Why I quit rp

Moon Guard
84

That’s your opinion :slight_smile: we used to have a lot of fun with it in game. Times change, the internet as it was is dead, and MMO’s are also less social since most of that goes on in Discord. It is what it is, but you definitely can’t say it wasn’t a thing. It certainly was, and many enjoyed it.

Most the people I used to RP with quit RPing a long time ago for similar reasons. A new generation of RPers replaced them with a more script-event-dice oriented method. I find it boring and tedious, if you have fun with it – well, it’s there for you to enjoy, so it’s not like my personal preference is changing that for you.

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85

Most of the people running these events aren’t new rpers. They’ve been around for many many years. If anything I’m the up and coming rper that can’t run a D20 event to save their life LMAO.

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86

More quit from the old days than are still around.

Just sayin’.

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87

I used to run a guild on WrA that was a roving trade caravan. We used to real time travel from city to city or village to village for the purpose of trade and merchanting. I always found city RP to be lacking something for me. I mean, if I wanted to sit in a bar and watch drunks, I could do that IRL. Our events were more puzzles then traditional hack and slash stuff, though we did plenty of that too when defending against raiders and/or highwaymen. I think one of our most fun events was crossing the sea to get to Kalimdor. We found an unoccupied ship and RPed our journey over 3 days and nights.

I would love to see stuff like that again. I have been table top RPing since before D&D required a version number, so I am very familier with the D20 system. I have seen some put together a character sheet with bonuses and such to their rolls but people keep getting carried away with the sheet and it turns into work instead of a game.

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88

I find it wild people don’t just go with the abilities their chosen class already has.

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89

It is definitely time for housing in this game. The retort is always that it’ll “kill cities” and community gathering, but that argument no longer holds any water. We’ve got delves now where people can level alone, and folks are okay with that. We need housing where people can invite each other over to RP.

Of course, RP has never been a focus of Blizzard’s. If they’re going to do housing, they feel it has to have some sort of key function that ties into the PvE. Sometimes I wish they’d just lighten up, more like SE/FFXIV, who offer housing just because it’s fun.

The obsession with tying everything into the PvE is why garrisons failed. Had they just introduced housing for fun, it would still be around to this day. Instead, they tried to tie it into the PvE, so as the game evolved with each expansion, they couldn’t be bothered with tying new mechanics back into the garrisons each time. I don’t even remember if they created garrisons knowing they’d abandon them after WoD or not.

Anyway, housing needs to happen. It doesn’t need to have PvE function to serve a grand purpose. Just by being customizable and fun, it keeps people in the game when they’re tired of questing or raiding for the day. That should be more than enough incentive to do it. If folks and/or Blizzard are worried about the antisocial factor that comes with having your own space in an MMORPG, change the housing concept to match. Install a town square for every neighborhood. Get creative. Link one thing to the next. Player House > Town Square > Stormwind, with the ability to port from one to the other.

Apologies if some of that doesn’t make any logical sense. I haven’t taken my meds in a while.

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90

Because there is a story and game mechanic separation usually. Things like making portals and resurrecting people is supposed to be very hard and very dangerous to do. Then again I like mixing and matching magical abilities from other games cause it’s rp and the only thing that’s going to hinder you is a limiting the possibilities.

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91

I mean you could RP it as being hard and dangerous to do. It’s far less of a stretch than half the TRP profiles I see running around claiming to be Runelords or Demon Princes or High-this-and-that.

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92

There’s a little bit of hope that they’re implementing more evergreen features, and there’s definitely been some things they’ve added that they really didn’t have to (heritage quests for example). The Trading Post is another example of something that yeah, it gives you a reason to play the game etc. but it’s purely for cosmetics. There’s also some evidence to suggest that Blizzard has learned from some of it’s past mistakes in other instances of the game, so I’m hoping that eventually they’ll add player housing as a purely optional thing which encourages you to go out and explore to gather cosmetic things for them which in and of itself can be an evergreen feature.

So fingers crossed. I think that garrisons were good on paper and were initially cool, but like the rest of WoD, seemed half-baked and incomplete.

93

Where I think we differ is that while you see it as a matter of grace, I see it as a matter of broken immersion.

Imagine for a moment that the Devs wrote the story based on dice rolls.

