Combating boredom without having to act OOCly...

[Uglyhead]

Grraaah. The urge to just have my character go crazy/get drunk and get killed (preferably taking down some other people with him) is strong these days. However, it would be sorta OOC for him to go crazy/get drunk all of a sudden and do such things. Are there neat/interesting/fun things to do in Arm that I do not know about?

Mah. Sometimes, just sometimes, mind you, don't read too much into this, I sometimes consider heading back to my Hack 'n Slash roots. I must remember, though, that down that path lies emptiness and unfulfillment. High levels and good eq amount to nothing if the gameworld is empty and there's no story, no plot, and no chance for a true adventure. Bah.

You must admit however, it is possible to draw a certain amount of comfort from being a mindless killing machine.

Anyway, back on topic, what should I do? Trade BS travel stories with other players (and hope they don't slit my throat the first chance they get)?

[Akaramu]

http://www.zalanthas.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=2799

[Flaming Ocotillo]

You may want to consider creating a character who is dedicated to learning some particular fighting style, or several fighting styles, that require him to travel the world and amass information about other people's fighting techniques. This role would probably consist of RP that revolves around training, getting to know the weapons of the world, teaching others and being taught yourself, and questing to learn more of what you didnt know previously. Between all that from a code perspective, you'd have plenty of reason to fight all sorts of PCs and NPCs, and could have a sort of pseudo-HnS experience as you fight regularly with an IC reason to do so.

This is probably one of the least original character concepts the game has seen, but it's still perfectly valid, and it's a concept that I personally have had a lot of fun playing.

[Teleri]

Don't act OOCly.  When I was playing a few other RPIs, nothing pissed me off more when some person got so bored with their character that they went around indiscriminately killing a lot of interesting and important characters.  Nothing is gained, and in fact I believe that the MUD suffers overall for such rampages ending in complete death.  Just because you CAN do it, doesn't mean you SHOULD.  If you're so bored with your character, minimize annoyance and an unfulfilling death by just retiring.  There are many instances in which some of my characters could have gone on this mindless spree to terminate themselves, yet I chose the least destructive path out of being conscientious.  

People do go crazy and kill a bunch of people before dying themselves, but I've seen that it's quite rare.  If you need to terminate your character by a violent means, I would suggest going all out on NPCs

If you do go back to HnS, don't do it here.  This isn't an HnS MUD, and doing so within it will probably breed OOC hate and bad things will happen for you.

[SpyGuy]

Teleri has valid points but I'd like to point out that this MUD can have HnS elements, well it does, but those need to be put in perspective with the RPI developments.  Random PKing isnt fitting with the RPI aspect and would lead to grief playing where anyone who wasnt a warrior/beefed up ranger would have to fear walking into a tavern because Bored Bynner (TM) decided he wanted to add a few more notches to his belt.

FO's concept sounds pretty good if you just want to go around, see some of the world, and orient your character to upping combat skills.  Or if you want to kill lots of NPCs a hunter, especially in the North, can do such though its not quite as rewarding as you think (on an OOC level) and is pretty dangerous.

All that being said, you can always HnS to your hearts content and then come back to Arm for some RP action.  Its hard to say what type of things could make your chars life more interesting without knowing what type of char he is but I suggest finding something in his life to make a goal (getting lots of sid, becoming a badass adventurer, creating new/unique weapons, starting a family) and going from there.

[jmordetsky]

Creatively come up with something (something not a lame reason to H&S) that fits with your background and take steps toward doing it.

Go awol to visit a sick brother
get a new or different job
set out in search of something based on a rumor you heard
decide you are sick of being poor and become a smuggler
fall in love with another char
fall in love with another char's spouse
realize something that changes their views on life
take a risk
lose all your money gambling
lose all your money to a spice addiction
start trading legal goods to a far off city or outpost
get drunk and insult someones dirty looking shoes.

the moral of the story, you don't have to go on a rampage and kill everything in sight to make the game interesting. Just be creative.

Doing someting rash, different, wild, interesting does mean you are poorly RPing your char. Just make sure the whys are IC...

