Sorry. 
This generalisation makes me feel sad for roleplaying, because I am put into one pot with the so-blamed "elite / hardcore / nazi" roleplayers. Be careful with your statements. (Not verden specifically, just in general.)
Quite right. There have been all manner of roleplayers and there always will be. I would even count in with you on that one. I guess my frustration was leaking out. Have you ever noticed how petulant the people that "leave" the game get about the game? In five years, I have seen it happen countless times. The player (who could have been a EHN roleplayer or a "powerleveler") goes through a boom-and-bust cycle that winds up with them returning to the forum and bashing the game again and again. The game is worse than Satan, everything is the fault of the (devs/RPers/PLers), and the game is just terrible, horrible, awful.
This is actually a very nice game for what it is. If you have no expectations when you come to PS, you will probably be very happy with the game. If you have high expectations or participate in these sorts of games for the purposes of inflating one's ego... then one will bust and leave, usually followed by a stream of petulant posts. People need to grow up. Its a game. Either play it or don't.
I don't hate roleplay. I hate the fact that there is no system for managing it in game, and it is a free-for-all situation where people use the concept of "roleplaying" as an excuse for acting hateful to one another in game. When you get down to a strict, game mechanics definition, PS is not a roleplaying game. These endless arguments about roleplaying, the way people use it as an excuse for trivial nonsense (this robbery that is being discussed), using the concept to hate on one another in game... these have all worn me down.
I started in 2005. There were the Rangers of Yliakum, the Enlightened, RHoP, Outlaws, SCoY, and a host of smaller and changing guilds, and people fought, and roleplay was often out of setting, and sometimes it was kind of stupid the RPs they did... but they stayed in game and kept it going. I remember the Trial of Daehaz for crying out loud, I was there in the Iron Temple. I miss Einnol and Indygo, Zhai, Vanae and a bunch of other people who could pull it off without hating on anyone, without banging anyone on the head, who stopped playing without getting all petulant and boringly hateful about it.
But the fact is that people leave games like this. They can't stay. Their life pulls them back or they get bored. And going on and on about the game/developers/powerlevelers/roleplayers/Talad doesn't have a damn thing to do with it. People have to be respectful of one another and quit dividing everything into black and white camps of I-am-this-I-am-not-that-and-you-(insert term)-are-ruining-the-game-get-off-this-server.
The only way to continue roleplay in PS is to get in game and do it... like Roled. He is there in game much more often than on the forums talking about roleplay, and when he does he does so in character, always. He manages to do it without hating on anyone, without being creepy or weird, and obviously has some class.
I'm sorry PheonixRizin if I made you sad. I am sad when I read all of this. I know I appear as a troll sometimes. But I love this project, and I have met many worthwhile people over the years. Many of whom have left, and a number of them I still talk to. There is no place like PlaneShift, and I like it the way it is. But the community needs help. The game is only going to get better, albeit slowly, and there is nothing at any time that stops one from going in game and seeking RP with people. But if your standards are going to be sooo high, or conversely, if you want to treat roleplayers like idiots... then how can you ever have fun here?
Vakacheck, your actions were inappropriate for RP in PlaneShift. It is detailed in a number of places including the covenant, which I think appears in game now. Quit arguing about it. Everyone knows it was an OOC abuse of mechanics and continuing to try and justify it is meaningless.
