Moderator Note:
What I like most about FCs and RPing
by Warren Castille
What I like most about FCs and RPing is that we are free to come and go as we please. Variety is the spice of life, and what is good for the goose isn't always good for the gander despite sometimes our best, most earnest wishes otherwise. Hi, I'm Warren Castille. I'm ostensibly the leader of the Nightblades (not the Night Blades) and I'm willing to bet dollars to doughnuts that none of you knew that (or you thought I was with Armi's FC). We're a small free company that comprises maybe half a dozen players an our alts. We don't do FC RP in any real form or function, though we have interacted with other FCs for various things. I'd like to share my thoughts on that, and I'm going to try and do it respectfully because I mean no ill-will towards the concept as a concept.
FC roleplay typically features someone in the Storyteller role. Someone to come up with a plot, someone to come up with an arc, someone to write the NPCs and twists and turns, if any. It's structured, traditionally speaking, and it's as close to an analog of tabletop gaming as you get.
FC roleplay is typically done spur of the moment and without any real guidance. Everyone gets to have their character feature in some way, and through everyone contributing a narrative arc is formed out of chaos.
FC roleplay happens in long arcs with predetermined roles and characters, with a group of officers helming the ship and writing it like a TV show season or a movie. The plot is derived without anyone specifically in mind and the arc is told with whomever best fits the roles as needed.
FC roleplay is the most fun when it's combat, which is determined by quality and length of post. Players are permitted to go as crazy as they like when posting things and there's a winner when someone concedes.
FC roleplay is the most fun when it's combat, which is determined by using the /random feature. Character ability doesn't matter as long as the number is higher.
FC roleplay is the most fun when it's combat, which is determined with character sheets that are written up off-game. It gives a realer sense of what anyone is capable of at any given point in time, and allows people to settle things without using dice for everything.
...nearly everything I just wrote is contradictory, and every single word of it is true. Free Companies tend to consist of people with matching philosophies or opinions on how things should be done. Their playerbases are usually made up of folks preferring to do something in a particular way. That's part of what makes having such a diverse community such a great thing. There's the relaxed folks who don't care if you bend lore. There's the immersion-centric who prefer to make their RP match the game world as much as possible. There's big and tall, short and thin, there's an FC for every personality. I understand the concept of the event is to serve a jumping-off point for collaboration and further storylines, but I'm not sure how wise that is. I don't presume to know anyone's FC better than anyone else, but I worry a little when I think of the sort of conflicts that can arise when systems and philosophies clash. It happens on the small-scale all the time. I can think of one larger one where two friendly FCs stopped being friendly, and a lot of grief came out of it on all sides.
The "Summit" as a meet-and-greet is a great idea. Let's see who is out there in the community and find if there's other folks with the same kind of philosophy as one another out there. I just... Hm. I've got faith in the folks attending by and large, but I admit the small-FC-mindset in me is worried this will somehow turn exclusionary. It's not anyone's goal, but these things do happen.
So with all of that rambled, I have to decline taking part. I hope good things come out of it, but I'm content to be watching from the sidelines if they do.
What I like most about FCs and RPing
by Warren Castille
What I like most about FCs and RPing is that we are free to come and go as we please. Variety is the spice of life, and what is good for the goose isn't always good for the gander despite sometimes our best, most earnest wishes otherwise. Hi, I'm Warren Castille. I'm ostensibly the leader of the Nightblades (not the Night Blades) and I'm willing to bet dollars to doughnuts that none of you knew that (or you thought I was with Armi's FC). We're a small free company that comprises maybe half a dozen players an our alts. We don't do FC RP in any real form or function, though we have interacted with other FCs for various things. I'd like to share my thoughts on that, and I'm going to try and do it respectfully because I mean no ill-will towards the concept as a concept.
FC roleplay typically features someone in the Storyteller role. Someone to come up with a plot, someone to come up with an arc, someone to write the NPCs and twists and turns, if any. It's structured, traditionally speaking, and it's as close to an analog of tabletop gaming as you get.
FC roleplay is typically done spur of the moment and without any real guidance. Everyone gets to have their character feature in some way, and through everyone contributing a narrative arc is formed out of chaos.
FC roleplay happens in long arcs with predetermined roles and characters, with a group of officers helming the ship and writing it like a TV show season or a movie. The plot is derived without anyone specifically in mind and the arc is told with whomever best fits the roles as needed.
FC roleplay is the most fun when it's combat, which is determined by quality and length of post. Players are permitted to go as crazy as they like when posting things and there's a winner when someone concedes.
FC roleplay is the most fun when it's combat, which is determined by using the /random feature. Character ability doesn't matter as long as the number is higher.
FC roleplay is the most fun when it's combat, which is determined with character sheets that are written up off-game. It gives a realer sense of what anyone is capable of at any given point in time, and allows people to settle things without using dice for everything.
...nearly everything I just wrote is contradictory, and every single word of it is true. Free Companies tend to consist of people with matching philosophies or opinions on how things should be done. Their playerbases are usually made up of folks preferring to do something in a particular way. That's part of what makes having such a diverse community such a great thing. There's the relaxed folks who don't care if you bend lore. There's the immersion-centric who prefer to make their RP match the game world as much as possible. There's big and tall, short and thin, there's an FC for every personality. I understand the concept of the event is to serve a jumping-off point for collaboration and further storylines, but I'm not sure how wise that is. I don't presume to know anyone's FC better than anyone else, but I worry a little when I think of the sort of conflicts that can arise when systems and philosophies clash. It happens on the small-scale all the time. I can think of one larger one where two friendly FCs stopped being friendly, and a lot of grief came out of it on all sides.
The "Summit" as a meet-and-greet is a great idea. Let's see who is out there in the community and find if there's other folks with the same kind of philosophy as one another out there. I just... Hm. I've got faith in the folks attending by and large, but I admit the small-FC-mindset in me is worried this will somehow turn exclusionary. It's not anyone's goal, but these things do happen.
So with all of that rambled, I have to decline taking part. I hope good things come out of it, but I'm content to be watching from the sidelines if they do.
![[Image: yEROfKO.png]](http://i.imgur.com/yEROfKO.png)