“Okay, Thrall, you have the Dragonsoul, and its time to destroy Deathwing once and for all.”

-Metzen rolls the dice, gets a 3.-

“Oooooh… not good. I think the world might’ve just ended. Uh… Thrall fumbles the Dragonsoul, getting damaged by released energy in the process. Thrall now has 1 HP. Any Aspects want to try and save the day?”

-Each aspect present rolls under a 10.-

“Okay… so, Deathwing’s just… flailing out there… Thrall, you want to try using the Dragon Soul, again?”

-Metzen rolls again-

“Wow. 1. And you were at 1 HP. So, Thrall’s dead. The Dragon Soul killed him.”

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94

Here’s the thing though…you’re not your character. There is no such as immersion and I think that’s the crux of the issue. I hate HATE the word “immersion” in terms of rp. It leads to people blurring the lines of ooc and ic. Also that’s a bit of false equivocation so I’m not even going to touch on it. It’s honestly not relevant to the discussion of you, the writer.

So on tumblr, and I know it gets it’s flack however, it had one way that didn’t prevent the blurring of lines so much. And that was the concept of a mundane writer. You oocly, are the mundane writer or mun for short for your character. You are the author of your character. So you have to think like an author. Your character is not the self-insert of you. They are a character in a larger all encompassing story. You are just one of many authors collaborating in this story.

So when I write Raina, I don’t “immerse” myself in my character because I know that ooc=/=ic. I am NOT my character. What helped me was the invention of a mundane name or a mun name. It wasn’t my actual name, but it was a pseudonym that I wanted to be referred by in ooc discussions. When I talk about Raina, I talk about her as a separate person from myself. Because she is a separate entity. I think what WoW could benefit from is by adopting a mun name especially in discords where we can refer to each other oocly. I’m not Raina. I’m Ari. It honestly irritates me when people refer to me by my character name. And when I have to refer to people by their character names and not by their mun name. It would again help with the issue of blurring lines of ooc and ic.

So I’m going to give you and anyone reading this thread a challenge. It’s a really simple and easy one. I want you to think yourself less of immersing yourself into your character and think more of being an author. You’re writing a story around your character. There’s going to be conflict and a resolution, a cause and effect. You roll a 1. What happens to your character. And don’t think in a bleak sense “Oh. They lose a limb, or well they’re dead.” Consider the following:

  • Is this a character that you’ve playing for a long time? Do you have a strong connection to them.
  • Does losing a limb some how expand their story? Does their death?
  • If they lose a limb, would they get a prosthetic? What would it look like, what features would be added to it. Would they not?
  • Think about how the challenges of losing a limb would affect the story or their role? Would it make being a warrior harder? Would they have to learn to fight one handed?
  • Think about giving them any kind of scars. Don’t think about just losing a limb or their life, having a massive deep scar is across the chest or face or arm is just as effective way of story telling or showing character development as it is losing a limb. Even getting a concussion which can be deadly can be effective.

And again, you are not your character. You are the author behind your character writing a very multi-faceted story with other authors.

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95

That’s not the problem I’m addressing.

This isn’t a matter of, “Oh, my character is perfect in every way, they can’t fail.”

It’s a matter of immersion being broken by the roll of a dice. Imagine if in the Lord of the Rings, Frodo tries to push Golum off into the lava at the end of the movie, rolled a 1, and went headfirst over himself instead, while Golum just crab walks out.

The immersion is the story being told, not the character I’m playing. I’ve RP’d an apprentice who could barely cast fireball, rolled nat 20s. Meanwhile the Archmage RP’ing my master was rolling all 1s and setting himself on fire. That’s beyond, “Taking it in stride,” or, “having an off day.” It’s just ridiculous.

Could you imagine Dumbledore showing up at the Ministry of Magic to duel Voldemort, tripping on his robes and knocking himself out when his head strikes the ground, and Harry just suddenly starts beating the crap out of Voldemort instead, because Voldemort’s rolling 1s like Dumbledore did, but Harry’s lucking out on 20s?

That’s my issue with an unforgiving, ‘all or nothing,’ type of d20 system. It breaks the immersion of the story being told, by having characters with experience, training, equipment, etc… at the mercy of chance. Realistically, all of that mitigates the threat of bad luck or an off day.

