What do you expect from users that play high ranking characters?

[Foxypaws 44]

Chief, boss, king, captain, whatever your roleplay calls them. If you have any sort of expectation in place for those who play these characters on your site, what might those be?
Personally, I just ask that my players carry their own weight and stay involved with others' characters without me having to push them the whole way. I want them to create threads and plots for their group themselves.

I also ask them once a month to write a current event prompt, just a word or two regarding the state of events in their group to set the stage for the coming month in character.

What are your expectations?

[Libby 100]

Write.

Plain and simple, so long as my players (in any position) are writing, they're encouraging others to write. Same with my staff, myself, and everyone else. If everyone is writing the stories flow.

I just want to have great stories. Those are born from people writing.  Forget everything else.

[Elena 546]

To be actively writing, doing their research on the aspects they are writing about and actively plotting with the others. 

[Kazetatsu 263]

keep up with the high-rank activity standards whatever they might be.

make things happen in the world based on the area they lead, pick fights, order investigations, post executive orders, even plots that don't directly involve their character in the leadership role such as npcing lower ranks so as to bring the plots to the majority of relevant players. a high-ranking character's player doesn't have to do it all, or can take other approaches entirely, but a commitment to enhancing the plot and the ability to take story-based risks is important.

[Icewolf 258]

Staying active and trying to write with as many people (as reasonably) as possible. One thing I've noticed that happens too often on sites is that people create their character and then do nothing with them, or don't reply to current storylines.

Edited February 15, 2019 by Icewolf

[Shieb 47]

I really prefer high-ranking characters that actually do something with their rank. I've run into a lot of players who create the character, get the position, and then lounge there. Putting aside how boring that is for other players, it doesn't make sense in-character. You know, that place where all the fun happens. If a character is in a high-ranking position, chances are even if they didn't have to fight for it, they still have some strong opinion for or against that position and what it's supposed to do. Heck, I'd even prefer a character that genuinely thinks being in charge means lounging than a player who says their character does important things, and then just forgets to write all those important things.

 

This, of course, depends on the context of the game. If it's a wolf RP where you need to literally fight for your position, then I want active leaders. If it's a medieval RP where high-ranking positions are mostly about flaunting nobility and starting wars over territory, then it's less likely the character will have to do any actual leading; their position becomes more about internal conflict than external influence.

[Kit the Human 759]

That they enjoy their character in their role and if they don't, they make changes.

 

I will of course remind users that characters in a leadership role affect their followers, so inactivity or simply not roleplaying as a leader can be detrimental to the experiences of others. Furthermore, other users are free to switch allegiances or actually (nicely) communicate with their leader if they have an issue.

 

If members have complaints and bring them to me, I can talk to the person in question to find out what the 'problem' is and then gently make some suggestions. That could mean that their character steps aside (maybe that's a plot!) or that a kind of roadmap is made so that people can write ahead if they want, without fears of derailing the overarching plot.

 

But I don't believe that all the mechanisms in the world will generate the activity you want. You'll just attract people who thrive in that kind of structured environment (not a bad thing!) or discourage other users who may or may not be fantastic in that leadership role (possibly worth the risk!).

 

Mind you, I love a leader that really deep dives into their character position by say, writing a regular captain's log.