Apply for all races but humans

[Lrmy]

Also, I'm totally in for making all races, apart from humans, special races that have to be applied for.

-To many people play races wrong. This would solve some of that and cause people to educate themselves on a race before playing it.
-New players should not play other races than humans because of the fact they are more difficult to play correctly. The other races that are in game would be good examples of how to play a race because they were already accepted.

[maryday]

YEA

[Lord Arcia]

~signed~

[Alytys Lamar]

/signed

[abcfantasy]

Signed.

[Talirea Iomee]

and what about the ones who are allready there? *sighs*
Here we go again with stereotypes... That's what I fear about...

not signed

[abcfantasy]

The already existing elves and other races? They are left as they are.

[Jupiter]

Then we will have a lot of humans and nearly no other races.

Looks at the goblins. How many of them are you see IG? Or gnomes, fairys etc.

There is planed the newbie island, there could be also leched how to play elves and other races in a proper way.

[Alytys Lamar]

and what about the ones who are allready there? *sighs*
Here we go again with stereotypes... That's what I fear about...

not signed

Has nothing to do with excisting and well played Characters. It should be only installed for the new ones.
After a playing period from 30 days or so ( only an example ) the player can asking for another race...

So I can't agree with Jupiter. I'm sure the RP would be better, cause the new player has no problem to play a human, has fun and then later more fun with playing another race.

[Korm Kormsen]

*me signs the proposal*

[abcfantasy]

Then we will have a lot of humans and nearly no other races.

Right now, we have alot of humans with different graphics. It's not any better.

[Jupiter]

Then we will have a lot of humans and nearly no other races.

Right now, we have alot of humans with different graphics. It's not any better.

Right. It isn't better, but this prosposal wouldn't make it better, too.

[abcfantasy]

You can't be sure. We're neither sure if it will be worse. I think it's worth a try.

[ogerawa]

Somehow I see this as something that would only make those special races can't evolve themselves and develop other characteristics. Unless they have like no adaptation ability at all.

I see it as in RL, the old generation versus the young generations in Asian mostly ( dont' really know much what's going on in the other side of the world) since the western cultures starts to influenced the young minds. The old generations, being conventional and everything, hardly accepts on what the young generations do. From the old folk songs into rock & roll and the like. The old generations hears it as noise, but the young hears it as a good music.

I mean, why do you limit people on how they should RP? Is there only those arrogant elves around? Don't they have their own personality? See it as the young elves begins to socialize too much with humans, they would pick up some of the human's traits. Unless everyone playing the old elves (as in old even for elves). Won't some of the elves, young ones especially, be curious about humans and learn their ways?

I fail to see how interesting the RP would be if all elves are arrogant, like a mass produce robots with coded personality. Maybe it would be interesting to see the elves be arrogant and reacts how they are supposed to. But after a while, you will learn their pattern and it won't be fun.

Why generalize people based on the race, when those people are individuals as well? Sure the race plays important role, but if you force everyone to RP the same kind of elves, they would lost their individuality, their uniqueness as a single being.

Maybe there are some that don't know how to RP an elf, those are the people that's need to be educated. Not the elves that already knows how an elf in Illa should be RPed, but decided to RP the other way around.

I think, it's better to make guidelines for race's stereotypical behaviors. Then let the players choose whether they would follow it or play their own way of a race.

EDIT: I might have over-simplified some matters, but I hope you get my point.

[AlexRose]

How about you also make it so people who have been active for x amount of time can automatically make these races instead of applying (as they have most likely had some good experience of these races).

I'd like to see the old orc group of 3-5 orcs sitting outside the shop and bullying people as they go by again. These were good times.

[Isilwen]

Yes, i'd love to see this happen.

On the side, i'll propose something as an alternative: Return the newbie-spawn points to different towns according to race. Where do all new characters end up when they first log in? Smack dab in the middle of Trollsbane. When I first joined you ended up in different towns, depending on what race your character was. This was not so good then because there weren't as many players in the different towns due to lack of resources, but that is different now. If we separate the races a bit, I think it could have the intended effect, because right now everyone is lumped together and a newbie's first impression on his character is going to be all the human RP, and he'll get used to that even if his character is not human.

