Jakelvin's Guide of Advanced Roleplay Techniques

Role Play Styles

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Forum Style
Example 1: Jakelvin entered a dusty room with a burning enigma that became his obsession. Literature after prose, he sat on the stale cushion of his throne and only a solitary glimmer of an accompanying candle placed upon the ancient study table was the only means for Jakelvin to scribe texts and paragraphs. The obsession was set aside when the slow patterned thumping returned to Jakelvin's heightened ears. The stones grinding in an empty wooden tunnel was getting louder as Jakelvin drew out his shimmering ruby dagger, ready to feed it with destruction once again.

Example 2: I entered a dusty room with a burning enigma in my mind that became my own obsession. Books after books, I sat at the desk with only one candle light helping me decipher the texts of Draconic origin. I felt something was wrong..thump..thump..thump..thump, then a growl of the stone golem approaching, alerted of my presence. There was no other way out, so I gripped my loyal ruby dagger, the Mazanalacknu and drew it out. I know I have to destroy the golem to get through.

The most descriptive style of the four, the forum style was meant to literally describe your actions and emotions. Some are not as descriptive as the examples above, some are more descriptive, but including EVERY details is not a must. In forums like this website, you are encouraged to make a paragraph or more just to describe a ten second moment with a lover or a villain. However, in limited spaces like in a massively multiplayer online game or in an instant messaging chat room where things are going by fast, you are recommended to have very quick fingers (like 40-60 words in a minute). Unfortunately, some do not have the speed required and have the possibilities of getting confused and block somethings out completely, referring to it as "repeated messages." It is indeed a professional format for any text-based role plays, but not meant for everyone or every type of system. It is too long for 140-500 character limits and takes longer time typing it all out than the live time style. Not only that, but it also required a creative mind to make it as understandable as it is interesting. Basically, for those who are not familiar with the advanced word combos like "tangible malefactor" and "doused optimism," you need to have a thesaurus or a dictionary next to your keyboard before attempting this style. If you know the words, then you're on your way to making a forum styled role play session with friends, even impressed them with your intellect.

Advantages: Precised and Creative
Disadvantages: Too Long and Advanced Role-Players Only

Live Time Style
Example 1: Jakejaliji: Hmm...~picks up the ferret and studies it as Jaeden searches for food~ Cute fellow. :3
(96 characters)

The quickest style of the four, it is solely meant for instant messaging and in-game chatters. There is no need to get creative and make five entries on one moment. All you need is the simple words necessary for the moment. It is as simple as it is quick and confusing. There are many symbols applied to segregate between dialogues, actions/attempts and Out of Character chit chats. Example; <This is my thought> ((This is OoC)) This is a dialogue *This is my action/attempt*. The bad thing about it is its simplicity, if your making an attempt in an unfamiliar approach or manner, the live time style was not built for highly creative attempts that needed some backup information to have less misconception.

Advantages: Quick and Simple
Disadvantages: Confusing and Inaccurate

Animated Style
Example 1: Use the emotes and chat simultaneously.

The style that emphasized in motions along with the dialogue to express the personality visually . It is the most commonly style (seen in movies, flash animations, anime and games) and often the most style in massively multiplayer online games due to lack of personalized emotes (or interactive animations) and limited actions placed due to ethical (like Player-Killers and Sex-Offenders ). The only requirements for that is the ability to do multiple tasks in one go and having the list of available emotes close by for references.

Advantages: Visually Creative, More Activity Going On
Disadvantages: Complicated in Some Games, Not Suitable for First Time Role-Players

Vocal Style
Example 1: Have a microphone, make sure it is voice chat compatible, press the magic button and talk to the microphone. Telephones work fine too.

This style focused on audio-ideal expression of their characters. It is rather uncommon due to Voice Chat still being new to gaming and had a bad reputation of having kiddies cooing and whining (and screaming) in the voice chat. Besides that, it is preference-dependent and not all people are able to speak without s-s-stu-u-utter-ter-ter-ing. Some of us actually shut down our voice box just as soon as another person start speaking. The only requirement to it is to consider vocally role-playing is to act like you're reading a piece of a story while enacting it. Sad thing is that in some places like instant messaging chat rooms, there are no visual aids to help you understand the situations more. It might be like playing a memory game while playing a guessing-and-not-get-yelled-at-by-the-fisherman game, mainly because there is so much focus in vocations, that no texts are typed out.

Advantages: Interaction With a Real Role-Player and Easy Detection of Audio Cues
Disadvantages: No Visual Aids in Some Areas and Preference-Dependent

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(More chapters will arrive soon)

This is great, Jake :3 *Squees at the mention of her ferret*


On your next update, I would include tips (such as the thesaurus one for forum style) on how to make RPing easier on other people's eyes.

