The Roleplayers Guide

02-22-2005, 11:45 PM

G65_The _Strange_One G65_The _Strange_One is offline

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The Roleplayers Guide

This is a guide for the new and old roleplayer here at the boards: when I'm finished typing this up, you can ask questions and give some comments. I'll summarize what roleplaying is in this here first post, then go onto other topics later in the guide. If you know all the basis of roleplaying, skip everything you feel good at. If you thought you were an advanced roleplayer and you couldn't learn something from the introduction but you did (besides maybe a few stories): You overestemated yourself.

INDEX

1. Introduction

2. About Characters

3. About Stories

4. About Neatness and Flow

5. Advanced Roleplaying

6. Questions and Comments

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter One: Introduction

Hello to all the new roleplayers who are reading this (and maybe a few of the curious older ones too)! You can't roleplay without knowing what it is, can you? Here are the basics of it:
- Roleplaying is making a story with other people using your own made up character.
- You take turns in the story: you will start to tell what happens, run out of ideas, and someone else pick up the story again and start talking about what happens.
- You tell the stories through posts.
- No one else is allowed to control your character: What he/she says, does, or thinks is entirely up to you. Likewise, if you're seen acting out someone else's character without asking, you're the one in a bad spot.
- No god-modding: That is making your character have god-like powers. Once my friend Gruntaloob had a person in one of his roleplays learn every spell there was in two days. (It was a fantasy roleplay on another site.) After knowing everything, that person flew into the air and made acid rain and fireballs rain down on everyone... Sound cool? It's not. That roleplay immediatly stopped, and when he did that to another, no one let him role play anymore. If you can tell by the unnecesarily long definition, this is my pet-peeve. NEVER do it over everything else.
- Neatness! Try to make as little spelling and punctuation mistakes as possible! Yes, I know I make them. We all make them. But please, know that here, it doesn't automatically capitalize letters. SO REMEMBER TO! You want your roleplays looking as neat as possible, right?
- One of the most important things of all: OOC. OOC means OUT OF CHARACTER. You use it whenever you need to say something that's not in the story in a roleplay, because people will otherwise think it is. I urge you to use the OOC threads and the Private Message system when it comes to this whenever possible, though. Like I said earlier, don't you want your roleplays as spam-free as possible?
- IC and BIC are pretty much the opposite of OOC. IC means IN CHARACTER, and BIC means BACK IN CHARACTER. IC is rarely used, but BIC is used when you've talked in OOC earlier in the post. Don't type in IC every time you're actually making an IC post, that's a given.
- And finally, no smilies or 1337.

And that pretty much concludes it to the facts of roleplaying, and hopefully you can thoroughly understand what it is roleplays actually are. For convienence, I'll put an example exerpt from a roleplay right here, so you can see some of the real thing, and a really good real thing at that. It's very long, and I'll understand if you can't sit through it. Just let it get the point across.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Gruntaloob~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Wars have always been fought, and they always will be. They will continue to be the cause of countries spiraling into debt, and the lives of millions disappearing within moments. Over the years, America had tried to stop wars, which was, all in all, a bad move. It's human nature to kill one another, not for instinct, but for no adequately explored reason. Because of this, Staff Sergeant Nick Vale was stuck in the cramped cockpit of a DM-12 Single Personal Assault Aircraft. If it were his choice, he would be back on Earth, finding a humane way to take down major politics and restore the planet to its original state.
The Staff Sergeant remembered that when he was five, his father had brought him hunting on Earth, not the cheaper T-11 Gan, a planet dense in forest but not fit for humans. He had seen a bunny, or a rabbit, or a hare, whatever they called it now while he was there. Vale had never seen one again.
He sighed, clicking the "all clear" button in the lower left hand corner of his control panel. At least he had a good view of the Saturn Station from here, a Russian controlled space station built to look like a moon from a distance to fool anyone using visual sight to glance at it, like Vale at the moment, but he knew the place all to well. Four other "all clear" lights popped up on his heads-up display, or HUD. He yawned and keyed his comlink, "Okay, Falcons, we can go back now," he said in his deep, official voice that he used whenever he was on patrol.
It would probably take five hours to get back to Phobos Station at IECU*, the Intergalactic Earth Colonization Unit, near Mars. How far they had come in just a hundred years... A human could almost live that long now. From the year 2000 to 2115, the United Kingdom had been exploring space colonization so much that they were now able to travel almost a million miles in two hours. The human race had advanced in technology but not, however, in conservation skills. A little less than 3% of all rain forests remained and a measly 7% of all uninhabited land wasn't filled with landfills. And that was mostly the melting Antarctica.

