Thread: Roleplay Management and Post Rate

Okay guys, we've all been there. You have a decent amount of roleplays going on, everything's fine and dandy, but then the post rate starts going down for all your roleplays. Some roleplays may even be stalled for a month or longer. Whatever the reason, you get bored and have the desire for a steady flow of posts at whatever rate is comfortable for you, so you take on a couple more roleplays. Then magically, everyone you've ever roleplayed with in your entire life decides to come back from the dead and post all at the same time. Boom, now you've got five million things to reply to and seemingly so little time. Sometimes it can be a little stressful, right? Before I go on, let me say this Not responding to roleplays in a steady manner, for whatever reason, is totally okay. Placing roleplays on hold, for whatever reason, is totally okay. Having writer's block or real-life issues, for whatever reason, IS MORE THAN OKAY. This thread is not to pick on the reasons why people do those things, because frankly it happens, and there are other threads to discuss why or why not you think that is appropriate. But this is not that thread. What this thread is for is to discuss how you manage your roleplays in attempt not to have a scenario like the one described above. Personal things you like to do so that you feel like you have enough roleplays to keep you satisfied, while also not feeling stressed about the fact that you have so many to respond to. 1 How many roleplays do you take on at once? Does the number you take on also depend on the general amount you write for those roleplays? 2 Do you ever expect a post-rate from your partners? If so, how often do you expect them to post? And if not, how do you handle individual cases of decreased activity in a single roleplay? 3 How do you handle an overall decrease in roleplaying activity as in, all of or most of your partners slow down? Do you search for more roleplays as replacements, or do you wait it out? 4 When you do get stressed out from having a pile of roleplays to respond to, what helps you de-stress? How do you go about picking where to start? 5 How do you resist the temptation to take on another roleplay? I've definitely experienced that moment where I find myself browsing request threads just for the hell of it even though I'm not really looking, and I end up sending out a PM because the story idea was just totally amazing. I find most of my problem is that I have the tendency to bite off a lot more than I can chew. I'm a full-time student, so during the academic semesters I really can only handle so many roleplays at a time. That number sits around 4 for me, but when I'm on summer or winter break, I get the itch to write more, so I take on more roleplays. Then everything starts to go downhill after the new semester starts because I find myself unable to keep up. Boo. I also never expect my partners to post at a certain rate because I know that the writing muse comes and goes like the wind. But when I get bored or impatient, I tend to pick up more roleplays, leaving me with the beginning scenario. And I get stressed out easily. Again, boo. Obviously, my roleplay management skills are lacking, lmaooo. So, what do you do for roleplay management?