Enough with the rp bias whining!

[Steve]

We use PvP, Player-versus-Player, to define the interaction...but I think that word use causes the inherent problem: Players end up thinking other Players are against Them!

Instead, we may turn perceptions by changing word use, and bring CvC, character-versus-character, into our common vocabulary.

If Players on all sides start to understand the game and Server through CvC, maybe there will not be so many disagreements, and therefore, rich and famous Conflict, that very well might end with the Death of a Character (in a hopeful very heroic or villainous way!).

But for this to happen, it will require Players to not be so possessive of their Characters, either in terms of RL time investment, nor in that the Character is a reflection of themselves in digital form (thus refusing to see “themselves” lose, suffer or be weak).

[Tsidkenu]

*Petitions Zanniej to add a PvP to the swear word filter and automatically edit it to CvC *

[Steve]

*Petitions Zanniej to add a PvP to the swear word filter and automatically edit it to CvC *

Haha! What an Overlord ultimate-control monstrous thing to do! I loves it!

[Blame The Rogue]

with the amount of time it takes to get to 30 and properly gear a character, it's hard not to have some kind of attachment, for the IRL time spent bringing them to their full potential. emotional attachments are also common

my final thoughts on this topic:

each person tells their character's story. they walk their own road, which turns into a winding path, IE, interactions with characters and the world around them. there is not, however, a U-turn on said path, though it does shift to the left, and to the right

take the extra moment and send a tell to the other player prior to conflict

they will less likely feel like "why is this person interrupting my rp?" and more like "hey, this player wants to include my character in their character's rp", which is the desired outcome. for all players involved to enjoy the situation

[Touri]

My old nwn1 pw didn't allow to play evil characters, and it was good. I didn't miss all the trouble talk, imersion braking situations, metagaming, godmodding and the ooc mess. Evil was mostly kept for the dm, but it was possible to send in a app for an evil character plot. I know that this was a different concept but there are good reasons to choose it. Watching the evil rp here for some years I totally understand why my former staff had decided to go that way.

My first char here was lawful neutral. He joined an "evil" guild. There leader was new to the game and chose to start with a warlock. Soon he noticed that his build was to bad for any pvp so he rcr into a more powerful build. For sure it was imersion breaking as he now was a mage and the purpose of the guild was to give warlocks a voice. The guild wasn't small but clearly other evil guilds and the good guys easily put them down. All ended in an ooc mess with the leader leaving back a broken guild that soon got inactive. With the rp of the last year more or less scratched I started a new char.

Sure I have seen some good evil rp players here. But as they told it here, it is a hard and often disappointing route. It is hard to not rp your character into a dead end or get oocly in conflict.
In the case with the malarite I like to mention a few things. First it is clear that the player took a druid because he knew that this class is almost unkillable by a lot of builds. Other pvp players that caused complains mostly had such powerbuild like druid, FS, bards or maybe clerics/mages. Also I am sure he transfered his best items over to his new build to be a strong as possible. He is always prepared for pvp as he seeks it. So he starts running around and kills randomly character with mostly builds he easily can kill, even if they engage in groups. Soon he has several victims and a lot of people hunt him. If this would happen without the bad mechanics (even the best tracker can't track if there is no machanic to track players), the pvp rules and bad balancing or if it would be a npc in a dm event, it wouldn't take long and a party of elves would hunt and shoot him down without problems. Actually that happend often in the past and whenever the evil pvp player logged in he got shot down until he retired his char. He is alone after all and all that protects him are the mechanics and the rules. That is the point where this rp gets more or less implausible to me. But yeah, that is the point where the evil pvp-er looks for allies, because he probably knows that his character already is on the best way to permadeath. But being now a party of evil will probably only call the cavalary and again this rp is cursed to end with a him and his friends getting killed. If the player is fine with this outcome, it may be fine. If not we get complains about metagaming and ooc drama. So the evil players complain about the pvp rules and that it is sensless if the victims/goodies are kind of unkillable and chars can't be permakilled by pc. But actually a char dies if his rp becomes unbearable, like that of the hunting malarite druid. I am very glad for the pvp rules here and that it isn't possible to perma another pc. Otherwise I believe that mostly the evil guilds with their lower player popularity like the red wizards would get killed all the time. Also good guilds would have problems if one leader after another gets assinated. The mechanic and balance is much to bad for such szenarios. I really can't see a good end for the malarte unless he is happy with the result of the hunt and leaves the coast as in retiring the character.

