Roleplaying etiquette for open world on Balmung

[LiadansWhisper]

The original thread that this linked to, I went and read it.  It honestly reminds me of subtweeting on Twitter.  And just as useful.

 

I honestly don't see how anyone could enforce one set of RP etiquette on the entire server anyway.  There's just too many people, and none of us have godmod ban powers. :evil:

[Rakoh]

There isn't a place like Goldshire in FFXIV, most ERP I have found takes place in FC houses and usually in private rooms. It is a bit of a running joke among the people that I play with that people who spend a bit too much time in a private room "Must be ERPing" and we do tease each other about it :lol:.

 

I rarely go to The Quicksand on Reiko anymore unless she is with other people. I have had one to many bad experiences there to the point where the people I play with consider dragging me over there ICly on any character a big deal.

 

When she had short hair I would get constant tells asking if she was a lesbian and bugging me for lesbian catgril ERP, even though 1) Reiko had a boyfriend a the time 2) Her sexuality really isn't something important to the character (Or something I haven't really thought too hard about, and really should not be any character's sole defining trait) given it's completely OOC of her to jump in bed with someone she just met regardless of gender :dodgy: ) .

 

She got the "Lightning Hair" back after growing it out after her friends encouraged her to do so (and being sick of called "boy" by one too many people ICly) and people ask if I'm playing a crossdresser or trangender character because she's extremely slender and slightly androgynous looking in certain clothes worn OOCly (Infantry Shirt, any kind of heavy armour, all baggy clothes) :?.

 

 

Being there alone on Rahal generally just gets me completely ignored with the odd "Are you playing a trap?" /tell :frustrated:. Yeah okay fine, Rahal being androgynous was deliberate, but still he only wore a dress once, and that was at a themed party, and he is not really interested in men anyway...

 

I've come to the conclusion that The Quicksand is a wretched hive of scum and villainy, where occasionally some idiot might preposition an alone character OOCly for ERP. If you are there with friends, it's a nice little place to Rp. Going there alone? Hoo boy. 

 

Also its a quest hub to be ready for trolls. I have found that most FC leaders are quite reasonable if you just send them a /tell to say they have some members trolling RPers. I've only ever had 2 FC leaders be rude or dismissive of it, and I've counted 6 instances of getting an apology from the players I reported to thier FC leader.

[g0ne]

Just be nice, friendly, respectful and level headed and calm. Also, communication. It's always good to speak up and try to clear up misunderstandings instead of zipping your mouth and letting things spiral out of control. :surprise: Be honest. COMMUNICATION!

Respect other people's boundaries and accept that not everyone's approaches to RP are the same. 

 

And like Faye said, there's lots of nice and friendly RPers out there, but like in real life, it's always the notorious bits that go boom and are spoken of and known.

[Faye]

I've come to the conclusion that The Quicksand is a wretched hive of scum and villainy, where occasionally some idiot might preposition an alone character OOCly for ERP. If you are there with friends, it's a nice little place to Rp. Going there alone? Hoo boy. 

 

I'm sorry to say that sounds like a pretty extreme opinion, and I do have to wonder how often these negative experiences have truly happened, or if there was some sort of behavior conveyed to provoke them? I've spent a lot of time at the Quicksand (typically alone) across several characters (female Midlander, male Midlander, and three different catgirls, one of which dressing and acting particularly provocative) and I've received only the occasional blatant "Want to ERP?" tell, several of the more subtle "omg your character is so pretty! we should RP sometime!" tells, and had a single instance of a total stranger telling me all about how their character is a futa, and the majority of all this happened on my female Midlander; oddly enough the catgirls were usually left alone, probably since the Quicksand is so often overflowing with female Miqo'te.

 

Also, none of these people were particularly volatile. The people asking for ERP I told no thanks and they left me alone, didn't try to harass or guilt me about it. The people who complimented my character I thanked and we both moved alone. Even futa lady I just humored with a brief conversation before my replies tapered off and hers did, too. No one displayed any cause for me to be concerned or offended.

[Rakoh]

"I don't believe this happened and you must have done something to make it your fault!" Is all I'm getting from this post. Sorry but have you any idea now very condescending and rude what you just said is?

 

if you want me to violate the forum ToS and name and shame that's one thing. If you genuinely believe that harassment is the fault of the person getting said harassment? That is another thing entirely that I have no words for.

[Warren Castille]

"I don't believe this happened and you must have done something to make it your fault!" Is all I'm getting from this post. Sorry but have you any idea now very condescending and rude what you just said is?

 

if you want me to violate the forum ToS and name and shame that's one thing. If you genuinely believe that harassment is the fault of the person getting said harassment? That is another thing entirely that I have no words for.

 

That's not what's happening here. Your experiences aren't the norm.

