staff member try to come up with a few NPCs for their area that they can just animate.  Maybe this dwarf doesn't get killed, but he does pay up his bribe each time... stupid Gulgak causing trouble again, oh well.

In my experience 19/20 of these happen "as an aside" to something else the players are already doing which may be why you get this sort of backlash at times.

Most of the time it isn't..."Hey there's a rumor that this gith tribe is here camping the Salt Road, maybe you want to go check that out!".

Most of the time it is...."You guys are going to gather pech gras...SURPRISE GITH TRIBE ATTACK!!!".

I'm not saying those aren't super freaking fun. They are super freaking fun. What I'm saying is making the fighting the "GOAL" so that when people go they KNOW the fight is the goal, and not the surprise in transit to the goal or the task stopping them from the goal might reduce the idea that "staff killed me" is realistic.

How do you blame staff for a gith tribe killing you when you KNOW you are on your way to fight said gith tribe?

It's a bit easier when that gith tribe randomly shows up unexpectedly while you are trying to harvest agate shards instead.

Both scenarios can be fun, but if the fear is you will get blamed for killing PC's when that isn't your intention, you might lean towards "full disclosure" events, so to speak.  

[CodeMaster]

Recurring events are good for getting people to pop in.  It's my understanding that we already have code that lets you spectate the arena no matter where you are in the world... so why not have regular but simple arena events?

For staff, there'd be the initial outlay of defining a number of humanoid NPCs with s/descriptions (maybe even solicited from players) and skills/stats. Then they could just be loaded into the arena to battle each other 1V1, 2V1, etc. using existing aggro code.  PCs could watch to determine which NPCs are the stronger ones, which would facilitate actual gambling.

[Inks]

More gamblin'!

[Rokal]

1.  Find ways to make clan recruits less likely to end up alone and bored, trapped by a schedule.  New players benefit from being in a clan when it works right; they have someone to show them the ropes and are somewhat shielded from the harsh realities of the struggle for survival in our game.

2.  Clans could have reciprocal agreements, where their members could train or hunt or whatever with each other, in times of lean numbers.  This really helped me in the times it's been available.  It'd have to be worked out in a way to make sense, of course, but idling in a clan hall doesn't compete well with other games that you could be playing instead, and when you're new, you might not know what else to do on your own.  Anyway, anything we can do to make clans better for new players would be great.

3.  Our GDB treatment of each other should always be respectful, even during times of heated disagreement.  We are a small and dwindling group of enthusiasts and we should value each other even if our PCs don't.  We are all at least fairly able to express ourselves, given the platform of the game we've chosen, and most of us are adults.  We should be able to debate anything without insulting or abusing each other.  When you see people sniping at each other on the boards, many might not choose to try to be part of that community.  And we -need- each other, because there's not too many people who 'get' us.

4.  Is there still a limit on the size of the Byn?  I'd suggest removing that, if not the limits on all clans, especially newbie-friendly ones.  If you've got a popular leader who draws in players because they're having fun, that's a good thing.

the bolded one especially - i've made it very obvious its been my first year of play so far, or close to it., it wasn't much of a problem to me as Arm wasn't my first RP game, but many newbies to RP are also seen first trying RP on muds ,or not even realizing the game -is- RP. I've had a character in the byn, when it was at a low period of activity - having to follow the schedule during this time is just awful. I mean its part of the RP, but no one wants to sit there rping chopping vegetables for ten minutes to help with stew. (i mean ,if its with others, it can be fun, given the content of the RP).

my first character had a lot of   moments that had me hooked, and I think this is the most important part for player retention - sure, there was down time, but its like reading a good book - theres a hook to the game that keeps people interested.

I've noticed in long time of RPing that most rpers online (from byond ,ect, other commuinites), especially when they're new to a game, or new to rping in general, they're 'reactionary' Rpers - they wait for something to happen, they either don't know enough to make something happen , or they are a bit intimidated to try and make something happen. If nothing happens, they wind up bored, then either stop logging in, or quit outright. So its not only important to make sure they're not sitting their twiddling their thumbs. A big part of what kept me hooked was lots of action and things going on that lead to me learning cool things one after another, both my PC and my self OOCly learned tons of neat things. I personally think its important to get a player interested in the world at large. Let them see tidbits of the lore , bring out their curoisity. This will lead to them not only being interested, but some will start being less reactionary and more get-going.. Starting things, trying things - even if they fail. That said. When I DM a RP, I follow a  large ideal of Risk vs reward. High Risk scenarios should carry an equally great reward that everyone involved could be a part of in some sort of way. I do not know if this could count in armageddon - but I honestly believe that when characters start something, Risk a lot. possibly evne their lives, reputation.. ect.  The reward should be fitting the risk. Theres many times where i've seen people quit a roleplay because they felt their effort after taking huge risk to their character only to be given a pat on a back and a 'good job!'

We also got to remember - Games are meant to be fun, its that fun factor that keeps them in , and yes, there will -always- be down times. But its punishing to make those down times have to be chopping up vegetables or cleaning shit.


One thought might be to allow newbie players to create a character thats already a new runner of the byn, but that might be too much.

Underlined part, I agree with as well - while it'd be bad to let something Swell TOO much, if a clan is growing big. Say for example house borsail gains not just aides, but starts having wyvern PCs build up. This is going to be noticed. Other noble houses might be interested in knocking them down a few notches. This alone would create possible conflict - the only issue I see is that its hard to populate many clans with that many players with our current playerbase, but in simple terms - without hiring caps, an influential noble house would actually be the -target- of their rivals. That to me  I think would make things fun.

[Rokal]

- Animate for them. Arm is the most realistic MUD I know of, so capitalize on this. Make the world come alive and it will hook the newbs into logging on again.
Now, how to hold onto those newbs that have logged in a few times, yet might be getting bored with the slow pace of skilling up, and the super steep learning curve that we all had to face.

This brings up the thought of possibly having a set of staffer, much like the builders focused on building, focused on animating and bringing the world to life on improvised situations - storytellers could then be allowed to focus on players working out the bigger plots and such. I don't know if 'it'd work out, but on other roleplays i played, some of them had an admin postion like this to be able to bring the world to life on the fly, and were constantly watching for situations for world reaction, they had an ability to see the posts of anyone emoting, ect, no matter where they were (And the ability to mute the RP of certain players to keep things like mudsex hidden). They could then target a specific character, then use a command to make a narration/echo in the local area of that character to show, or even spawning  an NPC character or taking control of one in the surrounding rooms to then RP.

its a long shot, but its an idea. I doubt it'd work anything like how I explained it. But it really worked at keeping the world alive.