Forgive me if this topic has already been massively overworked; I'm relatively new to PS and its style of RP and may have not seen prior discussions. If that's the case, mark this thread as 'read' and move on.

This may seem obvious to you. if so, mark this thred as 'read' and move on.

I've come to believe there are three very distinct levels of PVP play :
- Detailed : describe exact placement of body parts, angles of joints and orientation of extremities.
     - RL knowledge of fighting is critical.
     - Very good English skills are critical.
     - Can take a lot of time and good visualization.

- Light : generalized 'Comic book' styled fighting
     - Requires no RL knowledge of fighting.
     - Moderate English skills are quite sufficient.
     - Faster paced.

- Avoidant : dislike or completely unwilling to engage in physical conflict RP.

I am PVP-Light.
I would assert that by definition 'Role Play' allows us to be good (or bad) at something that in RL we are not. From this point of view Detailed-PVP is more like a text-based fight club than Role Play in that it would be almost impossible for a player with no fighting knowledge and a super-skilled character to defeat a player with knowledge but a low skill character. It is also a lot of work, that I simply don't enjoy. When my 'Light' descriptions do not seem to be as effective as a detailed description of the same move would be, I feel that the encounter is --let's call it frustrating. Furthermore I have no interest in spending my limited free time learning the details of something I don't really care about when I could be having fun in PS.

I *imagine* that from the PVP-Detailed point of view the player with RL knowledge would probably gag at having to swallow some of the cartoonish moves pulled by the PVP-Light player who has no RL knowledge. They would simply find it egregious.

Who's right?
PlaneShift seems to intend to support a wide range of styles, for example it accomodates FPS gamers, Levelers, Questers and pure RPers. From that perspective -although it sounds like a cop-out-  no one is right...or wrong.

What do I propose?
It's no sceret that there is a HUGE amount of friction between the three styles with 'god-modding' and 'hand-waving' being common (printable) terms brandished at each other. As a comunity we can do better. By having a simple level-setting OOC at the beginning of any conflict, and I do mean simple, we can provide more enjoyable RP for everyone :

player a : "I'm PVP-Light, you?"
player b : "PVP-Detailed"
player a : "Do you want to do Light, or avoid the conflict?"

Perhaps the avoidance approach is a little OOC but it's almost certain to be more enjoyable for both parties than a mismatched PVP.

I would assert one more thing : more enjoyable RP for everyone means that more people will hang around, so we'll ALL have more opportunities for RP. It's self supporting.

OK, I'm done. Let the inevitable flamage begin....

-P