ChaosRed

PuGs are where people learn to play with others. PuGs are how new players meet established players. PuGs are how good SGs recruit new members.

In short, when too many insular groups strangle the PuG community by refusing to participate in PuGs or writing them off as what noobs do until they find a good SG, the game starts to die.

Wins the thread.

PuGs are the meat and potato of any MMO. They are a joy to revisit from time to time. Even the bad ones, can at times, be entertaining. Sure its a roll of the dice for what you might get, but overall I think PuGs are a great way to experience the game.

My favorite part about it, is every blue moon, you encounter people playing the game for the first time. It's a real thrill to help them out, advise them a little and help them discover and enjoy the game.

We all mistakes with the keyboard, with grammar and with spelling.

I think at some point, a little tolerance can actually help RP. It is, after all, a hobby that thrives on collaborating with others. If there is genuine effort in the attempt, I don't see any reason to indict a fellow player, who is simply trying to ignite/maintain a little RP.

My observations:

Numbers have thinned and the new games are why. I seem to get someone on my FB want me to try Aion every day.

I am stunned people find Champions playable, but sometimes anything new is compelling.

I find groups at peak hours, but there is no doubt the numbers are down, Virtue has been at one green dot all week when I've tried, instead of it regularly being at two amber. So proof...meet pudding.

The AE crowd has run away screaming, and are now all building brutes and scrappers with difficulty slider up to 11. Everyone else made a stone controller and made it look like psychadelic lava, and on this front I am most guilty myself. My alien controller now dispenses rock powers that look like lava lamps.

I am still doing my goofy, ridiculous thing though. Aion is too much style, mixed with a lot of repetitive grinding, and the RP community seems to be finding itself. COH has spoiled me with customization, not just with characters but bases and missions. I pretty much expect that in a game now.

So I am here for the forseeable future I think.

It wasn't SS players sending the tells, just so we're clear. Your group never gave me a hard time.

And I'd say to the other post just above that the surrogate social life players in the D are a vast minority, I'm sure - but alas I think all online games have a small minority of players who use the game to replace a real social life, or worse, the game becomes their lives.

I don't know why people need to tell roleplayers they suck, or are unwelcome, or need to be quiet. There are those that resent RP though, and I seem to antagonize them, probably because I am clearly into it, I clearly type fast and often and because I have this dumb flowery style of purple prose. So its voluminous, quick and pretty purple and cheesy. And so people react and I get told. I don't mind, its part of the culture of gaming.

Yeah, the "booing" came from two tells, to paraphrase the tells they were essentially:

"Take that drama-queen stuff outside"

"Way to hog the stage ***hole, we were here first"

Both pretty similar to this, but with more spelling mistakes. I think the problem was your team and I invaded a space two others were just chatting in, and they resented this. Since I was normally my "blabby" self in character, I probably got the heat as I was dominating the conversation at the time.

What happens at the D sometimes for me, is social roleplayers get frustrated with dramatic RP. They consider it invasive, they consider it out-of-touch with the festive atmosphere of the bar. They are probably right, its just that the D is a rare cross-faction zone, so it sometimes requires you to use it. It is certainly convenient for that purpose anyway.

Other roleplayers see the D as a swinging-super bar, and some - (not all) use it as a surrogate social life. When you intrude on this atmosphere with a sudden surge of people, dialog and "drama" they can, at times, become resentful.

Most of the time its not an issue, but I seem to draw negative reaction when I roleplay. I seem to get more negative feedback than other roleplayers do. Perhaps my style just sucks, but I have been called names, threatened, even told my *real* mortal soul was in danger because of my roleplay. That "lecture" I got about roleplay being Satanic, and that God would enjoy watching me burn, was perhaps the most entertaining negative reaction to RP I've ever experienced.

Yeah, I just seem to draw them out of the woodwork, I blame fast typing skills and the fact my Zork VERBOSE switch is always turned on.

I know some people say that RPing extensively on teams may be a ticket to annoying the others, but so far, it's led to nothing more than tight-nit groups who become genuinely disappointed when someone needs to bow out.

Well said. I almost always try to RP on teams, even pick up teams. Just little throw-away lines (usually in local), just to make it clear I am open to it. It very often ignites RP for the entire time the team is together, not everyone of course, but the one or two role players who just seem to jump at the chance at the invitation.

I highly recommend it - just like you say.

I don't frequent the 'D', but it seems to have a lot of focus on social RP.

Social RP, tends to promote "fun" RP, that is light, witty and not far from an actual experience at a real tavern. In fact, Social RP is frequently festive, and often revolves around drinking, dancing and gossip.

