Space and Freeform Roleplay

A forum for in-character roleplay. (IC)
User avatar
The Mindset
Posts: 3079
Joined: Sat Apr 24, 2004 10:35 pm
Prefix: Den interstellera republik av
Name: The Mindset

Space and Freeform Roleplay

Post by The Mindset »

Iuthia wrote:Space RP Suggestions for a Friend

Introduction: Welcome to my rather brief guide to role-playing in space, mostly aimed at players like The Fedral Union and those who RP around him. The reason I’m keeping this OOC is to avoid all the IC issues that surround these nations and how they all seem to be pretty angry at one another and just love making accusations. Why am I writing this? Well lets call it a last ditch effort to slam some sense into a certain region of International Incidents, I did inform TFU that I would be writing something like this more or less to help him out… he can take it or leave it if he wants.

You would think that a lot of these nations have been role-playing space a lot longer then I have and would be more experienced at it, in general this is correct, but due to the fact that these nations commonly have arguments about number-wanking, tech-wanking, puppet-wanking and stat-wanking I think it’s about time we organised something to point out how role-playing etiquette fits into the space universe.

Please note these are suggestions, not laws or rules. They are not official and they are only being mentioned to hopefully point out some problems. Also note I will be changing this as I go along as I may have missed points… I’m fully prepared to change if someone has a better suggestion.

Why is it invite only then? Well that’s simple enough; because a lot of people like to take any opportunity to have a pop at the Fedral Union whenever someone points out their problems. This means that I’m forced to keep this between nations who generally RP with the Fedral Union and understand that if they are going to post in this thread they should be constructive… I will only warn you once before asking you to leave, if you do not leave then I will point out to a mod that you are being bothersome and they will warn you to leave. This is not an attempt to insult anyone, just help out with the arguments.


General Role-Playing Suggestions So that’s the basic idea of the thread out of the way, now on to the actual suggestions themselves. As many have noticed throughout the many role-plays in space, a lot of them in International Incidents have ended in arguments and claims that one player is ignoring the other, here are some tips to help avoid this:

- >> Work things out OOC: First piece of advise is fairly simple; you will find that when you start an role-play with a nation you may have combat with, you will find that most of the time you will both have different technologies and ideas on how the role-play will go. As such it’s important to work out any problems OOC before you start the RP. You can do this in MSN, telegram or even in a separate thread… if you don’t do this you may waste a lot of time arguing with the other nation over the power of your weapon, why they aren’t taking enough damage and so on. Work out how your technology will interact with one another… bare in mind people RP many different times and technologies and to say that yours is automatically better in every way will put them off role-playing with you. Work out an agreement.

- >> Spelling, Grammar and Format: This is a quick addition, but basically if you want to be understood you should make it easier to read for everyone else. Basically you should try and make sure that you’re spelling it reasonable, your grammar is ok and your format makes it easy for people to read. The best way to achieve this is to use a program like Win Word to spell check your post and maybe even point out some grammar problems. However your format is down to you. The best advice I can give you is to remember to space things out so it’s not all in one clump. Basically look at other peoples posts and see how they do it, who’s post is easier to read, which one looks neat… and so on.

- >> Its freeform baby! Yeah, I know I should have pointed this out earlier, but it goes without saying. You can RP anything you want and there is little anyone can do about it. However, while this is the case the little people can do about it includes the ignore feature, if you are being unreasonable with your latest idea people may choose not to acknowledge this. Remember, while you can role-play anything, you can also ignore anything. So while you can RP your nation being the best in the universe, everyone else can ignore such a claim and choose not to RP with you. That’s the beauty of freeform, and it’s greatest frustration. This is why you should be reasonable.

- >> Be reasonable: This one is related to the last tip, basically you are both about to role-play a story which may end in some form of combat, or maybe even start with combat. However you can’t assume that NS is a competition that you can win, think of it as a cooperative storyline where you each add a party and play out a battle. The winner can be determined by both of you depending on how well you do against the other; you can probably come up with an agreement as to the winner assuming you didn’t decide at the beginning. Don’t just assume that because Star Trek technology will automatically win against Homeworld technology… you are here to write a story, not wank over how superior your technology is. However, that said, if the other person admits they are weaker but are willing to role-play a futile attack/defence then fair enough, because it comes out as interesting for both players…

- >> Be descriptive: This isn’t really as important, but it makes the thread a whole lot better. The more description you put into it, the more interesting it is to read and the more you will enjoy the role-play on the whole. It also allows the other player to have a better idea of what’s going on. However, it’s possible to have too much description… its up to the individual player, but try not to let the information get drowned out by the description.

