university University/College - Is there any future for this kind of RP?

[SCANDALOUZ]

It's proven to work in other venues on GTA 5. Can be a bit mall ratty at times tho

[La Mala]

On 1/21/2022 at 1:02 PM, dimes said:

they can't imagine anyone doing crimes in colleges or grow up a criminal after graduating

I'm sorry to hear some players couldn't imagine that. Before that ULSA faction started up, everyone I knew RPing university students on GTAW were also involved in illegal RP. People are more complicated than 100% legal or 100% illegal, and many underworld types (especially women from what I've read) are expected to have a legal side. I think interesting characters exist in multiple worlds, they show different sides of themselves to different groups, like friends or family or work. School can be a big focus in any storyline where a character is trying to get out of the game and find a better life. I enjoy the tension of two worlds pulling on a character, like their home life against their school goals. Also there are legit real University of California professors (ULSA IRL) who used to be involved in gangs and drug dealing. It's like the gang capital of the world no? And of course, some professors and grad students actually participate in street crimes while studying street gangs.

Street gang characters might be less common but it's possible to be involved in gang life or on the edge of gang life and still working a legal job or attending some classes. But I'd definitely expect there to be students who were children of oligarchs, children of Asian autocratic elites, and children of mob style crime bosses. Like do people think these kids are getting schooled in an evil castle in the mountains? The whole idea of the underworld is that it literally exists under the world, everywhere we look there is some crime under the surface.

But like people here are saying, I don't think the classes/lectures are really the most important thing for us. I think a super helpful thing about RPing a school experience is the structure it brings to RP. Like we don't even need a faction for all types of students. Like if a character lives off campus and is always traveling back and forth between classes, that creates opportunities to encounter RP and also for a character to experience different vibes. If a character is mostly experiencing just one neighbourhood, I think being in a new environment can help open up lots of ideas. But of course the experience of living in dorms or just going to a big city university can change a character. I was super sheltered and ignorant about so many things before university. It'll be fun to see characters from Blaine County attending ULSA and experiencing some culture shock. I know people who had never left their home county before moving into the dorms before they came to university. These students legit never seen a skyscraper before.

[Hannibal11]

On 1/21/2022 at 3:48 PM, dimes said:

I've been in colleges on both SAMP LS:RP (USALS) and GTA:W (ULSA). Usually it turns out to be an OOC shitfest, when some people want to just rp around campus and be full time students and other people want to use the college as a development platform for their characters (mob, lspd, you name it). Me, @Street Boss, @Bellagio and few other guys joined ULSA on GTA:W and we got ton of hate the next few days, just because people knew we eventually gonna develop into illegal characters. So if the college's leadership acknowledges the fact that people want to develop through this platform, it'll be amazing - internships in various companies/departments, scholarships for athletes, etc etc. 

 

And obviously - it should be a crime-free zone on OOC level, BUT certain small crimes should be allowed for students only (acts of vandalism, small drug deals, fights, etc). 

 

P.S. Shoutout to Josh (Jack Ponaro) if he's still around. 

An unpopular opinion: The only GTA server where college RP has thrived is GTA:W - They've have had 30+ players online, every night for nearly 2 years. The only factions that come close to that are PD and SD, not even FD matches their numbers, so they must be doing something right.

 

Rather than try and copy a faction that didn't work (USALS), it would make far more sense at taking what this faction did right and then see how it can be improved.

 

The main issue is always going to be the lines of where acceptable criminality is drawn and I think you are on point when you said this:

And obviously - it should be a crime-free zone on OOC level, BUT certain small crimes should be allowed for students only (acts of vandalism, small drug deals, fights, etc). 

 

This statement is absolutely how College RP should be - expressly around campus. As far as I know, this is how ULSA mostly operates on GTA:W

- However GTA:W has a very strange notion of illegal factions vs legal factions - I think ULSA and any other faction is forced to play into this by their teams Legal Faction Management & this is where the cracks occur.

 

The problem of Illegal vs Legal faction divides.

There simply should never be a divide. You can have corrupt cops, you can have students who are borderline psychotic, and you can also have people caught up in gangs that aren't terrible murderers - there should NOT be a Legal / Illegal faction management, there should just be 'Faction Management'.

 

Remove the divide and suddenly you open up for far more 'grey' area's that can lead to interesting character concepts and there being a far less black vs white take on Legal vs Illegal RP. (Also I think one of the reasons previous GTA:W servers are so incredibly toxic).

 

Crime
GTA:W aside - What I think we'd certainly agree on is that you can't have daily stabbings / shootings in high school or college RP or it just reduces it to the very worst of Davis RP and it will kill the faction off just as fast as your average gangbanger_01 faction. 

While some serious crime does occur at college campus', it's extremely small in number and murders are even more rare.

 

Conclusion

College and Highschool's should be Mostly considered a 'safe zone' - where fights should be restricted to brawls and the most regular crime being drug deals (as per the posters comments above).

 

[Florida]

Yes definitely

[RUMLY]

If the server ever even launches, which at this point I'm starting to seriously doubt, yes, this type of RP could be fun. Lots of opportunities for different kinds of University RP. But like I said... Looks like we might be waiting on the forums throwing around ideas for something that's never gonna happen.

[Natasha Valentine]

I've never personally taken part in the Roleplay surrounding the University on LSRP SAMP but I liked the idea and with everything that is available on GTA V would make it that much better, such as clothes and being preppy with Gucci, inventory paper notes to do class work etc. It'd be neat if you could even get a little certificate of your graduation/degree. I'd totally like to see something like this exist on the server, it's different role-play and I like others role-playing a bunch of different things and that's what makes the server more lively. I vote yes!

[Strike12x]

I think colleges and university would be a great feature on the server. 

[Adrian]

I think it really depends on the supported atmosphere of the community. It is a niche sector of roleplay, but as long as you have a community of people willing to log onto those characters, I believe it's able to be done right. 

[Xanakin]

Like any type of RP that all depends on the people behind the facilitating said RP

[Kenado]

I've been reading through the comments and while I appreciate the enthusiasm, I have to admit that I'm not too keen on it myself. It seems like previous attempts at this kind of roleplay have ended up causing more trouble than enjoyment. The focus tends to shift away from the actual learning aspect and turn into a chaotic mix of different character developments and conflicting interests. Personally, I think there are other RP ideas that could offer more diverse and engaging experiences. But hey, that's just my opinion!

[BLAINE COUNTY MENACE]

I was involved / RPed as a student in UCLA. I can honestly say, that RP was sick and provided a unique experience, all I ever did before that was white gang rp and prison RP, but UCLA was a very enjoyable RP experience

[BLAINE COUNTY MENACE]

USALS*