Extra-special RPing Guide for those who RP

[Wes Janson]

This guide can be for both beginners and vetrans.

1. What is RPing?

RPing stands for Role Playing and in this text-based forum, it is a game in which a person picks a character (or several) in which to write about and creates new adventures for them to go on and interacts with other characters. It is an excellent way to brush up on your writing skills as well as to see how characters would live and react to in ways and scenarios that didn't happen in the movie or book that they are from.

2. How do I go about doing this thing?

You write. Plain and simple. Write a creative story in elementary school? Exact same thing. (Please don't use the same grammar and spelling, though! I assume that you have advanced.)

3. Aspects of writing:

First person vs. Third person

We use Third person in this forum. It makes it easier to read and it comes off more like a story.

Spelling and Grammar

This is pretty much an unwritten but expected thing in most if not all RPs. We want to read a story. Therefore, it better read like a story. I personally think that grammar is more important than spelling in the game because we all easily make spelling mistakes from time to time (especially with Star Wars names and places) but without good grammar, you can't even understand what's going on.

Run-on-Sentences

Don't make a sentence last the entire paragraph.

Luke did this and did that but went over here and then did that but all of a sudden he went over there instead but once he got settled he got back up and sat down on that thing but it wasn't comfortable so he got a pillow and went to sleep.

Yeah, it's weird.

Dialogue and Paragraphs

Space out your speaking bits so that it's easier to read. Breaking things up into paragraphs might make it easier for all of us so we don't have to take five minutes to search in the post to figure out where your dialogue is. I know this can be chalked up to personal preferences and writing styles sometimes and I am guilty of doing such, but it's mostly common courtesy when it comes to this. Don't forget the " ".

No:

It was a tough decision, but Wes was adamant about it. "You know what? Let's just go," he said. Then he placed his blaster back in the holster and went outside.

Yes:

It was a tough decision, but Wes was adamant about it.

"You know what? Let's just go," he said. Then he placed his blaster back in the holster and went outside.


4. Knowing your character:

Research. Wookee and wiki. Figure out what they would do in certain situations, how they would react to things and people. Be like a scientist and them your little lab rat. Subject them to stimuli and see how they react. Think about it when you're doing something at your house: How would Wes Janson wash his clothes every week? Answer: Probably doesn't, leaves them lying around until it gets too much to bear and then hires a droid to pick up after him. There will be games and things to help you with this in these forums. The journals and prompts are excellent in helping you with your character development.

[glow=red,2,300]The Dreaded Mary-Sue and Gary-Stu:[/glow]

In Star Wars verse, this is a little easier to discern because you don't have a pretty little intelligent elf-thing that everyone loves.

Good characters have flaws. Nobody's perfect. Now that doesn't mean they should be ALL flaws, that's just counter productive and people will get annoyed at the emo whining of your character. Angst is always a good plot device, however.

Make sure that they're good at some things--and bad at others.

However, oftentimes people use Mary-Sues to project themselves into the universe of their choice, so the character is basically themselves. There's nothing really wrong about that (I mean, I wouldn't do it 'cause it's not my thing, but I AM guilty of doing it in fanfic when I was like 14) but you have to be careful you don't just put the good things and forget the bad.

[Darth Vader]

5. The Do's and DO NOT's.

There are, in the course of a roleplay, many things that are appreciated. Similarly, there are just as many things that are not appreciated, looked down on and even considdered captial offenses in the RPing communitly. Here, I will outline the things that you do want to do in a roleplaying situation, as most of them have already been explained in detail up above. I will also explain things you want to stay away from at all costs.

Please DO:

• Stay in character! This means not doing things that your character probably wouldn't do in real life, such as Luke Skywalker killing in cold blood or Darth Sidious saving a kitten from a traffic accident.
  
• Be literate! This means writing in complete sentences with grammar and spelling that is not necessarily perfect, but still capable of being understood.
  
• Write in the third person! This means using pronouns like he, she and they rather then I, me and we.
  
• Roll with the flow of RP! Giving a plot twist every here and again is fine, but if every post you make has the course of RP turning a full 180, it gets a bit tiresome and annoying. Plot twists should only be drastic for cannon characters in the first place; OC plot twists shouldn't be galaxy-shattering at all.

Please DO NOT:

• Godmode! This means making your character so powerful that it gets unrealistic. There are many ways to do this, which are listed in detail below.
  
• Gary-Stu or Mary-Sue! This means making your character so perfect that it's sickeining, as has been explained above.
  
• Disrupt or change the flow of roleplay! This means that if a bunch of characters are sitting down and enjoying a picknick, you have no business coming in and crashing the party with blasters blazing unless it's a part of some bigger main event.

6. Godmode?

Godmode is a way of writing that a lot of people new to the roleplaying scene fall into. It is also the biggest pet peve of just about every roleplayer I've ever met, punishable by a ban in most roleplaying scenarios I've been exposed to. In an attempt to prevent an otherwise capable and interested roleplayer from falling into this deadly trap, I'm giving you this fair warning. As you write, be on the lookout for the following forms of godmode.

The most common means of godmode are:

• Autohit- This is when you write the affects of your attack in the same post that you do attack. For instance, writing that you take a shot at somebody, hitting them in the chest and piercing their lungs. That's AutoHit Godmode. Instead, say that you fire a shot aimed at their chest in hopes of piercing their lungs; let the player of your target decide what happens.
  
• Metagame- Perhaps the easiest trap of all to fall into, Metagame is simply using your personal OOC knowledge to assist your character in-game. For instance, if you know out-of-character that a person you're talking to is actually an enemy spy and use that knowledge to try and arrest him, that's Metagame. Even though you know you're dealing with a spy, your character doesn't, and they'll have to find out just like any other spy-hunter does.
  
• Invincibility- Perhaps the most debated of godmode forms, Invincibility takes place when your character is never hit. If your character is able to go up against an insanely well thought out attack from a Jedi Master, dodge incoming fire from enemy infantry, duck under the blast of a tank and still manage to retaliate against everything, you're being invincible. Tone it down!
  
• Escape Artist- Similar to an Invincible character, but slightly different in that instead of never being hit, your character always manages to drop in, inflict as much damage as possible and, as soon as things start to look bad(For instance, when you are hit), dissapear without a trace. Luck will only carry you so far, eventually you will be caught if you keep doing reckless things! Don't try to fight it!
  
• God Mode- Notice that this has been seperated into two seperate words. That's because this denotates a specific form of Godmode that is the most deadly and most annoying of them all. It's a situation where your character, no matter how much they've taken throughout the course of combat, is still able to keep coming with more intelligence then Palpetine, more wisdom then Yoda, more strength then Vader and more skill then Wedge. If you've been shot in the chest, you should be too busy writhing on the floor in agony(or even dying) to do any of that stuff.

In short, Godmode is a series of serious, but easily made mistakes that lead your character to be more powerful then he/she should ever be allowed to become. Be careful about that, keep it constantly in mind whenever you play your character... Especially with an Original.