Best Of

Hi, I've not read all the comments and frankly don't care to because I know it will just make me frustrated; disregard my comment if you think that disqualifies me. But I have also played the game for 15+ years, on Spirit, Shadow, and Pools.

Please do not equate 'darkness' with "disregarding ooc feelings" and please don't equate it with roleplaying things that have very clear OOC weight and parallels without first checking in with your very real roleplaying partner. There is a very obvious difference between acting out, say, a vivisection (something likely no one playing has experienced) and religious/racial/gender-based/sexuality-based/what-have-you persecution.

I regularly participate in frankly quite dark and heavy roleplay while, yes, checking in oocly to make sure the other person is aware of what they're signed up for! It's as simple as content warnings! Which I understand people also like to get up in arms about but it's literally as basic as saying "hey there's sexual violence here"! It's good to know! It's showing basic respect for the human on the other side of the screen! You playing a "dark" character does not exempt you from considering this other person, as much as PKing someone does not exempt you from considering that other person (hence the issue system), and as much as roleplay does not inherently staunch you playing a "dark" character or having OOC compassion! Why are these being conflated!

Exclamation points aside, I would ask that people just double check the content they are wanting to roleplay, and the participants. It's truly not the end of the world if someone's personal comfort level is not compatible with yours. It doesn't necessarily mean you have to stop your roleplay, it just means that you care that the human being, again, on the other side of the screen, also trying to have fun in their spare time and not necessarily wanting to experience a mirror to very real world persecution in their fantasy world, does not have to confront it here too.

There's no grand conspiracy to make you roleplay flowers and rainbows. It absolutely is still what you make it. If you're not finding the gravity you want, that's on you to find the people who will play in that sandbox with you, as it always has been. Why is it being considered a bad thing that we are having compassion for our fellow human beings and their unknown experiences and backgrounds. Thanks. Bye.

First off, this isn't even an opinion. It's an irrefutable fact, so lets get all the cards on the table. As @Rhyot pointed out, and I saw with my own eyes, Bamathis was equated to fascism and Nazi-ism and the volunteer was likewise personally attacked. While that was abhorrant, what was even more disgusting was that a huge portion of our community stood by silently and allowed it. As @Benedicto said, this is -our- community. If that sort of thing is allowed to happen without a massive outcry, don't be shocked that your deity is dormant for years at a time and no one wants to be a volunteer.

This is just my opinion but I've always considered the best RPers to be people who are playing characters that are drastically different from their real selves, who put my character into challenging situations and are able to trigger emotions with what they do. There is a character who comes to mind that does a very good job at this. I don't know this guy OOC at all, I've only ever interacted with him ICly.

Point blank, he makes you hate him. Not just your character, but he makes YOU hate him. Anyone who can provoke an emotional response from you (good or bad) with their RP is a VERY good roleplayer in my book. I remember one of the first encounters I had with him, I walked away kinda pissed off. About an hour later I had to laugh because I realized how silly it was to be pissed off about how a fictional character (his) treated another fictional character (mine). This is something we're all guilty of at some point or another and its to be expected because we get attached to our characters. What is NOT excusable though is to walk away from a situation like this and never realize your failure in controlling your own emotions, blaming that person behind the character for the emotional response that they triggered in you, then going so far as to attack that person OOCly based on how they've roleplayed. I've seen this a lot since I first started playing Aetolia and the fact of the matter is, people that respond like this and never see where they erred are simply bad roleplayers. We should never be angry at a player who got us emotional with their character. we should commend them because it takes skill to roleplay with the realism necessary to fool another person's emotions.

I agree with @Jhin. At present, Aetolia is a watered down land of snowflakes, carebears and unicorn kisses that has completely lost its identity. Bloodloch doesn't scare me, Duiran isn't "savage", Enorian has naughty secrets that would make Severn blush, and I think Spinesreach is just twiddling it's thumbs and waiting for something meaningful to do. Most vampires are weaklings that only drink NPC blood because they haven't the skill to take it from anyone competent. Its generally safe for non-coms to hunt in the fracture and vortex because no one wants to hurt their fragile feelings and get issued, and no one wants to do foci battles unless the odds are stacked in their favor because they're too emotionally weak to risk a death that costs them nothing except a little pride.

I know this sounds harsh, but this is the state of our game. We need to be kind and decent people to each other out of character no doubt, but in character anything should go. This is a foundational principal of roleplaying guys.. its kinda weird that so many people who have played this game for so long need to be reminded of what roleplay and immersion is. Evil characters shouldn't be attacked OOCly for being evil or pressured to be less evil. As @Benedicto pointed out, good characters need evil characters to make their character more relevant. Likewise, good characters shouldn't be attacked OOCly for fighting evil. That is what their character is all about. If someone is RPing in a way that you aren't comfortable with, then simply don't RP with them.

I 100% understand that there are real life things going on that are sensitive. If any of that causes me to be so sensitive that I'm trying to force other people in this game to play their character differently than they want to or worse yet, expect the admin to change the game in order to accommodate my sensitivity.. that's when I know I need to take a break, or just remove myself from whatever the situation is. Its not a fair expectation to ask those around you to tip toe around your feelings. Its borderline insane though to expect people to tip toe around your feelings while they're playing a fictional character in a fictional universe. Lets get back to the roots of what roleplay and immersion are and do our best to leave our real life baggage at the door when we login to this game.

I am not very in tune with the RP or metagame of Aetolia as a whole to say for sure, but I don't think RL politics is the main driving factor. A lot of it seems to boil down to what Benedicto said: there's a lot of good and innocent people in the world. Not everyone wants to be a villain. It's a tough job because:

1. Doing villainous things IC can earn you OOC recriminations you really didn't ask for or deserve. This doesn't have to be political at all. Some people just cannot tell the difference and, sometimes, IC villainous things are legitimate inconveniences to players OOCly.
   
2. Even if you take all of the above to mean "let's be villainous to NPCs and just ignore other players", you are still in trouble. Doing villainous things often puts you in direct conflict with the "heroes". The inclination to meat out immediate PK justice for villainy has probably killed more villainy than any other person's feelings or politics. Not every prospective villain is also a super capable fighter. I'm not saying it's wrong to do so, but it's a big factor, unfortunately.
   
3. Because of the above, keeping allies as a villain is hard. Your city and guild are going to be cross with you for causing trouble, more often than not. This is doubly true if you're losing more fights than you're winning.
   
4. Even if you're only being villainous to NPCs in your own backyard, far from the PK-starved eyes of the world, would evil RP behind closed doors actually contribute to the "Midnight Age" feel? Probably not. It's not very validating, either. Half the fun of being a villain is that other people know you're a villain and give you safe "heat" for being so, rather than actual dislike. As described above, though, "heat" translates very readily into "being PKed" because just like being a villain is your character, being a hero is someone else's.
   
5. The other half of the fun of villainy is reaping its rewards. Unfortunately, villainy doesn't pay ever since theft became veritably verboten. I'd love if slave trading became a Hobby skill or something. Maybe a little risqué to cast a player as slave trader, but it would sweeten the pot of villainy.
   

All in all, why bother? Why stick to your slavery roots at all, when there's not a whole lot of reward for it and a whole lot of hassle? Better to be the misunderstood villain who's actually a hero in their own way, or sit off to the sides of the issue and declare yourself above it all.