To be honest, I always feel way too awkward on chats unless it's with people I've known for a while. ^^; I mean I'm bad at small talk in general but yeah. So even if it gets made I'm probably sitting out on the whole Discord thing.
Well, I'm personally pretty comfortable with using discord for RP OOCs. It's convenient to use in my cellphone and quite dynamic when compared to forum threads (and it also makes the thread less... Polluted, may I say). That being said, I kind of understand @Raineh Daze's and @Rin's complaints about it, as it is, after all, a private message app that some people use for real life stuff that they don't want to mix with role-playing. Even if not related to personal life, it's kinda hard to feel comfortable talking with strangers in a message app when you've just started to do so. Even i was like that in the beginning, tons of comic occasions ago.
Eh, I guess it doesn't matter in the long-run, regardless. If the GM likes the idea, then we could make one, and the people who are cool with it could talk OOCly there. The ones who aren't cool with it don't have to. Personally, I don't really use Discord for real life stuff, but I can see how people would.
i'd consider making a discord server for this roleplay, considering chatrooms are an easy way to hash out relations between characters and such.
I'm all for it. The one game I've had so far that has used a discord was awesome. Planning events, character interactions and other stuff was incredibly easy, and it opened up for people to get to know each other better by off-topic talk without flooding the OOC with nonsense.
So are OOC threads. "It's quicker" is not the ideal argument. xD
I usually don't want to be that guy, but in this case "it's quicker" is one of the best arguments. If I need to check something about the game or my character with other players or the GM, I'd very much prefer it if the whole thing took ten minutes instead of three hours. Having a Discord would also give us several channels to coordinate the game through. Each "team" (however they will look in this game) can have their own channel where they can talk about their own stuff. Character feedback doesn't have to share space with event planning or meme-sharing. We'd also have a natural place to coordinate posts between people without having to rely on external web pages.
If the main complaints are a lack of comfort of communication and moderation I have to side with Asura. The difference in pure communication between a forum and a chat is only the average post length. If you're comfortable with how this thread have been for the last page with pretty much one short sentence per post then I say a chatroom will be no different. A chatroom can also be moderated, even harsher than this forum as we'd run it ourselves, set our own rules and wouldn't have to pray to the almighty forumgods to get something done if they have time. In the end, nothing is stopping any of us from writing the exact same things on a forum as we would in a chat room. I believe the question is whether or not one truly believes that without an impartial moderator people will, without fail, behave like complete bastards. I don't, and if they would the kick-button is right there, problem solved. Just follow the golden rule.
I added my completed (I think) CS to my first post on the first page.
I'll place it here, too, just because I can.
General Name: Hagane 鋼 (Steel), Haruka 遙 (Far Off/Distant)
Age: Eighteen (18)
Gender: Female ♀
Sexual Orientation: Heterosexual/Straight
Personality: If you only just met Haruka, what you will see is a brash, loud, arrogant and somewhat rude person. Despite how she might appear, Haruka is a very insecure person. She is self-conscious about her looks, her powers and her brains. No matter how casually a remark may be said, she takes them to heart as critique. She gets easily hurt and easily angry, but calming her down is quite hard. Getting hurt is more common than getting angry and when her feelings are hurt, she will say nothing, but just draws into herself. Haruka does not do things halfway; if she gets angry, she will get murderous. If she gets sad, she will get depressed and when she is happy, she is ecstatic. Usually, she is quite happy.
The story of how Haruka came to be is not one of unconditional love and burning passion that many can tell of the day their parents met. Rather, it is a tale of a young woman in training as a chef and a charming shinobi passing through her home town for a mission. The young woman, Someina, was still a year away from leaving her teenage years behind her, but yet choose to keep the small bloom of life growing within her. Haruka was born in the early spring, just when the cherry blossoms had started to bloom and Someina, the mother, had wanted to name her daughter after the pink flowers. The moment she saw the soft, lavender tufts of hair on her newborn's head, she decided that the name was not quite right for her little one and proudly told her mother that she wanted to name her Haruka (春=haru=spring, 花=ka=flower). Her mother, the grandmother, misunderstood the name and wrote it as 遙 (far off/distant) instead and so Haruka's name came to mean something far different from what her mother had wanted.
