Announcements: Cutting Costs (2024) » January 2024 Copyfraud Attack » Finding Universes to Join (and making yours more visible!) » Guide To Universes On RPG » Member Shoutout Thread » Starter Locations & Prompts for Newcomers » RPG Chat β€” the official app » Frequently Asked Questions » Suggestions & Requests: THE MASTER THREAD »

Latest Discussions: Adapa Adapa's for adapa » To the Rich Men North of Richmond » Shake Senora » Good Morning RPG! » Ramblings of a Madman: American History Unkempt » Site Revitalization » Map Making Resources » Lost Poetry » Wishes » Ring of Invisibility » Seeking Roleplayer for Rumple/Mr. Gold from Once Upon a Time » Some political parody for these trying times » What dinosaur are you? » So, I have an Etsy » Train Poetry I » Joker » D&D Alignment Chart: How To Get A Theorem Named After You » Dungeon23 : Creative Challenge » Returning User - Is it dead? » Twelve Days of Christmas »

Players Wanted: Serious Anime Crossover Roleplay (semi-literate) » Looking for a long term partner! » JoJo or Mha roleplay » Seeking long-term rp partners for MxM » [MxF] Ruining Beauty / Beauty x Bastard » Minecraft Rp Help Wanted » CALL FOR WITNESSES: The Public v Zosimos » Social Immortal: A Vampire Only Soiree [The Multiverse] » XENOMORPH EDM TOUR Feat. Synthe Gridd: Get Your Tickets! » Aishna: Tower of Desire » Looking for fellow RPGers/Characters » looking for a RP partner (ABO/BL) » Looking for a long term roleplay partner » Explore the World of Boruto with Our Roleplaying Group on FB » More Jedi, Sith, and Imperials needed! » Role-player's Wanted » OSR Armchair Warrior looking for Kin » Friday the 13th Fun, Anyone? » Writers Wanted! » Long term partner to play an older male wanted »

Changes in Roleplaying

a topic in Game Design Workshop, a part of the RPG forum.

Moderators: Ambassadors, Scholars

A forum for discussions about the general design of RPG systems and techniques for building good roleplaying games.

Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Senshi on Wed Jun 17, 2015 1:21 am

So, its been a while since I've been on a roleplay website, but I was on this one for a few months a couple years ago. Naturally, life got the better of me and I found myself going through some changes, but since I have recently found myself with more free time than I am used to, I decided to return to the site to see how things are, and if I had any desire to get back into roleplaying.

Now, I understand all things change with time, but this website is very different from how I remember it being and I was wondering if there was someone who has been here through the changes who could enlighten me as to why they occurred. If this seems confusing, I apologize, it's just I'm having difficulty wrapping my head around what a difference a couple years can make.

1) What is with face claims on every roleplay I click on? When I was last on here they were few and far between, but now almost every roleplay I click on has a gif of some famous kid from the CW channel.

2) Where are all the fantasy/high fiction roleplays? When I was last on these were popping up all the time and they now seem to be few and far between. There still be some here and there, but it seems like the setting of fantasy is being used as a prop for, once again, a more romance/melo-dramatic focused rp.

That's all I can think of at the moment.. Like I said, sorry if this may seem random (or even self-serving) but it was really a shock to see something that was just overflowing with unique roleplays be now mostly romance focused, "Vampire Diaries-esque" across the board. Has the demographic of the people on the site changed that much? OR am I just a buzzkill?

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Senshi
Member for 13 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Inspiration Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby zxci on Wed Jun 17, 2015 4:44 am

I just returned and I noticed two things, too:

1. GIF'S EVERYWHERE. No gif? No views. Also, sort of relevant, crazy amounts of fancy bbcode.
2. Faceclaims. Yeah.

My only thoughts on the matter are that it's probably spawned of laziness. I don't mean to offend, but if you're going to 100% rip someone elses appearance, with a picture/gif, rather than AT LEAST using words, you're a lazy roleplayer. Same goes with the gif's/excessive amounts of bbcode. Making the roleplay flashy and fancy, when it's a LITERARY GAME... I don't understand it. But I'll try and live with it. Meh.

It seems a bit different than what I remember years ago, but I've been here for only a couple days, and I don't make assumptions. I try not to, at least.
Image

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
zxci
Member for 9 years
Promethean Promethean Conversation Starter Author Inspiration Conversationalist Friendly Beginnings Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby LawOfTheLand on Fri Jun 19, 2015 1:14 am

The site had technical issues a couple of years ago, prompting some of the older crowd to leave. And a bunch of newer, younger, more hip RPers came around to take their place. Give it time...this too shall pass. It's all about the sort of audience they want to attract with their RPs.

