Info Roleplay Renovation [Please have a look.]

[Andante]

First of all, after a six month absence, I'd like to say its wonderful to be back and working with the roleplaying section again. I've truly missed the community here on the forums, reading the fantastic stories the players create, and writing with the great players here on the boards - and I'm grateful to be resuming my role as moderator of the roleplaying section. It's my hope we can all work together to have a fun, interesting, and creative environment for all players involved.​

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It's my intention to begin a sort of project of my own to clean up, organize and simplify the roleplaying section. It seems to me that things have been building and building upon themselves [which, don't get me wrong is wonderful!], and have ultimately become a bit disorienting and unorganized. I've seen more than a few very excellent character profiles go unnoticed in outdated threads, there are multiple sets of conflicting "General Rules" floating about, and a ton of unnecessary stickied threads are cluttering up the front page of the board. As you might imagine, this can create confusion, especially for new players looking to get started.​

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I hope to simplify the general rules section to make everything fair and balanced for all players, while leaving ample option for story creators to put their own rules into place concerning their stories. I plan to review, edit, and readjust my all-purpose "newbie guide" for those new to roleplaying and put it in an easily accessible place for quick reading, and in general hope to streamline the entire section so all active stories, their out of character threads, and all information is in one place and easy to find. However, most of all I want everyone to be able to contribute to their roleplay experience here.​

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Any thoughts, ideas, or suggestions you have: let them be heard! The roleplaying section is essentially created by all the players, and they should have the guiding role in the direction things go. Please don't hesitate to share your ideas.​

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It may take a few days for these new changes to take effect, but I hope to get started on them as soon as tonight. No important or active threads will be deleted, and any information that is accidentally misplaced, I will gladly relocate and salvage for you with no problem whatsoever. I'm hoping the transition is smooth and successful for us all.​

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If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about the cleanup process please post them here. Or, you may send me a PM at any time.​

 

[dunklunk]

Welcome back, Andante. Don't think I've had the pleasure (or opportunity) of conversing with you prior to this. Looking forward to RPing with you in the Hideaway RP. Cheers.

 

[Neverwin]

I was just going to leave a comment regarding how the Roleplaying Guide neglects to mention something that's kind of important: Meta-gaming. I've noticed that some roleplayers seem to be unaware of what meta-gaming is, and more than a couple of times a few other roleplayers have had to put up disclaimers of sorts in order to keep people from meta-gaming (not using that precise term but essentially telling people not to do it).

Meta-gaming is when a player has their character act on information that the player knows but the character couldn't possibly know. For example:

Player 1 informs everyone in an OOC thread that their character, A, plans to double-cross the other characters.

Player 2 reads the OOC thread and has their character, B, know that A plans to double-cross everyone and warns the other characters about it despite the fact that B cannot read A's mind, A has not said anything to B, and A has given no indication of double-crossing everyone.

That's the best example that I can come up with at the moment, but there are plenty of other examples... Characters remarking on private conversations between two other characters despite not being there to hear it, a character knowing the full extent of another character's backstory despite not being a part of that character's backstory or having the character tell that character about his/her backstory, etc.

 

[Neverwin]

I have another suggestion... There's pages upon pages of character cards... and I was just thinking... maybe it would be a good idea to like... build like a Character Profile sub-forum or something?

And it could be separated into species or classes or something...

Like Combative, Magical, Stealthy, Other... I dunno...

It would make it easy to find the various characters... and help people get an idea of what's been done and what hasn't... and whatnot...

 

[Andante]

Thanks for the suggestions. I've been asking around to different players, since I don't want to officially declare renovations complete until I'm sure there's a good amount of improvements in place. I'm really not wanting to upset the balance, so to speak, of the way things are currently set up, so I want my improvements to be subtle but helpful.

Though, I really like the idea of a sub-forum type area just for character creation and discussion. Perhaps one thread to host character cards, and a place where people can post threads for ideas when creating new characters, and can talk about different character-related things. I've seen a few threads where people just want to discuss their characters and their backstory, so it might not be a bad idea.

Anything else, let me know - I'm not declaring renovations complete until I'm certain things are really improved!

 

[Melee]

I have a suggestion as well.

I've been talking with a younger member who is looking for people to join his RP, but doesn't know how to get people to join. Would it be possible to create a "recruiting" thread that shows RPs that are currently looking for members?

 

[Hale Loneshadow]

I have more of a question, actually, and it may seem a bit far-fetched, but ideas never hurt.

