Personality Crisis Comments by Alexander Gambotto-Burke

I'm reminded of national brotherhood week.

Just reminds me of the famous Lightning Bolt video.

I played on an RP server in WoW. A bunch of fellow TOGers started on Defias Brotherhood when it started mostly just to escape the "Barrens Chat" that had spread everywhere on older servers. But it never sat well with me. I really couldn't get my head round people being "in character" all the time. And yeah, theres waaaay too many "thy's and thou's" going around there lol

edited due to me watching the tennis and not paying attention to my hyperlinks :P

I don't actively seek RPers, but for some reason I just tend to end up with them in WAR - on my server at least, there are lots of RPers about. I even went to the bother of making sure I knew what my characters backstory should probably be (not much, enough to make it up in a satisfactory way). It's quite enjoyable charging into battle with a Warrior Priest bellowing "FOR THE EMPEROR!" after having had a nice chat about how nice my homeland of Chrace is.

Is quite nerdy though, but if it's a universe you like, an MMO is the closest you'll get to anctually being there. Especially the likes of Lord of the Rings Online, I'd imagine RPing in that would be quite good.

all these years ago when i first heard about world of warcraft i assumed every player participated in a RP style. i fugred thats what made the mmorpg experience so unique i.e. that you were playing a roleplaying game with other people and were...you know, playing a role. i still think this utopian idea is really cool i mean creepy overtones aside its like playing an interactive book where by you can interact with characters on a deeper level then any single player game.

then i installed the game realised everyone was a racist bunny hopping dolt quit and went back to elder scrolls

sighh...

No conversations with role players in LotrO? I'd have thought that place was the ultimo wet dream to role-play in Tolkien's world.

I play an old man from Dale that mocks Rohan and Gondor, cause they aren't dragon slayers, innit.

I used to be a DM/admin for a NWN2 Roleplay persistant world, and the article gave me a few chuckles of recognition, to the point of being almost certain that this Rachel character is someone I know, especially with the pregnant roleplay part.

Roleplay attracts all kinds, i've met some very intelligent people who are basically creating stories and epics (and will undoubtably end up as successes in a creative field), some who like to bring communities together, some who are into fantasy debate and politics, some who sort of do a social adventuring group thing where they have their characters all matey and their relationships often spill into real life and they gain new drinking buddies (mainly people who roleplay dwarves).

Then you've got your weird fetishists (Halfling cybersex), sadists, sickos and sociopaths for sure. I banned more lunatics from that server than could fill an asylum.

So it's a mixed bag, when the emergent gameplay thing comes together it can be a fucking epic experience and it's possible to get quite invested. But when your stood around in an inn roleplaying that you're bored you know it's time to quit.

Personally I never did RP in a MMO.
It's just too much work. Rather bullshit in Dalaran about Michael Jackson etc. than making up an epic story of my rogue's background.
I mean when rolling him I was told: "Ah good. We were about to burn you with the other corpses. Glad to you made it out. Now go the fuck away and report to X." Since then he is out there to kill shit hitting it hard and getting the best gear I can get.
Enough story for me.

However I would not roll on a RP server and try to piss off the population because I respect that certain people want to roll play.

Also I wonder how RPs justify farming Ulduar and other instances. I mean shit died once. How can it be up next server reset?
All soustoned or Arthas running around rezzing? :p

I don't know if this is common in all MMOs but I found it hilarious that in WoW people were constantly walking everywhere. Honestly, I can't get anywhere fast enough when I'm playing!

Nice article, EG. As an MMO RPer myself, this is a subject that's very dear to me. Though it has to be said, we do other things as well! :)

Because having an imagination and talking in gramatically correct sentences these days is crazy and socially inept. Fact.

lololomgmirite11111?

"F*** you, David Tennant!"

LOL

I also ran an RP guild, in World of Warcraft.

Actually, I lie. I've run three RP guilds.