I think it would be good, if the DM would take the evil players and guilds as well as the opposing good players and guilds by the hand and support them, yes maybe use them like npc in their events. But I am not sure if it is wanted by the players to cooperate with the dm in that way as it often can cause ooc issues, like why did the dm help him and not me?

Okay so enough rp bias whining from me.

[Steve]

I forgot to mention something, which is also important: Character-versus-Character (CvC) can also happen between non-opposed Alignments/morals. LG can differ MIGHTILY with another LG, depending on innumerable circumstances!

It doesn't always have to be Evil vs. Good. If you think about, Evil vs. Good is probably way more clear cut, than say, if two Neutrals were trying to hash-out what "balanced" actions should be!

D&D plays on archetypes, and Alignment gives further "restrictions," because the game is about inhabiting a "Character," be it one, two, three...or however many dimensions you want to give it. But it is still a creation, not a Being, not Us. Sure, we put a bit of Us into the RP simply because We are the sum of our experiences and study, thus, we can only RP what we know...but I digress....

BGTSCC provides A LOT of World to RP in, but unfortunately, not very much of that World is alive. Players are often limited to interactions with other Players—non codified actions like with mobs—and thus, where certain Player Characters might wish to grow and shine, are hindered, massively, because the World is inactive, unresponsive to them. Let to be in this minimalizer RP state, the Player is "forced" to seek out whatever action is available...even if, and often so, this response is not willingly given, it becomes "taken," and that is a negative response, negative RP. Everyone is unhappy.

Could be Touri is right: just don't allow Evil Alignments, though allow Evil actions. Maybe if Players would be forced from taking up an archetype, there would more harmony, an alignment of Alignments! Lol. Or just, let Player Evil just be an Underdark thing.

Totally harsh and most likely not going to happen, but an interesting thought experiment!!

[Israe]

My old nwn1 pw didn't allow to play evil characters, and it was good. I didn't miss all the trouble talk, imersion braking situations, metagaming, godmodding and the ooc mess. Evil was mostly kept for the dm, but it was possible to send in a app for an evil character plot. I know that this was a different concept but there are good reasons to choose it. Watching the evil rp here for some years I totally understand why my former staff had decided to go that way.

My first char here was lawful neutral. He joined an "evil" guild. There leader was new to the game and chose to start with a warlock. Soon he noticed that his build was to bad for any pvp so he rcr into a more powerful build. For sure it was imersion breaking as he now was a mage and the purpose of the guild was to give warlocks a voice. The guild wasn't small but clearly other evil guilds and the good guys easily put them down. All ended in an ooc mess with the leader leaving back a broken guild that soon got inactive. With the rp of the last year more or less scratched I started a new char.

Sure I have seen some good evil rp players here. But as they told it here, it is a hard and often disappointing route. It is hard to not rp your character into a dead end or get oocly in conflict.
In the case with the malarite I like to mention a few things. First it is clear that the player took a druid because he knew that this class is almost unkillable by a lot of builds. Other pvp players that caused complains mostly had such powerbuild like druid, FS, bards or maybe clerics/mages. Also I am sure he transfered his best items over to his new build to be a strong as possible. He is always prepared for pvp as he seeks it. So he starts running around and kills randomly character with mostly builds he easily can kill, even if they engage in groups. Soon he has several victims and a lot of people hunt him. If this would happen without the bad mechanics (even the best tracker can't track if there is no machanic to track players), the pvp rules and bad balancing or if it would be a npc in a dm event, it wouldn't take long and a party of elves would hunt and shoot him down without problems. Actually that happend often in the past and whenever the evil pvp player logged in he got shot down until he retired his char. He is alone after all and all that protects him are the mechanics and the rules. That is the point where this rp gets more or less implausible to me. But yeah, that is the point where the evil pvp-er looks for allies, because he probably knows that his character already is on the best way to permadeath. But being now a party of evil will probably only call the cavalary and again this rp is cursed to end with a him and his friends getting killed. If the player is fine with this outcome, it may be fine. If not we get complains about metagaming and ooc drama. So the evil players complain about the pvp rules and that it is sensless if the victims/goodies are kind of unkillable and chars can't be permakilled by pc. But actually a char dies if his rp becomes unbearable, like that of the hunting malarite druid. I am very glad for the pvp rules here and that it isn't possible to perma another pc. Otherwise I believe that mostly the evil guilds with their lower player popularity like the red wizards would get killed all the time. Also good guilds would have problems if one leader after another gets assinated. The mechanic and balance is much to bad for such szenarios. I really can't see a good end for the malarte unless he is happy with the result of the hunt and leaves the coast as in retiring the character.