As for how fantasy is used as a backdrop for character interaction, well, that's how a good setting should act IMO.
Image

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
LawOfTheLand
Contributor
Contributor
Member for 16 years
Beta Tester Promethean Conversation Starter Author World Builder Conversationalist Friendly Beginnings Novelist Builder Donated! Party Starter Contributor Person of Interest Bug Hunter Streamwatcher Maiden Voyager Recruiter Greeter Visual Appeal Tipworthy Property Buyer Salesman Concierge Arc Warden Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Senshi on Fri Jun 19, 2015 3:17 am

Backdrop and prop are two different things IMO. I was referring to the world having no character of its own. Roleplays that use high fantasy so they can have an elf love story for example without actually developing the world at all. Hence the use of the word "prop". Appreciate the responses! Nice to know it wasn't just me... well, kinda wasn't just me haha.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Senshi
Member for 13 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Inspiration Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Dawn ✩ Quixotic on Sun Jun 21, 2015 8:08 pm

zxci wrote:My only thoughts on the matter are that it's probably spawned of laziness. I don't mean to offend, but if you're going to 100% rip someone elses appearance, with a picture/gif, rather than AT LEAST using words, you're a lazy roleplayer. Same goes with the gif's/excessive amounts of bbcode. Making the roleplay flashy and fancy, when it's a LITERARY GAME... I don't understand it. But I'll try and live with it. Meh.


I think it has more to do with wish fulfillment than laziness. Because it is also wispy looking gifs from the cool, hot kids. I even know of people who've had others rage at them because their "faceclaim" wasn't attractive enough or didn't fit their tastes.


The romance RPs have *always* been around. It's not that they're more common, it's just the other stuff is, less common.

Actually, the prevalence of the whole concept of "pairings", that most 1x1 ideas boiled down to an excuse for a certain story (which, if not explicitly, was probably going to romance oriented), is something that led me away from freeform roleplaying for awhile, since I very little interest in romantic storylines.

It's like this on most freeform sites I know, and I have to wonder if the players who like more complicated storylines are being drawn to using a rules-based approach, out of a desire to ground the events with a neutral decider for things like fights and the like.

Especially since there are several options out there now that are extremely rules-light, like Fate, and even moreso Risus, and some that don't even need dice rolls but afford players a number of "story points" to help succeed at actions, which are then awarded for certain things by the GM or other players.

Simply writing such a large collaborative story is tough without ANY such determiners. So maybe that's why a lot of freeform players are more interested in stories that focus predominantly on character interaction instead of bigger settings and plots.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Dawn ✩ Quixotic
Member for 10 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby LawOfTheLand on Mon Jun 22, 2015 12:28 am

I can speak from experience when I say that not all 1x1s have romance as a goal or even an incidental side effect. My RP "I'll Make A Man Out Of You" was about a master taking on and training an apprentice in controlling his newly awakened powers.

And would it surprise people to learn that I was playing the apprentice? Well, good! :)

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
LawOfTheLand
Contributor
Contributor
Member for 16 years
Beta Tester Promethean Conversation Starter Author World Builder Conversationalist Friendly Beginnings Novelist Builder Donated! Party Starter Contributor Person of Interest Bug Hunter Streamwatcher Maiden Voyager Recruiter Greeter Visual Appeal Tipworthy Property Buyer Salesman Concierge Arc Warden Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Dawn ✩ Quixotic on Mon Jun 22, 2015 5:52 am

Well not all, yeah, but it's something I find overwhelming in people's requests where they list stuff like

VampirexWerewolf
DemonxAngel
BadBoyxWholesomeGirl

etc...Maybe it's just without elaboration I figure the romantic pairing is what they're after (especially since most I tried to start with, since they didn't explicitly say it was romantic, but they took that turn anyway... then again the main one there the person sprung shota mpreg on me from nowhere so maybe it was just an outlier).

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Dawn ✩ Quixotic
Member for 10 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Portrait of a Sociopath on Mon Jun 22, 2015 3:12 pm

I wish I could give you cookies for this thread.

I haven't been on this site for too long so I wouldn't be of much help for that, but I've seen this FC trend popping up on other RP sites/communities like a plague. While pictures can inspire me for characters, I don't really like collecting 10000x pictures (or lord help me, gifs...) of a single character, especially since i tend to use fanarts and stick to one pic whenever I don't feel like going into much details.

I can understand people wanting to make their profiles pretty and shiny, but there are ways to do that other than pictures. Seriously. When looking for pictures take longer than writing the actual profile/rp, there's a lil problem imo, especially if you're going to be ostracized because your character isn't pretty or something >_>; Bruh, are you and EVERYONE around you pretteh? Nah? Calm down then. There's some beauty in RPCs that are not pretty too!

And don't get me started on romance. Romance is fine, it's part of life, but I feel like the RP community EVERYWHERE is being drowned in the amount of sappy tears shed by cliched, angsty character in poorly written romantic dramas. You know it's time to bail when the first thing that happens when an RP launches is people trying to get into each other's pants. HOLD UP, MATE, BUY HIM/HER DINNER FIRST PLZ. P.-S.: THERE'S A WAR HAPPENING BEHIND YER ARSE SO MAYBE WAIT TILL THAT'S DONE??

/true story.
Every god damn morning.
Image

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Portrait of a Sociopath
Member for 9 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author World Builder Conversationalist Arc Warden Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Dawn ✩ Quixotic on Mon Jun 22, 2015 9:34 pm

Portrait of a Sociopath wrote:I wish I could give you cookies for this thread.

