Jennivier
24-10-2003, 02:25
-As I promised in my first guide there would be a 2.0, it just took a while for me to decide to make it....
Table Of Contents:
A. RP - The Introduction
1. What is RP?
2. So how do I do it?
3. So what's it all mean?
B. RP - IC vs. OOC
1. IC vs. OOC
2. Difficult things to remember
C. Good RP
1. The goal of RP
2. Godmodding
3. Etiquette
4. What do you mean by 'ICly' enter the room?
5. Twinking
6. Consensual RP
7. Ending
A. RP - The Introduction
1. What is RP?
RP, short for 'Role Playing,' is basically the telling of a story; where your character is a character in the story, or your nation in this case. So like a character in any (well written) book, your character has limitations. Likewise a nation that is 2 NS years old and has 10 million in their population can’t declare war, nonetheless nuclear war. RPs, while fantasy, should be as close to real as possible.
2. So how do I do it?
It’s easy really. Find a post, either the “NationStates” or “International Incidents” forums, and join in. Of course you want to be sure you know what is going on, you obviously can’t step into a war saying “So and so entered the ballroom,” now could you?
3. So what's it all mean?
Well, like in the first part RPing is essentially the telling of a story or acting of an event. There is, however, a special language you may come across in OOC conversation: Lol(laugh out loud), OOC(out of conversation), IC(in conversation), BTW(by the way), of course this isn’t everything, people have a tendency to create phrases that you’ll just have to learn with time.
B. RP - IC vs. OOC
1. IC vs. OOC
As stated earlier IC is in conversation while OOC is out of conversation. Events like “so and so entered the ballroom” and “the sky was a marvelous shade of…” are OOC, while in contrast any “chatting” is also OOC. IC is basically the RP itself, the acting of dialogue, the unfolding of events, and so on.
2. Difficult things to remember
You don't know everybody's name. It's darn tempting... every time somebody does something, you more than likely see their name in their pose, for example:
'Strider glances up as the door opens. "Who are you?"'
'Strider's eyebrows contract. "WHAT?!"'
'Strider this.' 'Strider that.' But unless somebody has ICly told you who Strider is... you don't know. Which brings up the next one: ICly telling people things. Just because you, the PLAYER know something doesn't mean that George, the CHARACTER knows it. Even if you see:
Strider glances up as the door opens. "Who are you?"
Strider pages: "Strider Strider Strider, yes my name is Strider, hahaha, and Shadow is about to come and kill us!" to you.
You still can't react like:
a) George knows Strider's name. (You've seen Strider's name, and Strider's told you his name OOCly... but George still doesn't know it.)
b) You know that Shadow is coming. George doesn't know this. Strider told you in a page, and pages are OOC... so your character didn't hear anything. Here's what you (the player) saw:
Strider glances up as the door opens. "Who are you?"
Strider pages: Strider Strider Strider, yes my name is Strider, hahaha, and Shadow is about to come and kill us!
And here's generally what your character saw:
A man sitting in the room glances up as the door opens. "Who are you?"
Another thing that you don't know: where people are. When you enter a room, don't assume that you see somebody. Request (or let people do) 'position' poses, like:
Strider is sitting on a stool, talking to Bill.
Then you can determine whether or not your character sees them from where they are coming in the room, and pose accordingly.
C. Good RP
1. The goal of RP
To have fun. No, this isn't some old cliché that I dug out for this occasion. If you want a super powerful character, or this case nation, run off to a MUD or something. People who RP are in it for fun, and there's one good way of ruining it: godmodding.
2.Godmodding
Godmodding is really all in the name. You can pretty much sense it on impulse when a nation of 10 million enters the forum and declares nuclear warfare. Remember what I said earlier, sure you do, RP is to be realistic! Do you honestly believe a NEW nation of 10 million and “strong” economy has enough money for nuclear arms or 2 million soldiers? Just keep those variables in mind, godmodding can and will kill a RP.
3.Etiquette
Etiquette is very, very important in role playing. Perhaps more so than in RL (Real Life). Because in RL, you can chew with your mouth open and although some people might get irritated, it won't totally spoil their dinner.
