Opening Posts as a Deciding Factor

[Ellri]

Yes. Both long and short work. But not too far in either direction.

When we browse for additional RPs, we look about like this:
First step is an intriguing title. Hard to define what goes there, but too little or too much there is a putoff. Same goes if the title is misspelled.
Second step is first impression. If there's hardly any text, everything vague in the intro post (no matter if it is OoC or IntCk), or if the whole thing is a text wall with no spacing, then that tends to get us to go elsewhere.
Third step would be initial reading. If the intro is poorly spelled, confusing or seems to lack in spirit, then that chases away. For short ones, the whole post falls here. For longer ones, it might be that just a few paragraphs are needed to do so.
If the above three do not scare away, it will typically go into one of these two fourth phases:
If long, complete read-through to see if it is worth joining. If short, question phase. In that, we would ask questions to determine if the GM appears to have sufficient plans for RP to be likely to be viable. On longer ones, that phase might come after the fourth phase to clarify anything unclear in the full post.

A pass on all those four (or five) steps will generally mean that we try to join an RP. We have a feeling that many others use similar methods when they pick RPs. GMs might (from our guess) use similar ones to make RP attractive to players, turned about somewhat to fit for creator rather than player.

[Clirkus]

For interest checks I like to see samples of stuff the RP will be about, not all the backround info at once, that turns me off because usually when I'm browsing interest checks I like to read a brief summary about something that may or may not interest me, not a novel. I like the more detailed information to stick to the OOCs which come about because people liked the interest check, and so the people who are most likely to join it will consider all the backround information more important than if it was in an interest check.

[Brovo]

It depends.

Kad's basically got it. Get my attention in the first couple of paragraphs.

Then don't do things that'll drive me away. Like drowning me in pointless dribble that has nothing to do with the plot, or my potential characters, or even anything that'll happen during the course of the RP. Surprise is a good thing. Don't have to spoil everything right off the bat in a mountain of paragraphs, 90% of which don't relate to the current task at hand and/or character creation. Leave plot twists unmentioned. That's their point and purpose, but it's a common flaw in advanced OOC's. Especially lengthy ones. Is lore-dropping way, way too much information that equates to filler.

Also, the GM doesn't have to go completely nuts on designing his/her own culture.

Players can design the cultures of their own characters just fine.

[Foster]

Yes, it is a deciding factor, as I just 1 hour ago managed to derail my own topic on the first post.

[Dervish]

Typically, my interest checks follow a formula that apparently hits a lot of right chords with people ((The interest check. This RP is still on-going, to boot.)), where I'll write out a back story to start things off, be it describing what's happened to your to-be character to lead up to the point you're at, a character's speech, or even a brief scene to kind of set the mood, atmosphere, and open a lot of room for questions. This can be several paragraphs, but nothing too crazy.

Next, I'll kind of do an OOC overview explaining what the setting is, relevant background information, what characters will typically be doing, things to note, and the general plot without going into specifics or anything I plan on revealing as the game goes on. I'll also explain what writing standards I expect and general posting requirements, and potentially restrictions to the game. Basically, anything I think somebody needs to know to satisfy curiosity, and enough to tell people if it's going to be for them or not.

When it comes to OOC posts, it'll have everything the Interest Check had, including the in-character hook, the GM overview, game overview explaining game setting stuff that isn't covered in the overview, and then I'll go into general game rules, and then more specific rules and restrictions that are specific to the setting and lore, a character sheet followed by an accepted character list with links to the accepted sheets. Basically, the more information there is, the better. If people are turned off from the long post, they probably wouldn't be happy in the game and would probably drop out. If somebody can't be bothered to read an OOC, then they probably wouldn't stay invested in the game for the long term. The OOC's first post is supposed to be a useful reference, or at least I like to use it as such.

So, I'd like to think I'm doing something right. I've had really good luck with players, and people seem like they're pretty engaged.

What turns me off of an interest check or an OOC first post is if the GM doesn't seem like they put any thought into it. If it more or less amounts to two paragraphs or less of 'Okay, so I want to do this. You guys will be these people. What do you guys think?' The RP is almost guaranteed NOT to take off. This pretty much tells me the GM isn't going to be reliable or interested enough to use more than a basic theme to try and attract people to the game. Another thing that I'm wary of is if a movie or video game came out and the inevitable flood of RPs related to it within the first month or so, because usually those don't involve much planning or direction and are pretty much thrown together on the high that came from seeing or playing something you loved. Another thing that will make me steer clear is if I see the GM repeatedly bumping something without anybody else posting. Usually that's a sign of impatience, and if you have to bump a thread every two hours to keep it visible, you're just hurting yourself because if you have more posts saying bump than people expressing interest, you're about to screw yourself over.

