Passive-aggressive emotes and RP

[Grimcheese]

Encapsulating nonverbal cues with emotions/expressions is perfectly fine; believe me, spending several hours intricately describing an emote's every twitch instead of summing it up with "her posture seems ill-at-ease" may be exciting for some, but very unfun for others. Long story short, it's a matter of adjusting your writing style so both of you can have fun roleplaying and reading each other's works.

My safe rule of thumb is to restrict descriptive adjectives to your own character and their actions, because something as simple as where you place your adjective makes the difference between a perfectly acceptable emote and an OOC expression! For example:

"He gives the man an annoyed glance."

"He gives the annoying man a glance."

The first is alright. The second is not. Sure, the man might be annoying to this narrator, but maybe someone else in the audience finds him not annoying? In that case, describing the man as annoying, instead of your own reaction, is telepathy at best and an OOC jab/godmoding at worst, and neither option is easy to give an IC response to.

[Deathgrowl]

"He gives the man an annoyed glance."

"He gives the annoying man a glance."

The first is alright. The second is not. Sure, the man might be annoying to this narrator, but maybe someone else in the audience finds him not annoying? In that case, describing the man as annoying, instead of your own reaction, is telepathy at best and an OOC jab/godmoding at worst, and neither option is easy to give an IC response to.

I don't actually see much difference in them. The first describes the expression, the second describes the reason behind the glance. Do you automatically assume that the emotion is the player's opinion? What if it's the character's opinion?

And even if it is the player's opinion (which I find unlikely), I'm sorry, but if you're offended by that, you've got pretty thin skin.

[arakes99]

The point is we shouldn't know anyone's opinion from an emote.

emote

verb \i-ˈmōt\

: to express emotion in a very dramatic or obvious way

That is from Merriam-Webster. The point of an emote is to express or show a feeling, not to convey someone's thoughts. Finding someone annoying is not an emotion, but being annoyed, is.

If you want to make the point that someone is annoying, you need to tell them that and deal with the RP significance of it.

[Deathgrowl]

The point is we shouldn't know anyone's opinion from an emote.

The characters shouldn't, I agree. But why shouldn't the player? I think it's fun to get an insight into how the characters I interact with work psychologically.

So again, it's just a matter of opinion and preference.

[NegInfinity]

The point is we shouldn't know anyone's opinion from an emote.

emote

verb \i-ˈmōt\

: to express emotion in a very dramatic or obvious way

That is from Merriam-Webster. The point of an emote is to express or show a feeling, not to convey someone's thoughts. Finding someone annoying is not an emotion, but being annoyed, is.

If you want to make the point that someone is annoying, you need to tell them that and deal with the RP significance of it.

Dictionary arguments only work when dealing with robots, because context matters and word's meaning is not exactly set in stone and can vary slightly depending on circumstances.

The world "emote", used in context of nwn2 persistent world has slightly different meaning, and is very often used as a noun.

Noun
emote (plural emotes)

(Internet, text messaging) A virtual action, presented to other users as reported speech, rather than a direct message.

Anyway, just filter it out. Examples given by grimcheese are pretty much synonymous to each other.

[Grimcheese]

"He gives the man an annoyed glance."

"He gives the annoying man a glance."

I don't actually see much difference in them. The first describes the expression, the second describes the reason behind the glance. Do you automatically assume that the emotion is the player's opinion? What if it's the character's opinion?

There is actually a difference and I'll try to express it as concisely as possible.

In the second example, the subject expresses by describing the object. The subject may be expressing their annoyance towards the object, but they are also telling the audience that the object should be annoying for them. It may not be done deliberately, but the implication is there, and it creates bias towards others' reactions, and the bias may not always be appreciated.

The first example expresses by describing the subject's emote, and allows room for others to form their own opinions of the object; annoying, amusing, or otherwise, because the subject doesn't know if the object really intended to be annoying. Also, describing the subject's emotes does as good a job as expressing the subject's opinion with less OOC awkwardness, and it builds interest by giving the audience a little room to guess further. The subject may be annoyed because of a low tolerance of people with the object's personality. Probably a bad temper. Probably something else. Who knows?

It is a strictly pedantic thing, and most people probably still won't be able to tell, but little things like that can change the context of a message, even if the content is the same.

And even if it is the player's opinion (which I find unlikely), I'm sorry, but if you're offended by that, you've got pretty thin skin.

Not offended one bit. It's a matter of how I shape my words, and being aware of what the final shape means on top of what is being said. If doing that is considered being "thin-skinned", then I'm more than happy to accept the label.

Anyway, just filter it out. Examples given by grimcheese are pretty much synonymous to each other.

Synonymous in meaning, and...

[...] context matters and word's meaning is not exactly set in stone and can vary slightly depending on circumstances.

