I took some time reading posts and chatting with a few guildies and community members and I was surprised I hadn’t seen any post like this.
I’ll come on out and say I’m a player from Tarnished Coast, the unofficial role playing server for Guildwars 2. As a role player we run into many different scenarios, each scenario has it’s own challenges, partially from the immersion standpoint, and while GW2 is pretty to say the least, we think it’s animations and flexibility with how player characters interact with the world is limited.
So think of this thread as a wish list of sorts directed to Roleplayers. (And non-roleplayers who may think the same)
Disclaimer: Any other games mentioned are simply used in examples of the system in question, and are in no means me comparing GW2 to them directly.
1. Show me a woman who can wrestle a chair…
Tyria is inhabited by a curious race made of wood and cloth that can give roleplayers a real fight. Chairs (And their distant cousins couches and stools) have dislocated legs and arms, and even flipped asura, charr, and human alike head over heels. It’s amusing to see our characters turn contortionists, but doing the stool shuffle takes time out of continuing with the narrative so to speak.
Turning the chairs from static environmental items to entities (World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online, Starwars Galaxies) and allowing for a simple click to make alligning and a simple sitting animation/pose would alleviate the dreaded shuffle.
Another solution would be simply adding more sitting emotes to the game. (City of Heroes/Villains, Champions Online) and opening up the mesh for chairs and stools so more characters could find themselves seated comfortably on the chair’s surface, rather then floating a good foot above it.
2. She’s cute, I like the way she scowls.
Posing and mood play a big part of immersion, most of the time a roleplayer will detail exactly what a character is doing, how they look, a hint of what sort of mood they’re in, but that’s a split second, a single post in a stream of text that, occasionally needs to be re-posted or reinforced when new players enter the narrative.
That said, there are alot of existing animations and stances a character can take up, but they seem to be restricted to Non-Player Characters and cut scenes. Simple sustained poses and emotes (As in /kneel /sit) help in a way to summarize someone’s mood or condition. An extended pose/emote list would be a godsend.
If a character’s hurt or injured /wounded may have the character hold his/her side and hunch slightly, or maybe more dramatically assume the downed position already in game. /atattention may bring a characters hands to his sides and have them stand straight, for military oriented characters standing in line. /lean may be a more relaxed pose, leaning on a wall or even another player where they stand, arms crossed.
Facial expressions would be nice too, /sad /angry /happy /coy. All could be minor changes to the face or stance a player takes up when standing or walking.
Feel free to add your own suggestions, I’ll return often to add to the discussion as well.