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So, I was just kinda wondering, in all your guys' long travels around the internet--what kinds of places did you come from to end up here? What sites and realms and apps did you roleplay on before coming here? Have you found other interesting avenues of RP since coming here? What kinds of experiences have you had in these other places?

If anyone is curious about my own RP origins, I would be more than happy enough to share, too, though for this first post I'll keep as is, as a way to establish the topic. ^_^
Rogue-Scribe

What kinds of places did you come from to end up here?
Various Tolkien Lord of the Rings Middle Earth sites

What sites and realms and apps did you roleplay on before coming here?
Forum thread based, similar to here.

Have you found other interesting avenues of RP since coming here?
¯\_(ツ)_/¯

What kinds of experiences have you had in these other places?
Mostly good ones. A couple weird ones.


With an early start in D&D, I been RP writing Tolkien's Middle Earth fandom on various fan sites over the last several years (since those damn movies). Most either have disappeared or gone dormant. My wife and I are in an epic one over in Arwen Undomiel forum, but the site owner has basically abandoned it in place and there is little upkeep anymore. I think one mod still visits every now and then. Wefinally moved it to our own board as we were the only ones writing it.
It started out on paper with my best friends, then it went to deviant art, then google hangouts, ifunny, then polyvore, then facebook, and lastly here. For the first year it was on paper, devinatart and hangouts with just my best friend doing the same rp for months. She's the one to tell me about this sight and made me make an account. I personally thought it looked shady af first.
Claine Moderator

What kinds of places did you come from to end up here?
A friend introduced me to RPR!

What sites and realms and apps did you roleplay on before coming here?
Lots! I started off on a decently sized freeform RP forum quite like this one. The atmosphere wasn't as good - with a real focus on RP post length, and a lot of teenage drama in the forums (including from the moderator team)
After that forum collapsed on itself, I hosted a few of my own forums, had some experience in a MUD, and eventually wound up here.

Have you found other interesting avenues of RP since coming here?
Discord and Roll20 are great tools to for RP. But I use them enhancement to my RPs on RPR rather than the platform for RP.

What kinds of experiences have you had in these other places?

I've never gone looking for RP on these platforms - but as a tool I'd consider Roll20 a cornerstone for tabletop style RPs with map usage.
Maybe this will surprise you, or maybe not, but until recently I didn't rp really at all. I like creating and writing stories and have always rather excelled in writing I feel, but true rp I haven't really done actively since Yahoo user based rooms were still allowed (has to be 15 years ago lol)

I found this place out of a longing for role play. I was on another forum of mine for the sims PC game and saw some of them roleplaying....I nearly joined in but decided not to seeing as all the story ideas I had seemed too thorough for their rp, so I hit Google and searched role play websites and here I am....that was Nov 1st of this year only, but I can see myself staying here for years as long as the mods dont get sick of me and kick me out XD
What kinds of places did you come from to end up here?
Strangely enough, I ended up arriving here from Facebook while trying to learn how to roleplay with their pages feature (still don't know how Facebook roleplayers do it to this day, to be honest with you). I didn't go full swing here until later on in the year I joined, I believe.

What sites and realms and apps did you roleplay on before coming here?
Uh, let's see here... IMVU for a short while (I was part of a casual KH roleplay family that I soon had to leave because drama issues), DeviantArt (I was part of a school academy thing that fell under because poor management and again, drama), Google Hangouts with my current boyfriend, FanFiction PMs... But my roleplaying adventures began over the phone via voice roleplay and texts with someone from highschool. Broke up a long while back, but I still dabble in it with my darling when we're not as busy as can be.

Have you found other interesting avenues of RP since coming here?
Aside from reestablishing DeviantArt as an avenue for roleplay? Not really... Oh wait! I did discover Furcadia via RPR. It's actually quite fun to know that this place started from a need of character profile sites other than Wix that's built just for roleplay. (At least, that's what I learned via lurking anyway...) I also tried out Discord, but I soon quit. Wasn't for me.

