[Theory of Roleplay] Long Term Development & You

[SaintBatemanofWallStreet]

3 minutes ago, akari said:

this is a very good point and something i mentioned in passing in my original take - most people seeing this server as cinematic. this is actually a conversation i had just lastnight with a friend of mine who mains a PD character - while i am aware of usual LSPD "agenda" (patrol, routine traffic stop, bang bang shooty shooty, script revive, bad guy arrested), i don't think all of it should be chalked up to robocop syndrome as some people like to insist. it's also a huge, HUGE problem with the general "cop allergy" on the server. where the police are always the bad guys, and calm cooperation is never an option. hell, i know a huge chunk of west-side civilians that outright refuse to have a neutral/positive interaction with the police, and it's just like.... why? do you all go around IRL refusing contact with anyone who is or might be involved with a cop?

I'm not placing the blame squarely on them as robocops. However, some are MUCH MORE than others and play their characters like killing is just a part of their daily life. And I'm not saying every time they pull the trigger they need to cry in the corner. Especially when the person they shoot is just mad about it and immediately disconnects or whatever. I get it. But if it's a serious situation, a little bit of reflection after isn't too much to ask I don't think.

The cop allergy thing irks me on a personal level. I was just having a conversation with someone who is a PD main player. The person who doesn't bother to do any research on things that they're doing with their character, but can quote penal code down to the subsection is WILDLY obnoxious. And ridiculous. Everyone who is playing a street lawyer but can't differentiate what beer on draft and in the bottle when they're a "bartender" should honestly be punished for it. It's dumb.

 

 

9 minutes ago, akari said:

despite being america, guns aren't really as common of a thing in more urban areas as people seem to assume. marijuana and pills, absolutely, but i would say harder drugs are a lot more rare. now let me stop rambling and pull this all back to GTAW, where any script drug is not at all hard to find and everyone and their grandma either has their CCW or owns a gun under someone else's serial, and the difference is fairly staggering.

Honestly, this depends on where you are in the United States, to be honest. And it's a matter of state politics and the general attitude of the population. Usually, in California, you're not going to find very many people with a CCW in the city. It's a very convoluted process to get one and for the most part the metropolitan cities don't allow them. However, if you're in a place say like Florida, a fairly common thing for people have a CCW and a gun.

And I live in near a very big metropolitan city. And I know some people that I could call and they could probably get me just about any drug I was looking for within reason. But a gun? That would probably take some doing. The difference between RP servers and real life is, nobody is the end user of contraband products. Everyone wants to be a hustler. Buy a gun for $10,000? Time to sell it for $15,000. Same with drugs. That's not to say people don't do the drugs. But are they doing it because they're an addict? Or that sweet coke health right before a gunfight? I think it's a valid question that could probably do with some exploration.

[shiroq]

21 minutes ago, akari said:

hell, i know a huge chunk of west-side civilians that outright refuse to have a neutral/positive interaction with the police, and it's just like.... why? do you all go around IRL refusing contact with anyone who is or might be involved with a cop?

I think this is player mentality issue. On my previous character who was a heavy criminal, I have never interacted with police in a way that wouldn't make sense. Always have been respectful and did everything in my power to make them go away, or distracted them so they do not decide to search me and find my illegal firearm on me etc. Obviously not everyone has to be respectful but there has to be a line somewhere. Sometimes I would have made fun from cops while they roll up and there is no danger of me getting searched or getting in trouble etc. Which creates fun interaction. When players decide to be idiots and refuse arrest or try to cause a scene that's just player mentality issue that is OOC rather than IC.

 

[akari]

2 minutes ago, shiroq said:

I think this is player mentality issue. On my previous character who was a heavy criminal, I have never interacted with police in a way that wouldn't make sense. Always have been respectful and did everything in my power to make them go away, or distracted them so they do not decide to search me and find my illegal firearm on me etc. Obviously not everyone has to be respectful but there has to be a line somewhere. Sometimes I would have made fun from cops while they roll up and there is no danger of me getting searched or getting in trouble etc. Which creates fun interaction. When players decide to be idiots and refuse arrest or try to cause a scene that's just player mentality issue that is OOC rather than IC.

player mentality is the problem, hence Cop Allergy. PD characters are seen as the bad guys, no matter what, and everyone is focused on winning more than roleplaying.

and yes, that's a very good approach for an illegal character to take! akari has also been one to take the piss out of the police when she knows she's not in any real danger, but she doesn't go out of her way to straight up disrespect unless they try to come at her first.

