RPing Questions? Ask Here!

[Greater Soviet Ukraine]

Yep, this is the gameplay forum... you can request for a move, if you want.

[Orostan]

Yep, this is the gameplay forum... you can request for a move, if you want.

I did.

[Kyrusia]

Thread merged to a more appropriate venue, for the record.

[Sunset]

So, I've been thinking about my RP abilities. It seems as if in many of my role plays, I end up getting into arguments, and being accused of Godmodding. I want to know if I really am as bad as it is implied, or if I am simply in need of some improvement.

What you say, NSG?

Not being terribly familiar with your work and not blessed with the time to poke through all your threads, I'm going to ask for specific examples. Though, if I were painfully honest, I'd say that if you feel you can provide examples of Arguments or Godmodding you're already doing both. If you don't feel comfortable putting 'maybe' examples out there feel free to telegram them over and I'll take a look-see and offer a private opinion.

[Austisland]

I'm bad a deciding things, especially when it comes to government types. So I need some help. Convince me what government type I should have for my nation. I don't typically adhere to any one ideology, so that's why I need help. Monarchies intrigue me, Republics give me a sense of good-doing, and dictatorships are just plain fun to roleplay as. So go ahead, convince me and i'll consider your opinions as for what I should go with.

EDIT: I am not referring to the nationstates classifications, this is for roleplay purposes.

[Kannabyss]

Tyranny by Majority

[Drasnia]

Tyranny by Majority

Tyrannies by Majority are fun as are Libertarian Police states as they're both contradictions. Imagine the people constantly voting to oppress their neighbors at the price at oppressing themselves to the point where everything's banned, or where there are libertarians and police!

[Dytarma]

Go Republican Dictatorships!

[Austisland]

Tyranny by Majority

Tyrannies by Majority are fun as are Libertarian Police states as they're both contradictions. Imagine the people constantly voting to oppress their neighbors at the price at oppressing themselves to the point where everything's banned, or where there are libertarians and police!

Interesting... I suppose I could try it. A Police State would be interesting, more or less like a 1984 Oceania theme.

[Drasnia]

Tyrannies by Majority are fun as are Libertarian Police states as they're both contradictions. Imagine the people constantly voting to oppress their neighbors at the price at oppressing themselves to the point where everything's banned, or where there are libertarians and police!

Interesting... I suppose I could try it. A Police State would be interesting, more or less like a 1984 Oceania theme.

There are there are two classifications with "Police state" in them: "Corporate Police State" and "Libertarian Police State". For the latter, you need low political freedoms, medium economic freedoms, and high civil rights.

[Austisland]

There are there are two classifications with "Police state" in them: "Corporate Police State" and "Libertarian Police State". For the latter, you need low political freedoms, medium economic freedoms, and high civil rights.

I believe I didn't express myself clearly. This is for roleplaying purposes, not the NS classifications. I am looking for a government type for my nation to have for roleplay. Still, I could make my nation a Police State for RP.

[Kannabyss]

Tyrannies by Majority are fun as are Libertarian Police states as they're both contradictions. Imagine the people constantly voting to oppress their neighbors at the price at oppressing themselves to the point where everything's banned, or where there are libertarians and police!

Interesting... I suppose I could try it. A Police State would be interesting, more or less like a 1984 Oceania theme.

They're a little tricky to maintain, though. I try to keep a designated TBM, but I frequently screw up one of my axis

[Kyrusia]

I'm bad a deciding things, especially when it comes to government types. So I need some help. Convince me what government type I should have for my nation. I don't typically adhere to any one ideology, so that's why I need help. Monarchies intrigue me, Republics give me a sense of good-doing, and dictatorships are just plain fun to roleplay as. So go ahead, convince me and i'll consider your opinions as for what I should go with.

EDIT: I am not referring to the nationstates classifications, this is for roleplay purposes.

Howdy! Looks like your thread has bounced around the boards a bit. For future reference, stickies such as "RPing Questions? Ask Here!" (where this will be merged momentarily) or "Roleplaying Tips and Suggestions" are generally your best bet for questions such as this.

I would say it depends on the type of stories you want to tell and the sort of culture you'd like to write about. There will be overlap from one political structure to another, of course, but there are an infinite amount of combinations of political theory, socio-economic structures, etc. that can be applied and crafted into an interesting nation-state - especially when working within the realm of fiction.

I would suggest sitting down and deciding what sort of stories, as noted, you'd like to write about. Tales of plucky dissidents and cubicle farm rebels fighting against a consumerist and plutocratic elite? A largely democratic system weighted down by a tyrannical bureaucracy that, while holding good intentions, has lead to an pervasive corruption and degradation of the system? Perhaps a dystopic hegemony driven by the unknowable whims of an unknowable - and possibly non-existent - faceless despot? It's, ultimately, up to you. Many players research following the formation of a general idea about what they want before entering a state of persistent refinement and creative, conceptual expansion of their ideas and their complexity (worldbuilding). There is copious amounts of information available online relating to political theory, power dynamics, and governmental administration - contemporary, classical, and speculative; likewise, there are many places to research historical states where one might draw inspiration from.

