I think there are two major points that have to be addressed.  One, if a game isn't fun for every type of player, whether they be PVP, PVE or RP oriented, then it will go under and be non-existant within the first year.  That's the one major flaw of an MMORPG, to survive and be playable for however long you as a player want to play it, other players have to enjoy it as well.

That of course leads to the next point, the fact that you can't sacrifice other parts of a game to make another part of it "ultra-viable".  Fact of the matter is a game like World of Warcraft is just too watered down and attractive to the 13 year old, or the old married couple, its way too family friendly and easy - to have an established role playing community. 

So it's not necessarily the game play that has to be different, but the demographic that's attracted to said game.  For instance, EQ2 has a small but more serious role playing community than World of Warcraft.  Suppose you're role playing in a public place and a non role player rolls by in EQ2 9 times out of 10 they will ignore it or take part into it on the rare occasions they feel antsy.  In WoW if this happens we all know that 9 out of 10 players will make a ridiculous comment and troll you.

I think a developer can however, choose to make tweaks to certain expendable parts of a game that will contour to the playstyle of a role player.  One way is to make the way a player can play their character customizable.  Factions for one is a popular way to embed conflict into the mechanics of the game, which most games do.  However what a lot of these same games don't do is allow you to change between them.  For instance a Tauren can't decide to go to Alliance, which takes a whole slew of RP opprotunities out of the game.  But a Ogre can sure as heck put his allegiance with the queen in EQ2 and there's an opening for all sorts of interactions, back story modifications, etc.  Fact of the matter is the more customizable the entire experience you have during the span of the game you're playing the heavier a role player can weave himself into that world, with the inhabitants around him.  For instance the two top role playing experiences I've ever had in a role playing game took place in two games.  Shadowbane (god rest its soul) and Star Wars Galaxies before SOE decided to burn it to the ground with inadequacies and matches.   The reason is because within those world there were so many different things (a majority of which were player controlled) going on, that I could find a reason to role play almost constantly.  Within SWG I could sit for hours in the cantina on Tattooine and role play, then head out to a player made city and start an argument.  Start war with a guild and have gang wars that didn't require combat but vicious rhetoric.  Within Shadowbane, the free reign PVP system, and the ability create and siege entire player cities made the conflicts unlimited.  Factions were created by the players, not the developers, and that in itself made the possiblities for role play nearly unlimited. Sure the RP'ers have all but disappeared in those two games, but for a time they were popular enough to the non-RP'ers as well, that they survived for a time.  Both still alive today, even if they are in a decrepit state, suffering from virtual Alzheimer's as it forgets about its old players, and eventually its players forget about it.

I have always thought that a players ability to customize their looks to a major extent was an under-rated feature.  One of those issues that seems to be at the bottom of a developers list.  And admittedly it should be, but who says you can't show it the proper amount of time once you get to it on that list?

The point I'm trying to make is sure, it's the developers job to make their game accessible to all types of players.  And yes, many of the games out now seem to have forgotten the role players out there, instead focusing their game play on the PVE with a side of PVP.  But it's up to you as a role player to find a way to role play in the world they create, the developers can only make that harder or easier, they can never make it impossible.  Unfortunately, the longevity of a role playing demographic within a game is usually much shorter lived than a PVP or PVE community within the same game. 

But that said there are a few things I think should be required in MMORPG's for our (the rp'ers) sake...

-Either very dynamic player visual customization(Elder Scrolls), or a large number of race and class options (EQ2)

-Surnames, how hard is it to give me the option to have a last name? Yeesh.

-Either give us factions, or the freedom to create our own, its hard to role play without enemies, and even harder to role play when you can't fight said enemies.  I was forced to yell at my enemies in EQ2, this problem could have been remedied by giving guilds the ability to declare war on each other.  Granted this problem only applied to the religious zealots setting out to cleanse the queens population of the mud blooded :) rawr

-Don't get lazy on the visuals, and I dont mean on the graphic quallity of the game.  I mean why does 90 percent of my leather look the same with a slightly different shade of green or brown?  Give every armor a different look, ever sword a different bend in the blade or art on the hilt.

