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Complaint on Low-Quality RP

  • Thread starter Thread starter JustWats
  • Start date Start date
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JustWats

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Topic/subject: There are current systems in the server, and overall, the climate allows for low-quality roleplay to railroad the server.
Whom it may concern: Overall Community (Rebels in Specific).
Summary: The current state of the server and the quality of roleplay allow for low-quality players, characters, and overall roleplay. This roleplay residually railroads intertwined characters, stories, and the narrative of the server. This thread is not intended to chastise the staff or community of any specific person. The community has great players, and the staff team puts the utmost effort into supporting what they can.

In depth analysis of the issue:

I will bring up two threads that have discussed some of the points I will resurface and ones I would like to be re-evaluated now that the server has continued to make changes in the last few months.

This thread, and this one.

Let's return to the previous map to analyze an example in depth so we can begin with some context:


At the beginning of this clip, you can see a player held at gunpoint by multiple players. What happened in this scenario after several breaks and deterring roleplay for other participants to show up. Is the player held at gunpoint through S2RP railroads the scenario after more participants arrive. They allow themselves to be released without any actions and enforce players to begin S2K instead of S2RP. A battle ensued between at least 12+ players to witness or participate. This scenario caused more than one player to have their characters killed, consumed staff time, and flat-lined roleplay due to railroading an event. This is an example of the miserable quality of roleplay. I am sure you may be able to recall one or more recent events where you feel you may have been railroaded despite a genuine lack of roleplay. That is what this thread is for: discussing the subjects of this complaint and your experience with it.

People forget that this is a roleplay server, even if the title of the server says RPG in big, bold letters.

In a roleplay server, and community especially. I want to explain two concepts.

Creating roleplay and stale roleplay:

Creating roleplay involves creating fun and exciting situations in which people feel they have a stake, even if they're antagonistic or a part of a different faction. These stakes and inclusion extend to OOC as well. This means you should not be malicious or act in bad faith. You should try to develop something rather than doing it just because.

Stale roleplay is repetitive and something not unique; it keeps involvement to a minimum and prevents others from getting involved. It reuses the same material or plays on things people might not know about; it enforces actions from someone or forces them to react a certain way when it could be contributed through a much more exciting narrative.

Now.. What I would like to bring up: The systems or qualities I believe promote this behavior.

Qualities:
- Harming characters without having genuine development with the characters.
- Characters with a lack of morals or grasp on reality.
- Poor intentions for other players upon a differing faction.
- Lack of consideration for a player's time, regardless of whether you like their character or involvement.

Systems:
- Grinding
- Check crime rules
- Smuggling
- Open Server

Why is low quality bad? Shouldn't people have the opportunity to develop their ability or standard?

* Yes. Low quality is bad. It detracts from genuine roleplay, it can lead to controversy, it can waste staff time routinely, and ultimately, it can end long-standing arcs or characters through poor consideration and railroading. Players who commit low-quality RP would be validated upon something like a whitelist. And the risk of them consistently contributing poor roleplay or consideration for other players would be subject to removal from their whitelist.


Suggestion for improvement: Whitelist Server at v2.5, focus on warnings/punishment for consistent low-quality or heavy acts of low-quality RP.
 
Last edited:
Whitelist Server at v2.5
This is something that was already considered a while ago, but wasn't really spoke about due to having a lot of underlying issues.

As somebody that's played on whitelisted FiveM servers (different game but same formula overall) this sort of system works but bring about many other issues. Not everyone wants to write a 300 page essay on why they should play on the server, the overall work of checking each and every application, what would happen to already existing members of the server etc.

It's not a bad idea to do this, though as an already dying game to limit our playerbase to those who are extremely dedicated would be overall unhealthy to the server (not to say quality RP doesn't exist at low pop, but it's much harder to get into those situations if the overall population is lower).

As for warning people for low quality RP and such, as far as I know this is already being done (or at least should be.)


I also want to say that I'm simply outlining points against this, I am personally for the whitelist being in place but do realize that it would come with many issues. There has been a issue with quality RP for some time, but either nobody wants to go through the effort of fixing it or we've just given up trying.
 
This is something that was already considered a while ago, but wasn't really spoke about due to having a lot of underlying issues.

As somebody that's played on whitelisted FiveM servers (different game but same formula overall) this sort of system works but bring about many other issues. Not everyone wants to write a 300 page essay on why they should play on the server, the overall work of checking each and every application, what would happen to already existing members of the server etc.