- >> Show (OOC) respect: You may or may not respect the player you are role-playing with, but if you are going to insist on role-playing with them I would suggest you don’t insult them or their role-play fashion… after all, you are role-playing with them right? So at least role-play with them without going out of your way to insult them otherwise you will end up with nothing more then a bitch-fest on your hands. However, on the other hand, don’t assume every OOC criticism is intended as an insult, if you don’t like it then respectfully ask them to not to criticise like that… in the end they can choose not to role-play with you if you won’t pay attention to their problems.

- >> Have fun: It gets forgotten a lot of the time but Nationstates is just a game; albeit an addictive game which takes a lot of time and effort for some people. The important thing is to have fun; if you are not having fun then you should try something else. Tired of having wars with everyone? Chill out and try something else, make peace with those you fight or have a peace conference… that way you automatically have a character/diplomatic role-play. Or perhaps you don’t have enough combat… again, you can probably find something to get involved with or if you want to keep a good reputation you can role-play war games or something. Just enjoy yourself.


Combat Role-Playing Suggestions: Now that we have the basics out of the way, I think it’s time to move on to the more important parts of looking at combat itself. The problems here are that players often do things like deny the other player of the chance to defend themselves and so on. So these are the hints regarding combat:

- >> Work things out OOC: Oh dear, I’ve mentioned this one before, however I feel that this one is damn important for a combat role-play. In space, or anywhere for that matter, you will find that the other people will have different weapons and different ideas on how effective they are. Hell, both of you are using fictional weapons in a fictional universe, so how about working out together how effective your weapons would be and so on. This is important because if you don’t you may not like how the other player role-plays the damage he takes and argue about it, which would damage the thread. You can also talk about the speed of the thread here too, like if you want to bother role-playing mobilisation and deployment, mentioned below. Different players work at different speeds, work it out first guys.

- >> The Basics: These are the actual rules you shouldn’t be ignoring but a lot of people do anyways. I shouldn’t have to mention these but I guess that with people acting as they do it needs to be included. We are talking about things like claiming other people’s damage, role-playing other players’ character/forces and generally taking all the fun out of the role-play for the other players.

Firstly there is the godmode that is claiming damage. Freeform role-play is designed around the idea that you can role-play anything you like however you like. However you can only RP your own stuff, and more importantly, to make combat fair the defender chooses how much damage he takes from an attack. It’s a godmode to claim their damage for them; however it’s a godmod for them to ignore damage completely. As we all know, you can RP whatever you like, but if RP something in a way others can’t agree with, they can ignore whatever they like, including you.

Then there’s simple role-play etiquette like role-playing another nations forces or characters. You have to get permission to do so otherwise you will be enforcing something they may not have wanted to do; they control their people and you control yours. Breaking this one is to me a rather serious thing and I generally ignore any action which RPs when I didn’t allow them to do so.

You also need to know that you can’t puppet wank. This is basically the description I use of nations who use puppets to make their nation stronger then it is. You have one nation, you can’t use puppets to make it have more people or more forces… you can’t control another nation and claim it’s an ally, basically put puppets shouldn’t interact. Each nation is independent and one player can’t use two nations for the same problem.

- >> Mobilisation and Deployment: Ah, we are now on to the good stuff, you will recognise these words as being distinctively military based. Well now we discuss the importance of describing how your forces got into the combat, sometimes you won’t have to do this because neither player wants to bother with it… after all; you have a battle to get to. But to be safe, I’ll cover it here because many nations feel it is important and adds a level of realism.

Mobilisation is the process of getting your forces together and organising them so they are ready for action. This process is usually costly and you can’t really have your forces mobilised all the time because that’s pretty expensive. For space, imagine if your fleet was always on red alert, you can’t keep it up all the time. However could probably be done fairly quickly but remember that your forces could be all over the place so it could take some time, future tech or not.

Deployment is the process of moving the prepared forces into the areas they are going to be needed in. This can take a while and it depends on the speed of your vessels, you can use deployment to your advantage to flank and position yourself in the best area… however it needs to be said that the other side has to do this too so getting a good spot isn’t always possible. Both deployment and mobilisation should take at least a post each. Mobilisation takes more time depending on how much you are mobilising and where they are at the time. Deployment takes as long as it takes you to get the forces to the area you are deploying too.

- >> Take Turns You are in a cooperative story, it only makes sense to take it in turns to take actions. Basically you make your move and then allow them to make their move, fairly simple really. However, you can make more then one post at a time if you are bumping the thread a little or adding new information but you aren’t doing any more actions. You can also post more then once to describe action which isn’t going on between you and your opponent, such as reinforcements (bare in mind you can only post for the reinforcements once for each time your opponent posts). Basically, you do your bit and they do there’s… its simple.

