The Need To Survive

[glitterdown]

I'm sorry but in 200 actions many things can get down, especially since within those 200 actions there could be 1000, perhaps even 2000 things said, and so perhaps 15000-50000 words said, and that is enough to make a character well developed

Which is the difference between an active, serious, well-played/developed character and one that's not. By and large people don't log in day-in and day-out and fight to develop all their characters to the maximum amount possible. I've never played that way (frankly I seldom play more than 6 characters), so it takes a longer time for my characters to develop. When you don't maximize daily activity, the game holds interest longer and characters live longer because the player doesn't burn him or herself out. Now, there are times where I will be fantastically active, but honestly, if I log in and nothing is happening today, I don't fight to roleplay just to "put on a show."

[Crosshair]

The problem with people merely seeing that suicidal bravery comes easily to them is that they have nothing to lose by seeing their character cut down in a hail of steel. It just causes problems IG for the killer, from charges of murder leading to execution, to having to move another bloody body!
There's no pain, no saddness. It's just a digital representation of a person. Here's the crux of how you tell a good Cantr player from a bad one. Just the other day I was in a town, and some twentysomething goes "i dont want to live any more please kill me" shot a bunch of people, and then was attacked and imprisoned... This is just lazy. he'el just starve to death or commit suicide. Apart from someone who has a really good reason (enslaved, at 99% health with the prospect of nothing better than a painful and long existance *coughJasoncough*) most characters really don't want to die unless the player is just plain lazy.
There's no way to fix this problem, cause there will always be people who join Cantr and then think "huh, I could do better than this game." and leave.
This post has no real point, apart from the fact that people should be encouraged to act as if they want to survive... The easiest way to get your best acting skills out in the open is to put yourself staring down that Crossbow bolt, or facing all those melicious looking people in fancy clothes with lots of long pointy things. I do it all the time, although I particularly enjoy acting... Honestly, if you don't like acting, I don't know why you're playing Cantr

[deadboy]

The problem with people merely seeing that suicidal bravery comes easily to them is that they have nothing to lose by seeing their character cut down in a hail of steel. It just causes problems IG for the killer, from charges of murder leading to execution, to having to move another bloody body!
There's no pain, no saddness. It's just a digital representation of a person. Here's the crux of how you tell a good Cantr player from a bad one. Just the other day I was in a town, and some twentysomething goes "i dont want to live any more please kill me" shot a bunch of people, and then was attacked and imprisoned... This is just lazy. he'el just starve to death or commit suicide. Apart from someone who has a really good reason (enslaved, at 99% health with the prospect of nothing better than a painful and long existance *coughJasoncough*) most characters really don't want to die unless the player is just plain lazy.
There's no way to fix this problem, cause there will always be people who join Cantr and then think "huh, I could do better than this game." and leave.
This post has no real point, apart from the fact that people should be encouraged to act as if they want to survive... The easiest way to get your best acting skills out in the open is to put yourself staring down that Crossbow bolt, or facing all those melicious looking people in fancy clothes with lots of long pointy things. I do it all the time, although I particularly enjoy acting... Honestly, if you don't like acting, I don't know why you're playing Cantr

I agree with you on this one (I love acting , am in a play right now for that matter) although you don't -have- to enjoy acting to play cantr, if you played each character as yourself (this tends to be those of you out there who don't even -try- to play the opposite sex) and that is alright too, so long as you segment it a little. For example I have a mix, some of my characters remind me a huge amount of myself, some have traits that are a little like me, but then again some are just so wildly different from me that I cannot place any similarity (Although these often have a basis in someone I know in real life)

[Mafia Salad]

Why whine about newspawns willing to throw their life away? You can just enjoy playing now and accept it as a given. Learn how to deal with it and pursue your goals despite them. It can be done, I've seen it.

[N-Aldwitch]

Mafia S, the problem is, some 25-30 year olds, and not-too-active, non-forum players too, aren't attached to their characters at all, they're more than happy to have suicidal bravery when caught and about to die, than to use their brain and live- because hey, you can just click that big button, type a name and create a new one in seconds! (so long as the slot is free!)

[Mafia Salad]

I don't see what's wrong with that. And I think that it is likely and reasonable that someone could have a character they are very attached to be suicidally brave too. Perhaps that is who their character is.

This is a game and a lot of people enjoy playing characters who are passionate or dedicated enough to a cause that they would die for it. Others might see an opportunity to do something memorable with their characters so they can tell their friends or forum buddies about how their character died a heroic death when fighting tyranny, etc. Look around at the personalities of the characters in Cantr, they aren't the same as reality. A larger then real percentage of suicidaly brave characters is just part of that.

If you are trying to take over a town or something of that sort and three people armed with bone spears and clubs step up and say "over our dead bodies" then you have an opportunity to Role Play. Do you beat them all to death in public and give yourself a bad name (or to inspire fear in the other citizens)? Do you try to talk them out of their suicidal tendencies and into your army? Do you trick them into locked rooms and kill them off silently? Do you drag out their death in intresting ways to make the players want them to stay alive in their new situation? It really would give an opportunity for creativity.

If a player accepts that many characters will be suicidaly rebelious when challenged (usually when you challenge their independence or freedom) then often that player can think up more sensible and workable plans on how to enslave someone or how to establish x government when someone says they will die first.

A lot of people when they play their characters they see them as the hero of a book or movie. So when the odds are stacked against them they do the same thing as the hero's of pop culture do, they risk it all and try to defy the odds. Even if they had a mundane existence before their heroic stand. It's a part of Cantr because it's fed into the players minds all the time and that's not going to change any time soon.

If you can't work around the problems this playing style creates with in game creativity then maybe you should become the lackey of someone who can, then off them and take over when they accomplish your goal for you. Solutions can be found in game and I think that looking for them will create a more diverse and interesting game. Unlike mechanics related problems in Cantr this one does not have a best answer so you may just have the opportunity to see different people come up with radically different solutions that work well given their circumstances. It’s like getting people to do what you want them to do when they have their own goals that aren‘t the same as yours, it’s a challenge and an opportunity, it takes strategy and role playing. Isn't that what Cantr is all about?

It's easier to change how you play out a situation to get the results you want then to try to make lots of other people change the way they do.

[N-Aldwitch]

I don't see what's wrong with that. And I think that it is likely and reasonable that someone could have a character they are very attached to be suicidally brave too. Perhaps that is who their character is.

Stop. We're not talking about that kind of person.... We're talking about someone who ISN'T attached to their character, the minority on the forums, and majority in the game.