B
belVita
Guest
Godmodding, mainly
What do you want to avoid during a RP?
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Influenced Conscience
The Sick
I avoid role plays where it is based off of a series or show. It just feels as if you are being influenced rather than exploring new things. That's why I would enjoy some random space story about being stuck on a meteor, than some "Sequel to Harry Potter". Sometimes you'll just be performing and then you'll see something that makes you say, "That wasn't in the story." or, "What is he talking about?" It's just a personal thing, I don't know if others feel it.
Chris Lang
Well-Known Member
I generally avoid overpowered characters.
Things I think should be avoided:
'Godmoding' or all too easily defeating other characters (especially other players' characters) in a fight. Stealing other player characters' tools or weapons without consent from the character's player, especially if they have special significance and aren't easily replaceable or can't easily be stolen back. All this is stuff that should be avoided.
I also think that in fandom based RPs in particular, a reasonable effort should be played to play people as much in-character as they can. Also, try not to make the character a parody of that character unless you make it clear from the start that this is what you're going for.
Avoid OOC parentheses in the middle of an IC narrative paragraph, such as...
There, that's much better. The OOC is much less intrusive and immersion-shattering.
Also, if you're trying to create a dark, moody atmosphere, avoid making joking references to the Internet or celebrities or pop songs in the middle of a serious host narrative of events. For example, one RP I was in involved the players roaming a city in the midst of a zombie apocalypse. At one point, the zombies kill one of the people they meet, and the player characters find the remains. The host ruined the mood of a scene by comparing the grisly scene to an infamous shock site on the Internet. If you're going for all out parody and being silly, this could still work, but not when you're trying to play the scenario straight. Leave the humorous lines to the players who are inclined to have their characters be the comic relief in that scenario, and don't have the host's omniscient narrator make these sorts of jarring references.
These are the things I think should be avoided that come to mind right now.
Things I think should be avoided:
'Godmoding' or all too easily defeating other characters (especially other players' characters) in a fight. Stealing other player characters' tools or weapons without consent from the character's player, especially if they have special significance and aren't easily replaceable or can't easily be stolen back. All this is stuff that should be avoided.
I also think that in fandom based RPs in particular, a reasonable effort should be played to play people as much in-character as they can. Also, try not to make the character a parody of that character unless you make it clear from the start that this is what you're going for.
Avoid OOC parentheses in the middle of an IC narrative paragraph, such as...
He would have reacted sooner, but he was still weary from the last battle (OOC: and the guy who played him was stuck in traffic and didn't get home till late). Before he could stop them, the door had already closed and the Masters were already on their journey.
That is jarring, and throws us out of the story. Keep the OOC comments separate, such as this:
OOC: Sorry I'm late. I got stuck in traffic.
IC:
He would have reacted sooner, but he was still weary from the last battle. Before he could stop them, the door had already closed and the Masters were already on their journey.
IC:
He would have reacted sooner, but he was still weary from the last battle. Before he could stop them, the door had already closed and the Masters were already on their journey.
There, that's much better. The OOC is much less intrusive and immersion-shattering.
Also, if you're trying to create a dark, moody atmosphere, avoid making joking references to the Internet or celebrities or pop songs in the middle of a serious host narrative of events. For example, one RP I was in involved the players roaming a city in the midst of a zombie apocalypse. At one point, the zombies kill one of the people they meet, and the player characters find the remains. The host ruined the mood of a scene by comparing the grisly scene to an infamous shock site on the Internet. If you're going for all out parody and being silly, this could still work, but not when you're trying to play the scenario straight. Leave the humorous lines to the players who are inclined to have their characters be the comic relief in that scenario, and don't have the host's omniscient narrator make these sorts of jarring references.
These are the things I think should be avoided that come to mind right now.
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TheDeathOfABachelor
New Member
- Forced relationships with characters in fandoms
- Blocks of text. I know I write my novella like that, but cmon, I type slow, its gonna take me the good part of 15 minutes to reply to that standard
- People who don't rp with minors. Yes it might be odd in a social standing, but does my age denote my skill?
- O. P. Characters. Like, if you can rip me in two with a single glance, please, go away, you make things boring.
- Characters who refuse to look at the bright side of things. It makes things boring!
- People who talk in text speak
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Deroc
Muggeseggele!
Can answer these, actually. As a 25 year old male that occasionally puts a "no minors allowed" rule on some role plays. Question these motives as you wish.
- Some content (primarily sexual) is not suitable for minors--legally, or sensibly. Lots of people already get squeamish about the topic, throw in a minor and you kill it entirely for a lot of people. This may be problematic for some types of stories. (And I do mean just sexual themes here--not touching actual sex, no, god no.)
