Roleplay

If it's okay, I'm going to add a few salty lil things in this post:

• If your OC/RP Character has a secret/ailment/handicap of any kind that might not be obvious at first sight, do not expect your partners' characters to know it right away.
• To go with the above; if their character does something your character doesn't like because of said secret/ailment/handicap, don't take it as a personal attack against your character if nothing about your character was explained in the rp thread to their character beforehand. They had no way of knowing.
• Don't be rude. Don't go "oh by the way your character touched mine MY CHARACTER HAS A BOYFRIEND ALREADY. ALSO AN ARMY THAT WILL BEAT UP UR CHARACTER. STEP OFF". Calm down, reread, and it'll be very likely that their character touched yours to move them, get their attention, push them away, etc. Not every touch is meant to be taken as a move on yours.
• Don't make things into a p-ssing contest. I will be blunt. Nobody cares if your character has a legion of assassins at their feet. Take things into context before you start going off on people
• Overprotection of your own characters is only going to end in arguments and unnecessary ooc drama. If you're gonna RP, you gotta learn to let go of your OC a lil to let things happen to them in threads.

*coughs* I'm uh.... a lil sore and salty over some drama one of my friends just had to deal with

How do we bump threads?

Thank you for this post! I've been on FR for awhile now, but I am just now considering joining some Roleplay topics, and this really helped me understand the ins and outs of what to be doing : )

Thanks a bunch!

@LostEventide @Autopilot @Snowcat @LuseyMoth

What does NPC stand for?

@maleficent08 "Non Player Character" So basically a static character that doesn't usually belong to anybody and usually anyone can interact with them- they aren't directly being controlled or 'played' by one person. For example. Baldwin would be an 'NPC'. In games they are associated with quest givers and things you attack and kill, etc.

@Autopilot
Thanks!

very helpful, now just to have an original idea for a character and be able to stay in character .-.

Thank you for this :o I wanna get into RP but I never have before I'm so nervous hah...

I'd like to make a bit of an addition! Just a few random things I've collected over the years.

Break up your paragraphs.
When in rp, I tend to usually create 2-3 paragraphs. Sometimes, I'll write six. At the point that your paragraph is getting to be more than ten or so lines long, I like to bump to a new paragraph. It makes it much easier to read. I love to see a wall o' text as a reply to rps (the more guts to the post, the better!) though when it's several dozen lines, it can be difficult to read. A break or two helps that, and doesn't really interrupt the flow that much.

Get wordy!
Don't just use a dry, cut and paste sentence. Use big words, use a thesaurus. Give your words fire, make them powerful. Like instead of this:
"Why don't you scurry on off and leave me to this?" she said, growling.
Try this:
She'd turn harshly, eyes locking with theirs with a burning stare, "Why don't you scurry on off," She'd spit in a low tone as her shoulders raised and looked more menacing by the moment, "and leave me to this?" her eyes would rip away as she turned harshly and stormed off with a seething cloud of rage following her.

It's not a bad idea of tell other players of your character's weaknesses!
Mention it OOC (or in parentheses, that's what I do) that they do, or when you initially introduce your character if you use an info paragraph (which is common). I'll make an example; I have a military girl Sapphirus that's double amputee of both legs. However she constantly wears her armor. She also has trouble to remember things, and can be set off into a 'berserk' mode sometimes. While the other characters have no idea, the other rpers do. By doing this, it gives them ability to set up situations. As such with Sapphirus, maybe we (rpers) set up a scene that it was our intention to set her off, unbeknownst to the characters.

Give your characters a run for their life.
I can't say it enough- throw your characters under a bus. Break them. Put them through the Pits of Kaon and drag them across the desert over cacti. Have them nearly shake the hand of Death before violently ripping them back to reality. You'll get the best development from that. Plus, it's a blast to write. Have them hit and get hit. Have them get into a catastrophe over some small slip up. Have the most unexpected happen (when it makes sense)! Just have fun with it. I love all my characters, and I've put them through liquid fire, because it gives them character.

Got an idea? Tell it!
If you come up with something that might be fun to do, don't hesitate to put it in parentheses and talk about it. The others may love it, and that'll be set as the next thing that happens. Plot may be good to develop itself, but it can also be fun to make a part yourself!

