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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Suggestions for increasing 'heavy' roleplay immersion, should also help other play types
ArchivedUser
Guest
This is not a thread to discuss different types of Roleplay, any posts that attempt to derail this thread with such, will be flagged straight away. With thanks 
So, as things apparently stand, whilst there is a lot of focus by the Dev's on general game environment, PvP and PvE, the rather splendiferous heavy roleplay community so far appears to have been largely ignored.
Now this is fine, we're ALL much more interested right now in getting a game up and running, so Yay, go Dev's, you're doing a great job
Now I know that @GMSteven has acknowledged that he is a roleplayer and given the fact that this is going to be an MMORPG it should be going to play a vital role.. . . .
Having said that, I've floated around the community for a while now, and I've yet to get the feeling that there's anything lined up for the roleplayers other than,
'here is a world and a few emotes, be happy with that'
I have suggested it directly to yourselves, that it's worth the team considering actually having a chat to one of the heavy rp community, probably one of the guild leaders, if none of the team are involved in heavy rp themselves, just to take into consideration any issues that might be easily preventable. Ie, the heavy rp community never really gets established because they have to overcome too many hurdles.
So, what would be useful, or (in my opinion) worth thinking about getting in game long term,
Everyone has a diary, they can access in game.
This has two pages.
Guild leaders or those designated to do so by the guild leader, can create events that would show up on everyones diaries.
When they create events they have to class it under a 'type' ie PvP, RP, PvE
Players can sign up to subscribe for types of events.
So the first page of the diary would show ALL events that are due to happen in the next 24 hours,
Page two would show you only the events under your subscription type.
So my other half, the Viking works in government communications, this is exactly the kind of thing that he works with, so I know that it's more than feasible outside of the gaming environment.
Whilst I understand that this would require a lot of extra work, at this stage of development I thought it would be worth putting forward for consideration, given that at the moment I've not seen this in any other MMO, not saying it doesn't exist, just that I haven't seen it, and that it really would be beneficial to unite those who are dedicated to certain play styles, whilst letting others think about dipping their toes into a playstyle in a community run event.
No one would miss out on any large events.
Hmmm, other than the extra work, I cant forsee any downsides to this, but I'm sure that someone will come up with some for me.
TLDR: In game diaries to find the stuff we're interested in more easily without going outside of the game to access the forums.
So I'm assuming that 'corruption' will be automatically visible to others, whilst I'm not sure how @Intrepid are planning on showing this, changing their title/name to red or making them glow red would be the obvious.
But having this facility also available in other colours would be incredibly useful. (I'm going to be specifically referring to RP personally, however can see how this facility would also be useful to those seeking aid, wanting to group or open to PvP.)
Now I have a dodgy brain as I'm sure many of you will have heard by now, (sorry if I'm boring you), but I think I am right in remembering that there will be NO in game automatic grouping function, so something like this would be an aid to many.
Whilst I hate refering to a different MMO when you're looking to create something exceptionally new and different, on this one I think that I'm going to have to.
In LotRO you could simply change the colour of your titles/name to a different one, and that way anyone about you can see that you're in the mood for a little roleplay. I just makes them easier to identify at a glance.
Now whilst yes, most roleplayers I've spoken to are planning on rping as they go around in game, but spotting another rper similarly going around their game meant that you could change your plan and rp in their direction or create an interaction that wouldn't have occurred otherwise.
I can't personally see how tricky this would be to add, after all, depending upon how the team are planning on indicating corruption, the facility should already be there, it would just need a change in colour, and an in game option to allow players access to set their own.
Obviously, corruption would overrule all other 'chooseable' colours
TLDR: If we can change our name and title colours ourselves different play style groups can be more easily identified
The roleplay community really doesn't require a separate GM to monitor names or ban people who are acting like trolls, they'll be able to self monitor and ignore (hopefully)
TLDR: This one was kind of self explanatory.
Roleplayer GPS
Now most modern MMORPG's already have an in game location function, co-ordinates and wot-not. So how is this different and why is it needed?
As it has already been announced that there isn't going to be a specific roleplay server....
Ok, so the rp community, which is actively working behind the scenes already, will work around the lack of official server by choosing instead to group together on an unofficial one
Thereby still resulting in the separation of communities and playstyles that Steven is hoping to avoid. But if that's what will happen, it's what will happen.