It's a perfectly viable form of RP. My only issue with Social Roleplayers, is when they try to stifle any kind of conflict, or dramatic situation, because it will upset the pleasant aspect of Social RP. I've even read posts, on Virtue that went out of there way to hate characters that dare to have "problems" or even want to create any kind of situation to solve. In other words, to actually develop some story (all stories need some kind of conflict), rather than just chat, be nice, win friends and party.

The key here, again, is just tolerance. If you want to drink virtually (perhaps for real in unison) and dance, and listen to the Cape, and laugh and have fun, this is all wonderful stuff. Go for it.

It is okay however, to use the D (or any space) to map out other kinds of RP than this though. It doesn't have to be the D of course, but since this is a rare cross-faction space, it can be a convenient location to use. I once delivered a motion to censure an entire country (fictitious of course), directly from the UN to a character at the D. And the boos and cat calls I got privately for doing this were pretty astonishing. It just happened to be an easy place both a villain and hero to interact this way, so we used a small part of the D to stage the event. Why hate on that? I mean seriously, just why?

Roleplaying comes in different shades, styles and preferences. You sound like you want to dig deep into character interaction beyond "nice costume, do you like to party" and into "I hear the Rikti have an entire squadron hiding in the asteroid belt, but nobody believes me" (or whatever, that's a pretty lame example, but you get the idea).

To get to that, you often have to forge a connection to a group, and to do that, you have to troll the SG forum and our SG threads here on this forum, to find an RP group that interests you. You often, won't find that kind of thing in a social RP setting.

Hope that helps, and hope I got your general concern understood correctly.

I forgive spelling in RP. I just don't see it as indicative of quality or lack of it, unless the problem is extreme. As long as I can interpret the dialog, I go with it. This is a useful tact for me, because it allows for easier roleplay when the person you are gaming with uses English as a second language.

I don't forgive lack of mutual respect. So when someone gently asks, to have a word spelled correctly, or gently reminds me of something I got wrong, I am happy to adjust to their wishes. However, when the criticism is used as a device to claim superiority, or worse, just snob others, then I can't forgive the lack of mutual respect. Without mutual respect, there is facility to RP at all.

Somewhere along the way, good RP is about compromise and team work. This is why I believe it is a valuable and useful hobby. To tell a good collaborative story you must give and you must take. It's a hobby that rewards generous hearts and those who are keen to share ideas and thoughts with others. It's also why I believe many role players tend to be extremely tolerant and patient, because I believe both ingredients are necessary for RP to thrive. I believe tolerance includes adjusting to those who can't master the English language as well as others. Lord knows, my own writing style, requires a little patience. So I try to be tolerant of others too.

It's good threads like this come up from time to time. Although, I find I share the same thoughts over and over again, as each thread comes up, I always enjoy the dialog. Any discussion about our mutual hobby is useful to me. If it does nothing, it reminds me the hobby still thrives, and since RP is very near and dear to me, this makes me smile.

I played quite a bit this weekend, more than I have for a long time.

I dabbled in just about everything:

1. I set up two new AE missions, for both RP hooks and a simple mission run. We ran one on Saturday and the follow-up conclusion on Sunday. We had 5 members of the SG for both runs. Saturday's mission was a D&D-style forest with D&D-style Orcs, Trolls and Ogres, and was a total blast as we cracked Hackmaster jokes OOC along the way.

2. I created a new VG, just for the fun of it, and got to max members for prestige. Then I let a friend of mine design the base, using the witch in Sleeping Beauty for color and theme. (I had just seen the new dragon in Disneyland and was inspired by the look of it). Anyway, the base turned out with this bizarre blend of tech/arcane, but I like it.

3. I rolled two new villains to go with the VG. One, my very first Stalker, as I had never played one before. Meh. That class is fun, but only in short spurts. The other was a Brute, which is what I always seem to enjoy most villain-side. He looks like a D&D Troll and I named him "Fizz Wizz", and he is delightfully campy and weird.

4. Wrote my first villain-only AE mission. It is a simple "break out" mission, where the villain is trapped in Alpha Squad's base and needs to get out. Not bad, but the base minion solider has devices as a secondary, so you get stuck in an awful lot of web grenades.

5. I punched out some new content for VirtueVerse, and am now working with another roleplayer to bring a story that will bridge both villain and heroes. Where the heroes set up chapter one, then we switch to villains and complete chapter two.

6. Late last night, I took Doctor North to level 44. This is a character I have played since December 2004, is now level 44. I am awesome.

