I forgot to add: WHEN YOU MAKE AN RP AND IT JUST DOESN'T CLICK.

LOOK AT THIS SHIT.

I put waaaaaaaaaay too much effort into that. To be fair, it was a reboot of a rp I had PARTIALLY done (the forum died before I could finish, oh and then the roleplayerguild died when I had players the next time I tried it). I secretly suspect Fallout isn't a popular setting, also almost anything sci fi. Maybe it was the plotline that forced everyone together inadvertently and seemed linear. Could rewrite it as its own universe separate thing...

Brovo said
They'll die eventually, one by one. Whenever I see a 'dark' or 'gritty' story, that involves extremely fallible characters, with limited resources and experience, in a situation far above and beyond their capacity to resolve alone... And somehow... Not a single one dies. Not one. It could be six nonathletic, unremarkable, ordinary people, in the zombie apocalypse, surrounded by thousands of zombies, but no matter how insane the odds, they somehow, always, survive.This murders my immersion faster than a hamster in a meat grinder. It completely kills any suspense or concern I'd have for my characters in that situation. If Jimmy Junior is dumb enough to go melee a few zombies alone with nothing but his trusty baseball bat Stevie, then Jimmy Junior should just straight die. The GM should just kill Jimmy Junior if the player doesn't do it themselves. Otherwise, danger is meaningless, and the plot, no matter how violence and excessive, becomes boring and flaccid as a result.I'm not advocating that every story needs to contain gratuitous amounts of death and carnage... But any story that contains survival elements should at least have people, you know, survive from time to time.

I agree with this, but I also want to mention that on the flipside, in my personal opinion I'm done with stories/rps with gratutious levels of death and carnage. When it's done to an excess, it actually becomes meaningless and trite, and extremely difficult to care for any characters when the possible likelihood is that they'll just die. Shows like The Walking Dead and Game of Thrones are actually the worst offenders of this for me. Death isn't shocking. All they seek to do is try and make said death as shocking and gorey and over the top as they can, and again it doesn't elicit any reaction from me other then an eyeroll. Whilst I wouldn't like to see an rp where all the characters survive, considering what the stakes involved entail, I would actually rather have that then ridiculous pointless and over the top murderthons.

Prince said
@Kestrel: My complaint was solely about the people ehom either don't or attempt to minimally format a character to a setting. Actually putting a character through a valid redesign isn't bad at all. Having character concepts and archetypes to choose and design from is fine. The complaint here was the people with massive lists of premade characters that simply look for insertion. That complaint here isn't applicable all the time, but I can name a few places where it is. X-Men AU, Naruro AU, varying Fantasy levels and anything dystopian. Those settings are often alternate or specifically designed to highlight a central theme or difference. Coming in with a stock character that has no relation to that and wasn't formatted to the world often causes conflict and less than optimal interaction. Reusing a character an recycling character concepts are entirely different things. There are roleplayers that love their characters and are staunchly attached. That doesn't justify them trying to use them in every roleplay they see the slightest chance for them to be maybe relevant for a second. Rebooting an RP in and of itself is an entirely different endeavor that is hardly comparable.

Reusing a character usually only becomes an issue if their players don't let go of their previous experiences. For most games, I can simply c/p an old character sheet, change some place names here and there, and nobody would ever notice. Then again I usually don't write characters who won seventy wars single-handedly or are angel/wolf-anthro/unicorn hybrids, which I guess helps, but I can put a knight seeking redemption for failing to protect his previous lord into pretty much any fantasy RP ever. It doesn't matter whether the theme is conquest, corruption or romance. The character will change over the course of the story due to different experiences and relationships, but the initial slate easily suits multiple themes. Conquest? Prove his worth as a capable warrior to wash the stains off his record. Corruption? Enlist to a new but corrupt lord and struggle between failing yet another master or doing the right thing for the kingdom as a whole. Romance? Seek out a fair maiden to rebuild him as a man.

I don't often plainly reuse old characters without touching them, but when I do, it's really hard to notice unless people have RP'd with said character before. I don't think that's a testament to my 'roleplaying skill' but rather that reusing an old character isn't bad by definition. I think a few bad people are being taken as the norm here, whereas with most you'll never even know.

I heavily dislike Expies.