The DM-12 pulled itself into the airlock, autopilot doing 99% of the work. The ship looked like a flattened space shuttle from 2005 with four wings on the back. It was dead white and the cockpit was less than a fifth the size of the entire thing. The landing gear on the bottom of the craft pulled out, small little legs that it could stand on until it's next mission or patrol, as the airlock that was about the size of a football field began to shut, the hydraulics hissing silently in the void. As the other airlock opened, the craft that Vale was in was pulled on a small track into the room, that airlock shutting. The entire procedure took fifteen minutes according to Vale's mission clock. He sighed and pressed the "open" button that was under a glass cover for safety. He never got why they had that there even when the craft wouldn't let you open the cockpit during flight. He sighed again and hopped out, climbing down the latter that had rolled itself up to the side of the ship. Vale was wearing a black suit that looked like what motorcycle racers wore from the year 2005. He popped off his helmet, revealing his light brown hair in the standard military cut and his sharp, official looking facial features. His metal boots made clinking noises on the grated flooring as he jogged towards the debriefing room, hanging his helmet on a rack as he passed it. His teammates followed at a slower pace, still annoyed by the affect that zero gees has on the legs.
As Vale entered the main hall, he jumped back. It was crowded with people. He swore, a band was playing. He was going to get all his superiors ticked if he didn't make it to debriefing. Vale ran back to one of the secondary halls that led all the way around the station, which happened to be five kilometers in diameter. Vale had to sprint for almost a kilometer to just slide into the room on time. It was a small room, only meant for twenty people at max and had a large holo-projecter in the middle of the round table that was in the center of the room. It was so dark that it was impossible to tell anything in detail about the room, but Vale was used to it. He instinctivly reached for a chair and pulled it from under the table. Always the same place, always the same time. His teammates pulled themselves in about thirty seconds after him, rubbing their legs and complaining. Zach Carrolson sat next to Vale and whispered to him, "I bet that they're going to lecture us," before going back to his 'good posture' position.
Three people almost seemed to materialize at the opposite end of the table at which Vale sat, their faces blurred by some piece of unnecessary technology.
After a lecture on being late, and reciting the United Kingdoms pledge, the debriefing continued as it normally would, simple questions like, "What was you're mission time?" or, "Was there anything out of the ordinary?” Vale answered all of them for his team, then after thirty minutes, the people disappeared, leaving the team to rest for five minutes in the cool room before leaving.
"So, how are you all today?" Vale asked for the fifth time this "day", looking around at his team.

*Phobos Station in IECU: Phobos Station is paid and run for by Americans. It was erected in the year 2068 after a breakthrough in space station technology. It's in the shape of an old western wheel with a large circle in the middle. On the outside part of the wheel are mini-cities, shops, and all things needed to make the station comfortable. On the inside ring, there are two main parts. One for electronics and mechanics that keep the station working, and the other one is a rainforest/evergreen forest that produces 50% of the oxygen. Artificial machines in the mechanics section make the other 50%.
Phobos Station is in orbit around Mars' smaller moon, Phobos, which his mainly because of political reasons on who could own Mars or how the politicians would split it up. After serving twenty-seven years as a civilian station, it became a military outpost and has been up until now. It is expected to be replaced within thirty years.

This post has been edited by Gruntaloob on Feb 17 2005, 11:06 PM

The roleplay is continued next post, I've ran out of my 10,000 character limit.

Last edited by G65_The _Strange_One : 02-22-2005 at 11:58 PM.

