Hiya_Everyone
^_~*) Just know that any insult is not real... it's all in comedy and...... "I'm bored's" sake.
Okay, first thing's first.
Why people suck:
Now, I'm not the best RPer in the world, but I believe I now have the right to say I'm good enough to
be teaching other people how to do it.
I've been flamed and picked on, praised and even worshiped, however none of that matters.
I'm trying to teach people how to RP, and if you don't like it, take your complaints elsewhere. I'm not the
best speller-- but I try.
Now, the reason most people on this site suck, is either:
1) They COULD RP well, they're just too darned lazy, for these people, bully for you.
2) Now, this is the last reason of two-- the main reason of ALL.
Some horrible RPer who doesn't know any better, teaches a person how to "rp," thus making him
believe saying *Walks in* is a detailed "sentence," and he teaches someone else, they teach someone
else, so forth and so on.
And they're too stubborn to admit they're doing it the boring way and continue with it. Usually
they're pig-headed and won't take a hint.
Thus resulting in a hundred people failing college because they don't know how to spell, or write a
simple sentence. (The four types are simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex)
I'd teach you the difference between a verb and subject, but if you don't know, then you've failed at life.
Okay, here are the fake rules (the second example, "good," is also known as "semi-literate." In other words, baloney)
Here they are:
Bad: *walks n*
Good: *She walked in*
This is incorrect, true that using asterisks is okay (despite the fact that *She walked in and sat down*
isn't really a sentence in and of itself)
However, this gives no detail, no info, no nothing.
Now I don't want you saying *Takes ten steps forwards, looks at the door for exactly thirty seconds,
reaches my hand out, grabs the knob that was made of iron, and pushes it open with 3 G-forces*.
This is... not what I mean by detail, by detail I mean....
Rather than *Walks in from the cold, noticeing that the door is already unlocked... a robber must have come in. She gets a little scared.*. It should be somewhat like so:
She walked up the stone steps, shivering. The air was crisp and freezing; she stopped at the door,
thinking a moment on how much she didn't want to unwrap her cloak to open it. The cloak didn't do much to protect her from the freezing weather, she bounced on her tippy toes, mentally pleading with the door to open by itself.
When she'd
gotten up her nerve, she grabbed the handle and, to her surprise, the door creaked open by itself.
"That's odd" she thought to herself. She'd never left the door unlocked before. She quickly walked into her home and shut the door behind her. Something was up-- and a feeling of fear shivered through her spine.
See? I mean, when you actually know what you're talking
about, it's a lot better, I just thought of something off the tip of my brain.
Another thing about being a good RPer, you can't put TOO MUCH detail, or it will get boring. And
you have to describe actions the same amount as you describe the room, otherwise it will be dull.
But then, by the same token, if you NEED to put a lot of detail, don't let anyone tell you "Your story has so much detail that it's boring".
If they got there way, your book would be five pages long.
Now, there is nothing wrong with first-person, and nothing wrong with third, it's what you want to do.
For this guide I will RP third person so no one will get the wrong idea, but I'm a first person RPer
myself.
And none of these stupid things, like..... *He looked at you with a snarling look in his eyes*... or *She
hit the ground softly* or *He grabbed her hand gently, and pulled her up*.
Sometimes you just can't be gentle! These little words have a big tendacy to show up really often and they ruin your stuff.
As in *she shook lightly as the
bitter-cold winds hit against her harshly*. I DOUBT she's going to shake LIGHTLY when she's out in the middle of a frozen wasteland!!!!!! Probably out there for days! Know what I mean? Not only that, but there were TWO adverbs there in the same sentence! AWFUL!!!
And oh yes, avoid changing from past and present tenses without good reason, such as "He turns out
the lights before he left the room." It sounds awkward and disrupts the sentence.
Try to keep from using "They're" for there and vice versa.
Rose is the past tense of rise.