Ex. Restrict OoC chatter to bare minimum, or to guild / party chat, using third person for actions (( it just looks better imo x.x )), capitalizing and making sure to add in grammatical punctuations, etc.

Jaeden wrote: capitalizing and making sure to add in grammatical punctuations, etc.

I try my best ok! DX

Ethics of the Character

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God Modding and Plot Modding: How to Ethically Use Them?
Playing god or making a strict plot can make the role play tedious and annoying, but in some cases (like being a boss or the protagonist, depending on the perspective of the friendlies and minions which are going to be mentioned later on), god modding and plot modding can be ethically used. Not all god modding and plot modding are inherently unethical, it became unethical when they are abused for boasted ego, immaturity and/or blatant bigotry or being obviously biased. Drastic Character Alterations are the most blatant form of god mod and/or plot mod ever been committed and gotten away with. Why is that? Because it is considered an ethical god mod and/or plot mod if performed on self. To make it ethical, you need to have the following; Charge-Up Time, Process, Environmental Application upon the Modder, Price and Defects to top off the counterweight of the effects if needed. Example; Jakelvin launches an ice spear made from raindrops, but to avoid the call out, Jakelvin waited a bit to gather up enough rain water to form an ice spear, then spend some more time to use the same process as making an ice bolt to create the ice spear, since it was raining at where he is, he can engage the action and the process, finally when the spear is made, it is ready. When the player called Jakelvin out, Jakelvin and other role players can vouch out an ethical god mod because even though Jakelvin does not have the ice spear in game, he have the knowledge to use it in character.

Note: It only counts as God Mod if the ability exceeded the power of a Rank 1 Fire Ball, Rank 1 Windmill or Rank 1 Cooking. Otherwise, it is considered a normal ability

Countering Unethical God Mod and Plot Mod
This technique was one of the difficult things to role-play with. It required an ethical god mod or plot mod at a later time, not an instant like an unethical god mod and plot mod would do. Like Karma would say, "What goes around, comes around. I'm a bitch of vengeance when I'm not happy about what you did." Do remember that only a super-powered force can perform this technique to avoid causing a mass vengeance era. Super-powered forces like the Protagonist, the Guild Leader, The Guild Officer and the Boss are considered allowed to deal out a countermeasure for unethical god mod and/or plot mod.

Note: Countermeasure against Unethical God Mod or Plot Mod can include kicking out of the guild, banning and flagging.

Valid for Countermeasure
> The role-player committed a super spell/attack too many times under 30 minutes (one super spell/attack per 30 minutes, even if you got two different super spell/attacks).
> Anyone achieved total invulnerability (like iddqd or god mode).
> Boss or Protagonist being too strong (to the point of being "the ones to change the fate of the universe" rank overkill).
> Friendly or Minion being overpowered (to the point of being able to at most 10 hit kill the boss or protagonist)

Auto-Hitting
It happens, no big deal until it happened to be a punch from a yard away and blew your breakfast forward a year, then it is an unethical role-play. It is pretty common and often a mistake done many times over, even from an experienced role-player. Mainly the legal side of auto-hitting that it is legal when it targets an NPC, just took too long for the opposing player to type up the results and the story must move on or a prone player. What really made it bad is the making the hit impossible to be blocked by the opponent. Attempting an action is a way the most would considered flexible and fair, but sometimes, it took the opposing player too long that the story moved on, saying that the opposing player got hit. The ethical way is to end the fight before going away from the keyboard by any means, not to suspend the fight by going away from the keyboard in the middle of the fight. If the story must move on, the player who was fighting the visibly unavailable player will be given special permission to end the fight by walking away or submission, not by death (even if the fight is meant to be a death match). It is only unethical if the visibly unavailable character was not in a fight when attacked. So to say that if a player attacked a visibly unavailable player and the visibly unavailable player is not in a fight, then the attack is invalid and the attacker must move on like he or she did not find that visibly unavailable player where he or she spotted at.

