Tips for better RPing

[Midnight Melody]

Do you have any tips for others on how to make the best of your RP experience? What to avoid, what you should do? tips about character creation and so on and on, anything you can think of. Let's help each other I'm sure this could help those that are new to RPing.

 

[Naggrahn]

It is quite heart warming to see you looking out for the new rpers. Very admirable. I'd like to bring something up if that's alright. This is a tip for those new to rp. I used to create a lot of characters when I was big into rp. One thing to remember when making a new one, even if it is just temporary, is to not limit yourself when making a character. Let it be as spontaneous as you wish it to be. However, let's not start creating gods or anything like that. Just make your character special, even if it's just special to you.

 

[Nilum]

Sure. I can do that. For context: I've been writing for years, role playing for longer than that. I've crafted stories that have gone on for years at a time, and stories that have ended in under a month. I've made masterpieces and total train wrecks both respectively. Here's some advice about a bunch of random stuff.

#1: You will never please everyone, don't even try. If someone doesn't like your idea, that's normal. Let them leave.

#2: Stop beating yourself up for being imperfect. Just write some stuff. Seriously. It doesn't matter, it's all goofy as fuck. My best story is arguably either about a literal princess trope, or shapeshifters who live in a fog who spout Biblical verses at people. Fiction is inherently absurd, don't feel bad about it, don't give a shit what other people might think of it. Just do it! Even if it's ultimately a train wreck in the end, you'll learn from it!

#3: Communicate to others around you. Groups of role players often become friends (or at least somewhat familiar with one another), and this is almost a necessity for any group hobby that goes into the long term. Communication is integral to getting what you want and explaining what you have in mind for the story.

#4: People will leave your story without saying a word. That doesn't make them bad people, nor does it necessarily mean you're bad at writing. Be prepared for people to leave your role plays without a trace. Have a plan for that.

#5: It will probably take a few attempts to get your role play off the ground. This is fine. The best thing you can do is run a role play, watch it collapse, see who stuck through with you to the end, and specifically contact those people and involve them in your next roleplay. I'm as successful as I am because of the people I surround myself with--that's the key to my success, above any individual talent on my part.

#6: Being a DM is a very social thing. If you're reclusive and don't want to talk to people a lot, either break out of that, or don't DM, because the role will make you miserable.

#7: Don't set out to "win" at combat all the time. Combat is a narrative tool, a means to an end and little beyond that. Combat opens up a plethora of other scenes you can do. Like...

• Injury, severe or minor, and the consequences thereof--such as treating the injury, recovery, and so forth.
• A moment of weakness or fragility for your character, should they lose but survive.
• Prolonging combat across multiple opponents or through a tense cat-and-mouse chase sequence, invoking feelings of tension, and fear.

And so on, and so on, and so on...

#8: In western structure, a plot mirrors character development in terms of pacing. The inciting incident is the call to arms for a character, the rising action is a character's journey, the low point in the plot is marked by the character falling into severe physical and/or psychological trauma, and the resolution is tied to the character rising above themselves to resolve the conflict in the plot. The plot should inexorably be tied to some characters the moment they get involved, otherwise they will just be passengers to the DM's scene switches.

#9: Your RP doesn't have to last for years to be successful. If you derived fun from it, or emotional satisfaction, that's winning. A world can continue on through multiple stories, or individual characters can, or it might all end with one storyline. Any and all expressions of storytelling are valid.

#10: Have ideas. Present them. Don't ask others to come up with ideas for you, don't approach others with the classic prompt of "u wan sum rp?" Give people something to work with! Have characters, have plots, have worlds, or look at the designs of others and offer your input as a player! Expect only to receive as much (or less) effort as you are willing to give, and if you are willing to give little to no effort beyond bugging people to role play, expect nothing.

There you go. I guess. I'm gonna go back to drinking my tea now.

 

[Blacksmith]

Have fun, but not at the expense of being an asshole to the point you're tossed out of a group.

 

[Dizzy]

Somebody was sharing advice a while ago and they said something that really, really resonated with me.

A good writer never writes a character who won't do something, he'll find reasons for that character to do that thing that other roleplayers need him to do. It never hurts to go against the grain of a character who usually wouldn't do what you think he wouldn't do.

 

[Day]

I've always written characters from the inside out, feeling emotions motivations and beliefs first and then their appearance.

 

[Mr. Wade & Watch]

Don't do one liners.

As a buddy of mine once said: "excessively short posts can cause an RP to clog and die because the other participants don't have anything to work with. You're free to write as you like but the GM has to make sure it's fun for everyone else too, not just you."