- Some topics are generally harder for younger teens to grasp than fully fledged adults. Most young teens still don't know if they're straight or gay, or whether they support capitalism or socialism, or whether they support freedom of speech or hate speech. Now throw a question like "what measure of a nonhuman is a transhumanist machine?" And it might be understandable why some might view the lack of life experience as a sincere thing to consider.
- In role plays with a great deal of criticism, teens tend to chafe and get frustrated easier than adults do. I can personally attest that most of my issue players are under 20 most of the time. Not always, but most of the time.
Deroc
Muggeseggele!
This one I can understand of course.
Well, this is only a trend, some teens only cared about fashion and shopping but not all of us.
I do have some general knowledge of these political stuffs and I've roleplay many stories with such topics before. I've had several roleplays with my friends dealing with a mixed theme of Cold War, Neo-Feudalism and Urban Fantasy.
(Mainly thanks to Red Alert 2 and Warcraft III)
Well, sad but true for most cases; but we can always learn. Just make everyone converse in a calm, rational and respectful way.
Good.
You know, people could just conceal their age in the Internet...
They can, but I can't exactly stop them from doing that. All I can do is take whatever reasonable precautions I can to try and warn away honest people from experiencing content not suitable for their age range. If they choose to lie about their age and willfully disregard it, I cannot be held at fault for that--I did my part.
As for the rest, as I said, you were free to your opinion. I won't derail the thread further.
After a recent experience, I've doubled down on my opinion that someone that uses something arbitrary like a 'sample' of a post to attempt to prove they have an ability to articulate and express themselves themselves in a meaningful manner, they're worth avoiding.
More often than not, think the prose is more important than the nuances of conversation, overarching plots, and character personalities. A character and their story with no soul in either, presented to you all pretty and trimmed up is only interesting before you've torn the wrapping off. People should simply do well in a planning phase, start writing, and not take it too badly if you're not compatible.
More often than not, think the prose is more important than the nuances of conversation, overarching plots, and character personalities. A character and their story with no soul in either, presented to you all pretty and trimmed up is only interesting before you've torn the wrapping off. People should simply do well in a planning phase, start writing, and not take it too badly if you're not compatible.
Koishiteru
Member
Ohoho, I have a few pet peeve's that I'm sure a lot of other roleplayers have had happen to them as well.
- When you get a partner that's hard to plot with and they offer very little idea's on what they want in the roleplay. Am I supposed to read your mind?
- "Hey babe, wanna roleplay/cyber?"
- Roleplays being dropped because you're not available to reply every day
- Very little character development yet somehow the characters are "in a relationship" within the first five posts
- Conflicting character personality traits. "x character is shy and introverted but when you talk to them they're cheerful and upbeat!!"
Zarek
Roll for Initiative
I come from Dungeons and Dragons, but you get some incredibly annoying people in that game. You roll a dice to determine if you complete an action, and if you have a high point for whatever skill you are using, you don't need to roll as high. The guy running the game decides what skill the action needs: if your roll requires agility, if you picking stuff up requires strength, etc.
Some guy I played with always argued, saying that actually, him climbing a wall requires strength, even if the general consensus is that it needs agility. He would always argue and complain that almost every action needs strength, which was conveniently his highest skill. At one point he actually went and bought loaded dice, that always landed on 18/19/20.
Another thing you find is people trying to force their actions on your character, such as saying "I throw the knife at Bill, and he catches it, leaving him open for a left-hook". It can be hard to do with a decent dungeon master, but it is still mighty annoying. Or people arguing that their character can totally cast a resurrection spell when they're a level 2 warrior.
Some guy I played with always argued, saying that actually, him climbing a wall requires strength, even if the general consensus is that it needs agility. He would always argue and complain that almost every action needs strength, which was conveniently his highest skill. At one point he actually went and bought loaded dice, that always landed on 18/19/20.
Another thing you find is people trying to force their actions on your character, such as saying "I throw the knife at Bill, and he catches it, leaving him open for a left-hook". It can be hard to do with a decent dungeon master, but it is still mighty annoying. Or people arguing that their character can totally cast a resurrection spell when they're a level 2 warrior.
R
Roluevasreisa
Guest
My "one liner" is writing any less than me XD I write four paragraphs minimum and I'll say this to my rper many times so they are fully aware. If I work hard to set up a rp and they write less than what I said, proving they didn't listen to a single word I said, I will most likely drop the rp right then and there and cut contacts with them as I don't have much tolerance for children that don't want to listen to you
I also hate fuck dolls
This may be an unusual concept but it's very common on many sites. I like REAL characters but many rpers will put zero effort into their characters and just want their fan fiction porn. They just want someone to write out their porn for them.
I agree with depressed to a degree. I like challenged characters that are flawed and struggling. I don't like baby characters aka characters that are upset because they are. It reminds me of Spongebob:
"Hey Patrick are you mad?"
"YEAH!"
"Whys that?"
