Gaventeriel
08-11-2004, 08:24 AM
The Art of Surviving as an RP guild in a PvP world
By Mandrae Gaventeriel Lok-ri
RP, what exactly is it? Is it the simple act of pretending to be a character in a fantasy world or does it need lore and fancy language to back it up… or does it lie somewhere in between? In previous MMOs (other than the notable exceptions of Shadowbane and EVE) RP has by the very lack of lore based PvP been forced into a very strict and somewhat formal concept. When the only way for RP to exist at all is in words then the words have to be elaborate enough to supply the need for RP single handedly. Unfortunately, however, this form of RP faces a very simple problem in a world such as EVE, Shadowbane, or the subject of this treatise, Dark and Light.
The problem is that not everyone holds themselves to such a high standard of roleplay, and in a PvP game the benefit goes to those who are strong, not those who can speak a fantasy language perfectly. For an RP guild to survive without losing their ideals and RP they must find a way to withen the games rules make their ideals and RP not clash with their ability to survive. And they must learn how to make roleplay look to be fun to those who appreciate conflict as much as debate.
So how to make an RP guild that can roleplay with the best, and still keep from being overpowered or bullied by bigger non-rp guilds becomes the question.
Since this treatise is built entirely around the concept of games like Shadowbane or Dark and Light it almost goes without saying that the background lore of the game is built around the concept of players finding reasons to murder other players. Therefore, it becomes fairly simple to embrace one of those reasons as the core of your RP, whether it is defending the forests, hunting heretics, or just carving out a piece of land for your liege, once you have a reason to fight, fighting comes as natural as any other form of RP And in doing this you have set yourself on a path that can potentially lead to an RP guild being respected as an RP guild as well as a combat force. And the immediate result of this is one more step towards dispelling the myth that rpers can’t do anything but speak Shakespearean English and Elvish while sipping drinks.(not that there is anything wrong with a good wine while speaking elvish)
Now quite simply to make this work the RP guild must NOT do a few things.
First you CANNOT require a reward from the devs to RP. The devs should have provided you the lore you need for your ideals, and hopefully the game will be balanced and will have events built around RP, but if you ask for rewards other than the ones you get merely from participating in an RP environment, well things go wrong. You see if rpers start getting really nice items ect as a reward for their RP, the non-rp people will get mad and ask why they (who are paying the same money for the game) aren’t getting them, and it will in the end cheapen the event because people will only be rping for the items rather than the RP itself. If you do get things like an RP event, your ideal reward should be an item that has no value to anyone who is not an Rper. Non-RP guilds cant get jealous of things like a fancy signet ring with no stats.
Second you have to watch the tendency to become exclusive of non-rpers in general. Face the facts, they are there, they are the majority, and if you want to do anything but RP only with words in the beginning kingdom you have to fit them into your RP. There are ways to handle this. Say you run into a 1337 speaking fool, well you have your character act like the person is either a barbarian or quite insane. If he attacks you for no reason… then he is a psychotic or a bandit ect. The way to handle non-rpers is to rely on the fact that simply by playing a game they are Rping. Their actions are the same no matter their words, and it is their actions that affect how you play the game, the words can be ignored or if you want to really have fun play along as if you are your character confronted with the odd site of someone babbling incoherently. Now with less drastic cases you just take them as they come. Play your character, if you RP chances are you will get some RP back, even from people who think they cant RP.
Third you have to keep the balance, RP guilds pressed hard will sometimes lose the RP that is their base, but on the other hand a guild that goes too far into the formal parts of RP can lose its backbone. If you all can speak a fantasy language… great, but unless you can do it so well as to command a battle in it… save it for peacetime. It’s a balance, you want to be at the point where you stick to your guns RP wise but can still hold your own. So do the full blown RP events when you have time… but when in combat kill your foe and RP to his corpse.
