Old Player, New Character

[bilbous]

What are peoples opinions about old players role-playing inexperience with the game when starting new characters?

My opinion is that it is inappropriate to pretend to be unfamiliar with the setting and basic gameplay but proper not to "know" other peoples characters. I think that asking people about the npc's and landmarks particularly in the town where you spawn is wrong because it is presumably your home town within the context of the setting. Asking about the game controls that you know very well is wrong because it is completely out of context.

This is my opinion and I am not suggesting this should be the rule. Also it is purely hypothetical.

What do you think?

[Karyuu]

Asking about game controls is OOC, and there's no reason old players should be doing this except for amusement - however short and unusual.

However, I don't see anything wrong about asking for directions as a "new character," nor asking questions about your spawn-town. Just because you spawn there doesn't have to mean that this is where your character is born. Although if you roleplay that this is indeed your birth-town and you're a player who has been around for a while and understands more than your average newbie does, it makes no sense at all and I can't begin to imagine why they would do that.

Unless of course it's all an effort to not be recognized as [playername].

[Phinehas]

I agree. An above-average roleplayer would perhaps even allow his character to "know" some different people. I mean, technically speaking he wasn't born yesterday. Pardon the pun. However, I would advise all players creating a new character to retain their OOC knowledge, but not their IC.

[zanzibar]

I'll agree with the above comments.

When I have a character, I try to keep in mind what that character knows and doesn't know.  My character won't know about things that have been talked about on the forums, including any roleplays that my character hasn't been involved in or told about.  If a character is new to the city, he won't know the local land marks -- or the other characters around.

In the distant past, I did have alts that I used purely as spies.  In some cases, I would pretend not to understand the game mechanics or the controls in order to convince others in a very OOC way that I was truly a new player.  That was inappropriate however, as is the whole idea of spy-alts as it is generally practiced.  I wasn't aware that this had become a practice common enough to talk about on the forums though?

[Phinehas]

I wasn't aware that this had become a practice common enough to talk about on the forums though?

We were bored. So sue us.

[bilbous]

To me there is nothing that says "I've never played before, this is the first time ever I have logged into the game." Therefor there seems no need to go around asking people how to make money, where this is or that because an unfamilar name is almost enough to mark you as new.  As far as the npc's goes you can't really "know" them in the way of having conversations. As for the players there are some friendly players that will talk to unfamiliar faces to try and welcome them to the game. They have limited time for this and I see no reason not to let them know you are familliar with the game so that they can direct their time resources to helping people who really need it. This is not to say you should not have introductory type conversations with people but they might serve you better talking about the local luminaries--notable characters--rather than static npc's and setting details. That way when come across another character you have a conversation starter.

For example "Hi bilbous, I was talking to Janner and he said you had an interesting theory about the origin of the Kran Species. My name is Iky would you like to tell me about it?" I might not be particularly notable and Janner might never say any such thing about me but you get the idea. I think one can assume that typed conversations are merely shortcuts to what the verbal conversation would be so that if, per the example, Janner told Iky about bilbous, some means of identifying him would be implicit to the discussion and could be left out because typing takes longer than talking.

It just seems to me that you can waste time relearning the setting or you can get on with powerleveling or integrating yourself into the RP scene or both. I suppose it could be seen to be part of integrating yourself into the RP scene but you will get included into the current affairs quicker if you assume the basics.

Whenever my D&D character died permanently and I had to roll up a new one I just joined the party and went on. Sometimes there was some introductory prelude but for the most part is was "Let's get to the meat of the adventure as fast as we can. That is what we are here for!"

I suppose wrong was not the proper word to use. I don't mean we should shame anyone who feels this is the way to go, which appears to be the majority of the responders. I just don't see how it helps.

As far as common practice goes, I can't say but there always seems to be new players around and if they all are really new that is a very good thing. I do not have any statistics about how many actual new players Planeshift attracts. I do know I have three accounts even though I mostly only play the one character. I don't think I am alone in having more than one account and I really should take out one or other of my alts for a spin but I prefer playing the character that is known. Perhaps when bilbous has nothing more to learn another will continue the long climb to fulfillment or perhaps I will find some other reason to play one.

Does any of this make sense?

[zanzibar]

So your concern is that old players will try to pass themselves off as new, and there's the chance that other players will then waste their time by being friendly and helpful with those who don't need the help?

