[MUD-Dev] Maintaining fiction.

[Jon Lambert]

Brian Hook wrote:
> At 05:10 PM 5/29/01 -0700, Azeraab at dies-irae.org wrote:

>> I guess you really need to decide early on how important RP is to
>> your game.  Most games which profess to be RPGs are really just
>> adventure games(AG) in a fantasy setting.

> This is where we enter the very dangerous land of "My definition
> of an RPG is the correct one".

The problem with the words "role-playing" or "RPG" is not that they
do have various meanings or styles.  They map to quite different
points on a role-playing graph.  Not allowing more specific
terminology to enter into discussion isn't very conducive to
facilitating communication here.

Imagine discussing a point of morality with one's vocabulary limited
to the English word "kill".  "We killed the druid."  as opposed to
allowing "We murdered the druid", "We executed the druid.", "We
assassinated the druid.", "We slew the druid in self-defense.", "We
euthanized the druid.", "We aborted the potential druid.", etc.  All
these are graduations of moral meaning that are pretty important
(well to most people they are).

> I'm not defending these classifications, but merely pointing out
> that claiming one classification as the One True One is an open
> invitation to conflict.

In that light, and in the absence of classifications, nobody here
has yet discussed role-playing on this thread.  Mihaly and Tresca
have made some references to it though.  You see there is a sizable
group of text mudders and P&P players who engage in "role-acting"
and "shared story-telling".

Oddly enough perma-death is frequent, not really emotionally
upsetting and oftentimes sought as a desirable outcome.  It is death
by player consent.  Sometimes we even invoke forms of death I like
to call soap opera death.  Where the player sets the death stage in
order to leave a creative option to come back.

>> In order to actually have an RPG you must keep in character at
>> all times.  NEVER break character.

> This is just as big a strait jacket.  What if you want to be
> Drizzt, the Good Dark Elf?

> There is no roleplay in drinking Coke, eating pizza and having a
> side conversation about the exhaust mods on your car, but these
> still happen when you're sitting around playing Gamma World with
> your friends.

IC/OOC separation occurs more comfortably and naturally in face to
face play for a number of reasons.  Tone of voice, facial
expressions, body language, selective hearing.  It's quite possible
to role-play a dramatic scene while idle players are chatting
quietly about motorcycle repair in the same room.  Volume isn't
implemented well in muds.  While it can be disruptive to play in FTF
play, OTOH, OOC chat is essential to setting up scenes and
consensual PvP role-play.  IMO, attempts to totally squelch it make
play more difficult, if not impossible.  For the reasons above
strong separation mechanisms are the easiest way of doing it on
muds.  The most direct and pure form of role-playing (IMO again) is
LARPing.  Playing through an ascii text interface is oftentimes the
equivalent of Helen Keller trying to role-play.  I think better
clients can improve role-play on muds.  Voice!..I think would be a
wonderful improvement for role-acting and in shared storytelling
style muds.  Much more so than graphics.  The ability to use wave
modulators and filters would even be an awesome improvement over FTF
style play.  It could also grow the hobby since I know many RPers
who strongly prefer dialogue to strong typing.  Another
aside... true talkover is absent from muds.  Anyone notice that mud
role-playing scenes bear strong resemblances to acting styles in
movies of the 30's and 40's.  No talkover.  Actually what passes for
accidental talkover looks rather silly on the screen.  We do attempt
to emulate planned talkover in text through elipsis.  But I
digress...  Or do I... after all the thread title is "Maintaining
the Fiction".

Maintaining the fiction in a game such as EverQuest probably is I
think impossible since it is a GAME, can be GAMED, it acts as a
GOPer magnet.  The fun solution to increasing role-play is to
ruthlessly "terminate GOPers with extreme prejudice".  The same way
they'd never be invited back to your P7P game.  But since the GAME
remains a GAME and is there to be GAMED, and to ever remain GAMEABLE
this is a never ending and labor intensive task.  So the solution is
one of design.  Specifically, one must implement a WORLD that is not
a GAME.

Anyone care to discuss RP!Gs or RPWs.  ;-)

--
--* Jon A. Lambert - TychoMUD        Email:jlsysinc at ix.netcom.com *--
--* Mud Server Developer's Page <http://tychomud.home.netcom.com> *--
--* If I had known it was harmless, I would have killed it myself.*--

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