I haven't been on this site for too long so I wouldn't be of much help for that, but I've seen this FC trend popping up on other RP sites/communities like a plague. While pictures can inspire me for characters, I don't really like collecting 10000x pictures (or lord help me, gifs...) of a single character, especially since i tend to use fanarts and stick to one pic whenever I don't feel like going into much details.


This is what bugs me. I almost always look up a picture that looks pretty similar to my character, or use a picture as a springboard, which I stick in the profile, but when people... post a bunch of gifs *in* their posts... it goes beyond "oh hey, this is the actor that would play my character if this were a movie"... which, THAT is a concept I think is kind of cool.

Romance is fine, it's part of life, but I feel like the RP community EVERYWHERE is being drowned in the amount of sappy tears shed by cliched, angsty character in poorly written romantic dramas.


I don't like the melodrama. Even in non-romantic RPs, angst is so prevalent, and I just... don't see the point in it. I want to enjoy roleplaying. I want roleplays that will make me smile, and laugh, and feel elated. And if feeling upset, or creeped out, or sad is part of that, that's cool, but to just... wallow in it.

My last roleplaying experience was... evil characters... all trying to jockey for dominance and position and it led to IC conflict and insults, which then spilled out OOC, and this was in the very first scene. That's the first time I'd had a problem like that because in every other villain RP I did it was more about having fun and being badass, more like an Ocean's 11 plot or Invader Zim... not being serious, vile characters.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Dawn ✩ Quixotic
Member for 10 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Daiagnosis on Fri Jun 26, 2015 5:37 pm

    Hello, just gonna pop in here and give a little input as one of the people who do use gifs frequently when roleplaying.

    Senshi wrote:So, its been a while since I've been on a roleplay website, but I was on this one for a few months a couple years ago. Naturally, life got the better of me and I found myself going through some changes, but since I have recently found myself with more free time than I am used to, I decided to return to the site to see how things are, and if I had any desire to get back into roleplaying.

    Now, I understand all things change with time, but this website is very different from how I remember it being and I was wondering if there was someone who has been here through the changes who could enlighten me as to why they occurred. If this seems confusing, I apologize, it's just I'm having difficulty wrapping my head around what a difference a couple years can make.

    1) What is with face claims on every roleplay I click on? When I was last on here they were few and far between, but now almost every roleplay I click on has a gif of some famous kid from the CW channel.


    Face claims usually give people a better idea of how a character looks like exactly. This also allows for the person using the face claim to have an easier time when writing a description of their appearence, as there's already a clear picture there for them. Now, face claims shouldn't replace describing the physical appearance of a character, they should just be there for a clearer picture.

    Senshi wrote:2) Where are all the fantasy/high fiction roleplays? When I was last on these were popping up all the time and they now seem to be few and far between. There still be some here and there, but it seems like the setting of fantasy is being used as a prop for, once again, a more romance/melo-dramatic focused rp.

    There are still there, it's just that more romance focused roleplays pop up more often. One roleplay I was in on a alt account was Red Apotheosis, which was heaviy focused on fantasy. Though it was short lived, it still shows that roleplays like this still exist without romance clouding all of it up.

    zxci wrote:I just returned and I noticed two things, too:

    1. GIF'S EVERYWHERE. No gif? No views. Also, sort of relevant, crazy amounts of fancy bbcode.

    Gifs often make things a lot more appealing to the eye. Honestly, I don't want to click on a roleplay I find interesting and see a wall of text. This isn't because I don't want to read it, but more along the lines of that it's an eyesore to read. I don't need them to go all out and put gifs everywhere, but putting a little effort into making it look nice makes it a lot more presentable.
    A lot of what you're seeing is either pretty easy BBcode like the one I used here; roleplay/the-demons-inside/characters/chun-li
    Or actual images and things created in photoshop.
    Seriously though, the BBcode isn't that hard to do. Its pretty much this;
    Code: Select all
    [color=#27408B]β–ˆ[/color][color=transparent]X[/color][color=#6779AD]β–Œ[/color]

    Copied and pasted over and over again with only the bottom and top lines of code being different.

    Gifs aren't as hard to find as some of you are making it seem like, usually I can just go on tumblr, type in the name of my character and put gif beside it, and boom. And if the character doesn't have a lot of images I just use gifs of scenery (usually anime scenery, since I roleplay mostly using anime characters) to fill in the gaps. I also search up fanart of the character, and if I like it also use that as well.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

Daiagnosis
Member for 10 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Inspiration Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Dawn ✩ Quixotic on Sun Jun 28, 2015 6:40 pm

I don't want to read huge blocks of text ever, but one of my biggest pet peeves in freeform roleplaying is that people seem addicted to writing tons of paragraphs for their characters to do absolutely nothing (or do a ton of stuff all at once before other character can even react to it, often leading responses being made to several 'threads' of conversation or activity at once.

I don't get the crippling aversion to one liners people have. It's completely nonsensical. If you read a novel, it's never like that. Sometimes a character only has a couple lines of stuff they're doing in between what the next character does.

