Thread: ...but what does it MEAN to Roleplay? *puffs on pipe*

Shovel said Sometimes, the simplest of questions can be the most complex of questions. While out and about today I started thinking about the meaning of Roleplay, which prompted the question What does it mean to roleplay? And upon contemplation and reflection, this prompted even more questions from myself. Sure, we can look at the dictionary definition and get a basic understanding of the concept. Roleplay Noun 1. PSYCHOLOGY the acting out or performance of a particular role, either consciously as a technique in psychotherapy or training or unconsciously, in accordance with the perceived expectations of society with regard to a person's behavior in a particular context. 2. participation in a role-playing game. Click to expand... ...But I am not merely interested in just defining it. I would like to explore it more in depth. So, some questions that might be explored What is roleplay? What does it mean to roleplay? What is the purpose or goal of a roleplay? What motivates one to undertake a roleplay? When you have selected a role, is the role you? Or an aspect of you? Or a thought experiment one likes to see played out? Is there a wrong way to roleplay? What makes a roleplay good? Is roleplay real? Click to expand... May as well take a shot at this. Keep in mind none of this is intended to be anything more than my own nonsense, so don't expect citations or anything. Click to expand... What is roleplaywhat does it mean to roleplay? The obvious answer is to play a role. Exactly how far you take that depends on how far you want to take the label into interconnected realms. The term role playing is used in psychology, for instance, as a method of working through issues, it could involve training exercises, roleplaying in sex, conventional acting performances, and even the simple of performing whatever roles you have in your life. All these interlink as all relate to the ways we learn and express our behaviors. And there is, of course, the kind of roleplaying which is this site's purpose, and this is what I tend to think of when I think roleplaying. Everything else is perhaps better placed under other labels since, really, you'll always have overlap with anything. I would specifically call this recreational roleplaying to distinguish it from any other role-play like activites. For the purposes of this brand of roleplaying, I would specify the necessity that you, the player, assume the viewpoint of the character and make decisions for that character based on the setting they exist in. I would ascribe a few other traits to roleplaying in this sense 1 It is unscripted. You, the player, determine the characters thoughts, words, and actions, rather than operating off a script determined by a third-party. This is on a sliding scale, of course. Even with as an actor with a script, you can offer your interpretation on the it with non-scripted actions, mannerisms, and even ad-libs. Also compare the concept of roleplaying video games, where your decisions may be limited to a pre-determined selection, but are still your choice. 2 It is done primarily for the participants. You could do it in view of others, or gear it to be a demonstration with the intent of showing others how roleplaying is done, but it's still mostly for yourself and your partners. This is what contrasts recreational roleplaying against any other kind of performing art involving a role, like acting, improve, pro wrestling, and so forth. Performers might still enjoy slipping into their performance role in a manner similar to roleplaying as part of the overlap, but I would still point to this as a difference between the two things.. 3 Typically involves other people, i.e. one person doesn't have absolute control over things. However, I still think you can roleplay by yourself. Take roleplaying in a single-player video game... I often base decisions around a personality I've created for my character and often have an internal monologue of their thoughts. In a game like Skyrim where little is predetermined about your character I might even give them a backstory. Sometimes it isn't very elaborate and is mostly just by personal reactions, but it's still very similar. 4 I'd also characterize it as having a personal connection with the character you are playing. A sense of investment with that persona. It is you in the context of the roleplay's setting, even if it has nothing in common with you as a person in real life similar to how your dude in an FPS is you. This isn't an absolute, but is an aspect I'd point out to highlight the difference between PCs and NPCs... i.e. you might write side characters in an RP, but they aren't the main focus of your experience... also why GMs in games like DD have a temptation to create GM-PCs or have pet villains because the game doesn't normally afford them an avatar in the way that players have. On the flipside of that last point, you could also say there's an acknowledgement that the character is NOT you, that the roleplay is a fabrication you are intentionally indulging in. For the rest of these questions, I'll be focusing on this type of roleplaying, and not focusing so much on the overlapping concepts. What is the purpose or goal of roleplayingWhat motivates one to undertake a roleplay? This is one that is entirely up to participants, and will vary between them. The reasons might even go against what I said above i.e. a person might not be invested in their character personally, and simply want to write a story, like they might write a novel on their own, with input from another person. I guess, then, the simplest