 

Also, do you have any idea how condescending and rude it is for you to write off an entire RP hub as a "hive of scum and Star Wars references?" That does an excellent job of making people who choose to RP there feel like shit, you know.

[Faye]

"I don't believe this happened and you must have done something to make it your fault!" Is all I'm getting from this post. Sorry but have you any idea now very condescending and rude what you just said is?

 

if you want me to violate the forum ToS and name and shame that's one thing. If you genuinely believe that harassment is the fault of the person getting said harassment? That is another thing entirely that I have no words for.

 

That's not what's happening here. Your experiences aren't the norm.

 

Also, do you have any idea how condescending and rude it is for you to write off an entire RP hub as a "hive of scum and Star Wars references?" That does an excellent job of making people who choose to RP there feel like shit, you know.

 

^ This. Your experiences are not common, or at least are a far cry from mine and those of most people I know. I'm just wondering if you are just genuinely unlucky, if you are exaggerating (you'll have to excuse me for thinking this a possibility after you called the main RP hotspot " a wretched hive of scum of villainy" based off a few very personal experiences), or if you're doing something to provoke this sort of behavior to receive it so much more often than others. If something unpleasant happens to you more often than it does others, rather than externalize the blame, it's wise to do some introspection.

 

Maybe you really are just unfortunate and happen to attract all the weirdos each time you go to the Quicksand for no logical reason. I don't really know one way or the other. Either way, I did not at all ask for names or detailed accounts of what happened, only wondered at how often these negative experiences really occurred.

[Aaron]

The OP link was fun to read. If I was able to comment id probably have said something sarcastic like ". . . Well are you crazy? "

[industrythirteen]

To me, the whole thing just seems like a massive misunderstanding. I don't really know why the individual on the thread on the official forums felt the need to post about it, but they did. Now that it's known who was involved, and both sides of the story have been aired, I realize that this conversation is essentially taking place in two different places, and I don't know that that helps anybody. 

 

If it were me, I'd talk to the person and help clear up any OOC misunderstandings. As I've said in threads past, I hate to see misunderstandings become full-out grievances. For me, it would be well worth the time to understand how we got to this point, and what I can do to unravel it so that everyone gets right with it. Maybe the official forum original poster needs a little guidance, maybe they're just confused, maybe there's been some over-reaction, but regardless, they felt the need to post about it, and I don't feel like I should judge anyone for it; neither party involved. I'd rather see this discussion foster positive community growth, and something good come out of it. However, I know that that is the decision of the parties involved, and whether they think it is worth their time or efforts.

[Dravus]

If there's one thing I've learned over the years that I've role-played in various different MMO's it's that the experiences of various individuals can differ significantly across the board. I've found random role-play to be very hit and miss so far in FFXIV and some days visiting the likes of the Quicksand or the Bismarck leaves me satisfied whilst other days I'm left staring in disbelief at the sheer weirdness that goes on there from time to time.

[Darien Cadell]

^ This. Your experiences are not common, or at least are a far cry from mine and those of most people I know. I'm just wondering if you are just genuinely unlucky, if you are exaggerating (you'll have to excuse me for thinking this a possibility after you called the main RP hotspot " a wretched hive of scum of villainy" based off a few very personal experiences), or if you're doing something to provoke this sort of behavior to receive it so much more often than others.

 

To be fair, from my perspective, once is a coincidence, twice is creepy, and I could easily see how these kind of encounters could happen a handful of times to a single player, thus convincing them to stay away. I'd only need something like Rahal described to happen to me more than once for me to think "maybe I shouldn't go there anymore," but in the same line, I wouldn't paint everyone who does go there with the scum and villainy brush.

 

I've spent a little bit of time sidelining in the Quicksand and never had a questionable experience. I've witnessed the occasional questionable thing, but the actual "scum and villainy" encounters I've personally had in this game have taken place at the marketboard and at the aetheryte, hubs of a not at all IC sort, and I don't feel the need to avoid them, but if those encounters had been Quicksand-based, even though they were infrequent, I'd still be inclined to avoid the place.

[Addison]

Two people can witness or participate in the exact same roleplay and walk away with very opposite opinions on it. That's both the beauty and the curse of roleplay.

 

Enforcing 'etiquette?' Other than the big "Dont's" of roleplay and "Be excellent to one another," I fail to see a reasoning for more etiquette than that.

 

I've witnessed groups of people attempt to do that, and it's backfired each and every time. The RP community in EQ2 is dwindling to only a few dozen people now because people attempted to impose ridiculous guidelines and label them as "etiquette" that roleplay there has become a chore.

[Leggerless]

After reading through this thread, I think I can sum up Roleplaying Etiquette:

RPC: Don't do the things. Other than that, have fun.

 

Roleplayers: Okay.

RPC: Good.

 

Roleplayers: We did the things.

 

RPC: Guys