Why though has a specific roleplay server been so important to people, that it has generated at least four different threads so far on the forums?
Because, given that rp is a social playstyle, people want to be able to more easily find those that will help enhance their game;
and knowing that everyone who has chosen an official roleplay server means that roleplayers can feel comfortable that everyone there has accepted that roleplay will happen.
If you roleplay at someone on a designated server, nine times out of ten they will roleplay right back at you.
This hasn't been my experience on non-rp designated servers, but I accept I'm only one person out of 15k or so pledgers.
Why is there a feeling a server important?
Because no-one likes being called idiotic names by people who don't understand what they're doing, and silly little children seem to think that they are being wonderful by jumping up and down in-front of your character when you're running an event that has taken weeks to put together.
See also ignore function It just grinds on you if it incessantly happens.
Because actually, as has been shown on previous threads, those who aren't really into heavy, more immersive roleplay can find it difficult to understand our need to create our own stories or add items to the game world that exist no where other than in our imaginations, and this includes other roleplayers.
We all want to walk into a world and meet up with others with the same playstyle as ourselves, and this matches the statements made by the team regarding wanting Ashes to be playable by all, no matter what their play style.
So why is a GPS needed? Given the lack of quick travel and the size of the game world that we are expecting, there is very likely going to be an issue with finding other 'heavy' roleplayers', especially randomly.
Eventually rp will likely settle down around several major in world hubs, but until then, most will happen through in world 'shouts'
Right now, in most games finding others who are open to heavy rp is difficult, made more so if there isn't any official grouping.
Now a world wide 'shout' system may not be happening in game, due to immersion breaking.
So I'm sure that an out of game system such as discord will likely end up being used.
But please consider an option of in game functionality that doesn't mean you have to go outside the game to get the playstyle you love.
However having a system or function in game, that shows up as either an additional icon on your game screen, or as an extra ring around your current map icon (no idea how it's going to be)
Basically just some way of being able to locate on a nearby map all those who are self identifying as rpers, be it by proximity arrows or set icons...
There must be some facility that the intelligent team can think of for this.
Yes, there is a possibility it could be abused by those who incorrectly assume that roleplayers have never heard of PvP or are just rubbish at it, however in my experience the rp community have a strong group mentality, and have previously shown themselves more than capable of holding their own against random PvP griefers.
TLDR: An easy in game way to locate nearby roleplayers.
Is it going to be a simple:
/dance : leading to an in game dance action carried out by your character
A more complicated personalised emote possibility:
/ emote sways gently as his feet move in time to the rhythmic beats of the music : leading to
no actual in game action, but the in game personalised emote:
'x' sways gently as his feet move in time to the rhythmic beats of the music
What about the absolutely perfect mix of using the action and a personalised emote system. (this has been done in an MMO before)
/dance sways gently as his feet move in time to the rhythmic beats of the music : leading to an in game action of dancing and the personalised emote at the same time.
If this is still being worked up, or not actually decided yet, can we kindly get the last option? It's just so much better to be able to see your toon laughing when you're explaining about it... however....
there's nothing worse than giving that personalised emote with an in game toon animation that fails to match up with the story you're trying to tell.
I'll give LotRO as an example for this again, you could suggest that:
/laugh gives a nervous giggle as she is caught red handed
that resulted in a hobbit rolling around on the floor looking like it was having a fit... not a nervous laugh.
Also people don't just have one style of laughing, they have many, belly laughing, giggling, nervous laughing.
If you do end up working on emotes for the cash shop, could you also consider working on multiple versions of 'simple' actions.
We'd pay for them.
Multiple ways to sit. To stand. To lean. To lie down. etc etc.
TLDR: Roleplayers want emotes, no matter what style they'd class their roleplay as.
I'm going to say we because whilst I have no proof on this one that it's not just me alone, I'm sure that this would be something that everyone would prefer.
If we have to hunt to find a blacksmith, they should not only be easy to see, but easy to identify what they specialize in, humans are lazy and we like to see at a glance what's on offer.
Save us time for the killing and the crafting ourselves.
If there's a way to display three to five items and make them actually visible to others at a glance, please please work out a way to do this.
TLDR: This one was kind of self explanatory.
It'd be nice to get some sort of clarification from the team what their plans are in regards to storing and seeing costumes. If we've owned something once, will that unlock said item to us to wear forever?
