RP ≠ Really Powerful

Last night, I was about to log out in Dolanaar* when a Night Elf male ran up to me and said something I just had to screenshot. Take a look...

Finished looking? Okay.

I could've replied in character, over /say, but I wanted to give the fellow what I felt would be a more helpful reply, without confusing them. So, I wrote him up the whisper you see in the screenshot.

Unfortunately, the other player got bored of waiting for a reply and had a fit of the "awaa's" before running off. Now, I know the player claimed to be a noob, so it's possible that they had no idea how whispers worked, though they could've at least attempted some sort of response in /say or even /yell.

What irked and amused me at the same time was:

"Noob" refers to a person who in short, doesn't take the time to learn about something, or acts in a way that annoys others, without caring.

"Newb" refers to a player who is new at something, whether it be a game, sport or even career.

Does this mean that they just admitted they were asking a question to be a pain, or were they not aware of what "noob" actually means? Did they realize they were on a roleplaying server, and that /say is one of those "in character" channels? Why didn't they try looking at WoW's site first? Isn't that the logical thing to do?

WoW is a game, sure, but don't people usually try learn about the game a bit, before they try it? To, you know, make sure they'll enjoy it and even be a bit prepared? Ask people who play, read a review, watch a trailer...?

I want to go around in life, saying, "oh, I didn't know bills had to be paid in a timely manner and yes I'm a noob!" and then not be hit with penalty fees. Delusions of grandeur...? No no... well, yes.

Back to WoW!

Now, yes, the person could've taken a minute to do a search on WoW's site for "mount". However, the impression I got from this player is that they aren't interested in roleplaying. They just wanted their answer, quickly. This player probably doesn't know what (RP) stands for, and I've the hunch they don't care.

As such, I realize that there are several ways that Blizzard tries to distinguish and even explain the what a Roleplaying server actually is, but...

• On WoW's front page, under the Game Guide section, we have the Getting Started -> Realm Types links. Very straight-forward, but not everyone browses the Game Guide section before rolling their first character, so the Realm Types page doesn't always get noticed.

• Alright, what about the Roleplaying Policy page? It's even more obscure; the easiest way to stumble on this page is to actually view the Realm Types page and skim/read through to the Role-Playing Realms section.

• What about the WoW Game Manual? Well, I've looked through the manual packaged with the "standard" WoW, and there is no section mentioning roleplaying to any extent. Chapter 11 of the manual does discuss server types, but it states that there are only 2 kinds: PvP or Normal. I think that the manual should have briefly made note of what the various appellations are, just as the Realm Types page does. In short: explain what "RP", "RP-PvP", "PvP" and "PvE" means. Simple?
  

• TBC Game Manual? It only addresses what's in the expansion, which makes sense: You can't play WoW by only installing TBC. Why would the TBC manual explain how the basic features of the game work?

• When you load WoW, sometimes the game will try to suggest a realm for you - usually this occurs when you try and pick a server even though all servers are down. When you choose your country, you can also choose the server type and this is where you get a snippit of a description. Most of the time, this part goes unnoticed, or doesn't even occur.

• In most cases, a new player logging in for the first time will be greeted with a very long list of realm names. Each realm is tagged (RP)/(PvP)/et cetera. Now, this should be a dead giveaway for anyone who has heard of such acronyms before. Maybe, just maybe, they haven't.

In which case, my grand conclusion is that some people think that (RP) stands for "Really Powerful" and therefore they roll their first character on a (RP) server, thinking that they will surely be "Really Powerful" in no time at all!

Or, you know, I could just be trying to think up ways to avoid accepting the fact that some people don't care about gaming, aside from their desire to rush in and wtfpwn?

In the end, I'll keep trying to be helpful. Sometimes it works and whenever someone actually takes a moment to /whisper back "What's RP?", I can't help but smile and hope that they may get a bit interested in playing the game from a different perspective.

*I was in Dolanaar because I made a Night Elf, gasp!

P.S: The GM ticket generated by NameViolation was to report some advertising toons. Take that, you evil bots!

P.P.S: I respect people who don't roleplay, so long as they are not intentionally trying to ruin others' fun. This may have sounded like a rant, but the purpose of this entry was to organize my thoughts on why people seemingly roll on the wrong server for them. I thought of the phrase "RP ≠ Really Powerful" a while back, and this situation fit the glove in my opinion.