02-23-2005, 12:35 AM

G65_The _Strange_One G65_The _Strange_One is offline

Prophet

Join Date: Dec 2004

Posts: 499

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~G65_The_Strange_One~~~~~~~~~~~
Pilot Gary Lurman replyed with black stare, one eye closed, ad a mouth hanging wide open. "Not counting the run here, the fact that we are here, the stares from all the drunk people partying, my need to pee, and the fact that this suit is giving me a wedgie, just fine thank you." He looked about the dark room, trying to judge what was really just beond his vision. As far as he knew, those people that just told them about all that crap could be hiding just beond their sight. Damn intelligence spooks.
Gary really wished he could get one, no matter how lowly, and slowly burn his/her skin off and then stick a knife through his/her guts and peel them out like spagheti. Then he would toss the remains in a shallow pool of battery acid and watch their corpse afterwards burn in a bonfire fed by the gasses left to drift in space these space stations produced.
But that was beond him currently. Currently, he was in a freezing cold room surrounded by people on his squad, after a mission almost too bizzare to relate to. Odd what these guys wanted sometimes: Once it was a rock in a secluded vally on Jupiter's moon Ganymede... Which he found was surrounded by natural disasters just waiting to happen. 'Why did they want it?' Gary asked himself, 'Who gives a damn, they're themselves and they're probably stranger than a non-carbon based life form.
But what was most odd about what they had just accomplished was that they were to fly to mars before coming here. That wasn't normal. The current possitions of the planets made it so from Earth to Mars to Jupiter was in a 'V' shape: Those intel guys wanted them to avoid some one, or something.
When Gary finaly got bored with reasoning with what those guys did, he got up, and said, "Anyone know where to find a bathroom?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Gruntaloob~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Ah damn..." Vale muttered, "I was trying to not think about that! It's like half a mile back!" He said, irritably, standing up and pushing his chair in.
"Ah man!" Zach Carrolson said, doing the same as Vale, "Why do they have to have such a small amount of bathrooms up here?" He ranted hurridly, rushing out the door to the room which opened automaticly, still not letting any light in.
"Yeah, it's best that we get going now before we make fools of ourselves," Vale called over his shoulder, the door opening for him as he stepped out.

Nick thought about the the freaks at IECU, and the 'interview' he had with one a few years back. He had been asking about Phobos Station and the convieniences of the station. Somehow or another, they managed to make it so that there were only bathrooms in the mini-cities placed throughout the outer ring of the colony and still get by inspection. Not only that, but there was about a kilometer run between the cities. When Vale had asked about this, the IECU member laughed and said he was sorry for any poor fool that didn't go before they entered the halls. Vale had laughed it off there too, but now that he was in that fool's position, he wanted to strangle the member of IECU and jam his head in a toilet, one of those small ones that they had for the military people in the lounge.

Vale's black Staff Sergeant suit chaffed his legs, making it that much more uncomfortable as he walked quickly down the hall, hoping to find a bathroom sooner than at the next mini-city. He sighed heavily as he reached the entrance to the small city, suddenly he didn't have to go. At least he didn't make a fool of himself in public but it sure was a waste of time going all that way for nothing.

For all you people, newcomers and veterans alike, remember this: Gruntaloob is the best roleplayer here even if here he doesn't look it. He's been roleplaying for only he knows how long, so don't test his edge. He only bothers to roleplay his best when he's on a certain elite roleplaying site, but if you ask him to do his very best, expect what you people would call insanity. I'm writing this guide right now because Gruntaloob himself seems to be ditching right now, I'm sure he'd be on it if he were back.

Introductory Character Making:
Yes, I know this isn't the character making section yet, but I have a bit of everything here in the introductory. So how exactly do you make a character? To do so, fill out the sheet below and submit it to a sign-up... you want to be as detailed as possible, too. Ones to be particularly detailed will be marked with an asterik. (Asterik = *)

Name:
Age:
Race: (possibly)
Gender: (possibly)
Height: (american or metric)
Weight: (american or metric)
Eye Color:
Hair Color:
Skin Color:
Weapons:
*Battle Preferences:
*Bio: (short for biography, also could be classified as backround)

All but the last two are pretty self-explanatory. Battle preferences is a description of their fighting, and that means pretty much everything about it. Include weaknesses, which guns your character likes best, which he is best at, which he thinks he is best at, your character's worst case battle scenario, etc., etc.
The bio is the most detailed of them all. None of us are expecting a huge story on that person's life, just a solid summarization of what happened, important events, and the like. Should be as long or longer than battle preferences, but if it isn't, no one's going to get you.

