The trouble for most players, I think, isn't a lack of interest in both gameplay and roleplay, it's that time becomes a resource for the player - and it's a resource with increasing rarity for most players the older they become. We have college classes, work, relationships, non-MMO hobbies, keeping our homes clean, and so forth, and as our lives progress further we add children, maintenance of a home we own, maintenance of vehicles... as time progresses further than that, the kids start having after-school activities we really should be attending to support them, and... I could go on.
So to use my brother as an example, he gets home from work around 4:30 to 5 PM, Monday through Friday, and with the arrangement he and his wife have, she handles most of the housekeeping and he handles the cooking. It's usually about 6 PM by the time he settles into the game, depending on the evening, because he cooks and then eats dinner. Sometimes we might see him as early as 5 PM, if he got lucky with traffic on his way home and if he picked up junk food for dinner, but he tries not to do the latter very often (perhaps once a week).
In order to be up in time to get ready for work the next day, have breakfast, etc, he logs out for the night most nights at around 9:30 PM on average. This gives him a typical window of in-game opportunity - assuming he has nothing else he might want to do with his evening, such as playing a board game with his wife for an hour - of about 3.5 hours.
Assume for the sake of discussion that Saturday and Sunday he doesn't have significantly more time to play, because a lot of the time he doesn't, between handling errands, enjoying other hobbies, and enjoying activities outside the house with his wife.
Now examine the time commitment needed for raiding even for a player who only wants to do it casually. They'll be expected to keep their gear aimed at BIS, which changes every month or so as new patch content comes out and adds something else (the "treadmill", as people say). That usually means spending time grinding on some content in order to get a daily allotment of some manner of doodad, for which the allotment is limited by the day (or if not limited, soft-limited, such that once one's dailies with the high rewards are done, one could keep going with non-daily content but the doodads-per-hour rate drops off a cliff) and due to the daily limit he couldn't, if he wished, just allocate one weekend day per month to a hard grind and be good-to-go on his gear.
Dungeons with a decent group usually take 20-30 minutes depending on the dungeon, trials with a decent group take 10-20 minutes depending on the trial, I mean you know the times on this stuff I'm sure, and it's not unreasonable to say if he's keeping up on it all to ensure BIS, then for a substantial amount of time after the drop of a new patch he'd be sinking 1.5 to 2 hours a night on that. That's fully half of his available time most nights.
On top of that, he'll also need to... y'know, participate in the raid group. That's another couple of hours at least a couple nights a week if the group ever expects to actually learn the content and progress smoothly through it. Or, if he's not spending that much time actively running the content, he'd have to make up that time by watching YouTube videos to familiarize himself with it in advance and to try and memorize the patterns and indicators outside of first-hand experience. So if he has to spend 1.5 to 2 hours grinding on grind nights, this means he probably would need to use the rest of his free time towards raiding on raid nights (or watching raiding if he isn't actually participating). Granted, like I said, that's not every night.
Now the question becomes... how much RP can he actually accomplish in the 1.5 to 2 hours he has left on the nights that aren't raid nights? Is that enough time to A) discover among his friends where the RP exists that he can join into; B) set up a scene if one isn't already underway; C) contribute significantly enough to the scene that his character is a memorable presence to the others who were there, and D) advance his character's personal story arc in a meaningful way?
The answer there's a hard maybe - and the determining factor would undoubtedly be the extent to which he and his friends' roleplay had depth of writing and, I guess, "substance". If they mostly are writing quick snippets of dialogue bantering back and forth, then in that time they could possibly have some development of a story, sure. But if they start getting descriptive, emotive, or even if just dialogue, they begin delving into a deeper discussion which requires paragraphs... now one person is waiting on the other's reply before they can begin their own, and that delay time adds up. If there's more than 2 characters present, it could add up even further if they're going in a "turn order" to keep the scene flowing smoothly. If they aren't, then it could still take more time because there'd be a lot of back-and-forth as characters switch who they're responding to due to the overlap of the messages.
