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Lament · **10-02-2013, 05:32 PM**

I haven't reached the end of the main storyline, myself, but I read Ildur's spoiler tag anyway--

I don't think anyone should exclude the main storyline's events from their roleplay.

But I can see why people would.

Unlike console games, MMOs can't change much, visually, as the story progresses, because you have multiple people playing, and each person may be doing a different story step. So, as Ildur mentioned, the world itself is in a sort of permanent stasis. Story events aren't actually reflected in the world.

When there are changes that are reflected in the world, they tend to come in the form of patches. Now consider this scenario:

A patch comes up. Ishgard opens to foreigners.

Consider we have players A, B and C. Player A finished the story, player B just defeated Titan, player C just started.

Ishgard opened to foreigners at the same time to players A, B and C. But for player A, this was after the main story, for player B this was right after Titan's fall, and for player C, it opened before the main story actually happened. If all three players are taking what they know of the main storyline into consideration, you have three completely incompatible timelines.

This is generally why people tend to disregard the main storyline when it comes to RP - timelines get very messy.

Now, you absolutely can set up a scenario where you consider the main storyline has happened, for RP purposes (disregarding which step of the main storyline you're actually on in the game itself). But this also brings up a few potential problems:

- New players will not have experienced the full storyline yet. Reading about it is different from experiencing it, so it's likely new players will be unable to take part until they're done with the main story (which can take a long time if you prefer RP to leveling).

- Like Ildur has stated, most other people/groups will not be sharing that timeline. This makes it difficult to cross-interact or to absorb new players, unless they specifically roll a character to fit the timeline.

- It rules out or complicates several character concepts/ideas and limits what those characters can accomplish. Consider:

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Obviously, you don't need to disregard the main storyline if you don't want to. But it does severely limit entry into the group, it does rule out some concepts that people are likely to think of before they finish the main storyline, and it does severely limit interactions with people outside the group.

Which is absolutely okay, if you don't mind. It's entirely possible to make a group if everyone involved approves of the idea. There's nothing wrong with having a group headcanon that is incompatible with other people's.

Ildur never said this was a bad idea and everyone ever should always disregard the main storyline, just that they have reservations due to how limiting it can be.

Bryn · **10-02-2013, 05:38 PM**

Although I won't be joining you, I think your idea is a great one. It certainly sounds very interesting!

LiadansWhisper · **10-02-2013, 05:53 PM**

(10-02-2013, 05:32 PM)Lament Wrote: I haven't reached the end of the main storyline, myself, but I read Ildur's spoiler tag anyway--

I don't think anyone should exclude the main storyline's events from their roleplay.

But I can see why people would.

Unlike console games, MMOs can't change much, visually, as the story progresses, because you have multiple people playing, and each person may be doing a different story step. So, as Ildur mentioned, the world itself is in a sort of permanent stasis. Story events aren't actually reflected in the world.

They are, just not consistently in every single area.

Quote:When there are changes that are reflected in the world, they tend to come in the form of patches. Now consider this scenario:

A patch comes up. Ishgard opens to foreigners.

Consider we have players A, B and C. Player A finished the story, player B just defeated Titan, player C just started.

Ishgard opened to foreigners at the same time to players A, B and C. But for player A, this was after the main story, for player B this was right after Titan's fall, and for player C, it opened before the main story actually happened. If all three players are taking what they know of the main storyline into consideration, you have three completely incompatible timelines.

But in the overall meta-plot of the game, it occurred after the Main Storyline concluded. Â Personal stories always come second to the main meta plot of the game itself, because the developers dictate what is and is not canon, and they control the storyline and its progression, not us.

Quote:This is generally why people tend to disregard the main storyline when it comes to RP - timelines get very messy.

Only if people refuse to follow canon. Â :-\

Quote:Now, you absolutely can set up a scenario where you consider the main storyline has happened, for RP purposes (disregarding which step of the main storyline you're actually on in the game itself). But this also brings up a few potential problems:

- New players will not have experienced the full storyline yet. Reading about it is different from experiencing it, so it's likely new players will be unable to take part until they're done with the main story (which can take a long time if you prefer RP to leveling).

They can still experience the storyline. Â There's absolutely nothing preventing them from experiencing it.

Quote:- Like Ildur has stated, most other people/groups will not be sharing that timeline. This makes it difficult to cross-interact or to absorb new players, unless they specifically roll a character to fit the timeline.