Despite the very early mishap in her life, Haruka grew up to be a spirited child. She was always full of energy, but liked her sleep as well. She was a perfectly easy baby, although a bit slow at learning. When she was three, she started asking questions. Who was her father and where was he? Her mother, worried about telling her only child the truth of how she had been conceived, told the wide-eyed girl that her father had been a great and strong ninja and that she did not know where he was. Because of that, Haruka decided at a young age that she wanted to be a ninja, too, and her mother agreed for them to leave their small home town and move to one of the great villages, Konohagakure no Sato, for Haruka to attend the Academy there instead of the measly opportunities ninja had in their home.
Throughout her childhood, Haruka would ask her mother small questions that seemed harmless enough, but would later define the way Haruka thought of herself. One day, when she was seven, she asked her mother; “Mommy? Was daddy strong?” Her mother's reply had been with a warm smile as she said; “Like an ox, sweetie.” On another occasion, Haruka had asked her mother; “Did daddy use a weapon? Some of the kids say that their daddies use weapons!” Once Haruka had stopped ranting on about how they had only been allowed to play with lame little kunai, her mother had told her; “Your father had a huge sword!” She had barely been able to keep the blush off of her cheeks from the innuendo of it.
As Haruka grew older, she also grew stronger. Every day, she would train. Every day, she ran longer and longer, lifted heavier and heavier weights and got better and better at hand to hand fighting. She was easily the physically strongest in her class when the time for graduation came, but she still could do very little in regards of using techniques. She could barely manage to form a clone, her transformations were mediocre at best and her substitutions often wound up unpredictable. She did manage to pass, though, and proudly presented her headband to her mother. It brought tears to her eyes when her mother had given her a graduation present; a shiny and beautiful katana. It did not fit Haruka's style in the least, but it had a proud place on her wall as the very first item in her collection.
Haruka's teammates were both boys. One was a soft-spoken and sweet medic with an extensive knowledge on poisons and medicines by the name of Kenta while the other was a moody branch Hyuuga by the name Suzaku. Their sensei was a first-timer and was for the most part just nervous about everything, but went by the name Tora. For the first year of their genin time, they did not leave the village for their missions. They would spar every day; even on their days off, but it mattered very little. Despite both of her teammates' efforts to teach her how to mold and channel her chakra, she never really did manage to do it. She could mold it fine and Kenta told her that it was not the amount that was troubling her, but she just could not get the techniques to come out right. By the time they had been genin for two years, Haruka had only learned three techniques and relied almost solely on her close-combat skills and her teammates' help. It worked fine for them, with Haruka taking the role of the “tank”, gaining the attention of their foes and making sure that the “healer”, Kenta, could go unharmed while the “DPS”, Suzaku, tossed figurative fireballs from every angle at a distance.
Their team bond was good. Haruka had started crushing on Suzaku about three months after they became genin. Suzaku had bluntly informed her that he thought she was utterly unattractive with her big muscles, weird hair and missing tooth. Kenta had consoled her, telling her that she was beautiful in her own way. It took a year for Suzaku, after Haruka had started developing more feminine attributes, to agree with Kenta that Haruka was not ugly anymore. It took almost half a year after that before he agreed to go on a date with her. And just a month after that first date, they were officially an item.
The time came where the team was to take the chuunin exams and their sensei believed them to be ready for the task. They had not been. The results of the whole ordeal ended with Suzaku dead and Kenta retiring as a ninja, while Haruka was left with both physical and emotional scarring, but a fierce dedication to becoming even stronger, as well. Left without a genin team, Haruka went on a whole bunch of solo mission inside the village gates and most of her free time was spent either training like a madwoman or learning about medicines and poisons from Kenta, who now worked in his mother's herbal store. He taught her everything from which plants could be made into tea, to which plants could cause a slow and painful death as well as which plants could cure those poisons.