-Add places in a game that are clearly there for the role player.  Taverns that aren't filled with quest givers but with usable tables and chairs, music and even musical events.

-If you have a RP server, set asside a few GM's that are there souly to stop non-RP or at least RP trolls from participating in the servers ongoings.

Note that I agree, that post is too long.

Originally posted by Echelons

-If you have a RP server, set asside a few GM's that are there souly to stop non-RP or at least RP trolls from participating in the servers ongoings.

Note that I agree, that post is too long.

 

Even inside CoH (which is a pretty small game world to be honest), even with 1GM per zone, you are looking at 15 or so GM's just for roleplaying "quality"... even then they could still miss the local chat just due to being out of range for it. And if they could read all the chat in a zone, then they are superhuman (especially if a zone gets hugely busy very fast)... maybe even not human.

Granted in a fantasy setting it is indeed a bit easier to work out when somebody is "out of character" but in a present day setting, it gets much much harder.

Also roleplaying concepts which fit the game world perfectly (say being a con artist like "Cut Me Throat Dibbler" from Discworld) COULD be very hard to portray with GM's (and infact the GM might end up missing the point)....

Of course a way around this is to get your character "sanctioned" by the GM team, so they know what you are playing. BUT that is extremely time consuming. Idealy you would need 1GM per player (and the Gm would need to know the background to the character etc) to make sure that they are staying "in character".

For me, "Unofficial" RP servers is better than "Official" RP servers (at least for present day/sci fi settings).

But having said all of that, a good roleplayer makes do with the tools that they have been presented with and runs with it, and who also helps out new people.

*note* as soon as a MMORPG allows me to play an acrobat with all the nuances of being an acrobat (ie improved balance/ flips, twirls and cartwheels that you can think of) then i will be impressed with it. Unlikely though to happen...

I think that part of the limitation with implementing most of the previous (ie lots of character "look" creations) is the amount of bandwidth that the game can take uploading and downloading data as you leave/enter new zones.

*sigh* who even needs anything beyond words to roleplay anyway? Having done a couple of systems that relied on just 1d6 and a lot of talking skills its impressive that roleplayers are wanting to be "limited" by other systems to make it more real for them (granted it could also be highly UNreal for another die hard roleplayer)

Above is all my own opinion YMMV

Well, I had typed out a nice, long thought out post, but Internet Explorer sucks, so it's gone.

So here's the condensed version:

Anything you can come up with to give people opportunities to role play will make a game more appealing to role players.

Making players' actions matter to the storyline is a great idea for making the game more role player friendly.

The more role play matters, the more people will do it.

Originally posted by Lilalu

No the problem is, that nowadays the percentage of RPers is much smaller than those of non-Rpers. So if you try to regulate a server very strictly, but soon have about 80% Non-Rpers and only 20% Rpers (which would be much more than in an average MMO) on it, your system won´t work. Those 20% Rpers can report as much as possible, it won´t bother the 80% Non-Rpers.

I know, because we tried once in an RP-project to have an RP only server. For about three days  the atmosphere was great. But then we simply were outnumbered by non-Rpers.

The only way to have an RP-only game is to make the game unattractive for non-Rpers. As an Rper you still can have fun in such a game, because if there are no quests, Rpers invent their own stories. Non-Rpers won´t have fun that way.

I am playing on an NWN2-RP-Server. We have a lot of fun there. There are some quests, but content is nothing at all in comparison to a big MMO. Nevertheless we have much more fun, than I ever had in any MMO - because of the people, the stories, the interactions. There is some fighting and PvP too. But it is a rare thing to happen. And we also have a jail, so it´s usually no fun to kill someone :D

 

Well, I'm a die hard RPing fan and I wouldn't come within 100 ft of a RPing game without adventuring. A lot of people like to think of RP as acting. Well, we have all different sorts of movies. I am the type that is drawn to movies with adventure, heroism, combat, and science fiction stuff. It's not that I don't watch the other movies, because I do, I just would never want to act in a movie that isn't revolving around a conflict or adventure.

