Direction Roleplay Is Dead

[MonMarty]

I'm feeling very Essay-y today, so I decided to write a Thesis on the following concept:

"Direction Roleplay is dead. Narrative Roleplay is the way forward"​

Direction Role play is a standard which I myself have preached for a long time in the past. The basic premise of the idea is that players can be divided into different categories, those of the Directors, who drive role play with their story lines, the actors, who play roles in the Director's stories, and the spectators, people who simply watch from the back lines and don't necessarily take a pro-active role. The whole theory goes off the assumption that while Directors should be conscientious about their affairs, the actors should always submit themselves to the Director's story lines and plot drivings, regardless of whether they agree, because they simply wouldn't provide any role play for themselves or others around them otherwise. This is a dated concept that has proven time and time again to be false.

Those that support the notion of Direction Role play often argue that because they are able to provide story lines that entertain the majority, that they should be able to overrule the minority that disagrees with the direction of the role play for the sake of the merit they show in their ability to create role play. This is incredibly selfish, morally wrong and dated for the following reason:

"In role play, every player considered themselves the hero or mastermind of the story, and everyone else is a background character. Even our romance role play or family plots are just background events for our primary hero or mastermind characters."​

Here's a great example of how this can often be applied to Role play Families. Role play families are create by individuals, lets take @BillyTheScroofy as an example with the Coen Family. Billy was the original Coen, recruiting other players to take up the roles of siblings, cousins, children, parents etc. The point is, in the end of the day, to Billy, William Coen is still the center of his story. His now ex-wife Jehenna Coen, his mistress Ania Santorski, the house guard Veridan Daevaar, are all individually just supporting roles to the life story of William Coen. Inversely for the player of Jehenna Coen, William Coen is a supporting character that provides marital drama, as is Ania Santorski, the husband stealer, or the children Rodderick and Rosalina that just add to the dramatic backstory of Jehenna now-not-coen. Even to Veridan Daevaar, the entire Coen family is a supporting role to his backstory, which is more enticed around the idea of Veridan's romances and combat prowess. The Coen family, which considers him their loyalist, is just a means to an end to Veridan's backstory, something to give him a job, but the Coens are not substantial to Veridan's existence. Even the dog! Even William Coen's dog just sees William Coen as a feeder, hypothetically speaking if the dog was actually played at all.

"Every character around us is a supporting role, regardless of how much we like or love them Out of Character."

This is not inherently a bad thing. Rather, it's an important first step to making the right step in the right direction with regards to how to create conscientious role play, which I refer to as: Cooperative Narrative. We'll get back to Cooperative Narrative when it becomes applicable, but first I will dissect why Direction Role play is so backwards.

The essential problem with Direction Role play is that when Directors get frustrated, the communication very quickly resolves down to "You should just subject yourself to my story, because you won't create role play for yourself or anyone else around you anyway". Direction role play in this situation, would be Billy for example deciding that William Coen is suddenly no longer interested in maintaining the marriage with Jehenna Coen, and just dumping her both IC and OOC by saying "Well, I run this family and I provide most of the role play now, so this is how it's going to go, and you should just react to this situation". Direction role play permits those with little regard for the feel-good role play of others dictate the progression of role play by abusing the hypothetical merit they have from being the sole creators of role play.

I learned this lesson during the Freya Lo occupation with my actions against the Kronau Rebellion. From day one, the Kronau Rebellion had a lot of "cow dung" to deal with. They were repeatedly faced with the concept of "loss" and "failure", in their lacking food supplies, in their military losses against the Marked Werewolves, in the Freya Lo's sieges of their castle, and in the internal structure of the castle itself. The players would frequently complain of "We feel like its's a one way show, everything moves into a constant one direction flow where we constantly lose, and it's not fun." My initial response was always "Suck it up, this is part of the progression and you don't have the right to criticize my events because you're not hosting any yourself."

I would come to realize the folly of this situation when the Kronau leadership turned this rhetoric on the people within their fort itself, and I was a spectator to the situation. At one point a siege occurred, and the leaders "condemned" all the members down into the cistern, sort of like an underground sewer area. They then locked the way back up, and provided no further role play down there. The basic premise was that the members weren't behaving like this was an actual siege, disobeying orders of those who ran the castle, and just generally mucking about complaining how there was no role play, and then being barked at that they had no right to complain because they weren't providing any themselves.