I think it would be good, if the DM would take the evil players and guilds as well as the opposing good players and guilds by the hand and support them, yes maybe use them like npc in their events. But I am not sure if it is wanted by the players to cooperate with the dm in that way as it often can cause ooc issues, like why did the dm help him and not me?

Okay so enough rp bias whining from me.

That is not the Malarite at all, the Malarite build is a sub optimal druid build that fights in Worg form. And this proves my earlier point, you look at a player who engages in PVP and assume he only does the mechanics. The rules completely enable you to run when you see him, as an RP out. In terms of is he a powerbuild? No. He's nowhere near as strong as Omar or Ivan, my mage whooped him and upholding to his RP he was willing for his character to die. But sorry team good, Jys isn't gonna kill something causing this much chaos, just unfortunate that it's been brought I to another OOC PVP instead as Steve said, CvC.

[Hoihe]

My old nwn1 pw didn't allow to play evil characters, and it was good. I didn't miss all the trouble talk, imersion braking situations, metagaming, godmodding and the ooc mess. Evil was mostly kept for the dm, but it was possible to send in a app for an evil character plot. I know that this was a different concept but there are good reasons to choose it. Watching the evil rp here for some years I totally understand why my former staff had decided to go that way.

My first char here was lawful neutral. He joined an "evil" guild. There leader was new to the game and chose to start with a warlock. Soon he noticed that his build was to bad for any pvp so he rcr into a more powerful build. For sure it was imersion breaking as he now was a mage and the purpose of the guild was to give warlocks a voice. The guild wasn't small but clearly other evil guilds and the good guys easily put them down. All ended in an ooc mess with the leader leaving back a broken guild that soon got inactive. With the rp of the last year more or less scratched I started a new char.

Sure I have seen some good evil rp players here. But as they told it here, it is a hard and often disappointing route. It is hard to not rp your character into a dead end or get oocly in conflict.
In the case with the malarite I like to mention a few things. First it is clear that the player took a druid because he knew that this class is almost unkillable by a lot of builds. Other pvp players that caused complains mostly had such powerbuild like druid, FS, bards or maybe clerics/mages. Also I am sure he transfered his best items over to his new build to be a strong as possible. He is always prepared for pvp as he seeks it. So he starts running around and kills randomly character with mostly builds he easily can kill, even if they engage in groups. Soon he has several victims and a lot of people hunt him. If this would happen without the bad mechanics (even the best tracker can't track if there is no machanic to track players), the pvp rules and bad balancing or if it would be a npc in a dm event, it wouldn't take long and a party of elves would hunt and shoot him down without problems. Actually that happend often in the past and whenever the evil pvp player logged in he got shot down until he retired his char. He is alone after all and all that protects him are the mechanics and the rules. That is the point where this rp gets more or less implausible to me. But yeah, that is the point where the evil pvp-er looks for allies, because he probably knows that his character already is on the best way to permadeath. But being now a party of evil will probably only call the cavalary and again this rp is cursed to end with a him and his friends getting killed. If the player is fine with this outcome, it may be fine. If not we get complains about metagaming and ooc drama. So the evil players complain about the pvp rules and that it is sensless if the victims/goodies are kind of unkillable and chars can't be permakilled by pc. But actually a char dies if his rp becomes unbearable, like that of the hunting malarite druid. I am very glad for the pvp rules here and that it isn't possible to perma another pc. Otherwise I believe that mostly the evil guilds with their lower player popularity like the red wizards would get killed all the time. Also good guilds would have problems if one leader after another gets assinated. The mechanic and balance is much to bad for such szenarios. I really can't see a good end for the malarte unless he is happy with the result of the hunt and leaves the coast as in retiring the character.