So yes, you make the game uninteresting to non-rpers, but you also make it uninteresting to a lot of RPers too. I am willing to bet that it would be uninteresting to the majority of RPers actually. Look at Second Life or the SIMS as your proof. Those are games where you can recreate your life and the games aren't based around combat. Those games didn't turn out to be anymore RPing friendly than the combat oriented games. In fact, the RPers chose to play WoW and other major MMORPGs.

No, I take Neverwinter Nights 2 RP-Servers as an example. Neither Second Life nor the Sims have anything only near a backround story and a game world, which makes sense.

There are many adventures going on, on our NWN2 Server. It´s just that they are not implemented into the game by constantly repeating game mechanics and don´t involve slaying hundreds of monsters all the time. Adventures are invented by the players themselfs. They sometimes involve slaying a monster, but also many other activities, which can become very funny and exciting.  E.g. auctions (not like in the WoW-auction houses, but really role-played ones), a trial against a murderer, hunting a thief ...

I also do want adventures. Even fighting is o.k. with me (as long as it makes sense in a role-played story). But I say, there should be no adventures, without the players own activities. Don´t just give them "quests", which are reapeted by tousands of players (and enjoyed much by the non-rpers), but give them the tools and freedom to change the world by their own imagination.

No imagination, no partizipation, no fun.

Most Rpers I have met, have a lot of imagination and love to work in a team with the community. I would´nt worry for the game to be boring.

Originally posted by Master_Razor 

 

I love role playing, it's one of my favorite things to do whether it be in a game, a forum, or in a messenger. However, I would not like to play a game where the game mechanics effected role play. I wouldn't want a game where I was penalized for not role playing or given karma points (or exp) for role playing well. If you remove experience completely, you eliminate a major grind and therefore, you eliminate the majority of the non-role players. Also, without having an honor or pvp ranking system, the "pvp kiddies" are going to leave as well.

Well, yes and no.  I sat down last night and played EVE-Online for a couple of hours and it breaks your mold right away.  There is no experience, there are no levels, yet the entire game is virtually all PvP.  I came to the conclusion within a couple of hours that it wasn't a game I was interested in playing, period.

Originally posted by cmgangrel

 

Originally posted by Echelons

-If you have a RP server, set asside a few GM's that are there souly to stop non-RP or at least RP trolls from participating in the servers ongoings.

Note that I agree, that post is too long.

 

I will jump down to this point as the rest are pretty good. Depending on how large the game world is, you could end up with more GM's moderating purely for roleplaying "quality" than for helping resolve player issues/tickets.

 

Even inside CoH (which is a pretty small game world to be honest), even with 1GM per zone, you are looking at 15 or so GM's just for roleplaying "quality"... even then they could still miss the local chat just due to being out of range for it. And if they could read all the chat in a zone, then they are superhuman (especially if a zone gets hugely busy very fast)... maybe even not human.

Granted in a fantasy setting it is indeed a bit easier to work out when somebody is "out of character" but in a present day setting, it gets much much harder.

Also roleplaying concepts which fit the game world perfectly (say being a con artist like "Cut Me Throat Dibbler" from Discworld) COULD be very hard to portray with GM's (and infact the GM might end up missing the point)....

 

Most of the people I know come to RP servers not to RP, but because there is a more mature demographic playing there, so essentially they move there to get away from the proverbial noobs.  So if that's the general feeling behind RP servers my guess is that the problems a GM on such a server faces is a lot less intense than on a PVE or PVP server.

I know, there are many RPers, who want a lot of action-PvP and/ or masses of quests within an exciting linear story-line implemented into the game (like e.g. Lord of the Rings online) or experience points gained by fighting. I think, that´s o.k. I don´t like to discuss, which one is the better RP or such stupid things. In my opinion everything is o.k. as long as people have fun doing it. Playing games is our hobby and spare time. It should be fun!

I just don´t believe it will ever be possible to install real RP-servers in an average MMO. Who wants PvP and/or quests, and/or experience points will have to share the servers with non-rpers.