It's not a bad idea to do this, though as an already dying game to limit our playerbase to those who are extremely dedicated would be overall unhealthy to the server (not to say quality RP doesn't exist at low pop, but it's much harder to get into those situations if the overall population is lower).

As for warning people for low quality RP and such, as far as I know this is already being done (or at least should be.)


I also want to say that I'm simply outlining points against this, I am personally for the whitelist being in place but do realize that it would come with many issues. There has been a issue with quality RP for some time, but either nobody wants to go through the effort of fixing it or we've just given up trying.

Ban Amounts:

Over the last 60 days, 68 bans were administered. This includes the same players being banned several times. The majority of these bans were for NITRP (No Intent to Roleplay) aka the minges you all know and love.
These numbers aren't much. No, not really. GMod servers, including HL2RP, will find several minges join on the same day. Over the course of a single month, we average around 500 unique visits. That includes you. This happens every day. They'll almost always be banned and told to read the rules. They never do, because they were never here to actually roleplay anyway. All things considered, not as dramatic as initially believed.



Ban Management:

We've very recently established a Ban Management team. Currently, this consists of @Fedora and @Kappatalist. This team was formed to help curb the issues presented in this thread. Because there is a problem, I agree. Our current ban system is years old, and dare I say, out of touch with the community. We'll fix it.

This team will work with me and @Memesky to establish a new system for bans and warnings and the methodology to approach various situations across the board. The goal we have in mind with this new system is to promote fairness across the board and eliminate as many double standards as possible. This is a work-in-progress though and we ask you to be patient as we work out the finer details. We'll be transparent with you throughout this process and you as players will know exactly what changed and how it affects you while playing.

We'll simultaneously be working on a new and improved, modernized moderation guide for the staff team, so we're all on the same page. This guide will cover the essentials and help assure consistency across staff, no matter which admin ends up claiming your ticket or handling your dispute.

Neonity recently gave some statements about the frequency of players in this thread. Some of this process is already being objectively done. We already have staff committed to investigating players. The most common ban routinely is NITRP. If I am being honest, the server gets a high level of frequency and volume which makes it good. But then you also have the players that trickle in every now and then, and make poor decisions, without consideration for other players.

I agree with you, the work is a concern, but you have to ask yourself as well, what work comes in reciprocation from not having a whitelist?
 
As someone who's seen a Whitelist system be put in place on a different community (RDR2, not GmodRP), it doesn't fix all of the problems. Yes, you will usually see higher quality RPers, but even high quality RPers can be absolute shits sometimes, lacking any proper sense of emotional maturity or morality. A whitelist system will only add a extra step for those players, but it won't entirely deter them nor will it reveal what their true intentions may be when joining the server.

That's all I've got to say, really. Travis summarised anything else I would've said - staff are already trying to lay down the law on low quality RPers or players with intentions that don't align with a serious RP server.
 
I think simply, if a majority of staff decide a player's overall attitude OOCly but ESPECIALLY ICly is subpar, then simply they will either be dewhitelisted from all factions or told they can't play on WN anymore. I see no reason why anyone should have to endure shitty RPers and whiny bullshit in OOC. I see a lot of this being done for unestablished members of the community- but (without naming names which are of my personal belief) there are a few people who have made multiple characters that are less than subpar, and I have 0 interest in interacting with them on either scale.

Simply put, the quality of RP would improve if people did not have the shield of "Bad RP is okay, as long as you try". If someone is repeatedly TERRIBLE at RPing, and/or causes a lot of problems in-character or out of, just get rid of them. This does not need to be a welcoming community to those who are only here for selfish reasons. P2W should be more strictly handled- this isn't a real life simulator, this is a way for everyone to have fun within the vast HL2 universe. Your best idea for a character should not be "destroy the other side", because that does nothing but shut doors in peoples face. It doesn't facilitate a growing experience for you as a person, your characters, or others person/characters. ESPECIALLY if you do it on multiple characters.

This server has a great team of dedicated staff and many, many dedicated players. Being apart of complex and immersive interactive stories between dozens of people trying to improve it is A PRIVILEGE that should more often be treated AS a privilege. If a WL fixes this than I'm for it, but I think the simpler solution is just disallow P2W and selfish RP more often than is allowed now.
 
I'm a fan of darwninism in this situation, low quality roleplays don't last long as they don't put much thought into their actions.
 
I'm a fan of darwninism in this situation, low quality roleplays don't last long as they don't put much thought into their actions.
yeah, survival of the fittest, grab a USP day 2, kill CCA the next day
 
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