'State of the RP' feedback thread

[Berlioz]

Hey all,

So @Green Ranger asked for expansion on the "PvP is good/bad" issue, so I figure maybe I can oblige? There's no doubt that PvP is a contentious topic on the site. Look at this thread and you'd be an idiot not to see it (sorry if someone didn't notice). And unfortunately enough (can't believe I'm saying this, what's wrong with me?) I agree with a lot of what @Elijah Brockway said.

The issue with PvP doesn't lie with the rules laid out for PvP it's with people's view of it. If you've been around this site for any time at all, you'll know that I like PvP and am a supporter of it overall, but even I have times when I get burned out on the arguments associated with it because it is often accompanied by rampant OOC bickering, often about petty things. So I think we have to ask what the root of that is? Well, I don't think we can blame the system for that because just as I've had horrid OOC fights, I've had extremely pleasant fights as well. If it's the system, then you wouldn't have it producing both good and bad. That means that it must be the people involved that are causing the issue.

So, then, what is the root attitude behind these divisive actions? I would contend that (there may be other reasons as well) there are two major attitudes that are the issue in PvP: 1) People cannot/will not/do not separate OOC from IC and 2) People become WAY too attached to characters that they are putting into combat.

Now I am expecting point number 2 to get some extremely resentful comments, so before you start angrily slapping your keyboards and raging about how stupid I am, hear me out.

*Insert unpopular opinion puffin* Remember guys and gals, at the end of the day these are fake characters on a Star Wars fanfiction site. The world is not going to come to an end if one of them dies. People become so overly attached to their characters they are unable to realize that it is possible to write a new character with entirely new story opportunities. And I say this as someone who is quite attached to some of the characters that I have made.

Now, obviously we don't want to recycle characters at every turn or churn out characters whose stories we have absolutely no investment or interest in, but if you have some favorite character that you absolutely can't live without, then you probably shouldn't put them in combat. I'm not saying just fill your character slots with what people would term "PvP characters" but I've seen the archive request thread be used often enough for non-death related archives to know that you don't really care that deeply about every character you make. I'm not telling you to throw your characters away, but remember that even your and my favorite characters aren't real people and life will go on. People get so absorbed with not letting a character die that they will do nearly anything (including bashing OOC on their opponent) in order to resist.

That attitude OOC also kind of leads me to my other point: separating OOC and IC. I think some of this may have been slightly improved with the crossover in main factions, but the writers of the other faction aren't actually your enemy. Again, FANFICTION website. You don't have to be enemies with the people you fight, even if you're trying to outwit them. For instance, I think that every person that either has killed or really tried (and nearly succeeded) to kill my characters on this site has been a friend of mine OOC. And we're still friends. At the end of the day, if you lose a character, yeah, it's a bummer, but there are always new stories to write.

Ok, unpopular opinion over, sorry, no TL;DR

I agree completely.

If I may, that's a bit of a re-occurring theme from what I'm seeing. By having writers project onto their characters, the writing then becomes personal. The fun of it all gets lost, and all that's left is the bickering over who's got the better action figure. This applies both to Factions and PvP, as on a faction front the Militaristic view point there-in is just giving the other guy a horrible time. This is fine in war. It's not fine in a writing forum.

In my books, anyway.

Edit: Typo.

 

[Prudence]

it's prudent

 

[Elijah Brockway]

cut the bullshit prudii

 

[Cainhurst Crow]

All this talk of player initiated content and players regulating the flow of the plot and how rules are interpreted, really reminds me of star wars chaos. But I digress, and honestly, that has little to do with the actual words being spoken so much as the context they are being used in.

You asked about the state of the rp? Well, don't know what to tell you honestly. Nobody has a direction in this rp, except the sith, whose direction is wanton destruction without an endgoal. Nobody does anything else because its literally pointless to do anything else. On the sith side, it's because anyone who doesn't tow the line can expect to be challenged to a duel to the death, or otherwise summary executed. On the jedi and pubs side, it's because any plot that gets created with the involvement of the sith end up becoming "Sith get a super weapon and win a bunch" via the skype chats and planning, regardless if the proposed plot even initially called for a super weapon in the first place. And any plan that doens't involve the sith doesn't get attention because NPC's, who would be the main opposition in a thread without sith, cannot be used to harm PC's at all, not even grazes or obstructions.

