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Should there or should there not be RP servers?
Javeon
Member
Made this thread to take the heat away from my last one and bring the discussion here. What are your thoughts?
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W/ that there's already a player designated RP server being planned by a rather large group of guilds so I don't think it'll be a huge loss either way.
With that being said. I don't think that there is a need for an RP Tag at all. Inofficially, there will be community designated RP servers the same way you'll have community designated foreign language servers in the EU. Like one where turkish/polish/... speaking players concentrate.
In practice, the RP in MMORPG stands more for the statistics, level progression, and game mechanic role of a class aspects than the acting in, or personification of, a character. Don't get me wrong, we all love and appreciate the world building and lore created for these games, but when comes the time to actually play the game, that's mostly window dressing and background decor.
I'm not saying no one RP. I'm sure there are guilds that do it within there chat or discord channel, but I'm not sure how much even them hold it when they are in combat, let say tough boss or in a raid scenario. Even in pen and paper game session things get pretty low as far as RP is concerned in most combat moments.
Having designated RP servers may help, but it wouldn't change much. Maybe in the beginning of the genre it was niche enough to have attracted mostly "old school" role players, but now the crowd is much diverse, no one cares enough. Some are even bothered when people try to roleplay, not that it really matters, but still...
Not to reopen the debate or relaunch the multiple threads about it, but it is in large part why most people don't care about an archetype being named "tank" while others do.
Because a large portion of gamers do not share my uptight views on this, I usually just shrug it off and hope there is an RP server that *might* be marginally better.
That said, no. I do not believe there should be designated RP servers. I would not want to open the door to servers having different rulesets. Also, I can gank people with names I do not like and that makes me happy.
No one is going to try and RP right in the middle of combat, but outside of that there have been (and still are) very healthy RP communities in a number of game.
WoW has a considerable amount of player driven events to the point that the number of people trying to participate nearly breaks the server. SWTOR and FF both have a lot of RP within player housing b/c it's massive, private, and customizable.
All of which will likely be found in AoC
The unofficially server will be great because lots of RPers will roll there, but there will also be lots of people who do not respect RP at all.
RP needs to be immersive, non-rp players could ruin this experience (subconsciously and consciously) shooing away the RPers in all sorts of different methods.
I can see the intent behind the design to encourage everyone to play more RP like, but there are levels of degree with RP that player demographics enjoy and do not enjoy.
It could be a post launch thing once the player base is established if there are enough to fill a server to make the experience enjoyable.
If you have a server that has a cap of 10,000 players as an example, and only 10% populate that for RP purposes, then that is going to be a problem for immersive purposes. It just would not work out the same for the way they intend the game to be played.
I'd say let the unofficial' s do their thing as they're going to do regardless, and if the demand is sufficient enough, perhaps intrepid could provide a solution to that demand post launch to be on the safe side.
Non-role player and role players do not necessarily enjoy playing the game the same way in terms of immersion etc
It would be the equivalent of putting a "Kick me!" sign on your back. You basically telling the whole player base that the PvP competition is going to be lower on this server. Which means it would be heaven for gankers.
A RP name requirement is not going to magically keep you safe. Someone ganking you is technically RP because that crap happens all the time IRL.
Better just to let the servers form organically.
If I had more time, I would write a shorter post.
I don't think that's accurate. There's plenty of rpers that are also insanely sweaty pvpers...it's not like the two are mutually exclusive activities.
I would wager a fight with 10 random people who call themselves RPers vs 10 random people that call themselves PvPers would be a pretty one-sided maybe? Of course there are always outliers who do both or are good at both sure.
At a whole server level? IDK, to me it sounds like the RPers are asking for some rough waters to sail in.
If I had more time, I would write a shorter post.
I doubt many roleplayers are coming to AoC for an Animal Crossing experience. As I said in my very first comment there's already a large group of guilds (25-30) that are all classifying themselves as roleplayers w/ a number of them planning to focus largely on PvP
Even in other MMOs a lot of the player driven world PvP is initiated through roleplaying...I saw this a lot throughout the years in WoW
I played on a WOW RP server once, it was just a name report system from my prospective.
If all RPers want is a system to report dumb names like WOW RP servers than count me as a RPer.
We could just have that on all servers.
I play table top D&D so the idea of RPing in a MMO always felt like a waste to me.
Every time I have tried to put up with MMO RPers in the past it was MLP dudes, and other assorted weirdos.
So my imagination of the sort of threat someone who calls them self a RPer is a little lacking.
If I had more time, I would write a shorter post.
I spent some time in Archeage living next to someone that had a bit of an ERP possy, and they all thought that chat from inside a house was contained.
It wasn't.
If RP'ing is still allowed on other servers, I don't see the point in an RP server in any official capacity.
Saddest day in past game was a server merge.
So although I personally would love to see an official RP server because it would let every MMO Rper know where to go. I also have seen that Steven is unmoving on the idea of an RP server. So I along with several guilds have created a discord for RP guild leads to work together and create and unofficial rp server. I am the one organizing the group that @Maezriel spoke of and I find it to be super effective to get roleplayers together even if there is not going to be an official server.