On SWTOR, I have found a few years of enjoyable RP experiences with random strangers that justifiably wish me dead. But, in those years I have also had those people annoy me to no end in RP with certain ‘traits’ that I’ve seen a lot of. I wished to head to the community and ask what trait’s they have noticed that make them roll their eye’s.

With me, I’ve come across such RP trait’s as:

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• The Hype-alt
   
  These type of characters do not exist to have fun roleplaying experiences with (At least in my near blind, cloudy, less then trustworthy eyes), they are made to simply make the player’s other character look better. I’ve seen a character in a guild have an alt who was a few ranks above my trooper and I am not exaggerating when I say that EVERY ONE of his lines that were ever spoken were just to hype his main. Another incident of this was in a sith guild where the alt in question had broken a rule and needed to be interrogated to find out exactly who helped him do it, but no matter what, we couldn’t get the info because he only held fear for his main. Hell, we start cutting off fingers and nada, then later we’re informed that the main got the info after scaring the guy….by cutting of his fingers. Maybe I’m just easily annoyed, but I hate these characters…
   
   
  
• The Special Snowflake
   
  In this instance, this character is the common need to be different from everyone else so that your character is interesting. I do like different in RP and find it very interesting, but it’s when they make such a gosh darn fuss about it, that it becomes annoying. It can even be just a small detail that they just blow out of proportion, like their eye’s glow a colour and they have to make sure to mention it EVERY SECOND! It’s never explained, never given any sort of aspect to make it interesting and the person will keep telling you about it so many times that you start to make a swear jar about every time you hear ‘’Her eye’s glow unusually gold’’. I will admit that this seems much more like a small pet peeve of mine then something actually bad, but that’s why I want to see what others think.
   
   
  
• The Cat-Sith
   
  You know Sith, right? They’re lovable sadistic bad asses, well…Some. (Marr is the one we bow before ready to lick his feet, Thanton’s the one we do not talk about at the annual Sith meetings.) As I see, there are many Sith you encounter who are fully prepared to tell you how they screwed your mother and that they don’t give a damn about your existence, being as disrespectful to you as possible. But, what a lot of RolePlayers forget is that those sith earned the right to do that, they’re powerful enough to beat the one who doesn’t take the disrespect (If they are not powerful enough, they are dealt with) and have proven their worth. This takes me to talk about those characters who constantly only want to cause problems for you, insulting your character at every turn and making threats. Though their problem is that they can dish it out, but can’t take it. These are the people who in reality would have been killed by now for disrespect, but are protected by an Player-Shield (Basically, the fact that the most common rule of RolePlay is that you can’t kill another character without the player’s permission). They’re running their mouth at you, throwing cups and ‘accidentally’ shocking you, but your character has to sit there and make up a reason for why he doesn’t just kill the Lord doesn’t just kill the weak acolyte that has done nothing noteworthy.
  

So, have you witnessed anything like this or something that pushed the sigh out of your lips in annoyance? (Or made you buy a swear jar….)

Just sitting 5 minutes listening to cantina RP will make me roll my eyes out of my socket. Its bad, 49% of it is what you describe as 'cat-sith' 49% is dancers and ERPers.

2% of the RPers ive seen are actually any decent,

most of the RPers I listen to (I don't wish to participate in RP that will be bad or unreciprocated / ignored) also seem to suffer from the one line syndrome or unable to do anything but talk, no body language or descriptions of characters at all anywhere in their posts. A lot of it is also just people using cantina RP to get a booty call (urgh) instead of actually developing their character or helping someone else do that.

Just sitting 5 minutes listening to cantina RP will make me roll my eyes out of my socket. Its bad, 49% of it is what you describe as 'cat-sith' 49% is dancers and ERPers.

 

2% of the RPers ive seen are actually any decent,

most of the RPers I listen to (I don't wish to participate in RP that will be bad or unreciprocated / ignored) also seem to suffer from the one line syndrome or unable to do anything but talk, no body language or descriptions of characters at all anywhere in their posts. A lot of it is also just people using cantina RP to get a booty call (urgh) instead of actually developing their character or helping someone else do that.