I think it would be good, if the DM would take the evil players and guilds as well as the opposing good players and guilds by the hand and support them, yes maybe use them like npc in their events. But I am not sure if it is wanted by the players to cooperate with the dm in that way as it often can cause ooc issues, like why did the dm help him and not me?

Okay so enough rp bias whining from me.

That is not the Malarite at all, the Malarite build is a sub optimal druid build that fights in Worg form. And this proves my earlier point, you look at a player who engages in PVP and assume he only does the mechanics. The rules completely enable you to run when you see him, as an RP out. In terms of is he a powerbuild? No. He's nowhere near as strong as Omar or Ivan, my mage whooped him and upholding to his RP he was willing for his character to die. But sorry team good, Jys isn't gonna kill something causing this much chaos, just unfortunate that it's been brought I to another OOC PVP instead as Steve said, CvC.

Worgs are what, CR 8-10 creatures? (Based on Worg riders in Thundar's Ride.)

You see a Worg - for the RP out to be "run away", you need to metagame the fact that it's a player.


Also, there's no bias against any alignment. There's a bias against a behaviour.


Here's a few step guide to getting DM attention and avoiding stepping on toes:

1. Get a group of 6 people maximum.
2. Make a goal that will NOT negatively affect another player or group, nor will it majorly affect the overall setting.
3. Propose your idea in a way that the DM can keep it self contained.
4. Profit

The moment you start to try to force a change on the overall setting, especially if it can negatively affect a player is the moment you'll start encountering resistance. All DM events my guilds and I "received" were self-contained and had no CvC aspect to it. All DM events I ran were self-contained with carefully picked locations as to be out of jurisdiction of anyone who'd care.

People get pissy if you OOCly use their guild hall, with no IC impacts to it (During a DM event, DM had to use a guild hall as a backdrop for the scene. The guild, despite nobody wanting to use it at the time were quite annoyed.). Imagine if you ICly start toying with their assets.

[Israe]

My old nwn1 pw didn't allow to play evil characters, and it was good. I didn't miss all the trouble talk, imersion braking situations, metagaming, godmodding and the ooc mess. Evil was mostly kept for the dm, but it was possible to send in a app for an evil character plot. I know that this was a different concept but there are good reasons to choose it. Watching the evil rp here for some years I totally understand why my former staff had decided to go that way.

My first char here was lawful neutral. He joined an "evil" guild. There leader was new to the game and chose to start with a warlock. Soon he noticed that his build was to bad for any pvp so he rcr into a more powerful build. For sure it was imersion breaking as he now was a mage and the purpose of the guild was to give warlocks a voice. The guild wasn't small but clearly other evil guilds and the good guys easily put them down. All ended in an ooc mess with the leader leaving back a broken guild that soon got inactive. With the rp of the last year more or less scratched I started a new char.

Sure I have seen some good evil rp players here. But as they told it here, it is a hard and often disappointing route. It is hard to not rp your character into a dead end or get oocly in conflict.
In the case with the malarite I like to mention a few things. First it is clear that the player took a druid because he knew that this class is almost unkillable by a lot of builds. Other pvp players that caused complains mostly had such powerbuild like druid, FS, bards or maybe clerics/mages. Also I am sure he transfered his best items over to his new build to be a strong as possible. He is always prepared for pvp as he seeks it. So he starts running around and kills randomly character with mostly builds he easily can kill, even if they engage in groups. Soon he has several victims and a lot of people hunt him. If this would happen without the bad mechanics (even the best tracker can't track if there is no machanic to track players), the pvp rules and bad balancing or if it would be a npc in a dm event, it wouldn't take long and a party of elves would hunt and shoot him down without problems. Actually that happend often in the past and whenever the evil pvp player logged in he got shot down until he retired his char. He is alone after all and all that protects him are the mechanics and the rules. That is the point where this rp gets more or less implausible to me. But yeah, that is the point where the evil pvp-er looks for allies, because he probably knows that his character already is on the best way to permadeath. But being now a party of evil will probably only call the cavalary and again this rp is cursed to end with a him and his friends getting killed. If the player is fine with this outcome, it may be fine. If not we get complains about metagaming and ooc drama. So the evil players complain about the pvp rules and that it is sensless if the victims/goodies are kind of unkillable and chars can't be permakilled by pc. But actually a char dies if his rp becomes unbearable, like that of the hunting malarite druid. I am very glad for the pvp rules here and that it isn't possible to perma another pc. Otherwise I believe that mostly the evil guilds with their lower player popularity like the red wizards would get killed all the time. Also good guilds would have problems if one leader after another gets assinated. The mechanic and balance is much to bad for such szenarios. I really can't see a good end for the malarte unless he is happy with the result of the hunt and leaves the coast as in retiring the character.