[Pellandria]

I'm so signing Ogers Text, other reason is the "guidline" for elves, look at moonsilver what we got there about elves:
1.Mysterious Race, nearly no way to get any information about them.
2.They see the Natur as a whole being.
3.In general the character of an Elf is quite mild-tempered and friendly, also towards people of other races.
4.But it appears that there is a distinct period in their life, in which they choose to wander around the world and leave their homeland. This often happens in their youth. In doing so it is quite common that they maintain contact to other races or even seek their company.

So suck it up with arrogant elves... yeah they are maybe too open minded in illarion and played not "mysterious" enough, but they don't push away every other race as some rp'er think they would.

If we now just restrict everyone to one race, do you think the player beginn to play other races, after you "invested" a whole month into a char?

[Alytys Lamar]

I'm so signing Ogers Text, other reason is the "guidline" for elves, look at moonsilver what we got there about elves:
1.Mysterious Race, nearly no way to get any information about them.
2.They see the Natur as a whole being.
3.In general the character of an Elf is quite mild-tempered and friendly, also towards people of other races.
4.But it appears that there is a distinct period in their life, in which they choose to wander around the world and leave their homeland. This often happens in their youth. In doing so it is quite common that they maintain contact to other races or even seek their company.

So suck it up with arrogant elves... yeah they are maybe too open minded in illarion and played not "mysterious" enough, but they don't push away every other race as some rp'er think they would.

If we now just restrict everyone to one race, do you think the player beginn to play other races, after you "invested" a whole month into a char?

Well.. i think the player has after this time a knowledge of the game and the mechanics behind. Also he has the motivation to play another race with more knowledge... SO .. YES Pellandria, i think this could work.

[Pellandria]

Let me ask this: how many people joined Illarion in the last time, when I look at the list..I mostly see the same names, there aren't many new players, maybe I'm jsut mistaken, but if you really something usefull cut all players off and let everyone play humans for a month, no matter if they allready roleplay longer, you see it will bring nothing, as they will play a minor and not very important char and then change back to main chars and if you only learn with "humans" how are you supposed to play elves...there are allready too less elves or, as you like to say, wrong played ones, where to learn from, name me one elf, that is played according to the guidelines and let this elf hang around all newbies?

I just fear that the charm, every char has its own story..own believings..own charakteristics, that all will go down to waste if you push everyone on the guidlines, because thereare no true guidlines, there is no "Elves would never do this and that and this", if you want a differenc speak with the player of the false rp'ed chars, tell them how an elf could be, don't push them into something.

[ogerawa]

Another thing would be, if you see someone who RPed "badly" (according to you) such as the elves we have been talking, you should talk with them (OOC if you have to). Rather than witch hunt them and ban the char (i know this is exaggerating). Maybe they didn't know how to play elf, or maybe they have a background which tells why they are acting that way.

So if you see some poor RP, tell them how they can improve instead of left them like that and then talk somewhere in forum that the char sucks. Cause that won't help at all. They will stay with their poor RP. Not to mention, what you considers bad RP that might not be the case for other people. But if you think it is, then there is nothing wrong in giving some advice as someone who is more experienced.

PS: sorry for going rather far away about the discussion, but it's still related as this is the reasons for such proposal.

EDIT:
Before much complaining about "bad" RPs and "human" elves, lets go back to the past. When you see those "bad" RPs and "human" elves, what did you do? Talk to them, give any advice or anything to help them improve themselves at all? If your answer is "no" then, you know where to begin now. So, don't start with the "end" of the road. The things that had been talked so far is like the last option, not the first option.

[Retlak]

I'd like to see the old orc group of 3-5 orcs sitting outside the shop and bullying people as they go by again. These were good times.

This can easilly happen again If only the other Orc team were their main chars.


...Why was Orc a free race to play anyway? The slang and behaviour is EXTREMELY different and difficult compared to any other races.
It's lucky that so many people don't like the idea of playing Orcs But i've seen 4 newbies on Orcs lately. Not the best start.