It's why I've been bugged by the whole idea that roleplays can be "literary". You want to do a literary collaboration that's cool, but you're gonna have to go about it all differently, and actually write a story together... which is going to require things like editing and the rest of the writing process.

Part of why I like roleplaying in chat or around a tabletop is it's faster-paced, due to happening in real time, and there's less emphasis on "writing".

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Dawn ✩ Quixotic
Member for 10 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby blackrider on Wed Jul 01, 2015 5:55 pm

Dawn ✩ Quixotic wrote:I don't get the crippling aversion to one liners people have. It's completely nonsensical. If you read a novel, it's never like that. Sometimes a character only has a couple lines of stuff they're doing in between what the next character does.


First of all I just wana say its really nice to stumble across this thread and see people actually talking about these things, I also happen to agree with what practically all of you are saying. At the same time though I am ashamed to admit I have made a good few gif/pic riddled char's-and not because I wanted to do it mind you. The real fact is I've slowly begun using bb code and images more and more just because seemingly every damn rp I attempt to join expects, or outright demands, these features. Rps I run I like to keep code and all that jazz on char sheets totally optional and up to the individual writing it.

Secondly I really, really, really like that quote of Dawns above. I totally agree that the practically community wide crippling fear of one liners and short posts in general hurt rps as a whole, and I can't give any better reasons for this then just about everything Dawn said. They really hit the nail on the head.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
blackrider
Member for 10 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Inspiration Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Mr_Doomed on Thu Jul 02, 2015 12:52 pm

I feel like I've been around on this site long enough, both lurking and playing to express to you what most people's issues with "one-liners" are and why people want "literate" roleplays.

This has almost nothing to do with the act that people don't know how to write. It almost has everything to do with the fact that a fair sum of people don't understand that the nature of a roleplay is to constantly be moving the plot forward. The minute that the plot is no longer moves anywhere is the moment that the plot begins to die.

The biggest culprit of a post that does nothing to enhance the plot is a one-liner. The reason for this is almost always, one-liners are dialogue. Dialogue is great, but too much of it is a bad thing. If we get stuck talking to a single character for a long time, a couple of things may happen. The first thing is that the rest of the party is waiting for your two characters to finish their damn conversation because their characters have nothing to do while they wait for you. The other thing that might happen is that the conversation, while interesting to you, doesn't actually do anything to push the plot forward. We don't see ourselves reaching the end of the story goal and therefore, the roleplay becomes stagnant.

Look at roleplays that got off the ground and eventually failed and you'll see that a fair chunk of them end in the middle of a dialogue.

That being said, one-liners can be done right. It is just crucial to avoid bringing the momentum of the story to a stand-still.
β€œI have wrestled with death. It is the most unexciting contest you can imagine. It takes place in an impalpable greyness, with nothing underfoot, with nothing around, without spectators, without clamour, without glory, without the great desire of victory, without the great fear of defeat, in a sickly atmosphere of tepid scepticism, without much belief in your own right, and still less in that of your adversary.”
― Joseph Conrad

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Mr_Doomed
Member for 14 years
Conversation Starter Author Conversationalist Novelist Completionist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Senshi on Fri Jul 03, 2015 6:41 pm

β€”(β€’β€’Γ· ιяяєgυℓαяιту Γ·β€’β€’)β€” wrote:Hello, just gonna pop in here and give a little input as one of the people who do use gifs frequently when roleplaying.

Senshi wrote:So, its been a while since I've been on a roleplay website, but I was on this one for a few months a couple years ago. Naturally, life got the better of me and I found myself going through some changes, but since I have recently found myself with more free time than I am used to, I decided to return to the site to see how things are, and if I had any desire to get back into roleplaying.

Now, I understand all things change with time, but this website is very different from how I remember it being and I was wondering if there was someone who has been here through the changes who could enlighten me as to why they occurred. If this seems confusing, I apologize, it's just I'm having difficulty wrapping my head around what a difference a couple years can make.

1) What is with face claims on every roleplay I click on? When I was last on here they were few and far between, but now almost every roleplay I click on has a gif of some famous kid from the CW channel.


Face claims usually give people a better idea of how a character looks like exactly. This also allows for the person using the face claim to have an easier time when writing a description of their appearence, as there's already a clear picture there for them. Now, face claims shouldn't replace describing the physical appearance of a character, they should just be there for a clearer picture.


That might be the case, if you were choosing the Face claim yourself. But most of the roleplays I click on, the appearance of the character you're interested in has already been picked out by the GM. And 9/10, as I stated before, the appearance is some person who was on an episode of some teen drama.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Senshi
Member for 13 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Inspiration Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Daiagnosis on Fri Jul 03, 2015 9:38 pm

Senshi wrote:That might be the case, if you were choosing the Face claim yourself. But most of the roleplays I click on, the appearance of the character you're interested in has already been picked out by the GM. And 9/10, as I stated before, the appearance is some person who was on an episode of some teen drama.

    I've only see that problem arise in most roleplays that you HAVE to use real life face claims, which I tend to avoid those. Few anime roleplays do it, and the ones that do usually let you change it.