Raise would be the action of causing something to rise... like raising up a sammich to eat it... Though a balloon would rise of it's own accord. - Curtasy of Jello.
Remember, it's not that hard, the main point is that you're writing a story here, so keep at it.
Now we'll deal with:
Things you should hesitate to be:
Okay, I'm going to put a list of things that you shouldn't decide RIGHT OFF THE BAT that you're
going to be.
Notice: You can be any one of these, if and only if, you have a well thought out story to go along with them.
Vampires: Too no imagination and too overused....
Werewolves: Also too overused and no imagination is used here.
Dragons: Well, I've never seen anyone be a dragon yet..... so okay.
Dragon Tamers: ... actually this is a good idea... you can be this...
Demons: Overused, way overused, and geez... a demon? They're bad-guys. So unless you're planning
on being a bad-guy, the odds a thousand GOOD demons come into life.... are low.
Kitsune Neko Inu: I put these in the same category because they’re all on Gaia and half the people on
Gaia get the idea if it’s on Gaia, then you should be it. It’s too overused, stop being it.
Half demon/angel/vampire/human/dragons/vampires/Neko/Cezanne/Inu: Because half and half is a
whole, you moron! You can’t be half of everything. And it’s just as bad being one fourth everything. If
you’re one-fourth Kitsune, it’s VERY unlikely you get a whole tail.
Okay, now let’s deal with:
Making a topic!
Okay, this is getting frustrating... everyone assumes they need to make some kind of mysterious RP that
NO ONE can understand to get people to come to it.
Here are some that are overused and/or not allowed in Barton Town ANYWAY:
Slave Rps. (Not allowed)
In the Mall. (Overused)
Make-out rooms. (Also not allowed)
The such and such bar. (Not allowed, most of the time, I wouldn't make one anyway, what's the
point?)
On a beach. (Not allowed, it is, in NO WAY, an adventure roleplay.
When you make one, it's not always a good idea to make it set out, as in, everything is made and
ready.
A good portion should be, but not all of it. Thus making it possible for other people to work with the
RP.
And then the: Common mistakes.
These are mistakes that present themselves often in every day Rping, either overlooked or not cared
about.
First there's the repeat wording. Such as using one word several times.... in the same sentence... it's
wrong. Repetitive and makes it very.... not good. Wrong sounding.
Then there is the mistake of, no matter what you do, your characters always sound gloomy, in fact,
your whole Rping feels gloomy and sad... well I don't know how to fix this but uhm... you should do
something about it.
Well, there are a ton of things.... but I forget, I think I'm tired... well okay, we'll just take into consideration
what I've said.. And yeah.
Another mistake is making your entire post composed of actions. I'll explain:
When RPing you usually want to write as if a story, and you've never seen a story with JUST actions, have you?
Example: Atari grabbed his quarter-staff and rushed down the stairs. He hopped down the last step and took off towards the door thinking "I'm late, I'm late", he ran out the already opened door and down the steps, then ran foreward.
He went past the street and wiped his brow. After sliding his hand across a couple mailboxes his friend showed up.
Atari looked out of the corner of his eyes and saw her walking towards him.
He smiled and waved to her, she hugged him and he hugged back.
"Hi Hope!"
This just sounds too fast, like everything's happening a million miles per hour.
Just something to think about.
The English Lesson:
Ahh, I've got more info. All I have to do to discover this stuff is look around Barton Town, there are a million things I can contradict. Including my own spelling.
I notice people love to say "<Insert random line here> escaped her lips."
Okay, I know this SOUNDS detailed to you, but what do you PICTURE when you read it? You don't think of a noise, you can't picture a person speaking with this, here's what I picture: Lips moving.
Let me explain, escaped is when you want to say something, but you can't.
You want to speak so bad! And then suddenly, on purpose, or by accident, a scream escapes your lips.
Now, if you DON'T want to say something, it'd be the same deal. Suddenly you'd accidentally have a "I love you" escape your unwilling lips.