answer to this question is to tell a story. Which of course leads to the question, Why do we tell stories? which might be too... complicated and in-depth for me to examine here. Maybe I should ask, Why do we roleplaying rather than write, or something else? Well, I also said above, input from a source we don't control is one of them. We want to be surprised. It's fun to write and tell stories, but if you write a novel, you are 100 in control and the surprise element is not there, which takes certain thrills from the experience. There's social interaction. This is a big one for me. Consuming works of art, stories, etc., are one of my main hobbies, and sharingdiscussing these things is one of the big things I like to talk about with others, and is one of the main things that helps me establish friendships with those people. So actively creating those stories with them is even moreso. Personal enrichment and expression, wish fulfillment and fantasization. May you want to be somethingexperience somethingdo something, but can't for various reasons. So you act it out and express it in the form of a fictional story. It may not even be something you actually want in real life, but it's still as aspect of an emotion or desire you need an outlet of expression for. Maybe there's some concept you want to explore, or you want to slip into someone else's shoes just to get out of your own head and see how different you can be. Some forms, like playing DD or other RPGs, will have an actual game aspect to their enjoyability, like a board game. Depending on what you're doing, these are sliding scales that will go up and down to various degrees. When you have selected a role, is the role you? Or an aspect of you? Or a thought experiment one likes to see played out? This one varies. Some storytellers may have more detachment from the character, in a freeform writing style, it's more like writing a novel to them, in a tabletop RPG, it is more like playing a board game. For most roleplayers, I'd say there's an aspect of their interests, perhaps an aspect of themselves, they want to explore or express, and their character is a vessel for that. Again, it might not have anything to do with you as a person and could be your complete opposite, but it's still your dude in the story, your avatar. Compare how people think of their main character in a roleplay versus any side characters or NPCs. Some people might not think any differently of them, but many do. Is there a wrong way to roleplay? Not really, but you can definitely have a different style from someone else that is incompatible, and to not establish guidelines beforehand to facilitate including both your styles in the roleplay will lead to problems. What makes a roleplay good? Here I go trying to give objective answers to subjective things. Well. Depending on the satisfaction on the participants, it's tough to give objective criteria. But here's some suggestions. First off, roleplaying takes place in a medium, so it's quality is bound by the qualities of that medium. In writing, this means good grammar, evocative writing... well, good writing is another massive subjective topic... Around a tabletop, it means good communication with those around the table, it could also be helped with various accouterments to keep play going like decorations for atmosphere, miniatures on a map, etc... none of which are needed to be good by any means, but can certainly help making it great comparatively. At a tabletop, you might say, anything that makes things easierquickerflow better makes it good, like, cutting down on distractions or time spent paging through rulebooks. In a LARP, again... expressiveness of the players in their roles, quality of the costumes and props... anything that helps with immersion. That's as far as the format goes. As far as the story goes, the basic one is that every player is able to express their character without being hindered and without getting in the way of others so, a lot of RP etiquette things here... don't godmode, etc. Preferably, every participants would contribute at least in some way to the enrichment of the others. It's tough to otherwise say. Probably the biggest RP quality killer for me is... and this isn't necessarily their fault either... when other participants don't really entice me into their character and what they're doing which could be due to them excluding or ignoring me, but could just be due to general differences of style between us, which prevents me from being very invested and makes me feel what I'm getting out of it isn't any better than what I could get in terms of expressionexploration of the character in a solo writing. Is roleplay real? Nah. Not in the way that reality is real. Unless all these stories really are happening out there somewhere in the infinite existence. I mean, if you take the view that they are real in the sense that they are the expression of real thoughts, feelings, desires, dreams, fascinations, and obsessions that are held by their creators, then well, sure. And you could take the few that perhaps, in some cases, the characters we play are closer to the real us than the persona we assume in our day-to-day lives though that is faaaaar from absolute or universal and for some players out there it is never remotely true... but for some, it might be very, very accurate to say. Wordsmith said Roleplay as a real thing? Of course it's real, it's an activity that we here at BM, and millions of other places take part in every single day. Click to expand... You can't prove to me roleplaying is real! People don't actually do that! C'mon, show me one 20-sided die. You can't do it!