The most ironic thing ? RP was never the opposite of PvP. Actually PvP is Player vs Player, and afaik you can fight players when you RP. So it's even dumber, as these "PvP gods" didn't even knew what PvP is. Or didn't want others to know it, idk.
I agree with this view completely.
It's why I tend to build my ships (particularly the larger ones) to serve a
working crew of players. RP should be a natural outgrowth of actual game-play and whatever activity the player(s) are currently engaged in should serve as a framework upon which role-playing can be layered.
Pilots on a carrier should be able to see others running for their ships and launch as they scramble man-able fighters. Larger industrial ships in particular should be designed to accommodate working crews, rather than single pilots and a bunch of idle passengers. For industrial and military ships especially, this means fairly spartan, easily navigable interior spaces whenever possible and easily accessible, clearly demarcated sub-ships.
Too many people crafting such ships make labyrinthine interiors that are difficult to navigate under the best of circumstances, but when in the barely-controlled panic of combat for instance, add confusion to an already bad situation. Industrial settings are only different in that efficiency matters for regular, long-term, workaday use, rather than saving precious seconds that might win a battle, but they should still provide that same sense of collective effort and promotion of crew interactions when everyone heads to the mining ships or what have you.
With the devs now concentrating on making this game more of an actual game and trying to draw new players in, I feel that more ship-builders should be designing ships which serve and promote cooperative effort among players that is like any other tool: Highly functional, easy to use/maintain and easy to store when you don't need it.
I look at it quite simply, really. If you're about to put a whole ton of crew quarters, etc., into your ship build, ask yourself what all those people would actually
do on your ship. Instead of building 50 rooms of crew quarters, build 5 or 10. Then imagine people actually living in those rooms while the ship or station is in operation.
Now give each of them a job to do when the ship or station is performing it's intended function. In this way, RP is built into the very fabric of the construct, coming easily and naturally to the players who use it. You don't have to be a good actor to have good RP if you're actually
doing what you're playing at.
