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Old 03-12-2008, 10:50 AM   #33
Milawe
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Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: USA
Home MUD: Threshold RPG
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Re: Looking for an RPI, where the 'I' stands for "Immersive"

I'm not sure how I missed your post. That is a really pretty site, and I'm always a huge fan of MUD promotion sites. In addition, the nicer it looks, the better.

I think, though, that even as nice as that site is, it doesn't even give a really solid definition of an RPI mud. Here's a quote from the site:

The majority? That means that some don't, right? This seems like there's a lot of wiggle room, and it just depends what games they want to let in.

Several roleplay-enforced muds have restricted OOC communications. I'm going to guess that they won't make the RPI list, not that they'd want to, but you never know!

There is absolutely no mention of perma-death on the site, especially in the "What separates the RPIMUDs from other MUDs?" which is where I would expect a list of criteria for RPIs. From what everyone is saying here, an absolute in RPIs is perma-death. Shouldn't that be on the site dedicated to RPIMUDs then? Most of the "What separates" list focuses on describing the roleplay:

Again, this is all very vague and open to interpretation. Ask any player who plays on a game where roleplaying is enforced-- most put their very utmost effort into roleplaying. Games like Threshold and New Worlds, where there's plenty of hack and slash capabilities but also lots tons of roleplaying, have players who RP with NPCs and inanimate objects all the time. They're encouraged to do so, especially in specific areas. I still don't think they'd qualify as an RPI, and I don't really think either mud wants to be designated as one.

The RPIMUD requirements for an RPI mud is a prime example of why this debate still exists. RPI mud requirements are always changing, very vague, and, ultimately, seems to be just a gauge of the roleplaying skills of the players involved in various muds and a put down on other mud's roleplayers. (You can't be a REAL roleplayer if you chose to roleplay on anything but an RPI! Granted, this is more of a player's attitude than an admin's attitude. I've never heard any of the RPI mud admins say anything like that!) So, I honestly think the RPI community's refusal to actually acknowledge what the requirements are for being an RPI play a HUGE part in the confusion that the original poster obviously had.

If *I* were to define an RPI based on what players on this site have been saying, I would list the following qualities:

Otherwise, RPI will always be a judgement call, and this confusion will always be around in some form or another. Until then, I think that RPIMUD is leaving things open-ended in order to incorporate the muds that they wish to and exclude the muds they wish to based on the judgement of a handful of people. Though, honestly, that's totally legit, too. Who knows! Maybe RPIMUD simply wants to end up incorporating ALL RP Enforced muds. I have no clue!

See, ultimately, this is where I start getting weird feelings (oogies?) about RPI, the people who try to define it, and some of the players involved. The term "non-RP characteristics" makes very little sense to me and is completely subjective. What I feel adds to my RP could very well be something someone else feels detracts from their RP. In fact, I KNOW that some of the stuff I love and I feel adds to my roleplaying is stuff other roleplayers hate! While there's stuff on other muds that people love for RP that I think is simply a nuisance and actually breaks immersion including some of the extremely unwieldy emote systems out there.

Anyway, sorry to keep the debate going. I guess I was just feeling bad for Burrtyr.
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