What kinds of experiences have you had in these other places?
With Discord, it felt more like I should be using it for gaming chats and the like rather than roleplaying, so... Furcadia, I'm still getting used to. I pop on every now again, just to wander about, see all the people (even if most of them are AFK), and dreamweave a bit. I'm still a beginner in Dragonspeak, but I'm getting there!

If you mean experiences in other sites I used to RP in? ... ... ...I'd... Rather skip that part. Though I can tell you about my current experiences in vocal roleplay with my boyfriend. It's rather fun and intricate now that we've established a sort of system to keep up with things. We've ended up taking notes on where we left off, the overall plot so far, what new characters and NPCs we've added, schedules of the main/side characters (since this is a structured school setting), etc....

Before hand, my former vocal roleplay experiences in high school just started as: "Uh, where did we leave off on our last story again?" "I'unno, wanna start a new one?" "Okay!" My boyfriend was immediate in questioning my old methods when I first introduced him to the idea in full, and I thank him so much for it... Otherwise I would've fallen out of it when he lost interest in my old method.
Subtleknifewielder Topic Starter

So many fun and interesting places you all have been to/from!
LightSide-Lucree wrote:
If you mean experiences in other sites I used to RP in?

And to confirm, Lotus, I was asking about experiences both before and after, whatever you are comfortable sharing and no more than that ^_^
What kinds of places did you come from to end up here?
I came here from a guild in Elder Scrolls Online that hosts its guild page in a group here. The guild page ended up never being used (and an update to ESO outmoded my computer D:), but I figured there wasn't much point in making an account here just for that, so I decided to make the most of it. So far it's been a good decision!

What sites and realms and apps did you roleplay on before coming here?
Aside from the obvious answer of Elder Scrolls Online, I mostly I RPed via text messages between myself and my fiancée. I also play D&D and the Unofficial Elder Scrolls RPG both in person and on Roll20 (using Discord for voice chat). Before that was MSPARP, now known as MXRP, which at the time was a Homestuck-focused, Omegle-type, primarily script-style RP site. (As I understand it, MXRP is now multi-fandom.) But my first introduction to RP, aside from my first D&D game, was on a website called Scratch. It's a programming community for young people learning to code, made by MIT, and it's...a mess, community-wise. I cringe every time I go back and look at my old stuff on there.

Have you found other interesting avenues of RP since coming here?
Well, I've become interested in joining a certain Discord-based RP group, which is something I've not done before. I haven't yet, because I want to be able to focus on my final exams, but come Sunday or Monday I'll join up and see how that goes. I'm excited! I've also seen many mentions of Furcadia around RPR, but it sounds like a furry thing and I'm not a furry. (I'm engaged to one, though.)

What kinds of experiences have you had in these other places?
None, yet! I've used Discord for OOC communication with RP partners and groups before, used Discord's voice chat for tabletop RPGs, and done RP in DMs on Discord, but never joined an RP server. I hope I like it.
Subtleknifewielder Topic Starter

Oh, awesome, I enjoy RP'ing on Discord myself, hope your first experience with an RP server is enjoyable!
Back when I was a kid, I used to share a room with my brother, and for a while we would talk amongst ourselves playing what we called "the game" after we'd been put to bed. This was definitely some form of roleplay, but I just didn't know it yet. I have always been drawing pictures-- and up until then, writing fanfics-- to accompany it (or maybe it was vice versa?) and after my brother and I grew out of it, I eventually moved onto internet chat clients like MSN, chatzy, and then Furcadia, where I stayed for some time. I still log into Furcadia occasionally, but I've grown to dislike chat RP. The implied time constraint saps all the fun out of it for me, as I can take up to an hour writing a post, and for that reason I'll probably never move to places like Discord.

Prior to making an account here, I was actually writing on Facebook for years, and while I met some really good writers there I also think the culture there was just too toxic (to say nothing of personal drama), and that probably comes from Facebook being... well, Facebook. I reluctantly left it behind and just kind of floated around until I was pointed here by an old Furcadia companion, and so far, everything's been pretty alright!
I'm posting a lengthy trek, so lemme just collapse that...

