Forums » RP Discussion » Pet Peves in characters and/or RP

Actually I don't believe that posting short posts (even one-liners) is a terrible thing. You can have something like "Mary Featherboots slinks over to the cell's lock with the key grasped firmly in her paw" and have that be as worthwhile as a paragraph of Furc's smallest text.

But by all means, you MUST give something for others to react to, no matter the length. And don't fluff it up, people. I am not in the mood to read 3 paragraphs about the curves of your chara's muscles as their neck turns, or how many birthstones it would take to make the shine they have in their eyes, or how each and every stair creaks as they come down from the second floor...

I. AGREE. COMPLETELY.

I love putting details in when I'm feeling fancy, but never overdue it!!!

I will admit that I write in the style in which my character thinks, so there will occasionally be some excess detail, but I try not to overdo it. Mostly, I seem to succeed. ^^

I agree completely, Copper. I don't mind if there's description or character thoughts thrown in, usually (and in fact, I stylize at least one character that I play to have very meandering and whimsical narrative text), but if we're playing a battle scene or a large group scene or something else that should be fast-moving, keep it to a minimum, pleeeease!

I try to write my posts like news articles. I will tell you what happened, where, what was said, who said it, and so forth. I will not directly include thoughts, emotional states*, motivations*, backstory*, or unnecessary description*. I respect my fellow roleplayers, and that means communicating with them as effectively as possible while taking up as little of their time as possible. This principle applies to all communication, visual or auditory. For example, this post was originally close to four paragraphs long. Just five minutes of editing later it's down to one, and the original did not say anything important that this version does not.

*If my character is asked about her past, she will answer. In dialogue. Emotion and motivation should be inferred from body language and other mannerisms, just as in real life. This is called necessary description.

Edit: You know what? Strunk said it first, and better.

Omit needless words.

Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all his sentences short, or that he avoid all detail and treat his subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.

This might have been discussed or I might have said it already...
But when people make a full post, meaning it takes up the size of the Furc text box, typically on the smallest font, and add [sorry short!] at the end of it. Sometimes the post is even half the screen.. I never, for the life of me consider that short. It's as if I am doing something wrong when posting. Well, dammit! It seems I've been posting such small posts all these years!

I recently witnessed someone, in a crowded area with at least 20 people, around half that were consistently active, do five full posts. Only one post consisted of the characters immediate actions and the character saying hello. The last four were backstory.
Now.. when I RP one on one I may do a longer entry post to set the environment and explain what my character may have been doing previously to stepping into the RP. If I am RPing with four other people, my post might be longer if my character addresses them all individually.
In a public, active setting I find it almost inconsiderate that someone would, essentially, spam five to six long posts when there are quite a few other people around them RPing.

Sorry if this is a regurgitation of what was already discussed. ;p

Many of my first ever posts on a character will be up to five para's long. Or longer, depending. Why? Because it gives some insight into how they got there. Maybe they were coming through investigating something (Laermeluion), were hunting someone else (Chrestienne) or were forced there (Fachtna). Generally if I am rping, I am rping with usually one person. I do not do group rps well, mostly because it gets chaotic, the posting order gets ruined and everyone and their dog is jumping in regardless if I want to actually rp with them or not.

The only time I find large posts annoying, are if they go on about how pointlessly sexy, miserable or beaten-up their character is.
Five para of what adventure they may have been on before they got there? HELL YES
Five para of who they shagged before they got there? Erm...

/rant

No mention also of the fact that it is sometimes fun to do four-para posts with your mates when it's really early in the morning in the middle of TGT just to get people's response *whistles innocently* I love me some long para in the mornings.

If it's a good post, quality wise, and it actually contributes to getting a better feel for the character, then I personally find this excusable. If it's poorly written blabbing that's just there for the sake of filling five posts then I agree.

I ignore a whole bunch of people whose RPing style/posts I don't like, similar to a filter I suppose? If I RP in a public place where others are posting too, I can jut as easily move over to a different corner.

Then again, I don't let such things bother me easily. I am more bothered by unrealistic events, the famous 12 foot dragon strolling through a door without ducking or a heavily pregnant woman getting into a brawl with broken bones and bruises then strolling happily. There's a line between acceptable fiction and plain over dramatization for the sake of being dramatic and those kind of things cross it for me.

