To RP or not to RP...

[Dante Silverfire]

(Dwilight)

So, a lively discussion concerning Role playing, players perception of it, how it can be used, and such has recently begun in the Lurian realms in response to an RP of my character's thoughts while sitting in a region. My character was contemplating his need to place a bounty (a rather large one) on two of his so called "allies" who are also part of Luria. The entire thing was the character's thoughts and thought process about what was taking place and how he should respond to it based on certain things. I sent the RP to my entire realm (PeL) and then to our guild which has a large membership of all 3 Lurian realms jointly because I figured those were the two groups who would best understand the RP and could then get a better feel for my character (from a player pov) and because I feel that Roleplaying is fun and is an important part of the game.

After doing so, I got backlash asking that I don't send RP's to such a wide range of people because it forces the players to deal with having knowledge which their characters do not and which if their characters knew would likely act a different way towards my character. The reasoning was that because they had received the RP through their character (not OOC tagged) and even though it was listed as an RP could lead players to use the information of my character's private thoughts and thus cause problems, etc...

I was taken a bit aback by this because I consider the whole point of roleplaying is to show your characters "character" as you will and their reasons, reactions, etc... for things. Every RP you do (unless its about some stupid, LOL, LMAO thing) is going to reflect this in someway and thus likely have something in it which could "hurt" your character from a strategic standpoint if used against you unjustly.

Now, I can understand when you RP a conversation that someone else can RP it being overheard, from spies, etc... or other similar things but private thoughts of someone's head while these can be even more revealing should never be able to be used.

The Question I have for the community of players, is do we have any sort of sanctity of role play? I mean quite frankly I was surprised by the outburst against the RP that I did because I believe it is a fun part of the game and is what makes BM unique from a simple strategy game. Since there is no "winning" in Battlemaster, I see no reason for anyone to do what I consider "cheating" by using OOC information gathered from RP's to adjust behaviors or otherwise. (I'm not saying that if I RP: "We will attack region X, in 2 days from region Y" to the RUler's channel that it won't happen to accidentaly be used or quite simply purposefully used against me) but this whole situation seems weird to me.

The final statement someone has made about this is that there is no backend reinforcement (from Titans/Tom) to stop players from abusing RP knowledge in this way. That players are free to abuse things however they want and nothing can be done to them. The only reaction of course is to change your reactions for your own characters outside of what they would normally do to fix the situation or punish the character which you knew to abuse it. I don't see this as an ideal solution.

Overall, I'm perplexed and would love to hear what the community has to say. I can post a copy of the RP if that is necessary, (since anyone involved would of course already know about it) but want to hear what my fellow players think on a large scale.

[Sacha]

The final statement someone has made about this is that there is no backend reinforcement (from Titans/Tom) to stop players from abusing RP knowledge in this way. That players are free to abuse things however they want and nothing can be done to them.

That pretty much sums up the whole thing. There is no RP police and there likely never will be, so if someone uses your 'secret' RP against you, either deal with it IC, or accept the fact that you gave them the opportunity to use it.

I consider it similar to leaving your car unlocked in a bad neighborhood. The people who steal it are criminals, but then again, you made it very easy for them to dick you over.

[Miriam Ics]

I answer in the wrong post so will copy/paste here.

I think that RP is a lot more complex than to RP thoughts.
What is said in OOC *shouldn't* be used never by the characters, but we can't avoid this. I saw irc information being spread around IC as it were told by the char.
Thoughts, can never be known so as a description of something that happen far from everyone, but, many people just can't write well, some more can't interpret the writing even if it were from a good writer, and another bunch don't care for RP enough to not use it as a weapon or as a tool.

Another problem is about what should or should not be RP'd.
Why do one need to RP thoughts?
To make sure all the others understand that he/she didn't like it?
Thinking about this, I need to confess I did this once or twice.

If we think about why we are doing something, most of the times we will not do it.
RP is not different.
My advise would be: think twice on *why* you need to RP this or that to be sure is necessary for the understanding of your character.

[Ramiel]

In Character versus Out of Character

In Character, abbreviated IC, is what qualifies as "roleplay" even if the "roleplay" message type is not used. Out of Character, or OOC, is when you, the player, are communicating something to the other players.
The two are and must be kept separate!
Example:
One day you read a roleplay sent to the entire realm that is occuring between King Garhook and High Marshal Funman. In this roleplay, the two characters are having a dialogue, while walking along the palace in the capital.
In this example, unless your character is there, AND you are roleplaying that you are there and listening, OR you are told via another character who is, your character does NOT know about what they are saying. This is because what you the player knows (OOC) is different from what your character knows (IC).
Example 2:
One day you read a roleplay, again sent to the realm, in which another character, Lord Haha, thinks to himself, 'I wish I could kill all of these rodents and become the Tyrant of our realm!'
In this example, no matter what your character is doing, your character has NO knowledge of what Lord Haha has just thought. It would be very bad roleplay for you, then, to have your character respond with something like "That's awful Lord Haha, and I call on the Judge to banish you!" In fact, if you responded like that, your character would be a mind-reader (definitely a no-no in a low-fantasy setting like Battlemaster - and in a medieval setting, you'd be burned at the stake for Witchcraft).
In conclusion, just because a roleplay is sent to you via "to the entire realm," does not automatically mean your character will know anything that that happens in the roleplay. Use your common sense - don't respond to another character's internal thoughts, or private discussions taking place half a Realm away.

Also sums it up nicely however. And frankly is much more Roleplay friendly than everyone being douches and trying to 'win'. Maybe there is no RP Police from the Titans/Tom but the community should be able to police itself quite effectively through the options of ignoring it completely, or burning someone on the stake for being a mind-reader. However that would assume everyone can actually agree to be not be a douche and to respect the roleplay being done.

