Writing an Introduction
In roleplay, an introduction post is an important one, so it's therefore important that you make it a good one.
As you probably know, an introduction post (or 'intro') is the post with which you start a roleplay. It sets the scene and introduces your character, and sometimes explains the setting or plot if it's unusual. It's on the basis of your introduction that most people will decide whether or not to join your roleplay, so it's a good idea to make a nice presentation of it. Not just a nice presentation, in fact—you also have to make it easy for the other person to enter their character.
For this reason, you have to put some thought into where you're setting the scene. A solitary character in a locked room is probably going to
stay solitary—after all, how is anyone going to enter? Try a more open setting, where social interaction is possible, or hopefully even likely. There's a reason why taverns are a cliché of Fantasy Medieval roleplay—they give characters a reason to interact.
For the sake of interaction, you also have to consider what's happening in your intro—is your character running through a forest, or sitting in a library? The first option might have more 'action' in it, but it's very hard for people to join. If you use the second option, you'll still have a lot of chances to inject action into your roleplay, but you'll be starting somewhere where it's easy for people to join.
After all, if no one joins your roleplay, it's not going to be much fun.
Once you've figured out your setting, go ahead and write it up. One mistake that a lot of people make when starting a roleplay is that they spend oodles of space describing their character, and neglect the setting. The rule of thumb is
spend at least as much space on setting as you do on your character. After all, anyone who wants to join needs to know where they're putting their character.
Post your intro and go—you're ready to roleplay.
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Why Do I Need to Include Rules?
"We're all literate here. Why should I have to post rules?"
Rules tell people what they can expect from a roleplay—they tell people what the RP's creator wants, what the creator considers 'literate.' Rules set the tone for your board, and as such they're useful to have. They make it easier for people to enter successfully into your roleplay.
If you've ever had the problem of someone you don't consider literate joining your roleplay—or the problem of someone doing something you think they shouldn't—this problem could have been averted by posting rules to more clearly define your expectations for players joining your board. Remember, 'literate' is just a word, eight letters long—
people are likely to have different opinions on what it means, especially in relation to roleplay. This goes double for 'advanced.'
Rules don't have to be a chore. Type them out once and save them—you can usually use the same basic rule-set for all your roleplays, barring a few minor adjustments. If you like the rules someone else has, ask if you can use them. Many people share views on the particulars of literacy—rules are there to make sure everyone's on the same level.
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To Bump or Not to Bump?
That is the question.
As you probably already know, a bump is a mostly content-less post used to bring a board back up to the top of the board list. Some people say that "bump" is an acronym for "Bring Up My Post", while others say it's just what it says: a post to "bump" up a board.
Some people find bumping to be meaningless and offensive, while others consider it a useful tool.
When the roleplaying boards list is moving fast—when the rate of change is high—then bumping becomes a useful tool. If your board is only on the first page for a few seconds, it's unlikely that anyone wanting to roleplay will find it. Thus it becomes useful to bump your board to the top, to give it another chance to be viewed.
However, excessive bumping can very quickly become annoying. If a board has four introductory posts and eleven bumps, made in four minutes, there's obviously a problem. Too many bumps will annoy potential joiners as well as clutter up your board.
In the end, the "to bump or not to bump" question is best answered by your own discretion. A few bumps, at a rate of maybe once a minute, can help your board to be found. Too many bumps can turn people away. As with all things, a 'bump" is best used in moderation.
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Writing an Entrance
Saving and re-using your roleplay's introduction is no longer a new idea. Most people who fly the banner of "literacy" follow this practice, making it easy to create a roleplay any time.
However, some roleplayers are now saving and re-using their entrance posts—you know. The posts they use to enter someone else's roleplay. And this is a bad idea. Entrance posts must be customized to the roleplay.
When you join a roleplay, the first thing you do is read any rules the person has set up, and read their introduction. This is standard; we all know this. We read their intro, and we take note of the setting, the time of day, the weather, the details our roleplay's host has given us.
When we write our entrance post, we're inserting our own characters into the scene and world that our host made for us. It's not just rude to change this world without permission—it's against the rules. If it's cloudy, then there's no full moon. If it's a treeless field, there are no trees. You might think this is basic and needs no saying, but many people today still make simple mistakes which result in "scene-changing", a form of god-moding.
A number of these simple mistakes happen when a person uses a pre-made entrance post which doesn't fit the setting given.
So the first point in making a good entrance post is:
Match your post to the setting.
Since character interaction is the first and most basic goal of roleplaying, and an introduction usually is static (not moving), it is up to those who join a roleplay to make contact.
If the intro features a young man sitting in a crowded café in Paris, and you introduce your character as sitting five tables away reading a magazine, it is highly unlikely that anything will happen. Remember—a roleplay's about interaction, not about trying to out-pretty the other writer.
