EVE General Discussion

Morals are based on religion, a set of beliefs and emotions. Things non-existent in Eve. Eve has the mentality of fend for yourself, Fend for your corp mates or both. In order for a well-rounded corp you must do both. That is the only thing really. Make isk, help your corp make isk and shoot pixel spaceships (or crunch rocks with lasers) that float around in space on your computer screen(s)/television(s).

What I think is creating the main division of opinions here (ignoring the plain trolling) is the the difference between ordinary boardgame like chess, Risk, Thud or Hnefatafl is that people seldom see them as roleplaying games.

When I play Risk I rarely play it in the role of Stalin, Gandhi or Mother Theresa.

I play it with my friends as me.

But when I play a roleplaying game, I'm supposed to play my role, no matter what role I've selected (or been asked) to play. No matter if it's online or IRL with friends.

And when playing a roleplaying game you are always playing a role, even those who claim that they don't (lol)RP.

You're playing the role of someone who pretends not to play a role.

What you don't seem to understand is there is a difference between taking your internet spaceship stuff too seriously and not thinking its ok to lie to friends in order to get personal gain.

Yes everyone I talk to laughs when I describe people who take internet spaceships too seriously.

But you seem to assume that people who will lie to friends in order to get there stuff in this game, care less about the internet spaceships than those who won't. I'm not so sure about that.

When I explain how people lie to friends etc in order to get their internet spaceship stuff, I get a different reaction. It's more of a its amusingly pathetic that people will take this so seriously that they would do that. It may be a different explanations, or different friends and family.

Who said I left them at the door? Still flying around with my bible in my pod, and 10 commandments poster on my CQ wall.

Responding only to point out that I was not referring to that post, I was referring to the one after that.

The one you keep ignoring.

And it's apparent you've never actually had a friend.

Many competitive games involve an element of trickery and deception to a greater or lesser degree. Why should anyone be more upset about this happening in EVE than in a game of Poker or Risk? If you played a game of Risk with your friends and lost because 2 of them made a secret deal to combine against you whilst both pretending to ally with you, would you stop being friends with them? It sounds like you would.

Well you got me. No point pretending any longer - when I'm not at work or playing EVE, I join up with 50 or 60 friends and we drive around looking for other drivers to murder and vehicles to destroy and loot. That's who I really am. There: I said it.

Actually, you've done me a huge favour - it's such a relief to come out into the open and say it out loud.

The problem with this is that lots of people who behave "badly" in EVE aren't roleplaying a "bad" person in -game (e.g.a pirate), they're being themselves, doing something deliberately to annoy other people in real life, through the medium of a game.

i.e. they're griefing. EVE is, notoriously, a "griefer's paradise".

Look at it this way, supposing there was a way in which you could guarantee that every gank, every kill, in EVE was done IC - that everyone at least made some attempt at playing a role in the game. Not asking for "serious" RP, but just some attempt to get into the spirit of the game as a s-f virtual world that you pretend is real for fun.

Would there be a problem?

I doubt anybody would see a problem - then it really would be a roleplaying game.

And indeed for many people who play EVE, that's what it's like, for both "good" roleplayers and "bad".

But the trouble is, the very same mechanism that allows people to play the role of "bad" pirate or whatever, also allows people to come into the game without any concern for roleplaying, to do things solely to annoy other players for laughs. They may feel they're playing a game (and of course functionally they are) but they're not really playing a roleplaying game, they're just griefing. You even see comments in this thread - many people don't take the roleplaying seriously at all, and are amazed that others take it seriously, and laugh at it. (Or do they? Perhaps they're just covering their asses - they're too embarrassed to admit that they enjoy roleplaying spaceship pilots, so they have to pretend, all macho-like, that they don't take it seriously )

Anyway, I reckon that many people who are pissed off about being ganked in EVE are NOT pissed off about being ganked by people who are playing a "bad" role - THAT would be ok, THAT would be in the spirit of the game.

They're more pissed off that the ganking is a form of mockery directed at the player, using the game rules as a medium, rather than being a form of player-made content in the role of "evil", directed at the roleplayed character.

Jenn, that is not what you whispered in my ear last night.
I feel hurt now.

Excuse me, but how are you able to divine that j.random annoying asshat isn't roleplaying a j.random annoying asshat?

Just how do you divine that the j.random annoying asshat isn't a very friendly person?

Or for the reverse, how can you now if the nice and helpful character in EvE isn't a scamming annoying asshat in RL?