Is what we are going to be wearing the only thing that will be visible, or will we be able to hide items such as hoods, hats.... ?
Seaking of which will Ashes be the first MMORPG ever, to allow hats to be taken off and hung on your back/belt, or to put hoods' back without having to take the whole thing off?
Will we be able to save predecided selection of clothing, so that as long as we have all of the items still, we can put it automatically back on without having to go through and try everything to see if it works with each other item?
Honestly though, it'd be great to be a 'costume' vendor where you can sell a whole array of items as one 'costume' so you work out what it should look like, then sell it as a whole, putting it all on your window manequin of course first.... ah but I'm dreaming now.
I had other ideas, but my brain has now started telling me to sleep again, so I think I'll go and say hello to all the new folks on the forum, and return when I can remember what on earth it was I was thinking about
it was stuff like:
I know that you'd love us to fill in the gaps to make our own lore, please give us more skeletal lore to build the body upon!!!! Please, pretty please.
We don't need anything that'd give any of the story away, but at least a nod about when some more lore might be released, ie in the second beta stage, would be useful.
And of course can we confirm that there will be what is a now ever present in MMO's, ability to make our own short notice and in game ability for others to 'inspect' and see our notice.
And the also now ever present ability to add 'notes' next to friends names, just for ourselves so we can see why we've added them to friends, or ignore or what we were doing with them last etc etc.
And could you consider taking a few minutes to make a new unique 'pet' or in game 'title' that the community could give away as prizes in competitions....
Stuff like that.... but derpage, sorry.
Love to everyone.
So, as things apparently stand, whilst there is a lot of focus by the Dev's on general game environment, PvP and PvE, the rather splendiferous heavy roleplay community so far appears to have been largely ignored.
Now this is fine, we're ALL much more interested right now in getting a game up and running, so Yay, go Dev's, you're doing a great job
Now I know that @GMSteven has acknowledged that he is a roleplayer and given the fact that this is going to be an MMORPG it should be going to play a vital role.. . . .
Having said that, I've floated around the community for a while now, and I've yet to get the feeling that there's anything lined up for the roleplayers other than,
'here is a world and a few emotes, be happy with that'
I have suggested it directly to yourselves, that it's worth the team considering actually having a chat to one of the heavy rp community, probably one of the guild leaders, if none of the team are involved in heavy rp themselves, just to take into consideration any issues that might be easily preventable. Ie, the heavy rp community never really gets established because they have to overcome too many hurdles.
So, what would be useful, or (in my opinion) worth thinking about getting in game long term,
- In game accessible calendars of events / diaries.
Everyone has a diary, they can access in game.
This has two pages.
Guild leaders or those designated to do so by the guild leader, can create events that would show up on everyones diaries.
When they create events they have to class it under a 'type' ie PvP, RP, PvE
Players can sign up to subscribe for types of events.
So the first page of the diary would show ALL events that are due to happen in the next 24 hours,
Page two would show you only the events under your subscription type.
So my other half, the Viking works in government communications, this is exactly the kind of thing that he works with, so I know that it's more than feasible outside of the gaming environment.
Whilst I understand that this would require a lot of extra work, at this stage of development I thought it would be worth putting forward for consideration, given that at the moment I've not seen this in any other MMO, not saying it doesn't exist, just that I haven't seen it, and that it really would be beneficial to unite those who are dedicated to certain play styles, whilst letting others think about dipping their toes into a playstyle in a community run event.
No one would miss out on any large events.
Hmmm, other than the extra work, I cant forsee any downsides to this, but I'm sure that someone will come up with some for me.
TLDR: In game diaries to find the stuff we're interested in more easily without going outside of the game to access the forums.
- Being able to change the colour of your name / Title
So I'm assuming that 'corruption' will be automatically visible to others, whilst I'm not sure how @Intrepid are planning on showing this, changing their title/name to red or making them glow red would be the obvious.
But having this facility also available in other colours would be incredibly useful. (I'm going to be specifically referring to RP personally, however can see how this facility would also be useful to those seeking aid, wanting to group or open to PvP.)
Now I have a dodgy brain as I'm sure many of you will have heard by now, (sorry if I'm boring you), but I think I am right in remembering that there will be NO in game automatic grouping function, so something like this would be an aid to many.