Itroductory Story Advice:
So, now you got your character. You just need to use it in an roleplay, which from now on I'll shorten into RP. And what is the essence of an RP? Good plot, storytelling talent, and characters. I explained the last one above, so now onto plot and talent.
Talent isn't just, 'long posts'. In fact, many people making long posts do so with most of it being about nothing to do with the story. Oh no, you can have mamoth talent, and still just type in for a post: Jocall sighed, and leaned on him, too tired to keep awake much longer. Does it progress the story? Yes. Does it deliver the point? Yes. Could much detail be put into that post considering the character? Probably not. You see, you want to know when to make a long post: The person at my elite roleplayer's site hates short posts and bans anyone who does them, so I have to be careful. I don't want to be kicked off, but I don't think that correct.
This is where storytelling comes in. When you're a good storyteller, you know when to make the short posts, like when there's a lot of talking going on, and there isn't much that could happen at the current time: Or it's too early for that thing to happen. That's another aspect of a good storyteller: timing. Knowing the correct time when to make events happen and the like is just as important, if not more important, than all the other aspects of storytelling. Making things happen too quick - or too slow - is the downfall of about every roleplay here. DON'T LET POOR TIMING GET THE ADVANTAGE OF YOU!

Introduction continued next post.

Last edited by G65_The _Strange_One : 02-23-2005 at 03:51 AM.

02-23-2005, 12:56 AM

G65_The _Strange_One G65_The _Strange_One is offline

Prophet

Join Date: Dec 2004

Posts: 499

Introductory Neatness Advice:
Well, this will most likely be the shortest little section in my guide.
First of all, no smilies! They could be used in a story like this: Huj looked over at Guv and winked. . "Don't worry, we'll be alright ".
THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE! I saw a n00b that once did something along those lines, and everyone ignored him from then on. The second unacceptable thing, speaking in 1337. People who don't know what that is, it goes something like this: so dude got up 2 and 2 lina he said this is 4 u and she said well i got this 1 4 u...
Would that of better off been described as language of the n00bs? Probably.
Another thing I need to point out before I go onto the summary, always use correct capitalization! I don't care as much about the spelling, but its the capitalization and punctuation that's starting to piss me off.
First to do it: A person who started a good roleplay always did this, always does, and forgets about 75% of his punctuation. Things somewhat like: one last thing; kick their ass" really are starting to annoy me.
The thing to get me really set back: Seeing it in that roleplay by almost evryone now. If you don't want thisto turn into a 1337 junkhouse, use Neatness!

Summary:
Well, that does it for the introduction. I'll get to the character section when I can spare the time. So reveiw some things:
- Gruntaloob is the best roleplayer amoung us.
- OOC means out of character.
- BIC means back in character.
- You can always use that character sheet I provided the basis for by copying it.
- Long posts do not mark you as a good roleplayer, and short posts do not mark you as a bad one.
- Time the events in your roleplays as good as you can.
- Try to be as neat as possib;e - no smilies, no 1337, correct capitals and punctuation.
And that's pretty much it. Any questions? PM me or post here and I'll reply. It's off to, err, roleplay with me!

03-13-2005, 03:22 AM

G65_The _Strange_One G65_The _Strange_One is offline

Prophet

Join Date: Dec 2004

Posts: 499

A small update before I go on to post the next chapter is needed. So here it is!
Alright, RPing here is still in it's golden ages. When more and more people come, they'll need good posts to look up to, right? Right. Now, I expect the 'silver age' as it is dubbed in other RPing sites not to come anytime soon by the looks of it, so stay in your little happy worlds. But the new recruits here need a shaking up of reality, and I think some of you do too. The truth is, some of your posts are becoming much less and less detailed, in situations where you could describe things infinately more so.

Examples are:
When not fighting, people tend to try to get the story by quickly, without much detail at all. The real truth is that the non-fighting parts are what provide the real story, and they need the most description. If you were asked to describe how a planet looked, and then a battle on the planet, think about which you would leave out the most detail on.

The fighting could also do with a lot more detail, just with it it gets more tricky - you don't want to over do it either. Some of you talk about 'firing a few shots and running away', when really those words could be extended.

And with that to think about, I hope we can maintain our current RPing status.

__________________

Gruntaloob says: Moo cow!

