Best thing you could do? Set aside one instance per social zone as an RP instance. Then, have a community manager MONITOR complaints, not just the forums. If people are on the RP instance starting trouble, review the complaints, and bar offenders from that particular instance. For example, Drozana. Very often I get "nopossiblemaps" whenever I try to escape the trolls and the more...amorous RPers. What I've suggested would make it possible for the RPers to be left alone, the people who hate RP to be left in peace, and the trolls are left without a target.
Fleet starbases were kind of a step in the right direction, but not all RPers are in an RP fleet, or necessarily want to RP with their fleetmates. Not to mention, fleet starbases cannot be cross factional.
That's treading dangerously close to "approved" and "unapproved" RP territory, which is an absolute train wreck just waiting to happen.
Maybe the GM's could institute 'behavioral guidelines' for specific zones, but this would be rather irregular and hard to enforce.
More and more online games (not only mmos) try to offer more freedom (yes even for trolls) .Guidlines and s*** like that would only make people feel they have to follow more rules ....so they will move to other games whichi have less "rules" .
This game already has fleets which protect (though "protect" is the wrong word) people from trolls and if you want full freedom you can go outside them.The best way to censor other people is to ignore them like you do in real every day life (I bet you dont like to go in gettos and start complaning about things you dont like there).When you plan to get into a game where are more people than your friends you should expect people you wont like for x^y reasons.
GMs should spend more time helping people who have problems with the game not trying to stop gorn jokes in zone chat .Seen that in esd zone chat a week or two ago and that was a wtf moment .
^^^ that or cryptic can turn STO into a North Korea Online Simulator.Im sure people will spend money knowing that they have to memorize a list of things which can get their account banned.
Best thing you could do? Set aside one instance per social zone as an RP instance. Then, have a community manager MONITOR complaints, not just the forums. If people are on the RP instance starting trouble, review the complaints, and bar offenders from that particular instance. For example, Drozana. Very often I get "nopossiblemaps" whenever I try to escape the trolls and the more...amorous RPers. What I've suggested would make it possible for the RPers to be left alone, the people who hate RP to be left in peace, and the trolls are left without a target.
Fleet starbases were kind of a step in the right direction, but not all RPers are in an RP fleet, or necessarily want to RP with their fleetmates. Not to mention, fleet starbases cannot be cross factional.
On the environment side, this a good idea. Along with the player limits on some maps as also mentioned in this thread. Whenever I click the map name to see a dropdown of numbered instances, it would be nice to see one labeled as Roleplay. Although, the point of better GM support would need addressed for it to be worthwhile.
(/\) Exploring Star Trek Online Since July 2008 (/\)
That's treading dangerously close to "approved" and "unapproved" RP territory, which is an absolute train wreck just waiting to happen.
I'm not sure how. What I suggest is removing the inappropriate element(IE, things of a sexual nature or trolling/griefing), and not in a "ban your account" kind of way. Everyone wins this way. If you're flagged as an inappropriate RPer, then you simply do not have access to the instance provided. The RP community wins because they now have an unmolested haven to do their thing, the more graphic RP community can go to their own ship to do what they want, non-RPers just go on about their business, the trolls/griefers lose their targets without being banned, and the company continues to make money because no one's getting kicked from the game.
I'm not sure how. What I suggest is removing the inappropriate element(IE, things of a sexual nature or trolling/griefing), and not in a "ban your account" kind of way. Everyone wins this way. If you're flagged as an inappropriate RPer, then you simply do not have access to the instance provided. The RP community wins because they now have an unmolested haven to do their thing, the more graphic RP community can go to their own ship to do what they want, non-RPers just go on about their business, the trolls/griefers lose their targets without being banned, and the company continues to make money because no one's getting kicked from the game.
You've literally made my point for me. Making value judgements about who's stories or RP style are "worthy" about being out in the open is not the role of any moderator. Is some content, approaches or subject matter not necessarily ideal for public consumption? Absolutely, but that's something that should be dealt with person to person, and group to group, not by a system with the power to ban folks from interacting with other segments of the community.
Introduce an all powerful overlord with uncontested power, and it inevitably ends up being used as a weapon between various sub-groups.
You've literally made my point for me. Making value judgements about who's stories or RP style are "worthy" about being out in the open is not the role of any moderator. Is some content, approaches or subject matter not necessarily ideal for public consumption? Absolutely, but that's something that should be dealt with person to person, and group to group, not by a system with the power to ban folks from interacting with other segments of the community.
Introduce an all powerful overlord with uncontested power, and it inevitably ends up being used as a weapon between various sub-groups.
Okay, by inappropriate, I clearly mean griefing and overtly sexual behavior. Basically, put it this way: As it stands now, if I troll or graphically depict sexual scenarios on the forums, I will get banned. If I troll or graphically depict sexual scenarios in game, the general consensus seems to be "ignore them and they'll go away." But they're not going away. It's getting worse every day.
I guess I just disagree with you on principle, though I respect your opinion. No, I don't believe that the groups I mentioned are "worthy (of) being out in the open." We do have to remember that people of all ages play this game.
I do not believe that a separate RP instance and more of a GM presence in social zones is a "train wreck waiting to happen," it's a staple in most MMOs out there, including and especially the largest one in the world.