Yeah, unless you're looking to get flirted with, or just some really crazy scenario's (I saw a Chiss agent start a dance battle with a Darth in the Cantina, then everybody joined in!) get into a Guild. Usually I just go to the Cantina to see all the screwed up awesomeness that goes on there

If we are talking characters, then I hate the "rich kids", aka "iron mans". A character whos background starts with a long number describing the state of the account. It's a fast gateway to god-moding and I honestly hate it. One of my guilds had a new smuggler recently. He was carrying around a Cortosis Blade, which to my knowladge is quite expensive. The only explenation I got for him having it was, he's rich.

As for the players, I find the emoting bastards to be super annoying. I am normally RPing with my guild, but sometimes I feel the urge to do something alone, just for myself. So one day, Slippery Slopes was the choice. I encountered a Sith Lord that decided to hit on my ginger trooper. As I take my RP seriously and already had a partner my character cared about, I said a firm "no". That's the moment when he started god moding emotes, there was no "tries to pin" "attempts to grab". He just pinned me to the wall, grabbed, pushed and so on. If not for some other guild that was RPing there, I guess that would be a rape or molesting at least.

If we are talking characters, then I hate the "rich kids", aka "iron mans". A character whos background starts with a long number describing the state of the account. It's a fast gateway to god-moding and I honestly hate it. One of my guilds had a new smuggler recently. He was carrying around a Cortosis Blade, which to my knowladge is quite expensive. The only explenation I got for him having it was, he's rich.

 

As for the players, I find the emoting bastards to be super annoying. I am normally RPing with my guild, but sometimes I feel the urge to do something alone, just for myself. So one day, Slippery Slopes was the choice. I encountered a Sith Lord that decided to hit on my ginger trooper. As I take my RP seriously and already had a partner my character cared about, I said a firm "no". That's the moment when he started god moding emotes, there was no "tries to pin" "attempts to grab". He just pinned me to the wall, grabbed, pushed and so on. If not for some other guild that was RPing there, I guess that would be a rape or molesting at least.

I've never seen the rich ones as godmodding (Then again, every Sith I meet is rich...), but for metagaming, if I'm using the term right. I especially dislike it when I have my Sith Lord ordering Imperial Guards on our flagship to take away somone who just openly tried to kill our guild leader and apparently the traitor in question has paid off all the guards on the ship to ensure his escape. Yeah, I don't think any amount of credits would get a flagship's worth of guards to turn on the Sith, especially when it's for one girl with no allies.'

Also, when you lose hope, you always have friends at the Slopes!

Characters who talk about nothing but their backstory.

Seriously, it might be utterly fantastic but if I wanted to listen to a story then I'd be reading a book, not RPing. Backstories are cool, I love writing mine too and sometimes they can lead to interesting conversations or plots but I swear, if my first experience of RPing with someone is sitting through them telling me their life story then I'm not going to be particularly inclined to approach you again.

Characters who are supposed to be 'X' but the player can't pull it off.

'X' can be just about everything, the idea is that the player generally portrays their character as having knowledge they don't have themselves. While not a big problem, I can't help but find it annoying when your apparent expert in 'X' doesn't actually know what they're doing or doesn't do it at all.

 

Characters who are supposed to be 'X' but the player can't pull it off.

'X' can be just about everything, the idea is that the player generally portrays their character as having knowledge they don't have themselves. While not a big problem, I can't help but find it annoying when your apparent expert in 'X' doesn't actually know what they're doing or doesn't do it at all.

This is especially seen on the Rep side in my experience as Soldiers are constantly disrespectful to their superiors and the Jedis just can't follow the bloody code. I had a trooper once and RPed on him a few times, but I realised that I was RPing a role I barley knew anything about (This is what happens when I get my info on the military from 80's action movies!) and refused to RP on him until I got at least the basics of how a soldier should act.

I've done a bit of cantina rp in my day (my guild used to use as a recruitment tool, hanging out and rping our characters a bit and inviting people who seem competent and interested.) My main pet peeves:

The Lore Ignorer: So, I really enjoy the SW universe. I could probably large chunks of the movies from memory, own dozens of the books and have read twice that, and will play games just because they're Star Wars. I understand, not everyone is like that. Some people have only just gotten into it, or aren't really even into SW at all and just like this game and rp. That's fine, and I don't expect you to know everything. But if you're roleplaying in an established fictional universe, I am going to expect you to know the basics about how the world works, thing' like what Force powers can and cannot do, what the basic ideas of the Republic, Empire, Mandalorians, Jedi, etc are and who's allied with whom, and who the main cannon characters are and their basic personalities.