And it made me think back of the Rothburg hunting trail implementation, the fun I had with Muffins_ and AntonVoron back then. The idea of the Rothburg Hunting Trail (which is still up by the way near the Rothburg Palace!) was to create a role play scenario where rolls and a narrative created by the path provided a scene that used all members instead as a supporting role. There was a very slight nuanced difference between a normal hunting track and this track, in who was hosting it. Normally if I wanted to host a hunting track, I would go to the wilderness and by my own initiation basically dictate the events. I would treat my own character as the main story character, and all other characters that joined me as supporting roles. How this differs with the Rothburg Hunting Trial, is that the hunting trail does not assign any main character to the experience.

Rather, the trail sees itself in some abstract way as the leading character, and treats all players who part-take in it, as supporting characters. This means that all characters on the trail react to the non-existent direction of the narrative, the trail, as opposed to direction of one individual player who dictates the events. Direction Role play (the individual) Was replaced with Cooperative Narrative (The abstract nobody) to create an experience in which everyone could fulfill their own role. Because when you remove the individual leader from the equation and put every character on the same height in terms of relevance to the events, you allow them to create a "main character" or "hero" or "mastermind" out of their own character, without impeding on others. You essentially allow players to feel good about their character, and the interactions they have with others, without pulling constraints on them with your own feel goods about your character which you arbitrarily would assign to yourself just on the merit of being a Director in the situation.

This all sounds a bit abstract, so lets draw another example: In one situation, PonyoWantHam had an idea for Cecile Ravenstad's character to get hurt and develop some emotional bond with her father, Percy Ravenstad played by Muffins_. The premise of the situation was Ponyo (The Director), creating a scenario where some chemicals blew up on her hands and hurt her. The idea here was that Ponyo wanted to steer the situation in some direction, without necessarily Muffins_'s input. This is where this form of Direction roleplay went wrong, because Ponyo (The Director) didn't take into account how Muffins_ (The Actor) actually saw himself as the Director in this situation. When Muffins_'s Directing intent clashed with how Ponyo had planned out the roleplay scene to occur, OOC friction formed. Here is how this could have gone otherwise, and the situation is really benign and simple: Hunting Trail (the abstract nobody) enforces an area for players to roll to get spiders in their hair. In this case, the Trail forced myself and Muffins_ to react to something that the abstract nobody was doing, but because it came from a nobody, it did not raise myself or muffins onto a higher position of direction, unlike Ponyo had done in their situation. Rather, in the eyes of the abstract nobody, we were both equal, and instead of one of us being the person who directed, and the other the person who reacted, we were both reactors. This left us in equal value, and especially that concept of leaving characters in equal value, is very important in the concept of Cooperative Narrative. So in short:

"Cooperative Narrative is ensuring that no players have an unequal advantage over others by being the Drivers or Directors of a Roleplay scene, rather attributing the role of Directing to a Narrative (non-person) between all players, ensuring that all actors are now equal before the eyes of the situation, and can therefor fulfill the role in the way they want to, instead of playing a pre-scripted role assigned to them by the Director."
​

Here's an example of how Cooperative Narrative is currently being used in the Coen Family: Despite the fact that Billy is the leader of the family, we collectively decided on a new story arch that generates friction in the family. A new character, Osric the bully, was invented to drive a Narrative of conflict in the Coen Family. Osric's presence was suddenly a shock to the otherwise cooperative family existence, a character that split the family down the middle with switching loyalties and fear and intimidation. The important part here is that it wasn't me or Billy coming into the family and saying "this family is now subjected to Osric". Rather, we created a scenario "Guys, Osric is coming and he's really mean to everyone, and stuff is going to get worse, but it's going to get better after that!". The Narrative here is that we're providing a situation of conflict, with the promise of a happy ending. Rather than saying "here is Osric, he is now oppressing you, now react to MonMarty as Osric", we're saying "here is a situation where the balance of power in the Coen family is upset and fluid, and it will eventually get better, but you should make use of this scenario to play out your character in ways you were not able before." It is not the character Osric that is a Director, rather, the situation in shifting family politics as a whole is allowing the members to take a different approach to the evolving situation.