Soon, Haruka was placed in what they called a temporary team in order for her, as well as the others in her team, to take the chuunin exam again. All of them had either lost teammates or had them walk out of them and although Haruka did not bother to even try and form a real bond with them, Amaya and Noburo still became her friends. This time, Haruka was stronger, her teammates were stronger and the whole scene was different and they did manage to pass. In the final round, when Haruka had to fight some earth user one-on-one, the judges were impressed with her sheer strength as she smashed bounders with her bare hands and produced one weapon after another from scroll after scroll to toss at her enemy. Even though she ended up beaten and battered, with a broken arm and poison coursing through her veins, she did eventually manage to knee the guy in the nose hard enough to have him stay still after.
Haruka had thought that making chuunin would make her feel accomplished, but she still wanted to be more. She wanted to be stronger. She wanted to be better. She wanted to be a hero, like her dad. Her mother had, just like when she made genin, bought her a present. Apparently, she had bought it the first time Haruka had attempted the exam, but since she had not passed... well, she did not get a present. It was another sword. 判断は邪悪を降りかかる (Handan wa jaaku o furikakaru) was etched into the shiny steel of the blade and Haruka downright wept. She had the magnetic sheathe made the next day.
After a while, Haruka realized that she would never reach her full potential if she remained in the safety of her home. There were so many memories there and she felt like the weight of her past was crushing her. One early morning, she packed all of her weapon scrolls into a bag, hefted Seidou onto her back and the the village without a word. She has been traveling ever since.
Looks and Appearance:
Body Type and Shape: Although she makes people believe that her muscle does not take hours of daily training, this is actually not true. Haruka has a naturally endomorphic body type, which means that although gaining muscle is possible for her, it requires hard work for it to not become fat. Her body shape is mostly hourglass, due to the fact that she was blessed with wide hips and her shoulders have become broad with her muscles expanding.
Height: 5'0” - 152cm
Weight: 143 lbs - 65kg
Hair Color: Haruka's hair has an odd, purple color that would probably be described as “lavender”.
Hair Style: Haruka's hair is cut in three layers of length. The front, her bangs, are cut to just above her eyes. The sides, her “frames”, are cut to her shoulders. The back of her hair is mostly free-growing, but she does get it cut to her middle back once it reaches her bum.
Eye Color: Haruka's eyes are a deep, speaking gray color, much like that of steel. This color is common for members of the Hagane clan.
Scars and Marks: Haruka has several scars littering her body, with the most prominent and obvious one being a large, rather gross-looking scar on her left bicep where a branch penetrated the muscle during her first attempt at the Chuunin exams. She also has a large gash scar across the right side of her abdomen from the same occasion. Other than that, the rest of the scars are small and insignificant and one would barely even notice them being there, unless they already knew. Haruka lacks one of her front teeth, after a spar got a bit out of hand and her old teammate, Suzaku, ended up knocking it out.
Clothing: Haruka wears a crimson, tall-necked top with gray patches on the shoulders. Along with this, she wears high-cut gray jean shorts, that hold in the fat that clings to her sides and accentuates her waist. Her ninja boots are long, to just under the knees, and has a small amount of heel on them, as well as open toes. Her clothes cling tightly to her skin, both for easy movement and to try and show off the fact that her frame is feminine.
Birth Village: Although she was technically born outside the village, Haruka has always considered Konohagakure no Sato – The Village Hidden in the Leaves her home.
Current Village: None yet.
Rank: Chuunin
Ninja Status: Technically a Missing Nin
Nindo: To be strong, stronger, the strongest.
Chakra Element: Suiton – Water
Weapon(s):
”Seidou (正道)”
Haruka's trusty sword. “Her” name means, “The Path of Righteousness”. “Seidou” is stuck to her back in a magnetic sheath where the blade is “clicked” into place and held there by four small claws.
Ninja pouch
Haruka has her ninja pouch fastened to the back of her belt; right above her left butt-cheek. Within this ninja pouch, she carries with her a roll of bandages, a bottle of rubbing alcohol, a flash of water and a nutrition bar.
Weapon holster
Haruka carries her weapon holster on her left thigh. The holster has room for five kunai, five shuriken, ten makibishi and ten senbon, which she almost always has stocked to the max.
Scroll Number One: Dexterity Scroll
Haruka’s first and most used scroll is her so-called Dexterity Scroll with the weapons she uses for battles where her brute force just is not enough and some skill and speed is needed.