Angst Corner Sitters: AKA, the rper who doesn't want to rp. These characters just sit there throwing out brooding emotes and giving one-word answers to anyone who comes around and either ignoring or outright rejecting potential plot lines. Introverted RP characters are fine, but roleplay is a group effort, and your character needs to actually do something to be a part of the plot. If all you do is sit there and sigh, eventually people will stop trying to rp with you. And if your character is so shy/moody/anxious that they never really interact with others.... what's the point of rping as them?

The Copycat: Yes, I've seriously seen people trying to roleplay as characters from other fictional universes. Not just having the same name or being vaguely similar, but actually being "Cloud from Final Fantasy, in TOR." (not an actual example I've seen) It's not creative, it's really jarring for people rping with you, and most of the time it MAKES NO SENSE IN-UNIVERSE. The character will have powers that don't work in Star Wars, or a backstory that hinges on an event or phenomenon specific to their world. Edward Elric's backstory makes perfect sense in FMA, but it becomes either impossible without alchemy. Katniss Everdeen's is nonsensical if the Capitol and The Games themselves aren't a thing. Not to mention that whatever character is being ripped off is usually completely out of character anyway.

The Bad Guy "Good Guy": Basically, the guy who's supposed to a member of the Republic/Jedi/other good guys, or working with them, but acts so obiously evil that he (I see this way more often with male characters) should be killed, jailed, or at least abandoned by now, but haven't been because of PC armor. The same applies to Sith/Imperials/other bad guys who are not only not doing bad things, but actively working to prevent those bad things. Why are the bad guys keeping them around if they screw up all their plans?

So, yeah, those are my rp annoyances.

 

Angst Corner Sitters: AKA, the rper who doesn't want to rp. These characters just sit there throwing out brooding emotes and giving one-word answers to anyone who comes around and either ignoring or outright rejecting potential plot lines. Introverted RP characters are fine, but roleplay is a group effort, and your character needs to actually do something to be a part of the plot. If all you do is sit there and sigh, eventually people will stop trying to rp with you. And if your character is so shy/moody/anxious that they never really interact with others.... what's the point of rping as them?

.

Oh yes, these guys. Every time I walk into a Cantina, I see them, sitting by themselves at a table, playing with their food and always making everyone feel awkward with their looks of 'DEEP THOUGHTS!'. Who when you try to approach just act like a completely unsociable jerk, I mean, why come to the cantina if you're not there for a mission or RP? If you're just there to watch, why are you drawing RP attention to your self?

Angst Corner Sitters: AKA, the rper who doesn't want to rp. These characters just sit there throwing out brooding emotes and giving one-word answers to anyone who comes around and either ignoring or outright rejecting potential plot lines. Introverted RP characters are fine, but roleplay is a group effort, and your character needs to actually do something to be a part of the plot. If all you do is sit there and sigh, eventually people will stop trying to rp with you. And if your character is so shy/moody/anxious that they never really interact with others.... what's the point of rping as them?

My current character is an introvert and I can assure you, it's nothing close to replying with single words, sights all around and overall corner sitting. To play an introvert properly you have to be one yourself. Otherwise you cannot understand the way an itroverts mind works. An introvert is more or less a person that feels good when alone, but it does not mean she or he avoids contact with others. An introvert will sit in a cantina on a party, but she or he will avoid directly influencing the conversation. She or he will answer when asked, the answer might be short, might be delivered with a huge blush or jsut a nod. But the character will act totally diferent when surrounded with persons she or he trusts, knows and feels comfortable with. Suddenly that shy and always blushed girl can turn into the joking and laughing charm of beauty. It's how we work.

The players you talk about are the "I-Won't-RP-Guys". And I hate them. It's frustrating to write that long emote to see a single "No." as a reply.

The Bad Guy "Good Guy": Basically, the guy who's supposed to a member of the Republic/Jedi/other good guys, or working with them, but acts so obiously evil that he (I see this way more often with male characters) should be killed, jailed, or at least abandoned by now, but haven't been because of PC armor. The same applies to Sith/Imperials/other bad guys who are not only not doing bad things, but actively working to prevent those bad things. Why are the bad guys keeping them around if they screw up all their plans?