That doesn't mean if you don't get good now, you're fucked. If you have problems with writing, set up some challenges for yourself. Try and write out at good solid paragraph, discussing the characters interaction to the area around him, his movements, his dialogue if responding to a character, thoughts going through his mind, even if you're having a hard time making the post because the other person is giving you material that isn't suitable enough for a long post, don't believe that you're strictly limited to a basic action like 'he listened to her,' then have the character respond.

Stay patient with the post and don't rush it out, give yourself some time to think it all over. If you have the mindset of 'I gotta post as fast as I can or I'll loose my partner's interest in the RP,' you'll get sloppy. Take it slow, take your time, think it all over, and if you feel comfortable with that post and you felt you gave it your all, then you can post it.

If you're willing to put in the work to make your writing better and longer, you can improve.

 

[Arthur King]

to counter Bobby the Prussian, also don't ask for a literal novella length response. I shouldn't have to write a literal short story every time I respond to you, it stifles creativity, and forces too much detail. There IS such a thing as too much detail. So somewhere in between three lines and probably 2 paragraphs is good general length of response.

 

[Red Coil]

I think a very simple thing (in theory only) is to remember to communicate with the other people you are RPing with.

 

[Snowtwo]

Well, don't 'sentence-post' if at all possible. I know some people like to say 'I only contain the information I really need', but if all that info can be condensed down to just one sentence, odds are that there's a problem. You don't need to overly embellish everything; but even simple things like adding in 'he said with a frown before crossing his arms in annoyance and tapping his foot anxiously' can add a lot to a character and their interactions. Certainly makes you seem a lot better (and will make you grow).

My specialty happens to be fights, however, and I can summarize it like this. When it comes to a fight, make sure each blow DOES something! It's super annoying to read fights which are basically 'I shot fifty bullets down the hall' because that adds nothing. Target each of the bullets. Have one or two hit a potted plant by accident. Or have the gunner focus six bullets on trying to keep a person locked behind cover. Don't just spam it. In a melee fight make sure each strike has a point and isn't 'my character swings six times at the chest'. That's just annoying. Make sure each strike carries weight behind it and could be fatal if the opposing player doesn't do anything about it. With magic, don't just go 'I shoots the fireballs and he shoots his fireballs to block my balls.' That's nothing of interest. Find some unique way to deal with the spells as opposed to just hitting them back. If you really must counter-fireball them make sure it's something more than just a line or two. Make it a bit of a struggle or find an exploit to make it really easy. If a fight is meant to go on, you have the chance to plan it, or what not I suggest dividing it into two to three 'parts' with a clear and defined winner for each before the conclusion where someone wins (decide independently of the fight itself).

 

[Kaos]

Details are important yes, but don't get lost in the detail. The first thing people do from writing barebones paragraphs is work on post size and beef up their word count till they've made a small novel that's gone nowhere. Strike a balance. Pointless information is distracting, a waste of time, and a drain on the reader. Less is more.
Avoid fluff. There needs to be a focus. Information you give has to be relevant and usable.

Yes, describe what havoc a hail of gunfire is doing, maybe even the reaction of onlookers, how much dust is kicking up from the dirt sent flying, the drywall being smashed, that sort of thing is all acceptable because it's directly related to something happening in the foreground. The chestnut tree swaying in the fall breeze outside without a care in the world might help create some tension by showing the world's indifference to the violence, and even writing about bystanders freaking out is OK too.
When you start describing the leaves falling from the tree, the jewelry on one of the people fleeing the scene, or how cold the room felt, that type of information is practically useless and isn't related to the current focus.

Rule of thumb: Write out only what you'd notice the first time looking at a movie or an episode of a show, and don't go overboard with details.
If you don't expect to see what you're writing in a multi-million dollar film without pouring over the movie frame by frame, it's probably not needed. It's fluff; showiness, pointless information for the sake of it.
For every celebrity cameo or blooper going on in the background, there's hundreds of mundane things like an extra picking their nose that you missed. While you just spent ten minutes of your time focusing on the background to only end up seeing that guy digging for nose gold, you've missed the main attraction.

The difference between the author writing the background too much in depth, and the director hiding lots of easter eggs? You have to read about the ants hauling potato chip crumbs up the tree, you don't have to look at the girl in the back of the diner sticking gum under the table. It's a waste of everyones time, burns the audience out for slogging through it, and burns you out for having to write it all up.

This hobby is very much a theater of the mind, and the mind is perfectly capable of filling in all the little details when you give it enough to work with.