tex

Wants and Needs: an Inquiry on the Nature of Roleplaying

What a pretentious and overbearing title.

Role-playing is a practice in futility, I think. My never ending search for stories that see an ultimate end is constantly met with pitfalls and roadblocks. Most role-plays die out before even reaching a single significant plot point, and those that don't, typically slow down immensely and burn out into passionless embers.

Despite that however, there are plenty of people who just live in the moment. A hedonistic desire to fill out their wildest fantasies, or see their small-scale goals come to fruition. I'm guilty of this too. After all, it's called role-playing, not Role-cohesive-plot-analysis-and-subsequent-story-fulfillment. I think the fun of it really does just come from those moments when the pieces align. Most Role-plays are poorly thought out, but in that unstructured chaos, we find times where our characters feel like they're jutting from the words and grabbing at our hearts. Moments when our terribly fragmented cooperation links together into a beautiful fractal of radical catharsis.

It's hard to describe those moments, but to simplify, they're just like...

Whoosh

Bam

Pow

Y'know?

Anyways, on to the point, or rather, question I'm meant to pose.

What part of your Role-playing experience fulfills you the most? Which decisions, or encounters, give you those sick tingly feelings along the back of your wrists? What are you always looking for when you step into your character's shoes?

Feel free to elaborate while I constantly fret over the asinine nature of English grammar.

One Piece - Here We Are

Molly roused from her slumber slowly, but was still too groggy to speak. She looked past Shane at the sky, and without a word, pointed up at a giant smokestack that climbed into the cloud-line. It wasn't coming from town, though. It rose up from the northwestern outskirts, where Shane's uncle owned a private lumber mill. It was hard to tell exactly where the smoke came from, but if it wasn't uncle Richardson's mill, then the pirates would have had to be burning through the forest at random.

One Piece - Here We Are

Shane and Molly were completely passed out within seconds. The woman responsible gently laid them to rest in the sand and stood tall, pulling the smoke back into her hair. She turned to her allies and nodded. Without delay, hundreds of men and women began to rappel down from her giant ship, and within minutes, they split up and combed the island like a colony of worker ants desperately searching for food.

* * *

Shane woke up a few hours later. His body was sore, like somebody had just tossed him down a bumpy hill, but he could move just fine. Behind him, the boat still loomed overhead, but now he was surrounded by endless sets of footprints on either side of his body. Molly still slept at his feet, but wouldn't awaken.

One Piece - Here We Are

"Nothing, nothing," She whispered. A fog-like mist poured out from her hair and started to seep into both children. As it did, a drowsy feeling washed over them even stronger than before. By now, Molly was already passed out. "Just let my sink sink fruit pull you down into a world of slumber for a while, little ones. When you wake up, everything will be much better, I promise."

tex's interest check thinger.

What

Part One: Me, myself, and everything about me, but not really

Tex is the name, role-playing is not a huge thing I've been doing for a year or two. I'm looking to get back into the word-for-word stuff since I've been writing a lot more, just as another outlet to practice and keep my creative substances coursing through the brain-case or whatever. Forgive my lackadaisical mannerisms, or don't; I'm not stopping.

Here are a few who-cares facts about my writing and opinions of writing or writers. Maybe you agree, or maybe you already want to throw a brick at my head. Either way, let's get coffee. You'll have to drink mine though because I hate coffee and the prospect of 'getting coffee' in general.

I'm having fun with this, so bare with me here.