So, yeah, those are my rp annoyances.

Not every sith is a "bad guy". Not every republic trooper is a "good guy". But there are limits. A trooper that goes on a rampage will be discomishoned, trialed and then jailed or executed. Sith that refuses to do what's needed will be seen as weak and killed. But I agree, a lot of people take the RP to an entirely new level of awkwardness...

The Lore Ignorer: So, I really enjoy the SW universe. I could probably large chunks of the movies from memory, own dozens of the books and have read twice that, and will play games just because they're Star Wars. I understand, not everyone is like that. Some people have only just gotten into it, or aren't really even into SW at all and just like this game and rp. That's fine, and I don't expect you to know everything. But if you're roleplaying in an established fictional universe, I am going to expect you to know the basics about how the world works, thing' like what Force powers can and cannot do, what the basic ideas of the Republic, Empire, Mandalorians, Jedi, etc are and who's allied with whom, and who the main cannon characters are and their basic personalities.

Not really want to start on this one. I spent two weeks combining a list of materials used in SW universe just to RP my trooper that's an armstech specialist as well. That trooper is a Staff Sergeant now and I am constantly fighting with lower ranks that are openly refusing orders, laughing at me and what else. If I would play it by the military rules, all of them would be flogged, jailed or scrubing the floor of the Guild Flagship for eternity, but... PC armor.

My current character is an introvert and I can assure you, it's nothing close to replying with single words, sights all around and overall corner sitting. To play an introvert properly you have to be one yourself. Otherwise you cannot understand the way an itroverts mind works. An introvert is more or less a person that feels good when alone, but it does not mean she or he avoids contact with others. An introvert will sit in a cantina on a party, but she or he will avoid directly influencing the conversation. She or he will answer when asked, the answer might be short, might be delivered with a huge blush or jsut a nod. But the character will act totally diferent when surrounded with persons she or he trusts, knows and feels comfortable with. Suddenly that shy and always blushed girl can turn into the joking and laughing charm of beauty. It's how we work.

Exactly. My RP main is also very introverted, but that doesn't mean she doesn't do things. It means that when our (mostly Sith) guild is on a shuttle going to some sort of mission, rather than talking to the person in the seat next to her, she'll be reading, or checking over her gear, or thinking.

I was trying to distinguish between Angst Corner Sitters and characters who don't talk a lot. The latter is good, the former is annoying.

Thought of another one:

The One-Trait Character: I used to play DnD with a guy whose character's entire personality was that he was Chaotic Good and enjoyed climbing. That was it, those were his only character traits. This is more a roleplaying skill thing (the guy's characters are getting much better, btw), but one trait/quirk/alignment/backstory element does not make a personality or an interesting or likeable character. It gets really boring, really fast to RP with a Bounty Hunter played by a person who thinks that "not liking Force Users" fits somewhere on the MBTI system

Thought of another one:

 

The One-Trait Character: I used to play DnD with a guy whose character's entire personality was that he was Chaotic Good and enjoyed climbing. That was it, those were his only character traits. This is more a roleplaying skill thing (the guy's characters are getting much better, btw), but one trait/quirk/alignment/backstory element does not make a personality or an interesting or likeable character. It gets really boring, really fast to RP with a Bounty Hunter played by a person who thinks that "not liking Force Users" fits somewhere on the MBTI system

You mean like all the Sith that just didn't get enough hugs?

Also, thought of another.

The Amazing Rookie (Still working on the name...)

These are the characters that's back story includes that in whatever profession they're partaking in, they are 'surprisingly' one of the best. Always hearing the tales of how shocking (Get it? Because SITH!) their trials were, how they easily surpassed every acolyte there and how they even brought the overseers to their knees. Why can't we have backstories built upon sucking? I much prefer characters that became stronger because they were very horribly flawed (Like an actual person) in the past and built their strength upon their mistake.

The Amazing Rookie (Still working on the name...)

 

These are the characters that's back story includes that in whatever profession they're partaking in, they are 'surprisingly' one of the best. Always hearing the tales of how shocking (Get it? Because SITH!) their trials were, how they easily surpassed every acolyte there and how they even brought the overseers to their knees. Why can't we have backstories built upon sucking? I much prefer characters that became stronger because they were very horribly flawed (Like an actual person) in the past and built their strength upon their mistake.