- >> Made up statistics mean very little: Lets face it, we all know half of International Incidents is filled with posts about the latest tanks, ships and space craft which are going to be the greatest ever. However, when it really comes down to it, and I mean really comes down to it; these statistics are often over looked and ignored by the majority of role-players. Do you know how much damage a 10’000 Terawatt Phaser will do to a 5ft plate of Unobtanium? No? Well neither do I… they are both made up weapons for fiction. It’s up to the defender to decide how affective your weapon is against his unit, and a lot of the time he’s thinking about what he can afford to take without being ignored, he may take some of it into consideration but he won’t actually research the difference between two makes of one weapon. As such having a ship with uber-statitics will end up performing the same as a normal ship of its type because a lot of people don’t care about your improvements.

- >> Logistics: This isn’t as important as many others, as some technology levels ignore this completely. However it’s something I felt should be mentioned because a fair few nations hold this as important. Basically logistics is the aspect of military operations that deals with the procurement, distribution, maintenance, and replacement of materiel and personnel. In modern warfare it is vital to an operation as your troops need supplies to keep fighting. In many space battles it’s not so important so I’m not going to be too harsh about this one, but generally it limits the range of your vessels as you have to re-supply after a while, the more combat you are in the more often you will need supplies. In the modern world you need ships to transport your supplies to your troops, these ships need deepwater ports to offload their cargo and then they need trucks to distribute them further and so on. The larger the operation the more complex it is, the smaller the operation the easier it becomes, but other factors like getting them there and how dangerous it is come into it.

In space this could be anything from having to go and get a proper system check done at a space station to actual supplies needed. It’s not often RPed but it can be important.



Realism Suggestions: I couldn’t think of a name for this section, but basically this the idea is to go into detail as to how to be reasonable with the forces of your nation and statistics, I know that these things aren’t always important, but people like to be detailed. This is a guide on how to be reasonable with your nation’s forces and cover some hints to help:

- >> Concept Your nation is clearly based on something’s, maybe you are using ideas you like from real life be they real or fantasy, maybe you are making it up as you go along, but you have an idea of how your nation is run and what technology it has. This is your concept. Iuthia is based on a benevolent dictatorship run in the fashion I would rule the world if I had the chance (who’s surprised about that one, I bet it’s not many). The Fedral Union’s concept is Star Trek’s Federation with some changes to suit the player.

This concept is important to helping you imagine your nation. You can make it up or your can follow some other fiction or reality, freeform is freeform after all, you can do what you like.

- >> Be Feasible: This is the more important hint really, a lot of nations seem to get a little lost in the concept which is all very well but you have to remember you aren’t the best nation in the world, there is no such thing. At best your nation may be brilliant at some things and poor at others, but there is no overall best and it’s quite common that someone is bigger then you, has more money then you or more naked then you. So don’t get caught up in being the best. You should try and stay true to your concept while bearing in mind that others will want to interact with you and won’t always agree that you are the best. Your concept may be better then you if you are role-playing science fiction, after all those fictions have an entire galaxy to use for their adventures, you have a nation with a set population. The population isn’t always important, but a lot of people take note of it so it’s important not to get carried away with your concept. For example; you are a Star Trek nation, if you RPed it as though you were just like them you would have the resources of the Federation with just under a trillion people and thousands of advanced ships, but then what if someone then RPed Star Wars? They would have an entire galaxy to play with, maybe hundreds of thousands of ships and hundreds if not thousands of trillions of people. How about Warhammer 40’000? Well then you have pretty much the same as Star Wars, only your ships are even more obscene, you have worlds which produce nothing but Titans and stupidly powerful space marines…

Everyone can RP an idea and some of those ideas are a lot more powerful then others, the trick here is to balance them out to an acceptable level. The acceptable level depends on who you are role-playing with, some people don’t mind you having several systems to yourself, and some people will ignore your extra population and obscene amounts of ships. Some will ignore you on site and others may even mock you, even though they should not. It’s up to you to strike that balance, who do you want to RP with? Personally I like to be pretty feasible and strike a balance. I hope you do to.


Thanks, that is the conclusion, for the time being, of my guide. I didn’t cover the points I wanted to, I wanted to get into numbers and so on, but this is a fairly open thing now. Anyone can use these hints and it will probably help you get along better with some. Remember, these aren’t rules, just suggestions.

I will take comments as you like and I’m not really looking for a sticky (though I have to admit, if the title is changed it would be nice) this is all because I want to explain, in detail, what you can do to improve your chances in role-play. Thanks, I hope you find this useful.