"Doesn't this effectively mean Roleplay becomes scripted and non fluid?"​

Essentially. Yes. But I'm going to argue that this is not a bad thing on the premise of the Cooperative Narrative part, not just the Narrative part. It's important to always create a narrative that everyone can agree with, as opposed to one that is simply just dictated. Take the hunting trail for example. The Narrative here is that you're going on a hunting trail. This trail promises potential wounds, it promises potential embarrassment and failure, but it also promises success and an eventual good conclusion. It does not say "you're going to catch a squirrel, and break a hand". Rather it says "there is a chance for a hunting animal to be caught, and for you to suffer a wound, but where and how you get these is pretty much entirely up to you, the narrative is only providing you with the opportunities without you having to dictate or force them in an unfair way". You don't dictate what is going to happen, you just dictate the opportunities that are going to happen, just like there is an opportunity for Osric to reconcile with his family, but it is not assured, nor is a specific date set. A lot of people often have a really allergic reaction to the concept of scripted Role play, but this is often unnecessary. You cannot view Organic and Scripted role play as black and white, there are many shades in between, and hitting the right shade is important, because it allows you to achieve so much more and create much stronger OOC friendships by sacrificing some organic-ness for the sake of kindness and cooperation.

"The whole beauty of Cooperative Narrative is that you're able to respect each other's characters, respect each other's private space and dictation of their character's own future within reason, and respect each other not to hold yourself over others."

"But Marty! Crime Roleplay!"​

Yes, there is one linchpin in this entire concept: Crime Role play. Your immediate reaction must be "you cannot drive Cooperative Narrative with Crime role play (or Combat Role play), because the entire premise of Crime role play is that one party wins and the other loses. I would argue the opposite, In fact, I would argue that Cooperative Narrative is the salvation of Crime Roleplay. Crime Roleplay is marred by OOC disputes, players spiting each other, rule violations and other nastiness. The largest majority of Staff punishments in the roleplay community fall in the sewer or crime community, and this is not just a coincidence. The entire premise of Crime Roleplay, more so than say, Romance Roleplay, is the win-rp concept of it. Win-rp in the belief that we want our characters to succeed in the designs they were intended in. This doesn't necessarily always mean winning in the most concrete form, for example I could make a character which is designed to lose combat RP, and I would become frustrated because my CRP partner refuses to let me lose in combat, thus ruining my character design. Win-rp in this case, is having my character succeed in areas where they were designed to succeed. In Crime Roleplay, everyone is basically the Director and wants everyone else to be the Actor or Reactor, and it causes a lot of conflict, because they designed a character which is supposedly a skilled criminal mastermind, yet he is being defeated by another skilled criminal mastermind.

Crime Roleplay specifically can be saved by Cooperative Narrative by allowing groups that inherently fight each other or oppose one another create a platform for cooperation. Here's some examples of a cooperative narrative:

• Create an imaginary NPC gang that oppresses 2 player gangs, and that these two player gangs now have to cooperate to beat.
• Create an imaginary NPC threat like the Azure Order kidnapping members of the gangs, and create a D&D style corridor in a house rental region with localized dice rolls to see if a rescue attempt will succeed or not.
• Create an imaginary disease that strikes groups of people and forces gangs to cooperate.
• Create a rewarding theft/investigation narrative that results in both the theft of the item, but also the apprehension of some NPC criminals that impart actual losses on the gang, so that both the crime ring and justice ring feel accomplished.

These are just a few smaller examples of a much wider range of things you can conclude upon when you communicate and cooperate. Simply abducting a noble girl and then screaming "lol Government r corruupt. React to this abduction!" is not rewarding role play for anyone. You are falsely taking the position of the Director in a one-way street of win-rp where you glorify your own character and treat everyone else including the abductee as your supporting role. Rather, create a narrative of a character close to you being abducted by an abstract non-person, and allow an actual story arch to develop between yourself and others, where you are just as much an actor or reactor as they are.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

I had a lot of fun writing this, and I hope someone else finds it useful to help steer their role play, or even make amends with groups they have offended/ostracized in the past to create fun narrative cooperative role play. Remember that the entire essence of role play is cooperation, we are all heroes, masterminds and main characters in our own stories, and so we must all respect each other's place in our own way. To win-rp is to directly contradict the necessity of cooperative narrative, and Direction Role play is just an egotistical band aid that pretends to solve the problem, but rather just forces one through without the moral consent. ​

 

[Dardy]

oh

 

[FireFan96]

Making me look back at the hunting grounds, giving me the feels...;-;

 

[SouthernComfort_]

I'm feeling very Essay-y today, so I decided to write a Thesis on the following concept:

"Direction Roleplay is dead. Narrative Roleplay is the way forward"​

Direction Role play is a standard which I myself have preached for a long time in the past. The basic premise of the idea is that players can be divided into different categories, those of the Directors, who drive role play with their story lines, the actors, who play roles in the Director's stories, and the spectators, people who simply watch from the back lines and don't necessarily take a pro-active role. The whole theory goes off the assumption that while Directors should be conscientious about their affairs, the actors should always submit themselves to the Director's story lines and plot drivings, regardless of whether they agree, because they simply wouldn't provide any role play for themselves or others around them otherwise. This is a dated concept that has proven time and time again to be false.