Fourth, you have to watch yourself for the attitude of “We are the only true Rpers” This one is one of the most dangerous things that an RP guild will see in that it leads to RP guilds not supporting each other OOC. Everyone will interpret the lore to fit what they are trying to do… and only the devs can truly say whether an idea is incapable of fitting the lore. If you aren’t careful you can devolve from IC dislike to OOC or even RL dislike. And while In Character hatreds are all well and good, even to the point of keeping the RP going, Basically, if you find yourself hating the person behind the screen rather than the character you need to step back and ask why exactly you hate someone over a game.
Last… NEVER let RP become your weakness. Don’t be afraid to conquer when needed, don’t be afraid to go to war for your RP ideals. Stick to your RP guns and do what it takes to accomplish your RP goals. But on the other hand unless your guild is entirely behind it, don’t go so hard-line RP that you have too many enemies to survive. Basically the goal should be to accomplish your ideals while staying alive, so don’t bite off more than you can chew unless you want to go out in a blaze of glory. In the case of large non-rp guilds the key to surviving will be knowledge of the alliances, the ones that are not held together all that strongly often act like bullies using war as an excuse to keep from falling apart. Give them a few bloody noses and they start wondering why they attacked you, and in some cases often will start breaking up. However if you do that to a solid alliance that just like’s war or has a real goal in mind, you risk a long war. The thing is that in many cases long wars aren’t bad. If you stand up to a bigger guild or alliance and hold your ground you can forever damage the concept that RP guilds can’t fight. And when you do that you gain ground for every single RP guild in a pvp game.
RP guilds have the potential to be the basis for a pvp MMOs plot, as well as the potential to be the best known and most respected of any guild. For you see with an RP guild you get more than just the reputation from your conquests, you also gain the reputation of having done it while sticking to your RP guns. Instead of being known as the random people who held this duchy, your name becomes synonymous with the ideal you fought for, and even if you eventually are forced out of your territory, if you fight well and stick to your guns and hold your own you will find that your guilds reputation will be fully capable of rivaling the most powerful of the non-rp guilds in the game.
Good luck out there.
By Mandrae Gaventeriel Lok-ri
RP, what exactly is it? Is it the simple act of pretending to be a character in a fantasy world or does it need lore and fancy language to back it up… or does it lie somewhere in between? In previous MMOs (other than the notable exceptions of Shadowbane and EVE) RP has by the very lack of lore based PvP been forced into a very strict and somewhat formal concept. When the only way for RP to exist at all is in words then the words have to be elaborate enough to supply the need for RP single handedly. Unfortunately, however, this form of RP faces a very simple problem in a world such as EVE, Shadowbane, or the subject of this treatise, Dark and Light.
The problem is that not everyone holds themselves to such a high standard of roleplay, and in a PvP game the benefit goes to those who are strong, not those who can speak a fantasy language perfectly. For an RP guild to survive without losing their ideals and RP they must find a way to withen the games rules make their ideals and RP not clash with their ability to survive. And they must learn how to make roleplay look to be fun to those who appreciate conflict as much as debate.
So how to make an RP guild that can roleplay with the best, and still keep from being overpowered or bullied by bigger non-rp guilds becomes the question.
Since this treatise is built entirely around the concept of games like Shadowbane or Dark and Light it almost goes without saying that the background lore of the game is built around the concept of players finding reasons to murder other players. Therefore, it becomes fairly simple to embrace one of those reasons as the core of your RP, whether it is defending the forests, hunting heretics, or just carving out a piece of land for your liege, once you have a reason to fight, fighting comes as natural as any other form of RP And in doing this you have set yourself on a path that can potentially lead to an RP guild being respected as an RP guild as well as a combat force. And the immediate result of this is one more step towards dispelling the myth that rpers can’t do anything but speak Shakespearean English and Elvish while sipping drinks.(not that there is anything wrong with a good wine while speaking elvish)
Now quite simply to make this work the RP guild must NOT do a few things.
