Ok, so I read the "article" that Dana wrote. Have to say, I am really surprised how much the standards for MMORPG have dropped since I was staff here.

When staff wrote articles, opinions, reviews, etc., we had to be DAMN sure we covered all points of area in which we were writing about.  I remembered when I was writing the Star Wars review for the NGE, Dana kept on telling me "remember, don't be overly harsh, make sure you put in some good points too."

Looks like Dana has flushed these ideas down the toilet. Frankly, I am shocked that Admin even let that article surfaced. Did Craig even looked at the article?

I am not a roleplayer but, damn, after reading that article I know Dana hates them. Good for Dana, but he needs to keep his little prejudices to himself and not use his title to push his trollish agendas. The article really needs to be taken off the website as it reflects mmorpg.com.

If you guys don't know what Im talking about, its the first article on the home page.

come on, mmorpg.com, put some hair on your chest and take care of this article. You all know damn well if this came from a regular member, it would have never been published.

/rant off

PS: ironic thing is I bet this thread will be closed instead ;)

There were alot of roleplayers during the first few months of Everquest.  It attracted hardcore RPG types and the cutting edge tech was really immersive.

But the game had so much downtime it wasn't long before conversations drifted into the real world and players became increasingly focused on loot and "DPS".  All the number-crunching, cutesy MMO slang, deriviative character naming and obsessive farming started there. 

I just want to group with people who are focused on the game.  It doesn't matter to me if they're roleplaying or all about the numbers as long as they're giving 100% to their combat role in the group.

He makes a few valid points, but the rest shows that he hasen't grasped what is going on in a RP server beyond the discussions in chats. And one shouldn't write about what he doesn't completely understand.

I read that article too and was a little perplexed by it.  Funny, I thought about starting a thread on it as well, but figured I might be mildly flamed for not posting my comments on the article page.  But since you did it, I'll leave a comment.

I think he makes a blanket statement about RPers that is untrue.  I know I prefer the RP servers mostly to just get away from the immature gamers.  And I don't think I have ever come across others who play on them just to harrass the RPers.  But that's just me.  Maybe others have.

Anyway, I can handle all the threads on politics and religion, but when you start ripping on RPers, you have crossed the line.

Edit: Is Dana a guy or a girl?  I usually think of Dana as a female name, but I know there are some guys named Dana too.  Sorry if I got your gender wrong, Dana.

I read the article and it didn't seem like he was ripping on Rpr's i RP myself and honestly i have seen a lot of the bad things he has mentioned.

As it stands now on the server i play on in WoW, a week ago i watched in a chat channel as RPer's ripped each other to shreds on RPing, whats supposedly okay blah blah blah instead of just fostering good fun RP.

It was pathetic, in all the years i have been playing MMO's i have seen these types of things happen, i have caught the cybering people, i have seen people talk in old english, i have seen the vampire cat girls, just about everything.

I have seen people come to the server just to crap on RPer's, and people that move to these RP servers for raiding and they pretty much disrespect Rper's every chance they get.

I have watched the clicks form, shutting out new RPer's from participating, i have watched people leave the server because RP is clickish anymore and unless you fall into whatever pattern your not gonna break thru those walls.

RPer's are Rper's worst enemies, even with those that would troll RP servers, they are just a minority, because the RPer's stab each other in the backs enough for everyone.

Sadly i have seen more of this crap then Good Rpers, i wish there were more, its why i stopped Rping, it isn't worth the constant crap.

Yeah there are good people out there, just hard to find them.  I have been on many different RP servers its the same everywhere, log in, turn on the chat, RPer's arguing about unwritten Rp rules meh....his article was correct on a lot of things, i think people just don't wanna see it.

I don't know a lot about rpg's haven't played a lot of them, but I have a rant to share if you guys don't mind listening. I play dream of mirror online and the foums on the aeria site are going down these days. I believe its because of the headstrong GS's there. They are new and have gotten on this power trip thing and follow people around ranting about this and that little stuff that should never be second looked. I had one following me around for a good 2 weeks. I used to see fresh and new posts everyday now everyone is so afraid to post that they newest three threads we have are dieing. If this continues the threads will die.

I like to play the game, but i also like to communicate on the forums too and I just don't see how anyone would want to make people afraid to post. It just ruins chances for others to want to post...

so on that note:

GET OFF YOUR TRIP AND LEAVE US ALONE!

RAVEN

I agree, it's an absolute terrible article with pretty much no redeeming factor about it.

What's the point? There's absolutely nothing constructive about it; and if its meant to be deconstructive, it fails at that too with all of the blanket statements and absolutely nothing in the way of case studies or other specifics.