Okay, by inappropriate, I clearly mean griefing and overtly sexual behavior. Basically, put it this way: As it stands now, if I troll or graphically depict sexual scenarios on the forums, I will get banned. If I troll or graphically depict sexual scenarios in game, the general consensus seems to be "ignore them and they'll go away." But they're not going away. It's getting worse every day.
Which is an issue that vanishes for you the instant the five person barrier is broken on foundry maps.
I guess I just disagree with you on principle, though I respect your opinion. No, I don't believe that the groups I mentioned are "worthy (of) being out in the open." We do have to remember that people of all ages play this game.
I do not believe that a separate RP instance and more of a GM presence in social zones is a "train wreck waiting to happen," it's a staple in most MMOs out there, including and especially the largest one in the world.
You're confusing a GM whose role it is to ensure things like harassment don't occur, with a GM whose role it is to monitor a roleplaying space and take action against people who are "unfit" to be in that space (which by the way is what you're advocating). No MMO that I'm aware of has anything resembling the latter.
Secondly, what makes your RP any more appropriate than anyone else's (we're going to go on a little rhetorical journey here, none of this is meant as any kind of attack or insult)? Why should your actions be sanctioned while someone else who prefers a different approach or style be actioned against? What makes you right, and them wrong?
The answer to all of that, is of course nothing. RP is RP. Simply because you don't like what someone else is doing doesn't change that fact.
You're confusing a GM whose role it is to ensure things like harassment don't occur, with a GM whose role it is to monitor a roleplaying space and take action against people who are "unfit" to be in that space (which by the way is what you're advocating). No MMO that I'm aware of has anything resembling the latter.
No, I'm not, on either counts. As I said in previous posts, respectfully, is that we need more of a GM presence, and a separate instance. Violations of the EULA such as (wow, said this alot today) overtly sexual behavior and trolling/griefing should NOT be allowed in public space. Simple as that.
You're confusing a GM whose role it is to ensure things like harassment don't occur, with a GM whose role it is to monitor a roleplaying space and take action against people who are "unfit" to be in that space (which by the way is what you're advocating). No MMO that I'm aware of has anything resembling the latter.
WoW does. That policy is absolutely necessary to keep RP servers from devolving into regular PvE/PvP servers.
I'm curious, I often hear that STO isn't set up for RP, or doesn't support the RP community, but I never hear specifics. What are some things we (Cryptic) could be doing to support you guys better, without negatively impacting those who are not interested? Is there something specifically on the Environment side of things that I could keep in mind going forward? I'm always up for suggestions on other socialish places to include in maps besides bars/restaurants, but time/existing assets/lack of ideas often lead to more bars, etc.
Like some have said, the problem isn't as much social areas or zones but social instances. Since we are on a full single server everyone from PvPers to PvEers to hardcore mega method actor RPers are together. Rpers are in most cases the smallest group. In any particular instance of say ESD there is no way of knowing if there is anyone in the instance you are in open to RP other than asking in zone which... feels odd to many. If we just started RPing in local, hoping for a response, we'd be subjecting people who would call that spam or harass us openly.
Many other games get around that by having a server or shard devoted to RP, that way most people who start characters on that shard are aware of RP presence on the server and at least know what they are to expect even if they don't take part. Since STO isn't divided that way there is no way to make a simple judgement call for open world RP or to know anything you do will not garnish guaranteed RP griefers or open harassment.
A possible solution would perhaps be an instance marked for RP, such as ESD RP 1, or Drazona RP 3. That way players who want to be in that environment could probably find one another where now they are reliant on luck and fleets. Griefing would still be a problem, but, the Non-RPers wouldn't be "bothered" unless they chose to join those instances of the zones and the RPers would know they had an environment with other RPers in them. Not sure if possible, but, it would be perhaps one of the biggest things you could do to make that better environment.
It's a heck of a lot better than us trying to work out on our own that DS9#2 is for RPers or that if you want to RP you need to move to the Justice server or what have you.
I really think a dedicated GM for even 1 RP ESD instance, 24/7 is probably not realistic. We do have GMs, but we don't have WoW money to afford a billion of them to keep tabs on everyone all the time.
And an RP Server/Instance would most certainly draw trolls.
I really think a dedicated GM for even 1 RP ESD instance, 24/7 is probably not realistic. We do have GMs, but we don't have WoW money to afford a billion of them to keep tabs on everyone all the time.
And an RP Server/Instance would most certainly draw trolls.
I've always wondered why this doesn't work a bit like the community moderator program, volunteers, interviewed, selected, and trained but with only 'warning' level powers, which can then be escalated to higher ups.
I'm not an RPer, mostly because I can't keep a straight face while doing so, and often diverge into things that I find amusing, usually only leading to the real RPers getting mad at me. But I have an appreciation for it. This is a good article/video, thanks for doing it.
I'm curious, I often hear that STO isn't set up for RP, or doesn't support the RP community, but I never hear specifics. What are some things we (Cryptic) could be doing to support you guys better, without negatively impacting those who are not interested? Is there something specifically on the Environment side of things that I could keep in mind going forward? I'm always up for suggestions on other socialish places to include in maps besides bars/restaurants, but time/existing assets/lack of ideas often lead to more bars, etc.
RP is what you make of it and finding a group that you can fit in will be a challenge. I consider myself lucky to have fallen with group I have. What I have found is that Trekkies love to RP in game and as such are looking to keep things as close to cannon as possible.
