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[Veiki]

From here: https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=496456&p=1

Well it looks like it's that time of year again to answer the perennial question confronting RP in Eve:

How Can Cats Be Real If Our Lore Aren't Real

Or rather, the use of trying to win fictional internet spaceship debates by going, hurr durr quote the entire Scriptures for context, I win, for example when knowing full well the other party can't do that in addition to the potential absurdities that crop up when trying to be fully literal about the lore.

Okay or not okay?

[MakotoPriano]

The whole thing with Jaret and the Yulai Accords got sort of ridiculous, mostly because both sides too a binary position: completely secret, completely public.

But yeah.

"hurrdurr oh yeah? give me the text!" is pretty lame, because there's no way CCP has the bandwidth to actually produce even a decent portion of the documents we'd have access to.

[Morwen Lagann]

Falcon has said on more than one occasion he actually wants to have the Yulai Conventions written up and available.

At the end of the day there are a lot of things for which if we didn't have access to them IC the universe pretty much breaks down in a singularity of "wtf." The Scriptures and the Yulai Conventions are two of them.

My solution is simply not to pull scripture out of my ass for those (not difficult) and to just handwave in the meantime that the TOS/EULA/game mechanics restrictions approximate the contents of a good portion of the Yulai Conventions.

I mean, we can't shoot at planets except in specific cases and times and with specific weapons because concord said so and disabled the ability to do so. I would safely assume that's part of the stuff on rules of warfare. Same with things like why we can't use bombs outside of null, or why we couldn't use fighters in systems with a rating of 0.4 or higher until citadels were released.

[Nissui]

Hm. While I think a lot of RP could benefit from more collaborative worldbuilding and group improv, it's totally understandable that other players would not want to treat the setting so frivolously. A lot is lost in the translation from TTRPG to ORPG, perhaps with good reason.

...that and EVE players are not well known for being drama club or theatre enthusiasts.

[Silas Vitalia]

Derpers gonna derp.


The PF and game is not made of the sorts of threads that can hold some of these ideas together in an RP environment when people wanna get derpy and push.

Best to have fun with those that are on the same page, and ignore the rest (or shoot them).

[Saede Riordan]

The nice thing about Origin is that while it's all made up by us, there is in fact (player) lore that I can link to people if someone asks a question or wonders if X is real or just rumors. That helps a lot since I'm not arguing with people that 'this technology doesn't exist in New Eden' or 'this isn't real it's not in the lore' because there is at least (player) lore. The downside of this is that it puts us in a bit of a bubble if people don't want to accept the lore we've made.

[Silver Night]

On one hand, often the lack of PF on a topic can be advantage, because it gives players room to make up really cool stuff. One the other hand, you do run into people trying to 'win' RP, or just people who legitimately prefer a 'pure' RP experience that sticks to what is officially known - which is fair enough, but might limit the interactions they are going to have.

On the other side of it, I've always been a big fan and supporter of the 'making stuff up' side, though I think almost everyone (including myself) has limits as to how far that can be taken. I'm a big believer in people being allowed to play the way they want RP-wise, but I'm also a big believer that that isn't the same thing as me being required to interact with you if your RP isn't something I'm interested in or if I just find it nonsensical. Like, I'm 100% fine with you claiming that you are a Klingon who came here from an alternate dimension, so long as you are 100% fine with me writing you off and ignoring you.

[Elmund Egivand]

I am totally fine with making stuff up. If Jaret just pulled out the CONCORD directive out of his arse and made it believable, I would lap it up and be fine with it.

However, he went and go, "Go Google it," essentially, when there's nothing to Google. Then he claimed to be able to 'Google it', which I challenged. Then he swept it under the rug. That's my beef with him.

[Utari Onzo]

i'm more or less aligned with Silver here. I also would swallow a well made player interpretation of the Yulai accords because damn if someone didn't spend ages collating it. But everyone is entitled to a position and opinion on that.

My only real bug bears are mary suedom and people trying to win at rp.

[Xepharious]

My only real bug bears are mary suedom and people trying to win at rp.

I feel that a lot of this can be prevented or at least gently corrected through good RP education. It can take a lot of patience to explain to someone why their MarySue'nes is, in fact, such, and then help them refine it to encourage others to interact with them. I completely agree with the idea of just ignoring those that 'do their own thing' but I think it is also important to gently let them know that their choices 'might make it hard for others to participate' in their story.

I really feel like there should be an RP 101, kinda like EvE Uni is for game mechanics... basic stuff, in a basic format like:

1. there is no "winning" in RP. The closest thing to winning is having someone else accept the premise (plot) of your characters story and choose to interact with it.
2. give and take: the best RP involves letting your character lose something, whether it's as simple as an argument, or as complex as a bodypart, family member, or purpose in life. The best RP happens when a character grows
2a. growth: if your character doesn't grow in some fasion, they become less and less belivable and even worse.. less and less interesting.
.... and so on.

We have all these new alphas and I've already had many talking about "I want to RP but I don't really know how..."

If I were to try to write up something simple, not too long, and with good intentions... would that be helpful for folks in our RP community to link for newbros wanting to RP?

[Nissui]

I am totally fine with making stuff up. If Jaret just pulled out the CONCORD directive out of his arse and made it believable, I would lap it up and be fine with it.

To be fair, the risk involved in fudging cluster-wide capsuleer law is a lot greater than, say, Vherokior spiritual festivals primarily observed by clans in a particular constellation. Another Vherokior player can tell me, "never heard of that hokum," and we can both walk away with headcanon intact.

With the scenario quoted above, there are players who simply will not take Silver's example and quietly write that player content off, and that's a clash of playstyles that probably can't be reconciled IC. Getting players to "Yes, And" your content requires much lower stakes in most cases, IMO.

I'm in the camp where if the existing PF doesn't contravene one's content, have at it, but it's up to said player to make the case that it is worth other players investing in. Unfortunately, that didn't occur in the scenario you mention, but I think the idea is still approachable.