03-13-2005, 06:20 AM

Gruntaloob Gruntaloob is offline

Prophet

Join Date: Dec 2004

Posts: 286

Character outline

Name:
Rank:
Branch of Military:
Gender:
Age:
Height:
Weight:
Birthdate:Month/Day/Year
Preferred weaponry: (Such as sniping, assualt, short-range)
Preferred weapon: (MA25B Assualt rifle and so on)
Armour/Clothes:
Hometown/planet:
Current station:
Ship: (If any)
Description:
Profile: (Biography)

That's just a quick character profile for you to fill out, a bit more detailed than G's.
As for some tips...
A) Keep it clean, don't go like:
Weapons:Pistol,Sniper Rifle ,
And that stuff.
B) Be detailed, don't type 'Sniper Rifle', type 'AM-43 2x optical enhancement armour piercing sniper rifle'
C) Be creative, don't say 'John' as a name, oh, new point, don't BE John. Unless you really want to have that name, have something creative such as Zachary Carrolson or Fie Ying. You can make your own weapons too, that's always good, but try to keep it narrow, we can't have fifty types of sniper rifles and pistols (even though there are more)

__________________
98% of the online population has some crap about smoking pot in their sig. If you're one of the 2% who doesn't give a crap, copy & paste this into your sig.

Quote:

The difference between idiots and intelligent people is that you don't see intelligent people every day.

03-13-2005, 02:06 PM

Dark Eagle Dark Eagle is offline

Prophet

Join Date: Oct 2004

Posts: 1,507

Dark Eagle is an unknown quantity at this point

I have a few suggestions to make here. I'm not a professional RP'er like G65 and Gruntaloob, but I am a writer, which is the closest thing. First, during a role-play, don't radically change the plotline or the way things are going. For example, during the Elite's Campaign RP, which has now died out, I had set up a situation where my character was guarding a door against some unknown enemy, and the other character (only two people ever did that RP) was heading underground to complete our mission. But then in his next post, I went with him, and the unknown enemy above never reappeared. This particular incident could be classified as somebody controlling someone else's character, but it did change the plot a lot.

Also, is it okay if, during dialogue, you control someone's character to the extent of making them say "Yes" to obvious questions and stuff like that, to avoid making a post like "Permission to fire?" and then waiting for them to respond when you had a huge, well thought-out scene in mind that might not work if they made a long post? If you've tried this before and found it to not work well, I won't argue, but I think it would be a good idea.

__________________
Farewell, wherever you fare, till your eyries receive you at the journey's end.

Last edited by Spartan127 : 06-09-2006 at 11:25 PM.

03-15-2005, 01:04 AM

Gruntaloob Gruntaloob is offline

Prophet

Join Date: Dec 2004

Posts: 286

About Characters

Before I start off, remember that I'm only doing one part of this section. G65 is doing the other. If you don't want to read mine (it's partially advanced roleplaying), go on to part two.
Making a character doesn't always have to be in a 'list' form, I myself rarely do that. The list often makes the roleplays look, how should I say, not as 'clean', so many people choose to describe their character in their first post. This is more or less for advanced roleplayers and I'll understand if you can't do it, so if you want to cut corners, skip your next turn and go to G65's post.
Now, for those of you who are still reading, you need to realize that you cannot ONLY describe your character in the first post or else it just... doesn't work. You need to have some sort of significance to his/her's entrance. On another roleplaying site, my character shapeshifted from a raven (fantasy) and healed someone that was dying, it progressed the story and I described my characters hair, clothes, weapons and everything else while doing it. That's why it get's confusing, many people will forget to describe their character.
I've seen people try this fashion of making characters and wind up like 'He had black hair and brown eyes and a sniper rifle strapped to his back and a...' the list goes on. It looked very 'newbish' because they basically made a list without pressing enter. To not wind up in that poor fool's position, instead of saying 'He was thirty-two', say 'He looked as though he was in his early thirties though the look on his face made him look like and elder' (more fantasy stuff). If you randomly pick a book off a shelf in a library, you'll never see anyone list off their characters attributes in the first paragraph. In case you didn't get any of that, here are some examples. If you did get it, skip these.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Good~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Swaggering clumsily down the hall came an enormous, increditably loud man. In one hand he gripped a fuming Cuban cigar and in the opposite hand he clung to a bottle of whiskey. His tall, muscular frame was clothed in a dark blue deep space flight suit, the kind often worn by the miners of Jupiter's moons, however, several patches of old American space fighter units from the Lunar Uprising and other conflicts from decades ago had been sewn onto the arms. His bronzed face was covered by a full beard and he wore his dirty blond hair long, in a mullet. Around his head he wore a band of white cloth bearing emblazoned with the Rising Sun and the kanji for Kamikaze. Slung across his huge chest was a leather shoulder holster, carrying an old revolver. This massive drunkard was supported by two attractive young women, girls really, but only by their extreme effort. The one on the left, a blonde who was slightly taller and older looking than the brunette on the right, was choking on the thick cigar smoke enveloping her head. Both had the same pastel green eyes, indicating some relation, and both wore blue jump suits that revealed a few too many curves. In tow behind the trio was a pair of young males, who's resemblance to each other was uncanny. They wore the exact same blue suits, which clung tight to their sickly thin frames, and suckled on identical bottles of cheap wine. Their gaunt faces bore expressions of deep, brooding anger. The only distinguishing feature was that one, was missing his left thumb. They were something more than twins, something unnatural, they were clones.
This motley group was heading towards the station's medical center, the large man exclaiming rather exuberantly that this and that drink was for some exploit of a fighter pilot named "Charley."
G65's Edit: Posted by 'Karl' at my elite RPers site.
Gruntaloob's Edit: Ssshhh! They may come asking!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Bad~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Carl Harris slicked back his brown hair, his sniper rifle sticking up from behind his shoulders. He looked just like an average military personal, shaven head, green pants and shirt. He also looked like an average twenty year old football quarterback (shudders, I had to cut in, it just kinda... burns) and had a scar running down his face. He waved to his comrades (he isn't Russian, is he?) and walked over, "Hi!" He called in his Australian voice (it should be accent!).

