Re: Azrain

Jim O'Brien (jjobrien@erols.com)
Mon, 13 Apr 1998 20:13:53 -0400 (EDT)

At 07:47 AM 4/13/98 +0100, Brian P Enright wrote:
>Hi,
>
>
>At 02:21 PM 4/13/98 -0400, Greg Lindahl wrote:
>>> Greg,
>>
>>My name in the game is Oleg. Please learn to use character names; that
>>enhances this role-playing game for everyone.
>>
>
>Well, I've really found this whole Azrian discussion quite tedious, but,
>even though this may anger some, I had to comment on something...
>
>I think you're laboring under a misconception here, Greg. Namely, this is
>not a roleplaying game. It's a wargame, and roleplaying is optional (and
>not particulary wanted by me, though I am but one player). So, if I deal
>with you in this game (and it hasn't happened yet, and possably never
>will), I'm going to refer to you as 'Greg', because that's who I'd be
>dealing with, not some fictional being known as 'Oleg'. Well, OK, I might
>make concede this a bit if I wanted to be polite, but that depends on the
>situation. And I'd much prefer players referring to me (if they have
>occassion to do so) to call me 'Brian', or by the name of my faction, and
>not by the name of any of my characters. After all, my characters are just
>a collection of database fields that serve my ends (to do well in this
>game, and have some fun) through the order interface, and I am not any of
>them.
>
>Yes, if someone feels the need to insult a faction, they should make clear
>it's the faction they're insulting, and not the player. But, even then, I
>see no need to use character names (using the faction name does well
>enough). Personally, on the few occassions I've gotten 'in character'
>messages in this type of game, I've found it somewhat irritating, but if
>I've never dealt with the other player before, I'll let it pass. Anyways,
>the point being, I don't roleplay. I don't want to roleplay. And, yes, it
>could be that I'm alone in this feeling in this game, but you did say
>'everyone'.
>
>So, if you want to call yourself 'Oleg', whatever. But don't expect
>everyone else to do so.
>
>Brian Enright
>
>
That's really too bad, Brian. IMHO you're missing out on a lot of the fun in
this kind of game, but just because you don't want to role-play, you
shouldn't feel like you need to spoil other players good time by treating
messages from a character as messages from a player, which is what Eric
began to do to Greg in the recent Azrain messages.

I'm not even going to begin to rehash the whole wargame/role-playing game
discussion that has clogged enough of this mailing list's bandwidth already,
but if Greg and others want to deliver messages to this list from one of
their characters, not the player, they ought to be able to do so without
being afraid that their statements will be attributed to the real person,
not the fictional one, which (correct me if I'm wrong) is what Greg (not
Oleg) was concerned with in the first place.

No one is arguing that players should be *required* to communicate in
character. I just think it's important to recognize the difference between
in-character and out-of-character posts.

jim

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