If you crash an RP by doing something 'twinky' (inconsiderate, unfair, etc.) then you ruin the RP for others. Good etiquette-type things to do include:
a) Wait for others to pose. Take turns. If there are four people (including you) in the room RPing together, wait until three people have posed, then you pose. Otherwise, you just pile up a whole bunch of poses for the one patient person in the room to respond to.
b) Don't make fun! Not everyone's as perfect as you at the English language, so if somebody misspells something in a pose, it's considered impolite to correct it unless they ask. People hate it. They really, really, really hate it. Believe me.
c) Fix mistakes. If you accidentally hit the enter key before a pose is done, or type in the wrong word in a pose, making the sentence look odd, be honest and say so OOCly. Most people are patient enough to wait for you to repose, and if they aren't, just post the corrections in an OOC pose (room-page-pose).
d) Censor things, you $%^*ing s*n of a (censored)!!! If you're role playing with people who aren't so sensitive, and they don't mind, go right ahead and cuss up a storm. But under most circumstances, you'll want to censor out some of those words, or (if the other players are in-between in sensitiveness) only bleep out some letters, so they can tell what you were going to say without actually reading it. Or just think up a substitute... like 'you fricking son of a snitch.' It may seem silly, but it's still better on the eyes of some readers than a full blown cussing out. Note that people tend not to be really prissy about swearing, but many of the people who RP here are young and could be offended or caught off guard by foul language.
e) Finally, ask before you butt into an ongoing RP session. If you enter a room where others are RPing... ask if it's a private RP before you 'ICly' enter the room. You don't pose walking through empty rooms, and if you run into two people in a private RP then you don't pose walking through. Why? If George were there (ICly), he would have interrupted the RP. So George (the character) was never there, and it was just you (the player) looking around the MUCK for RP... not George wandering through h*ll and creation until he finds someone.
If you want to RP and you're not sure who's free, type 'find', and this will give you a list of characters and their locations in Arcania. It's perfectly permissible to page someone to ask if they're free to RP with you. If two or more appear to be in the same location and you'd like to join in, it's polite to page them to ask first.
Please don't be put off if people say they're not free, or the RP is private. It doesn't mean they are unfriendly or they don't like you. It means that they are either busy in another window, or that they are already RPing, and it's not convenient for another character to join, or possibly that they just don't feel like RP at the moment. Sooner or later, there'll be someone who wants to RP with you.
4.What do you mean by 'ICly' enter the room?
We skip things. There is no greater law telling us how, why and when to RP: so if something happens to be inconvenient, we skip it. So if Zirana is in the Enchanted Forest and George is in the Village of Nowhere -- and they're the only two people online -- then we can be-e-end things a bit so Zirana just sort of happens to be in the Village of Nowhere that day. That's the sort of thing you can arrange through pages. But if I happen to be moving Zirana from Forest to Village and I run into somebody, then... I don't worry about it. ICly, I'm not there. Zirana (ICly) had already gone to the village, so my 'walking' through other rooms to get there is a mere formality. This is a 'corner cutting' way of doing things, so use other players as a guide. If you don't know, ask. But better to have Zirana 'happen' to go to the Village of Nowhere that day than to have her ICly wandering around in the forest while you are bored to tears.
Likewise, don't assume that when someone else enters a room, you can see them right away, or they are there ICly. Don't pose something like:
George looks up and sees Strider coming and greets him with a cheerful, "Hello."
Strider may be just walking through, as mentioned above, or he may be wearing an Invisibility cloak, or be in disguise...any number of reasons why you may not see him. Wait for Strider to pose an entrance.
5.'Twinking'
See part 1 of this section for the goal of RP. Here's how you ruin that for others: Twink. Then other people will avoid you, and you'll be all alone, and then you aren't having any fun. And nobody will pity you, or wonder why. So what is being a 'Twink?' Typically, it means one of two things. Either playing unrealistically, or assuming things about other people.
Playing unrealistically is easy to avoid: be realistic. Your character can't hear a pin drop at 20 metres, can't run faster than everyone else, can't fly without wings. (Unless of course, their Magic Talent gives them that ability)
Don't assume. This is when you, the player, decide that things should ultimately go your way and therefore pose accordingly (Im sure we've all done this once or twice, it's quite easy to get carried away in the excitement, especially during a fight.) For example:
Strider growls at George. "Now you're gonna get it!" He throws a punch.
George dodges the punch, then grabs hold of Strider's arm and swings him around, flinging him into the nearest wall.
Now, Strider posed just throwing a punch. That is quite correct. You never pose the results of something unless you previously have a player's OOC permission to do so. George, on the other hand, was clearly Twinking. He not only assumed that he could actually get a hold of Strider's arm, but that he was strong enough to swing Strider around and throw him into a wall. Strider was given no opportunity to decide whether his character got grabbed and swung, or whether he retaliated in some other way. While sometimes the strength issue may be true, it's best to let the person you are fighting decide wether or not they are grabbed/punched/hurt in any fashion. Just as George was able to dodge the punch, Strider should be able to dodge being grabbed unless he doesn't want to. Here is the RP again, with George posing in the correct way:
Strider growls at George. "Now you're gonna get it!" He throws a punch.
