New RP incentives/penalties

[Iktomi]

In addition to the new PvP rules, we have implemented a number of new features with the goal of improving and rewarding roleplay activity on the shard.

1.) Irming will be introducing a new "Biographies" sub-board to the Roleplay Stories/Personal Letters board. Threads created on this sub-board will be non-replyable and can only be edited by the original poster.

This is meant to be a permanent location where players can provide the community with more in-depth history of their character, provide information regarding the character's personality/demeanor and track meaningful game/life experiences and changes (by editing the original post to add new information).

2.) We have implemented a mechanism by which the GMs can track positive roleplaying behaviour on each account. This will be used by GMs to help determine piety boosts (for example to 50 piety) but also to allow characters to "purchase" RP-related items or RP character modifications.

In order to be eligible to purchase a RP reward for a character, that character must have a biography (however, a player can still accumulate "points" if no biography is present). Factors determining whether to allocate a point include such things as consistency with a player biography (if one exists), emphasizing RP over m@d L00T, recent rewards from other GMs, etc.

Rewards may include things such as custom decoration items, renaming of items, unique hairstyles, special houses, unique hair/skin colour, etc. We are still in the process of determining cost guidelines and the exact details, although be sure we will not be turning Pangaea into some sort of freak-show elf disco. Any rewards cannot be sold and will be allocated to the rewarded character by serial number.

Because we do not currently have a resident no-life GM, we encourage people post screenshots of what they view as high-quality RP events/discussions/etc. on the Roleplay Stories board. This is not only to provide proof in cases where GMs may not have been present, but also because screenshots are often more entertaining for the rest of the player base. People are still welcome to write their own Roleplay Stories, and these will also be considered for points.

3.) We have implemented a new command which allows GMs to temporarily drop piety. Although there has long been the idea that religion players could get a piety drop for roleplaying their character in a way that conflicts with their deity's ideals, this was very rarely done in practice due to the long wait time before piety is restored. We now have a more effective tool for ensuring religion members (who should be the leading examples of roleplay quality) are living up to this standard.

[Iktomi]

Just wanted to say, great biographies so far and I appreciate the addition of some photos to RP stories, as Ricardus did here.

[Iktomi]

Direct plagiarism will not earn anyone any favours. Borrowing ideas is fine, but not effectively copy/pasting every paragraph from another source.

I know that many of you have English as a second language; however, this is no excuse for such excessive plagiarism. If you'd like people to proof-read your biography before posting, I'm sure there are many people (myself included) who would be willing to volunteer.

Also, when posting a biography, writers should ensure that it matches up with their current actions. For example, if the above-quoted biography wasn't changed, there would definitely need to be explanation about why Law would ally such a character.