Out of Character Chit-Chats and Making Texts into Eye-Candies
Normally, you would get newbies and bilinguals (even Inter-Noobs) who will hack and slash their way around the social public of the internet. Some are unintentional and some are just there to make you rather try and get accepted into Jackass University of Stupid Trash (which is JUST rather stupid) than to read its horrible, grammar-mutilated and vulgar-abused texts made by a five year old with no hint of parental positive influences. It is also common that role-players get caught up in the mess of Out of Character Chit-Chat Marathon because their social urges. Why is that? It is rather obvious, we are introduced to long timed chit-chats from people in social networks (including massively multiplayer online games and instant messaging chat rooms). Best to limit the amount of out of character chit-chat by five to ten entries per ten to thirty minutes, depending on the level of role-play activity (from very light to important). Why the restricted Out of Character Chit-Chat? Try experimenting how quickly a regular role-play session will die out when you have two or more motor-chatters. For the grammar and making texts into an eye-candy (something that is easy on the eyes), the best bet is to read a grammatically-corrected prose, take English classes and find someone who will teach you the grandeur of the English language. But usually, it takes long, but at least it is better than being corrected every 5 seconds by the Grammar Police (example: Omnisagi when she is in that particular mood). So if you don't like to "waste" role play time, best of luck in finding someone who is very good at the English language and able to teach it.

Borrowed Equipments
It is ethical to borrow spare or unused equipments necessary to proceed the storyline, but it is unethical to considered them as gifts to keep or suggested props in exchange to play out a bit of their glory piece. If the necessary spare/unused equipments are not available from anyone in the guild or friends, it is best to improvise because it is a waste of time and money, and unnecessary to buy the necessary equipments. If the plot is strictly requiring such an equipment, find something related and if someone said that it is not it, just tell them to use their imagination, it works a lot better than wasting time trying to make a point.

Your Story, Your Will; Their Story, Their Will
It is completely unethical to make suggestions on someone's storyline, even trying to outshine for your part to be important in someone's story. This applied to others towards your story. You can ask a role in the story by asking the protagonist via instant or private messaging or find a way for your character to make an impact while not upstaging the protagonist. Others will do the same, so always assumed that others may have asked for their parts of importance. To solve that problem, you can just play along and deal with the level of importance given within the role play while working a way to become an important person to the protagonist if you chose to. If you chose to be the background rogue, fine with them until the protagonist happened to be the activist of participation.

Respect the Land Given, Respect the Guild Master
It is quite blatant on what his mean. You're in a different field, do the research and deal with what you got. If they got a succubus, you can come up with a succubus character; if they don't have dwarves, don't bother making one, it may not possible to make one from scratch. No matter which guild you are in or you're not in a guild at all, respect the guild master like you would to a game master. Game Masters can kick you out of the game if you disrespected them while some Guild Masters might (can't guarantee that they'll do so) communicate to each other about you and make sure you'll not be accepted to a guild at all if you disrespected one of them. If possible, avoid meeting the wrong folks and meet with the right folks and get their favors by impressing them with your consistency to their world (role play wise). Who knows? They'll vouch for you to the guild master.

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(More will come later)

I have a feeling that your 'Overcharged Character' thing is making a reference to Entine. To that, I counter the argument with this: A character such as that role-played in the correct way actually adds to the campaign. Several people like playing with seriously obnoxious characters, even if that character could in theory kill them. Oddly enough, for weakness, he ran a lot and he can't beat Eugeal in her lab (very fun RP, that was). The thing is, make sure the person controlling said character is competent. Some suggestions for rules like that:

a) Always make sure that characters willingly do some stupid stuff. (ie. Touching Entine. I would normally make it clear that's a bad idea)
b) If the character is either powerful or deadly, DO NOT USE IT OFTEN! It's meant for dramatic effect, not to auto-win all the time.
c) Make sure the controlling player of said character is competent.

Now, in reference to some character things that I don't think should be used:

a) Powers that are unexplained. (Entine's skills were stated and made clear. It would be unacceptable if I didn't explain the theory behind it. Some things that can apparently change molecular consistency and such *cough I've seen it cough* should not be allowed unless it has a huge disadvantage, mainly because curses such as that are not good.)
b) A character with apparently endless items in their 'Hammerspace.' (the space where anime girls store very large items like hammers to smash on other characters' heads. It is 'infinite' and holds a lot of stuff). One must justify the items they have, especially if there are a lot of items one is pulling out.

That's all I've got so far.

Hey - There is nothing actually wrong with the use of "Hammer Space" in and of itself but does need the limits put on it like any other "overcharged" power.
-= I don't think Dell ever met our one "Hammer Space" user as far as I can remember =-

Also of the Role-Play styles there are two others but they are neither easy to do online or for the second even possible.
Turn Based system with a fixed rule set. Normally played at a table with a judge and 4-6 players ... ex DnD, Palladium, Dragon Quest, GURPS, MARS, etc
Live Action Role Play ... LARP ... as the name says, this is live. Uses fixed rules but is free form with multiple judges ... ex Vampire the Requiem, Werewolf, etc

I find most of what has been posted well thought out and in line of the goals of this guild.
I hope to see more feedback and once most has been said and done I will put together a summary of everything here to add to the Roleplay guidelines.