Raiding is intentionally designed to be a time sink. That's important to remember! It's designed by its nature to keep subscribers busy so they don't log in, check out the new patch content for a day, nod their head, log out, and unsub until the next patch. Or perhaps the patch after that, if they just weren't that drawn by the promo hype of the current patch. Some players out there have lots of time to play, maybe they're unemployed or they don't have a relationship or kids or whatever, I don't know. For players like that, they might be able to raid and also roleplay to an extent that stories can actually develop.
But for most players, especially as their lives advance... it's just not practical to try and balance it. What my brother does instead is, he just doesn't focus on current content. He and I, we've been around the block and we know the pattern. A couple months after the current content gets replaced by new content, the developers will lessen the requirements on the old current content. Suddenly instead of needing 100 doodads you only need 10, and maybe there's a crafted version of some of the stuff that's a comparable item level to what you would've had to grind for previously, or who knows. Suffice it to say, the content becomes more accessible to people who aren't willing to make it a time commitment. That's when people like my brother consider checking it out if they have time, but it still isn't a priority. If he misses out on doing his dailies because some friends wanted to RP, it just doesn't matter to him. The content isn't going anywhere. It'll still be there whenever he happens to get to it.
Recently, he's been talking about wanting to run through the entirety of the Binding Coil to get to experience that and have some fun with it. Given that his character is level 60 and wearing Eikon gear (or whatever the equivalent name is, but you get the idea, the crafted stuff of that item level), he can go and do those with zero grinding needed. Just form up a party with some friends, sync down, and go have fun. That's what a lot of players who focus on RP do, because for most of us, we really don't care if we get a "server first" or if we do some new instance within the first couple weeks it was out and we wiped 17 times trying to figure out the boss but we finally triumphed, that's no bragging right to us. To me, my bragging right comes from knowing I have an awesome group of RP friends and a really great venue for the community to enjoy for RP. :3
Anyway, I do hope you'll be able to do what you want to do, of course! Just please don't let it frustrate you that a lot of others might not be able to... everyone's life is different and for many it may just be more or less literally impossible to do both effectively.
So to use my brother as an example, he gets home from work around 4:30 to 5 PM, Monday through Friday, and with the arrangement he and his wife have, she handles most of the housekeeping and he handles the cooking. It's usually about 6 PM by the time he settles into the game, depending on the evening, because he cooks and then eats dinner. Sometimes we might see him as early as 5 PM, if he got lucky with traffic on his way home and if he picked up junk food for dinner, but he tries not to do the latter very often (perhaps once a week).
In order to be up in time to get ready for work the next day, have breakfast, etc, he logs out for the night most nights at around 9:30 PM on average. This gives him a typical window of in-game opportunity - assuming he has nothing else he might want to do with his evening, such as playing a board game with his wife for an hour - of about 3.5 hours.
Assume for the sake of discussion that Saturday and Sunday he doesn't have significantly more time to play, because a lot of the time he doesn't, between handling errands, enjoying other hobbies, and enjoying activities outside the house with his wife.
Now examine the time commitment needed for raiding even for a player who only wants to do it casually. They'll be expected to keep their gear aimed at BIS, which changes every month or so as new patch content comes out and adds something else (the "treadmill", as people say). That usually means spending time grinding on some content in order to get a daily allotment of some manner of doodad, for which the allotment is limited by the day (or if not limited, soft-limited, such that once one's dailies with the high rewards are done, one could keep going with non-daily content but the doodads-per-hour rate drops off a cliff) and due to the daily limit he couldn't, if he wished, just allocate one weekend day per month to a hard grind and be good-to-go on his gear.
Dungeons with a decent group usually take 20-30 minutes depending on the dungeon, trials with a decent group take 10-20 minutes depending on the trial, I mean you know the times on this stuff I'm sure, and it's not unreasonable to say if he's keeping up on it all to ensure BIS, then for a substantial amount of time after the drop of a new patch he'd be sinking 1.5 to 2 hours a night on that. That's fully half of his available time most nights.