Those that support the notion of Direction Role play often argue that because they are able to provide story lines that entertain the majority, that they should be able to overrule the minority that disagrees with the direction of the role play for the sake of the merit they show in their ability to create role play. This is incredibly selfish, morally wrong and dated for the following reason:

"In role play, every player considered themselves the hero or mastermind of the story, and everyone else is a background character. Even our romance role play or family plots are just background events for our primary hero or mastermind characters."​

Here's a great example of how this can often be applied to Role play Families. Role play families are create by individuals, lets take @BillyTheScroofy as an example with the Coen Family. Billy was the original Coen, recruiting other players to take up the roles of siblings, cousins, children, parents etc. The point is, in the end of the day, to Billy, William Coen is still the center of his story. His now ex-wife Jehenna Coen, his mistress Ania Santorski, the house guard Veridan Daevaar, are all individually just supporting roles to the life story of William Coen. Inversely for the player of Jehenna Coen, William Coen is a supporting character that provides marital drama, as is Ania Santorski, the husband stealer, or the children Rodderick and Rosalina that just add to the dramatic backstory of Jehenna now-not-coen. Even to Veridan Daevaar, the entire Coen family is a supporting role to his backstory, which is more enticed around the idea of Veridan's romances and combat prowess. The Coen family, which considers him their loyalist, is just a means to an end to Veridan's backstory, something to give him a job, but the Coens are not substantial to Veridan's existence. Even the dog! Even William Coen's dog just sees William Coen as a feeder, hypothetically speaking if the dog was actually played at all.

"Every character around us is a supporting role, regardless of how much we like or love them Out of Character."

This is not inherently a bad thing. Rather, it's an important first step to making the right step in the right direction with regards to how to create conscientious role play, which I refer to as: Cooperative Narrative. We'll get back to Cooperative Narrative when it becomes applicable, but first I will dissect why Direction Role play is so backwards.

The essential problem with Direction Role play is that when Directors get frustrated, the communication very quickly resolves down to "You should just subject yourself to my story, because you won't create role play for yourself or anyone else around you anyway". Direction role play in this situation, would be Billy for example deciding that William Coen is suddenly no longer interested in maintaining the marriage with Jehenna Coen, and just dumping her both IC and OOC by saying "Well, I run this family and I provide most of the role play now, so this is how it's going to go, and you should just react to this situation". Direction role play permits those with little regard for the feel-good role play of others dictate the progression of role play by abusing the hypothetical merit they have from being the sole creators of role play.

I learned this lesson during the Freya Lo occupation with my actions against the Kronau Rebellion. From day one, the Kronau Rebellion had a lot of "cow dung" to deal with. They were repeatedly faced with the concept of "loss" and "failure", in their lacking food supplies, in their military losses against the Marked Werewolves, in the Freya Lo's sieges of their castle, and in the internal structure of the castle itself. The players would frequently complain of "We feel like its's a one way show, everything moves into a constant one direction flow where we constantly lose, and it's not fun." My initial response was always "Suck it up, this is part of the progression and you don't have the right to criticize my events because you're not hosting any yourself."

I would come to realize the folly of this situation when the Kronau leadership turned this rhetoric on the people within their fort itself, and I was a spectator to the situation. At one point a siege occurred, and the leaders "condemned" all the members down into the cistern, sort of like an underground sewer area. They then locked the way back up, and provided no further role play down there. The basic premise was that the members weren't behaving like this was an actual siege, disobeying orders of those who ran the castle, and just generally mucking about complaining how there was no role play, and then being barked at that they had no right to complain because they weren't providing any themselves.

And it made me think back of the Rothburg hunting trail implementation, the fun I had with Muffins_ and AntonVoron back then. The idea of the Rothburg Hunting Trail (which is still up by the way near the Rothburg Palace!) was to create a role play scenario where rolls and a narrative created by the path provided a scene that used all members instead as a supporting role. There was a very slight nuanced difference between a normal hunting track and this track, in who was hosting it. Normally if I wanted to host a hunting track, I would go to the wilderness and by my own initiation basically dictate the events. I would treat my own character as the main story character, and all other characters that joined me as supporting roles. How this differs with the Rothburg Hunting Trial, is that the hunting trail does not assign any main character to the experience.

