You hit the nail on the head there I feel – even if they were controversial, and I had plenty (PLENTY) disagreements with Amarae myself even – they were there, they were known, they were an antagonistic ‘hook’ around which others schemed and plotted and so on. Later we had people like Kayera et. al., who at least existed, and now it feels like there is nobody at all.
That may be due to the lack of variety of guilds out there, all I’ve seen in Stormwind so far since GOT came out is a large abundance of House guilds, which is meh because most of them end up doing nothing.
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I have no idea! Maybe they are. This is a thread to discuss solutions, it would be great to hear from players who have ideas for institutional guilds or means to share a narrative again.
I’m genuinely not sure what Amarae had that other, similar figures do not. It might be as simple as the fact that she was very good at roleplaying the character or it was just a good environment for it.
Because it takes months of RP to establish a reputation and to become well known among the community.
Devotion.
Back then people were far more devoted to RP and the game. I feel they are not so much these days - also because BfA is just bad.
ps; I’m not Amarae.
Takes seconds if you do it right
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Well, go ask them, then?
Things don’t happen just from posting something on the forums. ![:wink:](https://d1bg94bbsh66ji.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/wink.png?v=6" ":wink:")
I feel like serverwide events in general boost a positive aura of roleplay for the server, even for those bubble-communities that rather only roleplay with themselves.
You just need one person in such communities to get interested and dip their toe at a server-wide event like some tavern crawl or a poetry night, if they enjoy it they for sure are going to tell their OOC RP-buddies right? Maybe they wont immediately attend a another serverwide event, but when we as humans (irl) enjoy something we sure want to enjoy it again.
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I also think a main issue that has affected Alliance roleplay is alts.
With the ability to throw multiple characters into multiple guilds, people are in turn just hopping on one toon when the other guild doesn’t seem to have anything too interesting going on, which is fair enough but sadly the lack of investment due to the ability of being able to quickly shift yourself into a different environment sees GM’s come and go very quickly across the server, unless there is a dedicated group of friends working around a concept. It’s a two way system, many people have the thought it’s just one way.
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Despite Marik(?)'s screw up, the Redridge Games were a good example of an event that made a lot of people RP with each other again.
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Stormwind City’s community is certainly more fractured than what you described in the OP, Albrecht. There’s still a go-to guard guild, usually some variation of guardsmen led by Kayera–currently as Mike Brooks leading the Lionwatch, I believe–and they regularly patrol the city. They’re competent, they have some banter, if they meet with criminals they take action.
Sometimes, it turns out the criminal is a terrible emote-fighter with a god complex or another equally undesirable trait. Their common response to this seems to be to walk away and treat the case as some nameless criminal NPC handled and tucked away in the Stockades, or something along those lines. At times I’ve seen both parties proclaim their decision to ignore each other and do their own thing.
This OOC animosity extends beyond just petty criminal interactions. Kayera, or Mike as their current toon goes, has led several previous guard guilds, and never have they been free of controversy. They started out in Eragorn’s Stormwind Home Guard and eventually came to make the Stormwind Bulwark. Although I didn’t interact with them, the forums would often report how stupid and terrible this guild’s supposed IC powergrabs were, condemning them as
both IC and OOC. Guilds chose to ignore them while others were able to make and maintain roleplaying relations with them. The community fractured and became a clique of its own.
This extends beyond Stormwind role-play. OOC disagreements across the server have led to guilds ignoring each other, often to the dismay of their members who are obligated to live by their guildmaster’s wishes if they wish to remain in their guild.
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this thread brought to you by: a boomer
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I’ll never advocate against guilds but if we make a comparison between now and a few years ago, people are far too reliant on events and campaigns to find roleplay.
The era of social world roleplay has just about come to its end. It’s very unlikely that you’ll stumble across roleplayers out in the world unless they’re part of a guild currently hosting some events, part of this problem is the ever-decreasing population of roleplayers, but I also get the feeling that it is because people feel entitled to being spoon-fed roleplay instead of actively working to provide it for themselves.
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And because BfA is bad, people also sub and unsub all the time. A few weeks ago the server was incredibly lively, and right now it has become a snoozefest again because people’s sub ran out after they subbed for patch 8.1.
Yes, maybe devotion. The fact that the basically hijacked guild name “The Stormguard” was already extremely well known as the best roughshod military style guild on the server probably did too. The non-stop controversy about her character and guild’s ridiculous and frankly roleplay-stifling actions gave her a lot of visibility.
Let’s not sugarcoat things too much!
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I am not sure if it helps the thread if we start discussing personal grudges in here. ![:slight_smile:](https://d1bg94bbsh66ji.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/slight_smile.png?v=6" ":slight_smile:")
I mean, I am not interested in discussing them. I’d rather just see some good RP again.
There’s definitely still solid roleplay occuring, but people are too easily drawn to Stormwind rather than researching through Argent Archives or other sources.
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No, it doesn’t, for sure – I just have a personal axe to grind I guess, because the guild “The Stormguard” wasn’t created by Amarae, it was already made highly popular by a close friend of mine, who is too nice in his dealings with people. They were asked to do something different and wouldn’t, he caved, and so the name still exists – as one thing for some, a different thing for others. But you are right, we won’t discuss it here. Feel free to whisper me if you’re interested but it’s basically a very old and boring story.
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Even in Stormwind. I’ve met some great roleplayers in Stormwind just by approaching them. I feel some of the reputation it has is undeserved.
Sure, I may, though rather to discuss solutions. As for the “Stormguard” name; I am just preserving it for vintage, just like another character of mine is preserving another well known guild name for vintage.
Off to bed now!
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The very long period that the AA was slow and unusable REALLY didn’t help. I used to check the AA every day, I’m sure a lot of people did, and I used it really heavily. Now it’s super underused. Massive shame.