English

What i guess is that you understand "comment" as "answering to the thread", this is not the same, at least in my mind.
I didn't think about Arfur's post only, but all the forum chat that followed beginning with it, and commenting the quote from the text. Thus excluding last posts from Salazar and Daomei, and excluding Ridditch's post as well.
[edited correction : Salazar and Daomei last post are discussing the same quote as well, and find no mercy in my eyes]

The title indicates it is a chronicle. The referrence indicates a long span of time for its writing. So it is more than probable that in the year 2574 that our character live in, this is not written yet, or at least not published, so nobody can quote a text that is not written and published.

Now the thing that make it absolutely clear is not available in the forum, sadly, but was written in chat InGame :
29/07/2013 00:47:24 * Tao Sian dit : [OOP: You can find the Tao Sian chronicles, writed in a lot of cycles, on your forum.. in a few minutes]

With original bad english language (we excuse you, french animator^^), let me correct like this : [OOC: you can find the Tao Sian chronicles, written a lot of cycles later, on your forum ....]

I take back the paranoid adjective for myself though. But who is not a little bit :p

First of all, i want to apologize for the (really) long post who will follow, who will be, as every long post, boring to read. I'll try to keep it as short and interesting as possible !

Before speaking about IC/OOC comment and the way to do them, i will do a quick explanation about IC/OOC.

1]IC

IC stands for "In character" (in french we usually use RP, for "role play"). It is everything that concerns your toon, as a living person. When Icus says to celiakos "oren pyr Abycus", it is IC. The only IC channel on ryzom is the around channel (everything on this channel is expected to be IC, unless you explain clearly that something isn't) : precisely, the standard speak and shout (/s and /sh), the action-emote (if there is something like "Icus bows to Abycus Zekops", your toon will of course see it), and the action-speaking emote (in a similar way, if you read "Icus turns to Bardor and says : what do you think about that ?", your toon will see Icus turning to bardor and saying "what do you think about that?"). I won't speak of though-emote and related stuff, there is already a thread about it (as a player, i think they are OOC cause i don't see how toon can read mind).

On other channel, everything is expected to be OOC ; but you can use them IC if you say it clearly to people and explain why you are doing this. Some examples : you can use tell sometimes (you are whispering to someone who is near you and people around you can't hear it : you do it in a private tell. They can hear you : use /em whispers to "YourToonName" : don't you think Icus is a fat useless fyros ?), and team channel (for multi-whispering in example ; or in hunt because of the short distance of /s, people moving a lot ... sometime i use it).

On the forum, there is one IC-section, which contains the event, roleplay, bazaar & guild registry forum (and the ambassade one on aniro forum). So everything on this forum is expected to be IC, like around chat, except if it's precised it's OOC. The nation / faction are supposed to be IC too, though they are often used as OOC (as long as it's explained, no problem). The event (ooc) forum is a bit special, used only for OOC stuff, so nothing IC should be in it.

2] OOC

OOC stands for "Out of character" (in french we usually use HRP, for "hors role play", which could be translated in "out of roleplay"). It is everything that isn't IC, who doesn't concern your toon. A server reboot will be IC ; if you says to someone "sorry, my internet connection crashed and i had to wait for relog", it is OOC. When we are using OOC in an IC-channel, we are usually using bracket/square bracket ()/[], eventually adding a "OOC" in the beginning of the sentence to be sure everybody understand it's OOC. In the forum, more or less the same, except you will almost always find the "OOC" indication.
To resume it shortly : what is said/done IC is what your toon think/do/see ; what is said OOC is what you, as a player, think.

3] Why there should be a strict IC/OOC separation.

There is a lot of reason to have a really strict IC/OOC separation. The first is : don't believe that what my toon think is what i think. Like almost any other fantasy (video)game, ryzom IS racist. You can play different races ; and based on your race people will attack you freely (the fyros/matis or zorai/tryker war you can find in the lore, for example), slave you (hi trykers !), have prejudice on you (you're a tryker, so you're an alcoholic), or disallowing you to do things (in the Lore, a matis noble HAVE to be a matis by sap, and it's very hard to be akenak/awakened if you aren't fyros/zorai).