Don't misunderstand, it's not all about total immersion and escapism (although both of those in moderation are certainly not unhealthy). For many it's about expanding content in a user-made way, and bringing more worth to a monthly subscription fee. Back in the early days of WoW, on the Moonglade server, it was perfectly normal to be setting up markets for traders, celebrating holidays before the Blizzard machine got their claws into making them official. Chasing down a lvl 40 pvp flagged player (usually me!), trying to get word of a horde plot to the Defias Brotherhood- resulting in a massive chase and manhunt from Booty Bay to Deadmines. Not to mention sitting around a campfire telling tall tales of your adventuring exploits.

For one, it encourages good player etiquette. Vanilla WoW was absolutely nothing like the state it is in now. You get people together and all bond over a common goal - to play along. They take note from others, and although I do get why people get strung up on people who go too oldy-worldy-speak, in my experience that has always been a vast minority. The best way to educate people out of that stupid idea of oldy-worldy speak and get them to embrace a "character" is to give them working examples, and that means - initially at least - bearing with them whilst they work it out of their system. There are people you ccan't save - those who pretend that inside their lvl 2 shell is a lvl 1000 ancient demon of destructive power - but that is what an ignore list is for. Strangers come together and have a bit of fun, you then log out and smile at the jokes or at the fun. Unhealthy? Do you read fantasy fiction?

The last guild I ran, I rolled an Orc Rogue, and on the face of it the guild was perfectly legit. AH trading, doing deals with other guilds for supplies etc. I was quick to exploit the facade though and thus an undercurrent of more "dastardly deeds" began to happen. At times, temporary guilds popped up claiming arrest warrants for my orc. On a very large scale, people got sucked into it - and my lovely assistant, Mayne (female Blood Elf hunter, also played by me) put on the pretty and more friendly face. I got a kick out of inspiring others to play along - who would inspire others. The only reason my time as the rogue had to come to an end was because, well. When you got a dozen or so guilds after your head for a large gold reward, the best thing to end up doing is kill the character off. Like any GOOD story. You don't want a nasty person walking into the sunset, right? And you sure don't want to give the satisfaction of ending the story to someone else. So you have to end it in a fitting fashion (and nothing says goodbye like your latest ill-gotten gains falling off the side of Outland and in a fit of luntic greed leaping off your flying mount to grab them whilst everyone watches. I thought it was funny anyways... and the rogue died. OR DID HE?*).

Is any of that unhealthy? I doubt it. It may not be everyones cup of tea, but it's certainly no less harmful than other forms of escapism, and participating in and creating new strands of a story is always good for the imagination, something most adults don't tend to use that often. Of course, you don't want to be doing it all the time but really, MMO's themselves should be played in moderation. Like tabletop, pen and paper or any other type of imaginary interactive fiction, too much of anything isn't entirely good for you. I think delving back into RP and raiding from time to time - which I do - is certainly a much more healthy thing to enjoy than someone who plays seven hours a day, seven days a week and never takes a break.

Besides, I'd rather pretend to be a dastardly evil hand of chaos in Azeroth than pretend I have a massive pair of 36DD boobs and call myself Katie and live on London. Let's put one last element of perspective on it - RP is often harmless fun, but really pretending to be something you are not is actually cause for real concern, and that is far more common on the internet than a few thousand people pretending to be adventurers in a fictional world.

* Do note I don't write soaps, and I really have no intention of resurrecting my evil rogue.

Not a bad article, I have to say, but it would be quite nice to see one of these pieces that seriously starts from the premise that role-playing is cool. Maybe. For a change.

A fuller exploration of role-playing probably is needed as preface to this, as role-playing online is just a development of tabletop/live-action role-playing, both of which are extensive and vibrant communities. But then that probably gets into a much larger and more different kettle of fish.

I would put it to you, however, that actually many more people are into role-playing than might be imagined. When you are offline, and playing some manner of single-player RPG (hey! it's in the name), you are, usually, role-playing. That's right. You might be doing it with a script and AI, but role-playing is what you are doing. Baldur's Gate is an excellent example - an immersive story-based role-playing game where you make choices, often, based on story and your character. Not just to game it and win with by twinking it (I have no idea if that's a common term in video-game world - it means tweaking your character to win to the max, often disregarding the element of character, background, role-playing etc).

Furthermore, those writing After Action Reports... are also role-playing. They are reporting to us the actions and results of a character/general/leader/whatever, often in a 'realistic' and involved kind of way. When they're playing it... they're role-playing as that character(s).

