AETEN II wrote:Nightkill the Emperor wrote:Aside from Excalibur and Mass Effect (and sorta EH, we cover all genres), I have never seen a military rp actually succeed and retain quality.
I again suggest to everyone to keep an rp idea in their head for a week before they write it down anywhere.
This so much. You can make a great war rp set in Sci Fi and it'll be good. But most people seem to try to model them off action movies. Plus then there's also the bugger that constant action is one of the things that can easily spawn terrible roleplaying due a lack of detail as posts get shorter and shorter. Real shame. I'd love for an RP styled like Band of Brothers, but there's just so many problems-
1- Every single decent war movie at least kills off someone. Not anyone is going to make it, but lest you have a great group of understanding people, making an OP decision to kill off someone's character will piss them the hell off most likely, or at least annoy them. Considering that on average you'd want to kill off half the group for it to be good, you'll end up with a very disgruntled group of players who won't like you a whole lot. While you could also have people control multiple characters, this as well gets complicated. Really, people don't like RP's of the realistic nature of:
'You see movement off in the far distance. You look to scan for enemies. There's a flash of light. Make a new character.'
2- Constant action is the enemy of development. Unless it's formed to be similar to an actual theater of war with lengthy pauses and leave and not a single battle- there simply will be little character development, or at least meaningful action between characters. Flashbacks, thoughts, and tiny powerful snippets of chatter are all that can be realistically done. You're not going to spill bits of your thoughts on the war while you're being suppressed by heavy machine-gun fire, getting shot, or looking for where the hell sniper of the week is.
3- No. You cannot make a character with an absurd rank charging into the battle with the rest of his men, because that's not how warfare works these days.
4- No. You cannot all be snipers. Seriously.. And you'll want a spotter if this is a modern-ish setting.
5- No. You cannot know how to fly a plane, drive a tank, and operate an artillery gun. That just doesn't work.
Those are most of the problems I see with them.
However guys, this gives me an idea. What about a Medieval War RP? Something maybe like Chivalry, set in a fictional world however with realistic tech for the time so there aren't wizards and warlocks running around. Although this would still require research to be fairly well done. Just a thought if anyone wanted to do it- as I likely wouldn't be able to be OP, as I'm still cooking my Warhammer 40k RP idea.
The way I could see something like this work is if someone makes a character with the intention of having them die and replacing them later on.