So you will find racist toon, nothing strange to that. (my main toon is really racist, for example). But it doesn't mean that the player playing this kind of toon are racist ; and some people do the confusion. And playing with people that you think are racist is hard to do (well, playing or speaking or staying with them), because IRL(In Real Life) the racist thing doesn't have a sense. I've take a specific example to explain it, but this apply to everything : it's not because my toon hates you that i, as a player, hates you (as a player). So we NEED a strict IC/OOC separation to avoid this kind of misunderstanding.

Another good reason is what Feylin pointed out : immersion. I will take another example : you go to theater to see "Romeo and Juliet". If in the middle of the act, Romeo says to Juliet "There is no more light, i think the lamp just blew up", you will most likely find it awkward, and says "man, i'm here to see a tragedy, not you speaking about your lunch". This is the same in ryzom : when 2 toons speaks, you don't expect it to see in the middle of the conversation an OOC intervention. This is why we need to clearly say it (if someone come and says "i'm sorry spectator, we are having some problem with the light, please don't pay attention to the technician", you will understand it and this won't be awkward).

If you don't explain that your post (or a part of it) is an OOC-one, people will get confused. "Is that OOC or IC ? does my toon have knowledge of that ?" and you will have to step out of the subject, think of it as a player (and not as toon) : the immersion will be destroyed. Another thing is that if there is too much OOC post in a IC-thread, you will wonders why is it still an IC-thread ; so Event (OOC) is perfect for long, OOC discussion who won't disturb an IC-thread. But i'm the first one doing big OOC intervention in IC-thread, so i know that is it hard to put everything in the OOC forum.

Of course, the contrary is true : if you speak about the recent storm in Florida and someone suddenly says "And, awakened fey-lin, what do you think about the termit mound solution to destroy the Kitin path ?", this will be awkward too.

4] How to do a good introduction to an IC post

A single post in a IC-thread/forum isn't enough ; the most important thing when you use forum, is to explain (shortly) where the action is taking place. To let the player see if his toon will know about what is said in the post. If it's a private discussion (like the post from Riditch), it is better to explain that is it ; for example, "Eeri and Icus, alone in the building, were speaking about ...". In this case, your toon will definitively not know what it's said (except, of course if it is Eeri or Icus).

If it's public, like an letter (consider every letter on the forum as public ; if you need to send a private letter, send a mail to events@ryzom.com), just say it "letter from XX to YY" ; if it's a public sign, says it too (and say where you can find it) : "On the wall of the fyros academy, a new sign with the following text could be found".

There is a last case, the "chronicle one" : mainly used by the event team, it's main purpose is a sort of summary of an event. The action that will take place in the text was probably public ; so everyone can know about this part. Though, if there is some though part in it (like "At this time, i was wondering why the matis were so damn silly about this"), or private action, then your toon won't know about it.

If you look carefully, you will see that (almost ? but it's all of them ithink) every IC-text posted by the event team will be introcuded in some manner. You won't find a thread just describing an event, or though, or anything else. So please, do the same, so we can know if our toon can know about it :). But if your toon don't know about what is in the text, don't react (or at least, don't do it IC !). This create odd situation where people are answering to other people thoughts ...

5] A little note, about IRL and IG knowledge

I will finish with a short point ; i think this is clear that for everyone of us, no toon will ever speak about Jesus and christianity, cause homin living on Atys just don't know about it. This is obvious for a lot of subject (the historic one, especially) ; and so we don't use a lot of word in IC conversation.