Literally pointless to do anything that doesn't involve just doing the same invasion/repelling threads with both usual opposing player side, because no matter the story told, it is instantly negated by the fact that "NPC's can never harm or inconvenience PC's in any circumstance", which is an unofficial rule adhered to on this site by all of its writers.

Don't even get me started on the Indies. Almost a year now and they still need a ridiculous amount of hoops to jump through, and for what reasons? Because the main factions have fleets they never use, and territory borders that mean fuck all because anyone can just hop onto any planet they want without any sort of repercussions. But Indies don't have that so they need to make, what was it last time, 4 Open threads or 8 Ask threads just to have a planet, and then 4 more opens or 8 more ask threads to secure a square? Wowie, it's a wonder more people don't do stuff with indies.

"Oh but you can do stuff that doesn't require squares", to which I say, "Like what?" Because frankly it seems like squares are the only thing that matter this timeline rp. Fleets don't matter, nobody uses them. Borders don't matter so any border organization or defense force is useless due to the fact that you can't prevent an enemy faction from setting foot on a world, period, they gotta get boots on the ground before they can get pushed back. Mercenary groups are already covered because of the sacred band, and bounty hunters as a faction collapsed due to no real ability to make threads. Be it a Smuggler organization, Humanitarian relief worker, Force Sensitive faction, or Assassin order, the fact is, in order to actually impact things in this story, you need to claim territory. Literally nothing else will get noticed.

The temple of Tython and Moraband were destroyed, two major blows that didn't invovle territory conquest, and the effect it had on the story was marginal to nonexistent. Because players needed to make the consequneces, and most players didn't give a shit cause it wasn't territory.

You know...im gonna be completely honest here. If this timeline were to end, or if some madman were to make a cosseted effort to massacre all of the jedi and all of the sith, and bring this timeline to a forced close...I'd be completely fine with that.

 

[Green Ranger]

So, a couple of suggestions. I wanted to do something more thorough, but that asshole Elijah beat me to most of the key points, so here's a few stubs on some problem areas relating to some specific problems that have been touched on by other members in this thread:

• PvP disagreements and discussions need some sort of process of resolution if we are going to keep the Manaan style timeframes. If members are expected to post within 48 hours, then OOC disagreements and discussions need to be similarly brief. Like...90% of discussions probably turn unpleasant because noone's telling them 'okay, stop talking, it's time to actually resolve this'. I'd recommend that whenever a report is filed, both parties get one OOC post after the report is filed to plead their case, and then it's ruled upon (unless an admin asks for more information).

• • To go with the above point, I think the staff should be handling reports more readily. I don't know if it's an intentional thing or not right now, but there is a cultural belief that you shouldn't report stuff unless you're absolutely deadlocked - and even then, report at your own peril. TBH, this is a bullshit attitude. IMHO, this causes OOC discussions to drag out unnecessarily, and creates more arguments than it's worth. Admins also handle a lot less than they used to, so I think it's reasonable for them to focus on handling reports more frequently, because they don't hold the reins of the story anymore. They also have mods now, so the burden's even less so, so...yeah, I think dispelling or changing the mentality and getting people to use the report system more, coupled with the above suggestion of a stricter process of discussion, will probably help a lot with the vitriolic attitudes and unpleasant discussions that have been mentioned a lot. Basically just the process of conflict resolution needs to be stricter and more efficient, and I think that'll go a long way towards fixing the issues. After all, if members aren't allowed to constantly and endlessly bicker, then problem solved, right?

• The Force needs to be buffed and conflicts needs to be resolved in a different way. See: FAIL score proposal. Not to toot my own horn but....well, toot. I'm not gonna bother rehashing that discussion.

