|
|
Post by Akkarin on May 21, 2007 20:20:06 GMT
So I was walking and randomly thinking, dangerous I know, about RP and plot styles. It's a thing I do sometimes.
So I though "Hey Friday, why not stick a thread up and see what peoples views and styles are?" which was strange, considering Friday isn't my name.
Anyway what I'm getting at is, it might be interesting to see what people say and how our various styles differ, yet somehow work in an odd hashed together mess of brilliance (like the FA, wowz).
To start it off, consequences, or more specificly character deaths. How many people here would, if the situation arose, accept that their character has been seriously pwned and it's time for them to go?
And another point, running a plot. I'm interested in what people do for such things. Personally, I have a general idea in mind, work out the details in my head and let the other people's actoins decide which way it goes.
Right... Discuss!
|
|
|
|
Post by Ves on May 22, 2007 2:44:50 GMT
Yeppers. If the situation arose where Alita or Ves, as concequence of their own actions, or anothers in a suitable setting (result of an injury, someone poisoning them, ninja assassins in the night, you get the idea), should die, then they would. The toon wouldn't be going anywhere, but the character would.
This is something I'd love to learn how to do, but basically don't have the foggiest how to organise it all. I've previously had to do a fair amount of plot dodging do to work commitments, but with more free time I'd like to learn the ropes and then see what my warped little mind can come up with.............
Hope that's helped
PS.
Yes it is, you know it, I know it, the whole world knows it. The sooner you stop trying to kid yourself, the better.
|
|
|
|
Post by Shadowe on May 22, 2007 9:34:00 GMT
Wow, big subject.
Okay. I've been a long time Pen and Paper RPer (20 years), but CoH is my first go at online RP, so I'm having to adapt my techniques to the new (well, not so new, now) interface.
I suppose the hardest thing for me has been that when PnPing, I usually GM - it's rather odd for me to be a player, and that colours my perceptions.
So, I'm going to be looking at this pretty much from the point of view of running plots, since if I'm not running one, I'm frantically trying to think of one, or simply reacting to plots other people are running.
When I run a plot, I will typically borrow from my tried-and-true GMing technique: Throw a situation at the players and see how they react to it. Adapt to their actions and worry about the consequences as they happen.
I have been known to plan, and when I do, it generally works, but I know for a fact that no plot survives contact with the players, so I consciously don't overplan.
A couple of examples of this: The original Psychonova (Andrew Martin) plot that I did a while back, and the current situation that Richard finds himself in.
The original plot was for one purpose, and one purpose only - to find an excuse for Kitmarch not to be in-game for a week while Plas was away with work.
Plas and I discussed the set-up, and set it off, and most of the rest was completely ad-libbed. The sole exception to this was the 'final scene', where I had a map and one page of notes to enable me to describe things.
My plot notes for this boiled down to three points (I can't remember what they are precisely, but I'll try to paraphrase). I planned a response if Andrew was surprised. A response if he saw Richard. And a response if any other circumstances arose. That was it. Everything else was situational and therefore could not be planned in advance.
The current situation is, as you all probably know, not one that I'd planned at all. I'm ad-libbing the whole thing, and desperately trying to think far enough ahead to have some idea of what might happen next. Hopefully it will all work - I've had a lot of experience doing this, and can usually pull it off, though I'll be the first to admit that a little planning goes a long way.
One thing I've learned is to not fall in love with my own plot. They will never be so rigorously planned that player input can't affect the outcome - when I want that, I write a story.
As a player, however, I guess I'm a bit impatient. I like to see progress in a plot - if things are qualitatively the same at the start of some RP as they are at the end, I feel as though I've wasted my time.
This doesn't mean that I like plots to be resolved straight away, though - I just like to see progress, have a sense of acheivement that I've either learned something new or can see where I have to go next to move things forward a bit more.
And I like a sense that my actions make a difference, too. Drawing from my own GMing experience, I know that the worst thing a player can feel is that they cannot affect the outcome of something. If, as a player, I come up with an innovative and exciting solution to a problem, the worst thing the GM can do is say to me "that doesn't work", especially when there's no reason for it not to work.