There is, though, a subject where it is harder to make the difference between what we know IRL and what our toon (might) know : science. If you read carefully the Lore, you will see that the homin'science isn't really advanced, mainly due to a lack of good material (as Feylin pointed out, they probably don't have any way to see thing on a cell-level for example). So using words/notion like genome is strange ; in a similar way, things like "biomass" are more likely to be unknown to homin. So excepted if it's stricly necessary, try to avoid using this sort of thing :)

Don't forget too, that some things IRL can't be applied on atys ; for example, nothing says to us that the magnetism as we know is the same as the magnetism we know on atys (they are probably two differents things ; IRL magnetism is heavily metal-related, when there is no metal on atys ...). Don't forget it is a fantasy and magical universe, so things from here can't always be the same as IRL. (though there is of course some things who will be the same as IRL)

If you read until here, congratulations and thanks !

I think this particular post should be pinned at the begining of every topic in the IC section of the forum. Just for educational purposes.

+1.

Well, knowing that my little comment, in retrospect, found no mercy in Feylin's eyes ;), I'd like to point out that while the first comment to the thread should not be there at all, it does not need to quote from Sian Tao at all; it could be, for all it's worth, be a writing on one town blackboard commenting on current well-known matters, as it was not uncommon on Leanon before the merge, and most likely not on Arispotle either. So it might have been evil that Arfur started it, and that Daomei and Rollocks and finally me jumped on the band wagon (Me! Once insulted as an "RP Nazi" because of the strict handling of RP rules even into OP battles!) with own comments, but it is not damaging to RP, for all comments, lax or not, are strictly in an RP fashion. I imagined this as the mentioned public blackboard, to which Salazar simply attatched a signed note. You might have realised that I only commented on the discussion, not on Sian Tao's writings. Happenings like that, though, I often thought make RP a little bit more lively, for people join in, if for short, you usually don't read in the RP forums - and that is a good thing, isn't it? So I take that much more relaxed than Feylin and probably Icus, although the latter - quite rightly - suggested that the whole affair would not worth a mention at all if the first posting by Arfur had referred to, say, a public blackboard, as implied, instead to Sian Tao's writings. Arfur, of course, could correct that in less than a minute and the whole bunch of comments could be - if neccessary - moved into its own thread. Then, in just a whiff, any harm would be undone and the comments would still be there to see, read, and to add. ^^

Having said (or rather written) that, indeed there's nothing to criticise about Riditch's commentary in the French forums, for it's an RP account, taking place in private (and in thought). One could argue about the fact that it ruins the timeline to which Feylin refers - that Sian Tao's writings were from much later than Riditch's in time description - and that it should be in it's own thread; but that would probably be an effort to be holier than the Pope. ;)

A little addendum: I used to write extensive RP texts about thoughts and actions of Salazar in the past, as those from Leanon might remember (and those on the English language forums got a taste of it). I almost completely stopped this when Salazar became a Filira. The reasons for that become obvious when you read this thread and both the references to Riditch's posting and in the fact that - as Icus says in another context - everything on the forums is public, or considered public. That sort of knowledge influences people's actions, wittingly or unwittingly. I stopped sharing Salazar's thoughts in the knowledge that it would influence politics. That is, in a way, a great sadness for me, because I enjoyed sharing these things, and from one moment to the other couldn't any longer - or only in a pretty casual, less personal way. I doubt even good role players are not affected by a certain knowledge (which is the main reason I never read the "bible"). But as a politician, you're not longer allowed to show your cards on the table - only if it helps your purpose. Just for that I sometimes think about leaving politics alone, but on the other hand see the need for it, the need to move things on, even if it comes at a price.

So please non-political role players, always keep in mind that - while we are all doing this for fun - those who dabble on the political stage do so not without restrictions. Lighten a candle for us sometimes! ;)

[sorry that has become somewhat long as well ..]
I think that there a a couple of controversial points in what Icus wrote - beneath a lot much will agree and several interesting points which may be discussed further.

Channels

There is not much to say about that around is used for IC communication, and I agree indeed that it should be reserved for IC in all roleplay situations no matter wether somebody is contributing there by saying, grunting, whispering, gesturing, thinking, or even farting (scnr). As there are not only roleplayers in the game, situations may arise anytime, though, where some are using around OOC, but roleplayers should indeed mark any OOC comment.

