Newcomer Observations

[Olipro]

So, I've been playing for a relatively short time - on one hand, this gives me a fairly "fresh" outlook on how RP works in the server. On the other hand, it also means I might have misunderstood things - hopefully the following consists of more of the former and less of the latter.

Firstly, I think a good number of the scripted jobs could do with being made more intuitive; newbies (including myself) are frequently confused by things as simple as the money truck job because interacting with the ATM doesn't tell them to get a back from the back of the truck and which key to use to do so - I'll find some time to stick them in a dedicated topic over at Server Suggestions - if any devs are reading, I work as a software engineer, mainly C++ but I know several others, let me know if you're looking for an extra pair of hands.

Some of the /me /my /do usage feels redundant; if you've verbalised something (e.g. a medic attends to you and you describe on mic what's wrong and that you want help) then proceeding to write out what you've already said feels a little arduous and somewhat interrupts the flow of verbal RP. Obviously this is not universal nor particularly problematic; just sometimes a bit of a nuisance and naturally there are cases where /do is required to obtain truthful information.

Despite being classed as a crime, wearing of masks in NCZ areas is entirely ignored - toggling it deserves a keyboard shortcut to make it less annoying to do and obviously, whilst this a comparatively small gripe, it's not only unrealistic to hang around a bank in a mask, I suspect to some degree it's also being abused (by wearing a mask 24/7) to prevent use of /alias by others.

Quality of RP is a very mixed-bag and I can basically divide them into the following categories:

• True RPers: The focus for these people is on the RP and creating entertaining interactions/scenarios. Nothing to really say here, this is what it's all about.
• FPSers: Little to no motivation to do any good RP beyond the minimum required to justify some form of violent confrontation.
• $$$ers: Similar to FPSers except their motivation is primarily amassing cash and doing the bare minimum RP interaction to obtain it.
• Idiots: No interest in RP but smart enough to not blatantly violate the rules; deliberately irritates people with banal stupidity like deliberately hitting cars and open hostility/rudeness to anyone.

The most rampant seems to be the cash-driven criminal types which follows a predictable and extremely repetitive formula:

1. You, as a random civilian with no obvious or apparent wealth get held up at gun point into FearRP.
2. You get robbed in silence. Worthless items like GPS, map and food are taken from you. You may or may not get your head shaved too.
3. The assailant leaves, scenario over.

Fixing lazy RP is obviously a personal problem that the individual needs to take ownership of, however, stealing petty items is unrealistic unless you've RP'd some dialogue beforehand that you're starving and desperate enough to use a gun to get food. The head shaving is patently stupid, again, unless you've got a great psycho robber character going. But either way, as a mechanic, it offers you unlimited opportunity to roam the map doing nothing other than stealing from other players; creating little to no RP value and a lot of frustration. My suggestion to (attempt) addressing this are a multi-pronged approach:

1. Implement a dedicated mechanic like /rob which comes with a cooldown - whether the cooldown should apply to the assailant, the victim or both is a matter of fine tuning.
2. Implement a rule disallowing theft of petty items and head shaving unless there is a proper RP scenario that would give way to reasonable expectation of such action(s) occurring.
3. Consider a command for victims to (try) using which will simulate a third party/camera alerting the cops - depending on the location and time of day, the command will either succeed or fail. Mugging someone with a gun in the middle of the day along Hollywood Blvd. would be a losing proposition, why should doing the same along Vinewood Blvd be any different?

The FPSers are of course also something of a nuisance but I feel this is somewhat self-limiting by virtue of the fact they're already restricted by DM rules; there's also a far better post which I believe has the right suggestions to try and tackle it and end the OOC report-a-thon battles.

Ultimately, so long as any OOC report's validity is based on the premise of evidence of bad faith and not for an honest mistake, the system is fine.

With all that said, there is some quality RP that goes on and by-and-large I think this community has a lot to offer; my two cents in a nutshell is that a bit more work should be done to weed out bad actors and incentivise others to do more than just the same bland scenarios over and over.

[Victor Einhart]

Masks in NCZs is an in-character issue.  LSPD already cracks down on this but as soon as the officer leaves the masks go back on again.  This is honestly a RP opportunity for you if you see it as an issue, as you can approach the LSPD and demand better enforcement if that's what your character wants.

You're right that the random robberies are dumb, though.  While most criminals regularly lose these basic items when they get put in jail so there is some small incentive to get these items back, I don't think it's justified to rob every single person that decides to stroll out of a NCZ.  Some gangs are better than others about this but the problem people make it frustrating for everyone.

[Olipro]

So, there's something of an inconsistency here, possibly just in my understanding of what NCZ really means:

as I understand it, NCZ denotes an area where you can't undertake any activity that is classified as illegal; for wearing a mask to be purely an IC matter, that logically implies that NCZ really means there's a selection of illegal activity that's OK, and some that isn't - but I haven't seen this documented anywhere.