I might direct you to several guides (this as well) the community has produced regarding statecraft and worldbuilding as a starting point - a "primer," if you will. You might also consider reaching out to one of the N&I RP Mentors (myself included, if so inclined) when you have the time.

Hope this helps!

[Austisland]

Howdy! Looks like your thread has bounced around the boards a bit. For future reference, stickies such as "RPing Questions? Ask Here!" (where this will be merged momentarily) or "Roleplaying Tips and Suggestions" are generally your best bet for questions such as this.

I would say it depends on the type of stories you want to tell and the sort of culture you'd like to write about. There will be overlap from one political structure to another, of course, but there are an infinite amount of combinations of political theory, socio-economic structures, etc. that can be applied and crafted into an interesting nation-state - especially when working within the realm of fiction.

I would suggest sitting down and deciding what sort of stories, as noted, you'd like to write about. Tales of plucky dissidents and cubicle farm rebels fighting against a consumerist and plutocratic elite? A largely democratic system weighted down by a tyrannical bureaucracy that, while holding good intentions, has lead to an pervasive corruption and degradation of the system? Perhaps a dystopic hegemony driven by the unknowable whims of an unknowable - and possibly non-existent - faceless despot? It's, ultimately, up to you. Many players research following the formation of a general idea about what they want before entering a state of persistent refinement and creative, conceptual expansion of their ideas and their complexity (worldbuilding). There is copious amounts of information available online relating to political theory, power dynamics, and governmental administration - contemporary, classical, and speculative; likewise, there are many places to research historical states where one might draw inspiration from.

I might direct you to several guides (this as well) the community has produced regarding statecraft and worldbuilding as a starting point - a "primer," if you will. You might also consider reaching out to one of the N&I RP Mentors (myself included, if so inclined) when you have the time.

Hope this helps!

That you for your reply. You got me to think actually. I've been on nationstates for a long time (this isn't the first nation I've made), and through all my time, I've never really been content with all my nations. Especially when it comes to roleplay, I can never decide what to do. I just change things based on impulse. It's difficult because I like to RP as so many things. Like all thoes ideas you gave me sounded good to me, but I could never decide on one. So, I think i'll sit down and read those guides you gave me, as well as search online for more information. Hopefully, I will find something that I like and something I can stick with for a good long while.

Thanks

[Bears Armed]

The arguments starting on this page are most relevant: https://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=383186&start=650

You don't have to participate in any RP if you don't want to do so... and if those other players' comments about your refusal to do so seem like harassment then you should report them to the Mods. (But don't respond to those comments by threatening to report them unless they stop, because that threat would be 'Mods as weapons' which is also against the rules...)

[Malo Motu]

I've been curious about something lately.

What exactly are the strengths and weaknesses between independent and regional roleplayers?

To clarify, I'm talking about the difference between people who roleplay strictly as a part of a regional community and people who pretty much ignore there region and RP using the NS forums and random other nations. This is all in terms of actual IC effects, so for example, somebody who strictly plays their actual nation as part of a region and only that region, but who is always doing various stuff in P2TM still counts as a regional roleplayer, because all of the roleplay that actually affects their nation is done in region.

I'm not sure exactly where I should put this question, so I've put it in gameplay since that apparently includes regional management and well this is related to that. It's about the way people play the game, after all. I could easily be wrong though.

And now to bore you all with my thoughts on the matter: Firstly, just so you know, I'm one of those people who has made about ten quintillion puppets on NS, spent about a week with most of them before forgetting about them and moving on, and having lasted a lot longer with a couple of them. I've been everything from a Chinese colony in Australia to an indochinese dictatorship to a space empire made of ex-hive mind insects to basically rip-offs of various random fiction that lasted about a day before I got bored of them.

As a result, I've done both independent and regional role play. One nation in particular (my longest lasting one) started as an independent roleplay, but joined the region of one of the other people in the RP. I wasn't too familiar with regions, and this one basically assigned land when you asked for it. It had a few huge empires followed by a few really tiny ones, such as my own one.

The next time I joined a region, it had a sign-up application that I found and was interested in. This region had much stricter rules, namely you only get more land through conquest. I had a good time here but eventually became overwhelmed by real life.

The reason I say all this is because these experiences have shown the strengths and weaknesses of each kind of roleplay, but I'm curious as to how others view it, those with more experience than I. One issue with certain regions is investment. Let's say there's a nation called Randomstan (if there actually is an active nation called that, not you sorry) that's in your region. You fight a major war, becoming hated enemies in RP but better friends IRL. You form a closer bond and have lots of fun, and they add a lot to the region, being a key part of its history. But eventually, the nation is abandoned. You have to undo all of that history, all of those events, especially if a new nation takes its place. It can become hard to manage, especially if this is a common occurrence.

Similarly, independent roleplay can become hard too. You can have two nations claiming to have the USA under their control, one your democratic, socialist ally and the other your hated communist enemy with parts of PMT tech, that must fight each other- on land that they are both in full control of. What about fictional and real land masses merging together? That time you fought a nation in which aliens lived as well as people. How can one form a coherent history and series of events from all of this?