The situation in other channels is trickier. In region, OOC is clearly default, but may be used IC in the course of events. Much more, ad hoc channels may be dedicated to RP and be reserved for, then. There is consensus that the Universum channels are completely OOC which means that IC communication should not occur, normally. Much more, any taunting, insulting etc. in those channels is considered a breach of chat rules even if it is "meant" IC. Btw, the chat rules in uni are indeed handled bit more liberally since the fusion so that not only random ingame chat, but also IC communication is tolerated to some extent. I tend to consider that a privilege, not a right, and to be dealt with with restraint.

Forums

Under my opinion, the headline over the forums group notwithstanding, there is only one forum fully considered IC (unless expressedly stated otherwise), namely the forum "roleplay (<server>)", all the others are not necessarily. The events forum is meant to announce events and discuss their details, OOC events as well als RP events, technical aspects as well as RP-related ones. In bazaar, business is done, frequently without regard of RP considerations (even if some roleplayers hate that), similarly, guild registry discusses many technically related issues of guild life even if the guild is RP oriented, and even completely OOC if it is not. That this forum here is OOC should be clear.

Roleplay rules and customs

While I agree to holding apart IC and OOC communication, I do not think that it is really a big deal. Even if OOC slips in with or without intention, or at least without evil intention, that can be figured out easily and dealt with most times. A bit of flexibility is necessary especially when dealing with RP newcomers.

Much more problematic is to achieve a consensus about what is IC at all and what not. Some Roleplayers consider PvP tags OOC (which sometimes ends up in the demand that other roleplayers ought to tag up) while others don't, some consider /tell and ingame mail to be OOC, as well as speaking in region while others don't. There is, IMHO, no final authoritative answer which opinion is "true" or "false". Rather there is the necessity to negotiate the mutual behavior in case those patterns are conflicting.

It is the very nature of roleplay that behaviour must be negotiated. There is no way to force such understanding of the world onto others. The only way is to respect differing views and to try to avoid clashes. This may imply, e.g., that during a mission in RP, Daomei informs some companions by /tell while she can't do that with those who consider it OOC, so that other methods must be used.

Conflicts and mistakes in roleplay

Icus mentioned that ingame racism does not imply that the player acting that way is a racist IRL. That is true beyond doubt. Yet it does not solve all problems. In theater, the actor of Duncan won't think that the actor of Macbeth is a murderer, and he would rather resent if he would not be killed ;). In the open situation of online roleplay, where the script is generated by the words and actions of the players, that is less simple.

Conflicts belong to roleplay, it would be boring without. But, the player playing an unpleasant role has some additional duties. One is prescribed by the rules of the games and violation defended as punishable, namely that one must not use RP as a disguise for abusing, mistreating, insulting or otherwise hindering other players to enjoy the game. That is a duty every player signed to follow when starting to play. So, when playing the racist, the villain, the rebel, one has the burden of responsibility that words and actions deriving from the role do not degenerate towards griefing. In doubt, one has to step back a bit.

Another point is breaking roleplay. It is not easy always to remain consistent in all utterings and actions, but one should work hard towards that goal to make the own role transparent to others allowing them to interact with. Illogical or deliberate behavior is not much better than abusive one, it may even be more damaging sometimes, killing fun and interaction.

An extremely problematic kind of RP, and a mistake frequently made, is "power RP", meaning RP actions which force the own RP behavior and its consequences onto others without their consent and without leaving them ways to develop their own RP responses. There is, unfortunately, an example in the event thread which led to this discussion. I mean the two "chronical articles" by Tao Sian, which indeed are an abhorrent example of power RP in two ways.

First, the form of a chronicle makes the contents uncontestable, as it is describing present and near future events from a wider future perspective (unless one assumes that the author was suffering from serious confusion when writing it down or is living in some parallel reality). So we "know" that the major threat of that year 2574 were not the Kitins, not assassination attempts of the clans of the marauders, not the Goo or anything else, but the Atys Rangers threatening the living planet with "the Ruin of Atys".