 

10 minutes ago, SaintBatemanofWallStreet said:

Honestly, this depends on where you are in the United States, to be honest. And it's a matter of state politics and the general attitude of the population. Usually, in California, you're not going to find very many people with a CCW in the city. It's a very convoluted process to get one and for the most part the metropolitan cities don't allow them. However, if you're in a place say like Florida, a fairly common thing for people have a CCW and a gun.

And I live in near a very big metropolitan city. And I know some people that I could call and they could probably get me just about any drug I was looking for within reason. But a gun? That would probably take some doing. The difference between RP servers and real life is, nobody is the end user of contraband products. Everyone wants to be a hustler. Buy a gun for $10,000? Time to sell it for $15,000. Same with drugs. That's not to say people don't do the drugs. But are they doing it because they're an addict? Or that sweet coke health right before a gunfight? I think it's a valid question that could probably do with some exploration.

correct! the crime is very dependent on your location, hence i gave the comparison between the metropolitan and the suburb. i didn't make it super clear - i know a lot of people in my area with legal guns. but Los Santos is a west coast metropolitan area. so why should the gun trade be reflective of a place like Florida (or in my case, outer Philadelphia)?

 

that last point is a very good one. i forgot through any of this that script drugs give script benefits. i only ever used them for rp purposes.?

[SaintBatemanofWallStreet]

1 minute ago, akari said:

correct! the crime is very dependent on your location, hence i gave the comparison between the metropolitan and the suburb. i didn't make it super clear - i know a lot of people in my area with legal guns. but Los Santos is a west coast metropolitan area. so why should the gun trade be reflective of a place like Florida (or in my case, outer Philadelphia)?

It shouldn't be. West Coast states especially metro areas are generally wildly liberal and have some of the most extreme anti-gun laws in the nation. To the point, they're being one by one challenged as a violation to the 2nd amendment and some are losing.

However it's an RP server and if you don't let some concessions go to the average player then you're going to have backlash about it and how "it's not fair because of x, y, and z" so on and so forth. And even if you made it mirror West Coast laws, do you think for a single second it's going to stop people from doing some ridiculous research to justify them owning a gun or whatever? These are the same people also RPing door kicking female SF operator with 478 tours of duty under her belt. When they want a win, they'll move Heaven and Earth to make it happen.

The gun trade, in general, should be many more handguns and a few scattered things like TEC-9's. The automatic rifle? Should be a rarity. This is America. Not Somalia. Not everyone is strapped with a full auto AK-47 or AR-15. But people don't know guns. I know when I had my illegal character you could get an AK all day for a reasonable price and by the bushel. Pistol? Get ready to give up a kidney if they had one. And then you'd get 12 rounds for it. *Insert thing about "when you're on the low end of the supply prices inflate." Got it. Doesn't make it right, or good for the server.*

[Bospy]

Even if west coast states are anti gun, the process at the moment to get guns isn’t really that’s far-fetched. If you want a gun legally, they’re easy to get if you aren’t a criminal.

 

I could discuss roleplay theory all day. I’ve been role playing for about 11 years on various settings. When it comes to real life settings, player mentality ultimately goes two ways when we’re discussing the context of a real life roleplay - either you are going to be legal or illegal. That’s the bipolar nature of real life roleplay. Legal roleplayers are always your police characters and firefighters, rarely with corrupt illegal roleplayers, and then civilian roleplay. The key to a successful and immersive community is to have a civilian section of the population with things to do beyond driving around pretty cars - investments, asset management, jobs, business. This server is doing an excellent job, but there’s a few things they could do. Imagine being on the upper end of wealth in the community - rather than sit on your stacks of cash, you should invest in liquid assets and property. Imagine if you could purchase large factories that other players work in and make profits or lose money based on performance. Imagine a dynamic product system where infrastructure is based on player interaction. That, in my opinion, would be the best civilian system and also entice good roleplay. Ultimately on a real life RP community, the investment into civilian RP is often ignored in favor of scripting more things for PD and illegal factions. But when you don’t have a civilian outlet, you will find people are polarized to purely legal or purely illegal roleplay. That gives a cops vs. robbers feel.

 

Legal roleplay always attracts people who want procedure. In many cases, developing a character is secondary or not even part of that player’s intentions. This is the persistent issue with legal roleplay, especially in police factions. A distinction should always be made between roleplaying and simulating - players that are in police factions for simulation are not there to give an enjoyable experience to criminals, they’re there to win. They do not view roleplay as a cooperative thing, they view criminals as a challenge. This is the ultimate mindset issue that police command must always fight. 