See, see?!
And then there's the issue of certain words: Aint/you're/your.
Aint should NEVER be used in writing unless your character talks that way, other than that, scrap it.
You're: Contraction of you are.
Your: As in "your shoes". If I put "you're shoes," it would mean "you are shoes". Get what I'm saying here?
Also, avoid using et, for ate.
And here's some helpful word tips:
Sit: To sit down. "He looked for a place to sit down, but the seats were all taken"
Set: To put something down. "She set her books on the table.
Rose/rise: To go up; to stand. "Atari rose from his position and walked towards the wounded person before him."
Raise/raised: To lift up! "They pulled the ropes, which raised the building to it's fullest height."
Hope you found this usefull, later!
Atari: Out.
Hey, what is this "semi-literate" I see so often?
Doeth mine ears decieve me? Or do the non-literate, pig-headed n00bs actually admit to not being "literate"?!!
Honestly, everytime I come across someone who thinks they're experienced, I point out a couple mistakes and tell them how to get better.
And they bark at me, then run off whimpering with there tail between there legs.
If you think that *walks in and sits down* is LITERATE, then what the heck is only SEMI literate?
*wlks n ad sts dwn*? ??? ??
That can't be, because they think that is totally the opposite of literate all-together.
So, my conclusion!:
They are using the word "semi-literate" for people who KNOW that there RPing is worth a bucket of rocks(and about as half as intelligent ), and aren't willing to do anything about it.
But when someone asks, they say they are "getting better," or they "aren't that good yet".
If there is no right or wrong way to RP, and you can simply say *sits down and looks around the room;* then saying there is semi-literacy, is actually admitting that there is a better way of RPing.
And that you're at least willing to learn a little.
Hmph, tell me you're literate.
I'll pop you all over this place with your stupid half-witted, badly spelled, grammatically and morally incorrect "sentence".
Okay, I'm back, and I've got something you might enjoy.....
The long awaited for masterfully executed, original and very unique, awesome battle RP stylings OOOOOF:
The Battle Guide
First, I'll give you the RULES:
First rule of battling: Don't talk about battling.... oh wait.. that's first rule of fight club... uhm.. moving on.
Rule number 1: No godmodding. The first, and most important rule of all!
Godmodding is when you do things that are beyond the capability's of your character. (Such as teleporting when you never had teleporting powers before, you just made them up to cope with what's going on.)
Also, godmodding is haveing a move "so powerful it can take you out with one hit and only takes a milisecond to charge".
Rule number 2: No power-playing. Also part of godmodding, basically. It's when your character has a barrier of some kind that is IMPOSSIBLE to penetrate. (Such as if we had a neuclear holocaust, you'd be the only man alive.)
Also, when no matter how many times you are hit, your character doesn't recognise his own damage. Such as being cut in the shoulder with a sword, then through the rest of the battle, he acts as if he can use that same arm perfectly.
Rule number 3: No puppeteering.
This is when you control your opponents character. Such as the following:
He swung his sword hard, vertical motion, but he dodged it skillfully and slid back into fighter stance. "You're good, but can you handle THIS!"
Uhm, yeah, you can't control your opponents character.
Rule number 4: Watch what your friggen doing! If someone dissapears because they went so fast that only an after-image is left, and they were running at YOU just before you dissapeared.
They're probably planning on hitting you instantly! Not five minutes later after you've come up with another plan while your opponent is still apparently running around and around the ring keeping you from seeing him, wasting his energy.
You have to be sensible about these things! Come on! I'm fighting someone now and he's so annoying! He doesn't even know how to use his fists....anyways.
Rule number 5: You must know your own strengths-- and weaknesses.
That's right, you can't dodge/jump/run/fly/shoot energy or magic/teleport/punch/kick/tackle or pummel, beyond your own characters limits.
It's simply not done.