People who use characters from other universes. Like say, someone putting in Jeff the Killer or Naruto or whatever, even though it doesn't fit the setting at all.

I remember RPing in this one RP, forgot what it was called but it was a bank of favours. You go there, ask for something to be done and later on, you have to pay off your debt and do something also. Someone made Jeff the Killer and got accepted.

...

Literally, the last two posts are like flipsides to the coin I'm talking about. Kestrel comes in with cool, calm logic, explaining the moderate response to the subject at hand and how it's not a big deal while Derpestein presents a radical example of the exact type of issue I'm talking about. In short, yes, you can reformat character concepts to fit into a roleplay. You can change character sheets until a character fits in. Yes, possible, totally a thing. I don't deny it. A character sheet is nothing more than a visual organization of information regarding a character concept or set of ideas and facts regarding a character. There is no reason that characters cannot be properly reformatted into new roleplays. I never argued that point. My point was that people will make lists of character that sure, they might honestly enjoy, but also be incredibly reluctant and stubborn in how they change and format that character to fit in a setting or plot, thus causing friction. It happens. You even admitted it happens. There are far more cases where it happens than just refusal to change past experiences, such as items they won't forfeit, or a home village or plot event that simply can't be spliced into a roleplay effectively or maybe even abilities that aren't scaled well enough for the roleplay. I've seen all those problems and more come from the multitude of people who just select pre-made characters from a list and try to push them into roleplays.

In summation, yes, it can be done right. However, we were bitching about the fairly common trend of people doing it wrong.

Kestrel said
Which completely ignores the part where there's plenty of people who reinvent their characters just to be a part of your RP.

No it doesn't. I just don't really consider a reinvented character to be a 'recycled' character, and more building a character from scratch using the same thematic root. Reusing themes, as you later go on to discuss in a later post, is perfectly fine by me. However, the manifestation of those themes is going to be different from RP to RP, depending on the content of those settings.

Kestrel said Liking a character and a setting aren't mutually exclusive either, and pre-made characters can easily add to your RP because that has more to do with the character's actions than whether a previous incarnation existed before your interest check went up or not.

I'm not saying they can't necessarily add (though a badly-transposed character wouldn't); I just find the practice, as Prince has said, tends to bring a lot of inappropriate baggage with it that I'd rather avoid.

Kestrel said Hell, even if someone goes digging through RP's just to find a game where their character can fit, that doesn't automatically their only opinion on your setting is "That'll do." Especially not if they made big changes to your character. Maybe be it's more like "Your world looks so interesting, I want to add to it by inserting something I love and am proud of."

That is admittedly a nice way of looking at it. Unfortunately, that's just rarely the vibe I get when I read gleefully talking about "How they can use <insert name> for this."
When I see people doing this, I always get the impression that they're harking back to a dead RP when they had fun, which, at the 'accepting characters' stage, doesn't really fill a GM with confidence that the player's interest in the RP is 'legitimate', rather than an opportunity to briefly relive their previous experience.

Kestrel said And lastly; just like there's only so many archetypes in characters, the same goes for settings and worlds.You're probably not all that different.

Yep, that's probably true, but I don't know what you're getting at.

Apparently 6 people is waaaaay too much for a RP! What's this? Two people who have been dying for this sort of roleplay REALLY wanna join? Well, fuck them! We can't let them join! 6 is too much and 8 is a whole fucking shitton! Even if they really wanna get in, we can't risk having this RP be overcrowded with 8 people!

Honestly, what the fuck. I understand people setting limits in order not to make the RP overcrowded or anything, but holy fuck. I don't give a shit if you're gonna "notify me for future slots open", because 1. we know you're not, and 2. if we're that desperate to join, why the fuck would we wait?

Prince said However, we were bitching about the fairly common trend of people doing it wrong.

My knight example was without changing anything. It was kinda making the point that the same base can be applied to multiple RP's. ie, bring in the exact same sheet, with cut and paste location names in history at best. I'm sure it would become more difficult to c/p a sheet if I gave said knight ability to breathe fire, sure, with you there, but a lot of roleplays follow the exact same conventions. That's my point. Not pushing for sir Spitflame in a setting where there's no magic, but that the same sheet can be used for different RP's.