That´s because of democrafic reasons. Nowadays most people have a fast internet-access and millions want to play MMOs. It´s not just the "educational elite" (like e.g. students and IT-experts) any more, who has internet access. And most people in the world just are not interested in RP. The few RPers, who are playing are not of any interest to the big MMO-Companies. At least those companies won´t risk to annoy the big "normal" part of their players by banning them from an RP-Server, if they want to be there (for what reason ever). Rather they annoy the small part of RPers and hope they will stay anyway, because they also like the quests and the rest of the stuff.

But I think there are RPers like me to. For me an overall RP-atmosphere is much more important then pre-installed linear quests. In fact I think those are not very good for RP, because every player kills the same monster several times. This doesn´t make any sense in my eyes.

I would never play an average MMO. I miss all the things there, which are fun to me. Most of all I miss other people responding to RP (e.g. allow themselfs to be arrested) and the possibility to have real impact on the game world (e.g. become a city major and other players respect you for this. In a game with pre-installed quests, the world is static, no matter what the players do and how often the end boss has been killed before.

Those small part of players could be interesting for a small MMO developed by a small company (maybe like Adellion). I guess 50 000 players from all over the world are possible to get. Just look at the many many text based games still out there. I am sure mostly because their players are not interested in an average MMO. And there are MMOs out there and running with 50 000 or even less players. So it must be possible to run the game with such a player base. It´s just not a number in which the big companies are interested.

It would not be the grafically most advanced game with the most interesting fighting system. That´s financially not possible for a small MMO. But it would have an overall RP-atmosphere.

At this point I think Rpers would have to make their own choice. Either stay in the average game, where you get all the technically most advanced features, exciting fighting and everything. But you will have to share this game (and also the Rp-server - I am sure of that) with a majority of non-rpers. Or go to the RP-game, get a nice atmosphere, but not the standards of one of the big MMOs.

I am sure many Rpers will decide to stay with WOW or whatever game. But I also think, enough RPers would want to play the RP-game.

Originally posted by Lilalu

I know, there are many RPers, who want a lot of action-PvP and/ or masses of quests within an exciting linear story-line implemented into the game (like e.g. Lord of the Rings online) or experience points gained by fighting. I think, that´s o.k. I don´t like to discuss, which one is the better RP or such stupid things. In my opinion everything is o.k. as long as people have fun doing it. Playing games is our hobby and spare time. It should be fun!

I just don´t believe it will ever be possible to install real RP-servers in an average MMO. Who wants PvP and/or quests, and/or experience points will have to share the servers with non-rpers.

That´s because of democrafic reasons. Nowadays most people have a fast internet-access and millions want to play MMOs. It´s not just the "educational elite" (like e.g. students and IT-experts) any more, who has internet access. And most people in the world just are not interested in RP. The few RPers, who are playing are not of any interest to the big MMO-Companies. At least those companies won´t risk to annoy the big "normal" part of their players by banning them from an RP-Server, if they want to be there (for what reason ever). Rather they annoy the small part of RPers and hope they will stay anyway, because they also like the quests and the rest of the stuff.

But I think there are RPers like me to. For me an overall RP-atmosphere is much more important then pre-installed linear quests. In fact I think those are not very good for RP, because every player kills the same monster several times. This doesn´t make any sense in my eyes.

I would never play an average MMO. I miss all the things there, which are fun to me. Most of all I miss other people responding to RP (e.g. allow themselfs to be arrested) and the possibility to have real impact on the game world (e.g. become a city major and other players respect you for this. In a game with pre-installed quests, the world is static, no matter what the players do and how often the end boss has been killed before.

Those small part of players could be interesting for a small MMO developed by a small company (maybe like Adellion). I guess 50 000 players from all over the world are possible to get. Just look at the many many text based games still out there. I am sure mostly because their players are not interested in an average MMO. And there are MMOs out there and running with 50 000 or even less players. So it must be possible to run the game with such a player base. It´s just not a number in which the big companies are interested.

It would not be the grafically most advanced game with the most interesting fighting system. That´s financially not possible for a small MMO. But it would have an overall RP-atmosphere.

