Mechanics for Roleplaying?

[Xillix Queen of Fools]

How does one make mechanics support roleplaying?

Cast your ideas here.

Flames will be mercilessly removed.

[Tuxide]

I'm going to state the obvious here, the leveling and skill system has much to do with this I think.  How the hell does your character play a single role when it's trying to max out everything?  The current skill system is good for testing but that's about it.

[Vannaka]

I'm going to state the obvious here, the leveling and skill system has much to do with this I think.  How the hell does your character play a single role when it's trying to max out everything?  The current skill system is good for testing but that's about it.

I agree, it's both a strength and a weakness that every character can learn every skill as well as every other character.  It's a strength, in that you can develop your character in whatever way you choose, but it's also a bit unrealistic.  Maybe some sort of character classifications would be good, maybe not.  I don't know if I'd really like having limits on how far I could advance in certain directions.

I don't think mechanics should bear the burden of supporting roleplay directly.  I think so long as mechanics support realism (or as close to realism as you can get in a world with elves and magic) then the mechanics are adding to roleplay.

[Garris Shrike]

Here're my thoughts after what I read...

Keep implementing items that play along with Yliakum's history. The more us roleplayers are given in the way of real, physical items to use, the more inventive we will become as the game expands to allow more features. If you talk about dueling mechanics or anything, then a good roleplayer simply needs to have a straight head on their shoulders and know when to give or take. Otherwise, new content alone will boost the curve of RP.

[Illysia]

Regarding the leveling mechanic, I think it should be the responsibility of the player to limit their characters ability in a given field. If your characters is a poet then don't go training them to be a warrior, a cook, an assassin, etc... all at the same time. Limits would cause the character to become too stiff and possible flat. After all, people can change their professions to something radically different at any point in time in real life.


I think a job system should be set up. People RP having a profession, but that is usually all you can do (RP having the profession not really doing it). The economy is not quite strong enough to have it fully player dependent so NPCs are needed, but just selling stuff back doesn't help RP much. Have characters that train in a craft accept crafted items from players. Maybe as a regular quest or maybe as something like the change making service where you hand over an item and get something in return. Having an employer will give people something to do with the skills they've acquired and would allow them to train it in a better for RP way. killing rats to train in cooking isn't quite the most effective way to learn how to cook in real life.

For instance, as a special quest you can have Harn respond to a specific prompt to take you straight to this quest and have him tell the player to craft him an axe or so many axes to help him fill an order. In return Harn can offer less than normal pay but higher than normal experience as that seems more realistic. When learning a trade or working under someone, you will earn less than them but you can still pick up techniques and learn from them. It would be better if the items requested and the number needed varied. Better still would be if quality played a part in how much money and experience you received, but I'm sure that would be a long way off. Since some stuff requires certain skill levels to make, it would be good if the NPC could request items based on skill level or asked the player if they are high enough level to fulfill the quest, like NPCs do with asking if you have winch access.

As a similar function to the change making service, you would make a crafted item, and then give it to the NPC who would then give you a reward or money and experience if possible similar to the quest system. But as it would be easier to  do it this way. Money and experience would probably have to be even lower.

[Thoss]

How does one make mehanics support roleplaying?

Use it.

Then augment with text rp if more detail is needed since things aren't fully developed.

And then try to continue developing the mechanics so that text rp is needed less and less.

Try and use the economy...buy from crafters/miners/smelters/, hire the services of warriors/guards.  Having a party?  buy some food from a cook. 

Create a way to brew booze and we can sell it at Kada-El's.

I dunno....try and play a roleplay game?

It is difficult to do this though with things still in development.  And we need more people.  And a way to schedule things consistently.

* Thoss is off to think.

would being able to hit or cast on an inanimate object be handy?  Thoss needed to cast Freeze on an object to help some people instead of attack them, but didn't know how without attacking a character so I had to text it.

[edit]
I like illysia's ideas too, a job/economic system that is worth the efforts would help alot.  I've tried to sell items as roleplay for the heck of it, but it's hard with the picks dripping tria.
[/edit]

[Xillix Queen of Fools]

I can stop picks from dripping tria quite easily.

[zanzibar]

I agree with Illysia that being able to have every skill maxed out simultaneously isn't in the interest of roleplay.  But it isn't in the interest of the economy either.  If a single person can, all by him or herself, mine ore, purify it, craft it into a weapon, and then use the weapon as a deadly killing machine, then that person doesn't have to interact with other players as much to create an interactive and dynamic gaming environment.

An organic job system will emerge if your level in a skill decreases if the skill falls into disuse.  It would mean we can still change our characters, switch professions, and explore different skills and skill combinations, but we would have to pick and choose which skills to have a high level in at any particular time.