Rather, the trail sees itself in some abstract way as the leading character, and treats all players who part-take in it, as supporting characters. This means that all characters on the trail react to the non-existent direction of the narrative, the trail, as opposed to direction of one individual player who dictates the events. Direction Role play (the individual) Was replaced with Cooperative Narrative (The abstract nobody) to create an experience in which everyone could fulfill their own role. Because when you remove the individual leader from the equation and put every character on the same height in terms of relevance to the events, you allow them to create a "main character" or "hero" or "mastermind" out of their own character, without impeding on others. You essentially allow players to feel good about their character, and the interactions they have with others, without pulling constraints on them with your own feel goods about your character which you arbitrarily would assign to yourself just on the merit of being a Director in the situation.

This all sounds a bit abstract, so lets draw another example: In one situation, PonyoWantHam had an idea for Cecile Ravenstad's character to get hurt and develop some emotional bond with her father, Percy Ravenstad played by Muffins_. The premise of the situation was Ponyo (The Director), creating a scenario where some chemicals blew up on her hands and hurt her. The idea here was that Ponyo wanted to steer the situation in some direction, without necessarily Muffins_'s input. This is where this form of Direction roleplay went wrong, because Ponyo (The Director) didn't take into account how Muffins_ (The Actor) actually saw himself as the Director in this situation. When Muffins_'s Directing intent clashed with how Ponyo had planned out the roleplay scene to occur, OOC friction formed. Here is how this could have gone otherwise, and the situation is really benign and simple: Hunting Trail (the abstract nobody) enforces an area for players to roll to get spiders in their hair. In this case, the Trail forced myself and Muffins_ to react to something that the abstract nobody was doing, but because it came from a nobody, it did not raise myself or muffins onto a higher position of direction, unlike Ponyo had done in their situation. Rather, in the eyes of the abstract nobody, we were both equal, and instead of one of us being the person who directed, and the other the person who reacted, we were both reactors. This left us in equal value, and especially that concept of leaving characters in equal value, is very important in the concept of Cooperative Narrative. So in short:

"Cooperative Narrative is ensuring that no players have an unequal advantage over others by being the Drivers or Directors of a Roleplay scene, rather attributing the role of Directing to a Narrative (non-person) between all players, ensuring that all actors are now equal before the eyes of the situation, and can therefor fulfill the role in the way they want to, instead of playing a pre-scripted role assigned to them by the Director."
​

Here's an example of how Cooperative Narrative is currently being used in the Coen Family: Despite the fact that Billy is the leader of the family, we collectively decided on a new story arch that generates friction in the family. A new character, Osric the bully, was invented to drive a Narrative of conflict in the Coen Family. Osric's presence was suddenly a shock to the otherwise cooperative family existence, a character that split the family down the middle with switching loyalties and fear and intimidation. The important part here is that it wasn't me or Billy coming into the family and saying "this family is now subjected to Osric". Rather, we created a scenario "Guys, Osric is coming and he's really mean to everyone, and stuff is going to get worse, but it's going to get better after that!". The Narrative here is that we're providing a situation of conflict, with the promise of a happy ending. Rather than saying "here is Osric, he is now oppressing you, now react to MonMarty as Osric", we're saying "here is a situation where the balance of power in the Coen family is upset and fluid, and it will eventually get better, but you should make use of this scenario to play out your character in ways you were not able before." It is not the character Osric that is a Director, rather, the situation in shifting family politics as a whole is allowing the members to take a different approach to the evolving situation.

"Doesn't this effectively mean Roleplay becomes scripted and non fluid?"​

Essentially. Yes. But I'm going to argue that this is not a bad thing on the premise of the Cooperative Narrative part, not just the Narrative part. It's important to always create a narrative that everyone can agree with, as opposed to one that is simply just dictated. Take the hunting trail for example. The Narrative here is that you're going on a hunting trail. This trail promises potential wounds, it promises potential embarrassment and failure, but it also promises success and an eventual good conclusion. It does not say "you're going to catch a squirrel, and break a hand". Rather it says "there is a chance for a hunting animal to be caught, and for you to suffer a wound, but where and how you get these is pretty much entirely up to you, the narrative is only providing you with the opportunities without you having to dictate or force them in an unfair way". You don't dictate what is going to happen, you just dictate the opportunities that are going to happen, just like there is an opportunity for Osric to reconcile with his family, but it is not assured, nor is a specific date set. A lot of people often have a really allergic reaction to the concept of scripted Role play, but this is often unnecessary. You cannot view Organic and Scripted role play as black and white, there are many shades in between, and hitting the right shade is important, because it allows you to achieve so much more and create much stronger OOC friendships by sacrificing some organic-ness for the sake of kindness and cooperation.