[V'rass]

Guys you are grasping at straws here. A pc saying they ignore another pc due to issues is not necessarily meant to spite the player ooc. It may simply be that that pc ic finds the man annoying. The problem with text based online chat on games such as this is that one can never know whether an insult made by another character is against their toon or against them personally. While some such remarks may be meant to insult the player it does not necessarily mean that they are meant to. This talk about banning thoughts is also creepy, sounds like something out of 1984.

[Lambe]

Encapsulating nonverbal cues with emotions/expressions is perfectly fine; believe me, spending several hours intricately describing an emote's every twitch instead of summing it up with "her posture seems ill-at-ease" may be exciting for some, but very unfun for others. Long story short, it's a matter of adjusting your writing style so both of you can have fun roleplaying and reading each other's works.

My safe rule of thumb is to restrict descriptive adjectives to your own character and their actions, because something as simple as where you place your adjective makes the difference between a perfectly acceptable emote and an OOC expression! For example:

"He gives the man an annoyed glance."

"He gives the annoying man a glance."

The first is alright. The second is not. Sure, the man might be annoying to this narrator, but maybe someone else in the audience finds him not annoying? In that case, describing the man as annoying, instead of your own reaction, is telepathy at best and an OOC jab/godmoding at worst, and neither option is easy to give an IC response to.

This. The first example gives the other player a chance to react with his PC, promoting further rp. The second one is opinion that skips the character and goes straight to the player, affecting and doubting his own playstyle. What's worse is that it is info he can't effectively work with ICly, which begs the question "What's the point of it?"

[Grimcheese]

The problem with text based online chat on games such as this is that one can never know whether an insult made by another character is against their toon or against them personally. While some such remarks may be meant to insult the player it does not necessarily mean that they are meant to.

This is why paying attention to what you are writing is important. Of course you don't mean to be OOCly insulting (at least I hope not ) so having a little care to how you shape your words goes a long way, because you'd be surprised what you can imply in text alone, whether you intended it or not.

It's not about "banning thoughts" (and that is a slippery, slippery slope to look at), but keeping in mind that you're not the only person writing the server story, and you should give the others room to write about their characters too.

[AkaiKishin]

I call it thought RP and it usually tells me who to avoid rping with.
Conflict RP - be it violence , insults or just a verbal discourse that's going heated can be expressed by written gestures or text speech from the character is fine.
The same can be said for any other kind of rp but as long as it remains within the boundries of what is reasonable us as players to have our characters express.


Emoting *She thinks he's noisy..* as a gesture is just poor form.
No one hears that , no one will react to it and nothing will come out of it.
Plain and simple.

[Considerate_]

When interacting with others, I always try to remind myself that there's another person with a different mindset and qualifications than mine on the other end of the screen.

Some might have an extensive grasp of the English language, ranging from university degrees to just frequently use of the written language.

Others don't. But few are, in my experience, trying to be rude OOCly. They're just trying to have fun, and most of them hope we do as well.


That doesn't mean they're bad people or even bad RP'ers. Though the former has a more noticeable advantage over the latter, but I've been surprised more than a few times with fascinating RP. Sure, sometimes I have to read emotes like *thinks you're weird* - but it's not all that difficult for me to translate that to *looks at you as if you're weird*

But some of the latter also shows a fascinating mindset, thinking completely differently than me and activating my character in ways I hadn't imagined myself. Some of them have great plans and are actively engaging - where I often find myself more passive and react, instead of act.



That said, I don't mind admitting that I love a good long emote with interesting and complex inflections, or phrases I haven't seen before. We can't all be best friends, though I find I'm sometimes surprised when I give others I normally wouldn't, a chance. If there's someone I find that I don't enjoy RPing with though, I try to steer clear and get along

[Atlas]

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[Sonic]

I... think y'all are giving people too much credit. Yeah, sure, some folks might be passive aggressive jerks who manipulate others around them into feeling symbiotic with their own feelings. Most of the time, however, I don't believe anything malicious is meant by it let alone know what they're doing. Yes, it's super unhealthy for literary roleplay... but let's not start burning (or banning) anyone for it. Call 'em in, not out, if you catch someone doing it.

[Monnock777]

For me personally I know I am not as good at role play as others. I am horrible at typing, public speaking i can do. But to show emotion thought words is not my strong point. I don't intend on hurting other feeling or or to be passive agressive if I am even doing it. I do have thick skins so if anyone ever has a problem with me or advice shot me a tell IG or send me a rant via pm.

[Hope]

This is just another RP police topic. They always seem to pop up from time to time. If you don't like how someone RPs then don't interact with them or grow up and realize not everything revolves around you and how you feel proper RP should be. If someone is consistently harassing you IG whether through OOC comments or IC comments after you ask them kindly OOC to leave you alone then screenshot and send it to the DMs.

Trying to tell others how they are allowed to RP, aside from thing that break lore or server rules, never ends well.