At this point I think Rpers would have to make their own choice. Either stay in the average game, where you get all the technically most advanced features, exciting fighting and everything. But you will have to share this game (and also the Rp-server - I am sure of that) with a majority of non-rpers. Or go to the RP-game, get a nice atmosphere, but not the standards of one of the big MMOs.

I am sure many Rpers will decide to stay with WOW or whatever game. But I also think, enough RPers would want to play the RP-game.

 

 

 

 

I don't want a linear quest line or a static atmosphere either. I want a MMORPG that is condusive to RP. A MMORPG like that must have no artificial barriers or rules to "keep people inline." That is why I am attracted to Darkfall so much. That is why a lot of RPers are attracted to Darkfall, actually. We want an environment where we can be whatever we want, whether that is a farmer, merchant, crafter, soldier, mercenary, tyrant, King or entertainer.

In a MMORPG with no boundaries, you are free to be whatever you want and can build a nation if you have the intelligence and leadership ability to do so. You could build a corporate empire or be a famous entertainer. However, with that ability also comes conflict, because one person may not want the same thing as another person. Resources are always limited, so you have nations fighting over those resources or making trade agreements. That's what happens in a MMORPG that caters to RPers. To me, that is real roleplaying. You have people playing roles in world where the sky is the limit. That's what Darkfall is to many of us Rpers. We cannot wait to build a government and society and keep it running through thick and thin. Through peace times and war times.

Quests in a game like that are player created...as they should be in all MMORPGs. When I spoke of adventure, I didn't mean doing these prebuilt quests that anyone and everyone will do. I mean creating my own content. For example, if I choose to be a free lance warrior type, I might slay the local goblin population that is making it hard for the player crafters to get their resources. I could do this for a fee, making me a mercenary or I could do it for free and become a hero. Players will talk about me if I did something like that for free for the people. I would gain a reputation for doing heroic and honorable deeds for the service of the player community and that would be my adventure, because I would do it not only in that one city, but I would also do it in all cities as I travel the world.

The point is that as a Rper, I want to do things I cannot do in real life. I do not want to live an alternate life that I can already live in real life now. In real life I have actually traveled the world, been in 1 war, experienced many cultures, sailed the high seas, and even became a martial artist. Why on Earth would I pay to play a game where I can only talk with other people in a graphical environment? No, I want to adventure in a game as well, just like I do in real life. I do not want to settle down in an in-game city and live a boring life. Oh, and I think perma-death is a necessity to maximize RP. Without perma-death, everyone would be an adventurer, because there will be no fear of dying. In a perma-death game, someone may never become good enough to slay the dragon that makes sense to be really hard to kill.

Sorry, but Darkfall will be a hardcore PvP game. I know some Rpers have hopes in this game. If you don´t mind sharing a server with a majority of people, who speak only in shooter-short talk and numbers, you will have fun there.

I admit the features of this game sounded attractive to me also at first glace. But the features are only a very small part of the fun. The most important factor for my decision is the community. And this will not consist of roleplayers. The majority just wants PvP and nothing else.

Have fun, if you like this. I will never play this game. I will stay with NWN2 until there is an MMO once, in which you don´t have to look for hours until you meet another roleplayer. If we never get this MMO, I will stay with NWN2. It´s the best alternative. And by far better than any MMO with roleplaying.

Originally posted by Lilalu

Sorry, but Darkfall will be a hardcore PvP game. I know some Rpers have hopes in this game. If you don´t mind sharing a server with a majority of people, who speak only in shooter-short talk and numbers, you will have fun there.

I admit the features of this game sounded attractive to me also at first glace. But the features are only a very small part of the fun. The most important factor for my decision is the community. And this will not consist of roleplayers. The majority just wants PvP and nothing else.

Have fun, if you like this. I will never play this game. I will stay with NWN2 until there is an MMO once, in which you don´t have to look for hours until you meet another roleplayer. If we never get this MMO, I will stay with NWN2. It´s the best alternative. And by far better than any MMO with roleplaying.