This does not leave many alternatives to those who have worked since many Atys cycles on the solution the Rangers had proposed. Either they agree to Tao Sian, then they cannot but abandon the damaging undertaking. Or they judge that either the dynastic healer has swallowed some wrong medicine, or even the heads of the Theocracy have lost their senses. While the Rangers never have condemned the search for alternative solutions of the Kitin tunnel threat, this approach practically calls for destruction of the "competing" event series with the termites.

I was a bit sad to see such from a member of the animation team. I hope that grave mistake in the arrangement can be corrected. I consider it intolerable that the players who contributed to the Rangers' event are vilified and frustrated in that way.

And that is an example how roleplay must not be done.

This is actually very interesting.

Let’s clear up some things first:
- The form of a chronicle does not make the content uncontestable. It only show the vision a character has/had on a certain event. A chronicle is not objective, it only shows what it is meant to show. Why do you think scenarists like to refer to things like “History is written by the victor”. Or, let’s say, that History as we know it is made by a great number of Chroniclers. All these Chroniclers do not make the facts uncontestable.
- The chronicle is probably an excerpt of a greater number of Chronicle. So, we can safely assume that Tao Sian mentioned a lot of other events in her complete Chronicles. So basically, we can safely assume as well that the Atys Rangers were not the main event of year 2574.

I think we should wait for further developments before reading into what the storyteller does.

Furthermore, the Rangers are still up and running. They will continue their experiences and, I guess, try to cope with the Zoraïs (who loves Zoraïs anyway? – annoying bunch of fanatics :-D).

Now, I would tend to agree that the event manager/guide who prepared these events did not think it fully through. This can be seen due to errors in the casting of characters. Let’s say it’s probably miscast (but that’s another matter). Anyway, it is just one side of the story, not the whole story.

Finally, I would insist on the difference between Power RP and Storytelling. Par essence, story telling is Power RP. But this is normal because the storyteller tells us how the world our characters live in is evolving. The storyteller is the game master, he has every right to set the constraints we have to act in. It is part of what makes the game interesting to follow.
Now, Power RP, as what the Maraudeurs often apply for instance, is annoying. It feels like “Let’s say we are the terriblest baddassest warriors evah with overpowerful stuff and overpowerful technology and overpowerful, overlong and overthick masculine attributes”. And it’s rightfully annoying, because they are no game masters. They don’t set the rules of the world of Atys.

Hmm, I think this answer is already long enough, I will wait for your answer and answer back after :-p. Let’s share our thoughts.

I agree with Brinnen on that. The chronicle - written by someone from his or her own view - has nothing to do with force on players. If that would be the case, there would be no need in RP at all - for all those damned Zorai and Tryker chroniclers simply stated that Matis are evil warlords and/or slavers. From that point of view, I could stop doing RP immediately. In the mentioned case it also gives not the slightest indication of the outcome, so I don't see any reason to take this as misleading or wrong or forcing.

See I told you Matis were evil! <snicker>

I suggest that Feylin, Geyos and Icus should form a comedy-trio!

1. Feylin starts this thread by complaining that s/he was allegedly unfairly accused of "driving out the representative of Hoi Cho from Zorai RP", which in fact proves as having been the truth, since s/he really did not accept (neither IC nor OOC) the title of "honorary initiate" of Zhoi, a representative of the Zorai of Hoi-Cho and in fact: at the time of this discussion Feylin did not want Zhoi to "represent" the Theocracy anymore...

Feylin was also claiming that "former Leanon" allegedly tried to "impose" the title "honorary initiate" on him/her/other players, while in fact this title had already been re-confirmed (votings) and also described/announced (forums) for the new server Atys in front of her/his eyes since January. And to top it off Feylin showed indignation and verbally accused his/her conversation partner after being pointed towards evidences that s/he made a mistake with his/her former allegations...

2. Geyos starts another thread complaining about players who answer IC to his pejorative / insulting thought-emotes about their characters, reacting as if they had heard/guessed them (which is a perfectly legal and accepted way in MMORPGs). Geyos was acting as if it was an insolence of others to defend themselves instead of taking his abuse by power-emotes silently...

