Ramble incoming, on and off topic.
Hopefully it helps?
Behind the scenes with gangs roleplaying between gangs (bring in one myself) we do follow the story quite a bit but the original post the stories have come a long way especially with relationships and scenarios between them.
There is still huge meetings and stuff going on that people wont see if you aren't in the group/gang/directly involved. Within gangs there is a huge push for money, a lot of the gangs that is what their stories are built on. However I do see your point of control, this is something we are looking at - The dealerships are and I emphasise not owned by a gang but the individual.
If there is abuse going on please raise it (To my forum pms with any info which I can look into, evidence isn't always needed) where shops aren't being ran properly or there is misuse of establishments and I'll see what I can do. If other people want shops or establishments, again please PM me on the forums with a decent proposal - everyone is on a equal front!
As of a few updates ago I stopped any gang members purchasing new dealerships/buisnesses to hold back and not let the gangs run all the cities shops because I did notice quite a few being bought up as they are the richest. People who propose dealerships and shops etc, we don't charge them as they will give back in roleplay.
Back to the story question, just thinking maybe we can come up with something to show what goes on behind the scenes for each of the turf gangs, what stories are currently in progress, wrapped up stories, etc etc, maybe a public sheet/forum post of the inners of the gang to help those on the outside see the vision and the stuff they get up to. Gangs are a big part of the city now, I hadn't realised how big they would have become, as of last update I put in a hard cap of 35 per gang, some gangs are over that and wont be able to recuit until they fall below that threshold, the aim of this is to concentrate on having a constant quality presence in the city with gang activity (drug dealing, and other gang stuff which goes along with it - EG: small arms making, making new storylines, interactions with other groups etc). It is quite rare you will ever see 35 members all at once, more likely 10 or so on at once all doing different things.
The gangs have taken different routes in their roleplay and cater to different types of people. Eg, the ones who play to just socialise, those who play to be small arms dealers, drug dealers, the ones who like to micromanage people to get rich, those who want to grind and become wealthy, the car race scene etc- I personally think there is a place for all in the city, and yes that includes the grinders. I am from a heavy MMORPG background where I would grind the fuck out of random shit for that 1 chance at something or collect everything type of thing.
Something I am completely against is restricting individual players doing what they want to do, if someone wants to spend 4 hours stood fishing, let them, if someone wants to collect cars, let them.
In terms of future for gangs (and stuff that impacts them the most) the following is coming which hopefully will bring new dynamics
- Club house/storage changes,
- Drug effect changes,
- Weapon balance & meta changes (Which I will target at making larger weapons rarer, small arms and knives used as a primary - See below),
- Weapons displayed on the character (all the server) - pretty much at the end of development a few more checks needed on this,
- Street racing (properly re-introduced),
- Car scene and car modification/repair shops,
The car modification/repair shops which support stuff like illegal street racing - I would personally perfer seeing these go to gangs and dealerships/regular shops be moved away from gangs. However I am open to opinions/ideas on this.
I tend not to work on "legal stuff" as that is the interest of the other developers. I'm primarily working on the clothing update at the minute, and the gang expansion stuff - with some smaller event like scripts such as Island hunger games and the safe deposit boxes at banks etc (Other stuff is stuff like fire service, hunting fixes and expansion is all listed and some parts have been done).
I will speak to the gang leads and I'm sure we can come up with something and some agreement with the forward motion of gangs and coming up with some good storylines to make public(likely through forum write ups)(which involve a wider range of people?)(Maybe snippets of what goes on day to day?)
Any questions from yourself, my messages are open, I like to think I am quite approachable and have been more forward/open than previous leads (This is a good and a bad thing in different ways, it is just my approach of leading - I can't stress this enough, it isn't meant at a dig at anyone, different approaches works for different people/scenarios). If people have genuine concerns about anything! Please get in touch, whether it is police, gangs, nhs, some random dude you seen 3 weeks ago doing something weird. I can be a little bit blunt at the best of times or hot headed but know I am only asking stuff or trying to get to the bottom of stuff or see all angles -
But rest assured if you have approached seniors or xyz member and not got anywhere, message me! I'll kick the door in and shout the concerns, I'm not here to be diplomatic and sit in 400 hours of TS and 300 google sheets, I'm here to get shit done for the community - to keep us moving forward in GTA RP and keep the community as a whole moving forward, not looking back or being caught behind the curve again - Lets find new games, new avenues and new stuff for RPUK. I'm sorry to anyone who messages me questions or wants to talk, I honestly wake up to about 12 forum messages per day, tons(10+) tags on discord and various other stuff (Just from when I have been asleep and this doesn't include my real life job
which is so demanding at the minute with my students not submitting assignments and coursework) - I will reply, but it might take me a few days! I usually go through and read loads on 1 day a week and dedicate time to respond, bare with me.
Cheers, hope this cleared up a little bit of the future/questions you had. The last development update post went quite well with where I was going to point the server development and meta next, I may do this again since we have higher numbers now and it may be better for people to know the general direction I intend on taking stuff. Sorry if this is rambly, or just an output - If I didn't answer something you wanted to know please let me know I will reply.
Stealthee
GTA RP Development / Project Lead