• Tech and the moderating that goes on there needs to be looked at, too. If you look at the sample submissions in the first post of this thread, most tech's beginning to resemble the 'what not to do' example more than the 'what to do' example. Another key quote to keep in mind is this:

"Blasters burn" and "bullets puncture" are really all you need to know about guns. Heavy blasters are designed to punch through armor, regular blasters are better for light infantry. There, there's your gun.\

...Which, I think many of you will agree, isn't really how things are being done - either in the tech submissions, or the rulings on tech. So if that's no longer the status quo for tech submissions, then the tech rules need to be changed - and if it is how things are supposed to be done, then the moderation of tech, both submissions and in practical use in combat, needs to re-adjust to fit the standards better. Either way, there's a disconnect in what is being said and what is being made with tech that desperately needs to be fixed.​

 

[Raydo]

Hey all,

So @Green Ranger asked for expansion on the "PvP is good/bad" issue, so I figure maybe I can oblige? There's no doubt that PvP is a contentious topic on the site. Look at this thread and you'd be an idiot not to see it (sorry if someone didn't notice). And unfortunately enough (can't believe I'm saying this, what's wrong with me?) I agree with a lot of what @Elijah Brockway said.

The issue with PvP doesn't lie with the rules laid out for PvP it's with people's view of it. If you've been around this site for any time at all, you'll know that I like PvP and am a supporter of it overall, but even I have times when I get burned out on the arguments associated with it because it is often accompanied by rampant OOC bickering, often about petty things. So I think we have to ask what the root of that is? Well, I don't think we can blame the system for that because just as I've had horrid OOC fights, I've had extremely pleasant fights as well. If it's the system, then you wouldn't have it producing both good and bad. That means that it must be the people involved that are causing the issue.

So, then, what is the root attitude behind these divisive actions? I would contend that (there may be other reasons as well) there are two major attitudes that are the issue in PvP: 1) People cannot/will not/do not separate OOC from IC and 2) People become WAY too attached to characters that they are putting into combat.

Now I am expecting point number 2 to get some extremely resentful comments, so before you start angrily slapping your keyboards and raging about how stupid I am, hear me out.

*Insert unpopular opinion puffin* Remember guys and gals, at the end of the day these are fake characters on a Star Wars fanfiction site. The world is not going to come to an end if one of them dies. People become so overly attached to their characters they are unable to realize that it is possible to write a new character with entirely new story opportunities. And I say this as someone who is quite attached to some of the characters that I have made.

Now, obviously we don't want to recycle characters at every turn or churn out characters whose stories we have absolutely no investment or interest in, but if you have some favorite character that you absolutely can't live without, then you probably shouldn't put them in combat. I'm not saying just fill your character slots with what people would term "PvP characters" but I've seen the archive request thread be used often enough for non-death related archives to know that you don't really care that deeply about every character you make. I'm not telling you to throw your characters away, but remember that even your and my favorite characters aren't real people and life will go on. People get so absorbed with not letting a character die that they will do nearly anything (including bashing OOC on their opponent) in order to resist.

That attitude OOC also kind of leads me to my other point: separating OOC and IC. I think some of this may have been slightly improved with the crossover in main factions, but the writers of the other faction aren't actually your enemy. Again, FANFICTION website. You don't have to be enemies with the people you fight, even if you're trying to outwit them. For instance, I think that every person that either has killed or really tried (and nearly succeeded) to kill my characters on this site has been a friend of mine OOC. And we're still friends. At the end of the day, if you lose a character, yeah, it's a bummer, but there are always new stories to write.

Ok, unpopular opinion over, sorry, no TL;DR

While I agree with the message, I also see how this is a hard pill to swallow for someone who maybe a bit less experienced as their characters are much more likely to meet an untimely end than someone who has a lot of experience (I.E. You). Character death is still rare, but I think it's worth acknowledging that it can be intimidating and not just tell newer folks to just suck it up.

Secondly, we have been known to take things bit too far when members have a character who dies. I will use @Deviant as an example here. He was a good sport when his character died and people made jokes about it for a long time. As a community, we can't say "Don't take it personally" and then OOC ridicule (even if it is done in fun) when someone does have a character who dies. This only builds anxiety for the members involved and serves to scare those off who are considering giving it a try. I think this type of attitude also helps build up the perception that character death is more normal than it is.

Anyone who knows me knows that I love to joke around, but I think we do ourselves a disservice when we let such things go on. I don't mean to complain on Deviant's behalf, just shamelessly using him as an example.

 

[Deviant]

wot

 

[Elijah Brockway]

we're just mentioning how hot we all thought Eryn was

 

[Minuteman75]

My chief concern is that when this timeline ends at some-point is whether or not it will end in an high note. Because there was a lack of an conclusion in the last timeline after what seem to be a buildup for an epic finale but then noting came of it.