Hoyo & Kisu (抱擁) & (キス)
In her Dexterity Scroll, Haruka carries a pair of sai knives that she has affectionately and humorously named “Hoyo & Kisu” or “Hugs and Kisses” in English.
Shojo (処女)
As one of her favorites when it comes to being quick on her feet, Haruka likes to bring her very first weapon, Shojo (Virgin), with her even if she hardly ever gets to use it.
Scroll Number Two: No-Kill Scroll
Haruka’s second to most used scroll is her so-called No-Kill Scroll, which holds the weapons she uses for battles where her intention is to not kill her opponent, nor cause any real harm to them; bruises and maybe a few broken bones are all these are good for.
Chou (蝶)
These tonfa were purchased on her first trip out of her birthplace. The guy she bought them from claimed them to be antique, with her teammates stating that that meant “old and used”. She bought them anyways and named them “Cho (Butterflies)”.
Bogire (棒切れ)
With the quite literal name of ”Bogire (Stick)”, Haruka’s bo-staff usually is not the most original weapon. It is quite useful, though, and great for keeping foes at a distance.
Tsubasa (翼)
Although even Haruka has no idea how these weapons got to be named the way they are, these nunchakus were named “Tsubasa (Wings)” by her teammate, Suzaku, when he bought them for her. She really has no clue how to use them and is more likely to hurt herself than her enemy, but she keeps them with her, anyways.
Fighting Style: Close combat.
Strengths:
Physically strong
Stubborn
Weaknesses:
Clumsy.
Not very smart and quite naive.
Taijutsu: Haruka's main focus is on her Taijutsu, with her Chakra Enhanced Strength and Kenjutsu skills. Despite the fact that she is quite good at throwing a punch, she never bothered to name most of it and thinks of her so-called Taijutsu as more of a style than an actual technique.
Name: Chakra Enhanced Strength Classification Fighting Style Rank: A-rank Effect: Unlike the Chakra Enhanced Strength that Tsunade and Sakura use, Haruka's version of this ”technique” is not focused on chakra control in the same sense. The original version of this technique applied a layer of chakra around the extremities of the user in order to release it as an explosion-like punch or kick. Haruka's version of the technique functions in a way similar to opening the first of the Eight Chakra Gates and actually enhances her physical strength by pumping her chakra veins and thus her muscles full of chakra to such an extent that it seeps from her skin. Drawback: Very high chakra use as well as chances of severe chakra burns on both her skin and her chakra veins. Excessive use could render her chakra pathways useless.
Name: Shinpai no Hi (Judgement Day) Classification Kenjutsu Rank: C-rank Effect: Haruka uses her broadsword katana, “Seidou (Path of Righteousness)” in a series of slashing, brute force attacks, molding chakra to her feet to stay standing while she swings the sword, due to the weight in the force of her swings. Despite being “glued” to the ground, she still moves around. Drawback: The technique is physically straining, due to the weight of her sword, and takes constant concentration on her chakra flow to keep glued to the ground – if she does not, she will fall over.
Ninjutsu: Haruka knows very little Ninjutsu, as she has a hard time making her chakra answer to her will. The techniques she does know, is often somewhat messed up in execution, either because she uses too much chakra or because of her own insecurity. She knows some simple and basic Fuuinjutsu (Sealing Techniques) to seal her weapons inside scrolls for easy transport and a few simple Suiton (Water Release) techniques.
Crush/Spouse/Bf/Gf: Hyuuga Suzaku – Former boyfriend. Deceased.
Likes:
♥ Sweet foods; her favorite being chocolate flavors.
♥ The scent of rain.
♥ Weapons and her collection of such.
♥ The color red; crimson in particular.
♥ Birds, butterflies and bees; she finds them fascinating and beautiful.
♥ Tea; green tea in particular.
♥ The feeling of accomplishment after a completed training round or mission.
♥ Sleeping; her covers seem so heavy in the morning, especially before dawn.
♥ The chill of a morning breeze.
Dislikes:
÷ Humid heat.
÷ Dogs; especially the small ones.
÷ Being bored.
÷ Physical contact makes her uncomfortable.
÷ Most types of vegetables are too sour for her tastes.
÷ Having to wait.
÷ Mornings; she is nothing before her morning workout.