Without roleplaying, your MMO is just about getting a shinier sword and armour... then bragging about it. With roleplaying, it can be a subtle, engaging, exciting and incredibly varied experience. More RP can only be a good thing.

"at worst, obsessive, sociopathic nerds."

That'd be the DorkFail community.

(Prepares for full karma-looting)

I think RP MMO players are very brave. I used to P&P CoC quite a lot, but taking that into the realms of MMO seems to much work and you really need close social interaction IMHO to RP successfully.

Sadly a lot of non-RP people invade RP servers just to f*ck around.

Good article & comments. I definitely think that RP can be a great tool for developing creative ability, especially among more the introverted. I was a fairly shy kid and spent the middle years of my teens in RP guilds in DAoC, SWG and WoW, and now I'm part of a successful improvised comedy group. I can definitely see the line between one and the other, though I'd probably never usually admit it..

I tried it briefly in both LOTRO and EVE, and I have to say that after probably a cumulative total of 4 weeks maximum struggling along writing awful backstories for my characters, I actually have a great deal of respect for RP'ers. It is not easy to do at all, in some larger conversations in EVE it essentially amounted to writing a novel real-time with constant feedback from other people, and keeping track of just what develops in the lore can be nigh-on impossible, but I can see how it might be rewarding for people who apply themselves to it.

To me, it amounted to a very hard second job, but I won't begrudge those who do enjoy it.

Well said AphoticCosmos.

As with most things, there are people who take it to extremes, and people who dont do it at all. I fall in the middle somewhere. I enjoy RP on various online games, going as far as writing back stories, and thinking about my characters motivations/concerns. I enjoy it as a writer, but once done, I only add the occasional new piece of information to the story, any more than that would get in the way of me playing the game. Also I enjoy lots of different genres of games, and dont like to devote a disproportionately large amount of time to just one.

ahh good old Argent Dawn, how I miss the at times like this

Did loads of roleplaying back in the 80s and 90s, call of cthulhu, runequest, rolemaster, d+d, warhammer, car wars, paranoia, and derivatives like stormbringerand merp.

I would find it far easier to tabletop roleplay because the whole narrative is tailored for your group, you all just get into it and try and work out what to do. we didn't dress up, we didn't thee and thou, we just got the character classes, skills and stuff and had a laugh trying to figure out how to progress the quests and campaigns.

It was remarkable to undertake a campaign in glorantha or the power behind the throne campaign in warhammer, the flexibility on the part of the gm, the intellectual challenge of figuring out, what to do far exceeds what computer games are capable of, because it was a communal story being told in the minds of 5 or 6 guys. You had to imagine it all for yourself, and the sense of achievement in completing the quests etc. remains to this day far stronger than any raid i've completed in lotro or anything that happened in UO.

UO was at least interesting insofar as the whole % based system and the provision of some flat content meant all the interactivity was generated by players, it was open world pvp really so people just got involved with whatever they wanted. being able to have your own vendors, house design, balancing skills etc. it was almost perfect, for a computer game.

Nothing is going to beat roleplaying 5 former first world war soldiers called to a friend in an asylum because he has dreams that one of our colleagues left to die in the trench under a bombardment wasn't dead...or alive. I have a clear picture of us all, in a muddy trench, one shovel and one pistol between us as a former german commander was finishing the raising of an army of dead tommies to take revenge forhis own dead comrades.

No more ridiculous than a computer game in terms of a plot, but it happened to take place around a table with a few beers and pizzas. There was a touch of blackadder about some of our dialogues, but then it's not like the dialogue would have clear boundaries defined carefully by designers when you're making it up as you go along.

and i thought Second Life was scary

I loved a form of RPing. I let my Gnome Warlock communicate with other characters in game. Also NPC. Thanking vendors, clapping for quest givers who give a story, laughing about silly things. I loved it.

You'll find grand Role-playing opportunities with LOTRO.

The developers seem to take great care in adding lots of bells and whistles that really have absolutely no specific use other than to add immersive depth to the world.

If only more developers shared this ambition.