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Greenstorm · 06-14-2005, 07:32 PM

I have to agree with Earthmother's second post, as well as Nutai. One of the things that seems to be an issue all across the roleplaying board (tabletop games included) is the gross overuseage of the word 'roleplay'. The word seems to range in meaning from directing the actions of an avatar, to as EM said taking control of a character and interacting with a coded world in code and word, to controlling character plus world with only descriptive words. Of course, there are a whole bunch of stops in-between, and variations and mix-and-matches on all those ways of doing things.

What I'd love to see (won't happen soon, but eh) is some sort of clear terminology to describe these differences. In general, on a MUD you roleplay by 'doing' things in interaction with code-- you're pretending to be a person drinking when you type 'drink wine' or 'smile' whatever, and the code then deals with telling other people what you're doing -- but the telling other people isn't the point of the game. In general, on a MUSH you roleplay by describing what your character does to other people, who are both audience and interactive world at the same time, and the point is to describe to each other what your characters do and thus mutually create the world.

I can kind of skirt around words for this: human-interactive roleplay vs code-interactive roleplay, descriptive roleplay vs active roleplay, whatever. Most of us have a good idea of what we're expecting with just the 'MUSH' and 'MUD' terminology, although sometimes that slips up.

In general, too, 'MUSH'es' encouragement to roleplay lies in the admiration of roleplaying peers. Standard encouragement on 'MUD's as described above involves an increase in ability or title.

If you want to encourage descriptive roleplay, it's good to have some way of publically recognising it. Doing something tends to be describing a thing so others can see it, so let others see it. Post logs of the roleplay on your website. Let people alter the world a little bit. Give them time to write some description of their actions, rather than making speed of command-input absolutely vital for the game. Give 'excuses' for more than one person to be in the same room so they can descriptively roleplay with each other, whether they be long-term excuses (a tavern) or short-term excuses (a party, kidnapped and held hostage in the same house).

If you want to encourage code-interactive roleplay, do much the same sort of thing: put in venues for it. On a code-interactive game, doing something means the code recognises what you're doing and helps narrate the story to you. Let people do a wide range of things in-character for the role they've chosen. Like EM said above, have books that can be 'read'. Make it easy for people to 'smile' and 'frown'. Give them pets to interact with, give them forests where wind actually blows, give some sort of feedback for walking down a street. If XP is a measurement of how many 'useful life experiences' someone's had, make sure they get XP for the things you want people to do.

I think it's trickier to do the MUD route because people expect different kinds of things from the world, and the code has to do it all.

In the MUSH-type roleplay described above (I know I'm grossly generalising here, and there are many many deviations from these generalisations on TMS) if someone wants a barstool, they just put it into their pose, no one had to think of it beforehand. If someone wants a handkerchief to do a fake magic trick, they put that in their pose.

On a MUD-style game, though, you need to anticipate the kinds of things people will want to do and support them, while thinking about the things people don't want to do, and not cluttering their time up with those things (Your nose itches. 'scratch nose' Your nose no longer itches.) Some people like a lot of nitty-gritty details, some like more sweeping details-free panning shots. While a MUSH environment automatically *is* whatever the players want it to be when they want it to be that way, a MUD environment stays however it was in the first place, never jumping details if they're put in, never only doing something when it's 'interesting'...

Bah, but I'm rambling on. Long and short, decide what the types of people you want to attract think of as a reward, make sure they have the ability to do the things you want them to do, and reward them when they do the things with that reward.

Most importantly, though, and the point of this post: make it clear, on your website or whatever, of the /type/ of encouragement you're giving roleplay, and the type of roleplay you have. Put snippets from your game up, describe what you do in clear terms and how you encourage it, and you'll get the type of people who like to do that thing and who like that type of encouragement. Once you have a group like that, they attract like-minded people, and it's all good.

06-14-2005, 07:32 PM	#13
Greenstorm Member Join Date: Jul 2002 Posts: 30	I have to agree with Earthmother's second post, as well as Nutai. One of the things that seems to be an issue all across the roleplaying board (tabletop games included) is the gross overuseage of the word 'roleplay'. The word seems to range in meaning from directing the actions of an avatar, to as EM said taking control of a character and interacting with a coded world in code and word, to controlling character plus world with only descriptive words. Of course, there are a whole bunch of stops in-between, and variations and mix-and-matches on all those ways of doing things. What I'd love to see (won't happen soon, but eh) is some sort of clear terminology to describe these differences. In general, on a MUD you roleplay by 'doing' things in interaction with code-- you're pretending to be a person drinking when you type 'drink wine' or 'smile' whatever, and the code then deals with telling other people what you're doing -- but the telling other people isn't the point of the game. In general, on a MUSH you roleplay by describing what your character does to other people, who are both audience and interactive world at the same time, and the point is to describe to each other what your characters do and thus mutually create the world. I can kind of skirt around words for this: human-interactive roleplay vs code-interactive roleplay, descriptive roleplay vs active roleplay, whatever. Most of us have a good idea of what we're expecting with just the 'MUSH' and 'MUD' terminology, although sometimes that slips up. In general, too, 'MUSH'es' encouragement to roleplay lies in the admiration of roleplaying peers. Standard encouragement on 'MUD's as described above involves an increase in ability or title. If you want to encourage descriptive roleplay, it's good to have some way of publically recognising it. Doing something tends to be describing a thing so others can see it, so let others see it. Post logs of the roleplay on your website. Let people alter the world a little bit. Give them time to write some description of their actions, rather than making speed of command-input absolutely vital for the game. Give 'excuses' for more than one person to be in the same room so they can descriptively roleplay with each other, whether they be long-term excuses (a tavern) or short-term excuses (a party, kidnapped and held hostage in the same house). If you want to encourage code-interactive roleplay, do much the same sort of thing: put in venues for it. On a code-interactive game, doing something means the code recognises what you're doing and helps narrate the story to you. Let people do a wide range of things in-character for the role they've chosen. Like EM said above, have books that can be 'read'. Make it easy for people to 'smile' and 'frown'. Give them pets to interact with, give them forests where wind actually blows, give some sort of feedback for walking down a street. If XP is a measurement of how many 'useful life experiences' someone's had, make sure they get XP for the things you want people to do. I think it's trickier to do the MUD route because people expect different kinds of things from the world, and the code has to do it all. In the MUSH-type roleplay described above (I know I'm grossly generalising here, and there are many many deviations from these generalisations on TMS) if someone wants a barstool, they just put it into their pose, no one had to think of it beforehand. If someone wants a handkerchief to do a fake magic trick, they put that in their pose. On a MUD-style game, though, you need to anticipate the kinds of things people will want to do and support them, while thinking about the things people don't want to do, and not cluttering their time up with those things (Your nose itches. 'scratch nose' Your nose no longer itches.) Some people like a lot of nitty-gritty details, some like more sweeping details-free panning shots. While a MUSH environment automatically is whatever the players want it to be when they want it to be that way, a MUD environment stays however it was in the first place, never jumping details if they're put in, never only doing something when it's 'interesting'... Bah, but I'm rambling on. Long and short, decide what the types of people you want to attract think of as a reward, make sure they have the ability to do the things you want them to do, and reward them when they do the things with that reward. Most importantly, though, and the point of this post: make it clear, on your website or whatever, of the /type/ of encouragement you're giving roleplay, and the type of roleplay you have. Put snippets from your game up, describe what you do in clear terms and how you encourage it, and you'll get the type of people who like to do that thing and who like that type of encouragement. Once you have a group like that, they attract like-minded people, and it's all good.