I see this alot when a new char especially a new combat type char plays in a clan. They are like this sucks, I'm bored. This happens to everyone at some point. Hell it's happening to me *right* now. But it's up to you to change it....

My advice is, don't be afraid to break the rules. You might get raped, robed, killed or maimed...so what.....shit happens. It's more fun then idling and waiting for something to happen.

[Ix Machina]

What I do when I feel like mindlessly killing npcs and pc's:

I look on the mud connector for a hack and slash, no rp mud.

I create a character on there and wack away to my heart's content until the urge to kill dissipates.

I find that if I feel bored and then play on Arm, I just get more bored and frustrated, especially if I'm in an environment where I am limited in what my pc can do on their own.

Seriously, lots of muds out there to hack and slash out on, you can kill, kill, kill, and it won't impact your Arm PC one bit. But you'll feel a lot better.

[sacac]

What I do when I have that urge: I take up a hobby

[WarriorPoet]

I like to swat a VNPC on the ass, or mebbe fondle a breast. The beauty of VNPC's is that you can have her turn around, smack you off your barstool and kick you in the throat, then to proceed with a vicious fistfight with her VNPC husband. I like to do this, but then I like to be on the recieving end of the scrap. I know alot of people who are anti RPing with VNPC's in this manner, but I like it, and it keeps me amused when there is noone about to amuse me.

A few more ideas... Think on what your character likes. Would he try a taste of spice? Would he like it, or LOVE it? Would he get strung out and go around robbing and killing to support his habit?

The 'quiet' times in the mud are when my characters think about things like this. The 'think' command will work wonders if you'll use it. I sit around, think to myself for hours on end. When I'm finished, I've fleshed out my characters loves, hopes, dreams, fears, desires, turnons, turnoffs, turnarounds pet peeves and all that stuff that solid, believable characters have...

But, I'm an ass so you can probably ignore me...

[Gesht]

- - I've always been a fan of solo-RP, myself, for passing the time.  VNPCs and think commands are your tools. WarriorPoet had some excellent suggestions for learning to solo-RP, so I won't bother rehashing them. However, if solo-RP isn't for you (because you're a fuggin' Commie pinko), below are some other suggestions.  I am suggesting a broad list of suggestions, with general sub-suggestions, because I do not know your character's mentality. It's sort of like firing buckshot; it's spread out enough that even with bad aim, some of my suggestions may hit.



Independent Warrior:
* Travel the world.  Learn new fighting styles, sample the foulest booze the world has to offer, seek trade opportunities, spread VDs, make enemies in foreign lands, explore, scout out villages for Borsail/Winrothol to enslave.

* Get a job, you damned hippie. Join a clan, move up in the clan, fail to move up in the clan and opt for making contacts with the local crime syndicate to screw over your clan, become a bodyguard, rent yourself out as a guide and kill your employer, become a spy, become a double agent, become a septuple agent.



Independent Non-combatant
* Travel the world. Find new materials, spy on people, spy on people for money, spread dissent, spread rumors, destroy people's lives, enhance people's lives, help people, help people so they will trust you then poison them, learn the markets, meet new people, pretend to be important.

* Join a clan. Try to get a promotion, do your best, get burned out and become abusive, become a drunk, become a spice fiend, plan an inside job on your clan, offer to sell clan secrets to the enemy, offer to spy on the enemy for your clan, seek training.



Independent Magickers
* Start your own business. Gather rare goods, join forces with other magickers, try to find a good place to set yourself up after getting rich, travel extensively looking for opportunity, explore your hometown looking for opportunity, scare the bejeezus out of commoners because you're having a bad day, make enemies, plan to kill those enemies, plan to kill those enemies so brutally people argue over what to nickname the ellusive fiend you've become.



Independent Gemmed Magickers
* Practice your spells. Practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, try to find a means of freeing yourself, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, practice, start your own business, look for a job, forego practice and employment and just see how much carnage you can get away with if you're sneaky enough.