Playing characters with weaknesses and flaws (a point in a well-written post just a few above this one), is excellent advice.

Characters that fail, have problems, or can't conquer something are much more interesting than a character that is flawless, and all-knowing. They should eventually triumph of course, but its the journey to the triumph where the fun RP lies.

Any good story, in just about any genre is about the protagonist struggling, failing, getting up and trying again - until finally they emerge victorious. Too often role players cut out the struggles, the defeats, the set backs and the weaknesses, when in fact, that's 90% of the fun.

I almost always gravitate to role players willing to lose, willing to express weaknesses, because this is an immediate signal to me that this role player can probably craft a great tale.

I love where the market is going right now. To the casual player, that just wants to build basic inventions, it is much easier now than it was just a few weeks ago.

Common salvage in particular, seems to be coming back to Earth, which is really nice to see.

I recommend Supreme Society for villainy, see link above.

I also recommend Paragon Universe, for heroes. I have little direct experience with PU, but they have a role player I very much admire, they have a superb web site and support structure - and they are extremely accommodating to newcomers. They also have a great reputation to anyone I've asked, so I feel good recommending them to you.

Our group, is pretty, sparse, tight and very casual in terms of frequency of play. So we're not a good fit. However, if you just need a little RP, and you see me online, feel free to look me up via global: @Ravyna. The link to our group is here: Alpha Squad Web Site

I think sometimes people judge things, based on how the overall mass-concensus and appeal.

Something can be great, wonderful and useful without having universal appeal. I'll cite my own personal examples:

Ween
C#
Tofu
Seattle
Twelve-Sided Dice
Gamma World
Wes Anderson

The fact is, AE serves a wonderful purpose for role players, story tellers and those who like to dabble a little creativity with their game play. These people are the minority in these games, as others point out here all the time. Still, it doesn't mean mob-rule defines everything.

If it did, Citizen Kane would be considered garbage, Woody Allen a useless hack and Motorhead an inferior brand of metal. To my eyes, all of these assumptions are dead-wrong, but because all three were never truly beloved by the masses, and aren't readily pumped into frenzy by mainstream media or any other measure of "alive" versus "dead", you could argue they are not worthy. The precise argument, those who contend AE is "dead" are suggesting, from what I can see.

This doesn't mean that things that are obscure, or limited in appeal are inherently superior either. This is where "Indies" have it all wrong (in my view).

AE is a superb addition to this game. I use it all the time. Many of my other friends in this game do as well.

I tried boss farming, I hated it. I don't mind others found it wonderful and fun. I respect that. What I dislike was the sense of entitlement it created when it was nerfed, or worse, the idea that boss farming was "intelligent", and that it required skill. Boss farming was devoid of skill, it attempted to minimize all skill, effort and risk solely to make the XP dial go "whirrrr". Even the maps chosen, had to be the least challenging or interesting of all of them, because this could deter the XP ever so slightly.

This is all fun for some, but hardly something to brag about. To me, it would be like bragging about how well you jerk yourself. I mean, I'm glad you enjoyed the ride, and we all enjoy it, but it is literally something a monkey can do.

Typos in RP happen all the time, especially, as you say when battle is flying and time is short.

Also there are cultural issues with spelling too, as a previous poster indicated with words such as neighbourhood and colour.

I don't think anyone can truly judge RP. It's like judging someone's favorite color or favorite band or author. You may have an opinion about it, but really RP style and methods can rarely be judged objectively. I think the only RP element that can be judged is whether the fellow-roleplayer involved has mutual-respect for you and others. Roleplayers that seek status over others, assume superiority over the others, or seem to continually mock, deride and scoff at other people's contributions or ideas, are indicative of behavior that I feel, can be criticized because they go beyond taste and style.

If you meet me, as a roleplayer half-way though, in terms of respect, your style, ideas and themes are probably not an issue at all. In fact, the more bizarre they are, the more intrigued I will be.

I am very impressed with your web site, and the warm reception your SG extends to new collaborators.

Virtue is lucky to have you, well done.

I love the hysteria over a tag, that will never come. An RP tag doesn't destroy anything of the things, I see people upset about might happen.

I also disagree roleplayers are less tolerant. In fact, show me a server with an RP tag (in games that have them), and I'll show you one of the most pleasant servers to play on in terms of maturity. So much so, that roleplayers become the minority on RP-tag servers, because so many non-roleplayers will join an RP server, because they are so tolerant and pleasant to play on.

Not that it matters, it will never happen, but for the records RP tags aren't a mechanism to destroy or punish non-roleplayers, at least not to the hysteria and rants here suggest they are. They are mostly there to help newbies to the game find a place that will comfortably accept their hobby.