How exactly are you determining that most groups will not be sharing the timeline? Â Do you have a count? Â Why are you speaking for everyone? Â :-\

Quote:- It rules out or complicates several character concepts/ideas and limits what those characters can accomplish. Consider:

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Spoilersummoners, primal researchers, resistance members, spies, people seeking revenge against the empire, et cetera.

None of that is ruled out. Â None of it. Â I don't even know why you would say that.

Quote:Obviously, you don't need to disregard the main storyline if you don't want to. But it does severely limit entry into the group, it does rule out some concepts that people are likely to think of before they finish the main storyline, and it does severely limit interactions with people outside the group.

I really disagree with this. Â But in the end, there's nothing that says that everyone has to play with everyone else. Â I'm fairly certain there will be plenty of people available to play with them, even if some others will choose not to. Â It's a big server.

Edited to Add: As an example, let's take World of Warcraft. So you have Vanilla Warcraft, and it had a specific storyline that took place during that time period (there are even websites that have delineated the timeline). I started playing in BC. I never got to experience the events of Vanilla WoW. Does that mean that my character can't have been a part of that? Or that somehow I can't progress my story because I didn't do those things? I never played the Warcraft RTS games, despite the fact that what occurred in those games and the storylines that they followed are absolutely integral to the storyline of World of Warcraft. Does that mean that I can't include that stuff in my character? Should I just pretend it didn't happen, because I didn't get to go through it? o_O

No. It means that I write my background taking into account the things that happened before. When new players started playing in Wrath of the Lich King, Cataclysm, or Mists of Pandaria, they hadn't experienced anything previous to the expansions they started in. Does that mean they should ignore those Canon events? Because they didn't get to see them, therefore they won't get ideas about their characters and so they should just do whatever they want and ignore the story itself? I mean, seriously, people can do whatever they want, but I reserve the right to walk away if someone is ignoring events out of the main freaking storyline. :-\

Cato · **10-02-2013, 06:36 PM**

I'm more than willing to set some of my role-play in the past to accommodate committed role-players who want to get involved but consider themselves to be at a completely different point in the game's timeline. It's something I made use of fairly often back in WoW, since it allowed me to explore past content from the perspective of new characters that were created long after a particular enemy or plot point was dealt with in the canon lore.

I'm not sure if I've made much sense when trying to explain that, but I can definitely understand where the concerns are coming from on all sides. I believe that this would be the best compromise.

Lament · **10-02-2013, 07:14 PM**

@LiadansWhisper: I started my post with "I don't think anyone should exclude the main storyline's events from their roleplay. But I can see why people would."

I'm not telling you how to do things. I didn't say most of the things you reacted to, actually. There's nothing wrong with this idea; I was just explaining why I, personally, understand Ildur's reservations.

Edit@Theo: I think that made sense and is a brilliant way to include incompatible timelines without changing the concept. "Future RP" would also work, but less well since other things may come up in the character's actual timeline that would mean the future RP can't actually happen (e.g. if in the future RP there is mention of a family member that ends up dying in the 'current' timeline). Though if everyone involved is OK with the possibility of "future" RP being disregarded by characters 'from the past', so to speak, nothing stops that either!

Ildur · **10-02-2013, 07:31 PM**

As stated, there's nothing stopping us picking one point of the game's storyline or another to base our micro-canonical timelines on. It's a matter of perspective.
For the sake of keeping this somewhat on-topic, I won't go at lenght about this matter. But I want to point out:

Quote: (...) I mean, seriously, people can do whatever they want, but I reserve the right to walk away if someone is ignoring events out of the main freaking storyline. :-\

I think you are missing the point. It's not about the game's storyline. It's about roleplay. We aren't talking about ignoring canon, but about picking a timeline that accomodates the greatest ammount of roleplayers.
There are people who don't like spoilers because they ruin their enjoyement of the storyline. If I pick a post-storyline timeline, and these people roleplay with me unknowningly about my timeline, then there's a very big chance that I will effectively ruin their enjoyment of the storyline. Because, unless it's stated beforehand, chances are the big events of the storyline will be something your character knows and talks about.

You can't actually give proof that the storyline has happened because the game's storyline is enterely dependant on each player's progress (from a mechanical point of view), of each player's selected timeline (from a roleplaying point of view) and because the game itself doesn't bother in enforcing that the storyline finished. Every region is locked in a status quo that won't change until the developers decide to do so.
Your example about WoW is quite accurate about this, actually: the status quo only changed after a patch/expansion happened. What was the starting status quo of those patches or expansions? The starting point. Once a expansion launched, the story moved on.