Jig said No it doesn't. I just don't really consider a reinvented character to be a 'recycled' character, and more building a character from scratch using the same thematic root. Reusing themes, as you later go on to discuss in a later post, is perfectly fine by me. However, the manifestation of those themes is going to be different from RP to RP, depending on the content of those settings.

It's more using the same character to explore different themes, an RP's theme can easily differ without too many adjustments to conventions. You lose sight of that at some point when you're creating, I know. I still remember one time I thought to have something totally original until someone said "So like x-men?" And internally I went like god-fucking-dammit. However, despite my best efforts to protest, Wolverine and Nightcrawler would totally be viable characters in that world.

Which coincidentally is also what I was getting at in the last quote. Settings really aren't as radically different as we like to pretend them to be.

Jig said When I see people doing this, I always get the impression that they're harking back to a dead RP when they had fun, which, at the 'accepting characters' stage, doesn't really fill a GM with confidence that the player's interest in the RP is 'legitimate', rather than an opportunity to briefly relive their previous experience.

Here's a hint; ask them how they feel instead of assuming it for them. When I have a bad impression of a CS, I ask people what they meant by it.

Look, If it obviously doesn't fit, it obviously doesn't fit, but from my own experience I've gotten a lot of characters in with minimal retouching. I have a character for three different RP's in a row and the only thing I've ever had to change about her is her power level (strangely, it's only gone up since her first incarnation). And yeah, for a large part my motivation was "I want to play this character because another RP died and I'm not done with her." But that doesn't mean I disrespect the creator or will force the RP to adapt to suit my character. It just worked out without major changes, except that powerlevel and a slight CS format, because a lot of RP's use the exact same conventions. Same way, I have a couple characters made for post-apocalyptic RP's and I've yet to find one where I can't use the exact same characters.

Again, I think people only ever notice the bad examples. Because the good ones are... Well, good.

ZombieMagikarp said
Apparently 6 people is waaaaay too much for a RP! What's this? Two people who have been dying for this sort of roleplay REALLY wanna join? Well, fuck them! We can't let them join! 6 is too much and 8 is a whole fucking shitton! Even if they really wanna get in, we can't risk having this RP be overcrowded with 8 people!

Eight is the magical number, I'm told, but what I can tell you is that more than four PC's in one scene can quickly make a scene chaotic or make every post round a filler-fest where only one or two people are proactive.

Chrononaut said
I forgot to add: WHEN YOU MAKE AN RP AND IT JUST DOESN'T CLICK.I put waaaaaaaaaay too much effort into that. To be fair, it was a reboot of a rp I had PARTIALLY done (the forum died before I could finish, oh and then the roleplayerguild died when I had players the next time I tried it). I secretly suspect Fallout isn't a popular setting, also almost anything sci fi. Maybe it was the plotline that forced everyone together inadvertently and seemed linear. Could rewrite it as its own universe separate thing...

I hear you there. The people here are hard to please, but so far I've discovered a pattern of interest:

Anime.

Zombies.

High Fantasy.

Vampires.

Steam Punk

Pokemon.

More anime.

Spaceships.

If you hit any of those, you'll get loads of interest. Even if your intro/1st OOC is a car wreck and barely legible. High fantasy is usually my strong point, because it's the only one of the above that I can blag my way through. Any attempts to create original works are generally rejected, or receive interest and then get cast to the abyss not long after starting.

Just my opinion on matters, so I ask any potential reactionaries not to wreck my face, for it is beautiful.

Though one more thing, and I'm sure it's been mentioned, but:

I hate people who barge into your RP uninvited, point out a logical flaw, historical inaccuracy or some other nonsense, then continue to argue with you over it. I mean, they're not even supposed to be there, so what's with that? It's rude, is what it is, and stupid. It's like someone just drove past you, and threw dog shit in your direction, before hastily speeding off. You've never met them, they had no part in your life, so what THE FU- I digress. Not sure if its an ego problem, or what, but hot dayam it's annoying and I wish there was a way of punishing them without sounding like a whining muppet.

EDIT:

ZombieMagikarp said
Apparently 6 people is waaaaay too much for a RP! What's this? Two people who have been dying for this sort of roleplay REALLY wanna join? Well, fuck them! We can't let them join! 6 is too much and 8 is a whole fucking shitton! Even if they really wanna get in, we can't risk having this RP be overcrowded with 8 people!Honestly, what the fuck. I understand people setting limits in order not to make the RP overcrowded or anything, but holy fuck. I don't give a shit if you're gonna "notify me for future slots open", because 1. we know you're not, and 2. if we're that desperate to join, why the fuck would we wait?

