It is also something that is supposed to be totaly IC... All the time. That is the way we are asked to play the game. That is what makes the game what it is.
Too bad it's not true. There are messeges that are completely unrelated to your IC position in the world. Like seeing someone change stance when it's outside your line of sight (already pointed out), maybe outside the room you are in. Face it, the Main chat windows is far from pure IC. And no other chat tab is IC either, unless you're using /tell to someone next to you to "implement" IC whispers. The system tab is cluttered with OOC info, too.
If you don't think they're nessesary go and try to RP in one of the internet games where people don't have to.
Now say where I've
ever written such a thing. Have I ever complained about enforcing RP? (well I've played a MUD where RP is not enforced, and there's more RP there than on PS for sure... there's no kill stealing either, even if nothing prevents it - i take MUDders are different beasts from MMORPGers.)
I'm fine with the RP requirement. I have troubles with your unexplainable (to me) horror for OCC chat (not speaking of random OOC chat, here, but of course of
RP related OCC chat, such as explaining OCCly the reasons for some IC action). My reasoning:
1) RPers of all the world for decades have been playing RPGs by mixing IC and OOC w/o any trouble or need to use []; I think that (real time) OOC info greatly improves RP; this has nothing to do with RP or not. To me, by
definition, RPing is mixing IC and OOC (game related, of course). Not to me only, I think any D&D player would agree.
2) this game already mixes OOC info in (for exaclty the reason stated in 1)): considering the whole screen, OCC info dominates and also in the Main chat tab OCC is present anyway, from the game itself. Is it IC that I see that Mr. X killed a Trepor while I'm fighting a Gladiator inside the Arena? Of course not. Is it IC that I see the name of characters talking to me, even if I've never met them before? of course not... the list goes on.
The point being that you don't realize that's OOC because your brain already filters that out. Recently someone introduced himself to me (char vs char) after a short conversation. That kind of surprised me, since there are two different ways to handle that OOC info (I already knew his name of course): one is to ignore it and pretend not to know the name, like he did, or think of an implicit introduction when you start chatting the first time, like I did. That's because I come from a game where you have to introduce yourself, before knowing each others' name. W/o formal introduction, all you see is a '<short description> elf/human/...', even when they talk to you. When my brains sees the name, it does this OOC->IC translation "since i know his name, we've already introduced ourselves". His brain simple deletes it. Both are correct, IC-wise. No matter how you treat it to make it compatible with your IC experience, that OOC info is present, right in the Main chat window.
3) useless, unrelated OOC chat ruins the RP experience, no doubt, but it does
anyway, with or without []'s. Related OOC improves it. Sometimes a brief OOC note makes a good shortcut for lenghty, boring, overall useless IC explanation (maybe on some almost irrelevant point), speeding up the pace of RP a lot. Sure, I can use [] for that, and I do, but 99.9% of the times I realize that any decent RPer would easily recognize it as OOC and integrate it in his RP experience with no effort.
4) I'm not saying []'s should be banned, or avoided, or that they are always useless... no, sometimes when I mistype something (or type in the wrong window) I type [sorry], just to make it clear it's not part of the IC dialog. Spelling corrections sometimes are needed, and I tend to use [] for that, too. I may have problems with spelling or typing, but my char should not look drunk.
In summary, I think that:
- OOC random chat should be banned, as it is now;
- OOC RP related chat should be allowed, as it is now;
- []'s make OOC random chat no more acceptable... the rule is "don't", and not "do, but use []'s";
- there's little point in enforcing []'s for RP related OOC, as any decent RPer is able to recognize it;
- when ambiguity really arises, use []'s to make it clear it's OCC. In a table RPG this is seldom necessary. In text conversation it's easier to misunderstand, that's why brackets sometime are useful.
- sometimes != everytime
Now this post is long enogh... I'd really like to explain by example, with some RPG action. Maybe next time.
