The biggest problem is definitely players and the lack of a DM. People may say that you don’t need a DM, but you do…it is essential. Without it not only do you not have conflict resolution, but you don’t have a legitimate rule bender. Example: all the best DnD games I have ever ran when they were at their best roleplaying, very rarely involved die rolls. And to clarify, i have NEVER LARPED. I would craft the backstory into my world when I made it. And contrary to what somebody said about it being difficult to create a world, and referencing Tolkien…I disagree. Tolkien created an alphabet for crying out loud! I made a four worlds, complete with maps and lore, for 4 of the 6 great campaigns I DMed, and I don’t mean that like I am great, just simply saying that it is not as difficult as it seems. For goood RP all you need is a few maps, some good lore, a detailed backstory, and GOOD PLAYERS!!! I never realized how good of players I used to have til I tried to start a new group after moving. All they cared about was metagaming and min/maxing stats. Thats why the DM is a rule bender. “What you want to start the game with a magic weapon? Sure give me a good plot mechanic as to why your level 2 bard has a magic lute.” If they could then I gave it to them, within reason. The game became about the relationships and plot, not about stats and gear. And when I say relationships, I do not mean sex, I mean revenge, betrayal, sacrifice, all the negative motivators that surround our great stories about heroes.

Bottom line is that these people, who we love to play with also, are the exception not the rule. The average player just wants to max their stats and get better gear, maybe drinking a beer and having some kind of horrible mockery of RP at the same time.

The bottom line is that the more people involved the less individual attention the player gets, and half the goal in RPing is to stand out or have something special about your character. I really just don’t think an MMO is the proper venue for this. Even DMing a table top game 6 was the maximum number of people I would allow to play, because there would be too much table talk and not enough individual RP time for each player.

The difficulty in that is what Jeff Kaplan I think said about quest text and people not reading it, people really do skip text that could communicate those things and make for a more immersive setting. Probably the best time to do that would be right at the newbie experience.

There’s an inbetween halfhouse between an immersive setting and full roleplaying where people can feel that their character is also part of the world and know how it fits in and why this explains the things it does in game. They may not need to go off and do pure roleplaying all the time, but they do know that their character has a background connection with the rest of the world. They know when they see other characters how their character vaguely feels about them. They get familiar with their racial tics (dwarfs like beer, forsaken are sarcastic) and factions.

I know it all feels very basic compared to crafting your own storylines, but I think a lot of people do immerse into their roles to some extent (even if it’s just disliking the other faction leaders). And it’s the immersion that MMOs could be very very good at indeed.

Plus the ones that do tend to be drama-fueled wankers. Just mention “Mary Sue” in a veteran roleplaying crowd and watch the venom flow. Endgamers have nothing on roleplayers for drama potential.

This would be bearable if the stories rper’s did were good, but 80% of RP is an excuse for sex, and not the good types, either. It was always so, even back of the days of MUD’s-now its almost unbearable. You make your MMO friendly to roleplaying, and you’ll have to deal with slave auctions and male pregnancy. The rest tend to be bad fanfiction, and maybe 3% of it will actually be decent stuff, but will dissolve due to drama.

It’s like darkfall-the idea is awesome, and in the right hands of the right players you could make an experience like no other, but reality trumps the ideal. No amount of game mechanical solutions can change that, cause of the way people are.