George dodges the punch, then grabs at Strider's arm with the intention of swinging him around and flinging him into the nearest wall.
Strider now has a choice. He can either pose something like:
Strider is taken by surprise and finds himself being swung into the wall. He slumps to the ground, the breath knocked out of him for a few moments.
Or...he could pose this way:
Strider finds his arm grabbed, but before George can swing him around, Strider brings up his booted foot to kick hard at George's midriff.
Now....George has a choice...he can pose the boot connecting with his midriff, or he can pose moving to the side so that Strider misses, and then trying another tactic. And so on.
But what if neither side lets the other do anything to them? This would be pretty dull, as I think you'd agree, and also highly improbable. So there has to be compromise. You let him get in a few hits, and he does the same. But make it realistic, if you find yourself in such a position that it's impossible to dodge or escape, then you have to allow the hit. The eventual outcome will be decided OOCly between you...who will win and who will lose.
Which brings us to the next section: Consensual RP.
6. Consensual RP
This is, simply, RP that everyone involved agrees to. It doesn't mean everything's planned (which would be dull), but it does mean that there are certain things that you should ask about before doing. Unless a character does something extremely stupid like walking up to a very large Troll and punching him in the nose, the following all require the permission of the character affected:
• Getting into a hand-to-hand fight, since this risks injury. (If you do get into a fight, you accept the risk that you may be injured in minor ways.)
• Time consuming injuries (if your character's stuck in the hospital, RP won't be much fun... so don't put another character in a body cast).
• Permanent Injury (like an amputation, or a permanent limp.)
• Death (Duh).
• Also, in this context, getting an IC personal item stolen is (currently) voluntary.
• So is getting kidnapped by Villains, etc.
If you have a conflict of interests between characters, then sort it out. If you can't, ask the Genremaster (Zirana), though typically there should be no such problems.
7. Ending
Now before you all bash me for making this guide character based keep in mind that if you were to put nation in place of character it would sound really stupid. I had to make it character based, I couldn’t think of a good RP guide that was nation based. I’m sure that by now you can distinguish where you need to change from person to nation. If you still have questions there are many other good guides out there, and as always I’m open to your questions. Good luck and have fun RPing!
Table Of Contents:
A. RP - The Introduction
1. What is RP?
2. So how do I do it?
3. So what's it all mean?
B. RP - IC vs. OOC
1. IC vs. OOC
2. Difficult things to remember
C. Good RP
1. The goal of RP
2. Godmodding
3. Etiquette
4. What do you mean by 'ICly' enter the room?
5. Twinking
6. Consensual RP
7. Ending
A. RP - The Introduction
1. What is RP?
RP, short for 'Role Playing,' is basically the telling of a story; where your character is a character in the story, or your nation in this case. So like a character in any (well written) book, your character has limitations. Likewise a nation that is 2 NS years old and has 10 million in their population can’t declare war, nonetheless nuclear war. RPs, while fantasy, should be as close to real as possible.
2. So how do I do it?
It’s easy really. Find a post, either the “NationStates” or “International Incidents” forums, and join in. Of course you want to be sure you know what is going on, you obviously can’t step into a war saying “So and so entered the ballroom,” now could you?
3. So what's it all mean?
Well, like in the first part RPing is essentially the telling of a story or acting of an event. There is, however, a special language you may come across in OOC conversation: Lol(laugh out loud), OOC(out of conversation), IC(in conversation), BTW(by the way), of course this isn’t everything, people have a tendency to create phrases that you’ll just have to learn with time.
B. RP - IC vs. OOC
1. IC vs. OOC
As stated earlier IC is in conversation while OOC is out of conversation. Events like “so and so entered the ballroom” and “the sky was a marvelous shade of…” are OOC, while in contrast any “chatting” is also OOC. IC is basically the RP itself, the acting of dialogue, the unfolding of events, and so on.
2. Difficult things to remember
You don't know everybody's name. It's darn tempting... every time somebody does something, you more than likely see their name in their pose, for example:
'Strider glances up as the door opens. "Who are you?"'
'Strider's eyebrows contract. "WHAT?!"'
'Strider this.' 'Strider that.' But unless somebody has ICly told you who Strider is... you don't know. Which brings up the next one: ICly telling people things. Just because you, the PLAYER know something doesn't mean that George, the CHARACTER knows it. Even if you see:
Strider glances up as the door opens. "Who are you?"