÷ Reading; she is slightly dyslectic and has a hard time doing so.
÷ Sharp colors; they are just not pretty.
÷ Sweating; although she does this a lot, she does not like the feeling.
Hobby:
Haruka collects weapons. She has a large collection ranging from purple tonfa, to an ivory bō, to her broad-katana, Seidou. Every single one of her weapons have a name.
Fear(s):
Seeing another loved one dead.
Poison; after almost dying from poison once, she gets terrified with the thought of not being so lucky next time.
Hyuugas.
Personal Quote:
””
Will of Steel
Haruka's will of steel is something that is believed to be inherited by the Hagane blood that flows in her veins. She is stubborn like few and once she gets an idea into her head, she will not stop until her goal has been accomplished.
Not the Sharpest Tool in the Shed
Although Haruka will fly into uncontrollable, table-throwing and wall-demolishing, rage whenever someone informs her of this fact, she really is not the sharpest tool in the shed. Her brain works in mysterious ways and takes far longer to get to a conclusion than most; and most of the time her conclusions are wrong.
The Clumsy Swordsman
Despite the fact that she constantly trips over her own feet, branches or even pebbles, Haruka has chosen to wield a giant, two-hand broadsword as her main weapon. The will often fall over when swinging her sword, due to the sheer weight of it.
Chakra Beast
Despite the fact that Haruka's control of her chakra is far from great, she is not very likely to run out of it. She has copious amounts of chakra for her to use, mostly due to her excessive training in an attempt to perfect her chakra educed strength.
Chakra Enduced Strength
Haruka is obsessed with being physically strong and as so, she has gone as far as to make herself stronger by infusing her muscles with chakra. Due to this, her physical power is far beyond that of a regular human and she is capable of smashing boulders with her bare hands.
Direct, real-time conversations seem a lot more personal to me than just posting on a forum, and I'm not comfortable at all doing that with people I don't know. I do use Discord, but the server I'm on is just with people I've known for years now because of this. Sorry.
First off, I have no problem using Discord or whatever happens to be the case.
However, regardless if whether Discord is used or not I do think that it's a user's personal choice to use it. I'm not sure about everyone else, but I RP to have fun. If using Discord, or any Chat program really, makes the RP less enjoyable I'm not sure the benefit is worth it. At the very least it shouldn't be mandatory for someone to use it.
I'm quite uncomfortable with Discord and stuff, too, despite normally being quite active when it comes to OOC banter. I can't actually describe why, but I'm just not cool with it. Especially when it's a large group RP.
@Halvtand I mean that I don't agree that a chat is quicker--unless you're in so few and they're so slow that you can afford to have notifications on for everything.
@Raineh Daze It actually is faster, it's generally the same difference in speed as any central server structure vs direct p2p-networking protocol. However, that difference in speed is irrelevant since your basic forum structure doesn't update continually like a chat does. As such you're always held back to whatever speed your connection type and web browser cares to update the web page at. That is of course, only after you've actively told it to update, whereas a chatroom would automatically update at the acceptance of a new message.
With that cleared up the strong dislike toward using Discord looks overwhelming so it's not likely we'll use it anyway.
How often are you comfortable and able to post? It varies of course. Both on how busy I am in my daily life and on the posting speed and quality of my co-players. At least one post per week is not a problem. A post per day on the other hand will be. Do you think there should be a post limit ? (I.e: a number of posts before you post again). Yes, the single reason for this is that a few players that post actively shouldn't A. flood the IC with short or nonsensical posts or B. move at a much faster pace than the characters of slower posters. My general rule is that you can post every third time, that is between each of your own post there should be two others. This lets the other people react to what's going on, while at the same time doesn't slow the game to a halt just because one guy isn't writing. What would you like to focus on? (Action, drama, character development, a combination of things). Focus... I would actually like to see some world development in this game as well. After all, the village was all but destroyed in the war and is described as evolving. Of course, some action is required, this is a shonen game after all. Any other notes? No, I think that covers it for now.
@Halvtand I think you went too far into the technical as opposed to the practical 'how often does the end user check it'. And Discord's scrolling with new messages is a great way to maybe miss something. xD
2x Thank