 

 

That is what I don't get with you. You are so concerned about what others are doing around you that it is affecting the enjoyment of your game. I agree that leet speak and short hand type is annoying and breaks RP. But most of that happens in General Chat, which can be turned off. Besides, someone in character will have General chat turned off anyways, since it is unrealistic to be able to hear conversations all over the world. You will only be able to hear conversations happening around you. If you concentrate on playing with like-minded people, the nonsense has a way of disappearing around you.

I've played MMORPGs for over 6 years now and I've went through many stages, especially after WoW was released. Before WoW, people were generally mature and RPing was easy as everyone liked to be in-character...so to speak. After WoW introduced MMORPGs to mainstream society, RPers and the mature players were kind of forced to exit out the back door or adapt. I fought tooth and nail for 2 years to create a mature environment to play in. I argued with the immature and disrespectful on general chat and tried to reason with others to be mature and considerate of others. I obviously lost that battle. I realized after those 2 yrs that the genre changed and there was nothing I could do about it. I realized that instead of trying to change other people, I should direct my efforts to pulling the RPing community together in a game and playing with them, while ignoring everyone else. You see, it is an attitude and state of mind you have to evolve to in order to enjoy MMORPGs the same way you did when RPing was a huge thing in MMORPGs.

I have evolved and watch people like you who are still going through that evolution process. Maybe you will never become tolerant and able to ignore, but if you do, you will see that there isn't much that a developer hasn't already done that can be done to increase others likely-hood to RP. All you can hope for is a game whose mechanics promote RP and that other RPers will hear your call to congregate with each other.

There is one thing that is constant. A mature intelligent person can always make an immature inconsiderate person feel stupid to the point where they shut up. If you want a mature environment, you and others have to fight for it or ignore the immature community. In Darkfall, it will be up to the mature people to secure a foot hold in the game and shut down any immaturity, which is possible contrary to your opinion of what Darkfall will be like. However, it is probably that the immature will find their place in every game, including Darkfall, but the key is finding like-minded people to play with. It doesn't matter what others are doing anyways. I think concentrating on what others are doing is childish, sort of like "well he is doing it, why can't we?" or "You think I am bad, look at what they are doing."

I noticed a few people in this thread talked about NwN. A fantastic, and very heavy RP world, that is currently using NwN is Layonara. Check it out, you will not be disappointed if you are indeed looking for a heavy RP world with a dedicated RP community and GM team. www.layonara.com

Great, can we have an RP game that isn't fantasy please?

In fact I do care for the other people on the server more than for game features. The other people are the reason to play an MMO. Otherwise a single-player would be much more fun. And I do care for the other people mostly because of roleplay reasons.

Maybeplayinf on a small RP-World  is not so much different, than what you do. You join an RP-guild and ignore the rest of the server-population. I join an small game with a small RP-server. We don´t have more (maybe even less) people than your guild.

But why should I want to play an MMO and pay for it, when I don´t want to play with most of the people anyway? And when most of the people only interrupt with the RP instead of joining in?

If you ever have played on an NWN hardcore RP-world and also in an RP-guild in an MMO with many     Non-RPers, you will know the difference. It´s gigantic!

You can do so many things, when all the people respond to your RP. Things that will never be possible in an MMO.  It starts with playing a town guard (and people allowing themselfs to be stoped and/or even arrested)  and does not end with becoming the respected major of a town.

NWN-world are small and don´t have so many players. But they are much more interactive. And people work together and not against each other.

Personally, I don't think Darkfall will really have all that many PvPers with no sense of vocabulary simply because the game will be out-shined by most of the bigger games like WAR, AoC, and of course people will still play WoW.

But that's besides the point. One thing I think a lot of RPers don't understand is that PvP is a huge part of RP in a RP game. In real life you could get into a fight with anyone you wanted, although it generally wouldn't be smart. Having FFA PvP is great for RP purposes. I heard someone say they played a guard and someone "let" themselves get caught. I'd much rather have a game where they got caught because the guard actually caught them.

