Taking Another Whack at Surface Evil RP. Who Wants In?

[enginseer-42]

Soubar aside... There's not exactly good support for grinding in the north either. Baldurs gate has repeatable quests that drop 600-750 xp a peice. There's the undead. There's the guy who you can sell wolf hides to. Meanwhile in Goodly lands you have the slow March south to Amn. With progressively stronger enemies along the way.

In short, there's infrastructure in place to make leveling up and making money at low levels a thing.

[Steve]

it takes perseverance steve.

I couldn't agree with you more...but that is the same for ANY character (development), imho.

But perseverance is also work, and this is a game, were it's also about having fun, enjoyment, pleasure, sure...challenge as well, but mainly: this should not be a laborious process in order to have an "enjoyable" experience in role-play.

So yeah...how and why not have the Surface Evil RP actually be more fun? Talk about a motivator...right? And where, specifically, can this fun by had/found?

And finally, how can that fun be developed into goals planned, into goals achieved, and supported actions that lead to environment changes, reflecting the time-energy spent in the storybuilding???

[aaron22]

besides the quest part, Soubar is a solid hub for grinding. Most players just don't know. I prefer it over the BG/FAI hub. I miss the CR10 area, but its workable.

[aaron22]

steve.. its only not fun if you do not appreciate what you are doing. if you have a goal and work toward that, how is that not fun.

i do this for fun. i have fun. playing football is fun.. its also work. playing poker is fun. it's also work. this is a game that rewards work put in. you want rewards? work for it. you want rewards without work. good luck.

if you feel like you are working too hard, then you will not reach your difficult goals. Good RP is ready to go and just pop your guy in and run. if you want that same thing in evil, you are gonna have to fight for it. its not ready to roll.

the things that apply for good RP does not apply for evil. you want easier. play good. simple.

anything worth having is not easy. how bad do you want it? there are people out there trying right now.

[Steve]

I didn't say it wasn't fun...but how to make it MORE FUN.

You can have plenty of fun RIGHT NOW working toward goals of your Evil Minded PC.

But there could/should be many more avenues for interaction fun, development fun, storybuilding fun.

Hell...I'd personally be satisfied with more accommodating!

Anyway, back to the OP: I think that one good solution to the OP's interest is to NOT ONLY have a group of Evil-minded PCs "get together," but to also solicit and acquire antagonists on the goodly side, a number of Players that are willing to "play with you" and your PC right out the box. This way, there is like a mini-story already building, and something both sides of the Alignment coin can enjoy, and that the Players in this storybuilding are there to essentially OOC help each other out, build that story.

Any takers?

[aaron22]

get together first. figure out your motivations and goals (reasonable ones) then find some antagonists to your goals.

developing trust is something that cannot be overlooked or understated. get that going first. not just with the player base, but with admin as well.

there are opportunities here for evil RP and development. can even put your mark on the server if you are willing to do it.

but you wont do it alone. and you wont do it if you are not willing to wait and (sorry steve) work for it.

the orcs are not me and are not real because of me. its the other orc guys and orc gals that have done everything. i had to wait for them. give them something when they got here. my accomplishments on this server are on the shoulders of giants.

[Darkwind]

Fascinating thread, and one that recurs from time to time. Even in my nearly 2 years milling about I've seen it pop up.

I think my take on it is somewhere in the middle realm of 'well, just RP hard and work for it and it will come to you' and 'its hopeless and futile'.

What I will say is born of time spent in MMOs which seems like a bad comparison, but actually it is not at all. The reason being, what makes NWN/NWN2 uniquely different is that the world can be radically changed on a whim. The problem is, change makes people unhappy and in some cases downright hostile.

So you are beholden to the weakest link in your player base, which is the one that will stomp their feet and shout the loudest. This is a mature RP issue basically. It is the gamer at the PnP table that doesn't like that there is a beholder living in the basement of the Inn because 'we are only 3rd level!11!' and if enough people like that gather it poisons the well entirely.

The two facets of this are just a general negativity towards conflict of any sort, this part is player driven hence the "just play hard enough and RP hard enough and..." part of it.

The second, and perhaps more important part, is the DM driven part because without it you truly have little actual purpose. The argument is made 'evil characters are just as restricted as good characters', that is fatuous and untrue actually. Because the order is the default position, the chaos is not. The chaos has to be generated somehow.

This is where the MMO reference comes in. You can set your watch to the static world in an MMO. The city will always look the same. The dragon will always spawn in the same spot. The heroes will always win and about the same pre-meditated manner.

The chaos, that is the interesting stuff. If tomorrow you log in and Soubar is on fire with eternal burning flame that never expires and devils are dancing in the streets, what would you do? Depends greatly on your maturity in RP. The well-adjusted RPer rolls with the punches and takes the novelty for what it is. The people who don't like disruption to routine complain to DMs, and if they do it in enough volume and loud enough, the city reverts.

This is the greatest challenge here. It is -not- just about you. It is about the population taken as a collective. If you have people who are open minded then crazy stuff can happen and amazing stories can be made from it. Also, before you write the next reply, I'm well aware of the history here. Of the gods walking the land, and tiamat, and all the other stuff that has ever occurred. My point is, frequency is key and players being directly involved in making it happen is even more key.