    Dawn ✩ Quixotic wrote:I don't get the crippling aversion to one liners people have. It's completely nonsensical. If you read a novel, it's never like that. Sometimes a character only has a couple lines of stuff they're doing in between what the next character does.

    It's pretty much all of what Mr.Doomed just said, one-liners, if not done the correct way, will stagnate a roleplay and eventually kill it. It seems that most of the roleplayers on this site use the Novella form of roleplaying.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

Daiagnosis
Member for 10 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Inspiration Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Kestrel on Sat Jul 04, 2015 10:33 am

Well. I do suppose the last few RP's I've joined here are of the supernatural anime academy variety. If I am honest, that is exactly why I even go to this site. I like the power fantasy. I enjoy the simplicity. I like the social interaction aspects and character focus. I like the drama and most of all I like not being railroaded from location to location by the plot. Though I have seen a cool fantasy epic show up here and there, it's no longer the dominant genre. I do enjoy my lotr slash pathfinder rip-offs too, albeit for totally different reasons. So nowadays I go elsewhere for those. I am sure that if you were to make a good fantasy RP and presented it decently; people would jump on it.

What I like about the bb-plastered gif-spamming CS is the effort people are supposed to put in it. It makes the RP less accessible and, yes, it is kind of stupid when you think about it (also superhard to find characters with enough gifs who haven't been used as fc's to hell and back) but effort inspires investment. It's no guarantee, mind you, but after I poured 3 hours into listing talents and aligning and finding images, I know I am more prone to hitting people upside the head for letting RP's die. I put effort in it so I want it to live more. Anime supernatural academy games attract players by the dozens. A filter like that is beneficial. Though it can get a bit crazy.

The one-liners aversion isn't so crazy when you consider people who post one-liners post them mostly exclusively. Because the purpose of any post is to further a scene, and to give others building blocks to further it, it is no surprise people who like to write more dislike them. It feels like you're the horse pulling the wagon. And most people write characters on the passive side of the spectrum to begin with (guess why most of mine are not. Exactly.) When you get just one line, it demotivated most people who enjoy lengthier posts. They don't get their building blocks. Yet Lego is a lot more fun with hundred blocks than ten because the sheer amount of options you get for building.

I like that metaphor. I'm going to use it more often.

There is nothing wrong with one-liners or with a dislike of them. They just denote different styles and preferences.

As for predetermined roles and FC's. Oh I am totally on the bandwagon of fuck that shit. Here is the thing though, if you prefer more character autonomy like me, scroll down, check if it's present and either hit back or scroll back up depending on the answer. Easy as that.
Do you come from a land down under?
Where women glow and men plunder?
Can't you hear, can't you hear the thunder?
You better run, you better take cover.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Kestrel
Member for 16 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Inspiration Conversationalist Friendly Beginnings Completionist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Dawn ✩ Quixotic on Sun Jul 05, 2015 7:29 am

blackrider wrote:First of all I just wana say its really nice to stumble across this thread and see people actually talking about these things, I also happen to agree with what practically all of you are saying. At the same time though I am ashamed to admit I have made a good few gif/pic riddled char's-and not because I wanted to do it mind you. The real fact is I've slowly begun using bb code and images more and more just because seemingly every damn rp I attempt to join expects, or outright demands, these features. Rps I run I like to keep code and all that jazz on char sheets totally optional and up to the individual writing it.

Secondly I really, really, really like that quote of Dawns above. I totally agree that the practically community wide crippling fear of one liners and short posts in general hurt rps as a whole, and I can't give any better reasons for this then just about everything Dawn said. They really hit the nail on the head.


I've been thinking about this lately. I mean it's like... if I want to write, I will work on my novel. If I want to read, I will go read a book. When I roleplay, I want to interact with other people, through the medium of characters. Maybe it's just my background, but the roleplays I started out doing in PbP were usually a few short lines of what the characters were saying/doing/thinking and it flowed from there... or chat-based games or live-tabletop ones, where again, real time, fast pace flow of the interaction. Not.... reading paragraphs upon paragraphs of what a character is doing before I can react to any of it.

Mr_Doomed wrote:I feel like I've been around on this site long enough, both lurking and playing to express to you what most people's issues with "one-liners" are and why people want "literate" roleplays.

This has almost nothing to do with the act that people don't know how to write. It almost has everything to do with the fact that a fair sum of people don't understand that the nature of a roleplay is to constantly be moving the plot forward. The minute that the plot is no longer moves anywhere is the moment that the plot begins to die.


The biggest culprit of a post that does nothing to enhance the plot is a one-liner. [/quote]

I've seen plenty of long, boring posts that do zero to advance the plot.
Again. Let's have my character Bob. Yours is, I dunno, Fred.

"Bob doesn't like Fred. He swings is sword at him and cries, 'Have at you!'"
Not the most inspiring strand of English, and you could certainly enhance it with so adjectives, descriptions, some emotion... maybe something like...
"Bob side-eyes Fred, the irritation held for him bubbling up. Bob tightly grasps the hilt of his sword, impulsively drawing it, and with a cry of "Have at you!" he lunges at Fred, blade whistling through the air."