Case in point the notion of "unenforceable rulesets". I began joining RP servers simply to get away from terrible names, and the stricter enforcement on names has always worked well. Even Sanya admits that roleplaying server rulesets succeed at this at least. Sure, I've had people in my guilds on RP servers test the naming policies, but they all ended up as stories of "they finally made me change my name". DAoC's Percival and WoW's Argent Dawn come to mind.

Has this guy even PLAYED on a roleplaying server? Even the unofficial ones; City of Heroes' Virtue and it's Pocket D, Age of Conan's Wiccanna and its guild gatherings (at least in the beginning); even freakin' again, World of Warcraft's Argent Dawn and it's Goldshire.

Even now in WAR and Phoenix Throne I see roleplay. I just turned down an invitation to an all Dark Elf guild that was centered solely around roleplay.

People on roleplay servers roleplay; there's no myth about it. The guilds drive it. Probably on any "Guild List" sticky on an RP server you're going to see a freaking rating each guild gives about how heavy or not they are into roleplaying. Most clearly spell out the type of roleplay they do in their charter and include roleplay events on their event calendar.  

The article is absolutely terrible. I'd like to have at least seen specific examples so we'd have CASES of where a roleplaying community had failed in an MMO. Then there'd at least be a POINT and not such a blanket accusation where we all could go on forever citing counterpoints.

Looks to me Dana was just writing to be 20 feet infront of Sanya's coat tail and missed the point entirely of what she'd actually write about. Her article was pretty good; discussed how roleplaying servers could be MORE than a ruleset and involve actual mechanics to help facilitate roleplay. His was just blind bashing, and I'm glad I read it AFTER Sanya's, because it would've been quite disappointing thinking she'd spew such vitriol or justify what he wrote.

I'd love for the article to be quickly archived or removed outright. Better yet, I'd love for Dana to actually defend it by, you know,

Granted this was just a subjective opinion piece, its' still important to identify the rationale behind saying what's being said. I'm highly disappointed he at least didn't cite a personal experience, roleplaying servers he'd played on, or at least the name of any MMO at all.

It was an EVE advert.

It appears mmorpg.com removed the article.  Good :)

Originally posted by Enigma

It appears mmorpg.com removed the article.  Good :)

Actually, they only removed it from the "current" articles.  It is still on the site under "More Features."

Quite frankly, I'm surprised anyone cares enough about the topic to make a fuss about it.

I still see it the news section, and i hope it stays.

As I mentioned in my reply to the original article I think Dana made some valid points, but then he just kept going and going and going and eventually what would have been a good article that might get people to discussing the topic he was writing about turned into nothing less than a huge rant about roleplayers in general.    I do not care if it is opinion piece or not because if anyone of us had written anything remotely like that and posted it on the pub forum it would be removed and we'd no doubt be banned for a week for trolling.    I know because I have had it happen to me on this very website.    Then to top it off Dana himself replies to all the negative responses and says something along the lines, yeah I went a little over board and yeah I did it to incite discussion.     Dana knew what he was doing and I bet he really didn't mean for it to come across so harshly, but clearly, to write something that might disenfranchise a large portion of the people that visit and read articles on this website is not a good thing.

Dana just needs to re-evaluate his writing before posting it in the future. 

On a side note:

He is right though on a couple of points.   Some games are better suited and are more conducive to actual roleplaying simple because the games design and mechanics, of how its played,  just makes people roleplay - whether they intended to or not.    Two games I know that do this - EvE and Planetside.     If you've ever played either of these two games you'll know what I am referring to.

Now in games like Dark Age of Camelot and Vanguard I came across many people who RP'ed on the RP servers for those games.    Some were actually quite good and some that I knew never ever got out of character while playing - if they did, they would always include the acronym OOC (out of character) before typing or saying anything.   Those players were rare, but they do exist and I have played with some.

I don't know.

The article covered some really valid issues such as a true rp server being rather hard to moderate.

Thing is for the most part it isn't that hard. The playerbase generally does a good job at out doing the once in a great while trolls.

Aside from that as a former rper who has lead many a rp guilds I have never had issues I would not have in a standard server.

As a matter of fact I personally prefer my memories of rp server guilds over the the standards.

That person really did make it sound like rp'ers need and want those things (The bullet points), in reality most rp'ers are happy just to have storyline mixed with their grinding, to give a greater purpose over "kill 50 ratlords".

Then again rp'ers as we all know are a more secular group so it's no wonder people like him/her don't understand. Not to mention the vocal minority elitist rp'ers who happen to believe their way is the only way (we have all been there).

All in all a good article, non offensive and for the most part it is true. Rp servers are a real pain for CSR's . It's a fact that more tickets are filed in daoc rp servers than on any other, so aside from any other data atleast I know that much is true*

*rl friend csr for that one.