 

Illegal factions have a similar issue. This is your Chiraq gangs and poor gang roleplayers. They do not view their character as something part of a story but rather an extension of themselves - they are living out a fantasy. Therefore, every win is a win for them, every loss is a loss for them. So they violate rules, metagame, and do anything to gain an edge over their competitors. You always have bad patterns in breeds of illegal roleplay. At least in terms of stereotypes, the gangs invite people who aren’t interested in following rules and constantly “e-bang.” Mafias incite egotistical jerks who want their character (moreso themselves) to be remembered. Biker clubs invite elitists. You can break it down further, but that’s the gist of it.

 

And then there’s obviously trolls that hope to point and laugh. I’ve been in that category many times on different platforms. If you were an experienced roleplayer, you’d also be amazing at trolling roleplay servers because you understand what pisses people off the most. Inexperienced roleplayers or bad roleplayers suck - they’ll just deathmatch and get banned. Very inefficient.

 

With any significant platform of roleplay with numbers like this, people will never be on the same level and you can never hope to enforce a uniform standard. But you can enforce rules that prevent low standards and have guidelines to prevent bad behaviors. 

 

Both of these are ultimately to be blamed on one key thing - people who are new to roleplay or taught badly will mix IC and OOC. Roleplay in the vein of serious roleplay is cooperative storytelling. These players don’t understand that and they won’t until they’re taught otherwise or fix wrong mindsets. Once they’re taught, then long term development can happen.

Edited July 13, 2019 by Bospy

[akari]

3 minutes ago, Bospy said:

A distinction should always be made between roleplaying and simulating - players that are in police factions for simulation are not there to give an enjoyable experience to criminals, they’re there to win. They do not view roleplay as a cooperative thing, they view criminals as a challenge. This is the ultimate mindset issue that police command must always fight. 

 

Illegal factions have a similar issue. This is your Chiraq gangs and poor gang roleplayers. They do not view their character as something part of a story but rather an extension of themselves - they are living out a fantasy. Therefore, every win is a win for them, every loss is a loss for them.

i don't have anything significant or new to add to this, but i agree wholeheartedly. my biggest beef with any roleplay platform is other players with a "play to win" mentality, and the biggest reason i wanted to bring up the topics i addressed; only RPing out a "loss" (whether it be a character death, a police interaction, an addiction, or a pre-established character trait) when they find it beneficial.

 

as i said in a discord convo that i can't be bothered to track down, "people need to see their characters as human beings, and not just power fantasies."

[alver]

9 hours ago, akari said:

it's also a huge, HUGE problem with the general "cop allergy" on the server. where the police are always the bad guys, and calm cooperation is never an option. hell, i know a huge chunk of west-side civilians that outright refuse to have a neutral/positive interaction with the police, and it's just like.... why? do you all go around IRL refusing contact with anyone who is or might be involved with a cop?

What's wrong with a character disliking the police? I know plenty of people IRL who aren't criminals or anything, yet hate the police with a passion. I'm sure considering we're roleplaying an American state, even more people would distrust the police, considering what they're known for in the states.

 

OT,, the original post was a great read. I wish people would portray actual characters more often instead of just portraying an extension/avatar of themselves. Whenever I start a char I always decide beforehand who/what I want my character to be, aswell as where I want to steer his/her development.

 

 

Edited July 13, 2019 by alver

[Bospy]

People should also avoid over developing a character on creation. It is always better to develop a character’s backstory dynamically through roleplay rather than create a long backstory on creation.

[akari]

2 hours ago, Bospy said:

People should also avoid over developing a character on creation. It is always better to develop a character’s backstory dynamically through roleplay rather than create a long backstory on creation.

this is a case-by-case basis tbh. if you're roleplaying a (relatively) older character, then you should be able to give yourself a bit more of a fleshed out backstory. if they've been on this earth for thirty or fourty years, then they've had to have been doing something in that timeframe.

 

but i see your point when it comes to like... twenty-five year old former men-in-black agents.

[Engelbert]

"Babies in sports cars" are actually lot more realistic (especially when you take a look at Los Santos, the haven for the depraved, pornstars, showbusiness all around) than people throwing up gang signs on every corner, every character starts with a background story, that serves as a path towards the shape said character is in at the time of creation. Which defines the initial traits, behaviour and such. Now the onward developmet depends on variety of things icluding interactions with other roleplayers and actual decisions of it's creator. A baby in a sports car (I myself am guilty of playing one) is a development measure as well. The quicksand here however is represented with hivemind (gang) mentality to an extent, it is not a rare sight of someone abandoning their personal development for the sake of having fun with a gang and just roleplay that as it s, (i.e. the character is inactive unless partaking in some gang operations for example.). That of course isn't a standard approach. The long term development should be taken into consideration when planning a character. Conclusion, don't roleplay every second nightclub, this one you have is yours only, so shouldn't look like every other.

Edited July 15, 2019 by Engelbert