I think it would be good, if the DM would take the evil players and guilds as well as the opposing good players and guilds by the hand and support them, yes maybe use them like npc in their events. But I am not sure if it is wanted by the players to cooperate with the dm in that way as it often can cause ooc issues, like why did the dm help him and not me?

Okay so enough rp bias whining from me.

That is not the Malarite at all, the Malarite build is a sub optimal druid build that fights in Worg form. And this proves my earlier point, you look at a player who engages in PVP and assume he only does the mechanics. The rules completely enable you to run when you see him, as an RP out. In terms of is he a powerbuild? No. He's nowhere near as strong as Omar or Ivan, my mage whooped him and upholding to his RP he was willing for his character to die. But sorry team good, Jys isn't gonna kill something causing this much chaos, just unfortunate that it's been brought I to another OOC PVP instead as Steve said, CvC.

Worgs are what, CR 8-10 creatures? (Based on Worg riders in Thundar's Ride.)

You see a Worg - for the RP out to be "run away", you need to metagame the fact that it's a player.


Also, there's no bias against any alignment. There's a bias against a behaviour.


Here's a few step guide to getting DM attention and avoiding stepping on toes:

1. Get a group of 6 people maximum.
2. Make a goal that will NOT negatively affect another player or group, nor will it majorly affect the overall setting.
3. Propose your idea in a way that the DM can keep it self contained.
4. Profit

The moment you start to try to force a change on the overall setting, especially if it can negatively affect a player is the moment you'll start encountering resistance. All DM events my guilds and I "received" were self-contained and had no CvC aspect to it. All DM events I ran were self-contained with carefully picked locations as to be out of jurisdiction of anyone who'd care.

People get pissy if you OOCly use their guild hall, with no IC impacts to it. Imagine if you ICly start toying with their assets.

And he RP's being an excessively large Worg, assuming a CR in the first place is meta gaming. Don't like PVP, take your RP out.

[aaron22]

no you need to have heard there is a really mean worg that is ripping experienced adventures up on the roads.

try again...

[Xanfyrst]

One of the problems with alignment versus alignment roleplay on this server is the lack of familiarity between players on both sides. Many of them stick to their own instead of trying to involve each other in their "stories". Everyone thinks the other side is out to ruin their RP. Only in few cases is that actually true and it mainly comes down to one player who can't distinguish between OOC and IC.

I have always enjoyed evil vs good roleplay with players I know because there's no "I must win"-mentality among friends/acquaintances, just a wish to tell a story.

And Hoihe, I understand you don't like CvC/FvF conflict... but this server needs it. The server has always been the most active and most alive when there has been conflict between characters and factions. And the outcomes have all contributed to more RP down the road.

Triel? Soubar? The Amn-Gate war? All those story-lines were fueled by CvC/FvF conflict and were defining moments for a lot of characters on the server.

[Israe]

no you need to have heard there is a really mean worg that is ripping experienced adventures up on the roads.

try again...

Huh? I'm pretty sure that's the point, goblins in UD compared to ones in the deeper mines are different CR, different gnolls. I can kill most npc commoners as if they are insects, yet here comes Ambrose Valexus and as a human gave me a thrashing. If players don't like the Malarite rp (which is incredibly good imo) you aren't forced to RP it. Btw Xanfyrst where's my damn marquis from the Amn/Gate war? Maybe we should focus on Continuity before slandering a group of players playstyles.

[Diamore]

And he RP's being an excessively large Worg, assuming a CR in the first place is meta gaming. Don't like PVP, take your RP out.

Experience:
He was not large.
I did take my out. After I was confusingly attacked due to a lack of clarity.
It was not enjoyable.

Counter points:
A sub par druid build that is fully buffed with Magical Creature shape is still more effective than nearly any non buffed build.