Whilst I hate refering to a different MMO when you're looking to create something exceptionally new and different, on this one I think that I'm going to have to.
In LotRO you could simply change the colour of your titles/name to a different one, and that way anyone about you can see that you're in the mood for a little roleplay. I just makes them easier to identify at a glance.
Now whilst yes, most roleplayers I've spoken to are planning on rping as they go around in game, but spotting another rper similarly going around their game meant that you could change your plan and rp in their direction or create an interaction that wouldn't have occurred otherwise.
I can't personally see how tricky this would be to add, after all, depending upon how the team are planning on indicating corruption, the facility should already be there, it would just need a change in colour, and an in game option to allow players access to set their own.
Obviously, corruption would overrule all other 'chooseable' colours
TLDR: If we can change our name and title colours ourselves different play style groups can be more easily identified
- In game Ignore function
The roleplay community really doesn't require a separate GM to monitor names or ban people who are acting like trolls, they'll be able to self monitor and ignore (hopefully)
TLDR: This one was kind of self explanatory.
Roleplayer GPS
Now most modern MMORPG's already have an in game location function, co-ordinates and wot-not. So how is this different and why is it needed?
As it has already been announced that there isn't going to be a specific roleplay server....
Ok, so the rp community, which is actively working behind the scenes already, will work around the lack of official server by choosing instead to group together on an unofficial one
Thereby still resulting in the separation of communities and playstyles that Steven is hoping to avoid. But if that's what will happen, it's what will happen.
Why though has a specific roleplay server been so important to people, that it has generated at least four different threads so far on the forums?
Because, given that rp is a social playstyle, people want to be able to more easily find those that will help enhance their game;
and knowing that everyone who has chosen an official roleplay server means that roleplayers can feel comfortable that everyone there has accepted that roleplay will happen.
If you roleplay at someone on a designated server, nine times out of ten they will roleplay right back at you.
This hasn't been my experience on non-rp designated servers, but I accept I'm only one person out of 15k or so pledgers.
Why is there a feeling a server important?
Because no-one likes being called idiotic names by people who don't understand what they're doing, and silly little children seem to think that they are being wonderful by jumping up and down in-front of your character when you're running an event that has taken weeks to put together.
See also ignore function
It just grinds on you if it incessantly happens.Because actually, as has been shown on previous threads, those who aren't really into heavy, more immersive roleplay can find it difficult to understand our need to create our own stories or add items to the game world that exist no where other than in our imaginations, and this includes other roleplayers.
We all want to walk into a world and meet up with others with the same playstyle as ourselves, and this matches the statements made by the team regarding wanting Ashes to be playable by all, no matter what their play style.
So why is a GPS needed? Given the lack of quick travel and the size of the game world that we are expecting, there is very likely going to be an issue with finding other 'heavy' roleplayers', especially randomly.
Eventually rp will likely settle down around several major in world hubs, but until then, most will happen through in world 'shouts'
Right now, in most games finding others who are open to heavy rp is difficult, made more so if there isn't any official grouping.
Now a world wide 'shout' system may not be happening in game, due to immersion breaking.
So I'm sure that an out of game system such as discord will likely end up being used.
But please consider an option of in game functionality that doesn't mean you have to go outside the game to get the playstyle you love.
However having a system or function in game, that shows up as either an additional icon on your game screen, or as an extra ring around your current map icon (no idea how it's going to be)
Basically just some way of being able to locate on a nearby map all those who are self identifying as rpers, be it by proximity arrows or set icons...
There must be some facility that the intelligent team can think of for this.
Yes, there is a possibility it could be abused by those who incorrectly assume that roleplayers have never heard of PvP or are just rubbish at it, however in my experience the rp community have a strong group mentality, and have previously shown themselves more than capable of holding their own against random PvP griefers.
TLDR: An easy in game way to locate nearby roleplayers.
- Additional emote / emoji options
Is it going to be a simple:
/dance : leading to an in game dance action carried out by your character
A more complicated personalised emote possibility:
/ emote sways gently as his feet move in time to the rhythmic beats of the music : leading to
no actual in game action, but the in game personalised emote:
'x' sways gently as his feet move in time to the rhythmic beats of the music
What about the absolutely perfect mix of using the action and a personalised emote system. (this has been done in an MMO before)
/dance sways gently as his feet move in time to the rhythmic beats of the music : leading to an in game action of dancing and the personalised emote at the same time.