That is most definitely a good choice to make if it makes roleplaying fun to you! But I always try to remember that not everyone likes the flavor of a banana milkshake, that some people just don't like broccoli and others don't like chicken soup. I really dig green beans with mashed potatoes, but plenty of folks don't like it. By eating mashed potatoes and green beans, does that mean I don't respect people who don't like it? Not really. It just means I take delight in eating what I like to eat, but I also let others take delight in eating what they like. I think the same applies to roleplaying.

We don't all have the same tastes in the styles that we roleplay in, but I always believe one should be careful with how they express their preferences. I don't believe you mean to imply that people who are descriptive on emotions or backstory are disrespectful towards their fellow players, but your phrasing carries that impression. I have fun reading posts that contain extra description, thoughts, emotions... because it entertains me as a bookworm and helps me visualize the character as intended.

Roleplaying to me is more than plain communication, it's being creative and creating together, and simulating emotions and being descriptive makes me happy. That doesn't make it wrong... It's just a different preference. We're not all going to be compatible as roleplaying buddies, just like how we can't all be best friends. We're all different and enjoy different things. Something we don't enjoy isn't necessarily wrong or disrespectful, it's simply different. If we can keep that in mind and seek out compatible partners for roleplay, then wheter we're overly descriptive or not doesn't even matter, because we'll have found someone who suits our preferences who we can have fun with.

Yeah i think you're right, I kinda came off as a dick there.

What I meant was that it's pretty hard for me to believe that anybody gives a crap about how sunlight reflects off of dew on my character's hair, creating double miracle rainbows, and I also am not interested in that stuff, so I leave it out. Here, I'm operating on the assumption that if I find some aspect of my character to be boring and irrelevant, other people are likely to feel the same way, since I'm typically going to be the person who's most biased in favor of finding my own characters interesting.

On the other hand, if you know someone well enough to already have a feel for their preferred style, then this becomes a non-issue, and you can just adapt accordingly without having to assume anything.

As far as thoughts and emotions and the rest of a character's internal experiences, I'm all for illuminating those - just not in direct narration. There's pretty much always a better way to get across such information. Don't tell me this dude is feeling mad, you shouldn't have to. I should be able to observe his behavior and make an inference about his internal state on my own - and even better, my inference can be wrong, leading to all sorts of interesting situations that might not have occurred otherwise.

And as for backstory, well, we can have our characters ask each other about it directly. It even allows Joe Brooder to respond that he's not comfortable talking about "that part of his past", further cementing his character and making him more believable, and therefore contributing to the roleplay as a whole having a greater emotional impact on its participants. Everybody wins!

Now, let's be fair. We're all here because we love to write. We all love our flowery, multiple-page, self-indulgent author-wank posts. We've all done them, myself included. (I recently wrote one of my longest posts to date on this very site, though I won't directly link to anything any of my characters are involved in. Doing so feels weird, there's a search function anyway, and I doubt anybody really cares.) And just look at the enormous text dumps people write up for character profiles! And, despite all appearances to the contrary, I have nothing against such posts, I believe they can do a lot to add variety to a thread.

The only thing I dislike is a player who consistently, and without regard for their fellow players, writes many, many words that don't really say anything. That's emphasized for a reason. If anyone did look at my longer posts, yes, they include a decent amount of pretentious wankery. However, every paragraph includes information that is actually relevant to the plot, setting, or other characters in some way.

Finally, I think it's important to re-iterate that nobody needs to give a crap about the way I do things, or think they should be done. At the end of the day, the only thing that matters is whether you're getting along with your fellow roleplayers and contributing something valuable.

Edit: You can tell I hate long posts by how brief, concise and especially well-composed this one is. Blugh.

HMMM. Those both sound extremely familiar.... ;P

I really have to agree with that. I personally don't mind a little bit of backstory, oh- previously my character was doing this or that, described in two short sentences. That doesn't bother me. It's when it comes down to massive posts with backstory- and as you said, that can all be done by one character asking another character, or someone offering it up, in dialogue.

But that's true! I may absolutely love mushrooms but there are those that despise the smell of them or being in the same room as them.
I do still belive in common courtesy when posting in an open/public RP setting. Five or six posts is getting rathe excessive.