There are extreme examples where people had to change their name from Haxx0r M0mma had to something else, but in a Super Hero game, this is a perfectly acceptable name, perhaps a Freakshow-derived character or something. So even that would be tolerated in COH, an RP tag changes nothing.

With the tag, a new roleplayer, wouldn't have to google for an hour to find where roleplayers congregate, or wonder if roleplaying even exists in the game. They would know, the company would say, "you are welcome, and you are most welcome here". It's just a welcome mat, nothing more.

Seeing a number of threads on other game forums, and facebook asking if roleplayers play game A or B, or where roleplayers should go for game A and B, clearly there is a need for roleplayers to know this info, a tag helps ease this passage.

Is the tag vitally necessary? No. Am I upset there isn't one? No. If the tag did come, would it be a threat to non-roleplayers? No. Ask the hundreds of thousands of non-roleplayers on RP servers and they will tell you that it is not a threat.

Are roleplayers more intolerant than your average gamer? Sorry, in my experience that is a lie. We are just as tolerant and intolerant as any other gamer. We have the same weaknesses, no more, no less, myself included.

Really, in my experience, the most intolerant gamer, is the frustrated-power gamer, who insists his missions/quests/raids run like clockwork, and screams at his team when they don't. Where's that video of the WOW raid, where the guild leader is screaming into VENT about the end of the dungeon raid when it goes astray? Now that's intolerance. Fortunately it's a very small minority of power-gamers.

I roleplay in non-RP groups all the time, I get complaints, but they are rare. I've never seen roleplayers complain that a non-RP group isn't playing their character right. That's usually some nerd who has six level 50's of your exact archetype and feel compelled to lecture on how to play a kid's game, as if the silly game is actually a science instead of just the mindless distraction and amusing hobby that it is.

But, if you want to believe an RP tag would be apocalyptic, go ahead. It's not true in my experience, but perhaps my bias doesn't seem the utter catastrophe the tag would create.

Asterix is a huge win for me. I had to read the damn things in french, but they were still great. Tintin was also full of win.

And the frightening thing is... I haven't the faintest clue what any of these things are.

Probably because you are younger than Blade Runner, and Episode IV (a good thing). On the other hand, I was reading comics daily, back when Jimmy Carter was president. I actually used paper route money to subscribe to this comic, shortly after the first issue debuted...



A really bad move, since the second issue came four months later, and then the third issue came two years later, and by then my subscription had been forgotten - making me bitter and angry for the rest of my days.

I'd like to gently urge you to read a little on Kirby. He's probably comic's "Joe Dimmagio", or "Vince Lombardi", and the godfather of the "Silver Age"

Jack Kirby

Some fun reading there, anyway I thought you might find it interesting.

Virtue and COH is old. Old RP servers tend to coalesce into small, tight groups of trusted friends. They also have to deal with absenteeism, as players wander off and then back on for months at a time. My WOW RP server, has a revolving door it seems, as players leave, then come back after a few months. Not all of us, but many of us are very migratory in our play.

Also COH is a fairly casual game these days, at least it is for me and most of my friends. There's too many other games to play. I think this explains why so many groups are tightly connected to their peers, but don't often seek others openly.

Don't worry though, there's plenty of places for you to find a home.

Anyway, the @Ravyna offer up above, still stands. Genia's group is worth exploring, and I think you'll find villain side has a few groups of great quality as well.

The Paragon Universe folks also have a superb guild portal and has Fuse Neutralus in their ranks, a young role player I greatly admire.

Just give it time, you'll find your niche for several of your characters.

I loved your JPG with all your characters on one image by the way, a nice cross section you have there! Well done.

I've played on Shadow Council for years, nobody was banned for a name.

Shadow Council was a great server, highly recommended, the RP tag did nothing but help that server in my view.

Well I didn't see a perfect fit for my small clan of players, Dragonblood Paragon was probably closest, but we're very much PG-13, so I don't know if it would work.

We're a Bronze-age group (think 70's and 80's) a fast hybrid of super-science and high fantasy.

We take our general style from Wolfman, Claremont, Infantino and Kirby. Kree versus Skrull, Dark Phoenix, New Gods, Galactic Guardians, the Slade/Terra sage, and most especially Crisis on Infinite Earths, is the kind of thing we're shooting for. We wrap the whole sandwich up with a northern theme, as our base is located in a fictitious country underneath the arctic ice. Alternate timelines, and alternate Earths in the past and future are going to be a key focus this winter (which is when I tend to RP most, I stop role playing quite a bit as spring/summer rolls around).