A superior levelled enemy is indistinguishable from an inferior one. The expectations of a character do not change when rping such an encounter. A worg is a threat that can be dealt with swiftly and easily for most adventurers who have made it to Beregost and back. Purely IC logic allows for a belief in ones ability to defeat it, setting up the low level victims for an instant loss as I have mentioned in the other thread. This sets up the victim to either take the out in an OOC fashion due to the nature of the threat, or to accept the mutilation and other fallout from losing to a vastly superior Malarite enemy as they have no chance of success.

PvP across a wide level range is always ridiculous, frequently immersion breaking and almost always a bad experience for the lower level.

Evil RP is not the same as PvP. Evil RP should be supported. PvP that is supported by a storyline, that has actual context and weight behind it as well as the knowledge of all those participating is a vastly different animal to the CE orc/bandit/malarite RP that always causes problems. (Although I did like the simple build bandit idea thing even if it didn't go down well)

[aaron22]

And Hoihe, I understand you don't like CvC/FvF conflict... but this server needs it. The server has always been the most active and most alive when there has been conflict between characters and factions. And the outcomes have all contributed to more RP down the road.

snipped...

this is what i think is the most upsetting. evil RP brings a viable and dynamic enemy to you goodies. something that is unpredictable and not a guaranteed win like DMs typically bring. evil RP does something that most players (by numbers) are unwilling to do. give the server a persistent face of evil that is not bound by the rules of a DM and the same stigma that facing DM controlled evil does.

you want to tell your story, but how many good stories do not have an enemy that is at least an equal.

so yea. keep complaining about the evil RP and all that goes with it. but without it, your world would be pretty boring.

and they do it knowing full well that it is harder and less server involved than just playing another goodie.

[chad878262]

wow, polarizing issue to have two separate threads worth of discussion on it.

Sometimes traffic sucks and I HATE being stuck in traffic. Everyone else on the road is a complete and utter moron while I am a paragon of driving prowess. Now, when in any other situation I can look at this and see that it's rather silly that I think like that, but while driving, stuck behind a soccer mom doing 25 in a 45 on a two lane road with double bars I still yell obscenities at the top of my lungs. I suppose I am not always a rational creature...must have a case of being human, I suppose.

So you meet someone in game and their RP doesn't mesh with yours. They PvP you, or CvC, or whatever we're calling it these days. You don't take your out because it would go against your character or require meta gaming or whatever other reason you have and you lose. Well, the encounters over, you can pop right back up and go on your way to play elsewhere, or log off and do something else, maybe come back later. Whatever works for you.

Simply put, the condition we have on this server is that we cater to MANY types. Grinding, campfire social hour, good, evil, cooperative and competitive gamer's. Simply put, PvP can be cooperative or competitive, but most of the 'bad' experiences are because people get competitive over it. People that don't like PvP should take the out, regardless if it is using meta-game data or goes against your RP if you know you won't enjoy it, take the out, it's that simple. Send a tell and say "I don't play for PvP, sorry" whatever... But if you don't take the out, accept the win or loss and move on with your day. No use complaining about anything on either side. If you feel rules are broken screen shot and send to the DMs then go about your day, accept whatever they determine the outcome to be. Really amazed this issue is so polarizing, makes me not so upset that I haven't been able to play in the past month or so. Seems to be a lot of anger on both sides which is kind of silly IMO. You are not going to convince someone else that your way of playing is better than their way so best to simply accept that they are looking for something different out of the game than you and move on.

Pretty easy to avoid those that you don't have fun around. Scry tool, invisibility potions, teleport scrolls, etc. etc. I don't care if it's meta, this is a game and if I know there is a situation that I will get pissed off about I am not going to subject myself to it. I don't know why anyone would... Life is full of stuff that "Must be done"... I haven't wanted to travel to Arizona and California 4 times in the past 6 weeks, but I had to. Would have rather been home more during holiday season, but work is busy and you do what they pay you to do. No one pays you to play this game, but it is a multi-player game so you don't get to decide how everyone else plays, so long as they are within the rules.

Sorry for the rant, but seems to be a lot of posts about "you play this way/I play that way" and the fact is there is not right or wrong way to enjoy the game... Thread had said everything it needed to with DG's quote of "Don't be an arse"...Everything else seems to just be attempts at making people who enjoy the game differently out to be the monsters we fight in game, chances are they are just people who go to school/work/what-have-you and hop in game to blow off steam. No matter what you enjoy in game, chances are you have more in common with the other players on this server than not.