To have a fully built ship would be a big help. Fleet star bases are a good alternative for this. The idea being a captain could go from the bridge to engineering and hit the spots in between without too many loading screens.
An end game raid type scenario where multiple fleets could come together with large fleet ships would be beneficial. A combination of ground and space environments. Teamwork.
War Games scenarios where Feds can battle Feds and KDF can battle KDF with a story line behind it. Perhaps there can be buffs added in that would last for an hour after the combat.
Classes at Star Fleet Academy. The instructors could be scripted to provide the same text on the hour. The idea being RPers could take a class at SFA or KDF and then RP the study and testing sessions. I'm sure you could find plenty of RPers that would help develop the text for the instructors.
I've always wondered why this doesn't work a bit like the community moderator program, volunteers, interviewed, selected, and trained but with only 'warning' level powers, which can then be escalated to higher ups.
Just strikes me as odd.
The risk we run with that is giving one class of players privileges above another. In UO you have an Event Moderator on each shard. That EM hosts a story line event the players can take part in and help shape. There is no way to have it RP focused and warn people not RPing. That would be food for the trolls.
That being said, it would be nice to see an EM program implemented in game.
I really think a dedicated GM for even 1 RP ESD instance, 24/7 is probably not realistic. We do have GMs, but we don't have WoW money to afford a billion of them to keep tabs on everyone all the time.
And an RP Server/Instance would most certainly draw trolls.
Well, looks like you got the answers to your question. There's never going to be a perfect environment, but, unless there is a place where the open community of players knows they can go and find RP and griefing is an infraction of ToS and manageable as such STO is not going to be set up for RPers or the RP community.
I agree that the 24/7 GM is unrealistic, but, if in any way there was a strong anti-harassment policy in the Terms of Service and a way to eventually penalize those that break it (even after long review or a tally of so many hundred bad marks and a GM checking and giving a rubber stamp and a penalty) would go an amazingly long way. It may even, over time, curb the shear amount of trolls for those RP instances.
I played WoW on an RP server, and never once did I see any kind of game staff act as "RP police". But, what I did see was trolls and griefers getting banned after a few weeks of constant harassment and reports. STO, has fleets built around the comradely of harassing this entire playerbase in Drozana.
Given all the problems with the game itself, STO still has the amazing potential to be a fantastic RP experience. The problem is the set pieces. Most of the chairs at Drozana, Bajor, or Quarks cannot be sat in. One cannot order a drink from the barkeep and see drinks at their table.
Larger groups and mixed groups would also be nice for neutral locations. One cannot effectively trade barbs like Kirk and Koloth if Kirk and Koloth cannot find one another efficiently.
Star Trek is rich in culture from many races and civilizations but there are very few locations we can actually visit. Most of the planets comprising these systems are dead or mysteriously populated with loitering, hostile aliens squatting ancient ruins of little significance.
Jack Emmert: "Starfleet and Klingon. ... So two factions, full PvE content." Al Rivera hates Klingons Star Trek Online: Agents of Jack Emmert All cloaks should be canon.
I'm not an RPer, mostly because I can't keep a straight face while doing so, and often diverge into things that I find amusing, usually only leading to the real RPers getting mad at me. But I have an appreciation for it. This is a good article/video, thanks for doing it.
I'm curious, I often hear that STO isn't set up for RP, or doesn't support the RP community, but I never hear specifics. What are some things we (Cryptic) could be doing to support you guys better, without negatively impacting those who are not interested? Is there something specifically on the Environment side of things that I could keep in mind going forward? I'm always up for suggestions on other socialish places to include in maps besides bars/restaurants, but time/existing assets/lack of ideas often lead to more bars, etc.
There have been a lot of good ideas mentioned already. I'd like to suggest a few more. Personally, I've found that in general, STO is just fine for roleplaying, but there are a lot of small improvements that could be made.
1) Ship interiors. It would be great if we could get some more customization for them, maybe able to choose different lower decks? Having ship interiors accessible is great for roleplay; being able to differentiate them from each other would be even better (the Galaxy and Defiant having the same enormous warp core strains credulity somewhat). Updating the chairs in the ready room, private quarters, and lounge to be sittable would also help, or at least adjusting their placement so we can use a sit emote on them (right now many are wedged under tables and inaccessible).
2) Emotes. A lot of verisimilitude can be added to a scene through emotes, and the wider the range of actions available, the better. For instance, just today there were two fairly lengthy scenes in base sickbay; if the injured personnel were able to utilize some of the 'injured/pained' stances (as seen on NPCs) instead of laying down stiff as a board (the current 'sleep' emote) it would have added a bit to the scene and made it that much more immersive. Also, being able to trigger more emotes as 'continuous'; to reference sickbay again, keeping the medical tricorder running constantly while giving a diagnosis is better than occasionally triggering it for 3-second bursts. Finally, if someone enters an area after an emote is activated, they don't see the emote, just the person standing on a chair - fixing that would get rid of a minor annoyance.
3) Keep working on expanding the interior options available for fleet starbases. A huge amount of our RP happens on the starbase, simply because we can't be interrupted by random passers-by. An immediate upgrade would be expanding the lounge to have tables with more than two seats, a limitation that's vexed us more than once.
4) In reference to why we RP on the starbase so much; perhaps some way of allowing private instances on the social worlds (Bajor, Vulcan, et al) so we can act out away missions and so forth without interrupting or being interrupted by other roleplayers and/or people just trying to run quests and buy things?