But that's still only a couple sentences.
And it advance the plot, Fred is now under attack. He'll react, dodge/block, maybe counterattack.
This could drag on or the players could agree for someone to lose or solve their differences... whatever.
NONE of these actions take paragraphs to write out, even if each character gave an inner monologue and the whole scene was describe in intricate detail.



The reason for this is almost always, one-liners are dialogue. Dialogue is great, but too much of it is a bad thing. If we get stuck talking to a single character for a long time, a couple of things may happen. The first thing is that the rest of the party is waiting for your two characters to finish their damn conversation because their characters have nothing to do while they wait for you.


Guess this is where I differ, since I love long in-character conversations more than... whatever contrived plot is actually going on. So chalk this one up to my personal tastes. I'm always more character focused, and sometimes an over-arching plot I find is just much more constraining to any character concept I feel like playing... I've never found a plot that was interesting enough on its own that I just wanted to play in it.

It raises the question though... if those other characters are there... why don't the join in? Or interrupt? Or say anything? If you were in a group out in public, what would you do? Join the conversation? Smack them on the head and say "Hey guys, let's go".

Your characters have literally *anything* to do. If you *want* to have your character just sit around while two people have a conversation you aren't involved in, that is your own fault for not taking initiative.

The other thing that might happen is that the conversation, while interesting to you, doesn't actually do anything to push the plot forward. We don't see ourselves reaching the end of the story goal and therefore, the roleplay becomes stagnant.


Again, I don't understand this. Dialogue helps to develop character and character relationships, which should tie into the plot... and again... I don't see how several dozen back-and-forth lines of dialogue is any more of a block than a single player writing out a huge multi-paragraph essay on what their character is up to (unless they are advancing the plot themselves, in which case, it's kind of not letting other people react to it... it's why I struggle to write more than a single paragraph since I hate having more than a single action or two and a sentence or so of dialogue if I think people will reasonably be able to react to it...)

Look at roleplays that got off the ground and eventually failed and you'll see that a fair chunk of them end in the middle of a dialogue.


I dunno, I see a lot that end after some big introduction posts for each character and then never go anywhere.
Some people just lose steam and it's for a LOT of reasons.

Especially in groups. 1x1 it's a bit easier since there's just two characters, but groups themselves just have some inherent difficulties with keeping everything together.

β€”(β€’β€’Γ· ιяяєgυℓαяιту Γ·β€’β€’)β€” wrote:It's pretty much all of what Mr.Doomed just said, one-liners, if not done the correct way, will stagnate a roleplay and eventually kill it. It seems that most of the roleplayers on this site use the Novella form of roleplaying.[/list][/color][/justify][/font]


Again, I just don't see it. As long as a continued chains of responsive action is going, nothing else matters.
I mean, yeah, if someone just comes and posts, "Joe twiddles his thumbs and says, "Meh."" then yeah, that won't do anything.

I'd think the real thing that would stagnate a story is expecting loooong posts that take people a long time to write out, and then eventually running into a block where someone doesn't have the energy or time to do that, and the schedule slips.
A roleplay focused on shorter posts would be able to have people pop in on their coffee break, update, and keep things moving, and would alleviate the potential for real world business to killing the posting rate.

The one-liners aversion isn't so crazy when you consider people who post one-liners post them mostly exclusively. Because the purpose of any post is to further a scene, and to give others building blocks to further it, it is no surprise people who like to write more dislike them. It feels like you're the horse pulling the wagon. And most people write characters on the passive side of the spectrum to begin with (guess why most of mine are not. Exactly.) When you get just one line, it demotivated most people who enjoy lengthier posts. They don't get their building blocks. Yet Lego is a lot more fun with hundred blocks than ten because the sheer amount of options you get for building.


Again, this is an immense fallacy. It's... in many ways just a form of snobbery to feel like writing more makes it better.
It's like, if we agree to build a house, I lay down a brick and wait for you, then you dump a truckload of bricks on the site and get back that I wasn't doing enough.
The amount of bricks doesn't have any affect on the amount of work going into things, it's the process of laying down brick by brick, one after another. and then eventually you WILL get a hundred blocks.

I have never, EVER met a roleplayer who's writing was actually inherently interesting to read in the majority of their posts.
I certainly know mine isn't. If I was writing a novel, I know I could be, but that process would take writes and rewrites and editing and planning.

So yeah, to me, it feels less like being given a ton of blocks, and more like a few blocks, and a bunch of sand.
Again, especially in posts where characters do a whole bunch of stuff and give a huge speech and you either have to just respond to the last thing they did or try to respond to it piecemeal as if you were doing that all along.



