RP Terms, Tips, and Tricks

Okay, so believe it or not I actually have quite a few years of roleplay experience under my belt. I offered my assistance as a teacher at another of your forums, but since there's already a section and helpfuls for that purpose that won't be what this thread is for. I'm going to focus on RP elements here, not grammar or punctuation. If you need a tutor, you should probably consult the enrollment sticky. However, I feel that there's still a need for a list of terms so I'm posting this over here. It's almost the same list as from the MH site, but I changed examples to be more relevant and added a couple things based on what I've seen so far. If you have a question, or think there's a term I should add to the list feel free.

These lists aren't complete. I'll be adding to them, probably when someone asks a question about something I forgot. So don't be afraid to ask!

PC: Player Character. A character controlled by a roleplayer.
NPC: Non-Playable Character. A character that doesn't belong to a player
IC: In Character, or posts that involve dialogue, actions and thoughts of your character. These posts are supposed to be like reading a story.
OOC: Out of Character. When you're talking directly to players. When doing this within an IC post ((double parentheses)) signifies something said in OOC.
Example:
((Frank, my character isn't in his costume right now))
This is also acceptable
(OOC: Sorry it took so long to post. Bad storm put the power out.)
Intro Post: Introduction post. This one is pretty straight forward. This is the post that introduces your character. In other words, your character's first post in a thread.
Mun:The player themselves. Used as a suffix with the character's name. For instance, my character's name is Metis so Metis-mun would refer to me.
God modding: A definite no-no that will make people hate you and probably kick you out of their games. This is when a character does whatever he wants without any limits or boundaries such as having invincible armour, or being able to dodge everything that comes at you not matter what. This also includes killing or injuring another player's character or using another person's character. YOU SHOULD NEVER, EVER CONTROL ANOTHER CHARACTER'S ACTIONS WITHOUT THEIR PERMISSION.
Example:
"I punch you in the face, my fist makes a crunching sound as it slams into your jaw and you're knocked to the floor."

Now see, this doesn't give the other character a chance to dodge or anything. You're telling him that he's hit in the face AND knocked to the floor. It's really rude, possibly making out the other character to be something he's not "(such as weak and sniveling,) and ruins the fun for everyone else.

Metagaming is when your character acts with external knowledge he/she shouldn't have. This includes adjusting your character's behavior because you have knowledge of long-term events, using certain attacks or strategies based on the weaknesses of your opponent, when your character shouldn't have knowledge of these weaknesses, acting differently towards other player-characters based on real-life relationships with those players, using knowledge of game mechanics (Here that means the stat system) to gain an advantage in the game by having the character do something incompatible with his/her personality. (An example would be making a character with an intelligence of 1, and posting like he has above average intelligence anyway.) Basically, any action based upon the knowledge you are playing a game. This destroys the line between player and character, as well as the suspension of disbelief necessary to pretend you're in a world filled with superheroes.

When roleplaying, you shouldn't think of "you" and "your character" as the same person. The only way you are related is that you write out his or her actions for other people to say. If anything, your chars are your children. For instance, my character is Metis. I am Metis's mun, Allison. Metis's personality is nothing like mine, and she will often act in ways that Allison would never do. This will often affect her in negative ways, but I will still write for Metis based on the person she is. I may see something as an obvious trap, but that doesn't mean Metis would. She's foolhardy impulsive, she may very well rush right in there and get caught in the trap. Avoiding the trap because I as the player know my character may get hurt is absolutely wrong, and hurts the game for everyone. Even me. After all, if there's no risk of my character getting hurt, captured, or killed how is the game even exciting?

Okay, I know everyone thinks the "Badass loner with a dangerous past" type character is cool, but I'd heavily recommend not making a character with a loner personality if you're a beginner. Interaction is the basis of roleplay, and if you're not interacting with other characters you probably won't be having as much fun as you should. If you finish your post and there's no interaction with any other characters, you might want to consider changing it. Note that interacting with another character can mean just saying something to someone.

The most common mistake made by people new to RP is they make a character that isn't flawed. It's important to have strengths, especially in a RP about super heroes, but flaws are what makes a character interesting. Even simple things. Maybe your character is strong, but not very fast. Maybe your character is fast on his feet, but is weaker than most characters. Once you start to get better at making characters you're going to want to add other flaws, besides just physical. Like Personality flaws. Maybe your character is a braggart, or overly competitive. Maybe he/she has some sort of skeleton is his closet. Maybe he/she is very young and suffers from ageism. I could keep going on and on. This is what makes your character unique.

Yes, your character's appearance is described in his character sheet. Does that mean you should let everyone who wants to know what your character looks like look up your character sheet? Absolutely not. Character sheets are there for reference, you should be able to RP with your character without anyone else ever having to see your character sheet. Now of course, you don't need fully describe your character's appearance every post. This would waste your time, as well as you're readers. A description of your character belongs in the first post in a thread, this is your characters "Intro Post." You might want to touch a bit on your character's appearance here and there of course, especially if it's a long thread with new characters being introduced, but an intro post is probably the only time when it's appropriate to have a whole paragraph to describe your character.

So you're new. Your posts are short and people are having trouble playing with you. Everyone tells you to start writing more detailed posts, but that isn't helpful to you. How do make more detailed posts? Well, there's an easy way to start improving on that. Write your post as you normally would, but when you finish writing a paragraph read back over it. Anytime your character does something you should ask yourself HOW he does it. Edit your post so that any time your character does something it, you're also saying how he does it. It is a small change, but you'll notice the improvement. After you do this for a while, it'll become more natural and you'll star seeing how you can add more detail. So this is a way to "teach yourself. In summary, whenever you say your character does something say HOW he does it.

If you're on a computer you probably have MS Word or some other kind of word processor. It would be wise to make a habit of writing your posts in Word or another program, and then copying and pasting it to the thread reply. This is mainly for two reasons. !.) Spell & grammar checks. Sure, Firefox has spellcheck built in. It isn't near as good as what Word has though. Running a spellcheck and grammar-check is an easy, quick thing that will GREATLY improve your posts. 2.) This will keep your post safer, probably saving you a lot of stress. A lot can go wrong when you're typing in your web browser. Your browser can freak out and close itself or freeze. Maybe you forgot to check the "Keep my logged in" box and you press send only to be told that you're not logged in and all your work is lost. Word is especially handy for this since it has an auto-recover feature that will save your document if word isn't closed properly.

*Claps you on the back*

Good work. You'll be a good addition to the site. I think we have this information already, but you've more or less put in your application for becoming a mod.

A mod? Eheheh, I don't know about all that. I'm probably too timid. I don't mind helping out with Roleplay stuff though.

Alright. This'll be useful for our newbies.

However, I'd also put emphases on detail. A long detailed post will give other characters more ability to join in, in different ways.

I'm pretty sure I know what you're saying. I think I can add in a tip to help in that area. It'll just take a moment.

Edit: "He's in the details" and "A man's only as good as his microsoft word" added to the tips section.