5) It's been mentioned, but finding some way to allow more than 5 people on a mission would be spectacular. There are always more volunteers than spaces available on roleplayed missions.
I'm curious, I often hear that STO isn't set up for RP, or doesn't support the RP community, but I never hear specifics. What are some things we (Cryptic) could be doing to support you guys better, without negatively impacting those who are not interested? Is there something specifically on the Environment side of things that I could keep in mind going forward? I'm always up for suggestions on other socialish places to include in maps besides bars/restaurants, but time/existing assets/lack of ideas often lead to more bars, etc.
RP'rs are usually pretty good at adapting their environment to suit, even games like GW2 which have little RP support people find a way - remember, RPG's started life as pen and paper tabletop games where they had nothing but their own imaginations to work with.
Some of my own personal issues are more mechanical than environmental.
a) Ship "destruction" on death. As people've said, every ship explodes violently, you never see ships disabled allied or enemy. It'd improve immersion if ships frequently were rendered inoperable rather than destroyed; it happens plenty enough when the plot requires it so the mechanics exist in the game; this is especially true of player ships - the respawn mechanic cheapens dying. It'd be better to have a "downed" mechanic so a player ship becomes disabled; maybe keeps on drifting to get it clear of the fight, and when the respawn timer has counted down systems comes back online. (A ship frequently disabled will eventually be renderted helpless from critical system damage anyway so it doesn't differ much from normal respawn rules)
b) Size of spawns. The game addresses multiple players by spawning more enemy ships to compensate, but this can end up in rediculous scenarios where a routine patrol ends up having to cut through the entire romulan armada and half a dozen scimitar dreadnoughts - in these situations you have to get creative in your after action report or debriefing because there is no way you can realistically blow up 10,000 people every time you leave spacedock
A "4th difficulty mode" would be helpful, where instead of spawning more ships, it scales up the damage and toughess of the ships spawned to keep the situation dangerous without turning it into a clusterfudge.
Asides from this thought STO provides an outstanding amount of content to work with - bridges, private fleet bases embassies etc. and is right on the mark for RP's
When it comes to RP, there are a couple things that I would really like to see added or enhanced:
1- Additional Emotes: This is for the most part a no-brainer and I'm sure that others before me have posted this. Emotes such as using a PADD would be very helpful, as we already have the tricorder one, it seems only right to add a PADD to the mix.
Another helpful set of emotes would be ones for using a console, be it a desk console, wall console etc.
2- Talking Animation when in the 'Local' Channel: Self explanatory, this is something that Star Wars Galaxies did very well, in my opinion. When saying something in "Local" or "Say", the character would make a general talking animation, which would also do another animation based on certain keywords that were used.
Example 1: A character says "That was a good joke!" The character would merely do the normal talking animation.
Example 2: A character says "Hahaha! That was a good joke!" The character would do a laughing animation rather than the standard talking one to reflect the words used by the character.
This was a small detail in the grand scheme of things, but it was just another bit to add to the overall immersion.
3- Looped Animations: If my character is working on a report on a tricorder (or a PADD if they were available) they might be taking longer than 2 seconds. Rather than having to type in /emote tricorder every 3 seconds, it would be nice to type something such as /emote tricorder_loop to let the animation continue until I move or hit esc.
4- Modify Bridge Officer Locations on Ship: While on my bridge, there is one thing that I wish I could change immediately and one that I wish I could change down the road. The more immediate change would be the placement of my Bridge Officers. If I am going to RP with another player as my first officer, they currently have no place to sit, since NPC Bridge Officers currently fill all of the available spaces. I would like to see the option to have any bridge mimic the setup of the Odyssey Bridge, where the 3 command seats in the center are not only open, but able to be sat in via clicking on them.
The secondary change I would like is to change which ship is displayed on the back wall panels, but this is minor in the grand scheme of things.
5- Every chair "sittable"- Every RPers wish and again self explanatory, If there is a chair in the world, you should be able to sit in it via clicking on it.
We do have GMs, but we don't have WoW money to afford a billion of them to keep tabs on everyone all the time.
Neither did WoW when they started in the business. Their money comes from good customer service, listening to the players and taking an active stance into the game itself. Maybe instead of paying a guy to make ridiculous noncom pets like epohhs, you could pay a guy to review chat logs.
This seems to be a common misconception that WoW is a great game with devs working on bug fixes and GM's actively managing the game because it has lots and lots of money. It's really the other way around. WoW has lots and lots of money BECAUSE it's a great game with devs working on bug fixes and GM's actively managing the game.
I'm curious, I often hear that STO isn't set up for RP, or doesn't support the RP community, but I never hear specifics. What are some things we (Cryptic) could be doing to support you guys better, without negatively impacting those who are not interested? Is there something specifically on the Environment side of things that I could keep in mind going forward? I'm always up for suggestions on other socialish places to include in maps besides bars/restaurants, but time/existing assets/lack of ideas often lead to more bars, etc.
Most of the existing stuff is suficient but I can throw in a few thoughts of some good places that would be fun for roleplayers.
Fleet Starbase Additions
Crew Quarters Deck (With Customization if Possible)
Brig (And not the cell kind weve seen in game, the kind where the brig is built into the wall, ex: Voyager and TNG)
Interiors to Facilities (Ex. Shipyard with the ability to see ships in the drydocks)
Fleet Admiral's Office
Stage/Stadium (Place to hold fleet wide meetings, the conference room can only hold 8)
Stateroom/Courtoom
Arboretum
Atrometrics Labs
I'm sure I can think of more. I might post more ideas later after some more thought.