3. And now Icus posts an explanation about the difference between IC/RP and OOC/HRP...

Icus of all people, the only one who repeatedly uses OOC-tricks during RP on purpose to annoy other players - by using French thought-emotes including the names of characters of non-French-speaking players, just to prevent them from replying to his abuse, even though he can speak English very well.

Icus, who is telling other players that they shall not mention anything that happened on their former servers IC, but himself repeatedly insults characters from former Leanon-players about allegedly "not knowing" about "history/facts" that were only Aniro-specific; during nearly every roleplaying-session...

Do you people really have no ablilty of self-reflection at all?

Sorry for you, I only work solo, one (wo)man show

I see that nothing is gonna ever being forgotten or forgiven, I suggest that we make 3 servers to split the community.

hey, vous savez quoi, vous êtes gonflant, alors tapez vous une bonne fois sur la tronche et arrêtez de martyriser ce pauvre forum qui a rien demandé =).

yes, i post in french (mais que fais la police), anyway nobody try to understand the other one, why I should bother me to write in english (zut en fait je le fait quand même =) so stop now!

and Zhoi, ok you think Feylin, Geyos and Icus are not fair whith you, and maybe it's true,but try to understand why, i can also write a post in the same kind of yours about you or daomei if i want.

everybody is in fault, so take your part of it and stop, please!!!

sinon je revient poster, et tout en français ce coup si =p

I would suggest not to get into quarreling, again. Such will not add to the attractivity of RP, on contrary. Forming a consensus about our Lore and a more or less common history are of greatest importance. That, again, has to be negotiated, which will be neither easy nor painless.

Btw. my critque concerning the prophetic chronicle shall not sound ungrateful. I highly value and acknowledge the work of the animators who have designed and are taking care of both the Rangers' and Zorai/Matis events and am curious of the further developments. I want to thank them both at this opportunity.

Another thing seeming important in RP Icus mentioned is, to which extent scientific terms should or must not be introduced. For my part, I accept the critique for a term like biomass, though only to some extent, as the difference of matter of living and non-living nature precedes the modern ages by centuries if not longer, and the world of the homins is quite modern under a couple of respects. Similarly it is inappropriate to use terms like genetics which in the narrow sense require electron microscopy which we do not have. Mendelian observations, on the other hand, may certainly have been made by so careful gardeners like the Matis. So, being careful with such terms and ideas is surely an important hint and a good idea.

What kind of technological understanding we have should be discussed further, anyway, better in a seperate thread.

Then do so and try to prove your words instead of just accusing me falsely! Yes, I'm calling you a liar.
Forget it, because I've had it with all the mobbing going on in Ryzom! I won't tolerate this any longer.

Roleplaying is totally loosing it's fun as some people are using unfair means and picking on each other; while being "tolerated" or even supported in doing so by the Event-Team. And RP in Ryzom is going down especially because of these few people who are using griefing methods, who are supported by too many "friends" even inside the Event-Team, and who are attacking and accusing others OOC unfairly as well in these forums here to boot. This is unbearable.

I might have forgotten about this thread if Feylin hadn't posted here again. And I am not happy to see that s/he is still attacking others for small things that might in fact be her own mistakes. Like about posting IC in a thread that might very well be IC, but Feylin assumes "must" be OOC...

Only the Event-Team can clear this up and can tell us if the thread was "meant" IC or OOC, as a public letter or a private one or whatever. So go and ask the Event-Team if you want this matter solved! Otherwise I have to assume that you just like to quarrel, Daomei and Feylin. You're doing this in a public forum/board for others to read, so stop telling others that they shall stay out of the fight if you yourself are enjoying fighting.

I posted again in this thread to have my concern with Daomei not pollute the discussion of the originial post.
This one was already a nice garbage for such considerations.

But well, next time I rather simply send a private message, I should have learned the first time.
I ask this thread to be closed. After all, too much people didn't talk about me, this is not good for my ego and contradict the title.