@shylarahI'll actually take the time to give a response to all this, since
another problem has come up and I've lost
more work, so I don't feel like dealing with my notes right now -- I'll get back to it later. I feel another all-nighter coming my way.
Yeah, but...I mean, rp is about story, and interaction. It's not about each individual sequin on a dress. I think some of how people describe things (at least if they're any good) has to do with what they like to read. So yes, if a character always wears a certain item, I'd describe it on a character sheet. That's solely for an explanation. However, since (as I said) I'm not a huge fan of sheets in the first place, when describing a character in a post, it's not necessary to go into the same detail. The same is true for solo writing.
Role-play is about story and interaction, but you can't make a realistic interaction with a stick figure -- that's basically the point of a lot of my previous statements. I'm all about realism and you can't have realism without details. It's completely reasonable to want to know the details of a person's outfit in order to react in the way the character would in reality. Sometimes the tiniest detail - whether it be something physical, or something they said, or their expression, et cetera - of a person can change the way I'll react to them, and this
definitely carries over into how I work as a solo writer.
In my own experience, the writers I have the most respect for are the ones who don't just present stories, but also present worlds -- having detailed character profiles for me to read proves that this is a world full of characters who are alive, not just a one-dimensional story about a knight with no personality who is off to kill a dragon. In my eyes, there is no story without fleshed out and detailed characters.
A character sheet as a /player/ application I might understand. There's a lot of tests out there to separate the wheat from the chaff. However, it does sound like that forum was also elitist. I know a number of people that are absolutely amazing at creating settings and lore and characters and /using/ them, but ask for a char sheet and watch those magic words dry right up. It's the same as practical ability vs. test-taking ability. They are often equated, but they are not the same.
That site had a lot of elitists -- I've made no secret of this considering I'm arguably responsible for the destruction of that forum because I admonished them for it. Nevertheless, I'm all for the idea of practical ability vs. test-taking ability, but I've actually never really seen good examples of what you're describing (people who can make good settings; lore; characters; et cetera, but when asked to put them down on paper they can't do it), so I can't really base my attitude on that. I have, on the other hand, seen a lot of people - specifically those who can't write down their work - end up quitting their projects.
From my own experiences, the less established someone can make their characters and world, the more likely I am to see plot holes. To further emphasize this -- I actually consider many of the most famous novelists out there - those responsible for many of the fictions people use as the basis for fandom role-play here - to have works full of plot holes that the fans simply either don't notice or choose to ignore. I don't think I'm an elitist for wanting a person to put their all into something.
There's also the idea that posting pages when paragraphs -- or even /a/ paragraph -- will do is an indication of a less-skilled rper. Sure, it takes skill to churn out that much. But it takes more skill to know when to stop. There's a /lot/ of people that confuse length with skill level and that is a huge peeve of mine.
There's also a
lot of people who think simplicity equals quality, and it really doesn't at all in my eyes. I really do need to emphasize that when I say that truth and realism are in the details, I view this as pretty much the golden rule of writing. I may write a lot, but - to those who actually read and understand my content - there is never a single
meaningless detail, and I don't believe I should have the quality of my posts ridiculed based on their length yet many people behave this way with me. There's also a lot you can't say in a small amount, resulting in a very weak argument (in terms of debate) or a very weak story (in terms of writing).
Knowing when to stop is entirely a matter of subjectivity -- there is no true limit to how much a writer 'should' pour into their work, only a limit to the attention span of their readers. It's similar to the reason why a lot of people don't read novels and they watch movies instead -- they don't like reading in the first place, so they don't have a right to tell people how to write. One of my own biggest pet peeves is people who bash writers for being detailed -- for every person who doesn't want to read those finer details, there's people - like myself - who will give the writer a thumb up for them.
Additionally, given that rp is multiple people, and thus multiple characters, the longer a post, the more likely something in it will need changing because someone will have a reaction that would then affect the initial character's interaction. The best example of this is interrupting someone talking, which is not often done in forum rp or even chat rp, because player two can't see player one's char's words until the sentence has already been completed. But irl, if I interrupt someone, chances are they're going to stop talking -- or raise their voice, or tell me to shut up. And once that happens instead of finishing the rest of the sentence, then everything else splits off as well, like the tempest caused by the flutter of an insect. I absolutely adore interpersonal interaction for rps, so the more back-and-forth, the happier I am. This means cutting down on post size.