Gotta have weaknesses.
Your character might have a wide range of abilities but don't make every single one able and perfect. Sapphirus, for example, CAN draw a weld with her plasma gun but it's FAR from decent. It might get the job done for the most part, but stressed too much or too long and it won't hold. If they can fly, maybe they can't fly in when it's raining or against strong wind. If your character can swim, they probably can't go to the abyss of the oceans without gear, unless they're an anglerfish (and if they're an anglerfish, they probably can't go to the surface very quickly). Give them weaknesses from ones that are minor, to ones that will completely destroy them in one hit.

Experiment with characters.
Don't be afraid to play with gender, race, ethnicity, values, and species (just don't make it ridiculous beyond comprehension). You can have a fox that is just a normal fox, or one that's outcasted because it's albino or melanistic (opposite of albino- all black). Perhaps you'll have someone that's a really handy person but any semblance of pressure will make them shake uncontrollably. Or maybe someone that can be strange but full of seemingly useless bits of information (*coughLunaLovegoodcough*). Maybe your character is morbid, like they don't care to kill for their own gains, but they're honestly unable to think to bring harm to someone close to them for a job. Maybe they're a misunderstood thief that barely survives on their pilfered materials because they keep giving it out to those that need it because they know how it's like.

There is such a thing as character theft.
This can tie in hand in hand with art theft. It's not only their looks, but their stories, their behaviors, every part of what makes them, them. Unless it's a shared character (NPC, usually), or one that you are allowed to use/given permission to, don't take a character that someone else made and roleplay with them. It's not a right thing to do. Not only are you disrespecting the person who made it, in a way you are disrespecting the character. Just don't take a character without permission.

Hit and be hit.
This is an obvious one that ties into godmod/powerplay, but I feel like this one needs noted. Your character might be dodgy, but it's unfair when their opposition can't land a single hit. Maybe your character still does it right, but then perhaps a stray root trips them up. Just don't make them impossible. Also, may your character be an enemy to the other's!

Lurking an rp isn't bad.
This is usually taken as, "Someone is READING my roleplay?! Awesome!" A person outside reading a roleplay could be imagined like someone reading a book. They like the story, and follow it intently. If you're a watcher, you might get an idea to draw for the rp. Usually, given proper credits/permissions, people in a thread will be thrilled to see someone so into it that they drew something from their roleplay. Don't do the character theft thing. Some people don't mind you drawing their characters, just ask if you're not totally positive. Perhaps post in the thread, "I got an idea to draw from here, you guys mind?"

There's usually a turn order.
This applies to rps with three or more rpers in it. Think of it like turn-based RPG games. Player one goes, then two, then three, and so on. This establishment may come on it's own. This isn't a bad thing; in fact I prefer a turn order that installs itself because it regulates the characters, and keeps things nice and tidy. Usually, your player three character can do something that happened in the player one post. If you're working with lots of people, try and take it a little slower so people can get a chance to do something for a current situation. Also it's not a bad idea to ping the others.

Be nice to new people to the rp.
Okay, here's another one worth mentioning. If it's an open rp, welcome someone new. Give them a rundown of the rp, and what's happening now. If you're the newly joined, read back at least three pages (or more) to get a good grasp on the other's style and where they're at. As well, join in when it makes sense. If there's a war going on, maybe the team gets a message that HQ is dispatching help instead of a rogue showing up from the same HQ the party is from. You might have to wait a little bit, but don't burst in. If everyone's writing two or three paragraphs, try to match that.

Don't be that guy.
Here's one that I've had trouble with. I've been on a few places, and roleplayed there. I am very open to new people, and have headed many a massive rp with more than ten people, as well as run several individual roleplays. One user though came in, and started to godmod. After several warnings from everyone, they still didn't stop. So we booted them, and rolled back to before they came in. They continued though and kept posting (flaming and going to personal insults i won't repeat) to the thread- there was nothing users could do to stop a player posting in their threads. Later this user caused the shutdown of the entire roleplay forum because he'd done this to several threads. Don't be that guy that causes the Apocalypse.