I don't mind at all if players control their own RP family members actions. But now that I think of it it is also my primary turn-off in RP when they do it a certain way. So long as it is kept realistic I think it could add a lot of fun to the RP experience. However... being a capsuleer in itself should be interesting and exciting enough experience with tons of story potential! Adventures are plentiful in space, and I prefer to talk about a capsuleers exploits that can be measured in the actual game world rather than those they invent in RP channels.
Therefore I see no need to turn every RP interaction out-of-pod into an action-packed movie or tear-jerking theatre performance. In fact, I prefer it when capsuleers seem vulnerable when they aren't in space, and it is fun to see when they have a family which adds some story depth. I don't mind if that family is "boring/mundane". In fact, I like it that way. The most interesting interactions to me in RP are also always the most apparently simple ones. Family life isn't about explosions!
This is why I don't really like it when RP'ers make their family members (also applies to servants/rivals/slaves) by creating throwaway alts in the game. This breaks my immersion because I am looking at a capsuleer, and would have to "play pretend" for it to be anything else in the game world. What makes it worse is that usually the players who make these alts tend to get bored with them quickly and make up murder/kidnapping plots, soap opera level drama, or other nonesense shortly after the alt was created. I try to keep an open mind, but it got so bad over the years that I instantly get irritated when I recognize any RP alt at all.
Down with space lesbian alts or Amarrian slave alts who have recently graduated from the Imperial Academy when I check their profile!
Hmm, I didn't mean to turn this into a rant.. but that's what I think about it!
Not that my opinion should matter, but anyone reading this and thinking of representing their family members in the game, please consider this:
I prefer:
-{Lucius Vindictus enters the channel}-/emote Lucius Vindictus enters the room, accompanied by a woman who cradles a baby in her arms.
(etc... the woman doesn't have to be a character in the game to be in my RP...)
I dislike:
-{Wife Alt Vindictus enters the channel}-
Lucius Vindictus:
"Oh my! What a surprise! Look who is here!"Wife Alt Vindictus:
"Hi everyone! I'm totally not a capsuleer in the Imperial Academy who is going to be schredded into a bloody pulp of biomass in about 15 minutes. Look at my baby! Can someone abduct me now? ... We haven't had a bombing in like two days, that would be fine as well!" I feel different about the CCP actors though! I have no problem accepting that they are not capsuleers, but rather are baseliners with the rare priviledge of access to the IGS or the Summit channel in the game due to their position in the corporation they represent. I tend to take someone with an in-game employment history with Mordus Legion Command for the pas 28 years rather more seriously than someone who has been a member of the Imperial Academy for less than a day and is making grand claims...
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Topic: Idea: Family Member Characters under other player control (yay?) (Read 7754 times)