I've been DMing in some form or fashion for 3 decades so this is old hat to me in the PnP world. You must have the ability to manipulate reality or the 'evil' falls flat and becomes basically an act, a pantomime that nobody truly cares about or fears because they know as surely as the sun rises Soubar will NOT be on fire tomorrow. Until it is... then Pandora's awesome box of intrigue is opened wide.

The risk aversion here is too high I think for this to ever become reality based on the, as I said before, many threads that have been tossed back and forth about this over the years. Here is hoping for something new and different though.

I have *boundless* deep and complex evil RP ideas, far too many to post here w/o making this post about 5 times longer. But the main issue is, you must have not only the players but DM buy in as well. It simply doesn't work w/o both components.

[Tekill]

I have *boundless* deep and complex evil RP ideas, far too many to post here w/o making this post about 5 times longer. But the main issue is, you must have not only the players but DM buy in as well. It simply doesn't work w/o both components.

If we do have lots of ideas then that is half the battle. I only really have one good idea that could include lots of players. But if we have creative evil players with reasonable goals/ideas well then....

The DMs say they will entertain some of our ideas if we can get high enough numbers of players to go along with said ideas to make it worthwhile for the DM to bother with it.

Some ideas the DMs will not go along with. We cant burn down Soubar, for example. But the other alignments cant do that either.

The DM's right now create plot lines with the other aligned players in mind. An evil threat of some sort or similar such campaign. They play the evil side. The evil players can join the other alignments in thwarting the DM evil NPC's. That is sort of where things are right now.

The non evil players do not have to hide thier natures and can easily work together on their own or the DMs plotlines.

We evil players are hidden which means its hard to group up and its hard to work together (and later betray each other).

So if we can:
Figure a way to network amoungst outselves a bit. A evil network of some sort. A dark network. This would be a good counter balance to the Good players being able to openly show thier nature to one another.
If we can find each other, and organize our factions a bit better, and then network a bit between factions (where it is practical to do so), then our numbers will grow.

(1)If we have ideas, and (2)the numbers, then we can (3)implement our ideas to the (4)DM's with better success.

The question is how do we create this Dark Network we can all tap into?

[electric mayhem]

I think DMs are players too.

[Tsidkenu]

Some ideas the DMs will not go along with. We cant burn down Soubar, for example.

This here is my gripe with the status quo. Why couldnt a group of evil organise a plan to burn down Soubar? And if they pulled it off, would Soubar therefore be burnt down?

Quite some time ago I presented evidence to utterly condemn Captain Norton of severe corruption and he's still lazing aroung the Fist Barracks as if nothing ever happened. And thats all ive ever been able to achieve in the NPC sphere. Nothing. And not for lack of trying. Its just ive given up on that now too. Sigh.

Quietly optimistic in the new team though so we'll see what happens in the next couple of months.

[Fury_US]

This here is my gripe with the status quo. Why couldnt a group of evil organise a plan to burn down Soubar? And if they pulled it off, would Soubar therefore be burnt down?

Just going to point out the very recent server history where a group of evil that has anything players can make beat hands down absolutely got their faces melted off by Mag.

Mag is why you could not burn Soubar down.

Mag will melt you.

Fear Mag.

[enginseer-42]

This here is my gripe with the status quo. Why couldnt a group of evil organise a plan to burn down Soubar? And if they pulled it off, would Soubar therefore be burnt down?

Just going to point out the very recent server history where a group of evil that has anything players can make beat hands down absolutely got their faces melted off by Mag.

Mag is why you could not burn Soubar down.

Mag will melt you.

Fear Mag.

So, this raises the question. Is that really any different from a Deus Ex Machina?

That appears to be a common theme with the server. Any permanent settlement has some sort of Uber NPCs or NPC that defend it. And on the one hand I can see why. With PCs being powerful there does need to be counters or else people will burn cities just because they can. (Seen it happen before on other games.)

Whether it's the Fist, Mag, or whatever.

[Korchas]

To be fair, overpowered NPCs are a common thing in the Forgotten Realms.
Can't throw a stone without hitting a level 10-15 barkeep, at minimum. And that's in the base "level 20 maximum"-PnP-rules.
That said, I agree that having no way to change the status quo and only rarely a sensible way to side with "villains" in DM plots (Whether they be Disney/Saturday-morning-cartoon levels of schemers or sensible) is kind of limiting what you can do if you wanna be evil.
Additionally, the red Wizards and Zhents alike do like to complain about rather limited options of actually affecting anything plot-wise. While that alone is a thing many complain about...I can't help but wonder what kernel of truth is in these complaints.

[Invoker]

So, this raises the question. Is that really any different from a Deus Ex Machina?

That appears to be a common theme with the server. Any permanent settlement has some sort of Uber NPCs or NPC that defend it. And on the one hand I can see why. With PCs being powerful there does need to be counters or else people will burn cities just because they can. (Seen it happen before on other games.)

Whether it's the Fist, Mag, or whatever.

It's kind of the other way around, I think: settlements grow around the power that can keep people safe. If Mag weren't there, there would be no Soubar.

[aaron22]

the red Wizards and Zhents alike do like to complain about rather limited options of actually affecting anything plot-wise.

most of the plots are good-centric. easy for a good to dive into. why? because 90% of the server is organized good/neu or evil (evil-lite) inside organized good/neu.

Another thing to consider outside of those two factions is organized evil doesn't stay long enough to gain the acknowledgement of the Admin. It happens so often that its must be a "wait and see" standard that must be thought of.