"The whole beauty of Cooperative Narrative is that you're able to respect each other's characters, respect each other's private space and dictation of their character's own future within reason, and respect each other not to hold yourself over others."

"But Marty! Crime Roleplay!"​

Yes, there is one linchpin in this entire concept: Crime Role play. Your immediate reaction must be "you cannot drive Cooperative Narrative with Crime role play (or Combat Role play), because the entire premise of Crime role play is that one party wins and the other loses. I would argue the opposite, In fact, I would argue that Cooperative Narrative is the salvation of Crime Roleplay. Crime Roleplay is marred by OOC disputes, players spiting each other, rule violations and other nastiness. The largest majority of Staff punishments in the roleplay community fall in the sewer or crime community, and this is not just a coincidence. The entire premise of Crime Roleplay, more so than say, Romance Roleplay, is the win-rp concept of it. Win-rp in the belief that we want our characters to succeed in the designs they were intended in. This doesn't necessarily always mean winning in the most concrete form, for example I could make a character which is designed to lose combat RP, and I would become frustrated because my CRP partner refuses to let me lose in combat, thus ruining my character design. Win-rp in this case, is having my character succeed in areas where they were designed to succeed. In Crime Roleplay, everyone is basically the Director and wants everyone else to be the Actor or Reactor, and it causes a lot of conflict, because they designed a character which is supposedly a skilled criminal mastermind, yet he is being defeated by another skilled criminal mastermind.

Crime Roleplay specifically can be saved by Cooperative Narrative by allowing groups that inherently fight each other or oppose one another create a platform for cooperation. Here's some examples of a cooperative narrative:

• Create an imaginary NPC gang that oppresses 2 player gangs, and that these two player gangs now have to cooperate to beat.
• Create an imaginary NPC threat like the Azure Order kidnapping members of the gangs, and create a D&D style corridor in a house rental region with localized dice rolls to see if a rescue attempt will succeed or not.
• Create an imaginary disease that strikes groups of people and forces gangs to cooperate.
• Create a rewarding theft/investigation narrative that results in both the theft of the item, but also the apprehension of some NPC criminals that impart actual losses on the gang, so that both the crime ring and justice ring feel accomplished.

These are just a few smaller examples of a much wider range of things you can conclude upon when you communicate and cooperate. Simply abducting a noble girl and then screaming "lol Government r corruupt. React to this abduction!" is not rewarding role play for anyone. You are falsely taking the position of the Director in a one-way street of win-rp where you glorify your own character and treat everyone else including the abductee as your supporting role. Rather, create a narrative of a character close to you being abducted by an abstract non-person, and allow an actual story arch to develop between yourself and others, where you are just as much an actor or reactor as they are.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

I had a lot of fun writing this, and I hope someone else finds it useful to help steer their role play, or even make amends with groups they have offended/ostracized in the past to create fun narrative cooperative role play. Remember that the entire essence of role play is cooperation, we are all heroes, masterminds and main characters in our own stories, and so we must all respect each other's place in our own way. To win-rp is to directly contradict the necessity of cooperative narrative, and Direction Role play is just an egotistical band aid that pretends to solve the problem, but rather just forces one through without the moral consent. ​

Click to shrink...

You're amazing Marty

 

[Kaezir]

Overall the concept is more positive. Even with your antagonists, you should be collaborating with each other to drive your story forward. It is a group effort, no matter how you approach it.

 

[GoodDreamer]

Now this is story progression, have a song as a reward!

I think I'm cute <3

 

[Tibertastic]

I was in the hunting trial too ! ! !

 

[Phon_Senajan]

What about the noble RP? Would there be any change to that or would it remain competitive and stuff with friends and enemies?
@MonMarty

 

[CainsTedTalk]

Create an imaginary NPC threat like the Azure Order kidnapping members of the gangs, and create a D&D style corridor in a house rental region with localized dice rolls to see if a rescue attempt will succeed or not.

Click to shrink...

I was under the impression we couldn't roleplay out npc organizations?

Edit: I got this thinking, and could it be possible for criminals to play off a heist like this?

 

[DrFong]

Do you remember on the show "The Office" when it shows Michael Scott's improv class? Every scene in the class he pulls a gun and forces everyone into his scene rather than participating in the scene others are trying to create. Something to think about.

 

[YouDontKnowJack]

Do you remember on the show "The Office" when it shows Michael Scott's improv class? Every scene in the class he pulls a gun and forces everyone into his scene rather than participating in the scene others are trying to create. Something to think about.