Clan members
* Think of an activity, and suggest it to your imm. Suggest an RPT, suggest a weekly RPT, seek out business with other clans, work out a plan for your character to try to steal sensitive info for another clan, find a clan/place you hate and actively plot to destroy them, attack Tuluk because it has it coming, attack Allanak because it has it coming, start extorting money from independents, plan to massively extort money from independents.



Anyone:
* Learn new languages. Find someone and pay them in liquor to teach you how to swear in other tongues, ask a templar to teach you Tatlum just to see the look on his/her face (possibly the last thing you see), learn dirty jokes in other languages, honestly try to learn other languages for the sake of learning them.

* Go into a bar, get drunk, maybe set nosave on, and attack someone unarmed.  Spend some time in jail, wind up in debt to a templar, make a new enemy for life, make several new enemies for life, make new friends by taking a swing at an asshole, curse at the guards dragging you away, hit on the guards dragging you away, promise never to fight again after your release and then go pick another fight.

* Become a total asshole. Zalanthas' bastard population can always use fleshing out. Treat everyone you meet like dirt, swindle, con, do disgusting things with phlegm, trip people, trip onto people, make enemies, make lifelong enemies, become friends with another asshole and have contests to see who can aggrivate others the most, pretend to be a war veteran, pretend to have a missing limb up until 3 seconds after you are given pity money, see just how much it takes to get someone to kill you in public.

* Go crazy and become a serial killer. Try to kill other players via cunning, pkill via poison, pkill people because they wandered into YOUR alley or YOUR tavern, kill VNPCs, kill NPCs, leave corpses in clever places, post a rumor after victim 6 of your killing spree, leave clues to see if the templarate can catch you, develop a signature style.

* Go really crazy/self-righteous and begin fighting crime. Track down serial killers, report smuggling, become both a templar stooge and a defender of the underdog, bring order to the Rinth, accept that you cannot bring order to the Rinth and settle for saving the elderly from being ganked, steal from thieves, steal from thugs, extreminate criminals and loot their corpses, decide that you will only eat and drink what you buy with cleansed blood money.

* Move to Red Storm. I'm biased, so sue me.

[Agent_137]

wow.

archive?

[Delirium]

Nice post. I second the archive motion.

[Stroker]

because you're a fuggin' Commie pinko

I've always been an admirer of the one known as the great Gesht, but ouch, man, that hurts .... right in the heart ....

*The one who still marches under the old, red hammer and sickle.*

[Gesht]

- - I just love falling back on old 80's slurs.  The fall of the Soviet Union really hurt my vocabulary.  A whole decade of not being able to call someone a Commie for no reason... truly awful.  Thank goodness sentamentality has brought back a familiartiy with the 80's!

[Stroker]

True, true. I often reminisce and sink into a bottomless pit of nostalgia. However, now we may sit together; you'll call me a pinko commie, and I'll hit you over the head with an empty bottle of vodka, invariably. Do not worry, you won't feel much pain, you'll be as inebriated as any true Soviet.

[Gesht]

*sniff* I feel misty-eyed for the old days already.

[Revelations]

These are all good suggestions, but what I find that keeps me the most active and excited are roles that involve players. I can come up with a gagilion number of hobbies but sooner of later, I'll get back to getting bored. The only sure way to prevent boredom, from my experience so far, is to get involved with PCs in plots or even just normal everyday circumstances like a chat over a mug of ale at the tavern. You can hack and slash to your heart's content, but eventually, if you have no players to interact with, then you'll become bored, which is the reason why I've switched from the H&S games to Arm, and have stayed. I suggest joining a clan, and if there isn't much excitement going on with the PCs of that clan, then aspire to get to a position that will allow you to 'spice' things up with plots and PC interaction of your own. You'll be surprised at the number of things that are possible in this game.

Anyways, hope you stick around and get through the low times.

[Cenghiz]

Archiving before I can say anything? No no...

I'll add just one very little tiny thing. Approach to a templar. Bow/nod, then mumble something about your loyalty. Believe me, those templars' characters are dying for more plots and interaction. After a few tests of trusts -eh, those badasses have some elven blood in them for sure-, they'll push you into a great and interesting story 99%. This is what I do whenever I feel my char needs a plot to get rid of boredom.