Remember:
a good entrance post follows your character from the first moment the enter the scene to the moment when they make contact (in whatever way) with another character.
Now, this is not to say that forcing interaction is a good idea. Tripping over or bumping into the other character, for example, is done to death. If interaction is not possible in the first post, it's up to your ingenuity to find a way to interact that's both plausible and right for your character. Hopefully, your roleplaying companion will have read this guide as well, and will make it easy for you to join the roleplay.
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A Little More on Interaction Points
[Coming Soon]
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Literate Means Good Character, Too
So you've got your writing down pat. You flow, you enthrall your readers, you know exactly when you make your posts short and when to make them long. That's great-but if your character is uninteresting, you're dead in the water.
Your character is not the most important thing about your posts. Like your writing style and your grasp of technical knowledge, your character is a tool- in roleplaying even more so than in standard, socially acceptable novel-writing. Arguably the most important tool- after all, roleplaying is basically your character's interaction with everyone else's character- but a tool nonetheless. A plot device.
But so what? Everyone else is on the same level.
Believability is much more important than many writers know. This is roleplaying, not professional writing. Your character doesn't have to come across as sincere, or true to his or her self, or even necessarily physically possible, as evidenced by the number of Fantasy roleplayers. He or she does, however, have to be believable. This means a few simple things.
First, simply because you write well does not mean you have left behind the dangers of godmoding. We're all drawn to the idea of powerful, beautiful characters. Resist the draw. There are ways to balance the power and physical beauty, but unless your character has got some really interesting opinions, then being crazy or lusting for more power to a fault will not cut it. If your character is, however, interesting for his or her own sake, then minor mental disorders, small obsessions and/or compulsions, and minor quirks are an acceptable way to add depth to a character. Don't go overboard, though, unless you're prepared to play it.
Secondly, do your research. It's okay if you don't know Chinese or Croatian or German, but don't rely on Babelfish to do the work for you. Got a character with OCD? Know the symptoms. Got a character born in the 1800s? Know what was going on. It's alright if you're not word-perfect- characters can be forgetful. But don't rely on faulty memory.
Third, be aware of circumstance. Say your character is an attractive but snide antisocial recluse. In real life, snide antisocial recluses self-perpetuate because they are snide and antisocial, unless everyone around them is blind to the fact because they've known them a long time or are just stupid. This really happens. But you can't count on other characters' outlooks. Unless you are 'playing with some seriously devoted and insistent players, your character will remain a snide antisocial recluse while everybody else groups off.
Similarly, be aware that your fabulous and original elderly woman character, rich in personality and interest, may not fit into a roleplay set in a nightclub. Be prepared to specialise, or be prepared to have a range of characters.
Nobody Likes An Orphan. This isn't true at all, of course. What is true, however, is that roleplaying is a cliché-riddled form of writing. And, contrary to popular belief, clichés change to suit time and place. Be aware of the demographics of a roleplay, and instead of ignoring it use it to build a character which is likely to work in the given environment with the given characters.
Does it seem like all of your characters run on a theme or seem alike? That's because you probably do. Humans are a pattern-seeking animal, and we're damn good at it.
You say, "I have this fantastic idea for a character but I have problems roleplaying that mindset." We say, "Sorry, good luck with that." You have fallen into a niche, and you can't get out. This is one that you have to do for yourself. Many people find they're better at roleplaying fundamentally good people with small but glaring flaws than careful, cautious people- or vise versa, Insert Personality Type Here. Breaking out of a niche that you've built up around yourself will only come with time and practice.
Without a character, you can't roleplay—and if your tools are faulty, so will be the things you try to build. Spending time making believable, interesting, many-faceted characters will make your experience—and the experiences of those who 'play with you—more enjoyable. Humans are all psychological beings. Remember—so are your characters.
Section submitted by Cami.
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Length = Literacy … right?
There was a time when people communicated over long distances solely through an archaic practice known to the world as "letter writing." This "letter" would be pages and pages long, much like some roleplay posts today. The only difference is that people who wrote letters tried very hard to keep them short. At the end of one woman's letter, she was recorded to have written, "I apologize for the length of this letter, it would have been shorter if I had more time." This ingenius quote pertains to writing as a whole: there is wit in brevity and power in clarity.
I'm not saying one-liners are
good, but they do get to the point faster and are much less time-consuming. You're roleplaying, not writing a novel. One-liners lack content, but they lack as much content as pages and pages about a rock. A part of me dies inside when I see things like "post must be at least one page long" or "two posts per person, at least." This forces roleplayers to go on page long tangents about how beautiful the flowers are, when it makes no difference to anyone whether the flowers are even there or not. No one wants to read a four post internal monologue about stars or darkness, no matter how well-written it is.