[Sacha]

If you're banking on everyone in BM not being a douche 100% of the time, you shouldn't get your hopes up too high I'm afraid...

This kind of thing has been happening since BM started and it will go on until BM stops, . If you have to RP about your shenanigans, do it to a crowd that won't sell you out, or do it at a time where people can't use it against you anymore, or when it doesn't matter if they do.

[Ramiel]

If you're banking on everyone in BM not being a douche 100% of the time, you shouldn't get your hopes up too high I'm afraid...

This kind of thing has been happening since BM started and it will go on until BM stops, . If you have to RP about your shenanigans, do it to a crowd that won't sell you out, or do it at a time where people can't use it against you anymore, or when it doesn't matter if they do.

I know, I know, a foolish thought that everyone would respect Fair Play. But hey, I can be a naive idealist surely?

Besides, if the majority of the community agreed to not be a douche and take action against douches, then the douches would stop being douches (I am even using this american word right? no idea!) at least in my mind, since they would have no one left to be douches against.

Its sort of like the death of the Internet Troll to be honest, we can now block people, ignore people, or outright ban and exile them from our online worlds (at least social networking wise), and I guarantee that those dear trolls will very soon be an extinct species renegaded to the dregs of the internet forums and websites. I just prefer to take a pro-action stance and take it apart here and now rather than wait a few years.

Lament that technology does not always upgrade everything at the same time

[Perth]

Indeed, people SHOULD respect the basic concepts of RP and shouldn't have their characters acting on information they shouldn't actually know.

But since there is no formal enforcement of this via the Titans, etc. then it must be up the community.


Honestly, I think a nicely spelled out "RP Honor Code" would do a lot. It could easily be referenced by players and would do away with any confusion there might be over what is okay and what is not okay, and it could help the community self-police itself/promote good gameplay/roleplay.

[D`Este]

Person x makes a roleplay with information
Person y finds out that information via an other way and uses it.
Person x claims person y broke the code and now person x has to defend himself because he looks a bad boy

How many of those discussions will we get?

Why don't people just play their characters according how they were made and use RP's to enlighten parts of the character when they want others to know. Don't go write Rp's with information others aren't allowed to know, keep that to yourself, else we will have an endless debate how people found out information.

[Anaris]

Person x makes a roleplay with information
Person y finds out that information via an other way and uses it.
Person x claims person y broke the code and now person x has to defend himself because he looks a bad boy

How many of those discussions will we get?

And this, in a nutshell, is the problem.

[Ramiel]

And this, in a nutshell, is the problem.

Then its a simple case of Person Y roleplaying how they got that information, remarkably it is a very simple solution.

[Anaris]

Then its a simple case of Person Y roleplaying how they got that information, remarkably it is a very simple solution.

And if Person Y is lying?

[Sacha]

"I bribed one of your closest vassals."

There's your RPed explanation.

[Indirik]

The final statement someone has made about this is that there is no backend reinforcement (from Titans/Tom) to stop players from abusing RP knowledge in this way.

Just to amplify this point:
There is no possible way that Tom, the Titans, the Magistrates, or *any* body of "RP Police" can enforce any kind of IC/OOC knowledge split, or punish any kind of infraction. It's practically impossible for them to determine whether or not the accused player has obtained the information in a legitimate, IC way. In order to do so, the enforcing body would have to be able to read all of the accused player's messages. So any time that Alice accuses Bob of using OOC knowledge IC, then Charlie would have to open up Bob's messages, and read 30 days worth of Bob's messages to see if Bob really did know that information IC. And even then you risk making the wrong decision, because maybe Bob learned it more than 30 days ago, and the message is gone already. And then you have to worry that maybe Charlie is misusing all the information that *he* gets from trolling Bob's messages.

This entire endeavor would be a stupidly time-consuming process.

And then there are all kinds of other problems where Alice only *thinks* Bob is using some OOC information, but Bob is really doing what he's doing for an entirely different reason. Or Bob is smart enough to disguise the fact that he's misusing that OOC information, and cleverly devises some other plausible IC reason to take actions in response to the OOC information. (i.e. you only catch the stupid people, or the first-time offenders. Next time, they'll be smarter about it.) Or maybe Dave is being a metagaming ass, and used OOC knowledge IC but set Bob up as the fall guy by giving Bob the OOC information in such a way as to make Bob think it was valid IC information.

No matter how you slice it, there can be no realistic way for anyone to enforce any of this.

[D`Este]

Then its a simple case of Person Y roleplaying how they got that information, remarkably it is a very simple solution.

Unless person Y doesn't want to share that info? If a close friend of person x gave away that info for example.

[Ramiel]

Unless person Y doesn't want to share that info? If a close friend of person x gave away that info for example.

Then instead of saying:

Player A stopped and looked at Player B "You are sure of this? He plans to invade her duchy?"
"Indeed Player A. When he told me, I knew I had to tell you and get you to warn her, we can not afford another war" Player B responded

You could do:

Player A stopped and looked at the man, a man who had Player C's ear and confidence, "You are sure of this? He plans to invade her duchy?"
"Indeed Player A. When he told me, I knew I had to tell you and get you to warn her, we can not afford another war" came the response.

Or:

Player A stopped and looked his informant, "You are sure of this? He plans to invade her duchy?"
"Indeed Player A. When he told me, I knew I had to tell you and get you to warn her, we can not afford another war" the informant replied.

Although I will admit that this forces us to trust that people are not just douchebagging us and not taking it direct from RP w/e and actually ARE learning about this in a valid RP and IC way.