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Old 01-10-2012, 01:37 PM   #7
Will
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Join Date: Aug 2007
Posts: 90
Will is on a distinguished road
Re: "Planned" RP or Pure Immersion?

Ah. I see. Yeah, I spent seven years running weekly live events. They can be difficult to do well, but they can also be a lot of fun, for GMs and players alike. Like you, I often found myself getting frustrated, but I think my problems were different than yours. As a game admin involved heavily in the day to day happenings in my little world, my philosophy on role-play was that players should push the action, not me. I created and played lots of NPCs with personalities, histories, issues and agendas, and introduced the tip of the iceberg to players, but where the story went and how it ended was up to the players. What I encountered a lot of times was players waiting around for me to tell them what to do, which wasn't gonna happen. If I was gonna steer them around toward some predetermined outcome, I might as well have just written the stories and sent out a mass email. Sure woulda saved us all a lot of time.

To me, role-play is all about making decisions and accepting the rewards or dealing with the consequences. If folks can't listen to what is being told to them by a NPC and agree on a course of action so they can follow the lead, tough. That's part of life. Not every foray is going to end in success.

I guess it's a matter of what you're looking for. Some people aren't into becoming part of the world and some are. I like being part of storylines. I like it when there are repercussions to the stuff my character says and does. I don't think battling a hoard of invading orcs is exactly great RP, but if I'd have mouthed off to the King, I'd have had a good reason for doing it and be expecting some kind of response.

Years ago my friends and I had tons of fun embroiling ourselves in the intrigue offered to us by the gaming world in which we played. We created a vast majority of the conflict, but the staff followed our lead, brought in live NPCs and used the tools available to them to enrich the experience. It was a blast. I never wrote a single character background or spent any amount of time worrying about whether or not what I was doing was "proper." Keeping last night's sporting event and the crappy day at work out of the game wasn't something any of us trained at or were born with the ability to do. We didn't work at making sure it didn't happen and nothing about it was unpleasant.

And I think consistency has to do with what you want out of a game. If you want to be part of a virtual world where football and Facebook don't exist, resisting their discussion while you're there won't be a problem at all. One preference is not better or more correct than than the other, but they do both exist. Most people who enjoy RP like to occasionally drop into the realm and slink off somewhere to bash some heads and rip some guts without having to deal with the drama of the day. And that's ok too.

I think "proper role-play," per your definition, is easy and enjoyable to be part of if that's what you want. There are many degrees of RP, though, and what people expect from game to game can vary widely. The good thing is, there's scads of them out there, so nobody has to play anything s/he doesn't want to.
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