If you have a long cut, from across your chest to your belly-button, you're not going to be bending down much I promise you.
Now we'll get with the basics: When you fight, you're trying to beat the other guy up, I'm sure all of you ladies have fought before so you don't need much training.
But you homosexuals, supposedly "girly," probably need a few lessons. (Not that I've ever laid a fist on someone in real life either--)
Here are some tips:
If you're going to get hit, then GET HIT, take it like a man and don't make your character fly back ten feet! This ruins everything!
You can't have a battle where both of you, everytime you get hit you fly back and then come foreward, fly back then come foreward! That's no fun! And can be solved with a lil' system I made up.... .just now while writing this...
Okay, a long time ago someone came in and stated three methods of fighting, ONE of them being, you can auto-hit a person several times, but you can NOT autohit the finishing, most powerful hit.
Just the short combo at the beginning.
Well, I've got something that could make that a bit better.
Rather than comboing the heck out of them easily. Here's the deal: If you hit them once (not an auto-hit) then you can continue comboing from there.
But ONLY if you've already landed a blow.
Now here's the catch, the first, and last hit of this combo, is always judged by your opponent.
Note: Remember, how long your combo lasts should be judged by how strong you are, how strong your opponent is, and what you think he could probably block.
Like, if you uppercut him, well he's easily open for another hit, but if you kick him in the shin-- well he might be able to recover.... ow.. so just .. pay attention.
Now here's something else that you might have trouble with: Grabbing.
Ever wanted to grab someone but you figured it'd be autohitting if you did? So what do you do?
Simple: You wait for the right moment. If you're in a position where there is NO WAY that he could possibly dodge your grab (especially if you're grabbing with a long, powerful tail), then you go ahead and RP grabbing them.
Like if he ran at you and did a jumping kick, and you ducked under it, you can automatically grab his waist with your tail and do a powerslam, or whatever you do.
Also, you can say things like, if he punched at you, you could do something like the following:
I side stepped and grabbed his wrist, then turned around and attempted to throw him over my shoulder.
Then, he could easily say something like this:
Atari, used to this situation, quickly grabbed onto his wrist and jumped into the air, spinning so as to twist his arm back.
Without wasting anytime, he yanked his hand away quickly.
Then, if he doesn't want it to end there, he could say:
Tuken wouldn't let him get away so quickly, he held fastly to his wrist and bent down, spinning to untwist his own arm.
Then to finish this, he raised his elbow and slammed it hard on the back of Atari's.
Now, one person is probably going to get hit, so let's imagine that it is Atari, he would do this:
Atari was surprised by this action, he was sure he'd have gotten his hand away, everything happened so fast.
And before he knew it, a sharp bone slammed into his arm.
He grunted in pain and closed his eyes tightly. Though that wasn't the best thing to do now.
And, basing this on the rules that I've stated above, this is what Tuken would do:
His elbow connected harsly and, without letting go of Atari's wrist, he kicked him in the stomach, then punched him in the face with a hard right.
He could feel his knuckles dig into his skin.
He let go of his wrist and jumped into the air, spinning hard he kicked at his face with the side of his foot.
And of course, Atari gets to decide weather the last hit would connect:
Atari was dazed and in pain, before the final kick, he dropped to his knees and Tuken missed by inches.
He felt the wind of the kick blow his hair.
Finally gathering himself, Atari quickly stood to his feet and scurried backwards.
"You have skills, you're strong! I give this match to you."
Wow-- that looked fun, didn't it?
There are many other things to do, but that's just an example of grabbing and comboing.
Enjoy!
Okay, 'nuff of this, let's get on to better things, like
Describing the Scenery
Now you may think "I'm insulted! I have some of the best scenery describing skills this side of... of. uhm... yeah!"
Well, I'm sure you do, but my job is to keep people away from cliche' lines!
I don't have anything already planned to say here, this just popped into my head, so bare with me.