Pete – The Player behind Iuthia.
Originally taken from: http://forums2.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=355347
Last edited by Admin on Sat Nov 06, 2004 4:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.
New Calabra (Albion)
ESUS Teletubby Fan
Posts: 257
Joined: Sun Jun 20, 2004 12:30 am

Post by New Calabra (Albion) »

*read it all*

Very good. :) I can't say I've seen a better set of advice for Rpers ever.
Image
Tappee
ESUS Teletubby Fan
Posts: 237
Joined: Tue Aug 24, 2004 10:31 pm

Post by Tappee »

The best piece of advise that was mentioned was working things out ooc. Personally my self I’ve only taken part in two wars. Both which were with a person that I knew very well, and knew what their limitations were. Every few days we would get on Aim and work things out OOC. They would compromise for me, and I would do the same for them. The result was a strong story based RP, with an excellent plot. In truth the actual fighting was never a major part of the RP, it served simply as a backdrop.

Here’s are few example of what I mean. it's one story, but we had to break it up into three parts.

http://forums2.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=334413
http://forums2.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=306974
http://forums2.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=305669

Numbers, weapon types, logistic, the battle it’s self is rather meaningless, the only important thing are the characters. Character development at least to me is the most important thing in a RP since I try to carry my character though different RP’s and like to see them grow and evolve.

But then again that just me, there are those out there that Like to see their fleet kick another fleet ass, and that ok. Just different RP styles that’s all, but again working the details out before hand will make the RP much fun and will prevent and RP from becoming nothing more then a pissing contest.
Last edited by Guest on Tue Sep 07, 2004 9:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Metallinauts
Posts: 2595
Joined: Sun Apr 25, 2004 3:29 am
Prefix: The
Name: Metallinautsi Federation

Post by Metallinauts »

Well, I can proudly say I follow all of these.
Torontonias
ESUS Danza Slap
Posts: 761
Joined: Sat Jun 05, 2004 1:40 pm

Post by Torontonias »

Very Nice
Sskiss
ESUS Testicle Monster
Posts: 1799
Joined: Tue Jun 15, 2004 9:46 pm
Prefix: The Great Therapodian Empire of
Name: The Sskiss

Post by Sskiss »

Tapee, your posts you showed are what I would call "high focus". That is, they are focused on a few key characters and rest of the "world" serves merely as a backdrop. This style is very RPish - such as seen in various tabletop, pen and paper "roleplaying games". Such a style focuses on character development above all else.

As for myself, I try and strike a balance between character development, tactics and a greater or grand "theater" style play. I'm currently in two RP's on NS. And so far, according to the individuals who started the threads I am doing quite well. I've certainly never got any complaints.

And I'm happy with all that.
Last edited by Guest on Tue Sep 07, 2004 10:12 pm, edited 2 times in total.
"The Sskiss are prepared to share all - All that YOU have, that is!"

"Life is like a fresh kill, eat as much as you can before it all rots"

"Our blood drenched clade shall reclaim what is rightfully ours - and so wrongly taken from us by a whim of fate"
Metallinauts
Posts: 2595
Joined: Sun Apr 25, 2004 3:29 am
Prefix: The
Name: Metallinautsi Federation

Post by Metallinauts »

Sskiss wrote:Tapee, your posts you showed are what I would call "high focus". That is, they are focued on a few key characters and rest of the "world" serves merely as a backdrop. This style is very RPish - such as seen in various tabletop, pen and paper "roleplaying games". Such a style focuses on character development above all else.

As for myself, I try and strike a balance between character development, tactics and a greater or grand "theater" style play. I'm currently in two RP's on NS. And so far, according to the individuals who started the threads and doing quite well. I've certainly never got any complaints.

And I'm happy with all that.
Yes you are doing quite well.
Jangle Jangle Ridge
Pseudo-member
Posts: 1476
Joined: Wed Aug 04, 2004 3:46 am

Post by Jangle Jangle Ridge »

Well... I like theater, but I also like 1-5 Vs. 1-5 ship battles. It allows for more techno-flashey!
'Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one' Albert Einstein, man of the big brain.

I'm the ESUS member most capable of ingesting a sock! Weeee!

ThePsychopathicOddling@gmail.com

CF is my saviour!
Tappee
ESUS Teletubby Fan
Posts: 237
Joined: Tue Aug 24, 2004 10:31 pm

Post by Tappee »

Like I said, it just the way that I personally like to RP, and in now way am I saying that it is better.

I've seen a number of other RP styles done well, it just all depends on who is taking part in it.

My point is that working things out OOC makes an RP much more intresting.
Sskiss
ESUS Testicle Monster
Posts: 1799
Joined: Tue Jun 15, 2004 9:46 pm
Prefix: The Great Therapodian Empire of
Name: The Sskiss

Post by Sskiss »

Tappee, I never claimed otherwise. Do what works for you. It's enough for me not to be accused as being a godmodder, number/tech wanker or all round n00b.
"The Sskiss are prepared to share all - All that YOU have, that is!"

"Life is like a fresh kill, eat as much as you can before it all rots"

"Our blood drenched clade shall reclaim what is rightfully ours - and so wrongly taken from us by a whim of fate"
Post Reply