Cyber's Guide to Roleplaying

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Cyber’s Guide to Roleplaying
Hopefully after I’m done with you, you’ll be the envy of every n00b on the Internet.

Roleplaying?: Before we get this guide up on it’s feet, why don’t we clear up just what exactly ‘roleplaying’ is.
Roleplay – (v) To act and speak as if you are the character you're portraying. It means to keep your speech in the context of the setting in which your character (or avatar) exists. Context can be defined as both time and place. *
The act of text-based roleplaying is to portray a character’s actions and thoughts through writing. It’s basically like writing a story about your character, only with input from other roleplayers. Note: a major, major factor in effective roleplaying is to make sure you stay in character. If your character is an evil, maniacal bastard, he is not going to run around chanting “Desu! Desu! Desu! ” like a fangirl on crack and pick kittens off the street and pet them. You also have to pay attention to the setting your character is in. If you’re roleplaying a cop from the 1920’s, they’re not going to whip out an iPhone. The setting also includes trivial things like weather and time of day.
* www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=roleplay

Let’s pick apart a sample rp post! I whipped this outta my ass real fast, so it’s far from perfect, but it works for our little guide:

A leaf crackled. Nona spun around, brown eyes glinting off the moonlight. There was a dark figure standing at the mouth of the alley. She unsheathed her claws instinctively, ready to fight off this malevolent presence. A hiss was about to escape her maw before it spoke.
“What are you doing, you flea-ridden kitten?” It was Vulcan’s voice. “I thought the great Nona was too proud to eat human leftovers.”
The hiss escaped anyway. Of all the cats she’d rather meet alone in a dark alley, it had to be Vulcan. The black tom was the most stuck-up, pompous, rude bastard she’d ever met. Nona almost couldn’t believe a cat could physically be so full of himself and not explode. When it came to Vulcan, nothing was more important than himself and putting down other cats: Aries and Nona especially. It was a holy day indeed when they managed to escape his cynical eye and sharp tongue. Aries was always berated about how his leadership skills were no better than a rock’s, and how he was ‘abusive’ and ‘overly demanding’ and generally unconcerned with the experiments’ safety. As far as Nona was concerned, nothing was considered over the line. In everything she did, he found some sort of fault. Her pelt wasn’t groomed thoroughly, her hunting crouch wasn’t low enough – Nona would guess he found some flaw in the way she relieved herself.
“And what are you doing in the alleys, your majesty?” She spat the last two words to make a point. “Decided you need to figure out for yourself just what it’s like to actually work for your survival instead of living off the charity of other cats? Why is a ‘flea-ridden’ queen like me even worth your time?”

Reverse Action:
This stuff. It’s the stuff that happened in the previous post. The stuff your character is reacting to. If Vulcan were to jump off a building, Nona would respond to it in her next post… y’know, either crying out in anguish or laughing manically. Reverse action doesn’t usually take up a lot of the post. If you’ll notice in the sample above, it only accounts for maybe the first paragraph of the post (oh yes, you’re going to be posting paragraphs when I’m through with you).
Reverse action is always needed. It may only comprise a sentence or two, but it’s always needed. If it didn’t exist, forward action would be pointless. Delete all of the blue part from the post above. It starts with Nona randomly explaining the appearance of Vulcan and how she hates him. Somehow, Vulcan just poofed onto the scene and Nona feels the need to educate the readers on how much she hates him. Doesn’t make a lot of sense, right?
Reverse action can be tricky do deal with as you’re never sure what to respond to and what to let be. A good rule of thumb is if they’ve already responded to something you said, let it be. For example: Nona walks down the street. Vulcan watches her walk. Nona continues to walk down the street and turns into an alley. In his next post Vulcan should drop the street reverse action. It’s over and done with – Nona is in a new location, and new stuff should be happening. Unless it’s really, really critical to your plot/character development, I suggest you use this rule of thumb. It keeps the post from being too clogged with reaction.
I tend to repost any final dialogue the character before me has said. It helps me find some structure to my post and get in the mindset for writing in character. I know people to go right ahead and just respond to the dialogue. Both styles appear to work just fine.