One thing that would be great is to bring back the old lounge From the old ESD. The place that you went up into via a turbolift behind the old club 47. That used to be a center of Federation RP. It's a place that is sorely missed.
Oh sure, call even MORE attention to us. Not like us role-players don't suffer enough scorn from PvPers and raiders as it is.
I've always maintained that role-players are the ones that stick around long after the content goes stale and keeps the lights on with their subscription fee. Those are the people you should be catering too. PvPers and raiders will move on to the next flashy game regardless how much you try to placate them.
Oh sure, call even MORE attention to us. Not like us role-players don't suffer enough scorn from PvPers and raiders as it is.
I've always maintained that role-players are the ones that stick around long after the content goes stale and keeps the lights on with their subscription fee. Those are the people you should be catering too. PvPers and raiders will move on to the next flashy game regardless how much you try to placate them.
There she is! You need to log-in more, young lady.
Unfortunately, options for RP in STO are somewhat limited, especially considering the rather inconvenient way the chat works, having to hit return to start a message as well as send one, only being allowed a very limited number of characters per message and the chat clearing out by itself after some time so you can't just scroll up and re-read something you might have missed or forgotten. I've been roleplaying Star Trek for a little over twelve years now, though usually I play by e-mail or message board as that allows for a more convenient writing environment.
The visual aspect of STO certainly helps with imagination sometimes and I've started using the tailor to make avatars for my RPG characters, however the limited number of interactions possible and the lack of functionality of all the surroundings (you don't even have a replicator animation for someone to walk up and order Earl Grey, and no matter what you eat or drink it always looks the same) put a damper on the in-game RP, as far as I'm concerned. By and large, I find RP out of the game a lot more engaging and offering a lot more creative possibilities than in the game.
Add to that the number of trolls in the game whose only highlight in life seems to be running around with fire extinguishers and other annoying gadgets and specifically disrupting people who RP and I'm really not all that excited about things here. What this game needs is an option to completely ignore annoying players, that means not even displaying their avatars or the results of their actions on a social map, only should you happen to be grouped with them into PvE or PvP. That way, all the trolling on social maps would stop immediately.
My experience with RPers has been one of xenophobia - always reticent about including others into their cadres without a three-page description about their toon.
Out of curiosity, what's wrong with having to hit enter to start chat?
It's not the way all other usual chat features work. Deviation from the norm, in this case, means the chance for accidental power activation or running around, breaking an emote, are a lot higher than they would otherwise be.
But this is only a minor issue, a small inconvenience. By far the biggest issue is that you can't fully ignore the trolls.
My experience with RPers has been one of xenophobia - always reticent about including others into their cadres without a three-page description about their toon.
I know not all are like this, but c'mon...
This is necessary for consistent roleplay, for several reasons.
a) If you're unknown to the group nobody will know what to expect from you. A game such as STO breeds power gamers. In the PvE part of the game the player's character and ship are always a lot stronger than the opponents they meet, with the correct setup it's possible to simultaneously tackle dozens of ships, for example. This is frowned upon by most in the RP community and asking for a bio will put your character into perspective, allowing them to figure out if and how you'll fit into the group.
b) Often, RP characters are not exactly what they look like on the outside. The game allows for the creation of only Starfleet or KDF officers. There are no civilians, no enlisted, no members of any other organisations that can be represented by the player's avatar or toon, as you call it. In order to allow other players in the group to react to yours in an appropriate fashion, background information is very helpful.
c) Depending on the type of RP, it's important for people who participate, and especially a game master (i.e. the one who directs a plot-driven RP), to know about specific skills, powers and knowledge a given character has. While the characters won't know that right off the start, it's important knowledge for the players to have, as that tells them what they can and cannot do. It also gives them the ability to call another player out on suddenly adding a skill or an ability to their characters as it suits the situation, thereby playing themselves into the foreground and heroically saving the day, side-lining everyone else in the game.
Now, claiming it's three pages, I'm sure, is a bit of an exaggeration on your part. I, for one, only write biographies this long for forum or e-mail based games, where there's a lot more focus on writing the part, writing about what the character thinks and feels much more than about what the character says and does.
For the purposes of a run-of-the-mill improvised RP, such as meeting at a bar on Drozana station or by the fountain on Bajor, just having a friendly chat and downing a few drinks, a two or three paragraph introductions of your character is entirely sufficient, and there's plenty of space for that in the character bio section you can fill out in-game.
Comments
That's treading dangerously close to "approved" and "unapproved" RP territory, which is an absolute train wreck just waiting to happen.
More and more online games (not only mmos) try to offer more freedom (yes even for trolls) .Guidlines and s*** like that would only make people feel they have to follow more rules ....so they will move to other games whichi have less "rules" .
This game already has fleets which protect (though "protect" is the wrong word) people from trolls and if you want full freedom you can go outside them.The best way to censor other people is to ignore them like you do in real every day life (I bet you dont like to go in gettos and start complaning about things you dont like there).When you plan to get into a game where are more people than your friends you should expect people you wont like for x^y reasons.
GMs should spend more time helping people who have problems with the game not trying to stop gorn jokes in zone chat .Seen that in esd zone chat a week or two ago and that was a wtf moment .