Click to shrink...

oml yes

 

[MonMarty]

I was under the impression we couldn't roleplay out npc organizations?

Edit: I got this thinking, and could it be possible for criminals to play off a heist like this?

Click to shrink...

It's a bit more complicated than a blanket "No you cannot roleplay out NPC organizations". Lore basically assists to help you engage in more plot lines or to form them, but you have to be careful that you don't mis-use the lore. As such we generally say you shouldn't, but between the lines you could if certain criteria are met.

The reason why we don't generally permit players to sock puppet government organizations is because they might mis-portray them. Many players don't understand or read into the smaller nuances of these NPC groups to understand what they would do, and wouldn't do, and many people then try to use events against the government, say for example they make a character whose parents was violently beaten and killed on the street by guard brutality and it drove them to vampirism, so now they spend their lives hunting guards men.

This didn't happen, and it's also a prime example of Direction Roleplay where you force the PC guards to react to a situation that you made up by NPC guards, which is basically an unfair position.

You can, within reason, puppet NPC organizations in ways as long as:

• It stays accurate to the lore (maybe ask a lore staff member to provide input to ensure lore compliance)
• It stays within your Cooperative Narrative and does not bleed out to other roleplay (for example you decide to be abducted by an NPC guard, it would be "bleeding out" if you start using this event you made in your rhetoric against say for example William Coen the High Constable by criticizing him for the abduction of your character by an NPC guard that supposedly is his subordinate).
• Nothing overtly ridiculous happens.

I think it's important in such cases for the players to remain communicative with the lore staff to ensure compliance, but as long as you keep your narrative roleplay within a closed circuit of just the people participating, it shouldn't be able to harm anyone.

What about the noble RP? Would there be any change to that or would it remain competitive and stuff with friends and enemies?
@MonMarty

Click to shrink...

It's a bit more complex with nobility, because nobility essentially sign up to the concept of the political struggles. When a noble family either registers or gets canonized, they already consent to the constant battery and plotting that exists among the nobility. When you sign into this system, you agree to levy that right over to the abstract nobody that is the noble programme. Everyone in the noble system has equal chances at growing to be competent, it's just that because some players are more politically competent or dedicated than others, some might face repeated failure in their plans.

 

[Arganam]

I agree, I think moving away from direction rp would be great, I think I have forced things a bit in faction rp too, now that I read this, anyway, another great thread marty!

 

[FeyWitches]

Docked sitting there being useless fretting because he has to write a thesis... Sees this and it's a thesis... Looks at it and has perfect build, it has facts, it's perfect... And I think, "Well crap just in time, I need to look over good thesis papers so I can properly write my own... Convenient!"

On a serious note this is agreeable. My thing is, specifically for players that aren't as involved (Or rather are unable to, for varying reasons. Like say someone had constructed something, than someone wants to join but that completely throws off their picture, hence forth being rude on an IC scale to dismiss the character, leaving the player confused... I'm not a primary subject but I can't say I haven't seen in happen once or twice. I simply don't engage enough to be put in this position.) as most. For players who simply are unable to find a window for say, "Participating in the hunting trail." or are unable to participate in, "Saving Herp from the Derplings." because they simply can't get in that situation because people already constructed firm relationships, where they are comfortable rping with each other. Plus certain characters can't fit... Sure I made a noble character in the Kade family! Holt sh** big deal, best day of my life! But there's still a matter of involvement because your character just came out of "The Creation Womb" (rather vulgar but can't find another way of saying it.), so they can't just immediately hop in and help with the, "Rabid Klien Invasion Issue", or something political, because for one you can't really interject straight away, and it's near impossible to interject because you can't walk into a situation "hey what's going on?" and expect to be taken seriously, you'll be entitled that guy who knows nothing and joined a little too late. Yeah! Eventually you will! But that takes close relationships, and it's hard to make relationships and climbing a. "Social Ladder", (I hate those by the way and they're everywhere, I'm not saying they are avoidable, we all deal with them, massive falls subject but can't encourage players to dismiss human nature...) which is really hard to climb. What every player goes through the steps of the social steps, Fletchling, Aware, Compliant, Known, Liked, Loved, Respected, Famous, and High Noble. These are custom and these are often ranks of the social ladder I see.