[zog]

Whenever my D&D character died permanently and I had to roll up a new one I just joined the party and went on. Sometimes there was some introductory prelude but for the most part is was "Let's get to the meat of the adventure as fast as we can. That is what we are here for!"

...at least you didn't begin the game with your brand-new paladin roasting on a spit ...surrounded by ogres ...and the REST of the party had about five minutes of game-time to rescue you before you cooked to death (and they were SO not on-time!) 

[zhai]

Having new characters implies creating new stories for them. An elliptical license that would save us the time to explain how they got there knowing all our friends is too much in my opinion. It doesn't take much to get to know new people in the game, especially if you... er... already know them... I mean, well yeah... you know what I mean! Just a little RP with those you enjoy RPing already.

Anyways, pretending you are a new player is totally OOC and if you do it, it is with OOC reasons. Whether that's good or not, I think would depend on the situation. However, there's no point in trying to disguise it's OOC. And as far as guild spies goes, a good solution is to keep it all IC, never using knowledge that isn't told to the spy IC nor take information from their forums or anything. I wouldn't mind as a player having that kind of spies around my characters. Of course, if my characters found out about them they would slap the wax out their ears. In fact, I think the rangers had some spies for a while... wonder why?

*Zhai cracks her knuckles*

[bilbous]

Zog: Were you there? ... except I think I was a mage, staked out on a Giant Fire Ant hill, covered in maple syrup and the party stopped to make pancakes.

Zan: no real concern, just exploring ideas that come to mind.

zhai: wasn't really thinking about spies. I was thinking more about the kind of person who pretends to be a new player to abuse the generosity of well-meaning players. Such people are like those male players who consistantly play female characters because other guys are more likely to give them things. I am not suggesting this is a particular problem here nor can I think of any specific examples. These players are more likely to say they just want to look at the female form rather than the male one but they don't mind accepting chivalrous benefits. I have a rather unflattering name for these but that is not important.

This kind of thinking about the people who play online games is not specific to PS but I am trying to consider how it applies to PS. If this topic is unsuitable in your mind just ignore it and it will go away.

[zanzibar]

I don't think that the things you're concerned about actually happen in game though.  I don't understand why you're worried.

[Seytra]

Sadly, this sort of thing has happened and continues to happen. At least once it created major and very OOC trouble. That particular instance has been resolved, but there certainly are many such cases going on, not known to me.

The only correct behaviour IMO is that if you play an alt, be it on the same account or another, and you start to interact with someone you or your other character know, to immediately tell them that you are playing an alt of the char they know already.

The only exception is the use of very temporary alts as parts of an RP that you are conducting, where their purpose is short-lived and interaction doesn't take place beyond the replies to quest-related issues, because in that case, players are likely to know beforehand that they are alts of you.

Why would players not do this? Several reasons:

1) To spy on IC things. Very OOC and IMNSHO should be punished.
2) To spy on OOC things. Must be punished severely. This is close to fraud.
3) To remove bad OOC reputation. Instead of being honest and trying to better your reputation, they take the easy way out (which won't work, unless they actually changed their ways, in which case the disguise wouldn't be required).
4) To abuse kindness of other players. Like 1.
5) To gain undeserved OOC attention of whatever sort. Like 2.

In short, with the single exception I mentioned, I see absolutely no valid reason why this should be acceptable.

IC, however, any new character must obviously know only what they learn, and transferring knowledge from one char to another is bad RP at least. You can always skip things that your char may have learned already (like landmarks and such) if it doesn't add to the RP at hand, but other things, like other chars (not players!), must be gotten to know separately. This isn't much of a burden IMO, because alts shouldn't happen frequently.
I have only one single account, and this single account has two characters: one for RP (Netrhys) and the other (Seytra) solely for testing, but if a player thinks they can RP several characters, this is fine as well (though not at the same time, for the delayed responses).

[zanzibar]

I'm not saying you're wrong, but... giving money to characters because the player behind the character is new is itself an OOC activity.

[bilbous]

I'm not saying you're wrong, but... giving money to characters because the player behind the character is new is itself an OOC activity.

It may be strictly Out Of Context but helping truly new player/characters should not be discouraged. Old players taking advantage of this discourages the helping of new players in my opinion.

For the record, I started this topic in the abstract sense for the purposes of discussion. I do not know of any players who might be doing this but I do think it is probably being done. I hope that is clear.

[zanzibar]

Meh.  The average handout is anywhere from 500 trias to 2,000 in rare cases.  Given that the "elite" players have many millions of trias, I still don't think it's a problem.