As for character death... Tough call. It would be pretty difficult for someone to come up with a way to kill Richard, but Sam is as vulnerable as a normal human, though she heals pretty damn fast. I get very attached to my characters, and would hate to see one die, but... if the situation demands it, and there's no reasonable way that the character could survive, then I would have to accept their death. So, if Sam ends up tied to a railway track in traditional Penelope Pitstop style, and no one comes along to save her, and she doesn't manage to free herself... Yeah, I'd kill her.
|
|
|
|
Post by Solar on May 22, 2007 14:41:15 GMT
As far as char death goes: I would probably find myself, subconsiously mind you, making up excuses to keep my characters. I get very attatched to them, seeing as my very first one I got very bored of as his style meant that I mainly stayed in the background doing nothing, and now that my chars actually have someone to talk to, I'd prefer to keep them that way  . If it came to it (i.e: Iris did something very stupid, something very bad happened very quickly.) I would think about it and (atleast I hope I would) accept them snuffing it. I do try and catch myself thinking up silly reasons that have no way to work, and I hope I'm getting better at it Plots: I'm not one to start plots. I dont have time to think of them, and I'd probably end up making it seem too much like a typical story. My current status on plots is that I've only done very mini plots to introduce new characters. Chlorr and giving Iris a WS for example. Or Ebil Iris, which I have no current idea what the hell I'm going to do with, as she/he appears at points. (And I need to sort out the gender so badly, I cant remember what I've said to which people >.<) Over all, I think I'm still learning and am no where near perfect, and I think your all complete loons for putting up with some of my actions looking back on it. ((*Hits self for sticking a sword in Iris lung*...))
|
|
Lu
Full Member
Posts: 114
|
Post by Lu on May 22, 2007 16:53:51 GMT
Eeep! Please don't kill my characters. I like them too much.
I know as a proper RPer I should accept the death of my characters with god grace, particularly if they do something stoopid that is going to get them killed. But I am only learning and I am having way too much fun with my toons at the mo. I guess I'm not mature enough in my RP to accept character death just like that. I hope in time I will be able to accept it, but at the moment I can honestly say I would struggle.
Consequences of actions leading to serious incapacitation / hospitalisation / paralysis / deformity I think I could handle. Mostly because they don't quite have the permanence death does.
Sorry, this sounds like I'm a complete wuss compared to the others. Blame it on me being a soppy sentimental girly. I'm sure I'll grow up some time.
What was the other thing, oh, yeah, running plots. Hmmm, if I had any idea of a plot to run I might try, but not really got any idea at the mo. Kind of have something brewing with Lu and her cool black sword, but I don't know what it is yet, let alone how I might 'run' it.
I absolutely love reacting to ther people's plots though. Sometimes I do run out of ideas, but I try to find out what's happening and to keep things going. Apologies if this can be annoying to the person running things. I guess like Shad I get impatient and I agree with his statement about players needing to know they can make a difference, that they can achieve something by their actions.
Um.... did that answer the questions? Was it enough discussion? Hope it helped.
|
|
|
|
Post by Kat on May 22, 2007 18:00:34 GMT
I don't have many characters, so letting one (Kat particularly) go permanently would require a hell of a good reason. Even if that did happen, I like to think there would be ways to pull a character back- anyone remember Saint?- and thinking about it I've got a few things I could pull if it came to that! Plots? Well, I've only done one and I think it went OK. I planned, but "let" the characters go their way. The funny thing is I knew how everyone would react and they basically ran rails without knowing it |
|
Meadow
Junior Member
Posts: 56
|
Post by Meadow on Jun 3, 2007 1:42:20 GMT
I dont mind letting my characters die at all. It is afterall not entirely healthy to be shot several times each day ect ect. Hell .. to be honest ive even been planning killing one .. since it feels like most of my characters are turning out being worthless no matter what, so *shrugs*. Even if it is characters ive been playing for about a year. Just too bad really.
As for peoples characters surviving certain death. I would normally just see that character as being death or simply just avoid contact. Cause .. X being shot 100 times, stabbed 25 times and then being able to survive .. thats pretty stupid. Even if they did resist it. If something happends, it happends. Would i delete the character after its death ? .. It is possible that i would .. so that i could use the slot for something else. Have already deleted alot of characters.
|
|
|
|
Post by viessa on Jul 13, 2007 19:50:51 GMT
To be completly honest, I hope Viessa won't die somehow. I mean... I won't be against it, but if such a thing were to happen you'd have a Undead Viessa Karde being used as a puppet by what fragments of her mother remains inside of her skull... That would generaly be bad.  Edit: Okay, I admit it, if Viessa died I'd probably cry over it or something, I'm like Lu... please don't kill my characters. XD;; Bah, I'm such a wuss. x.x |
|
. 