Picking the finishing point of the story-line is more practical than picking any intermediate point, but it isn't as practical as picking the initial point. You are implicitly forcing people into rushing to level 50 if they want to roleplay with you and enjoy a spoiler-free ride across the game's storyline. It is practical only for those who don't care about spoilers and those who reached level 50. Whereas the starting point is practical for everyone regardless of they levelling speed and resistance to spoilers.

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Theodric's alternative is a good one: 'Fluid Time'! (Or as I call them, 'retro scenes'). You'll have to stablish OOCly beforehand at which point of the timeline every people you roleplay with is, and things might get confusing due to character development. Planning will be required, which might or might not be on everyone's alley.
But it allows you to be on a post-storyline date while also allowing you roleplay with people who aren't there. So it's a good plan.

LiadansWhisper · **10-02-2013, 09:55 PM**

(10-02-2013, 07:31 PM)Ildur Wrote: As stated, there's nothing stopping us picking one point of the game's storyline or another to base our micro-canonical timelines on. It's a matter of perspective.
For the sake of keeping this somewhat on-topic, I won't go at lenght about this matter. But I want to point out:

Quote: (...) I mean, seriously, people can do whatever they want, but I reserve the right to walk away if someone is ignoring events out of the main freaking storyline. :-\

I think you are missing the point. It's not about the game's storyline. It's about roleplay. We aren't talking about ignoring canon, but about picking a timeline that accomodates the greatest ammount of roleplayers.
There are people who don't like spoilers because they ruin their enjoyement of the storyline. If I pick a post-storyline timeline, and these people roleplay with me unknowningly about my timeline, then there's a very big chance that I will effectively ruin their enjoyment of the storyline. Because, unless it's stated beforehand, chances are the big events of the storyline will be something your character knows and talks about.

You can't actually give proof that the storyline has happened because the game's storyline is enterely dependant on each player's progress (from a mechanical point of view), of each player's selected timeline (from a roleplaying point of view) and because the game itself doesn't bother in enforcing that the storyline finished. Every region is locked in a status quo that won't change until the developers decide to do so.
Your example about WoW is quite accurate about this, actually: the status quo only changed after a patch/expansion happened. What was the starting status quo of those patches or expansions? The starting point. Once a expansion launched, the story moved on.

Picking the finishing point of the story-line is more practical than picking any intermediate point, but it isn't as practical as picking the initial point. You are implicitly forcing people into rushing to level 50 if they want to roleplay with you and enjoy a spoiler-free ride across the game's storyline. It is practical only for those who don't care about spoilers and those who reached level 50. Whereas the starting point is practical for everyone regardless of they levelling speed and resistance to spoilers.

Well, no. Â It's called "you don't bring it up during the RP." Â Not every single RP scene has to be focused around the central storyline of the game. Â :-\ Â A lot of stuff is completely mundane, and there's no guarantee that every character will have participated in the storyline events, even if their story is currently taking place after the end of the main questline.

Quote:------

Theodric's alternative is a good one: 'Fluid Time'! (Or as I call them, 'retro scenes'). You'll have to stablish OOCly beforehand at which point of the timeline every people you roleplay with is, and things might get confusing due to character development. Planning will be required, which might or might not be on everyone's alley.
But it allows you to be on a post-storyline date while also allowing you roleplay with people who aren't there. So it's a good plan.

I agree it's a great idea.

Illira · **10-02-2013, 11:02 PM**

(10-02-2013, 09:55 PM)LiadansWhisper Wrote: Well, no. Â It's called "you don't bring it up during the RP." Â Not every single RP scene has to be focused around the central storyline of the game. Â :-\ Â A lot of stuff is completely mundane, and there's no guarantee that every character will have participated in the storyline events, even if their story is currently taking place after the end of the main questline.

While I do agree that much RP shouldn't and doesn't necessarily interact directly with the "official main storyline", it is important, especially in scenarios such the RP of Garlean Supporters to know where your character, and micro-canon reside in context to it. As it effects the atmosphere and general lore used within the RP. I haven't finished through to cap yet, so I don't know the what happens and what the state of the world is at "end-game" yet. Spoilers are fine, honestly 80% of the storyline is pretty bland, but RPing a Garlean supporter when the Empire is being pushed back is potentially a very different thing than win they are the overbearing aggressors.Â

That goes beyond, just not 'bringing it up during RP'. Because its not about your character at every given moment. Its about the state of the world at large and the subsequent fallout of that.Â

Anyway, Theodric, like the my compatriots, Ildur and Naunet, I''d be happy to work on Pro-Garlean RP with you. My main, Illira, is a staunch supporter of the Empire.

