I'd sort of prefer to avoid #2. IC and OOC goals/ideas/personalities do not always align. What if someone is an extremely active member of the RPC community, but RPs a half-crazed hermit with a deep-seated mistrust for civilization in general? To maintain the integrity of their character, they'd be forced to ICly 'opt out' of the RPC, even though OOCly they are one of the major players. Alternatively, what if their character is simply of the type of personality that they have no interest whatsoever in the IC incarnation of the RPC? How accepting or open the membership to the IC RPC is would be irrelevant in those situations. To me, there isn't really any good way to make the IC and OOC match up without forcing the IC incarnation of the RPC to be such an all-pervading fundamental of the setting that "membership" is not an option. And that's sure to make people chafe.
While I really do like the idea of large-scale player-run organizations, I think the ideas in the Cross-Guild Organizations thread are a better model for things than trying to force an IC fit to an OOC reality that may prove akward. A large-scale open-membership multipurpose loose adventurer's coalition would be pretty cool, honestly. Someone could toss up a framework, model it after the RPC, accept input, and make sure as many people as possible are cool with it so it actually WILL be large in-game, maybe even having most of the RPC's characters as members. But trying to make the RPC itself as-is into an IC organization is sort of like saying "Who here plays guitar? Alright, cool, let's make an IC band!" Well... what if your character doesn't?
While I really do like the idea of large-scale player-run organizations, I think the ideas in the Cross-Guild Organizations thread are a better model for things than trying to force an IC fit to an OOC reality that may prove akward. A large-scale open-membership multipurpose loose adventurer's coalition would be pretty cool, honestly. Someone could toss up a framework, model it after the RPC, accept input, and make sure as many people as possible are cool with it so it actually WILL be large in-game, maybe even having most of the RPC's characters as members. But trying to make the RPC itself as-is into an IC organization is sort of like saying "Who here plays guitar? Alright, cool, let's make an IC band!" Well... what if your character doesn't?