^^^ that or cryptic can turn STO into a North Korea Online Simulator.Im sure people will spend money knowing that they have to memorize a list of things which can get their account banned.
On the environment side, this a good idea. Along with the player limits on some maps as also mentioned in this thread. Whenever I click the map name to see a dropdown of numbered instances, it would be nice to see one labeled as Roleplay. Although, the point of better GM support would need addressed for it to be worthwhile.
I'm not sure how. What I suggest is removing the inappropriate element(IE, things of a sexual nature or trolling/griefing), and not in a "ban your account" kind of way. Everyone wins this way. If you're flagged as an inappropriate RPer, then you simply do not have access to the instance provided. The RP community wins because they now have an unmolested haven to do their thing, the more graphic RP community can go to their own ship to do what they want, non-RPers just go on about their business, the trolls/griefers lose their targets without being banned, and the company continues to make money because no one's getting kicked from the game.
You've literally made my point for me. Making value judgements about who's stories or RP style are "worthy" about being out in the open is not the role of any moderator. Is some content, approaches or subject matter not necessarily ideal for public consumption? Absolutely, but that's something that should be dealt with person to person, and group to group, not by a system with the power to ban folks from interacting with other segments of the community.
Introduce an all powerful overlord with uncontested power, and it inevitably ends up being used as a weapon between various sub-groups.
Okay, by inappropriate, I clearly mean griefing and overtly sexual behavior. Basically, put it this way: As it stands now, if I troll or graphically depict sexual scenarios on the forums, I will get banned. If I troll or graphically depict sexual scenarios in game, the general consensus seems to be "ignore them and they'll go away." But they're not going away. It's getting worse every day.
I guess I just disagree with you on principle, though I respect your opinion. No, I don't believe that the groups I mentioned are "worthy (of) being out in the open." We do have to remember that people of all ages play this game.
I do not believe that a separate RP instance and more of a GM presence in social zones is a "train wreck waiting to happen," it's a staple in most MMOs out there, including and especially the largest one in the world.
Which is an issue that vanishes for you the instant the five person barrier is broken on foundry maps.
You're confusing a GM whose role it is to ensure things like harassment don't occur, with a GM whose role it is to monitor a roleplaying space and take action against people who are "unfit" to be in that space (which by the way is what you're advocating). No MMO that I'm aware of has anything resembling the latter.
Secondly, what makes your RP any more appropriate than anyone else's (we're going to go on a little rhetorical journey here, none of this is meant as any kind of attack or insult)? Why should your actions be sanctioned while someone else who prefers a different approach or style be actioned against? What makes you right, and them wrong?
The answer to all of that, is of course nothing. RP is RP. Simply because you don't like what someone else is doing doesn't change that fact.
No, I'm not, on either counts. As I said in previous posts, respectfully, is that we need more of a GM presence, and a separate instance. Violations of the EULA such as (wow, said this alot today) overtly sexual behavior and trolling/griefing should NOT be allowed in public space. Simple as that.
In fact, I'll just leave this here. This is an example of what other MMOs do, and what should be done in STO. http://wow.joystiq.com/2010/08/04/blizzard-to-patrol-moon-guards-goldshire-for-harassment-erotic/
Like some have said, the problem isn't as much social areas or zones but social instances. Since we are on a full single server everyone from PvPers to PvEers to hardcore mega method actor RPers are together. Rpers are in most cases the smallest group. In any particular instance of say ESD there is no way of knowing if there is anyone in the instance you are in open to RP other than asking in zone which... feels odd to many. If we just started RPing in local, hoping for a response, we'd be subjecting people who would call that spam or harass us openly.
Many other games get around that by having a server or shard devoted to RP, that way most people who start characters on that shard are aware of RP presence on the server and at least know what they are to expect even if they don't take part. Since STO isn't divided that way there is no way to make a simple judgement call for open world RP or to know anything you do will not garnish guaranteed RP griefers or open harassment.
A possible solution would perhaps be an instance marked for RP, such as ESD RP 1, or Drazona RP 3. That way players who want to be in that environment could probably find one another where now they are reliant on luck and fleets. Griefing would still be a problem, but, the Non-RPers wouldn't be "bothered" unless they chose to join those instances of the zones and the RPers would know they had an environment with other RPers in them. Not sure if possible, but, it would be perhaps one of the biggest things you could do to make that better environment.
It's a heck of a lot better than us trying to work out on our own that DS9#2 is for RPers or that if you want to RP you need to move to the Justice server or what have you.
And an RP Server/Instance would most certainly draw trolls.
I've always wondered why this doesn't work a bit like the community moderator program, volunteers, interviewed, selected, and trained but with only 'warning' level powers, which can then be escalated to higher ups.
Just strikes me as odd.
knaws how to give a ship a proper shakdown
I have mastered crafting all PVE mastered the new reputation stuff
I forgot I mastered STF's to and Doff system
RP is what you make of it and finding a group that you can fit in will be a challenge. I consider myself lucky to have fallen with group I have. What I have found is that Trekkies love to RP in game and as such are looking to keep things as close to cannon as possible.
Thanks for the game.
The risk we run with that is giving one class of players privileges above another. In UO you have an Event Moderator on each shard. That EM hosts a story line event the players can take part in and help shape. There is no way to have it RP focused and warn people not RPing. That would be food for the trolls.
That being said, it would be nice to see an EM program implemented in game.
