Exclusiveness vs Roleplay

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Postmaster
Wizard
Posts: 972
Joined: 03 Mar 2010 22:37

Exclusiveness vs Roleplay

Post by Postmaster » 27 Jun 2008 13:16

Originally posted by Mortimor

Having played this game on and off for about 12 years now I haven't seen the
corrolation between excluvise guilds and the amount/quality of the roleplay.
From what I've experienced the amount/quality of roleplay is dependent on
something else entirely.

It seems to me that the roleplaying is mostly dependent on the work of the
Wizards and the lore behind the content.

If Wizards create a clear purpose for a guild, then that guild is helped
immensely in terms of roleplay. If that is coupled with an interesting
structure, a good range of emotes that can help roleplay along, then it's
already in a very good shape to become a guild of roleplay.
Other equally important parts are the NPCs for example. Guild NPCs set the tone
and become kind of a cliche of the role that the Wizards envisioned people to
play in a guild. They set the tone, so to speak.

This leads me back to the lore, as I mentioned above. The lore of a guild and
it's context is the most important thing if you ask me. The lore of the guild
itself, but just as much the lore of the land/area the guild is in.
Guilds in Middle Earth is helped immensely in this area by the great books and
movies, so most people already have a fair idea of the boundaries and the
atmosphere of the lands, and therefore also the character that inhabit the
lands.
Other areas of Genesis have the same situation to a lesser degree, but I'd like
to draw up the example of Sybarus here because it is not based on any books or
movies.

Sybarus is really, really well made in most every aspect. There have been put
alot of thought into the society, the laws, the atmosphere, the morality and
the behaviour of the characters in this realm.
That very solid foundation, added to the fact that the Shadow Warriors have a
very clear purpose makes it very interesting and makes it easy to roleplay in
that guild.
A player simply have so many tools to build his roleplay & character with, plus
there are alot of touches that can help spice up ones roleplay there.

It is virtually the same with the Middle Earth guilds. Take the Morgul Mages,
they are in general almost a carbon-copy of each other in terms of the roleplay
that they display, to outsiders atleast. But the context that they play in
gives them alot of depth, and it gives them alot of previously established lore
to work with and work from.

Now some guilds are completely disconnected from any lore, history or context.
With the Gladiators for example, the material to work with is very weak. Tyr is
an arid, barren landscape in more than one respects in Genesis.
The purpose of the guild also does not suit Genesis at all. To fight in the
Arena and die for the amusement of Kalak...Well, it really doesn't leave much
room for doing anything that this game have to offer.
I know that Tyr is based off the Dark Sun material, but few seems to have read
much about it, and very very little of it is relayed in Genesis.

The Mercenaries are an intersting case, because they have virtually no context.
They seem to have been made merely for a place where players could get some
combat skills.
But the fact that they are a complete blank slate still leaves more options
than the Gladiators for instance. I am sure that there are many members who do
not roleplay, and don't really have any tools to roleplay with if they started.
But some probably do roleplay quite a bit, especially if they can hatch their
character concepts on to other existing guilds and benefit from their lore.
This could be the Shields of Morgul for instance.

I'll venture the guess that it is because of these things that roleplaying is
often seen more in the Shadow Warriors than in the Gladiators. Not because of
the way one can or cannot join the guilds.

Ofcourse there are other factors like the player behind the screen and whether
or not he/she is interested in roleplaying at all. But my original opinion
still stands, as I do not think that excluding people from a guild, magically
produces better roleplay.

This got kind of long winded, so I'll stop for now. But I hope it made for an
interesting read if nothing else.

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