I'm sick of guards that are so weak that a player can take 4 of them on and win without a sweat. If I designed a game with guards and someone started doing wrong, those guards would MESS. YOU. UP. Think about it, these guards are trained to beat the living crap out of people that are causing problems. Some hot shot mercenary isn't gonna just be able to come along and drop guards left and right. That's what happens in action movies, not real life.

Also, what's with these games where you can charge into this valley of fire and aggrivate 20 fire-breathing monsters and kill them all? I'd want a game where if you try to kill 6 bears you're gonna get torn to shreads. If the game had perma-death, this would make people extremely wary about charging into a cave full of gremlins or whatever.

If I designed an MMO...If you ran up and killed someone (another player) completely unprovoked and there was nothing lore-wise to support your action, you'd have guards on your ass. It wouldn't just be for a little while either, no hiding for x seconds to get them off your tail. These guards aren't complete idiots. Though there are other ways to try to get guards on your side, such as bribery.

I would absolutely love to see a game like this and I would be heavily motivated to RP in it.

Originally posted by Master_Razor

Personally, I don't think Darkfall will really have all that many PvPers with no sense of vocabulary simply because the game will be out-shined by most of the bigger games like WAR, AoC, and of course people will still play WoW.

But that's besides the point. One thing I think a lot of RPers don't understand is that PvP is a huge part of RP in a RP game. In real life you could get into a fight with anyone you wanted, although it generally wouldn't be smart. Having FFA PvP is great for RP purposes. I heard someone say they played a guard and someone "let" themselves get caught. I'd much rather have a game where they got caught because the guard actually caught them.

I'm sick of guards that are so weak that a player can take 4 of them on and win without a sweat. If I designed a game with guards and someone started doing wrong, those guards would MESS. YOU. UP. Think about it, these guards are trained to beat the living crap out of people that are causing problems. Some hot shot mercenary isn't gonna just be able to come along and drop guards left and right. That's what happens in action movies, not real life.

Also, what's with these games where you can charge into this valley of fire and aggrivate 20 fire-breathing monsters and kill them all? I'd want a game where if you try to kill 6 bears you're gonna get torn to shreads. If the game had perma-death, this would make people extremely wary about charging into a cave full of gremlins or whatever.

If I designed an MMO...If you ran up and killed someone (another player) completely unprovoked and there was nothing lore-wise to support your action, you'd have guards on your ass. It wouldn't just be for a little while either, no hiding for x seconds to get them off your tail. These guards aren't complete idiots. Though there are other ways to try to get guards on your side, such as bribery.

I would absolutely love to see a game like this and I would be heavily motivated to RP in it.

I agree. To add, I think that "allowing" yourself to get caught is a sign of artificial barriers in a game. RP is replicating real life or what a person might actually do in real life. No one, if they did something wrong, is going to let themselves get caught. They will run if they don't think they can win the fight or they will fight if they think they have a chance. A game with FFA PvP allows for these situations, whereas this NWN PW sounds like it has artificial barriers.

In fact I am playing on a server, which has PvP. But it´s a rare event. Not a constant fighting and do nothing else game. We also have perma death. If a character dies in a PvP situation (not in fighting artificial monsters), it´s dead. Game over!

I thinks, this is realistic :D. Everybody is careful and thinks twice, if a conflict should end in PvP.

But it´s only the characters having a conflict anyway. The players get along quite well with each other. We know each other (not in real life, but after many hours of playing quite well, I think). That´s why I would not kill another character in a PvP duell, if the player does not agree with this.

But I thinks this discussion does not lead to anything anyway. As I said, it´s just a matter of taste and nothing else. If you prefer to play a big MMO, play it. I prefer my small RP-world, because of it´s great atmosphere.

EDIT: And of course the characters will try to run away, but the players don´t misuse game mechanics, so their character can´t be caught. If the game mechanics don´t make arresting someone possible, the player allows his character to get caught . That´s when our DMs come in :D. But it´s rarly necessary. That´s what RP is all about. Responding to the RP of the guards player, even though game mechanics make it possible to ignore the guard and walk straight through him.

what game are you speaking of?

