I’m going to play Devil’s advocate in a minute but need to preface this with a statement. I absolutely love the RP that’s been springing to life here. This steadily increasing collection of interesting moments in the spaces between the big events that are the duty shifts. I love the fact that Eric, Adele, Conrad, Strife, John, and others are all evolving into their own characters, rather than just being our online “avatars”. I love the work that the GMs are doing to put our half-baked ideas into actual game play. I love that, because of all this, I’m getting to know folks from outside my assigned ship better than if it was just all talking in the Galley. I love that there’s pushing to incorporate systemic roleplaying (my primary Hobby) into the forums, which will allow us to do so much more.
With all this in mind, one thought is rearing its head. Are we taking the RP too far? Or at least adding more than is ultimately a good idea? My image of the TSN for a while now has been one that is very welcoming to newcomers. Even if they’ve never played Artemis before, we’re all more than happy to get them set up as painlessly as possible. This is an important thing, as coming into a new group with structure and traditions can be overwhelming. Even more so when you have to manually install a mod on top of the game you’re here to play.
Then if one of these newcomers jumps onto the forums, they’ll quickly run into our cast of characters hanging out, and speaking as both shipmates and friends. Ones that have effectively formed their own inner circle inside the TSN. A circle that would love for more to join in, but this newcomer may not be sure they can just walk in on the conversation without someone having a problem with it. Am I rambling? I think I’m rambling.
Ultimately, my worry is that by adding another bit of system, that’s one more hurdle to jump for anyone wanting to get involved with all the TSN has to offer. As well as those that have the time for all this suddenly become more dominant of characters in the story than those who only can spare the time to make it to shift each week.
I might be worrying unnecessarily, or the only one that thinks this way. If so, I will continue to jump into these changed wholeheartedly. Bit this feel like it’s worth seriously thinking about. I’m sure we all remember the excitement of when we first got the Dauntless. Now we don’t even have it in dry dock anymore…