As I also mentioned previously: there's the distorting factor that it prevents others from using /alias on you which incentivises wearing a mask constantly despite the negative effect on RP realism.

But when all is said and done, the issue with mask usage is a miniscule one compared to some of the robbery/PvP'ing behaviour. sorting out mask rules/etiquette is bottom of the issues pile

[CaesarSeizure]

The big issue with criminals, is that they lack activities. There are only so many option available to do vs the number of criminals, that most have to resort to robbing random people to make some progress.

[Olipro]

11 minutes ago, CaesarSeizure said:

The big issue with criminals, is that they lack activities. There are only so many option available to do vs the number of criminals, that most have to resort to robbing random people to make some progress.

So, I have two issues with this.

Firstly, the attraction to robbery is a matter of opportunity cost, therefore, it's not that there is a lack of any alternative activities, it's that there aren't alternative activities with an equal or lower risk:reward ratio. It's also probably not reasonable to just go ahead and create a criminal activity that is lower/same risk for same/higher reward to reduce the attraction to robbery... then again, maybe it is, but I can't think of any justifiable options with respect to the current balancing.

Secondly, when you refer to "progress" you're talking about financial progress rather than RP progress (character development) - Obviously money is a significant mechanic of the game, but when it becomes the primary focus, as I've been saying, the RP suffers for it.

[CaesarSeizure]

7 minutes ago, Olipro said:

So, I have two issues with this.

Firstly, the attraction to robbery is a matter of opportunity cost, therefore, it's not that there is a lack of any alternative activities, it's that there aren't alternative activities with an equal or lower risk:reward ratio. It's also probably not reasonable to just go ahead and create a criminal activity that is lower/same risk for same/higher reward to reduce the attraction to robbery... then again, maybe it is, but I can't think of any justifiable options with respect to the current balancing.

Secondly, when you refer to "progress" you're talking about financial progress rather than RP progress (character development) - Obviously money is a significant mechanic of the game, but when it becomes the primary focus, as I've been saying, the RP suffers for it.

I think for the most part, simple robberies, while low risk/higher reward, getting put in jail really causes damage to the criminals, as those that are not big gang affiliate, and therefore more likely to go around robbing people, dont really have a safety net. If they get caught, they serve time and get a massive financial penalty.

Its not just about making criminal activities that have same or different rewards, but one of the ideas thats been going around for some time now, is to create turfs for gangs to fight over, which would create more option for them that would encourage people to engage with other gangs on a more RP level, rather than just killing each other. Could be wrong though, but there is limited availability for criminals in what they can do, and people who do chain robberies are usually people who are non-affiliated or are fairly new.

While it might not seem that money should be the main goal, it does matter. People want to have a safe space to store their stuff and vehicle (chances are you will get robbed at the only parking lot in town). People want to drive the cars that they want. If you want to be a part of a bigger gang, you need money to make the gang work, without proper equipment, you will be at a disadvantage compared to better equipped gangs. Additionally, character development happens over time, i had 0 thoughts regarding my background when i started off, but through playing, the character was developed. Most people need to get used to the game before they can start moving forward, so you either look for work or turn to crime and overtime their characters are developed, but in the meantime they have to resort to robbing because you do need to have money.

At the end of the day, while you might want different RP and maybe even more character development focused RP, it does happen, you just need to meet those people. There are a lot of different people, some have really well developed characters, some are working on it and some just dont care - and it should be fine, regardless of how you go about it. But at the end, even in real life, money is one of the biggest motivators for people, so why should it be any different in a game that aims to mimic real life?

[Olipro]

The turf wars idea is a really neat idea, but I cannot see how it would have any bearing on the issue of robberies, especially when you make the point yourself that it is primarily people not in gangs who are big on robbery.

If your character is motivated by money, that's fine. When you are motivated by money and your character is in fact just a husk for you to treat the game like a pinball machine where your only interest is getting the high-score, it's entirely missing the point of an RP server.

And let's say your character is motivated by money and you're great at dialogue - there's no realism in committing serial muggings in the middle of the day in a major city, not for your character or anyone else playing.

[kenichis]

What I would say to the discussion is that most people who join Eclipse usually join under the guise that this is a "realistic" GTA mod, not a roleplaying server. This is literally what got me interested in joining the first time. During my early time here I too was just that one idiot who didn't know the rules or what roleplaying is and was just grinding for money.

However, after about 1 month or so, I finally really understood what RP is all about and why its enjoyable. I shifted from just trying to grind my way up and not really providing any fun and unique RP to doing my own thing and trying to give an interesting scenario for people.

I think the people who are just in it for the action or money are always gonna be there, but all we can do is just improve how we RP. It can still be fun eitherway.