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]@Strawberry425

In regards to your discussion on Advanced RPing -
I come to and fro from the guild every once in a while. As I've grown up (I joined back in 2009, or maybe earlier) my writing has improved considerably (Partially due to maturity, partially due to AP English). I used to struggle at writing at a casual level, but now writing as a character I can pull off advanced.

I think the issues are really as follows-

1. No one pays attention to the 18+ rules. I sure as hell didn't. Lots of people here are probably the good writer in their friend group, and get 100s on every English assignment. I never was. But there is simply no way a fourteen year old no matter how talented can write at what was considered the advanced level. At that age the chances you've been in an actually serious relationship are small, you feel like your the only one whos experiencing what's going on in your life, and you are most likely confused. It is really hard to roleplay well when you have NO life experience. While logically many fourteen year olds know this, they don't really believe or understand it. In some ways, the snobiness of the old guild kept this out.

2. Being able to roleplay at an advanced level does not mean you can GM at an advanced level. I've realized recently I can't, and I probably should train my GM abilities at a lower level where quick posting will let me get a lot of experience.

3. A lack of patience. Partially tied into point 1. Rps where people post about once a week have great quality. It gives people plenty of time for others to think about a response, write that response, and then sleep on it. When you come back the next day chances are you will fix the post up considerably and the quality will be much higher as a result. I really think this is the biggest difference between high-cas and advanced as categories. Length isn't what makes advanced, and you should have character development by high casual. What makes a post advanced is being willing to come back the next day an improve the quality.

I really wished Free roleplays got more people and dedication like casual does.

I now understand why people here have "black lists". I didn't want to get one myself, but I might have to.

I love free-level RPs if you can trust the players. You can make great stories on the tip of a hat with new CS's or extensive lore. It can be fun. But I think the only way I can have a RP like that is if I restricted it to my friends/people I know.

<Snipped quote by Weird Tales>

When I think of "Free", I think of one-liners and horrible grammar. Now, I don't know if it's true or not, but I think that's why people don't go there -- especially those of us who are mid-cas and above.

<Snipped quote by Altered Tundra>

sometimes it's good to relax and not get blasted by the snobs that exist on the guild. Free is where people can write without having too much standards.

<Snipped quote by Weird Tales>

And that's good for people who enjoy that freedom. I'm just the type of writer who likes to challenge himself with certain goals and standards. It's the reason why I'm usually a High Casual and Advanced roleplayer. It's not broken, so why fix it, right?

<Snipped quote by Altered Tundra>

who said it's broken? Not everyone wants to write and roleplay the same way, simple as that. I do casual most of the time, but I like free because it's more relaxing and easier to test out new characters to see which ones work for roleplaying and which ones don't. I love causal, but some of my worst experiences on the Guild usually come from there, also the most judgemental and snobby do tend to hang around that part of the guild.

I'll have to ask forgiveness for not reading all 53 pages of this thread, so if this random complaint has already come up and been beaten to death, then that's my bad.

This isn't something I've encountered explicitly on RPG (at least, not yet--the night is still young and whatnot seeing as I've only recently joined), but just something I've come across fairly often on other RP forums: minimum length requirements per post.

This is different from recommended lengths, which serve as a rule of thumb to elicit more detail than just "he said, she said, he ran, she ran."

While I tend to align my posting style with the GM's demands out of respect for the hard work they've put into creating a RP, I personally do not feel comfortable with RPs that demand "at least x number of paragraphs per post." My philosophy has always been "If you can do everything you need and want to do in one line, then do it in one line." Obviously, this is an extreme, but the point is I've come across RPs that emphasize quantity over quality and have always found myself a little annoyed when a GM PMs me saying "Your latest post is one paragraph short of the requirements." At least give me a reason other than length, even if you have to lie about it. I would gladly edit a post if I was unclear, or if I forgot to address something I should have, but requiring useless fluff just to meet min. reqs. is a little offensive to the craft and process of writing.

Concision is an art form, I believe, one I'm still struggling heavily to improve in my writing style, and I really can't put up with people who want length for the sake of length.

There are a few implications in your post that I hope aren't intended to be insults in my direction. If it's just a general observation, then don't mind this.

I'll be specific to avoid future misunderstanding: I've been in RPs where strict minimum requirements of five or more paragraphs per post have caused players to resort to rather desperate fluff tactics such as describing vast amounts of unnecessary details to meet the minimum. No one needs to know your character's strangely focused observation of the composition and wood striations of a door when the scene's focus is a raucous bar fight happening right behind that door. Just open the door.

Keep in mind while I dislike min. reqs. overall, I don't particularly mind if they're reasonable and the occasional exception is allowed. I understand where you're coming from, but I think you've misunderstood a lot of what I've said, which is in part due to my lack of specificity.

The RPs I had in mind while typing out the previous post were serious cases of length for length's sake, not just a two-paragraph requirement. The essence of the complaint was that I ran into those types far more often than I would like.

Most of the people who "demand" five paragraphs a post are the tryhard Advanced guys that think length = quality.

I mean, I'm perfectly fine with writing several paragraphs a post (I usually write more for my own RP), but I'm really not fond of that because it's forcing you to write that, instead of naturally letting it occur. Like, I believe that, regardless of the standard, people should write as much as they can - otherwise, they're just using filler.

@Altered Tundra

No worries. Text loses all the tone and body language that would imply a completely innocuous response, but I admit I was little scared you were about to go in on me when I saw the notification--last thing I want is to get into an argument over personal preferences. Haha.

<Snipped quote by Mr Allen J>

I agree--while I often end up typing plenty to address everything I need to and want to, especially in more involved RPs, just the presence of a min. req. distracts me a fair amount because one of my inevitable thoughts as I type is "Okay. I've met the min. req. Good." I don't enjoy thinking that while composing a reply (It just makes me uncomfortable and leaves me with the irrational feeling like I only typed that much to meet a min. req., not because I love the RP and had a lot to say and do. Then the thought nags at me despite my clear knowledge that I really did write this out of enjoyment, not requirement.), though for most that paranoia is probably not an issue. The world is a weird place for fretting neurotics like me.