Guide To Roleplaying

[Jaimie]

How To Roleplay
A Guide For Beginners

VWW is a roleplaying website based around Warriors, the series by Erin Hunter.

Roleplaying (abbreviated as RPing) is a read & respond writing style. It allows writers to work together and create an active story based around individual player-controlled characters. RPing is designed as a form of both playing and writing, intended for individual enjoyment rather than literary skill development, though the latter is often found to be a positive side-effect.

RPing is learned primarily through experience; as time goes on, you'll find that it will be easier. Roleplaying varies greatly in its use of tone, tense, and writing styles. All of these decisions revolve around the individual tastes and preferences of the roleplayer. There are no rights or wrongs in RPing, bu there are some chief guidelines we can give you to help you start your journey.


IN CHARACTER

[/b]. In Character Roleplay involves writing to describe your character's actions, speech, and thoughts in reaction to the given situation at the time of the post. Characters are diverse, and so it is important that each post accurately conveys (through actions, speech, or thoughts) how a character is feeling in relation to other characters or an event.

Roleplaying on VWW has progressed from using *asterisks* to describe actions. Instead, most members using "quotation marks" for speech, leaving actions unmarked. Despite this, there are no rules to the kind of formatting you can use for roleplaying. Some examples of possible formats are listed below.


THIRD PERSON

Nightripple padded into the IceClan camp with a vole in her jaws. After placing it on the fresh-kill pile, she turned to her hunting partner, Pantherswamp, with a small smile. "That was a good hunt. Catching that squirrel was really impressive!" she told him excitedly with a cheerful wave of her black tail. At the same time, she thought, I hope he didn't see me miss that mouse!

Notice how all of Nightripple's actions are told without any marks, and in a simple third-person story format. All of the things she says are within "quotation marks". Additionally, if you wish to incorporate your character's thoughts, use italics. Third person roleplaying is the most popular RP format on VWW, and is strongly recommended for beginners.

FIRST PERSON

I padded into the IceClan camp with a vole in my jaws. After placing it on the fresh-kill pile, I turned to my hunting partner, Pantherswamp, with a small smile. "That was a good hunt. Catching that squirrel was really impressive!" I told him excitedly with a cheerful wave of my black tail. I hope he didn't see me miss that mouse!

First person roleplaying is a different form of roleplaying which still uses quotation marks. It is almost exactly the same as third person, except that it uses "I" and "me" rather than 'she' and 'her'. Italics can still be used for thoughts. First person is not used as often on VWW, but it's still perfectly allowed. Pick the style you're most comfortable with!

ASTERISKS

*Nightripple padded into the Fireclan camp with a vole in her jaws*
*She placed it on the fresh-kill pile*
*She turned to Pantherswamp and smiled*
That was a good hunt. Catching that squirrel was really impressive!
*She spoke to him excitedly with a cheerful wave of her tail*
/I hope he didn't see me miss that mouse/

Asterisk roleplaying was the original roleplay format for VWW, and it is almost never used these days. That is not to say, however, that you are forbidden from using it! With this roleplaying style, all separate actions are separated into different pairs of *asterisks*, while speech is left without anything. You may still add thoughts, and the most common way to do it in this style is with /forward slashes/.

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OUT OF CHARACTER

[/b] the persona of your character. That is to say, you are talking as yourself: a person behind the screen of a computer. OOC talk is usually used outside of the designated roleplaying boards - for example, within the General, Art Sharing, Help, or Club boards. Playing as a character is frowned upon in such places. Unlike with In Character posts, these OOC posts do not abide by the three-word minimum rule. OOC posts may have any amount of words. However, they must still be meaningful. A simple post to say "thank you!" is acceptable, but a post saying only "LOL!" is not.

While OOC-only posts are restricted to the Out Of Character sections of the site mentioned above, there are still instances in IC posts where OOC comments may be made. Some examples are:


CHATTING WITH A RPER

Nightripple padded into the IceClan camp with a vole in her jaws. After placing it on the fresh-kill pile, she turned to her hunting partner, Pantherswamp, with a small smile. "That was a good hunt. Catching that squirrel was really impressive!" she told him excitedly with a cheerful wave of her black tail. At the same time, she thought, I hope he didn't see me miss that mouse!

( OOC: Hey, it's nice to meet you, Pantherswamp! )

PROVIDING EXTRA INFORMATION

Nightripple padded into the IceClan camp with a vole in her jaws. After placing it on the fresh-kill pile, she turned to her hunting partner, Pantherswamp, with a small smile. "That was a good hunt. Catching that squirrel was really impressive!" she told him excitedly with a cheerful wave of her black tail. At the same time, she thought, I hope he didn't see me miss that mouse!

( OOC: It's up to you if you did or did not see her miss the mouse, I don't mind! )

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