Strider pages: "Strider Strider Strider, yes my name is Strider, hahaha, and Shadow is about to come and kill us!" to you.
You still can't react like:
a) George knows Strider's name. (You've seen Strider's name, and Strider's told you his name OOCly... but George still doesn't know it.)
b) You know that Shadow is coming. George doesn't know this. Strider told you in a page, and pages are OOC... so your character didn't hear anything. Here's what you (the player) saw:
Strider glances up as the door opens. "Who are you?"
Strider pages: Strider Strider Strider, yes my name is Strider, hahaha, and Shadow is about to come and kill us!
And here's generally what your character saw:
A man sitting in the room glances up as the door opens. "Who are you?"
Another thing that you don't know: where people are. When you enter a room, don't assume that you see somebody. Request (or let people do) 'position' poses, like:
Strider is sitting on a stool, talking to Bill.
Then you can determine whether or not your character sees them from where they are coming in the room, and pose accordingly.
C. Good RP
1. The goal of RP
To have fun. No, this isn't some old cliché that I dug out for this occasion. If you want a super powerful character, or this case nation, run off to a MUD or something. People who RP are in it for fun, and there's one good way of ruining it: godmodding.
2.Godmodding
Godmodding is really all in the name. You can pretty much sense it on impulse when a nation of 10 million enters the forum and declares nuclear warfare. Remember what I said earlier, sure you do, RP is to be realistic! Do you honestly believe a NEW nation of 10 million and “strong” economy has enough money for nuclear arms or 2 million soldiers? Just keep those variables in mind, godmodding can and will kill a RP.
3.Etiquette
Etiquette is very, very important in role playing. Perhaps more so than in RL (Real Life). Because in RL, you can chew with your mouth open and although some people might get irritated, it won't totally spoil their dinner.
If you crash an RP by doing something 'twinky' (inconsiderate, unfair, etc.) then you ruin the RP for others. Good etiquette-type things to do include:
a) Wait for others to pose. Take turns. If there are four people (including you) in the room RPing together, wait until three people have posed, then you pose. Otherwise, you just pile up a whole bunch of poses for the one patient person in the room to respond to.
b) Don't make fun! Not everyone's as perfect as you at the English language, so if somebody misspells something in a pose, it's considered impolite to correct it unless they ask. People hate it. They really, really, really hate it. Believe me.
c) Fix mistakes. If you accidentally hit the enter key before a pose is done, or type in the wrong word in a pose, making the sentence look odd, be honest and say so OOCly. Most people are patient enough to wait for you to repose, and if they aren't, just post the corrections in an OOC pose (room-page-pose).
d) Censor things, you $%^*ing s*n of a (censored)!!! If you're role playing with people who aren't so sensitive, and they don't mind, go right ahead and cuss up a storm. But under most circumstances, you'll want to censor out some of those words, or (if the other players are in-between in sensitiveness) only bleep out some letters, so they can tell what you were going to say without actually reading it. Or just think up a substitute... like 'you fricking son of a snitch.' It may seem silly, but it's still better on the eyes of some readers than a full blown cussing out. Note that people tend not to be really prissy about swearing, but many of the people who RP here are young and could be offended or caught off guard by foul language.
e) Finally, ask before you butt into an ongoing RP session. If you enter a room where others are RPing... ask if it's a private RP before you 'ICly' enter the room. You don't pose walking through empty rooms, and if you run into two people in a private RP then you don't pose walking through. Why? If George were there (ICly), he would have interrupted the RP. So George (the character) was never there, and it was just you (the player) looking around the MUCK for RP... not George wandering through h*ll and creation until he finds someone.
If you want to RP and you're not sure who's free, type 'find', and this will give you a list of characters and their locations in Arcania. It's perfectly permissible to page someone to ask if they're free to RP with you. If two or more appear to be in the same location and you'd like to join in, it's polite to page them to ask first.
Please don't be put off if people say they're not free, or the RP is private. It doesn't mean they are unfriendly or they don't like you. It means that they are either busy in another window, or that they are already RPing, and it's not convenient for another character to join, or possibly that they just don't feel like RP at the moment. Sooner or later, there'll be someone who wants to RP with you.
4.What do you mean by 'ICly' enter the room?