Neverwinter Nights 2 persistant worlds. Not an MMO but just a game with a multiplayer function. There are servers where up to 60 (or soon even 90 as I was told) players can play together. And there are servers for all kind of tastes (PvP, hardcore RP, perma death or not ...).

*sigh* who even needs anything beyond words to roleplay anyway? Having done a couple of systems that relied on just 1d6 and a lot of talking skills its impressive that roleplayers are wanting to be "limited" by other systems to make it more real for them (granted it could also be highly UNreal for another die hard roleplayer)

 

Nah. I've tried a word-based mmorpg (Guild Wars) where the character actions were so limited that the players mostly relied on gathering in outposts, sitting down and talking. It wasn't very entertaining, but I guess it's all about what you're used to. I bet pen and paper RP can also be fun for that matter, though I had to give it up after a few poor, unsucessful attempts. But many of those who would rather RP on mmorpgs do it for the visual part. It's just a personal opinion, but I would love to actually -see- my character sit, laugh, walk, sneak and fight another character.

So far, many interesting points have been made in this thread. (We're still doing an unofficial market analysis. Note unofficial, I'm still studying this and we won't make any fancyass game... in the nearest future.) To sum up a bit , it seems as if many think a roleplaybased mmorpg should be as strict and realistic as possible. After going on a game-testing spree, hearing the opinions on this board and asking other RPers, we found out that any mmorpg should, above all, be satisfying. After testing the games for RP possibilities, (WoW, GW, KOTOR, EQ2, ect etc) we ended up with the usual "Good, but... something is missing."

My conclusion is that a possible mmorpg for roleplayers should be as satisfying as possible.  That's why, I'm against realistic games where the characters die permanently, no magic, dragons, ect. Let me explain:

What happens in RP? Action. Action, blood and intrigues. Mostly guild feuds or complicated love affairs. A very few would be satisfied with playing your average peasant who never walks out of the village because he would be killed by wolves and bears. Players need to be able to create a character they feel is unique. The whole meaning with RP (imo) is to be able to escape reality and do something impossible. Players want to play a brave hero, a clever thief, a powerful mage, not a John or Tom who is killed on his first attempt at fighting a monster or arrested for his first crime. Sure, a universe where everyone is awesome isn't realistic, but it pleases. (And good roleplayers would create weaker bi-characters if their storyline requires it anyway)

If I was in charge of making a mmorpg, I'd rather focus on:

Graphics and design. It should keep the eye happy. It's mentioned before, but such a game must  have an advanced character creation sheet, all the basic emotes such as walking, sitting, sleeping, and I'd also add things like being able to carry other characters (Man, this was annoying in the mmorpgs I've tried. "No, we're not walking in a row. I'm carrying her!") and generally ensure that players had tons of emotes and actions to choose from, all put in a systematic, easy-to-browse system. Graphics and design also refer to environment, costumes and details. You can have an awesome story, tons of races/classes/professions, a well-functioning duel/fight system and it will still make me wince if the character's feet and arms look like lego-squares.

It should be the game developers' responsibility to ensure that the RP doesn't turn one-sided by constantly adding new challenges. Pirate-raids, new threats, ect. I'm honestly not sure how this can be done correctly to keep the RP varied, but I believe it would make the game more exciting anyway, and some RPers would probably take advantage of such in-game events as they would give consequences for their characters. (A wild idea that crossed my mind would be to have a few GMs with the sole purpose of making trouble by controlling various enemies, monsters, criminal clans since RP with computer-controlled chars doesn't work well.)

I think the challenge is not to re-create an online society where everything is as realistic as possible, but to keep the majority of the players content. And people want bread and circus after all. I would make a game that visually depended little on imagination and much on creativity. Varietas delectat. 

I realize however that there are lots of challenges coming with my idea, but problems like invincible characters, dissatisfying/unfair pvp systems, guides for newcomers and how to prevent people from ruining gameplay by going OoC have already been mentioned and should of course be considered as the game is worked on.

I just wish that game developers would see what previously released mmorpgs lack and improve, instead of releasing game after game with the same minor but annoying flaws. *coughs in Aion's direction*