Do automated systems stifle roleplay? A shower thought.

[rat]

Hey all,

I was playing perpheads.com and took a break to have a shower (for those who don't know, it's something that you do when you start to smell bad.) During this shower, I considered the medic injury system. Being able to instantly press a button and see someones injuries definitely speeds things up for people, but does it take away from roleplay? I say this because, before this, I would see people /me'ing a check and others writing out a /desc, systems that seem to have been relegated to having very little use now.

My main argument would be that, by making these things into systems, you are removing the expectation of roleplay from the player, they don't have to consider these things about their character anymore as the system will track it for them. By automating these systems we remove any sense of traditional roleplay from them.

Just a silly thought, interested to see what other people think of this. By no means am I trying to suggest we should go back to the old system.

EDIT: Another question I have is, does anyone even care / want to engage in this kind of roleplay anymore? Did they ever want to? Is this kind of thing best left for the tabletop?

 

[mimeyy]

Another question I have is, does anyone even care / want to engage in this kind of roleplay anymore? Did they ever want to? Is this kind of thing best left for the tabletop?

I think it mostly boils down to this - some perp servers were extreme in text-based rp, to the point of needing a /me bind for turning the safety off a specific weapon. It felt tedious and broke the flow of things, I think most players just did it because they had to.

The medic system does remove the need for inquiry, but good rpers will be able to improvise something, or have their set of binds if they wish. The medic role, while fulfilling, ultimately serves as flavor to what might be considered “richer” rp or gameplay -police/detective work or patching someone up so they can get back to what they were doing. So having it be a quick process serves the RP needs of others well, but when appropriate I’m sure everyone enjoys some more flavor during the process

 

[GP]

Roleplay means different things to different players.

For me, the kind of roleplay I'm looking for is close to improvisational theater, mostly through voice, and automated systems support it just fine if not better than having to interrupt the scene to start typing commands. I prefer focusing on the interactions with people and acting roles.

I don't particularly enjoy, or care to engage, with the "/me" "/desc" "/roll" style of roleplay. If I could choose, I'd most likely opt-out of most of it.

 

[Creepis]

I think it's up to everyone individually how they wish to expand the roleplay experience and their interaction with other players. Those interested will naturally gravitate more towards doing /me's or asking questions to another player, in the example you've given a Paramedic would probably ask first where the person is hurt. Of course they see this with the floating red and green orbs but it adds another element of roleplay for them and can treat actual injured body parts.

Back then this previous system was even worse where you just had to left click someone and they were fine again. I feel like that when adding systems like this it only improves instead of worsening the roleplay factor. I feel like the same would be for Roadcrew, imagine if they had to individually change tyres (or stand near them) which itself adds a lot more life to a roleplay situation instead of just whacking your wrench and the car becomes fine again.

I hope I understood your question but this is just my gist of it. It really just comes down to the person performing the roleplay, systems like this that add more depth to a game feature only improve it, even for those that aren't that interested in roleplaying it.