To be fair, one of my RPs had about 8 people active at once, and with all characters starting in the same location, it became a bit of a problem. People would come home from work, with limited time, and have to sift through 6000 words. It sorted itself out after the characters split off, but next time I host an RP, no way in Hell are 8 people starting in the same place.

Although, this guild carries a 50% deserter ratio. That 8 I mentioned was actually 10, and I think it's degenerated to 3-4 now, despite receiving 2 new players.

I agree with you though, and generally speaking, if an RP of mine goes over the safe character limit, I will work out ways to have those extra characters start somewhere else so there's not the immediate post clog at the start. If the RP is a huge sandbox world, with everyone starting all over the show, then player limit is less of an issue.

Pachamac said
I agree with this, but I also want to mention that on the flipside, in my personal opinion I'm done with stories/rps with gratutious levels of death and carnage. When it's done to an excess, it actually becomes meaningless and trite, and extremely difficult to care for any characters when the possible likelihood is that they'll just die. Shows like The Walking Dead and Game of Thrones are actually the worst offenders of this for me. Death isn't shocking. All they seek to do is try and make said death as shocking and gorey and over the top as they can, and again it doesn't elicit any reaction from me other then an eyeroll. Whilst I wouldn't like to see an rp where all the characters survive, considering what the stakes involved entail, I would actually rather have that then ridiculous pointless and over the top murderthons.

Brovo said I'm not advocating that every story needs to contain gratuitous amounts of death and carnage...

Death is a tool. Depending on the story you may or may not use it. For instance, you wouldn't likely use it often (or at all) in any kind of academia type RP: You don't use a hammer to nail in a screw. I mean, you can, it's just not going to be nearly as effective as a screwdriver.

It just bothers me when I see a story full of red shirts who IRL would get fucking slaughtered in seconds somehow surviving against a billion to one odds several times over. It's completely nonsensical and stretches my disbelief to its absolute limits.

On the flip side, yeah, I agree, it's trite nonsense to go for extremely gory and shocking deaths all the time. It's just grit for the sake of it, which is neither remarkable or creative. Heck I find the most surprising and hard hitting deaths are the ones that happen suddenly and give you no chance to say goodbye. Character A is standing out in a street talking with his love interest. They thought the area was clear. Bam, sniper shot. Bam, character A falls over dead instantly. Bam, instant shock, terror, fury, and sorrow as everyone else ducks for cover and tries to survive.

Now, in an RP, it's hard to justify where an instant, warning-less death would be appropriate to deliver as a GM towards a player. The general idea being that a player has control over their character and should be allowed to weigh risk and reward to try and come out on top, and there's no chance for them to do that in an instant stealth-execution. So you have to deliver it in other ways, which can be a bit tricky sometimes. You also can't straight up murder the entire cast, if you do, the story is over.

A canvas of only red hue will lack the contrast it would have with blue.

New Gripe

Reading comprehension. Two little words that certain individuals will never seem to understand. When I say "the staircase is gone", and the staircase was the only way for enemies to reach you, this means you are safe since you cleared that floor. Oh, no, wait, you're setting up a defensible zone with explosives instead of bolting for evac when the part of the city you're in is about to be torched... Why?

The reason I can't write smarter plots or more original environments is because the average person isn't capable of understanding it. I don't even say that with malice or a sense of elitism, either. I find it rather frustrating, actually, but I can at least use it as an opportunity to try and teach and uplift those who want to learn. I like those people. They could have the most god awful reading comprehension ever, but if they want to learn, I can help them, they can get better, and everything only gets better from there.

Then you have the people who refuse to learn, who want me to hold their hand and tell them everything in explicit detail, then laugh at me for my "feeble" and "simple" stories that they easily "figured out". Because they were incapable of reading between the lines and needed to be told everything. Those people are the first and foremost on my kill list and I do it without shame.

Brovo said The reason I can't write smarter plots or more original environments is because the average person isn't capable of understanding it. I don't even say that with malice or a sense of elitism, either. I find it rather frustrating, actually, but I can at least use it as an opportunity to try and teach and uplift those who want to learn. I like those people. They could have the most god awful reading comprehension ever, but if they want to learn, I can help them, they can get better, and everything only gets better from there.