Heh, I was acused of creating such a character. She is a master at sensing things while being rookie with other force uses, as she never had any major training. I had to explain over and over again that she is blind and that's how she sees the world. She is in a constant practice of that skill for the past four years.

But the one trait characters. If I ever see another sith that's killing everyone who dares to have even the slightest diference of opinions, I am gonna commit an IC suicide. That's like... Meh. My only sith that I RP does not kill, just because she prefares other methods of gaining power and influence. She will torture if needed, bully, threaten and what else, but killing is a waste of time for her. Unless someone poses a threat to her family, then she is ruthless and does not stop untill her girls are safe.

And one more

The awkward sitters:

People who join a group cantina RP and just sit there listening, never saying anything else then the first few words when joining. That's just... They usually leave without a word or even a tiny emote. It's frustrating.

Heh, I was accused of creating such a character. She is a master at sensing things while being rookie with other force uses, as she never had any major training. I had to explain over and over again that she is blind and that's how she sees the world. She is in a constant practice of that skill for the past four years.

Was she a miraluka? (The race of blind people)

[schanez;8171618]

 

And one more

The awkward sitters:

People who join a group cantina RP and just sit there listening, never saying anything else then the first few words when joining. That's just... They usually leave without a word or even a tiny emote. It's frustrating.

Why is that frustrating? Some people like to listen to roleplaying for various reasons. (1) They are new to roleplaying and watch to learn something so when they decide later to join in they know what to do.

(2) They just want to watch how you roleplay to see if you are someone they want to roleplay later with.

Why is that frustrating? Some people like to listen to roleplaying for various reasons. (1) They are new to roleplaying and watch to learn something so when they decide later to join in they know what to do.

This is how I got into RP ten years ago back on WoW. When I wasn't leveling, I plopped myself in a chair at the inn (you all know which inn...) and watched others RP around me until I felt confident enough to join in.

Just sitting 5 minutes listening to cantina RP will make me roll my eyes out of my socket. Its bad, 49% of it is what you describe as 'cat-sith' 49% is dancers and ERPers.

One thing that's surprised me more than anything else about the RP community in TOR... is how you'll have people in a cantina rping as if their characters were actually on a date, possibly, maybe trying to get into each other's pants. It has a realism and subtlety that I find surprising whenever I'm in one to logout.

So one day, Slippery Slopes was the choice. I encountered a Sith Lord that decided to hit on my ginger trooper. As I take my RP seriously and already had a partner my character cared about, I said a firm "no". That's the moment when he started god moding emotes, there was no "tries to pin" "attempts to grab". He just pinned me to the wall, grabbed, pushed and so on. If not for some other guild that was RPing there, I guess that would be a rape or molesting at least.

It is rape regardless. That's equal parts terrifying and I'm reasonably certain grounds for in-game reporting of harassment.

This is how I got into RP ten years ago back on WoW. When I wasn't leveling, I plopped myself in a chair at the inn (you all know which inn...) and watched others RP around me until I felt confident enough to join in.

I'm not saying Goldshire inn is a bad place for RP... but it's a bad place for RP.

I'm not saying Goldshire inn is a bad place for RP... but it's a bad place for RP.

Oh it was. Vampires galore, demons running rampant, but it's where everyone started out in RP and there were a few gems among the rubble. Those of us who progressed moved to Stormwind and beyond, the rest stayed behind. This was of course ten years ago, long before Goldshire became the eerily silent sex show it is today.

1. She uses the race miraluka, but is human.

2. I do not mind people listening to our RP, but when they approach us with an emote and a nice speach clezrly indicating they know a bit or two about RP and then just sit there staring... It's a little awkward.

3. It could have been reported, but nothing happened in the end and that throwing around and groping was not much more what other RPers do. I have no idea if the sith would use the blackscreen or just eRP in the middle. If he did the later. As a player, I always have the ability to simply drop out from RP if it comes to that.

As someone who would like to join in on RP with this 12x delight coming up, I was wondering if any of you fine people would be willing to assist a newby like myself. Else I will probably do what a few of you have mentioned and sit in the corner of a cantina, slowly learning

We can aid in your learning process....But we're a community of an MMO, we are far from our 'fine people' badge.

I would be most grateful, I think you earn the "outstanding citizen" badge now

I will....as long as they don't find out about all the NPC's I ate...