A good rule of thumb, I find, is following the who, what, where, when, and why guidelines before you post and see if you can think of any questions people might ask, and see if you have the answer covered. Basically, if you think you're adequately explaining what your game is and providing a hook to get people's attention, you should be okay.

[Kagamine]

Long or short, a good OOC needs an attention-catcher. As a GM I've learned this from experience. As a player and a GM, though, I've learned that large amounts of text in the OOC aren't really a problem as long as it's organized correctly. For example, take this RP, which I find to be a great example (yes it's invite only, but it could easily function otherwise, so let's treat it like an open RP for the sake of the example). At first glance, you don't get a wall of overwhelming text, so that's good. Also, a nice little paragraph introducing you to the concept and piquing your interest. Good.

Now, here's the catch. If you tried to open up every hider, then sit back and look at the absolutely massive wall of text in front of you, well... that would be enough to scare anyone off if they saw that right away. It's massive! But, that's not a problem here, because normally you wouldn't open all the hiders. This serves two purposes; 1) a long wall of text is long and intimidating, while text chunked up into different hiders makes it look much smaller and therefore less intimidating and B) a long wall of text implies that you're supposed to read it all, which when coupled with the first factor can seem like a rather daunting task. Information divided into hiders, however, makes the OOC feel more like a reference guide where you can just open up to what you need to find. It's still the same amount of information, but leaving it well-organized into hiders that shove the text away make the huge amount of info less intimidating as well as easier to read.

This and this are also good examples of this sort of thing. Again, they both have tons of info, both not in the form of a wall of text.

[Marrone]

As someone who's looked at almost a hundred introduction posts (I went back and read other RP introductions in advanced for inspiration and still keep a list of the ones I like) all the way back to 2007, I can safely say that it's how you present it that's important, not the brevity or verbosity of the introduction. Sometimes having a flowery, long introduction (especially for me, in different fonts) completely makes me skip over it without hesitating to skim and check out the more brief aspects of the piece. If those look good, or more specifically, the engine of the RolePlay looks well tuned and engaging, I'll go up and read the introduction and try to see judging off the systematics if I could effectively apply myself to the RP.

I don't want to machete my way through a jungling festoon of figurative language only to come to a faulty engine.

Sometimes it's difficult to understand the message through too many flowery references, or badly played ones (which are there to make it look 'engaging') so the most important thing ought to be the substance. It's what occurs that matters and the better you can communicate the general situation to the purveyor of your game whether through a lengthy essay or a timeline, the more likely someone will join regardless of their preference for brief or verbose.

Some people, no matter how terrible the introduction might be, might love the idea so much that they'll invest themselves into it in hopes of improving the situation. That's the power of the idea in itself, so if you're looking to maximize players, that's the way to do it!

[Hellis]

I'm a fan of elaborate OOC. For fantasy, I usually throw up clear ground rules, a little flavor in shape of creation myth and pantheons, races and what not .But I am also a massive fan of world building, so I usually invite my players to have their own takes on things. This as so far attracted some FANTASTIC players, most if not all of them far better players then me. I gave them a fairly clear undertanding of what I, as a GM wanted from my RP. They took it and ran with it in both instances. I really like that. Players should be able to mold their own character and fit them into the world, even if the gm has to kill some of his darlings for it. That said. I feel every game benefits from clear Guide Lines, such my Broken Circl one. I was adamant that they did not treat magic as a superpower like "lol I throw fire.". What I got was fantastic writing from all parties involved, withe some vivid imagination and basis in "real" practices. It's fantastic.

Also Brovo very much pointed out alot of things that I agree with. You do not have design every aspect of something. PWorld creation should be all inclusive. my Silver Leaves is only alive becouse the people in it came up with so much cool stuff on their own. All I did there was "These are the major Nations, Gods, Continents." Now I got all manners of savages, rogues, and crazy but fitting cultural schisms ppopping up.
In short: GM's have to trust their players. A lenghthy elaborate OOC post is fine but do not get it to convoluted, stay on course, dont give everything away.