You realize that right there embodies the entire concept of positive Elitism, right? That attitude. That is how a socially-positive Elitist would think in and address that situation.

Prince said
You realize that right there embodies the entire concept of positive Elitism, right? That attitude. That is how a socially-positive Elitist would think in and address that situation.

I don't generally like to consider myself above that of my fellows, though. I find it's more effective to put myself at the same level and in the same shoes as the person struggling. Rather than speaking from authority, I go from the equal angle. Whether or not it is true is irrelevant to me so much as it is simply more effective for this site, as there's a lot of easily bruised egos. Mainly due to the nature of people growing very attached to the things they create very quickly, and by the average age range of the person on this site being... Eh'... Probably around high school age.

I find it's simply more effective to dispose of the elitist tagline and just approach from a softer side.

I don't generally like to consider

At work, I don't generally like to consider myself the guy with a fancy golden name tag and a spiffy button-down shirt whose sole purpose in the building is to make every else work harder and faster to accomplish the same goal they would normally all for the purpose of making them look busy on one of our thirty-six cameras. I don't like to enforce the "if you have time to lean, you have time to clean" policy. I can try and be gentle about it. I can try and be polite. I can explain or assist in every possible way I can to make the work experience better while also doing my job. And, you're right. Normally, being positive and gentle in those situation reaps better results.

That doesn't change the fact I'm still management. Likewise, that doesn't change the fact that, by definition, that scenario still has elitist aspects in it. It's not a bad thing. You did what most good GM's would have done or said.

Prince said At work, I don't generally like to consider myself the guy with a fancy golden name tag and a spiffy button-down shirt whose sole purpose in the building is to make every else work harder and faster to accomplish the same goal they would normally all for the purpose of making them look busy on one of our thirty-six cameras. I don't like to enforce the "if you have time to lean, you have time to clean" policy. I can try and be gentle about it. I can try and be polite. I can explain or assist in every possible way I can to make the work experience better while also doing my job. And, you're right. Normally, being positive and gentle in those situation reaps better results.That doesn't change the fact I'm still management. Likewise, that doesn't change the fact that, by definition, that scenario still has elitist aspects in it. It's not a bad thing. You did what most good GM's would have done or said.

Exactly. You get it. Sounds like you're a pleasant manager, by the way.

You're not a bad person for seeing yourself as an elitist either by the way. I just try to avoid that term, it has a lot of negative baggage with it, and the point I was making was one you understood with your pleasant sounding management tactics, so...

I have no idea what I'm saying now.

I wish there were more ferrets and other animals of the like that were truly useless but adorable. They're great for subtle character exposition. For instance: How X treats their pet says a lot about who they are as a person, regardless of whether they're introverted or extroverted.

There are thirteen managers were I work. There are over a hundred in our district. Some of them are well-liked, but have terrible stats. Some of them are vice versa. I work customer service and my stats there are the highest in my establishment and third for my district, but my production lacks. Thus, I have to get a good PM, otherwise I'm no better than a manager that has bad stats because they try to be part of the crew and offer no leadership. What I mean is that every single style is going to have weaknesses. There are only a handful out of a hundred that can do it all on their own and that's due to being there forever. But, if there is stratification and leadership, stats are better accross the board.

Management is nothing more than applied elitism via meritocracy. If there was no crew, there would be no store. If there were no crew trainers, thered be no crew. If there was no management, there's be no crew trainer s. Structure exists for a reason. There isn't a positive synonymn for Elitism, but facts are, there are elites. Let yjem be teachers and leaders, not opressive tyrants.

Edit: typing on a phone is hard...

# ALL the rp's ive looked forward to these last 10 days died.

#i put heart and soul into participating in as many other people's roleplays as i do my own. I make aroleplay, and if im LUCKY 2 people say a peep. And one of those ***holes is only there to correct my spelling or something.

#when your rping with an inexperienced person and you kindly ask them "did you mean this? Your wording made that unclear" and they bite your head off because **** you im right... Thanks jerk.

#when you make an entirely new char. For an rp, and you cant think of a f***ing name! GRAAAAGHH CURSE THEE WRITERS BLOCK!