So I dunno. Maybe I should give more concrete examples of what I like/dislike from RPs I'm in/have been in but I'd hate to make it seem like I was being negative or critical to any specific person... but I'll have to think about it.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Dawn ✩ Quixotic
Member for 10 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Daiagnosis on Sun Jul 05, 2015 8:30 pm

Dawn ✩ Quixotic wrote:Again, I don't understand this. Dialogue helps to develop character and character relationships, which should tie into the plot... and again... I don't see how several dozen back-and-forth lines of dialogue is any more of a block than a single player writing out a huge multi-paragraph essay on what their character is up to (unless they are advancing the plot themselves, in which case, it's kind of not letting other people react to it... it's why I struggle to write more than a single paragraph since I hate having more than a single action or two and a sentence or so of dialogue if I think people will reasonably be able to react to it...)

    Writing multi-paragraph posts during a discussion will more often than not end the discussion the same, or following post. This allows for the characters to move onto to something else, ultimately advancing the plot faster than several dozen back-and-forth lines of two people talking.

Dawn ✩ Quixotic wrote:I dunno, I see a lot that end after some big introduction posts for each character and then never go anywhere.
Some people just lose steam and it's for a LOT of reasons.

Especially in groups. 1x1 it's a bit easier since there's just two characters, but groups themselves just have some inherent difficulties with keeping everything together.

    Most of the time introductions will be the longest posts, and it's more likely during the introductions that roleplayers will put themselves in a position that won't allow them to interact with any other players.

Dawn ✩ Quixotic wrote:Again, I just don't see it. As long as a continued chains of responsive action is going, nothing else matters.
I mean, yeah, if someone just comes and posts, "Joe twiddles his thumbs and says, "Meh."" then yeah, that won't do anything.

I'd think the real thing that would stagnate a story is expecting loooong posts that take people a long time to write out, and then eventually running into a block where someone doesn't have the energy or time to do that, and the schedule slips.
A roleplay focused on shorter posts would be able to have people pop in on their coffee break, update, and keep things moving, and would alleviate the potential for real world business to killing the posting rate.

    And shorter posts, would often require that some people reply immediately after in order to not stagnate the roleplay, and some people don't have time for that either. If the posting rate is too fast, some people will fall behind, and if they were interacting with another player at the time, it still stagnates the roleplay. I personally think you're exaggerating how long the posts really are in most roleplays. Yes, there are some that post like 800+ words each and every post (which is ridiculous). But most posts I've seen will often be around the 400 or 600 words, and sometimes possibly even 700 in some cases.

Dawn ✩ Quixotic wrote:Again, this is an immense fallacy. It's... in many ways just a form of snobbery to feel like writing more makes it better.
It's like, if we agree to build a house, I lay down a brick and wait for you, then you dump a truckload of bricks on the site and get back that I wasn't doing enough.
The amount of bricks doesn't have any affect on the amount of work going into things, it's the process of laying down brick by brick, one after another. and then eventually you WILL get a hundred blocks.

I have never, EVER met a roleplayer who's writing was actually inherently interesting to read in the majority of their posts.
I certainly know mine isn't. If I was writing a novel, I know I could be, but that process would take writes and rewrites and editing and planning.

    I often do write my posts like I'm writing a novel, and I don't do many rewrites or planning, but I'd ALWAYS go back and edit, even if I was just doing normal roleplaying. No one looking for absolute perfection in writing with roleplays, so all of that rewriting stuff is unnecessary.

    And while I don't like knowing everything about the character, I like knowing just enough so that I don't have to guess every single bit. That personally why one-liners will never work for me, because they usually don't give me insight into what the character is thinking, and I personally think that expands more on the character than a regular conversation with another character.

    Yes, you may eventually you get enough bricks to build up that one portion of the wall, but it may take possibly twenty posts. If I were to write a possible 5 paragraph post 400 words, that could be around a hundred blocks right there. The plot progresses much slower whenever you write shorter posts, and eventually some people will get bored and move on if there isn't constant action going on or something there that would make them want to stay. So while one house may have 100 bricks laid out after it's been worked on twenty times, the other house could have 2000 bricks after being worked on the same amount of times. (Assuming that every person working on that house always contributes 100 bricks each of the time.)

    That's how I feel that shorter posts can stagnate a roleplay. Now if the roleplay is MENT to be short and not long term, then more power to you. But I don't feel as though shorter posts work out well for long term roleplays.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

Daiagnosis
Member for 10 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Inspiration Conversationalist Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Portrait of a Sociopath on Sun Jul 05, 2015 10:35 pm

I can see the pros and cons of both short and long posts as I've RPed in both types of RPs before. I think the general dislike for "one-liners" is due to the belief that one-liners=illiterate posts which is, as Dawn has demonstrated, false in some cases. I also think that one-liners are so hated because it makes people pass off as lazy, as though they can't be bothered with contributing "more" to the RP.

Personally, I find that medium length posts (semi-lit?) of around 200-300 posts are the best. They're just long enough to have all the essential information while remaining short enough to avoid useless fluff. This number will naturally increase depending on how many characters need a response in that single post although there is a high risk that you may get stuck inserting your responses in between other RPCs' actions, and that where I think we should draw the line. If you need to rewind time and state that your character's action took place between Line A and Line B of your RP partner, it's time to ask them to reduce the period of time and number of actions their post covers. I hate nothing more than posts with 10 paragraphs, each dedicated to different RPCs in the same scene and independent of one another. I can tolerate them every now and then since RPing is not the same as writing a linear book and one needs to adapt to different medium every now and then, but if just pokes me the wrong way nevertheless.