Well, looks like you got the answers to your question. There's never going to be a perfect environment, but, unless there is a place where the open community of players knows they can go and find RP and griefing is an infraction of ToS and manageable as such STO is not going to be set up for RPers or the RP community.
I agree that the 24/7 GM is unrealistic, but, if in any way there was a strong anti-harassment policy in the Terms of Service and a way to eventually penalize those that break it (even after long review or a tally of so many hundred bad marks and a GM checking and giving a rubber stamp and a penalty) would go an amazingly long way. It may even, over time, curb the shear amount of trolls for those RP instances.
I played WoW on an RP server, and never once did I see any kind of game staff act as "RP police". But, what I did see was trolls and griefers getting banned after a few weeks of constant harassment and reports. STO, has fleets built around the comradely of harassing this entire playerbase in Drozana.
Larger groups and mixed groups would also be nice for neutral locations. One cannot effectively trade barbs like Kirk and Koloth if Kirk and Koloth cannot find one another efficiently.
Star Trek is rich in culture from many races and civilizations but there are very few locations we can actually visit. Most of the planets comprising these systems are dead or mysteriously populated with loitering, hostile aliens squatting ancient ruins of little significance.
Al Rivera hates Klingons
Star Trek Online: Agents of Jack Emmert
All cloaks should be canon.
There have been a lot of good ideas mentioned already. I'd like to suggest a few more. Personally, I've found that in general, STO is just fine for roleplaying, but there are a lot of small improvements that could be made.
1) Ship interiors. It would be great if we could get some more customization for them, maybe able to choose different lower decks? Having ship interiors accessible is great for roleplay; being able to differentiate them from each other would be even better (the Galaxy and Defiant having the same enormous warp core strains credulity somewhat). Updating the chairs in the ready room, private quarters, and lounge to be sittable would also help, or at least adjusting their placement so we can use a sit emote on them (right now many are wedged under tables and inaccessible).
2) Emotes. A lot of verisimilitude can be added to a scene through emotes, and the wider the range of actions available, the better. For instance, just today there were two fairly lengthy scenes in base sickbay; if the injured personnel were able to utilize some of the 'injured/pained' stances (as seen on NPCs) instead of laying down stiff as a board (the current 'sleep' emote) it would have added a bit to the scene and made it that much more immersive. Also, being able to trigger more emotes as 'continuous'; to reference sickbay again, keeping the medical tricorder running constantly while giving a diagnosis is better than occasionally triggering it for 3-second bursts. Finally, if someone enters an area after an emote is activated, they don't see the emote, just the person standing on a chair - fixing that would get rid of a minor annoyance.
3) Keep working on expanding the interior options available for fleet starbases. A huge amount of our RP happens on the starbase, simply because we can't be interrupted by random passers-by. An immediate upgrade would be expanding the lounge to have tables with more than two seats, a limitation that's vexed us more than once.
4) In reference to why we RP on the starbase so much; perhaps some way of allowing private instances on the social worlds (Bajor, Vulcan, et al) so we can act out away missions and so forth without interrupting or being interrupted by other roleplayers and/or people just trying to run quests and buy things?
5) It's been mentioned, but finding some way to allow more than 5 people on a mission would be spectacular. There are always more volunteers than spaces available on roleplayed missions.
RP'rs are usually pretty good at adapting their environment to suit, even games like GW2 which have little RP support people find a way - remember, RPG's started life as pen and paper tabletop games where they had nothing but their own imaginations to work with.
Some of my own personal issues are more mechanical than environmental.
a) Ship "destruction" on death. As people've said, every ship explodes violently, you never see ships disabled allied or enemy. It'd improve immersion if ships frequently were rendered inoperable rather than destroyed; it happens plenty enough when the plot requires it so the mechanics exist in the game; this is especially true of player ships - the respawn mechanic cheapens dying. It'd be better to have a "downed" mechanic so a player ship becomes disabled; maybe keeps on drifting to get it clear of the fight, and when the respawn timer has counted down systems comes back online. (A ship frequently disabled will eventually be renderted helpless from critical system damage anyway so it doesn't differ much from normal respawn rules)
b) Size of spawns. The game addresses multiple players by spawning more enemy ships to compensate, but this can end up in rediculous scenarios where a routine patrol ends up having to cut through the entire romulan armada and half a dozen scimitar dreadnoughts - in these situations you have to get creative in your after action report or debriefing because there is no way you can realistically blow up 10,000 people every time you leave spacedock
A "4th difficulty mode" would be helpful, where instead of spawning more ships, it scales up the damage and toughess of the ships spawned to keep the situation dangerous without turning it into a clusterfudge.
Asides from this thought STO provides an outstanding amount of content to work with - bridges, private fleet bases embassies etc. and is right on the mark for RP's
1- Additional Emotes: This is for the most part a no-brainer and I'm sure that others before me have posted this. Emotes such as using a PADD would be very helpful, as we already have the tricorder one, it seems only right to add a PADD to the mix.
Another helpful set of emotes would be ones for using a console, be it a desk console, wall console etc.
2- Talking Animation when in the 'Local' Channel: Self explanatory, this is something that Star Wars Galaxies did very well, in my opinion. When saying something in "Local" or "Say", the character would make a general talking animation, which would also do another animation based on certain keywords that were used.
Example 1: A character says "That was a good joke!" The character would merely do the normal talking animation.