I'm merely speaking on top of mind regarding my personal experiences as a role player.
This is an advanced guide, so you guys can apply the things that should have been added.
Here is the codes I used in my setup

Code:

[size=24]Category[/size]
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[size=18]Sub Section 1[/size]
Body Text...
[size=18]Sub Section 2[/size]
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And so on...
Oh yeah. I gave Captincrunch the authority to make sure that any third-party contributions are useful and neutral (so to say that unproven, smashed-up, plagiarized, polarized or biased texts are not allowed in the advanced role play guide). I'll check on it daily and discuss it with Captincrunch about the new third-party contributions. So, as an author and Captincrunch being the guild leader, we have a say and we promised to be fair about what we do. If what you contributed was deleted, look into the PM about either me and/or Captincrunch's reasons about why your contribution was deleted and your post will be added also with the reason so you can review it and critique it to fit the recommendations given by me and/or Captincrunch.

PS: Don't forget to change the Subject box text to "[Sectional/Proposed] Contribution: [Title]" labeling as either a proposed amendment or a new section. Having "RE:" on the beginning will make it a comment/criticism/compliment/opinion while having "Jakelvin's Guide of Advanced Role Play Techniques" will confused others to think it was from me.

Looking forward to your contributions.
~~Jacob Smith, the guy behind Jakelvin.

God Modding

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Definition
"God Modding" is, in essence, when someone’s character has the ability to do practically anything without limits or boundaries. An example is when they simply cannot be harmed by any and all means other RP-ers try, or when one attempts to control another player's character. Major examples of God Modding:

-Killing or injuring a character without the player's express permission.
-When one simply can’t be hit and/or dodge all attacks or anything for this matter aimed at them.
-When one RPs as another player character without the express permission of the player.
-When one attempts to automatically do something to another player without offering a chance for failure without permission.
-When one states that something happened to one's character or the character's family (if it is not RPed by others) without permission.
-When one power-plays over other characters.

God Modding tends to irritate others around the offender, and is not normally looked kindly upon. One should attempt to avoid God-Modding at all costs.

Is God-Modding Ever Acceptable?
In Player to Player interactions (ie: those who are not the ones running the event), god modding is not allowed. There are some cases in which being able to tell if someone is god modding or not is difficult. If some characters have some ability that seems god moddish, but is only activated by an action that most people know / have been told about, it should not be defined as god modding if the ability is widely accepted by the players in the RP. If said abilities are not stated beforehand and said limitations have not been discussed, a discussion and decision should be made on said abilities. This all should be done in the bio and not in Mabi to save issues and time arguing.

If someone is controlling a character that is overpowered, but seems to only have these effects in said character specific RP (such as bad guys or allies), this should be acceptable. It adds challenge to said RP, and gives more variety to the types of RPs allowed.

One may only control another Player Character if they are given express permission to do so by the character's player.

The JWA (Just-Walk-Away) Rule
Now, if someone doesn't like an RP with a boss or character that seems way overpowered, what should they do? The answer is to just leave the RP. The JWA rule basically states that one reserves the right to leave an RP designed by someone else that seems to have some very powerful characters if one does not desire to participate in RPs that have such characters. This prevents problems; if one does not like the situation or the character, they can just walk away.

(( Open to suggestions / talking about ideas ))

Dellinger wrote:God Modding


If someone is controlling a character that is overpowered, but seems to only have these effects in said character specific RP (such as bad guys or allies), this should be acceptable. It adds challenge to said RP, and gives more variety to the types of RPs allowed.

(( Open to suggestions / talking about ideas ))

Ex. Knarex. Which he is....ermm was un killable. I have his reasons for him being so strong IC and OOC wise. He died by his own choice. So he is dead..for now anyways >

What you are stating is kind of covered in the first paragraph of my "Is Godmodding Acceptable" part.
Basically, as long as people accept it and the powers are made clear to those who don't know them,
then they are fine.

Dellinger wrote:What you are stating is kind of covered in the first paragraph of my "Is Godmodding Acceptable" part.
Basically, as long as people accept it and the powers are made clear to those who don't know them,
then they are fine.

Indeed XP

And if one doesn't like said character or RP with 'overpowered' characters,
there is the just walk away rule.
I feel it gives good variety and the chance to leave RPs one does not want to be a part of
without really limiting the types of RPs that go on.