"I can't see my forehead"
I also hate fuck dolls
This may be an unusual concept but it's very common on many sites. I like REAL characters but many rpers will put zero effort into their characters and just want their fan fiction porn. They just want someone to write out their porn for them.
I agree with depressed to a degree. I like challenged characters that are flawed and struggling. I don't like baby characters aka characters that are upset because they are. It reminds me of Spongebob:
"Hey Patrick are you mad?"
"YEAH!"
"Whys that?"
"I can't see my forehead"
I guess it's time for unpopular opinions: RP Edition!
- Mandatory post lengths are awful. Just the worst. If you think a minimum amount of crap thrown onto a page is the way to go, you clearly don't understand how writing fundamentally works. You want to say as much as is possible with as little as is possible. This is especially true of role playing, where you have two or more authors competing over the same amount of total space. Having multiple protagonists all elucidating their innermost monologues and thoughts every paragraph isn't good writing, it's fucking garbage that wouldn't even pass for a Harlequin Romance Novel.
- "I'd like to RP with you!" "Great! What would you like to do?" "Idk, anything so long as I can RP!" Get. Out. If you want to role play with me, have an idea. If you don't have an idea, go get one. Why the hell do you want to write a story if you don't even know what the hell you want to write about? What sort of sense does that make? That's like wanting to drive somewhere with a friend only to announce, loudly, "I don't own a car, but we can make that up as we go along." No! If you want to go on a road trip, GET A FUCKIN' CAR! If you want to role play with me, HAVE A FUCKIN' IDEA!
- Not every role play needs to last a bajillion trillion years. Some role plays are meant to last only a single sequence of events--like a short story. In fact, exceedingly short role plays are fantastic practice for writing particular scenes or characters that you might not otherwise want to be locked into in the long term. Also, you know, I sincerely doubt that a fifteen year old still going through public school truly understand just how time consuming five years really is.
- "I WANT TO POST EVERY DAY!" Well, fantastic. I'm glad you clearly don't need to work for a living. I do, though, so...
- "I want to do something adult..." Yeah, okay, you're not fooling anyone. Just admit you want to write porn, or, if you prefer, "erotic fiction." Everyone's done it at some point. We were all horny teenagers at one point. It's fine. I know adults who still do that. The only shame is in feigning otherwise.
- "You must respect me and my work!" No. I don't have to. Not at all. Not even slightly. If I think there is something wrong with your work, I will tell you as such--albeit I'll strive to do it nicely. If you think your work is above criticism, then you clearly think your work is above me, in which case, we are not equals, and I have no interest in doing anything with you.
Midnight Melody
Member
I hate when someone makes their character all powerful. It makes the whole thing just bad. I mean whats the fun if there isn't any challenge at all? Then there is the one line thing. OK, I get it sometimes the story comes to a point where one line just fits better than six or however many but that is an exception.
Also what I hate most and did happen before is when someone just takes over your character and writes what your character did, said or what happened to it because he/she had a scene he/she wanted to play out the way they wanted and don't even ask your premission.
And then the last but not least: when someone ends roleplay writing altogether without telling you they won't be back (ever) and you wait for days and maybe weeks (i never waited a week but some might) before you realize they won't come back. Just say you're not into it anymore it's less rude.
that's just what I think anyway.
Also what I hate most and did happen before is when someone just takes over your character and writes what your character did, said or what happened to it because he/she had a scene he/she wanted to play out the way they wanted and don't even ask your premission.
And then the last but not least: when someone ends roleplay writing altogether without telling you they won't be back (ever) and you wait for days and maybe weeks (i never waited a week but some might) before you realize they won't come back. Just say you're not into it anymore it's less rude.
that's just what I think anyway.
cr0w
Member
Wow, I agreed with all of that point by point.I guess it's time for unpopular opinions: RP Edition!
- Mandatory post lengths are awful. Just the worst. If you think a minimum amount of crap thrown onto a page is the way to go, you clearly don't understand how writing fundamentally works. You want to say as much as is possible with as little as is possible. This is especially true of role playing, where you have two or more authors competing over the same amount of total space. Having multiple protagonists all elucidating their innermost monologues and thoughts every paragraph isn't good writing, it's fucking garbage that wouldn't even pass for a Harlequin Romance Novel.
- "I'd like to RP with you!" "Great! What would you like to do?" "Idk, anything so long as I can RP!" Get. Out. If you want to role play with me, have an idea. If you don't have an idea, go get one. Why the hell do you want to write a story if you don't even know what the hell you want to write about? What sort of sense does that make? That's like wanting to drive somewhere with a friend only to announce, loudly, "I don't own a car, but we can make that up as we go along." No! If you want to go on a road trip, GET A FUCKIN' CAR! If you want to role play with me, HAVE A FUCKIN' IDEA!