Okay I've noticed that everyone who describes scenery seems to do it-- uhm... the same way as everyone else.
Is there a book on it-- ?
Anyways, if you're going to describe the night, one of the main things is, night is USUALLY cold. (Where I live anyways)
So, it's always good to describe that first, if you're going to describe trees, use fancy words like "lush" and "evergreen".
You know, things that tell what kind of trees, this gives a mentail image.
When I say "Oak tree" what do you think of?
What was that? An Oak tree? Wow! It worked!
If everything is dead, use words like "baren" or "dull".
If you're in a wasteland, don't use the word valley.
Now, when describing stars, do NOT use cliche' lines or any crud like that.
Don't say "Diamonds spread over a sheet of black leather"..... okay? (unless your character sees things that way.. literally.. heh.)
When you describe things like this, I've found it best to use exactly what it seems like.
Such as, say the stars
Twinkle shine, glisten, are bright, burn brightly, sparkle, you see the different images that come into your mind with each word?
And do not spend five hours on what you're describing, it'll get dull. You don't have to get instantly to the point, especially if your character is just taking in all that's there.
Just try to keep things together and interesting.
If you're in a forest with gigantic trees, don't just say "I'd come to a forest with gigantic trees".
Geez man! Put some emphasis on it!
Like uhh, this:
I looked behind me, scared to death, praying they weren't following-- I saw nothing.
I suddenly noticed leaves crunching under my feet as I slowed to a bare walk.
I'd come to a forest, I didn't even know how long I'd been in here.
"Oh man.... tell me I'm not lost!" I paused for a moment, resting my hand against the trunk of a tree.
By chance, I happened to look up and I was immediately aw-strucken.
I stepped back and gazed far, far up.
This tree was huge!
I turned around and looked, again I found my head raising as I looked up-- they were all huge!
I backed into the tree I had been leaning against and my head hit the trunk.
I quickly jumped foreward and turned around, one hand holding my head, the other a knife in hand. "Oh." I said, frozen at my jumpyness "just a tree." I quickly put my knife back in my pouch and began to walk in the only direction I could: Foreward.
Never did I stop gazing up at trees from time to time. This forest was truely wonderful-- but now I had a new fear.
See? And, notice how I ended it? Keeps you interested, OOOH the suspence! What's his new fear? Where are those guys that were chasing him? Why were they chasing him? WHAT was chasing him?!!?
Find out-- NEVER! Because even I don't know.
Anyway, that's all for now, I'll give some more...... later.
Now, more on the
Imagination
Okay, the imagination is a fascinating thing. Unfortunately, it is-- very rarely used.
Do you know where vampires and werewolves come from?
You guessed it! They come from the lack of imagination, a deep pit that everyone is sucked into and blown out as some unimaginative creature.
That's also where people on Gaia with buck teeth are spawned.
Now, I'm going to cover the art of role playing with your imagination.
It's an ancient technique and is used by very few, (with an exception of me and a few other people that will be mentioned later on) so pay attention!
Now the first thing you're going to want to do, is forget the cliche' lines, forget the sad stuff, forget all these things like "gently" and "She took her keys out, walking towards the door."
This stuff-- it's irrelevent.
These are things that everyone uses, it's just not right. Think of your own wording, say it how you think it should be said.
When you type something down, read it and think, "does everyone else write the same way I do?"
Then fix it.
The imagination also comes in handy for emotions.
Rather than describe it with words that everyone else uses, or say things like, "there was a raging beast inside of him threatening to get out." (this is supposed to be describing anger)
Close your eyes and picture, picture how you would feel in the same situation.
If you were sad, excited, angry, horrified.
Imagine the expression, describe it.
Well, that's all I have on this topic.
Now let's take a look at the
Credits
All the people who helped me out and made this possible:
Jello. (The a*****e)
Tobias. (The longwinded defender)
Fire Demon Red. (The Fire Demon who is Red)
Atari. (The Blue haired bull-taker)
Some girl. (The cliche' angel)
If you helped and I did not give credit to you, I probably don't care about you, so get lost.