• I hate the semicolon. I used it earlier to emphasize how much it sucks and should not be used in creative writing, ever. Did you double take when you saw it? Maybe bite your lip in frustration a little? Same, tbh.
• Post length? What's that? As long as you effectively get across everything important to you as a player, the length of a post doesn't determine anything. I literally read a 500-word paragraph in another thread just two minutes ago that trips over itself describing a deer or a horse or something. It sucks to be put down for short posts, and it sucks to feel like you need to live up to some outrageous expectation of what writing should be. Don't feel bad if you can't conjure up the pretentious word-vomit that is the traditional writer's methodology. We here to enjoy ourselves, yeah?
• Now to directly contradict what I just said, I'm not looking to role-play with people who can't keep my attention with their characters. It's cool if you want to do your own thing with the characters you're playing, but I will bail outright if something doesn't really flow for me, ya dig? I don't expect all that much, but if I see that you're trying too hard, or it seems like you're not having fun with it, I'm not forcing myself to stick around, and you shouldn't either.
• Let me be clear here: Don't force yourself to stick around if the story isn't clicking with you either, but seriously, be up-front about it. If you ghost me, or delay for weeks at a time without any reason, you'll never see me again. I mean, we'll see each other, probably, but it'll be like one of those awkward water cooler conversations. You know the one. Where like, you just called me a flamboyant weasel in front of the whole office, and we all have to just pretend that it's no big deal, but we're both seething inside? Something like that. Bad metaphor.
• I couldn't think of anything for this bullet point. Uh, I hate when people use big words that they don't understand. Don't do it.
• Try to work with me, and I'll try to work with you. Communication is key, otherwise things are just going to keep happening and it's gonna suck for everything. You want a thing? Ask for it, but don't expect to get it exactly the way you want it.
• Post frequency? I don't like it when people take weeks to get out a single post. If you can't manage a fairly consistent schedule, you might want to look elsewhere. Like, I'll be real, I can manage multiple posts daily if I'm in the zone, like, writing faster than Steven King? Done, easy. Granted, it's not going to be great content, but have you looked around? I'm not exactly competing with the George Orwell's of our time, here. At any rate, I'm not looking for somebody who can match my ridiculous posting habits, just people who won't devolve into posting once every two weeks. If you think you'll have constant hold-ups, please don't inquire.
• Yes I forgot to capitalize my username. I'm not changing it, I live up to my mistakes! It's like having a forehead tattoo, except not at all.
• S Y M B O L I S M.
• Ask, and you'll get an answer. Doesn't matter what the question is.

Now for the important genre stuff.

• Action: Regardless of the genre, I really enjoy action above all else. If there's no action, I can manage, but action is pretty great. Writing out combat, or like, literally a murder is 100* more interesting than writing out a slow walk downtown or something.
• Adventure: Also great. The sense of progress is strongest when there's a destination ahead of us that seems just out of reach. Going from point A all the way to point Z is where all the excitement and suspense comes from, y'know?
• Fantasy: My favorite genre, this is where I live. I've made so many universes I can't even count them on both hands.
• Sci-Fi: Honestly it's just fantasy in space. Not that different imo.
• Romance: Let me be clear on this, if you go into a role-play expecting a guaranteed romance to play out, get lost. I won't be coy about it, stay away from me, man. I'm not about playing out fantasies or whatever. If two characters have chemistry and they want to make out, that's cool, but I don't do the whole 'plan for this goal in mind' nonsense in role playing. But hey, if one of your characters ends up having a thing for one of mine, feel free to have them make a move so that I can crush their hearts with one momentous denial.
• 18+/Smut: No. Begone from this realm, fiend. Return to the dank underbelly of your wretched crack den, you absolute ruffian. Crawl to the cavernous void that you call a home, you insatiable maniac. I will not adhere to your degeneracy.

Holy fuck, you read all of that?

Damn. If it wasn't clear, I prioritize having fun with writing over most other things. My version of 'fun' might be very different than yours, though. If you actually read all that, then damn, send me an idea and I'll think it over.

Drop a post here in this thread, or DM me, and we'll do the prep stuff. Maybe.

One Piece - Here We Are

Molly didn't say anything. Her silence was accompanied by a sudden weight in Shane's step. Suddenly, a hand crept underneath his arm and yanked him to a standstill. Molly fainted behind him, and he felt woozy, like he'd just taken a 100 foot tumble down a huge hill.

The lady captain craned over him like a giant skeleton and grabbed his other arm. "No need to be getting those stubborn marines involved, little boy."

Video Games: The General Discussion & Community Thread

If there's a boss fight that really stood out to me, it was the optional Leviathan summon Materia fight. It felt like a raid and had some cool mechanics that forced you to position in certain ways in order to optimize the fight. But in reality, most boss fights really just do boil down to face-tanking with block and outputting ass-loads of damage. I just loved the music tracks and cinematic craziness of it all. If Leviathan is anything to go based off of for 'giant boss fights' though, I'm looking forward to the post-game content in the Ruby/Emerald/Ultima weapon fights.