#when you are filtering out your own profanity... I SHOULD BE ABLE TO TYPE WHATEVER THE FLYING F*** I WANT AND MOT HAVE TO FILTER IT MYSELF! SET A STUPID F***ING PROFANITY FILTER THAT CAN BE ADJUSTED BY US! Seriously, if a grown *** adult wants to f***ing say **** then let him f***ing say ***. WHOLY TOTS!

#trying to be serious on my iphone. XD wholy crap the typos! Lord i wish i had a better computer... Mine dosnt turn on!

#nobody thought of this s*** on my other rp sites! Wholy crap im gunna steal this idea. (And watch it get ignored w en i do it.)

#one worders.... D*** thee to hell. You thought a one liner was bad? "Cool" after i posted a 5 paragraph responce... OH HE** NO! (Noticing im filtering less)

#people who make a character that changes with every post... Now im emo, now im not. Now im angry, now im erotic, now im every fu**ing color of the mother fu**ing rainbow! FOR FUC* sakes!

#that moment when yourtyping a long long long long responce and you dont wanna break concentration, but then your bladder says "heh heh no"

#when you ask for feedbaxk and NOBODY says squat, but suddenly when you no longer want feedbaxk, a flood of critics logg on.

#other sotes whith character limits on your replies! HOW THE HEL* AM I SUPPOSED TO DEVELOPE A PLOT, A CHARACTER, OR DESCRIBE A GOD DA** SCENE IN 255 LETTERS NUMBERS AND SYMBOLS! IN THAT SPACE YOU CANT EVEN COMPLAIN ABOUT--- (this message has been cut short due to character limit.)

#TROLLS WHO SUCCEDE AT TROLLING YOU! AS WE SPEAK SOMEBODY IS DANCING AND TROLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLING more than i care to repeat.

#when your friends ask "watcha doing" while they are roleplaying.... With you.... -mega facepalm-

#when people wine after they die in a roleplay... I KILLED YOU BECAUSE YOUR A WHINEY BITCH!

#when you die in a roleplay, and cant whine because of a standard youhold. FUUU im too proud sometimes.

#when you die because a group of people said so... IF I WON THE FIGHT, HOW THE HELL AM I DEAD? Because u 3 people who dislike me voted so? Whut? Wtf do you mean i should have died from that pillow fight? The pillow only went through my heart!

#not being able to sleep because you are buiy raunting on rpg.

#when you post a character sheet, and are the only person the gm dosnt accept... Ugh.

#when you post a cs, and say this is my weakness... 3 post and 20 minuts later somebody post a cs specifically built on your weaknesses. WELL YOU CAN PLACE THINE WOCKED LIPS UPON MY PROSTERIOR AND PLUCK ITS PETALS REPEATEDLY. You lil a** wipe.

---

Some stuff i wanna raunt over but it has nothin to do with roleplaying.
-i havent spoken to a girl since i showered last week... Could the two have something in coon? Nah probly not. (Jk i shower regularly, but its been too long...)
-THE MOON IS A WIFI HOTSPOT!
# for those guys who spend 4 hrs at a coffee shop for one drink... Cofee is good, wifi was fast, hut the place had no atmosphere. (Dun dun pun)
# sure ill post on rpg or fb, but gamming? Forget about it! Immagine the latency!
# once upon a time, neil armstrong wanted to play the candy crush saga at work... He just got his wish
- ive slept on the couch for like 3 weeka because im scared of the monster under my ned! Im 18 for fu** sake!
- got denied by the college i wanted to go to because i dont have enough community service hours and the fu**ers didnt like my language.
- just started working out again, and as soon as i started feeling confident enoughfh go back to the gym, a dude steals my bench, then shows off on it... Back to the backyard weights with me. Thanks
- the new pokemon games lost my interest
- my cousin is in jail... Now i cant larp cuz my best friend is a a** and gets way way way too into it... (He has hreatened to stop hanging out with me if he didnt win a certain larp fight...)
- i wanna complain more but i gotta take a restroom break. (You thought i was gunna say piss huh?) you allhave fun complaining. Somebody message me if a list ever tops mine. XD
-i complain too much.

You don't need to fucking self center. As shown.

Well, killing people without telling/asking (depending on the situation) Is kind of a dick move.