Naunet · **10-03-2013, 01:01 AM**

I've always treated story lead-up during a patch as the "current" situation, but whatever "end boss" there is in the patch, he or she or it doesn't actually die or resolve something or whatever until the next patch hits. Ragnaros wasn't beaten back until the next tier released. The Lich King wasn't defeated and summarily usurped until the day the Cataclysm patch hit. Each of the dragons in Rift were not officially dead until the next patch. Shandra Manaya did not truly die until the Alliance patch launched. But all the events and dungeons and various plotsy whatnots leading up to those moments are either in some vague "process" of happening or have already happened (depending on the thing).

It's what the RP communities I've been involved with in the past seem to have settled upon, and I think it's a pretty good rule as far as RP goes.

LiadansWhisper · **10-03-2013, 01:22 AM**

(10-02-2013, 11:02 PM)Illira Wrote:
(10-02-2013, 09:55 PM)LiadansWhisper Wrote: Well, no. Â It's called "you don't bring it up during the RP." Â Not every single RP scene has to be focused around the central storyline of the game. Â :-\ Â A lot of stuff is completely mundane, and there's no guarantee that every character will have participated in the storyline events, even if their story is currently taking place after the end of the main questline.

While I do agree that much RP shouldn't and doesn't necessarily interact directly with the "official main storyline", it is important, especially in scenarios such the RP of Garlean Supporters to know where your character, and micro-canon reside in context to it. As it effects the atmosphere and general lore used within the RP. I haven't finished through to cap yet, so I don't know the what happens and what the state of the world is at "end-game" yet. Spoilers are fine, honestly 80% of the storyline is pretty bland, but RPing a Garlean supporter when the Empire is being pushed back is potentially a very different thing than win they are the overbearing aggressors.Â

That goes beyond, just not 'bringing it up during RP'. Because its not about your character at every given moment. Its about the state of the world at large and the subsequent fallout of that.Â

Anyway, Theodric, like the my compatriots, Ildur and Naunet, I''d be happy to work on Pro-Garlean RP with you. My main, Illira, is a staunch supporter of the Empire.

You're right, it is completely different for the person roleplaying that character. Â I was more trying to address the idea that somehow, if you are in a different timeline from someone else, you can't interact. Â If JoeBob hasn't seen the end of the story, and is playing a loyal Gridanian, he can't interact with FredSpy because FredSpy has finished the Storyline and is playing a Garlean spy with the end events of the storyline factored in. Â I don't think its that cut or dry.

(10-03-2013, 01:01 AM)Naunet Wrote: I've always treated story lead-up during a patch as the "current" situation, but whatever "end boss" there is in the patch, he or she or it doesn't actually die or resolve something or whatever until the next patch hits. Ragnaros wasn't beaten back until the next tier released. The Lich King wasn't defeated and summarily usurped until the day the Cataclysm patch hit. Each of the dragons in Rift were not officially dead until the next patch. Shandra Manaya did not truly die until the Alliance patch launched. But all the events and dungeons and various plotsy whatnots leading up to those moments are either in some vague "process" of happening or have already happened (depending on the thing).

It's what the RP communities I've been involved with in the past seem to have settled upon, and I think it's a pretty good rule as far as RP goes.

That's actually what I've always done, too. Â Especially since the follow-up patch tends to have the "mopping-up" portion of the fallout from the previous patch. Â I mean, most of the time. Â Blizzard isn't always so good about addressing those loose ends, but they've gotten better recently.

ArmachiA · **10-03-2013, 01:37 AM**

(10-03-2013, 01:01 AM)Naunet Wrote: I've always treated story lead-up during a patch as the "current" situation, but whatever "end boss" there is in the patch, he or she or it doesn't actually die or resolve something or whatever until the next patch hits. Ragnaros wasn't beaten back until the next tier released. The Lich King wasn't defeated and summarily usurped until the day the Cataclysm patch hit. Each of the dragons in Rift were not officially dead until the next patch. Shandra Manaya did not truly die until the Alliance patch launched. But all the events and dungeons and various plotsy whatnots leading up to those moments are either in some vague "process" of happening or have already happened (depending on the thing).