One retcon I wouldn't mind having: Sapphire weapon actually getting a fight instead of having its stupid head blown off by Juno's giant Mako cannon. Maybe even a better diamond weapon fight and some Omega weapon content - Really just any retcons that allow for some more super-boss fights.

Going back and playing the original FF-7 shows that it was really just littered with a lot of linear sections to begin with, and midgar was the most grievous offender, but it's true that they kind further dumb down the pathing into a giant hallway in the remake. It's not really forgivable that they essentially made Midgar into an entire game without adding much of substance. Makes you wonder how exactly they're going to pad the world map.

One Piece - Here We Are

Molly tried her best to keep upright as she followed after her brother. "We gotta tell the people at the Marines outpost!" she shouted. Molly didn't even think it over before saying it. At the mention of marines, the gunman stepped out of the lineup and flipped his weapon around his body.

"Calm down," the captain whispered, "They're just children, Chadley."

Chadley frowned and flipped his gun back into position on his back. "I've sure we've done worse, ma'am."

"Children don't need to die over such a trifle. Oh yoo-hoo! Little boy! Little girl!" The extra tall lady captain rose a hand and waved at Molly and Shane.

One Piece - Here We Are

Molly immediately grabbed her brother's shoulder and tried pulling him away, to no avail. "Are you stupid!? We gotta run!" She pulled and pulled, thrashing her body with every tug, but her little arms were not enough to move her elder sibling.

From atop the boat, five people dropped down into the sand as if it were nothing, flinging shards across the beach with each landing.

The first was the helmsman, a giant of a man with glistening black armor that hugged his rounded figure. He wore a pair of high-tech goggles and a gas mask to hide his face, and had swirly black hair, held high in a spiked pompadour. His lanky arms hung low, bare to the wind, with a pair of black gloves covering each hand.

The second man stood just over 6 feet tall and had a giant rifle slung around his shoulder at a 40 degree angle. Its golden nozzle hovered a few inches above the sand. He wore a pair of shorts, a green vest, and a blue neckerchief around his forehead that held his short blonde hair up and away from his eyes. For a sniper, he looked pretty burly, with a bulging upper body. His thin, almost atrophied legs told another story. With such a peculiar build, it was a wonder he could stand up straight at all.

The third person's face attracted the eye faster than the rest. A woman. Possibly in her twenties. Maybe thirties? It was hard to think and look at her without stumbling over your thoughts. Especially since she wasn't wearing any clothes. Thankfully, her slender form was entirely obscured by clouds of pink smoke that stuck to her like cotton candy. She smiled ear to ear with a V-shaped mouth, and stared at the children with malice lacing the thin slits of her eyelids.

The fourth didn't even look like a man at all. He stood at least 7 feet tall. A cloak hid his entire body in segmented strips of green and black fabric. The shape of his face though... It was peculiar. Almost like that of a snake's. The edge of his mouth bore scars that wrapped nearly all the way around to the back of his head, and his pupils were slits in their sockets.

At the center of the crew members, their Captain stood taller than the rest. A beanpole of a woman. Thinner than Molly, and taller than her clunky, extra-wide friend. Her hair clung close to her face and torso, flicking off of her body with tiny curls near the middle of her waist. She wore a black dress with a split down the side of her left leg that clung to her figure.

The five of them looked down at Molly and Shane, but didn't say a word.

Video Games: The General Discussion & Community Thread

FF7 capitalizes on an existing story that was pretty ok to begin with by adding in ridiculous plot elements that either make no sense, or come across as shameless retcons.

The game is... So unabashedly padded with constant nonsense. Even if the slow-walks and narrow passages are just used to buffer loading times, it can get excessively cumbersome.

The battle system is like what FF15 should have been. Engaging to some degree, but not too complex to the point that you end up tripping over a bunch of inane mechanics. It's good at masking its own simplicity with moves that make you feel like you're really taking part in the combat. The Boss battles almost never fail to impress.

Regardless of anything the first game did right, the future of the FF7 Remake series looks absolutely abysmal.