You should get the point. I can't stress enough how important it is not to just turn a list into a paragraph.

For those of you who can't really do this, but are still reading it even though I told you to skip it, here is how to turn your list into a character post.
I) Take the name, as seen on both the second example, and use it in your first sentance unless you're an overachiever like the person who made the first one. Be sure to have a verb in there for meaningfulness.
II) Never go out and say their age right away. It is often best to just give the height and weight and a good physical description, that often indicates the area of age.
III) Never give any history in the first post unless it's something like 'and had a scar from battles long past' or 'a face that had seen many deaths, many battles, many loved ones desintegrate' or something like that.
IV) Include sounds that their feet make or how their breathing sounds and/or possibly what the weapon sounds like, not firing but tapping against their hip or something.
V) Although it wasn't shown well in the examples, describe what their eyes look like. As I had said in one of my roleplays, eyes can tell more about a person than words can.
And those are some quick tips on how to make a character post.

Using Your Character
A lot of people tend not to stick to their character when they get farther into a roleplay. They begin making their aggresive characters passive for no reason, their passive characters aggresive, and their serious ones begin to crack a joke at every corner. This is unnacceptable.
To prevent this,
~Add new characters every once in awhile, not at the blink of an eye but whenever it seems nescessary.
~Post what your character is thinking about, this is often done in Italic.
~Think before you post! As G65 said, don't let bad timing get ahead of you, although I'm using it in a different way! Grrr!
~Give your characters accents! It get's kinda boring if everyone always talks the same way, have you ever seen a Western movie where everyone talks plainly? And on the subject of accents, 'gangsta' talk sucks. Yo, homie G, hood, and all those types of words should be abolished, help me in my crusade!
~Give them a sense of humor, whether it be cruel or funny.
That should help you keep your characters in shape.
While using your character, don't go looking for love, remember, for those of you who are really that low, it's FAKE! FAKE! FAKE! Let it come naturally, people don't just randomly go, "Oh, I like Katie now!"
If you can do it, make more than one character, if your mind set is right, having two characters with different personalities will keep you from swaying one way or the other.
Dark, mysterious, evil characters are often times... BORING! How many people do you know that don't want to make friends but do because some guy at a computer tells them too?

__________________
98% of the online population has some crap about smoking pot in their sig. If you're one of the 2% who doesn't give a crap, copy & paste this into your sig.

Quote:

The difference between idiots and intelligent people is that you don't see intelligent people every day.

Last edited by Gruntaloob : 03-15-2005 at 05:11 AM.