@ Dylan: Five or six posts in an open or public setting might be seen as excessive to you, but what about the equally as disinteresting, filler and/or pointless description of a one para or god forbid, less than three lines? Or the cliche characters, the overdone slavers, the tacky herms and so on? But as much as I do not like those sort of characters, I will generally not think much of them posting around me. They have their way of rping, I have mine, regardless of how I dislike their particular style.

@ mross: Finally, I think it's important to re-iterate that nobody needs to give a crap about the way I do things, or think they should be done. At the end of the day, the only thing that matters is whether you're getting along with your fellow roleplayers and contributing something valuable. <- Agreed.

You are not forced to rp with everyone. You should not have to tailor your rp posts to everyone's liking because hey, guess what, you will not be able to. This reminds me of the 'debate' on the main Furcadia forums about post length. Which... never got anywhere, and came to roughly the same conclusion along the lines of different strokes for different folks.

<insert massive quote of posts with mross>

I know you didn't mean it, so I'm not offended at all. The phrasing just felt a bit odd.

I can definitely see where you're coming from, but to me it's the opposite. I don't find that straight forward approach in roleplay that appealing. I don't read books that are written like that either, so I find it difficult to appreciate and fit with my own style.

Most of the time I do only roleplay with my closer friends because we all know how we roll and we are tuned in to each other like that. So it works for us, we have fun, ???, profit!

To be honest, most people here probably don't like the empty filler posts that do absolutely nothing for the RP. Perhaps that's one thing we all have in common? Number one pet peeve of seasoned multi-para posters, I think. The worst example I can think of that I read was a 3 Furc page full post that, literally, only described how the character walked to a seat, sat down and looked around. Now the last three paragraphs, including this one, is at least one full page long in Furcadia. Times three.

This. Don't forget the fun though. If it wasn't fun we wouldn't be doing it in the first place!

They should! There are 12 foot dragons who sit on tiny seats that don't break all throughout Furcadia, and every other pregnant female seems to have a uterus of steel in Kasuria for some reason...

Given that dragons fly, their bones must be hollow / honey-combed, so it's at least possible that a 12-foot dragon might not weigh enough to destroy a reasonably well-built stool that was constructed out of something dense like mahogany or ironwood. [/devilsadvocate]

But then how would it arrange that much bulk on to a relatively tiny stool in a way that approached any sort of comfort? For that matter, wouldn't any self-respecting dragon lounge arrogantly in the middle of the tavern as opposed to sitting at the bar, the better to allow its slavering maw to yawn lazily/menacingly at people entering?

Ultimately, though, a dragon has no business being near an inn unless it's setting it on fire or stealing the town's livestock and virgins.

The difference, to me, is that "the equally as disinteresting, filler and/or pointless description of a one para or god forbid, less than three lines" or "the cliche characters, the overdone slavers, the tacky herms and so on", I'm assuming, are keeping it to a single post. That is considerably easier for me to ignore than the five to six posts from one person. If I happen to read that single post I'm still not going to care much for it, but it is easier to pass over.

The only reason I bring up the filler is that when faced with a six post, I am curious what the character is doing to make that many posts in this public area. Thus, I read it to see what it is all about. Had it been six Furcadia text box sized post of all actions I would still see it as excessive. In my previous statement I really only used one example from something I had recently seen, which happened to be mainly filler.

Let me reiterate: As much as content is or can be an issue with regards to 'filler', it's amplified when it is in six massive posts within a public setting that everyone shares. However, in this case, it isn't simply the content but the size of the post. I am not saying this is a requirement for every single roleplay, whether in public or private, neither am I implying that I am going to create a rule over how many posts someone makes in one go.

edit;
We certainly do all have our own way of RPing. And this thread is a Pet Peeve with regards to RPs, so it is expected all of our opinions will differentiate.

Ahhhh, so THAT'S why I haven't been doing it as of late, haha.

Well, so, what's peeving me the most lately is starting up a RP and all, but then, suddenly, in the middle of it, I get writer's block.
It's like
"HHHHNNNGGHHHH! Where'd that come from?!"
It's so discouraging hahaha

I know just what you mean!!

And 'uterus of steel' made me rofl. I actually had my newly pregnant alt try to get into a fighting tornament once in Northkeep but they wouldn't let her. She was kinda peeved but she understood that it would totally not be good for the baby.

That, or when you're midway through an RP or have just started one and you feel in need of sleep. Reeeaally annoying.