I see this as entirely irrelevant to the discussion about character sheets, but you did mention later on in your post that you're getting off-topic - so you're aware of it - and I'm actually fine with responding to this part as well.
Simply put, this is one of the reasons that I think large character sheets are more important than long IC posts. I'm entirely capable of giving smaller posts in order to prevent a discussion from ending up unrealistic like you just described -- I've actually had plenty of realistic conversations portrayed through my IM role-plays in the past, and my forum role-plays. Even if I do spend a lot of time to give thorough content about what's going on in the character's mind, that doesn't mean I'll post too much spoken dialogue and make the conversation become unrealistic. Whether my posts are long or short is usually largely dependant on the situation. The OOC is also available on this site to prevent those sorts of unrealistic interactions from happening. On the other hand, if all people do is post one-liners then it doesn't really give people something to work with realistically.
The other issue is that in conversations, one item, one response, one connected item is a more natural formula than ten items, and ten responses, some with connected items of their own. The latter tends to create multiple parallel conversations and drives me absolutely nuts. The other thing I see happen a lot is the same part of a scene getting covered five, six times because actions taken by chars 2 and 3 then get reactions from char 1, and those are reacted to in turn. Yeah, on a forum most people don't post multiple times a day, and the more people there are in the group the longer it's going to take to cycle back to you, or else some people might get left behind (though this is a balance issue too). But once you get to about a page, unless there's something uninterrupted or a whole lot of explanation or exposition, that's enough in many cases. There is often no reason to keep going. It's time to let someone reply.
Just because your character is thinking about the multiple aspects of what the person is wearing doesn't mean they're going to talk about all of them, or even one of them for that matter. Did at any point I actually say that my character would definitely
speak to the other character about any of the things they're wearing? All I said is they'd react to them, and this can be entirely internal -- this is a very realistic thing that pretty much everyone - who is analytical or has an attention to detail anyway - does often and wherever they go. A good analogy of this is when you're reading/watching a good mystery story. Frequently a lot of characters will notice a tiny little detail on the table or about something a character said that will eventually solve an important puzzle or reveal who a villain is. I spend a lot of time in my story using this type of foreshadowing (and, yes, misdirection as you put it), and I really hate writers who pull details out of their backside instead of have them hinted at during the first given opportunity a character might realistically notice them.
The second part of this quote was pretty much off-topic again - as you noted - but the all I can really say about it is that, in my own opinion, this isn't a problem with long posts -- it's a problem with role-playing
in general when compared to writing. This is one of the reasons that a lot of role-players prefer to do collaborations, in order to prevent this sort of thing from even happening. I'm actually proficient at taking a choppy role-play and converting it into proper writing, so I know exactly what sort of problem you're describing here, but it's honestly just a drawback of role-playing itself, and is one of several reasons why I (personally) consider solo writing to be a more compelling form of storytelling.
And I"m totally off-topic, rambling -- and covering things I've said to you before. Man, I get worked up over this stuff way to easily. -.- Being half-awake doesn't help either. *flops off to bed*
I relate to both being half-awake and also to the whole getting worked up thing, because frankly the number one reason I'm considering leaving this site is that I don't think people actually appreciate the 'long-winded' (read: well-thought-out) 'rants' (read: debates) I go into during the OOC discussions. Why bother taking my time to give people feedback here when there's plenty of people elsewhere who admire and respect it? I've got an important project I could be pouring my soul into instead -- one which many people are eagerly awaiting to see. Naturally, I'm not referring to anyone specific here, and there's plenty of people who
do appreciate it, but let's just say I consider bashing the details incredibly ignorant and it's a major hate I have for a very large number of role-players.
When all is said and done, this is all subjective, but I truly despise those who bash GMs for wanting detailed/realistic characters. It's like people want to police others on how they should or shouldn't GM their role-plays. I thought the whole point of having the role-plays on this site separated into sections ('free', 'casual', 'advanced', et cetera) was to prevent people getting into arguments over subjective opinions about character depth and post length, as well as arguments over things like Tabletop mechanics and whether or not three people is too many for a role-play. I'm an 'advanced' role-player through and through -- anyone who has a problem with that doesn't
have to write with me.
Edit: Posted this one up before I had a moment to check it for problems, so I've fixed it now.