- Not every role play needs to last a bajillion trillion years. Some role plays are meant to last only a single sequence of events--like a short story. In fact, exceedingly short role plays are fantastic practice for writing particular scenes or characters that you might not otherwise want to be locked into in the long term. Also, you know, I sincerely doubt that a fifteen year old still going through public school truly understand just how time consuming five years really is.
- "I WANT TO POST EVERY DAY!" Well, fantastic. I'm glad you clearly don't need to work for a living. I do, though, so...
- "I want to do something adult..." Yeah, okay, you're not fooling anyone. Just admit you want to write porn, or, if you prefer, "erotic fiction." Everyone's done it at some point. We were all horny teenagers at one point. It's fine. I know adults who still do that. The only shame is in feigning otherwise.
- "You must respect me and my work!" No. I don't have to. Not at all. Not even slightly. If I think there is something wrong with your work, I will tell you as such--albeit I'll strive to do it nicely. If you think your work is above criticism, then you clearly think your work is above me, in which case, we are not equals, and I have no interest in doing anything with you.
Alright. Let's go for round 2 on unpopular opinions: RP Edition with things I want to avoid during an RP. This time starring... Using artwork you don't own in your character sheet.
If you take art from an artist and use it without their consent, and it's not a creative commons or public domain artwork, that is theft. At the very least, it's copyright infringement. Get over it. No, "I'm using it for nonprofit" is not covered in fair use. Don't even pretend it is. Fair Use as defined in the law is the copying of a copyrighted material for a limited and--this is the important, key word here--transformative purpose. Transformative purposes include commenting upon it, criticism, or parody. When you use a person's artwork to represent your character or depict an environment or set a mood, you are not transforming that artwork in any way, you are using it verbatim as part of your own work. That is literally copyright infringement at its most basic definition.
That being said, the odds of you getting caught are virtually none, and even if you are, the "damage" of your "crime" is very minimal to nonexistent. Nonetheless, if the original artist found their artwork being used by you as part of, say, a character sheet? They have every legal right to copyright takedown that artwork. If that makes you feel squeamish, good. It should.
As for the ethics of it: I don't personally care if other people do it. It's not my domain to tell you what you should and shouldn't do--I'm not your fucking dad. I personally try to avoid using artwork for my characters in forum role plays at this point. I still totally do it for forum avatars and the like. There's a moral grey area here about this whole issue, just, y'know... Don't be willfully ignorant of reality.
I figured this out a long time ago by asking myself a simple question: If I put in several hours of work to write a book about a fantasy story and put it up for sale, and someone stole a copy of that book off the Internet and changed a few words in it and tried to offer it for free, would that bother me? At what point would I consider it fan fiction? How many changes would it have to undergo before it reached that point? I applied that same litmus to actual art, and decided that using the artwork of other people for my characters without their consent was just straight up distasteful.
Besides, it made me a better writer to describe my own characters with text. If I can't do something as simple as describe what a person looks like without resorting to stealing someone else's ideas via their art, then how the fuck can I call myself a writer anyway?
If you take art from an artist and use it without their consent, and it's not a creative commons or public domain artwork, that is theft. At the very least, it's copyright infringement. Get over it. No, "I'm using it for nonprofit" is not covered in fair use. Don't even pretend it is. Fair Use as defined in the law is the copying of a copyrighted material for a limited and--this is the important, key word here--transformative purpose. Transformative purposes include commenting upon it, criticism, or parody. When you use a person's artwork to represent your character or depict an environment or set a mood, you are not transforming that artwork in any way, you are using it verbatim as part of your own work. That is literally copyright infringement at its most basic definition.
That being said, the odds of you getting caught are virtually none, and even if you are, the "damage" of your "crime" is very minimal to nonexistent. Nonetheless, if the original artist found their artwork being used by you as part of, say, a character sheet? They have every legal right to copyright takedown that artwork. If that makes you feel squeamish, good. It should.
As for the ethics of it: I don't personally care if other people do it. It's not my domain to tell you what you should and shouldn't do--I'm not your fucking dad. I personally try to avoid using artwork for my characters in forum role plays at this point. I still totally do it for forum avatars and the like. There's a moral grey area here about this whole issue, just, y'know... Don't be willfully ignorant of reality.
I figured this out a long time ago by asking myself a simple question: If I put in several hours of work to write a book about a fantasy story and put it up for sale, and someone stole a copy of that book off the Internet and changed a few words in it and tried to offer it for free, would that bother me? At what point would I consider it fan fiction? How many changes would it have to undergo before it reached that point? I applied that same litmus to actual art, and decided that using the artwork of other people for my characters without their consent was just straight up distasteful.
Besides, it made me a better writer to describe my own characters with text. If I can't do something as simple as describe what a person looks like without resorting to stealing someone else's ideas via their art, then how the fuck can I call myself a writer anyway?