03-15-2005, 05:35 AM

Gruntaloob Gruntaloob is offline

Prophet

Join Date: Dec 2004

Posts: 286

Chapter Three:
About Stories
Index
~Keeping it Together
~Timing
~Cleaning Up the messes
~Making an Original Story
~Your Character’s Story

Part One:
Keeping it Together

The problem, and often downfall, of many roleplays is what I like to call 'drifting'. Drifting is when a roleplay strays from its original plot, for instance, one roleplay I was in changed from searching for an Elven village to finding pieces of a medallion to banish an evil guy without ever finding the village. Of course there are some of you that can change the plot slowly and gracefully enough that sudden bolts of confusion won't kill off half of the people roleplaying with you and I respect that, but if you were thinking of skipping this section, you may learn something hidden in these characters.
To keep your roleplay from drifting, you have to be in it most (99%) of the time. If you let the roleplay go on without you, someone else will most likely take over and when you come back, it has been 'driftified'. Because of this, most people say "Sum it up for the night" and then leave.
Even if you are constantly on your roleplay, some people may try to change the plot without you knowing. What I've found is you have everyone who joins PM you before they A) Make a character entrance or B) Make a huge decision, such as killing off a character or finding a strange artifact that may change the plotline. To catch these people, read every post twice, once to get what is happening and the second to catch any underlying schemes.
You may find yourself drifting your own roleplay, such as turning it into a love scene when its really about SPARTANS on a mission. Oh, with that, SPARTANS don't make loving gestures for those of you on the Halo boards.
If a person or person is causing your roleplay to fail, you can always kick them off, but make sure to do it in an orderly fashion, no screaming and no sudden heart attacks.
The time to be most aware for drifting is during the night. This is when people are tired and make bad judgment calls, as I have had experience with before. If someone is appearing tired, make sure to recommend sleep in a polite fashion and if they say that they aren't tired, ask them to clean up their posts. If all else fails, resort to the big boot.

Drifting isn't the only thing that can cause a roleplay to fail, a bad leader can too. If you are the leader/creator of a roleplay, make sure that people know it, but don't feel like they are in a submission hold. You have to be aware of what other people are thinking. If your roleplayers are becoming bored, make something interesting happen, not something completely random and stupid. If they are thinking that there's too much action and not enough getting to know the characters, give them time to talk over lunch. Being a good leader also consists of continuing to post on your own roleplays, which I myself had a hard time doing at the beginning of my 'career'. Never quit your own roleplays unless everyone else has, then you should request a forum moderator or administrator to lock your thread so that no one else can post in it; this keeps the forums squeaky clean!

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Last edited by Gruntaloob : 03-18-2005 at 03:40 AM.

10-09-2005, 06:07 PM

G65_The _Strange_One G65_The _Strange_One is offline

Prophet

Join Date: Dec 2004

Posts: 499

And finally, the exeptionally long put off timing part is complete! Gruntaloob still needs to make a few more things though... If he came back.

Part Three: Timing
Possibly the most overlooked part of a roleplay is the timing. And it is the worst thing possible to have a roleplay with bad timing. So what is timing? Timing is, to put it very, very simply, the times at which you place certain events in the story, and how those events are reletive to other events. And let me tell you, this is what claims the awesomeness of many a roleplay. In fact, bad timing claims the awesomeness of about every roleplay. (I don't care if awesomeness isn't a word!)
Think back to the best book you have ever read (not counting Dr. Suess). Think about the events that happened in it. Did they happen one after another, so that barely a page after the hero set off to get revenge (not the he did - this is just an example!) he met up with his first enemies and killed hundreds of them single handedly? No, events don't happen like that! The writers take the time to explain what happens inbetween the action, and those parts are necessary parts (,and your guy shouldn't be able to kill that many people without help, anyway)!
For some reason, most of us think that roleplays are all about action. There should be no parts explaining why characters do what they do exept for character profiles, and there shouldn't be any let up in the action. Now all of those fights scenes, one after another, are events. What are they doing, being right next to each other, with nothing resonably describing what happens inbetween? They are rushing. Rushing is what timing is all about. You don't want to rush events, you want them to ease into each other naturally. If you rush, your roleplay will seem very sloppy, and you don't want that, do you?
So think about what happens when in your roleplay. Treat it like a real story, so that it isn't just mindless fighting, but actual explanarion and description. Wars are fought with strategy and tactics, not mindless killing. Time your parts right!

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Gruntaloob says: Moo cow!