My rule of thumb is, "if you're in public, your RP is public, and others are welcome to join in." Certainly, that's how I play it; if I don't want the possibility of random RPers engaging with me, I won't RP in public. And no, sitting in a public locale and using /party doesn't count as being private. I don't feel that anyone needs to ask permission before engaging with people talking in a public location.
It's important that we as RPers promote this point of view on our servers, because otherwise, people start thinking it's okay to exclude people from public RP -- and that, quite possibly faster than anything else, fires up the accusations of cliquishness and an exclusionary environment. Then, as the RPers so accused "circle the wagons," so to speak, and restrict their RP further to just those they know, they actually create the very situation of which they've been accused. (I'm sure WoW players are intimately familiar with this, since it happened on most, if not all, of their large RP servers.)
Let's not do this.
<soapbox>
So -- to everyone out there -- if you want your RP to be private, do not do it in public. If you RP in the open, you're giving an implicit invitation to others to join in. Think of other people responding IC as the IC Consequence of your IC Action to talk in the open.
</soapbox>
To the OP: if you see me around in public, please feel free to come up and start talking, even if I'm already RPing with someone else. That's part of the fun of RP. I would assume most other RPers would be the same way. There's no need to ask permission first.
EDIT: As others have noticed, there's in public and then there's, well, private in a public area (quasi-private?).
This is not an exhortation to go find RPers anywhere in the entire world; chances are, if someone's gone somewhere off the beaten path that's difficult to easily stumble upon, even if it's not a private instance, and are using /party, they're intending to be private. In that case, an OOC tell is warranted. Both the people trying to be private and those wanting to engage should use their best judgment -- clearly communicating a desire for privacy can require some finesse.
It's important that we as RPers promote this point of view on our servers, because otherwise, people start thinking it's okay to exclude people from public RP -- and that, quite possibly faster than anything else, fires up the accusations of cliquishness and an exclusionary environment. Then, as the RPers so accused "circle the wagons," so to speak, and restrict their RP further to just those they know, they actually create the very situation of which they've been accused. (I'm sure WoW players are intimately familiar with this, since it happened on most, if not all, of their large RP servers.)
Let's not do this.
<soapbox>
So -- to everyone out there -- if you want your RP to be private, do not do it in public. If you RP in the open, you're giving an implicit invitation to others to join in. Think of other people responding IC as the IC Consequence of your IC Action to talk in the open.
</soapbox>
To the OP: if you see me around in public, please feel free to come up and start talking, even if I'm already RPing with someone else. That's part of the fun of RP. I would assume most other RPers would be the same way. There's no need to ask permission first.
EDIT: As others have noticed, there's in public and then there's, well, private in a public area (quasi-private?).
This is not an exhortation to go find RPers anywhere in the entire world; chances are, if someone's gone somewhere off the beaten path that's difficult to easily stumble upon, even if it's not a private instance, and are using /party, they're intending to be private. In that case, an OOC tell is warranted. Both the people trying to be private and those wanting to engage should use their best judgment -- clearly communicating a desire for privacy can require some finesse.
The Freelance Wizard
Quality RP at low, low prices!
((about me | about L'yhta Mahre | L'yhta's desk | about Mysterium, the Ivory Tower: a heavy RP society of mages))
Quality RP at low, low prices!
((about me | about L'yhta Mahre | L'yhta's desk | about Mysterium, the Ivory Tower: a heavy RP society of mages))