I'd extend a legit invitation but we're a scattered group. We tend to RP the most late on Saturday and Sunday nights, and we spread our toons across three super-groups that form one larger group. We did this for reasons of theme, and so we could each have a crack at designing a different style of base.

We're also very insular. Not because we're snobs, but because none of us are online enough to forge broader ties. When most of us do, reach out further, we usually fall apart or bite off more than we can chew. Also our PG-13 style puts some people off, most of Virtue goes for MRP.

So while I am not much help, I would welcome you as a role player any time you happen to see me online. My global is @Ravyna. If you are online and just need some RP, shoot me a tell, I'll happily invite you to one of our bases or help you run an RP-AE mission, or whatever suits you needs.

So while, I can't really offer you a home, (we're too flaky to offer anyone a home), I can offer you RP companionship, and someone to add to your friends list when you need some RP. Anyway, if you need someone to RP with, feel free to look up @Ravyna, I'm always up for a little RP.

Best of luck with your search.

I like official tags. I think they help establish, that RP is accepted on a particular server - and it can provide some substance to conflict resolution.

For reasons, that I still do not understand, some people are so damn hostile about role play. Indeed, I was verbally abused for role playing just this weekend. An official tag at least gives you some credibility, that the behavior exhibited is supposed to be tolerated on the server.

But, really, all an official tag does is help guide newbs. I spent a year on Guardian in 2005, before realizing Virtue was the RP server, and even then, because there was no official tag I debated switching over, given I had managed to find RP pockets on Guardian.

Tags, I argue, work. They aren't critical to a game's success, but they do help guide players to an appropriate community.

The real solution of course, isn't permanent servers at all, but rather shards (or virtual servers if your prefer), that you can join (even create) and invite your friends to join, or set up meta-tags to describe. That will come, in time, and as radical as it sounds would be a great asset to MMOs.

Anyway, tags aren't a bad thing. I'd welcome them. I'd also say for an unofficial RP Server, Virtue has a higher percentage of role players than most. And that if you're not role playing with this game, I think you're missing about 70% of its fun. Really, this game ain't all that on the PvE front - and is downright dreadful on the PvP front.

But the base editor, coalitions, multiple costumes, arena zones and AE make it a superb RP space. In some ways, one of the best out there, bar none. It's a shame COH doesn't realize this and advertise this element more heavily.

Strangely, RP tags on other games, are often a maturity filter. People who do not RP will gravitate to an RP server, just because they tend to be more peaceful, more mature and feature a lot less l33ter rubbish.

Then again for every 1 role player, there are 50 power-gamers. I think we're a dying breed in many way. So, we're not exactly a community to bank on.

But really, all a tag gets you is it helps a new player decide what server is right for them, a useful guide, and I like games that go out of their way to make a new player's experience as pleasant as possible.

Sorry Count, when Psycho Boy dies, it will be due to the aftermath of a reckless crime performed by Chaos Red. The very catalyst he needed to turn "hero". Kind of a weak fusion of the Spider-Man/Batman origins I guess.

When "Going Rogue" is launched, and I perform the in-game story-arcs to perform, I could use your help. I have a hero named Cobra Fist, who will become a full-time villain. He's a meat and potato scrapper-villain, but with a small army of snakes at his command.

The kind of "B" grade villain, that would gladly take orders from an "A" grade villain who needs pigeons, uh I mean recruits, to do various villainous tasks considered beneath the dignity of someone like Count.

You know send him out to beat people up, rob stuff to gain access to new technology etc. etc.

Short answer: no.

Not impressed.

I will probably be killing another toon later this month.

Looks like Psycho Boy is my latest victim. He's only 24th level, but I did dedicate some energy into him.

Killing him will turn Chaos Red to a hero, and make that character active again (he hasn't been played in two years).

Fun what the new Going Rogue, will make us all do. I predict it will be a great expansion for that reason.

It won't be for a few weeks, but when it happens, I'll be sure to post to the names thread, that "Psycho Boy" is up for grabs.

Rumor has it, all kinds of awesome RP exists outside the D. No psychic barrier warning labels necessary.

The moral of this thread is: those who Mary Sue should just be given a gentle pat on the head - and then you can return to regularly scheduled programming.

Now if you get Count Logan'd, then my advice is find a thesaurus and beat him at his own game. If you construct a decent sentence using the words alacrity, vociferous and "in situ", he'll generally leave you alone.

Don't sweat him calling you soppy apeth, he does that to everyone, even those clearly worth more than a half penny.