K.I.S.S." - Keep it short and simple. Almost everyone learned this back in
grade school, but no one puts this advice to use. Very few people go over a short story and
add phrases, clauses, adverbs, and adjectives.
If you choose the right noun/verb, you won't have to use an adverb/adjective. Take this for instance: "rant" instead of "angry speech," or
"She sat on the rock" instead of "Her knees folded beneath her as she rested against the rough, hard stone.
Describing words, prepositional phrases, and clauses are the
weak. Your writing should stand strong on its own rather than carry useless baggage.
Remember, take a step back. You're supposed to describe the surroundings and the subtle movements of your character, not what they're thinking. This isn't first person or omniscient narration. Describe your character physically, and if you do that well enough you won't have to write what they're thinking. How is ten lines about how your character feels useful to your roleplaying partner? If there's only thought, no action, your roleplay will come to a grinding halt. Static description is not fun to read. Get to the action quickly before you bore people to death.
Any writer can go on for pages and pages about something. It's very easy to master the art of being uselessly verbose. Only a great writer can say the same thing with a few simple words.
Get to the point.
Reduction releases power--Omit!" Before you post, read over what you wrote and say out loud, "Does this have anything to do with what's going on?" If it doesn't, KISS it.
Section submitted by Shinime
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A Few Definitions Worth Repeating
[Coming Soon]
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The Danger of Over-writing
In which the author of this guide goes against that which was previously said about not talking about style.
"Mellifluously the elegantly-crested kaleidoscopic birds trill from their branches high in the diaphanous frondescence, each sweet, ephemeral song gallivanting from the heights with the verdant-stained strands of warm diurnal light..."
By now, you've read the article titled "Length = Literacy… right?" in which our guest author brought down the evidence for why longer isn't necessarily better. And now, I'm going to bring up a new idea:
The same is true for words.
The English language is a huge and marvelous thing, full of synonyms and nouns for just about everything... but that doesn't mean you have to exercise every single one.
Concise writing doesn't just mean making one word do the work of three. It also means using language that is simple and can be understood by all. You can be just as descriptive using one long word and five short ones as you can be with six long words.
Lengthy, uncommon or out-of-date words lack a common connotation—a certain feeling that they give to people that has little to do with the exact dictionary meaning—and a lot of writing is dependant on connotation for mood and feel.
If you use too many of these words, your writing seems stuffy, or pretentious, and hard to read.
Instead of making your writing higher-class, and making it sound more intelligent, lengthy words tend to have a negative effect. If you can find a more common word that gives you the same meaning, use it—and if you don't know the meaning of a word you've found in a thesaurus, learn it before you use it.
This doesn't mean you shouldn't use any word over three syllables. This just means that you should concentrate on giving your writing flow, in making it roll off the tongue and full of meaning instead of shallow (but pretty) words. Your readers will thank you for it.
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Whaddaya Mean, Wolfspeak Isn't Literate?
I mean, it's not literate. Let me explain...
Wolfspeak is a distinct style of role-playing, like chatspeak RP or literate RP, and has
as much a right to exist as any other style. It's neither inherently good nor bad—it's just a way of roleplaying.
However, wolfspeak is a set
deviation from the standard English language, marked by
sentence fragments, much passive voice, dropped articles, and a number of non-words or non-synonyms (such as fae, fea, femme or femora to mean female; orbs, optics, oculars to mean eyes, and other terms such as auds, terra, pillars, cranium, and tassle.) Wolfspeak ignores the connotation and sometimes also the denotation of the words it uses.
Literate roleplay focuses particularly on the
use of standard English, particularly as one might find in a typical modern novel. Standard grammar rules are followed, passive voice is avoided when possible, articles are used, and both the connotation and the actual denotation of words are considered very important to the meaning and content of what is written.
I think you can see what is meant by "Wolfspeak is not literate". It's not an insult by any means, just a clear definition—wolfspeak and the literate style follow different forms and use different words.
By all rights, wolfspeak cannot be called literate.
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Updates
Well, the site's up.. I just have to write up the actual information. Don't worry, folks. I'm working on it. In the meantime, you're free to neomail me (chaosandinnocence) if you have questions.
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About
Well, it's a guide to roleplaying. I think you were able to figure that much out on your own, weren't you?
Who am I to be making a guide for you, you might ask. Well, I'm just a girl who has been roleplaying for six or so years and knows the tricks. That's all.
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Links
•
The Basics.
•
Useful Tips.
•
Grammar Help.
•
Ugly but Informative.
•
Comprehensive Definitions.
•
The Literati Movement.
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