First you CANNOT require a reward from the devs to RP. The devs should have provided you the lore you need for your ideals, and hopefully the game will be balanced and will have events built around RP, but if you ask for rewards other than the ones you get merely from participating in an RP environment, well things go wrong. You see if rpers start getting really nice items ect as a reward for their RP, the non-rp people will get mad and ask why they (who are paying the same money for the game) aren’t getting them, and it will in the end cheapen the event because people will only be rping for the items rather than the RP itself. If you do get things like an RP event, your ideal reward should be an item that has no value to anyone who is not an Rper. Non-RP guilds cant get jealous of things like a fancy signet ring with no stats.
Second you have to watch the tendency to become exclusive of non-rpers in general. Face the facts, they are there, they are the majority, and if you want to do anything but RP only with words in the beginning kingdom you have to fit them into your RP. There are ways to handle this. Say you run into a 1337 speaking fool, well you have your character act like the person is either a barbarian or quite insane. If he attacks you for no reason… then he is a psychotic or a bandit ect. The way to handle non-rpers is to rely on the fact that simply by playing a game they are Rping. Their actions are the same no matter their words, and it is their actions that affect how you play the game, the words can be ignored or if you want to really have fun play along as if you are your character confronted with the odd site of someone babbling incoherently. Now with less drastic cases you just take them as they come. Play your character, if you RP chances are you will get some RP back, even from people who think they cant RP.
Third you have to keep the balance, RP guilds pressed hard will sometimes lose the RP that is their base, but on the other hand a guild that goes too far into the formal parts of RP can lose its backbone. If you all can speak a fantasy language… great, but unless you can do it so well as to command a battle in it… save it for peacetime. It’s a balance, you want to be at the point where you stick to your guns RP wise but can still hold your own. So do the full blown RP events when you have time… but when in combat kill your foe and RP to his corpse.
Fourth, you have to watch yourself for the attitude of “We are the only true Rpers” This one is one of the most dangerous things that an RP guild will see in that it leads to RP guilds not supporting each other OOC. Everyone will interpret the lore to fit what they are trying to do… and only the devs can truly say whether an idea is incapable of fitting the lore. If you aren’t careful you can devolve from IC dislike to OOC or even RL dislike. And while In Character hatreds are all well and good, even to the point of keeping the RP going, Basically, if you find yourself hating the person behind the screen rather than the character you need to step back and ask why exactly you hate someone over a game.
Last… NEVER let RP become your weakness. Don’t be afraid to conquer when needed, don’t be afraid to go to war for your RP ideals. Stick to your RP guns and do what it takes to accomplish your RP goals. But on the other hand unless your guild is entirely behind it, don’t go so hard-line RP that you have too many enemies to survive. Basically the goal should be to accomplish your ideals while staying alive, so don’t bite off more than you can chew unless you want to go out in a blaze of glory. In the case of large non-rp guilds the key to surviving will be knowledge of the alliances, the ones that are not held together all that strongly often act like bullies using war as an excuse to keep from falling apart. Give them a few bloody noses and they start wondering why they attacked you, and in some cases often will start breaking up. However if you do that to a solid alliance that just like’s war or has a real goal in mind, you risk a long war. The thing is that in many cases long wars aren’t bad. If you stand up to a bigger guild or alliance and hold your ground you can forever damage the concept that RP guilds can’t fight. And when you do that you gain ground for every single RP guild in a pvp game.
RP guilds have the potential to be the basis for a pvp MMOs plot, as well as the potential to be the best known and most respected of any guild. For you see with an RP guild you get more than just the reputation from your conquests, you also gain the reputation of having done it while sticking to your RP guns. Instead of being known as the random people who held this duchy, your name becomes synonymous with the ideal you fought for, and even if you eventually are forced out of your territory, if you fight well and stick to your guns and hold your own you will find that your guilds reputation will be fully capable of rivaling the most powerful of the non-rp guilds in the game.
Good luck out there.