You see that I went severely of topic and the fact that there's a social ladder has nothing to do with rp... But it does in reality. I'm not saying a huge issue, but it's still hard for a player to rise to the occasion, because they simply don't have that popularity to have the certain respects and requisites to participate in, "Saving Squire Ryan". It's cool and all you have wrote about how roleplay can work for groups and people that know each other and want to become the head master, and it's awesome how you suggested a way for groups to be in harmony and all be on an equal play field... But I'm mainly for those singular people who find it hard to participate in groups because they simply don't have enough experience with people, and if you're lucky someone will work with you to get that publicity you need to help save Squire Ryan.

I can be completely wrong and I'm rambling for nothing! And I'm just insecure and have the luck of interjecting when it's the worst time! But I like to be open and say, "Good job, nice writing, I love the thought you put into these, and it helps." and it does! It helps a lot for future reference if I'm able to remotely get close to a rather close relationship with a group. Just a few thoughts...

 

[Valentinian]

I agree with you in regards to most points, but I personally disagree with the manner in which you define the 'cooperative narrative'. In particular, I will respond to your second and fifth sections of writing as it is what I take contention with. Before doing so, I'd like to make a few general points.

Roleplay, wherever you go to do it, is always something that'll necessitate cooperation between a number of parties, the likes of which often dislike eachother for one reason or another. While I believe that kindness and sacrifice are necessary for the success of any system, I do not think that we should forgo any degree of dynamic roleplay in lieu of the aforementioned qualities. These qualities are something that should be fostered through the community, something I personally consider relatively developed from my experience thus far. This sort of situation would typically not work, but with the great deal of centralization - whether that be through the regulatory system upon nobility, government positions, or the rest - this has been easily accomplished. A theme of the server is a lack of roleplay moderation by the staff, meaning that most interactions are done on the basis of respect for the individual you're dealing with. This essentially accomplishes the cooperation that is required for roleplay without sacrificing the dynamic nature that everyone knows and loves.

I find that the concept of predetermination behind a character's story to be at odds with the manner in which 'collaborative storytelling' generally works. I, however, am not saying that you shouldn't have goals for your character, because that tends to lead to gimmick characters who are cycled out once the gimmick gets old, which is equally bad for the experience of others. Instead of saying, "My character will be a successful swordsman. He will become a noble. He will become the head of the military, etcetera,", you should instead try to set up a personality with accompanying principles, and once those are set to allow the character to react to roleplay and proceed accordingly.

With that said, I'll go into a few specifics.

"Direction role play in this situation, would be Billy for example deciding that William Coen is suddenly no longer interested in maintaining the marriage with Jehenna Coen, and just dumping her both IC and OOC by saying "Well, I run this family and I provide most of the role play now, so this is how it's going to go, and you should just react to this situation"."

By preventing William Coen, in this situation, from taking the initiative and divorcing his wife, you remove an entire aspect from the relationship with Jehenna. Mystery, one of the most powerful elements of a cooperative storytelling experience, disappears. According to the manner in which you defined this system, in order for Jehenna to do something that would drive William to divorce her, they would have to discuss it prior OOCly to make sure they're both okay with the development. Likewise, for William to take the next step, if the previous action was approved among them, and divorce her, he would have to consult her because it could have consequences on her character. This adds a great deal of unnecessary out of character consultation, something that could easily be avoided as long as they both are respectful individuals.

"It's important to always create a narrative that everyone can agree with, as opposed to one that is simply just dictated."

This is where I mostly take issue with your post. When you get everyone together to agree with something, the possibility for conflict begins to dwindle. There should never be 100% security in what you are doing, or the assurance of a particular outcome. It is quite clear, from my experience at least, that people are more active when conflict is present and less active when it is not. Politics and the strife between nobility, as an example, is a good case of what I'm talking about. Everyone has the potential to contribute to developing the political climate and is able to, should they put in the work and planning, to climb just like everyone else. But the fun is that this is treacherous and uncertain, undetermined between the player in question and those organizing the centralized roleplay (Marty, nobility managers, etc). The possibility for conflict and surprise is what makes for exciting roleplay.

In conclusion, while direction roleplay is certainly not flawless, I believe that its merit is in its dynamic nature. That said, I think it's important for people to have respect for other members of the community because we're all here to have fun at the end of the day. Only through this respect can we achieve an interesting narrative that everyone can look back on and appreciate. There are no winners and losers in this system and all can enjoy.

Addendum:
I wholeheartedly agree with you on the nature of criminal roleplay. That certainly is not something about winning or losing, but rather something where they can go and develop. This is the reason why I personally avoid killing anyone unless it's absolutely necessary for catharsis after a long feud or something of that sort. Communication in this regard is key. I only wanted to make this distinction because, as you said, this isn't a black and white issue and that we ought to find a shade between.