Post by Pearl Forrester on Mar 9, 2013 15:57:18 GMT -5
I was looking for some links to Roleplaying 101 sites to put up as a link for new/inexperienced players to go to and figure out how to RP well, and I came across a concept that I think, if adapted, might be worth a try.
The concept was for forum-based RPs (play by post) which is what we're doing, and it involved the notion of focusing on forwarding PLOT rather than CHARACTERS. They put forth the notion that if you have seven people playing seven characters, all of them will be fighting to be the 'Main' character - that instead, you should allow people to pick up and put down characters as needed, thus focusing on moving the story ahead instead of just one or two characters. That was a rather startling thing to think about, and it made me think back to something we had on MUSHes: Temporary Characters.
Sometimes we would need a particular character for a function they had or their significance to a plot, and we wouldn't have anyone to play them. In that case, an admin/wiz/gm would 'temp' the character and play them long enough to move the plot along. It was like checking out a book from a library and putting it back when you're done.
At the same time, for those of us already RPing, we have some original characters or particular canon characters that we just really get on well with - they fit like a comfortable pair of shoes. We can get inside their heads and really make them come alive. The idea of letting someone else borrow them or just trade around all the cannons and OCs to people who may not write them well is kind of anathema.
I want to mix the two and experiment with this in the AU sandbox with a couple of threads to see if this 'write for a group and plot' rather than just 'write for a character' works better. I can see benefits to it. I'm not saying we all pool the FCs and then write for them whenever, swapping them off back and forth in each post, that goes against what I've done all my RPing 'life', and probably yours as well... but I am considering that anyone we don't have specifically apped, we could write in temporarily per thread as needed. I think this is a good way of trying on characters to see which ones resonate with you, and also keeping threads from dragging on waiting for someone to get back.
This would mean that our character sheets should be written as REFERENCE GUIDES that others can use, should they need to write for a character if they're unapped, needed, stalled. This also means we need COMMUNICATION - we need to state what our characters are after and be courteous with each other.
I AM NOT SAYING WE NEED TO REDO THE ENTIRE FORUM'S GAME PLAY TO MATCH THIS STYLE. NO NO NO NO NO NO NO. AM I CLEAR ABOUT THAT? NO.
What I am wanting to do is try this for a couple of threads in the AU Sandbox and see if it works or if it causes problems. I would say this is going to be more like writing for a TEAM or writing an actually fanfic in which you can make characters interact with each other more naturally instead of waiting on permissions from others. I want to see if it works, because if it helps us keep the RP flow moving and allows us to fill empty character slots even as NPCs in each post, it might help us out.
The concept was for forum-based RPs (play by post) which is what we're doing, and it involved the notion of focusing on forwarding PLOT rather than CHARACTERS. They put forth the notion that if you have seven people playing seven characters, all of them will be fighting to be the 'Main' character - that instead, you should allow people to pick up and put down characters as needed, thus focusing on moving the story ahead instead of just one or two characters. That was a rather startling thing to think about, and it made me think back to something we had on MUSHes: Temporary Characters.
Sometimes we would need a particular character for a function they had or their significance to a plot, and we wouldn't have anyone to play them. In that case, an admin/wiz/gm would 'temp' the character and play them long enough to move the plot along. It was like checking out a book from a library and putting it back when you're done.
At the same time, for those of us already RPing, we have some original characters or particular canon characters that we just really get on well with - they fit like a comfortable pair of shoes. We can get inside their heads and really make them come alive. The idea of letting someone else borrow them or just trade around all the cannons and OCs to people who may not write them well is kind of anathema.
I want to mix the two and experiment with this in the AU sandbox with a couple of threads to see if this 'write for a group and plot' rather than just 'write for a character' works better. I can see benefits to it. I'm not saying we all pool the FCs and then write for them whenever, swapping them off back and forth in each post, that goes against what I've done all my RPing 'life', and probably yours as well... but I am considering that anyone we don't have specifically apped, we could write in temporarily per thread as needed. I think this is a good way of trying on characters to see which ones resonate with you, and also keeping threads from dragging on waiting for someone to get back.
This would mean that our character sheets should be written as REFERENCE GUIDES that others can use, should they need to write for a character if they're unapped, needed, stalled. This also means we need COMMUNICATION - we need to state what our characters are after and be courteous with each other.
I AM NOT SAYING WE NEED TO REDO THE ENTIRE FORUM'S GAME PLAY TO MATCH THIS STYLE. NO NO NO NO NO NO NO. AM I CLEAR ABOUT THAT? NO.
What I am wanting to do is try this for a couple of threads in the AU Sandbox and see if it works or if it causes problems. I would say this is going to be more like writing for a TEAM or writing an actually fanfic in which you can make characters interact with each other more naturally instead of waiting on permissions from others. I want to see if it works, because if it helps us keep the RP flow moving and allows us to fill empty character slots even as NPCs in each post, it might help us out.