(04-15-2015, 01:11 PM)Zyrusticae Wrote:(04-15-2015, 12:45 PM)Warren Castille Wrote: ...and you don't see how that possibly offensive to anyone?Everyone's the MC of their own stories.
Edit, expanded upon: Declaring yourself the main character in an RP community is missing the entire point of being in a community.
However, the grand majority of the time no one is fighting anything, and no one is actively participating in any grand story. Such is the nature of public roleplaying. As such, the grand majority of time this entire thread is completely moot. It's only those rare one-off situations where someone is actually fighting someone else that this even matters. (Note that this sort of quibbling is why I don't participate in events like the Grindstone, and avoid RP-PVP entirely if I can at all help it.)
But when the gloves come off, I prefer it if everyone is on the same playing field, otherwise we do get the situations where someone who's playing at MC-levels is facing off against someone playing at side-character levels and things just don't work out for anyone involved. It IS possible to have an ensemble cast of major protagonists and have it work, and I think that's the preferable way to go about things, rather than trying to mix everyone in without a baseline to go off of.
However, that is simply my 'perfect world' version of events. Obviously, the reality is that we have a huge variety of PCs doing a huge variety of things at very different levels of competency, and that's just something we have to deal with.
And my way of dealing with it is by placing 'weaker' characters at a lower level. Is that nice? No, but then again, neither is ignoring their existence entirely, which is something I see bandied about as a solution around here so often. They're background characters, which is fine, because the NPCs aren't alive enough to serve that role sufficiently, but I'm not going to bring myself down to their level just so that nobody butts heads or stands out from the crowd.
AND THE THING IS - if nobody is OP, then nobody is OP. There's no point trying to homogenize everyone to fight against... heh... homogenization due to power creep or any such thing, especially when we already have a decent baseline to go off of. In the end, power levels are meaningless outside of the context in which they are used to further a story, and the constant quibbling over how OP one is allowed to be are just comical in the face of how little they matter in the grand scheme of things. The game clearly renders out these kinds of superheroics to be possible on a very regular basis now, so why are some so adamant about simply not allowing it? It's weird. I don't get it.
If folks want to play NPCs, they can play NPCs. Just don't freakin' whine when I treat you like an NPC, nor join you in the effort, capiche?
I'm fine with people not being as powerful as others. Why? Because it isn't a contest, as someone has said in the other thread (at least, I think it was the other one).Â
When Val and Berrod first met, for example, they exchanged blows and were on par. They both won one and tied for their third, earning each other's respect. After a while, Val's story took him to helping Faye run the FC and being relatively unable to get as much combat in as he used to. Berrod, on the other hand, kept fighting and training. When they met and fought another time, Val found that Berrod far surpassed him, and I'm entirely okay with that. In fact, I expect it because it's realistic and it's simply what would happen.
Another of my characters, Cyrus, is a knight in training. He's yet to find someone to actually teach him how to properly fight, and so while he can defend himself and is physically fit, he is largely without technique. Most fighters would take him out.
I love watching people play normal characters, as someone else mentioned earlier about the random brass blade. I feel it adds more flavor. If I wanted to play a main character or something, I'd just.. you know. Play a game. I feel that one of the worst things you can do is try to make yourself the main character of anything. Yes, your character has their own personal story, but that isn't an excuse to make them super powered protagonist #whatever. I feel that it's respectful both to the community and the people you RP with to keep yourself, and your character, in check when it comes to limiting one's power. It's incredibly obnoxious otherwise, and when someone runs around wanting to mary sue themselves as the main character of whatever, they hopefully won't be surprised to find people don't want to do things with them.
Edit: And let it be said I'm perfectly fine with losing fights so long as the other individual, in a non-rolled combat scenario, actually earns it. If they're not being realistic in their attacks or expect Val to stand there in a daze while they do some super somersault backflip and expect him NOT to try to move in the time they've given him, assuming he isn't already hurt or injured otherwise, they're going to be sorely disappointed. This isn't an anime. People don't stand still while you take six episodes to make an attack.
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