Do’s and Don’ts:
Do: Leave the talking to the forward action. Personally, I hate it when people put dialogue in their reverse action, unless they plan on more dialogue in their forward action. It’s confusing to me - do I react to that, or not?
Don’t: Just copy/paste the last paragraph of the post before yours, especially if it has a character’s thoughts in it. Unless your character is a mind reader, they shouldn’t have access to that information; therefore it should not be in your post.
Don’t: Include their reverse action in your reverse action. Theoretically, that stuff should be over and done with by the time you post. It can be done, but tread carefully in those waters. Too much reverse action drags the roleplay out and it becomes more like a flashback.

Neutral Action:
This can get kind of tricky differentiate from reverse action. They almost go hand-in-hand, and aren’t separated by a clear boundary. However, neutral action is usually your character’s thoughts, opinions, and anything else that may be personal. If you’ll notice in the neutral action above, Nona isn’t doing anything physically. If we were to look at the situation through Vulcan’s eyes, he’d see a very pissed orange tabby glaring at him. All my character is doing is expressing her opinion. We’re given some background information about her relationship with Vulcan and Aries, a cat she appears to be close to, is brought in for a couple sentences. Here, you can elaborate on the setting, bring up your character’s past, etc.
In theory, neutral action doesn’t even have to exist. Without it, a post is very short, but it’s not a critical thing to have. A post should be able to move from reverse to forward action with no seams. If you deleted all of the yellow above, does my post still make sense?
Therefore, neutral action is no longer neutral once it contains an action. As soon as your character starts to speak or move in a direction or change her body language, that becomes forward action.

Do’s and Don’ts:
Do: Use detail detail detail! Your character obviously has a brain and feelings, why not express them? All good roleplay will evoke some kind of emotional response from the leader. At the end of those paragraphs, didn’t you kind of get the feel that Vulcan was this shady, cruel character? If you did, then I as a roleplayer did my job expressing Nona through my writing.
Do: Be mindful of the setting. I’ve done roleplays where I designated the time of day to be night, and the other roleplayers will make comments about the sun.
Don’t: Leave this out of your posts. I know I said you could, but most semi-literate and above sites look down on action-to-action posts. And you really miss out on a chance to flesh out your character.
Don’t: Get too carried away with this part. Length is good, but a novel is bad. Most people don’t want to sit through an hour of neutral action just to get something to react to. As cool and deep as your character may be, we do eventually get bored of his inner monologue.

Forward Action:
This is a lot like reverse action as far as verbiage. Forward action doesn’t usually take up much a post, unless your character is ranting or making a lot of commands. Posts including physical fights can also have quite a bit of forward action. The forward action is critical to a post – almost like the brain. Forward action could stand by itself as a post, can be paired only with the background action, or finish a well-rounded post. Forward action must give the other character(s) something to react to. Your character can speak, move in a direction, attack, leave the situation, etc, etc as long as something happens.
There’s a lot of freedom here, because you really don’t have any criteria to conform to. You’re drawing a line on a blank piece of paper. In my post above, Nona doesn’t make any physical movement, but she verbally abuses her friend and gives Vulcan something to respond to.

Do’s and Don’ts:
Do: Always, always, always include forward action. Ending a post with the neutral action gives the other roleplayers nothing to do!
Don’t: Take control of the other person’s character. This is referred to by most sites as ‘power-playing’ and it pisses people off. If I had mentioned anything about Vulcan’s reaction to Nona in my post, that would be power-playing. It’s rather tough to determine what is power-play and what is not. I would suggest asking your admins or the person you’re roleplaying with if they’re all right with the post.

Some Final Tips:
* Remember to stay in-character throughout the duration of the post! Nothing ruins a good roleplay faster than characters that change from nice and sweet, to deep and cynical, to angsty in the course of a couple sentences. Try to keep yourself out of the writing.
* SPELL CHECK IS YOUR FRIEND. If your browser doesn’t have a spell check build in, write your posts in Word first. Nothing makes you seem more ridiculously unintelligent like misspelled or improperly used words.
* Description is also your friend. It adds lengths to posts. Nona’s not just an orange tabby: her coat is short and straight, almost rough to the touch; the color of a young summer orange, painted over with ripples of chocolate brown.

This guide is not the be-all-end-all guide on how to roleplay. I’m probably not the best roleplayer on the face of the planet. A lot of roleplay requires you to use your creativity and good judgment. I’m just here to help you improve your writing a little bit, and to educate n00bs on how to get off on the right foot with the admins. I’ll be honest – I would side with the slightly standoffish newbie who can roleplay brilliantly over the nice, friendly newbie who couldn’t write to save his life. I hope this guide has helped you understand what makes a good roleplay post!

Happy Roleplaying!