Help! I don't know how to start a role play!
In this guide you will learn how to use our forum to create your very own role play, and how to manage different things within the role play as a game master, and as a player. The very first thing we need to do is learn how to make a new topic inside the forum. I will be using the Fantasy role play forum as my example.
Each of our forums has a brief description about what is inside of them. Most, also, have sub forums for with more specific criteria to post under. Since we just want to post a fantasy role play we will click the link next to the image.
Once inside we will see a variety of topics and other places to go, this can be confusing to a new or inexperienced user. For now, just focus on making your own role play. Look for the New Topic button. It should look like this.
Click that button and it will bring you to the New Topic/New Post page. The first thing you will notice is the large letters that say Subject. This means title, the thing that people will see when they want to view your role play from the forum.
There are also small icons that you can select to gain some extra attention to your Subject or “Topic Title.” There are also ways to promote your role play on our main page, but you can click Find Out More… for more information on that.
Make sure your topic title is to the point and catchy, but not offensive. For our fantasy role play I will use the title “Caravans and Bandits!” You never want to use all caps, or !!!! and the likes, it makes most users not want to check out the role play.
The next thing we see is Tags. This is something I find extremely useful when trying to get new role players to join the role play.
You simply enter in a word that has to do with your role play, and follow it with a comma before entering a new word. So if this role play had to do with Dragons and Caravans and battle, I would use “Dragon, caravan, battle, attack, role, play” Not only that, when you are typing, the Suggestions box on the right gives you a list of things that have been used around our forum that you can scroll down and choose! This helps users search the site, and use search engines like Google; to find role plays that have to do with things they like.
The next thing we move to is the actual Post Information box.
This is where you actually post up your role plays information. This can be describing everything in your role play and introducing characters, whatever you want to start the role play with. You can see a list of buttons on top of it. Each of those buttons gives you some functionality to format your text and information, allowing you to place pictures and change your font size and color. That is something I suggest you tinker with; if you hover over them they will give you information about what they do. After you’ve put in what you think you want scroll down and look below the post information box.
That if you have a large red X it means you have a pretty short post, maybe you should add some more information about your role play. Once it is a green check mark, it means you’ve done pretty well. No matter what you have there I suggest you ALWAYS hit the preview button. It allows you to take a look at what your post would look like before you submit everything permanently. If you have to leave really fast, you can always hit the save button and come back to it later through your User Control Panel at the top of the website. Once you are ready, click submit and it will be added to the top of our list in the forum you posted it in.
One other thing I recommend to go along with your role play is an OOC (Out of Character) Discussion.
There you are able to make comments and answer questions about your role play. Posting a new topic in there is the exact same as posting a new role play. Better yet, if you aren’t sure people are interested in your role play, one tool you could use is our Interest Checks subforum. Post some information about your role play, and see who may want to join up!
With all of this in mind, good luck, and happy role playing!