Concerning RP progress speed, it may just be my crappy luck, but I've found that, except for introductory posts, longer posts make the RP progress slower. People think they need to pour more time/energy into their posts, so they post less frequently, and out of fear of puppetting/godmodding, their characters barely do anything in their lengthy posts. Call me cynical, but I personally don't think that short posts stall RPs that much because they essentially have the same amount of content (granted, my definition of short is usually 100-250 words) that I can respond to. Shorter and more frequent post also keeps the RP active because it's always there, popping up in your face. I like the compare RPs with long gaps between post with long distance relationships. It may have started great, but because it didn't constantly remind you of its existence, you eventually grow distant.

It all boils down to how skilled an RPer is though, how capable they are of spinning something new in their post, lengthy or concise, that can move the story forward.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

User avatar
Portrait of a Sociopath
Member for 9 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author World Builder Conversationalist Arc Warden Lifegiver

Re: Changes in Roleplaying

Tips: 0.00 INK Postby Daiagnosis on Sun Jul 05, 2015 11:55 pm

    Script: A very IM style roleplay. The posts in a script-style roleplay will usually look like this;
    Ricia: (Sad) *Sulking in the corner with her pet octopus* Why won't user-senpai understand me?

    One-liners: This refers to any response that is under a paragraph. So 1 to 4 sentences. Sometimes even 1 paragraph.

    Paragraph / Multi-Para: Generally 2-5 full paragraphs. More descriptor words, generally more substance then a one-liner or Script.

    Novella: Upwards of 6 or more paragraphs, but generally you can get away with it with 5 lengthy paragraphs full of descriptor, thoughts and substance.


    Just putting this here, as I think it describes the types of roleplay rather well.


Portrait of a Sociopath wrote:I can see the pros and cons of both short and long posts as I've RPed in both types of RPs before. I think the general dislike for "one-liners" is due to the belief that one-liners=illiterate posts which is, as Dawn has demonstrated, false in some cases. I also think that one-liners are so hated because it makes people pass off as lazy, as though they can't be bothered with contributing "more" to the RP.

    They only come off as lazy if they were to post a one-liner in a roleplay that's expecting paragraph or novella, and this is just rude to the roleplay creator and the expectations that they had put for the roleplay to be run at.


Portrait of a Sociopath wrote:Personally, I find that medium length posts (semi-lit?) of around 200-300 posts are the best. They're just long enough to have all the essential information while remaining short enough to avoid useless fluff. This number will naturally increase depending on how many characters need a response in that single post although there is a high risk that you may get stuck inserting your responses in between other RPCs' actions, and that where I think we should draw the line. If you need to rewind time and state that your character's action took place between Line A and Line B of your RP partner, it's time to ask them to reduce the period of time and number of actions their post covers. I hate nothing more than posts with 10 paragraphs, each dedicated to different RPCs in the same scene and independent of one another. I can tolerate them every now and then since RPing is not the same as writing a linear book and one needs to adapt to different medium every now and then, but if just pokes me the wrong way nevertheless.

    I've found that if you're going to do Novella/Literate type roleplay, rewinding time to have your character say something is something that often can't be avoided. I really don't find it annoying though, just something that happens.

Portrait of a Sociopath wrote:Concerning RP progress speed, it may just be my crappy luck, but I've found that, except for introductory posts, longer posts make the RP progress slower. People think they need to pour more time/energy into their posts, so they post less frequently, and out of fear of puppetting/godmodding, their characters barely do anything in their lengthy posts. Call me cynical, but I personally don't think that short posts, stall RPs that much because they essentially have the same amount of content (granted, my definition of short is usually 100-250 words) that I can respond to. Shorter, and more frequent post also keeps the RP active because it's always there, popping up in your face. I like the compare RPs with long gaps between post with long distance relationships. It may have started great, but because it didn't constantly remind you of its existence, you eventually grow distant.

    I think at this point, it's just your experience, because most roleplays I've been in have died either due to someone making this unnecessary 1000+ word post in response to someones 400-600 word post and people not able to keep up, or someone making this short 100 word post that didn't offer enough to the other person and it just dwindled. There was certainly no in-between. I've been in roleplays that have had huge posts that were posted like EVERY day, and then have had roleplays that had probably 200-300 word that were once a week. I'm starting to think that while the time available at hand, while may be a factor, is surely not the problem in most cases. (Then again I type like 89 words per minute, 500 word for me WOULD take around 10 min for me if I didn't procrastinate all the time. So I can't really say anything (^ - ^ ").

    I personally suggest we stop discussing this topic since we've pretty much discussed everything that we can.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received 0.00 INK in return for their work.

Daiagnosis
Member for 10 years
Promethean Conversation Starter Author Inspiration Conversationalist Lifegiver


Post a reply

Make a Donation

$

RPG relies exclusively on user donations to support the platform.

Donors earn the "Contributor" achievement and are permanently recognized in the credits. Consider donating today!

 

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 0 guests