We skip things. There is no greater law telling us how, why and when to RP: so if something happens to be inconvenient, we skip it. So if Zirana is in the Enchanted Forest and George is in the Village of Nowhere -- and they're the only two people online -- then we can be-e-end things a bit so Zirana just sort of happens to be in the Village of Nowhere that day. That's the sort of thing you can arrange through pages. But if I happen to be moving Zirana from Forest to Village and I run into somebody, then... I don't worry about it. ICly, I'm not there. Zirana (ICly) had already gone to the village, so my 'walking' through other rooms to get there is a mere formality. This is a 'corner cutting' way of doing things, so use other players as a guide. If you don't know, ask. But better to have Zirana 'happen' to go to the Village of Nowhere that day than to have her ICly wandering around in the forest while you are bored to tears.
Likewise, don't assume that when someone else enters a room, you can see them right away, or they are there ICly. Don't pose something like:
George looks up and sees Strider coming and greets him with a cheerful, "Hello."
Strider may be just walking through, as mentioned above, or he may be wearing an Invisibility cloak, or be in disguise...any number of reasons why you may not see him. Wait for Strider to pose an entrance.
5.'Twinking'
See part 1 of this section for the goal of RP. Here's how you ruin that for others: Twink. Then other people will avoid you, and you'll be all alone, and then you aren't having any fun. And nobody will pity you, or wonder why. So what is being a 'Twink?' Typically, it means one of two things. Either playing unrealistically, or assuming things about other people.
Playing unrealistically is easy to avoid: be realistic. Your character can't hear a pin drop at 20 metres, can't run faster than everyone else, can't fly without wings. (Unless of course, their Magic Talent gives them that ability)
Don't assume. This is when you, the player, decide that things should ultimately go your way and therefore pose accordingly (Im sure we've all done this once or twice, it's quite easy to get carried away in the excitement, especially during a fight.) For example:
Strider growls at George. "Now you're gonna get it!" He throws a punch.
George dodges the punch, then grabs hold of Strider's arm and swings him around, flinging him into the nearest wall.
Now, Strider posed just throwing a punch. That is quite correct. You never pose the results of something unless you previously have a player's OOC permission to do so. George, on the other hand, was clearly Twinking. He not only assumed that he could actually get a hold of Strider's arm, but that he was strong enough to swing Strider around and throw him into a wall. Strider was given no opportunity to decide whether his character got grabbed and swung, or whether he retaliated in some other way. While sometimes the strength issue may be true, it's best to let the person you are fighting decide wether or not they are grabbed/punched/hurt in any fashion. Just as George was able to dodge the punch, Strider should be able to dodge being grabbed unless he doesn't want to. Here is the RP again, with George posing in the correct way:
Strider growls at George. "Now you're gonna get it!" He throws a punch.
George dodges the punch, then grabs at Strider's arm with the intention of swinging him around and flinging him into the nearest wall.
Strider now has a choice. He can either pose something like:
Strider is taken by surprise and finds himself being swung into the wall. He slumps to the ground, the breath knocked out of him for a few moments.
Or...he could pose this way:
Strider finds his arm grabbed, but before George can swing him around, Strider brings up his booted foot to kick hard at George's midriff.
Now....George has a choice...he can pose the boot connecting with his midriff, or he can pose moving to the side so that Strider misses, and then trying another tactic. And so on.
But what if neither side lets the other do anything to them? This would be pretty dull, as I think you'd agree, and also highly improbable. So there has to be compromise. You let him get in a few hits, and he does the same. But make it realistic, if you find yourself in such a position that it's impossible to dodge or escape, then you have to allow the hit. The eventual outcome will be decided OOCly between you...who will win and who will lose.
Which brings us to the next section: Consensual RP.
6. Consensual RP
This is, simply, RP that everyone involved agrees to. It doesn't mean everything's planned (which would be dull), but it does mean that there are certain things that you should ask about before doing. Unless a character does something extremely stupid like walking up to a very large Troll and punching him in the nose, the following all require the permission of the character affected:
• Getting into a hand-to-hand fight, since this risks injury. (If you do get into a fight, you accept the risk that you may be injured in minor ways.)
• Time consuming injuries (if your character's stuck in the hospital, RP won't be much fun... so don't put another character in a body cast).
• Permanent Injury (like an amputation, or a permanent limp.)
• Death (Duh).
• Also, in this context, getting an IC personal item stolen is (currently) voluntary.
• So is getting kidnapped by Villains, etc.
If you have a conflict of interests between characters, then sort it out. If you can't, ask the Genremaster (Zirana), though typically there should be no such problems.
7. Ending
Now before you all bash me for making this guide character based keep in mind that if you were to put nation in place of character it would sound really stupid. I had to make it character based, I couldn’t think of a good RP guide that was nation based. I’m sure that by now you can distinguish where you need to change from person to nation. If you still have questions there are many other good guides out there, and as always I’m open to your questions. Good luck and have fun RPing!