[Llama]

#me signs the proposal

I'd like it if there was a 'test' (remember the old stories?) for people who haven't had an account for 3-5 months and still want a different character.

[Taeryon Silverlight]

I completly love this idea. Also, it is a fact, that we have players, who play about 5 months and have the rp-experience of a total newbie. This is poor but true. I'm for application for every other race then human and maybe halfling.

[Estralis Seborian]

I can name some reasons why I don't like this proposal:

• We only have one type of avatar for humans, there is no paperdolling. If everybody starts as human, all characters would look equal. This looks boring and will not attract more players
• We had an application system for accounts that did not work out - the difference is not huge to the proposed system
• Illarion needs more players, urgently. Players want to play elves, dwarves, orcs,... and not only humans. So, they will search for a game where they can
• Restrictions usually are a fun killer
• Illarion is not a well known game everybody on the world wants to play. Many UO shards can afford strict application systems because people know what they get, the basics of the game and can be attracted anyway. Illarion cannot compete with commercial games
• Players learn best from players. If there are almost no elven players, nobody can teach the newbies in racial roleplay
• A huge increase of workload for the GMs, resulting in them spending less time online

I can also name some reasons what I like about this proposal:

• An increase in the quality of racial roleplay will happen
• The ingame athmosphere will be better
• Hardcore roleplayers will benefit, their gaming experience will be better
• Newbie will only learn from the best

All in all, the "contra"s outstands the "pro"s for me, personally. I still think that it is better to let 10 bad players in than to scare away one good player.

[Kaila Galathil Travinus]

Aside from the interpretation of the "arrogant" elf, to the "too modern" on to the "too friendly", this request seems to be asking for an elf, or any race besides human to be stereotyped, for the people who would approve/disapprove to decide how a race should be played or am I misinterpreting something? As it is now, certain things are expected of fairies (there appears to be no bold fairies), and goblins (usually something strange,quirky, or funny) automatically. If these races are so much fun to play for the PO, why don't we see more ig? If I wanted to play an orc, and played one more "barbaric", less "civilized" then the other races, but not that aggressive, would I be denied an application for one?

Are there any chars on Illa that are played incorrectly besides the new ones? If you can actually only name two or three chars, how about calling a GM to talk to that one or two rather then change the rules of the game? It would not bother me to talk to any about my chars, nor their background.

I actually think of Trolls Bane not as a "human" town, but something similar to the United Nations... a mulit-racial town. The orcs, dwarves, halflings (though never used as such), elves all have their towns. Fairies in the forests and I have no idea about the goblins. Practically however, in order to have someone to RP with, most have to go to Trolls Bane. To encourage the use of their own towns, maybe make it an advantage to go there. If possible to program, have free transporter of that particular race to certain towns, or something similar. Humans would have it to Trolls Bane.


As far as learning to play a human first, Illa is very generous allowing other chars to be created, only allowing a human as a first char for newbie island seems reasonable. This would make it easier to learn game mechanics.

[Fooser]

I think we need special applications for humans too.

(no that wasn't serious, why not just trash it and bring back the old app system if only 1 race isn't going to abide by it)

[Magdha Tiefenerz]

I think we need special applications for humans too.

(no that wasn't serious, why not just trash it and bring back the old app system if only 1 race isn't going to abide by it)

/signed

[Jupiter]

I think we need special applications for humans too.

(no that wasn't serious, why not just trash it and bring back the old app system if only 1 race isn't going to abide by it)

*nods*

[abcfantasy]

[*]Illarion needs more players, urgently. Players want to play elves, dwarves, orcs,... and not only humans. So, they will search for a game where they can

Why does illarion need more players urgently? This...'urgency' is ruining a bit of the atmosphere rolepaly, because of people playing illarion with the wrong mentality, more like a hack & slash game.

[Estralis Seborian]

That's why.

But maybe I should rephrase: Illarion needs more good players as soon as possible. I would rather think about methods how to accomplish that instead of thinking about methods that hit new players, good and bad alike. Keep in mind that 80% of all players were scared away by the old account system. And who tells me that those 80% were bad roleplayers anyway is mistaken. I think a real newbie island will help alot - hopefully.