It's one thing to accept that your character can die during PvP conflict, yet to contribute time and effort to the storyline but only have an anticlimactic end can leave a writer quite discouraged from RPing further. I want to believe such an occurrence won't happen again, but still is a concern that keeps lingering in the back of my mind.

 

[Shalken]

I don't normally chime in on these conversations, and I don't know how much of an impact it's going to make in the long run, but I just feel like getting my initial thoughts about the current PvP system down. Sorry if this is a bit of a ramble, I can't guarantee I'll have solutions to any of this stuff either.


As PvP currently stands, it functions very similarly to popular competitive games like League or DOTA or Overwatch. And like these games, you're going to have skill brackets or "tiers", where some people are not so great with little experience (like myself), and then others that have tons of experience and are very, very good at it. As it stands, in my eyes at least, this skill gap is so massive that you have a select group of people that are "god tier", and basically win every single fight that they enter. In fact, I know that entire MFBs are planned around these people and assume that they will win automatically - which they inevitably do - in order to win the MFB as a whole. This, to me, is an incredibly unfair system. The fact that a select group of members, which almost always tend to align themselves on the same side, can practically dictate a faction's victory based on what side they join, is insanely unfair. Now, I'm not trying to be rude here, and I personally harbour no ill will towards these people - I'm just calling it as I see it. Like I said, I don't have any kind of solution to this problem, but I thought it just needed to be laid out.

The other point I'd like to make is somewhat related. As PvP currently stands, almost all of the skills and abilities of the characters themselves are completely handwaved, and instead it boils down to the imagination of the writer contestants themselves. (I think this is one of the things that a lot of people have sort of been lumping in when they talk about "story" in PvP, but from what I've read it hasn't been expressly mentioned.) I'm not necessarily saying that it'a a bad system or that it doesn't work, or even that it needs to be changed necessarily. I'd just like to mention that in a real-world scenario, when people fight each other, a lot of the time the fight's victor is determined by actual personal skills, experience, and human error. For example, realistically a lieutenant in the GAR who has been serving for five years or so should not be able to defeat a Sith Lord in a sword fight who has been training since a child. A lot of people also mention things such as physical attributes, mental prowess, Force aptitude, lightsaber proficiency and form - but in a lot of PvPs I see, most of this information is blown aside and ignored. Also, we're humans. People make mistakes, and our characters would too. In the rush of a fight, nobody is going to realistically land all of their hits perfectly right, every single time. However, this is a highly competitive field, and perhaps "levelling the playing field" is for the best, and all that extra character development is best left for tPvP and other threads. Food for thought.


Ramble over, that's all I've got for now.

 

[Nor'baal]

Again, this is individual preference.

I like to balance my threads, one doing what I want, followed by one helping another character.

Working together is possible, and I dont agree with the idea that non-pvp characters cannot influence the story.

My hutt influences it, by hiring people to kill/wound/burn others for him.

Also, as has just occured to me....just because X Faction won Y Planet, doesn't mean a group of indies cannot rp there, or take Y Planet back and make it indie again.


Oh, and this timeline isn't ending until a gold plated hutt statue is on ziost and chandrila.

 

[Nova Elgrin]

Hey all first off thx @Green Ranger for opening this thread :) I think having a general dicussion about how everyone feels about the site is a good thing :)

There isn't aaaaall that much to complain for me (except for the one thing that will follow xD) But we should also mention the good stuff so: when I first came here I was super scared of being sent straight back to German boards as I was concerned Non-Native speakers would not be welcome. However I found myself welcomed in the most kind and warm manner which I'm very grateful for and I want to thank the ones that have to deal with my grammatical/spelling mistakes but never complained <3

The one thing that really seems to cause a lot of trouble is PvP. I have read enough OOC threads and seen enough characters die to stay miles amd miiiiiiles away from it (except for one or two threads with people I trust). All of what I'm concerend about has been perfectly stated by @Calixis and @Outlander in this thread.

But even though I haven't been around the timeline before, I can still see and understand the problem of the PvP community when they state the last timeline lacked momentum or that the predetermined battles didn't offer as much action/tension. I can understand they don't want to lose the momentum PvP currently provides.