Now that I've said my thanks, here are some more things that I have officially, and unoffically dubbed,
Roleplayers Little Problems.
I usually start another section because of what one person did.
So I start out with only ONE problem and a whole entire section. So I have to think up on the past and find some more information on it.
Now, I'll just start with problem number one.
Problem 1) Well, when you do your opening post, you're going to want to explain how your character walks, how he/she moves, how they stand, what color there eyes are, how friendly does he/she look?
What color hair and what does it look like? What cloths you're wearing, and so on.
Now, people have this tendacy to uh-- to keep describing his or her eyes, after the introductory post.
Here is something that I got from someone else's guide:
The scowl remained on Bob?s face, disgusted with how the customers were acting. His blue eyes caught sight of a muscular man juggling a pair of Halflings!? How pathetic. The blonde haired man thought. Turning his gaze to a waitress, he waved her over. ?Hey wench! Come here! I need some ale!?Bob exclaimed, furious.
There are two things wrong with this, first of all, she said his "blue eyes" turned.
This would sound okay in most instances however, she said that the post before this!
So it just ends up sounding repetetive.
I've put a line through the messed up area's.
The other thing is the describing his blond hair, again. Trust me, it just sounds wrong.
She should have just explained how his hair moved or something. Anyway, that's one thing people should learn to keep away from, repetetiveness is roleplaying enemy number one.
Then comes mistake number 2) ...... ah man! I'm running out of material.
One moment please----
Ah yes, the missconsumption that "anyways" is a word.
It is in the dictionary, however-- it's actually a missuse of the word, "anyway."
So be careful of that little-- thing.
Problem number 3) Now, don't point out the obvious unless it's not that obvious.
Example of point out the obvious when it's already obvious:
I grabbed his wrist and pulled hard, I spun around and around, twirling him with all my strength.
The G-force was too great for him to do much anything so my opponent had no choice but to hang on, then, all at once, I flung him as hard as I could.
He shot off like a rocket, spinning extremely fast.
I thought for sure he would hit the ground and be out for the count, to my surprise, he suddenly seemed to gain control!
He backflipped and landed lightly on his toes, then sank to the flat of his feet-- smiling mischeviously.
I looked on with horror, realizing what I planned had failed.
Okay-- this sounds good at first but-- it's the way I pointed out the obvious, my plan had failed.
Duh! Since he's standing and not fainted, it obviously failed. I'm sure no one would think, "Oh gee, my plan failed."
The most obvious thing they would think, is, "Rats!"
Now, here's how to make it right:
I grabbed his wrist and pulled hard, I spun around and around, twirling him with all my strength.
The G-force was too great for him to do much anything so my opponent had no choice but to hang on, then, all at once, I flung him as hard as I could.
He shot off like a rocket, spinning extremely fast.
I thought for sure he would hit the ground and be out for the count, to my surprise, he suddenly seemed to gain control!
I shook my head in defeat, already knowing my plan had failed.
He backflipped and landed lightly on his toes, then sank to the flat of his feet-- smiling mischeviously.
Sound better? Deffinantly. It's all about where you place your junk.
Well, that's all for this.
Atari: out.
Special honors.
Thank you, Sienna Ranos.
She is the one who supplied us all with these great words of wisdom. (now maybe people will shut the heck up!)
"Well done Atari for taking the time to sit down and write down all these ideas."
This is the ACTUAL phrase in its ORIGINAL CONTEXT. It is not edited, or touched in any way.
Look on with wonder and amazment--
And my response:
Kumizu
This little guide is really good. I originally had my character based as a demon, but since my start at the guild I'd like to think I've pulled away from that cliche. That's another thing he should mention: nothing is set in stone. Your character will grow, and oftentimes you'll throw out some of the ideas you had when you first created him/her.