Example 2: A character says "Hahaha! That was a good joke!" The character would do a laughing animation rather than the standard talking one to reflect the words used by the character.
This was a small detail in the grand scheme of things, but it was just another bit to add to the overall immersion.
3- Looped Animations: If my character is working on a report on a tricorder (or a PADD if they were available) they might be taking longer than 2 seconds. Rather than having to type in /emote tricorder every 3 seconds, it would be nice to type something such as /emote tricorder_loop to let the animation continue until I move or hit esc.
4- Modify Bridge Officer Locations on Ship: While on my bridge, there is one thing that I wish I could change immediately and one that I wish I could change down the road. The more immediate change would be the placement of my Bridge Officers. If I am going to RP with another player as my first officer, they currently have no place to sit, since NPC Bridge Officers currently fill all of the available spaces. I would like to see the option to have any bridge mimic the setup of the Odyssey Bridge, where the 3 command seats in the center are not only open, but able to be sat in via clicking on them.
The secondary change I would like is to change which ship is displayed on the back wall panels, but this is minor in the grand scheme of things.
5- Every chair "sittable"- Every RPers wish and again self explanatory, If there is a chair in the world, you should be able to sit in it via clicking on it.
Neither did WoW when they started in the business. Their money comes from good customer service, listening to the players and taking an active stance into the game itself. Maybe instead of paying a guy to make ridiculous noncom pets like epohhs, you could pay a guy to review chat logs.
This seems to be a common misconception that WoW is a great game with devs working on bug fixes and GM's actively managing the game because it has lots and lots of money. It's really the other way around. WoW has lots and lots of money BECAUSE it's a great game with devs working on bug fixes and GM's actively managing the game.
Most of the existing stuff is suficient but I can throw in a few thoughts of some good places that would be fun for roleplayers.
Fleet Starbase Additions
I'm sure I can think of more. I might post more ideas later after some more thought.
One thing that would be great is to bring back the old lounge From the old ESD. The place that you went up into via a turbolift behind the old club 47. That used to be a center of Federation RP. It's a place that is sorely missed.
I've always maintained that role-players are the ones that stick around long after the content goes stale and keeps the lights on with their subscription fee. Those are the people you should be catering too. PvPers and raiders will move on to the next flashy game regardless how much you try to placate them.
There she is! You need to log-in more, young lady.
<==Corris.
Come RP with us!
The visual aspect of STO certainly helps with imagination sometimes and I've started using the tailor to make avatars for my RPG characters, however the limited number of interactions possible and the lack of functionality of all the surroundings (you don't even have a replicator animation for someone to walk up and order Earl Grey, and no matter what you eat or drink it always looks the same) put a damper on the in-game RP, as far as I'm concerned. By and large, I find RP out of the game a lot more engaging and offering a lot more creative possibilities than in the game.
Add to that the number of trolls in the game whose only highlight in life seems to be running around with fire extinguishers and other annoying gadgets and specifically disrupting people who RP and I'm really not all that excited about things here. What this game needs is an option to completely ignore annoying players, that means not even displaying their avatars or the results of their actions on a social map, only should you happen to be grouped with them into PvE or PvP. That way, all the trolling on social maps would stop immediately.
Out of curiosity, what's wrong with having to hit enter to start chat?
LULZ!!!
My experience with RPers has been one of xenophobia - always reticent about including others into their cadres without a three-page description about their toon.
I know not all are like this, but c'mon...
It's not the way all other usual chat features work. Deviation from the norm, in this case, means the chance for accidental power activation or running around, breaking an emote, are a lot higher than they would otherwise be.
But this is only a minor issue, a small inconvenience. By far the biggest issue is that you can't fully ignore the trolls.
This is necessary for consistent roleplay, for several reasons.
a) If you're unknown to the group nobody will know what to expect from you. A game such as STO breeds power gamers. In the PvE part of the game the player's character and ship are always a lot stronger than the opponents they meet, with the correct setup it's possible to simultaneously tackle dozens of ships, for example. This is frowned upon by most in the RP community and asking for a bio will put your character into perspective, allowing them to figure out if and how you'll fit into the group.
b) Often, RP characters are not exactly what they look like on the outside. The game allows for the creation of only Starfleet or KDF officers. There are no civilians, no enlisted, no members of any other organisations that can be represented by the player's avatar or toon, as you call it. In order to allow other players in the group to react to yours in an appropriate fashion, background information is very helpful.
c) Depending on the type of RP, it's important for people who participate, and especially a game master (i.e. the one who directs a plot-driven RP), to know about specific skills, powers and knowledge a given character has. While the characters won't know that right off the start, it's important knowledge for the players to have, as that tells them what they can and cannot do. It also gives them the ability to call another player out on suddenly adding a skill or an ability to their characters as it suits the situation, thereby playing themselves into the foreground and heroically saving the day, side-lining everyone else in the game.
Now, claiming it's three pages, I'm sure, is a bit of an exaggeration on your part. I, for one, only write biographies this long for forum or e-mail based games, where there's a lot more focus on writing the part, writing about what the character thinks and feels much more than about what the character says and does.
For the purposes of a run-of-the-mill improvised RP, such as meeting at a bar on Drozana station or by the fountain on Bajor, just having a friendly chat and downing a few drinks, a two or three paragraph introductions of your character is entirely sufficient, and there's plenty of space for that in the character bio section you can fill out in-game.