It's what the RP communities I've been involved with in the past seem to have settled upon, and I think it's a pretty good rule as far as RP goes.

This is EXACTLY how I treat things, too. Nothing really happens yet till the first expansion or major patch that changes anything. When the first expansion hits then <Story spoilers here> happened right before it

LiadansWhisper · **10-03-2013, 01:43 AM**

(10-03-2013, 01:37 AM)ArmachiA Wrote:
(10-03-2013, 01:01 AM)Naunet Wrote: I've always treated story lead-up during a patch as the "current" situation, but whatever "end boss" there is in the patch, he or she or it doesn't actually die or resolve something or whatever until the next patch hits. Ragnaros wasn't beaten back until the next tier released. The Lich King wasn't defeated and summarily usurped until the day the Cataclysm patch hit. Each of the dragons in Rift were not officially dead until the next patch. Shandra Manaya did not truly die until the Alliance patch launched. But all the events and dungeons and various plotsy whatnots leading up to those moments are either in some vague "process" of happening or have already happened (depending on the thing).

It's what the RP communities I've been involved with in the past seem to have settled upon, and I think it's a pretty good rule as far as RP goes.

This is EXACTLY how I treat things, too. Nothing really happens yet till the first expansion or major patch that changes anything. When the first expansion hits then <Story spoilers here> happened right before it

Trying very hard to tiptoe around spoilers...

There's a significant gap between parts of the story. Like, stuff that happens around level 30 and stuff that happens around level 45ish, they seem to be weeks, perhaps more, apart. Â All the stuff in-between involves a lot of travel and groundwork that probably takes quite some time. Â I think that's a bit different from, say, WoW, where the Siege of Orgrimmar is going on right now (even though my guild cleared it the first week), and though there are events that take place at the very, very tail end of the raid, they won't actually be placed into the game world until the start of next patch.

WoW tends to smash things up really close together, whereas FF seems to ah...spread them out a bit?

ArmachiA · **10-03-2013, 02:06 AM**

Then with FF, you can look and see what the release date is for Major patch/Expansion and plan accordingly. Know you have 2 months till the Expansion hits? That's when the storyline starts. They always give us plenty of warning before hand that there will be a change, so it's pretty easy to just roleplay accordingly. Right now the game just came out so time doesn't have to go SO FAST OmG to catch up the the game canon (Which, as you said, seems it takes a long time to ramp up).

LiadansWhisper · **10-03-2013, 02:25 AM**

(10-03-2013, 02:06 AM)ArmachiA Wrote: Then with FF, you can look and see what the release date is for Major patch/Expansion and plan accordingly. Know you have 2 months till the Expansion hits? That's when the storyline starts. They always give us plenty of warning before hand that there will be a change, so it's pretty easy to just roleplay accordingly. Right now the game just came out so time doesn't have to go SO FAST OmG to catch up the the game canon (Which, as you said, seems it takes a long time to ramp up).

Hmmm. Â Well, I mean, if it works for you. Â But there's just sooo much in the main Storyline that I'm personally not really wanting to wait like that. Â Especially not for an expansion. Â I mean, it should be a personal choice. Â I guess it's not a big deal to me - including the events in the storyline, I mean - because there's no way on god's green earth Liadan would be directly involved in most of that. Â So I mean, for me, it's out there, but it's not really clear and in my character's face.

I also think that telling people to put off the Storyline ending is a bit unfair (as there's even more that happens after the main storyline is over) when that period seems like it would be at least as interesting as the period leading up to it. Â Especially for Garlean-loyal characters, there'd be a wealth of stuff to play with.

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LandStander · **10-03-2013, 02:55 AM**

Honestly I just ignore the main story as much as possible. I had a problem in Guild Wars 2 with people who claimed to kill the dragon, but NPCs (and myself included) did not agree that the dragon was dead. I think planning things to go along with the patches is a pretty good middle ground.

At this point and time, I wouldn't mind people saying that Titan has been awakened and needs to be put down (Don't think this is a spoiler since even SE has been parading this fight everywhere), but saying whatever happens to the Garleans at the end of the storyline (I havent reached that part yet) I think is pushing it too far. Say the Garleans are losing the fight and are pushed back, but in patch 2.1 they launch a second offensive, then I am okay with someone saying we were winning, but now they grew some balls and are fighting back.Â

I just think its a great idea to keep the main storyline out of RP as much as possible, or else we end up with 10,000 people who say they beat up Neal.

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