Roleplay is used in many things to describe playing out stories and characters usually involved with creating a backstory and playing as your character or IC - in character. I've never roleplayed on ESO but I've been around other games with roleplayers.

Well, for those playing by the MMO roles of tank, DD and healer a character is just a bunch of numbers and exchangeable without any regret whenever the meta is changing - that is not role play at all - that is number crunching.

Sergykid wrote: »

roleplay actually means playing by the roles, heal tank dd. It means sticking to the game formal roles into completing content, on an MMO level, technically and mechanically...

Nope. Not really.
I mean, look it up: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Role-playing
In pretty much ALL definitions of the term, it refers to playing a -role- in a (loosely or strictly defined) -story- one way or another, be it in computer games, pen&paper RPGs, in psychotherapy settings or naughty bedroom fun...
And you don't get to rewrite the dictionary, language is detemined by the majority population using the term.

Playing the in-game job? That's just common sense, as much as some [ -censored, censored, oh, so censored- ] think it a "good trick" to mis-represent their job to get a quicker PUG queue pop... one of the reasons I dislike PUGing, and would much rather do dungeons with friends (if I had any that would ask me...)

Not to sound insulting, but i think this is a pointless discussion and it does not add anything constructive to the development and potential of ESO

Sergykid wrote: »

roleplay actually means playing by the roles, heal tank dd. It means sticking to the game formal roles into completing content, on an MMO level, technically and mechanically.
while loreplay means playing by the lore, what actually roleplay now means. You create your characters with his background story in mind, tied to ESO's lore.

Don't listen to them too seriously, mate, you will never make them understand anything, it's just a waste of time. They think that only those who write stories, distinguish "in-character" and "out of character" actions, create backstories, give themselves some nonexistent titles and achievements that may contradict the lore and game mech, etc. are roleplayers. But those other who just create characters according to their views, take quests, fight in the dungeons and in the Alliance War, study and become educated mages, soldiers, merchants and crafters, any other role in that virtual world because of different reasons such as money, items, some in-game national interests of their race, who play according to their own views of what is good and bad, etc. are not considered to be roleplayers in spite we all play a massive roleplaying game.

I am a Dunmer Ordinator, an Almalexia's Hand, not because I've created a story about it, but because I wanted to become the one, I studied the game options on that matter, I completed a certain quest, I was named Her Hand by Almalexia herself, I earned a certain achievement, I spent much time to pick up certain dyes and to earn the certain motif to create armor in full accordance to all the lore books that state the requirements to it. In other words, I can prove my words of being an Ordinator to be true (at least today. Who knows if the things change it in future and, say, the base game dialogue changes). The same time, for example, I also fight for the Ebonheart Pact in Cyrodiil for all those citizens killed and lands ravaged in Morrowind and in Black Marsh by the Covenant and the Dominion. And for Alliance points of course . This is what I call roleplaying. Other guys become crafters, dungeon raiders (additionally taking positions of tanks, damage dealers, etc., as you said it), merchants and chefs - they are all roleplayers too.

I prefer to think we are all roleplayers here, but some of us are just taletellers, as I call them. I try to avoid them, because I've already met some of them, they tried to convince me in some things like their characters were some sort of, say, Ashlander ashkhans though it is impossible to become the one, or tried to explain their deeds as being "in-character". Stealing is considered to be a crime in both worlds, but to them it is their character who is a criminal in a virtual world, not the player who controls him. On the other hand, he might be a good man IRL, but I won't think good of him (not of his character) while we are in the game. I do not separate player's actions and words from the ones of his character due to obvious reason I've just mentioned. Anyway, I'm not the one to judge them, let them play whatever dream they wish to believe. Some stories they write can be really good, but ESO is not a book, it is a world though virtual and interactive where people communicate with each other and perform communal tasks the same way they do IRL. It is just a virtual world, so the roles, troubles and tasks are virtual and different. So don't let some of those taletellers make you believe in their "achievements" - it's just their own fiction inside an already fictious world created and working well in terms of lore without their private canon.