If this is still being worked up, or not actually decided yet, can we kindly get the last option? It's just so much better to be able to see your toon laughing when you're explaining about it... however....
there's nothing worse than giving that personalised emote with an in game toon animation that fails to match up with the story you're trying to tell.
I'll give LotRO as an example for this again, you could suggest that:
/laugh gives a nervous giggle as she is caught red handed
that resulted in a hobbit rolling around on the floor looking like it was having a fit... not a nervous laugh.
Also people don't just have one style of laughing, they have many, belly laughing, giggling, nervous laughing.
If you do end up working on emotes for the cash shop, could you also consider working on multiple versions of 'simple' actions.
We'd pay for them.
Multiple ways to sit. To stand. To lean. To lie down. etc etc.
TLDR: Roleplayers want emotes, no matter what style they'd class their roleplay as.
- In game shop windows.
I'm going to say we because whilst I have no proof on this one that it's not just me alone, I'm sure that this would be something that everyone would prefer.
If we have to hunt to find a blacksmith, they should not only be easy to see, but easy to identify what they specialize in, humans are lazy and we like to see at a glance what's on offer.
Save us time for the killing and the crafting ourselves.
If there's a way to display three to five items and make them actually visible to others at a glance, please please work out a way to do this.
TLDR: This one was kind of self explanatory.
- Wardrobes and costumes
It'd be nice to get some sort of clarification from the team what their plans are in regards to storing and seeing costumes. If we've owned something once, will that unlock said item to us to wear forever?
Is what we are going to be wearing the only thing that will be visible, or will we be able to hide items such as hoods, hats.... ?
Seaking of which will Ashes be the first MMORPG ever, to allow hats to be taken off and hung on your back/belt, or to put hoods' back without having to take the whole thing off?
Will we be able to save predecided selection of clothing, so that as long as we have all of the items still, we can put it automatically back on without having to go through and try everything to see if it works with each other item?
Honestly though, it'd be great to be a 'costume' vendor where you can sell a whole array of items as one 'costume' so you work out what it should look like, then sell it as a whole, putting it all on your window manequin of course first.... ah but I'm dreaming now.
I had other ideas, but my brain has now started telling me to sleep again, so I think I'll go and say hello to all the new folks on the forum, and return when I can remember what on earth it was I was thinking about
it was stuff like:
I know that you'd love us to fill in the gaps to make our own lore, please give us more skeletal lore to build the body upon!!!! Please, pretty please.
We don't need anything that'd give any of the story away, but at least a nod about when some more lore might be released, ie in the second beta stage, would be useful.
And of course can we confirm that there will be what is a now ever present in MMO's, ability to make our own short notice and in game ability for others to 'inspect' and see our notice.
And the also now ever present ability to add 'notes' next to friends names, just for ourselves so we can see why we've added them to friends, or ignore or what we were doing with them last etc etc.
And could you consider taking a few minutes to make a new unique 'pet' or in game 'title' that the community could give away as prizes in competitions....
Stuff like that.... but derpage, sorry.
Love to everyone.
0
Comments
I think a lot of care will be put into certain /emotes, as the lead on this game is an avid DM and GM for many MMOs. RP adds so much immersion to a game. The general /laugh emote (and action of character laughing) can be tied in with /giggle, /snicker, /guffaw, etc. I would imagine at a minimum this would be done, alongside a whole suite of other emotes.
I would also hope a lot of effort goes into the sheathing and unsheathing of weapons, and how they appear on your character when sheathed. The pride and joy of any adventurer is his blade, staff, or scepter. Nothing worse than looking at some great new sword that is attached to your back - with some glitchy cloak flowing through it that makes it look ridiculous. Also, for mounting, would be nice to have the weapon attached to the mount(tied to the saddle bags or the like), so that the cloak can billow like crazy. As having a huge 2 handed weapon still equipped wouldn't really be conducive when riding long distances. Note, this is for visual, it's not actually an action to tie your weapon to your mount.
Or even a separate wardrobe function for mounted, so that the player has the option to hide shields/huge weapons that just look goofy when mounted.
I think AoC's focus to player immersion into the world will be very appealing to RP focused players out there. I look forward to interacting with any I come across in the open world. It's something I look to encourage, but don't have the patience or typing speed to commit to myself =P