Perhaps you could balance the two. But then, how would you explain to your region that you lost all of your Indian territory to the Antarctic People's Freedom Alliance? Maybe you could have a separate existence for both types of RP. But then, why not just have two nations to begin with?

I ask all of these things because I am curious. So, what do you think? Which kind do you prefer, and why? Is it more coordinated? More free? Do you dislike planning every event of an RP because of regional rules, or do you like the massive and intriguing stories that they can create? And above all, which gives the most personal fun to you?

[Kyrusia]

Merged to a more appropriate venue.

[The Macabees]

...

What you refer to as "independent" and "regional" roleplay aren't necessarily mutually exclusive. For the first 7–10 years of the game, many players roleplayed with other players in their region as well as some from outside of their region. In fact, some still do, myself included. I'm currently in RPs that involve regional members almost exclusively and I'm in RPs that involve almost none of the members of my region. And there's still canonical continuity – it's still the same nation, it's just involved with different countries, some of them which exist in different parts of the NS world.

Different regions have different rules. My region has almost no "meta-rules." We do have a general rule of thumb that territorial expansion has to be RPd and that there are tasteful ways of occupying NPC territory on the map (without it being a straightforward land grab), but these "meta-rules" are informal and flexible. As far as who players can RP with, well, I've always belonged to the school of thought that a player should be able to RP with whomever that person wants. Furthermore, in my personal opinion, regions that close themselves off to extra-regional RPs are regions that condemn themselves to an ultimate death. What happens is that when players start to discover other interesting ideas to RP outside the region, the rules stop them from combining the canons in a reasonable way and some players end up veering up into new communities. It seems more sensible to me to do away with the arbitrary borderlines defined by a "region" (which is really about a common map -- but you can also establish canon that connects many different regional maps) and promote open roleplaying.

While I'm on the open-RP side of things, there is another side too. Say that you're in a community that abides by rules as strict as: (i.) only currently existing weapons are allowed; (ii.) populations must always be scaled to real world standards; et cetera. Not everyone on NS abides by these rules and so, in this case, there can be a conflict of interest if there's extra-regional roleplay.

But, honestly, even here (this is personal opinion, again) I don't see the point, really. There are plenty of nations who scale their populations in my region to make them smaller and it's perfectly okay for them to request me to do the same -- in the context of the RP (by, for example, scaling my military deployment or whatever it is). Players are smart enough to negotiate and compromise for each other, so to me it doesn't make sense to restrict "official RPing" to the bounds of a specific region. This game is about the spread of ideas and mutual story-telling. Why restrict your creativity to a small group of players? That's how ideas get stale.

[Draica]

Let us say your country captures a group of war criminals/foreign leaders in a country that it invades and wants to send them before the World Assembly to be tried for war crimes, how would that work? Who would play the world assembly?

Do I post a thread in the World Assembly forums? Again, how does this work?

[Bears Armed]

The WA currently doesn't have a court for that purpose, at least as far as courts that would be established by GA resolutions are concerned.

[Sunset]

Let us say your country captures a group of war criminals/foreign leaders in a country that it invades and wants to send them before the World Assembly to be tried for war crimes, how would that work? Who would play the world assembly?

Do I post a thread in the World Assembly forums? Again, how does this work?

And it would depend on if there's even a World Assembly - some people don't acknowledge or have reason to acknowledge such an organization when it comes to RP. For most FT RPers in particular there's no such thing. There's a bit of a history there with proposed or claimed Galactic Assembly-alikes being used to bully players out-of-character, but not really pertinent to the conversation. As Bears Armed pointed out - the NS WA has no Criminal Court or equivalent. So if you were to somehow involve the WA you'd first have to propose and get a resolution passed establishing the creation of an ICC-like organization. I'll leave that to Bears to give you an assessment of the likelihood of that happening...

[Olthenia]

I've a question of a somewhat technical nature. Is there any way for me to unfollow a topic I've previously posted in? Like, I no longer want it to come up in the 'View your posts' tab, even though it is still an active topic?

Apologies in advance if this question should've been fielded elsewhere.

[Ghant]

I've a question of a somewhat technical nature. Is there any way for me to unfollow a topic I've previously posted in? Like, I no longer want it to come up in the 'View your posts' tab, even though it is still an active topic?

Apologies in advance if this question should've been fielded elsewhere.

If you're using Nationstates ++ on Google Chrome or Firefox, there's a "hide" feature that removes it from your 'view your posts' tab. That's what I do.

[Prosorusiya]

Any good Red Cross type organization RPs out there still left, like the old Transversal Red Cross (rip)?

Also, is there anything like a Socialist Internationale RP out there? I think I saw one a year ago or so but never got round to joining in...

[Havensky]

Havensky has the Humanitarian White Fleet (as seen recently in Fatherland) - but it's part of our military and not its own non-profit organization. It's usually almost never it's own RP.

I hadn't seen anything like the Transversal Red Cross in a while.