I think Nhaima has had a little bit of a chance to see a few instances of RP on the Horizon. What tends to happen for us is after an event occurs within the storyline (like the recent Caltron incursion), we begin this speculative brainstorming process on what just happened, where did they come from, why did this happen, etc. The last one is where we came up with this idea that the Caltrons were using their propulsion method to directly damage our infrastructure, which was a new tactic. This fit in amazingly well with some RP that was happening apparently simultaneously on the Sabre, where they connected a recent discovery of an artifact to the Caltron incursion. The two totally independent RP moments just happened so organically it was really pretty amazing.
For us, though, there needs to be a catalyst to get this started. Sometimes it’s a mission event, sometimes it’s sparked from some of our “filler” RP (like the stuff that happens in transit that was mentioned earlier). The good ones seem to be triggered by in-game events though. Those are the ones we have the most fun with.
I also think that within a crew, it’s good to know who’s into the RP and who isn’t, because if you don’t know that, then prompting someone to respond to an RP conversation is difficult, especially if it catches someone off guard.
As far as player archetypes, I really don’t know where I fit in. I see some tactician characteristics, maybe a bit of the storyteller as well, and quite a bit of the Casual Gamer. I don’t see myself as an overly formal commanding officer, and have never really had a strong character background (I really never bothered to create a background, actually). I do follow the communications protocols, and use the combat orders/language, and play along with the RP dialogue as much as I can.
Really, these sorts of things have to be worked out within a ship’s core crew, the regular players, and then try to bring the floaters into the groove when they join a crew. Some may bite, others may not.
I found an interesting article, with some other archetypes that overlap a bit with the original list Nhaima posted. I think the key statement here is the art of finding the balance between what they call “crunch and fluff”. See the paragraphs under “System and Social Intelligence”. I think it’s pretty interesting. http://www.cardboardrepublic.com/articles/up-on-a-soapbox/the-archetypes-applied-to-roleplaying-games