Which is another issue I have with the d20 system. Very rarely does it get modified, because it becomes a nightmare for DMs to keep track of everything. “Okay, Sir Reginald has the Shield of Azure Light, so he takes 2 damage less from all attacks, but he also has the Crown of Costly Power which increases damage he takes by 3 in exchange for increasing his damage dealt by as much, and he just used an attack that both harms his foe and heals himself with splash healing for allies… wait, Lady Alora has the Veil of Mercy, reducing the damage of all light-wielders by 2, and converting damage absorbed into HP, and I think Arcanist Kiron has an aura which allows for overhealing…”

There’s just no way to progress or customize, especially in large scale events. The story is lost to the mechanics.

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96

Again you’re making a false equivocation. You’re basically comparing an apple to an orange which is a logical fallacy and one I’m not going to take part in.

97

Except, I’m not?

You’re the one insisting this is a character issue. I’m talking about a story issue.

98

You’re putting words in my mouth. I say things very directly so there’s really no need to try and find a hidden meaning when there is one.

What I’m saying is that there is a problem with you as the mundane person behind the character as there is with multiple within Moon Guard. You all blur the lines between ooc and ic and become your character instead of looking at the scenario that a normal rper anywhere else, be it tumblr or on a forum or in a table top setting would look at it.

A normal rper wouldn’t cry about immersion lost when they rolled a 1. They would look at it from the perspective of developing their character. You just can’t be normal. You have to be cringe and think you are your character.

Anytime someone complains about immersion I always think “They need to touch some grass.” It’s gotten cooler in Arizona and probably where you are…go outside.

99

And in this, you’re wrong.

I couldn’t care less that I roll a 1. What I care about, is when the 10,000 year old Night Elf who has been a druid for about 9,000 years rolls a 1, and suddenly the Wrath spell they’re using backfires and takes a chunk out of their left arm.

What I care about, is when the Draebei Paladin, who has the Light itself as a part of his racial kit, goes to heal his ally, rolls a 2, and instead kills them.

This isn’t about, “My character is too perfect to fail.” This is about, “Experience, equipment, and planning don’t mean a damned thing when the d20 starts rolling.”

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100

The distinction is in altering your writing based on collaboration with another author, versus based on the randomized output of a d20. The former is collaborative storytelling, the latter is… improv? To each their own I suppose, but I strongly prefer to veer away from dice-influenced RP in the WoW format. It serves a lot better in tabletop arenas where the systems are a lot more fleshed out rather than the truncated formats usually found in large-scale d20 WoW events.

As an aside, drawing a distinction between “Moon Guard roleplayers” and “Normal roleplayers” is a bad look when discussing RP on a Moon Guard forum.

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101

I would like to chime in, for the benefit of those wanting an RP environment that is more long term focused than short, my friend and I formed a horde side Earthen based guild on MG and we’re both of the “no ERP” variety of roleplayer. If any of y’all are willing to do the whole “blank character in a strange world” RP journey horde side on this server, Earthsong would be happy to have you.

102

It’s interesting how you go straight to insults instead of attempting to understand what he’s telling you. You’re not helping your argument at all, and you’re both arguing completely different points. Immersion and “not being your character” has literally nothing to do with being unhappy about how roll systems work.

To THAT initial point that desiring immersion makes you a bad RPer, I call a bunch of BS. Escaping into a story doesn’t make you your character. Putting yourself in another person’s shoes is what roleplaying IS, and tumblr is notoriously silly in its gatekeeping and needless rules… not that it should be surprising, given that the vast majority of tumblr role-players are under the age of 18 and being overly judgmental about completely mundane things tracks for that age group. I hope you, presumably an adult, grow out of this phase of unnecessary cruelty at some point.

Toward the OTHER point that our other fellow is attempting to make: The guy’s not his character, immersion isn’t his issue; he just wants to tell a cool story and you sometimes can’t do that when your character’s actions are left to the whims of often unfair RNG and your DM is too incompetent to find a better use for bad rolls than “your guy sucks at everything”.

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103

To be fair, immersion and good story-telling go hand in hand.

Think of, say, the Game of Thrones for a moment, and it’s last season. Daenerys’ character was written to behave in a way that broke a lot of people’s immersion in the series, because it didn’t make sense for the established character. In the case of this example, I guess you could say her player, “rolled a 1.”

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