I don't know if there could be some healthy middle-ground?

Hey all,
1) People cannot/will not/do not separate OOC from IC and 2) People become WAY too attached to characters that they are putting into combat.

1. well I think it becomes quite hard to separate OOC from IC when you are not just dueling ICly but also OOCly. It's about writing the other person into a corner and outsmarting them, therefor it's not just between the characters but also the writers. As this makes it a mix of IC and OOC by nature it's hardly suprising people quarrel with each other.

2. Naw I'm not gonna get angry, I'm just curious who are you to tell players they are WAY too attached? Yes some people (myself included) don't want to lose their characters because a sandwich gets thrown into their face or because someone decides the sun was standing in a specific angle so XY will get blinded in the very second a blow is thrown at them... ;) Does this make me a second-class writer in your eyes? That my characters mean something to me and I'm not willing to dagger them on the altar of PvP ^^°? I know you don't mean it in a rude way and if you have no problem replacing your characters by just another then I congratulate you, however please don't belittle the ones that are not like this :)

 

[The Living Daylights]

@Nova Elgrin - Is the sun thing legit? Because that's pretty pathetic, lol.

 

[Nova Elgrin]

@The Living Daylights
Someone mentioned it to me mooooonths and moooonths ago however said person never specified if it was legit or not :) I just repeated it but I wasn't serious about it, I was making a point by exaggerating what can happen XD However the sandwich thing is legit, even though I'm not sure if the character died because of excately that xD (the character still died within the same thread though)

 

[The Living Daylights]

@Nova Elgrin - Throwing a sandwich isn't necessarily that stupid. Sure, the item is dumb, but that could just be out of desperation, when a character would throw anything.

The sun thing is plain stupid, though. Trying to write in sudden environmental advantages that (I assume) had no forewarning in the thread whatsoever? That's extremely low. You might as well just write "I win".

 

[Vinn Esper]

Canon wise, you got the Jedi wrong and most people who play the Jedi, are playing them as pascifistic when the Jedi during this time were just as savage and warlike as the sith. Just saying. You asked.

 

[Nova Elgrin]

It wasn't the opponent who threw it, it was during a Sith duel and the sandwich came from the grand stand as far as I'm aware of ^^

However I didn't mention it to critizise it but to further bring my point across as how I don't want my characters to die in a way like that xD

 

[Nova Elgrin]

Canon wise, you got the Jedi wrong and most people who play the Jedi, are playing them as pascifistic when the Jedi during this time were just as savage and warlike as the sith. Just saying. You asked.

This is way I left the faction tbh. I was playing more like a warrior kind of Jedi and I saw no possibilty of how I could stay IC logical wise.

 

[The Living Daylights]

It wasn't the opponent who threw it, it was during a Sith duel and the sandwich came from the grand stand as far as I'm aware of ^^

However I didn't mention it to critizise it but to further bring my point across as how I don't want my characters to die in a way like that xD

I know. I'm just surprised that some people would resort to such blatantly obvious PIS (plot-induced-stupidity) to win.

Personally, I think this only goes to reinforce my prior point. If you plan the fight well, you won't need stupid things like the sun blinding your opponent at a critical moment in order to win. Or to escape.

 

[soed]

I think the core issue with PvP as threads play out, is that it is often not "What would my character do?" but rather "How do I win?". Personally outwit the other writer, rather than having your character outwit theirs.

As @Berlioz said on the first page: It just isn't fun for the other person. Then @Nova Elgrin touches on the character attachment thing, which I think is a related topic. Sure, it could be more in character for your guy to go for a kill, but are you really such an asshole that you would do it if the other part asked you not to? Again not caring about the fun of the other player.

This is sort of handled with "PvP WILL OFTEN result in character death, so don't partake if you can't handle losing your character" but that splits the community in two, rather than unifies it, and even then splits the groups into smaller groups.

Don't even get me started in Sith and Jedi, the most powerful people in the galaxy, some of whom are hundreds if not thousands of years old, wielding blaster rifles, commando-armour and chucking grenades left and right like fucking G.I. Joes.

I mean it is clearly a result of the tech/force debacle, which is in turn clearly a result of people caring more about winning in PvP than making interesting, collaborative and fun experience for both/all parties - which it seems is what everything circles back to.