On top of that, he'll also need to... y'know, participate in the raid group. That's another couple of hours at least a couple nights a week if the group ever expects to actually learn the content and progress smoothly through it. Or, if he's not spending that much time actively running the content, he'd have to make up that time by watching YouTube videos to familiarize himself with it in advance and to try and memorize the patterns and indicators outside of first-hand experience. So if he has to spend 1.5 to 2 hours grinding on grind nights, this means he probably would need to use the rest of his free time towards raiding on raid nights (or watching raiding if he isn't actually participating). Granted, like I said, that's not every night.
Now the question becomes... how much RP can he actually accomplish in the 1.5 to 2 hours he has left on the nights that aren't raid nights? Is that enough time to A) discover among his friends where the RP exists that he can join into; B) set up a scene if one isn't already underway; C) contribute significantly enough to the scene that his character is a memorable presence to the others who were there, and D) advance his character's personal story arc in a meaningful way?
The answer there's a hard maybe - and the determining factor would undoubtedly be the extent to which he and his friends' roleplay had depth of writing and, I guess, "substance". If they mostly are writing quick snippets of dialogue bantering back and forth, then in that time they could possibly have some development of a story, sure. But if they start getting descriptive, emotive, or even if just dialogue, they begin delving into a deeper discussion which requires paragraphs... now one person is waiting on the other's reply before they can begin their own, and that delay time adds up. If there's more than 2 characters present, it could add up even further if they're going in a "turn order" to keep the scene flowing smoothly. If they aren't, then it could still take more time because there'd be a lot of back-and-forth as characters switch who they're responding to due to the overlap of the messages.
Raiding is intentionally designed to be a time sink. That's important to remember! It's designed by its nature to keep subscribers busy so they don't log in, check out the new patch content for a day, nod their head, log out, and unsub until the next patch. Or perhaps the patch after that, if they just weren't that drawn by the promo hype of the current patch. Some players out there have lots of time to play, maybe they're unemployed or they don't have a relationship or kids or whatever, I don't know. For players like that, they might be able to raid and also roleplay to an extent that stories can actually develop.
But for most players, especially as their lives advance... it's just not practical to try and balance it. What my brother does instead is, he just doesn't focus on current content. He and I, we've been around the block and we know the pattern. A couple months after the current content gets replaced by new content, the developers will lessen the requirements on the old current content. Suddenly instead of needing 100 doodads you only need 10, and maybe there's a crafted version of some of the stuff that's a comparable item level to what you would've had to grind for previously, or who knows. Suffice it to say, the content becomes more accessible to people who aren't willing to make it a time commitment. That's when people like my brother consider checking it out if they have time, but it still isn't a priority. If he misses out on doing his dailies because some friends wanted to RP, it just doesn't matter to him. The content isn't going anywhere. It'll still be there whenever he happens to get to it.
Recently, he's been talking about wanting to run through the entirety of the Binding Coil to get to experience that and have some fun with it. Given that his character is level 60 and wearing Eikon gear (or whatever the equivalent name is, but you get the idea, the crafted stuff of that item level), he can go and do those with zero grinding needed. Just form up a party with some friends, sync down, and go have fun. That's what a lot of players who focus on RP do, because for most of us, we really don't care if we get a "server first" or if we do some new instance within the first couple weeks it was out and we wiped 17 times trying to figure out the boss but we finally triumphed, that's no bragging right to us. To me, my bragging right comes from knowing I have an awesome group of RP friends and a really great venue for the community to enjoy for RP. :3
Anyway, I do hope you'll be able to do what you want to do, of course! Just please don't let it frustrate you that a lot of others might not be able to... everyone's life is different and for many it may just be more or less literally impossible to do both effectively.
Lydia Lightfoot ~ The Reliquarian's Guild «Relic» ~ Lavender Beds, Ward 12, #41
This player has a sense of humor. If the content of the post suggests otherwise, please err on the side of amusement and friendship, because that's almost certainly the intent. We're all on the same team: Team Roleplayer! Have a smile, have a chuckle, and have a slice of pie. Isn't pie great?
This player has a sense of humor. If the content of the post suggests otherwise, please err on the side of amusement and friendship, because that's almost certainly the intent. We're all on the same team: Team Roleplayer! Have a smile, have a chuckle, and have a slice of pie. Isn't pie great?
