PvP, storytelling, character development, a little bit on invasions.

So PvP vs. Character Development. Its an issue that has been arising on the site recently and I figured I should address after the past few days because of particular events, mostly OOC, which I’m not going to bother to explain as OOC events don’t dictate the issue, they just brought the issue up. Also since Chao is in super crazy mode to get everything on the site updated or fix. I figure I should give some means of

So this site has quite obviously been moving more into a PvP realm. For those that don’t know what PvP means, It literally translates to Player versus Player. It’s like playing a Magic or YuGiOh card game but we do it in turn based events.

Now first let me say this. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. PvP is incredibly fun for many people. It’s dynamic and exciting and creates a lot of fun. How we’ve been going about transitioning more into PvP has been a little…weak. It’s not wrong, but its imcomplete.

Basically, rp sites are telling a story, a story in which you control your character and other players have control over theirs. No more, no less. Sometimes you will be impeded and sometimes you will succeed and you get to develop your character through successes and failures. Meaning Character Development basically is the equivalent of storytelling.

What is the reward for telling a provocative story on your own and getting multiple people involved? Nothing. Do you get a bonus for going an extra mile on a mission and making it something it wasn’t initially meant to be, ultimately making the story more fun to read and more exciting? You get nothing. Basically your character development doesn’t improve your pvp status. You don’t get better for your character experiencing a traumatic event or a tear jerking victory. Nothing carries massive risk for attempting (invasions. >.>) but also nothing carries any reward for going the extra mile. Being a better rper or trying to have more fun and get better at rping serves no value. Just follow the instructions given on a mission and do as you’re told.

Missions can provide for great story for characters but there’s also zero reason to do anything other than missions because nothing else can give you experience. If you want to tell story there’s more than just the missions. There’s interacting with other characters outside of missions to better establish (or severely worsen) relationships and there’s also the few solo events which are done when your character needs time alone to figure things out and reach an epiphany (this can also be done through just rping with people). Now am I sounding a little insane for a lot of the new players which this site have throngs of? Yeah I have been rping for a few years and get really deep with my characters sometimes. For those this just means there’s less opportunity to get better or less incentive to go against the grain and do things differently than other players. If missions are the only way to get experience just do missions. Why should I ever do anything else?

Let me use Invasions as an example. One thing I heard an admin say it that they can be used as a storytelling tool and can create a plethora of possibilities story wise. Absolutely correct. The flaws in this however are two things. One, there’s no incentive to do such, as making story doesn’t give extra experience so the only real plan is to survive or deal with the impediment to your gaining experience. Two, there’s no risk to invading. I think I had a discussion about imprisonment earlier but if let’s say Sinali decides to invade the Rune Knights why can’t the rune knights arrest her if she fails? Vice versa why couldn’t Sinali imprison the rune knights and put them in the torture room to get information she may want or even use them in her messed up experiments. A lot of the possibilities an invasion creates is caused by the possibility to fail, rather than simply success.

Ultimately I'm stressing one thing. Get your storytelling involved in your pvp. Give an incentive, because I have little reason to make something great on this site unless that was my initial goal in the first place. Also, it gives new rpers a better perspective on rping. Its not just about getting a strong character and I feel like we're diving deeper and deeper into that mindset and whether your a veteran or a new player that is a very very very very ~insert an infinite amount of very's~ bad for the site.

editing more because it just occurred to me:

In a thread where Kira was celebrating the drop in experience to get to S-rank, I was informed that nobody has ever gotten to S-rank via experience they needed money to get it. First off, MONEY SHOULD NEVER BUY POWER OH MY GOD I WANT TO HIT SOMEBODY FOR THIS.

But onto what we're actually talking about this could be because there's only one way to get experience and you can't get more for doing more so to speak. So you get experience at a much slower pace then you should be.

I skimmed what you wrote.

One thing on the last part, the reason I stated "you need money" is because acquiring the things necessary through normal means is absolutely insane.

E.g. to get from A to S, you need lacrima milks. A LOT of them. And well, they're not cheap. 200k jewels. That's an S Rank spell slot. It's a LOT for people who don't invest money into the site. However, if you invest money, you can get jewels, and buy the tools needed to rank up faster in a simplified way. You can't throw money at the screen and hope to get a rank. The amount of rping necessary to gain the Experience required for S (from A) stays the same (same for S to H), but acquiring the tools necessary happens much faster, so the speed at which you can succeed is raised immensely.

Money is an indirect way to get ranks faster, not a direct way to buy ranks. Just wanted to clarify that.

alright now I understand. I thought you meant through the donation process which should never happen. Not in Jewels. Alright that problem is solved the point of the entire issue as a whole stands.