[Agent_137 (2L2L)]

it's been long enough.

ARCHIVE PLEASE.

This is a vital post to my career, and can save many great players from moving on to different games (like i've seen happen.)

[HardCarbon]

Archiving before I can say anything? No no...

I'll add just one very little tiny thing. Approach to a templar. Bow/nod, then mumble something about your loyalty. Believe me, those templars' characters are dying for more plots and interaction. After a few tests of trusts -eh, those badasses have some elven blood in them for sure-, they'll push you into a great and interesting story 99%. This is what I do whenever I feel my char needs a plot to get rid of boredom.

 Feck that...  Even when I tried to help them I ended up face down in a pile of filth  and many smalls poorer .....

[Pantoufle]

Do what you want.  

Note, I didn't say: do what you want as long as it's IC to do so.

Why?

Because it's your character and you can have him do whatever he wants.  What?  It's not IC for him to travel to Red Storm village, since he has no reason to, even though you, the player, want him to?  So invent a virtual relative who has asked him to go.  Maybe your character's grandmother is sick and needs you to buy a fruit only sold in that village, which she can use to make some herbal remedy.  Look, if you really want to do something you can make up any nonsense you want and -- voila -- it's suddenly completely IC to do it.

Now before all you IC/RP Fascists trample me to the ground, please consider I haven't suggested that anyone completely disregard their character concept and commit acts which stand in opposition with their background.  But I think there is a trend for people to say "Oh I can't do this because it's not IC for him to do it" or "Oh I can't do that because it's not IC for him to do it", when, 9 times out of 10, that's pure rubbish.  It's your character, if you're bored then do something about it.  If you really want to do something (within reason), you're more than welcome to conjure up any number of virtual scenarios that give him the chance.

I'd rather see players be inventive with their character's virtual lives than idle endlessly in taverns because "doing anything else isn't IC".

You don't have an IC reason to do something that you, OOCly, want to do?  Then find a reason!

[Oxidised Lizard]

Somebody's already posted this link, but I'd just like to point out that there is already a thread dealing with boredom in the archives:
http://www.zalanthas.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=2799

Still, there are some more suggestions in this thread so it could be archived.

- - I've always been a fan of solo-RP, myself, for passing the time.  VNPCs and think commands are your tools. WarriorPoet had some excellent suggestions for learning to solo-RP, so I won't bother rehashing them. However, if solo-RP isn't for you (because you're a fuggin' Commie pinko), below are some other suggestions.  I am suggesting a broad list of suggestions, with general sub-suggestions, because I do not know your character's mentality. It's sort of like firing buckshot; it's spread out enough that even with bad aim, some of my suggestions may hit.

Listen that is really uncalled for take a chill pill man.

[WarriorPoet]

Listen that is really uncalled for take a chill pill man.

? I'm very confused about what he needs to chill about, and, whatever it is, how he's still not chilled after he posted that almost fifteen months ago...?

-WP

[Delirium]

He's a bot.  A very stupid bot.

[Ritley (lazy)]

Trust me Arm would never be the same without RP....if it was then I would be playing Achea. You do not have to stay in a tavern all day....oh no go hunting as long as it's realistic.....or make a street thug as long as you give him a personality and be realistic....everything is made so much more fun because it has RP. Everything. In a way it's like reading a book, but you have control over a character of your choice. And it's multi genred. Trust me Arm is the best.  And I have played almost every mud out their so trust my advice.

[Agent_137]

I had a dream last night. One of my current PC's sergeants was giving me advice OOCly on how to see new things with your character, and break out of ruts. She said:


Take your character out of his guild and subguild. Take him out of his clan. Strip your character of everything but who he is at heart. And look at him then. What does he want? What does he need? Where does he want to go?


And for gaining better combat emotes, she suggested:

Imagine your character fighting some one of equal ability in your mind. Not while you're distracted with armageddon, but as a thought exercise by itself. Imagine what he'd have to do new that would help him to overcome his opponent. "getting better" doesnt' cut it, in this case. Some new move or action that lets him defeat his opponent. Find that and use it to represent improved combat ability in the game.


Thanks Sergeant!