Clothing is a big one.  Clothes tell others about your status in society and a little about your personality or history, including possible cultural backgrounds.

I think that if skills could be maxed out more quickly, people would spend less time grinding and more time interacting with other players.

[Tuxide]

ither.  If a single person can, all by him or herself, mine ore, purify it, craft it into a weapon, and then use the weapon as a deadly killing machine, then that person doesn't have to interact with other players as much to create an interactive and dynamic gaming environment.

Keep in mind that you can do that with alts.  But then again if you were forced to have a dedicated farmer/miner alt and a dedicated blacksmith alt then would that qualify as mechanics supporting roleplaying?

I think that if skills could be maxed out more quickly, people would spend less time grinding and more time interacting with other players.

I know this has been brought up before but what about an Ultima Online-style skill cap?  If you couldn't level for more than, say, 700 times then it would be impossible to max everything in the game but you would still have the freedom to tailor your character's skills to have some functional purpose.  I think the actual game in PlaneShift is the endgame and not the leveling because if people weren't leveling they would be interacting with other players.  Then again with the number of implemented skills there wouldn't be much point to doing something like this right now.

[Donari Tyndale]

The major part is to make mechanics promote player to player interaction. Currently, you can do everything on your own, no one depends on someone else. That promotes roleplay per se. Another thing is the training system. You shouldn't need to mine 24/7 and then kill a zillion tefusangs in order to gain a crystal way level.

[Dermathil]

The major part is to make mechanics promote player to player interaction. Currently, you can do everything on your own, no one depends on someone else. That promotes roleplay per se. Another thing is the training system. You shouldn't need to mine 24/7 and then kill a zillion tefusangs in order to gain a crystal way level.

I agree with Donari, it is unrealistic to mine then to kill tefusangs to level up in anything else. I think that maybe if experience is done by practising the skill you want to level, and that no experience would be needed for Training with Trainers, but that maybe something else could replace it. Also, maybe skill-training and stat-training should have different ways to be trained. If one mined and killed tefusangs to get a higher charisma, it wouldn't look natural at all.

[Illysia]

I still think that limits and caps are a bad idea. Better to leave it too open than to clamp down to hard. People who want to level probably don't care about RP is it takes time away from training and people who RP won't max a ton of skills at once as it will interrupt RPing.

I think that leaving it open and one day having a mechanic that will allow your unused skills to gradually lower in level will be enough to prevent people from being able to do everything all at once. Although, as the renaissance proved, having people proficient in a wide variety of skills isn't a bad thing. (i.e. Leonardo da Vinci) But any skill that isn't used will eventually be forgotten in real life.

Regarding player interaction, the only thing that will promote player interaction is player interaction. Players will have to step up on this one. If you want to get more player interacting with your character you will have to get creative and be proactive. Find reasons for your character to engage other characters. It is out of the comfort zone of most RPers but it is what needs to be done.

[Dermathil]

I still think that limits and caps are a bad idea. Better to leave it too open than to clamp down to hard. People who want to level probably don't care about RP is it takes time away from training and people who RP won't max a ton of skills at once as it will interrupt RPing.

I think that leaving it open and one day having a mechanic that will allow your unused skills to gradually lower in level will be enough to prevent people from being able to do everything all at once. Although, as the renaissance proved, having people proficient in a wide variety of skills isn't a bad thing. (i.e. Leonardo da Vinci) But any skill that isn't used will eventually be forgotten in real life.

Regarding player interaction, the only thing that will promote player interaction is player interaction. Players will have to step up on this one. If you want to get more player interacting with your character you will have to get creative and be proactive. Find reasons for your character to engage other characters. It is out of the comfort zone of most RPers but it is what needs to be done.

To me all this sounds true. Although a mechanic that would lower unused skill has downsides (people always practising every skill to prevent them from lowering, for example), it also has very good sides, which might be bigger than the downsides.

Regarding the Player-to-Player interaction, I agree that your suggestion is out of the comfort zone of most RPers. But, maybe an update of the Guide to Roleplay should be updated to add a list of tips to help RPers slowly integrate that in the comfort zone of the RPers.

[Illysia]

Like I said earlier, someone that determined to level is probably less concerned with RPing. The idea is not to force people to RP but to help out those who already wish to do so.

[Tuxide]

But any skill that isn't used will eventually be forgotten in real life.

I don't really agree with this, that's just not how long-term memory works.  Look up fluid and crystallized intelligence and you'll see what I mean.  When someone is rusty on a skill, that person has had the experience before and it should take a very significantly less time to regain the knowledge than those who have never had his skill level.  Even then when you use a skill, like Heavy Armor, there are other skills that you are not even using, like Baking.  I'm not going to explain how such a mechanism should work, but I think having a decrease-over-time would punish players who don't use skills altogether.