Long story
Mm... my journey starts with Writing.Com, which was then Stories.Com, and which is the other "friendliest site I've ever seen" I'm talking about when I mentioned that RPR is one of two. (RPR is the one I favor; I've hardly done anything on WDC in ages.) While I was there, I gained access to the site chat, where I became a regular. The earliest stages of my play-by-post RPing happened there, actually: goofy little "fights" where me and another guy would basically try to out-do each other in ridiculous ways of horribly murdering each other. Overall, a fun experience.

As a regular, I was eventually invited to a little ProBoards forum community that one of the others had set up as a little "town" for us to populate. The was where I first started actually getting the concept of RP, of taking on another persona to act things out. It was also the second time I had a crush on someone online, but the first time it got so much of my attention - it was on someone who joined who was a personal friend of another, rather than a member of WDC, but who also was a bit more creative with his character. Unfortunately, I think this "cyber town" was also the first place I experienced online bullying, simply because I mentioned that I enjoyed some of the music by someone the rest of them thought was horrible and obnoxious. The admin actually used site tools to give me the title "Liker of the Evil One." So experiences there were kinda a mixed bag.

Anyway, that got me to start actually looking around for places to RP. I bounced around a bit between the personal projects of others and MUDs that I didn't really have much fun with or know what to do with before finally stumbling into another Proboards RP site, one that had a set up more like here where different threads were all different RPs of different genres and stuff. I stayed there a good while and believe I had a good bit of fun there, but it's unfortunately some negatives that most stand out in my memory now. From the first RP I created and was most attached to being taken over by an unpleasant trio that eventually drove me to have my character killed off to escape it, to being seriously chewed out by the admin I respected for poorly (but not that poorly, I've since learned) handling an issue in an RP, to just the constant sorta creepy presence of this one 20- or 30-something guy who would frequently talking about being "in love" with the admin - who was a minor for much of that time. Also, remembering back to hold I played at the time, so much cringe. XD

Around the time I accepted that I just wasn't having fun there anymore, I started looking around again, but still wasn't finding much to my taste. Someone I knew there tried starting his own place, but it never really went anywhere. Eventually though, a friend of his who I developed a heck of a crush on (hoo boy that soured bad enough that there's an entire state that I get nervous thinking about visiting) led me on over the GaiaOnline. I did do a lot of developing there, and I made a few cool friends, but... the place is toxic. I was seeing popularity games all the time, mostly by the very sorts of folks who would surely claim popularity games to be evil and that they'd do no such thing. A lot of it revolved around how much someone could type, so large posts of tiny text of word vomit became increasingly popular. I was afraid to RP via PM there because, even though ERP was strictly forbidden there, that seemed to be the only reason to RP via PMs and I didn't want to get involved in that. And of the friends I made there, I only managed to hang on to one; others drifted away, and one had to outright cut contact because I guess his girlfriend thought I was trying to steal him or something?

I should have left from the toxicity. Instead I left because it was getting in the way of college and, well... I'd kinda given up on RP at that point. I also tried setting up my own place, one with a single world that was to be developed collaboratively. It started off decently, but didn't make it far. I kinda looked around at other places again, but lacked the will to get involved. I fell back on email RP with the only friend I'd kept from Gaia, a guy I'd actually ended up dating. But in time, I got to nagging him for more than he felt up to, and eventually he was like, "Hey, I remember this RP Repository place, maybe you can check that out."

So I came and checked out RPR. And at first, this happened. And then I decided to try just diving in and... have not regretted it. I mean, it's not all been sunshine and daisies, but that's normal, and overall... it's been amazing here.
Subtleknifewielder Topic Starter

@saltfactory I know what you mean, RP on social media can be a very mixed bag--I myself am fortunate enough to have found a solid group of friends there. One of them even invited me into a Pathfinder campaign her husband is DM'ing on Discord, and I'm quite enjoying playing the party Fighter. :)

@Nova Long story indeed--that sounds like an incredible journey! Sorry you had to wade through so much toxicity to find your way here, but I am glad you stuck with it to find your way here! And I certainly know what you mean by looking back and cringing at early roleplaying, hahah, I blush at what I got up to in my earliest days of roleplaying--I must have committed half the sins in the book. XD

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