So, I've been RP'ing a lot more frequently with some of the same people, as well as meeting new people! Since a lot of groups of RP'ers are creating their own extended plot-lines, character sub-plots, and in general their own "worlds" of Skyrim/Tamriel/Nirn that tie in to each other throughout different RP's (I hope you get what I mean here!), I guess I was just wondering if there is kind of a way to make different threads that pertain to each "world" as it were, and how one would go about doing that if it were possible?

If it is, all I would need is the info on how to do such a thing/any suggestions from our moderators here, and I would be more than willing do make it happen, or at least start it up for everyone. I just ask cause I've been seeing this a lot; how a lot of friends on here have extenuating story lines/character stories that roll-over from one RP to another, and I just think it would be cool for those players/groups of players to have some sort of way to have their own "version" of Tamriel/Nirn (that of course anyone can join), that they can work with, and really allow for their creativity to flow through.

It would also be a cool way for a lot of fledgling writers such as myself (and many other talented individuals on here!) to continue their character's story, and their friend's character's stories. Just a thought!

Also, if something like this already exists, then this was all for naught, haha. If something does exist though, if someone could point it out to me that'd be great as well.

Thanks for (hopefully) reading!

 

[Simus]

I have more of a question, actually, and it may seem a bit far-fetched, but ideas never hurt.

So, I've been RP'ing a lot more frequently with some of the same people, as well as meeting new people! Since a lot of groups of RP'ers are creating their own extended plot-lines, character sub-plots, and in general their own "worlds" of Skyrim/Tamriel/Nirn that tie in to each other throughout different RP's (I hope you get what I mean here!), I guess I was just wondering if there is kind of a way to make different threads that pertain to each "world" as it were, and how one would go about doing that if it were possible?

If it is, all I would need is the info on how to do such a thing/any suggestions from our moderators here, and I would be more than willing do make it happen, or at least start it up for everyone. I just ask cause I've been seeing this a lot; how a lot of friends on here have extenuating story lines/character stories that roll-over from one RP to another, and I just think it would be cool for those players/groups of players to have some sort of way to have their own "version" of Tamriel/Nirn (that of course anyone can join), that they can work with, and really allow for their creativity to flow through.

It would also be a cool way for a lot of fledgling writers such as myself (and many other talented individuals on here!) to continue their character's story, and their friend's character's stories. Just a thought!

Also, if something like this already exists, then this was all for naught, haha. If something does exist though, if someone could point it out to me that'd be great as well.

Thanks for (hopefully) reading!

Hmm...this RP-transcending character bolderdash sounds exactly like something I'D do

And if it hasn't been done already, there really should be a rule against metagaming in the RP guide, as well an an explaination of what meta gaming is. A very common example of meta gaming I've seen (and in extriemly rare cases been guilty of). Is seeing someone post in their character card that their character is a vampire or a werewolf. Another member reads this and the immediately calls the first character out on it despite having no prior history with said character and no way to see if they're a vampire or a werewolf.

As for Hale's suggestion, perhapse we could set up different sub boards that cater to different versions of Tamriel based on choices you can make in game. Some examples of sub boards could be "Imperial Victory Stories." (stories that take place after the Civil War wherein the Empire won), "Stormcloak Victory Stories", "Post Companion (or whatever faction concerns you) Stories" (as in stories that take place after the aformentioned quest line and bear all the in-game consequences of such), or even "Pre/Post Dragonborn Stories." (Stories that take place before or after Alduin triest to destroy Nirn and is stopped by the Dragonborn.)

Just my two cents

 

[Hale Loneshadow]

Simus my friend, you've summarized my intent MUCH more clear than how I think I did! Thank you haha.

 

[Simus]

No problem mate

 

[Harperlarp]

Hey guys. Is there currently, or are there plans to include, a thread for video roleplayers? I have a nice Skyrim Roleplay Adventure series going on youtube and figured this would be the bets place to share it with like minded folks.

 

[tdatapina]

I have a suggestion, what if we have like a set layout for character profiles? So we know what everyone needs to include and any additional info important to a specific rp can be added

 

[Balomew]

tdatapina, that sounds like a super idea to me. Having a general CC layout would help people out a lot, especially new members or those not very good at creating character profiles. I take my layout inspiration from Call of Time, but I don't think we're technically allowed to copy that from them. We could always ask politely and/or base it off of theirs. Thoughts?

Now to what I was going to originally mention: ads. I don't mean ads for other websites, blah de blah blah. I mean a way to tell people "Hey, we need this kind of person for our roleplay" or "Hey, I need an artist good with landscapes" or, what I'm especially thinking of at the moment, "Hey, I just created a new roleplay thread." It might draw people's attention and get the roleplay section running more fluidly. Just a thought. Thoughts on that, too?