Roleplay Tips and Tricks

Roleplay is an interactive and collaborative method of storytelling in which participants, posing as their original characters, enact prewritten or improvised scenes. In other words, an individual invents a fictional character and pretends to be him/her, speaking and acting as he/she would inside a fictional world full of other characters puppeteered by their creators. This tutorial exists to help beginner roleplayers get started.

## Emotes

Messages, called **emotes,** describe a character's words and actions. Most online roleplaying communities use the same format when writing emotes:

**SAM:** *Sam walks up to his friend, Mo, and waves.* "Hi, Mo!"

**MO:** *Mo smiles and waves back.* "Hello!"

Observe that actions are *italicized* while dialogue is placed in "quotes." This formatting helps other players easily tell the difference between action, dialogue, and OOC (out of character) text. Some roleplayers prefer to use bold text instead of italics.

Note also how "Sam" and "Mo's" creators write in the *present tense*. Some roleplay communities are strict about which verb tense participants must use, while others (including Elysium) are more lenient. It is good roleplay etiquette to use the verb tense most commonly used by others.

## OOC

OOC or Out of Character text refers to discussion that takes place between roleplay participants outside of the roleplay world. If a participant wishes to ask a question or make a comment as themselves, not their character, they will use special formatting to indicate that their text is OOC:

**SAM:** *Sam starts his car and waves to Mo out the window.* "Bye!"

***SAMIAM25:*** ( What day is it in the story? )

***MOES69:*** Tuesday )

**SAM:** "See you on Wednesday!"

Notice how the creator of "Sam" used parenthesis to indicate OOC text. MOES69, however, only used one parenthesis at the end of his message. Some players use one, two, or even double parenthesis for OOC text.

OOC text inside a roleplay channel should be on-topic and relevant to the current scene. If the discussion starts to exceed 10-15 messages, participants should move to a community channel or general text channel to continue their conversation, in order to free roleplay channels of clutter. Remember to always be kind and respectful!

## Roleplay Etiquette

It is important to maintain a sense of etiquette when roleplaying. Good etiquette can be as simple as using common sense and being kind and respectful to others. Always remember the Golden Rule: **treat others the way *you* wish to be treated.**

### **Writing**

To the best of their ability, roleplayers should use proper English grammar, spelling, and punctuation in their emotes. Lazy emotes are difficult to read and understand, and frustrate other roleplayers.

* ACCEPTABLE: "Hello, how are you?"
* UNACCEPTABLE: "hello how r u"

NOTE: Everyone comes to Elysium with a different skill level in writing. Many Elysium members are from other countries, and English is not their second language. We understand that creative writing can be difficult and will never expect perfection. After all, roleplay is an excellent way to sharpen one's writing skills!

### **24-Hour Rule**

We know that life happens; timezones and unexpected events can make it difficult to emote consistently. However, for the sake of others, players should emote within 24 hours of being emoted to. If the player cannot emote in time, the other players *may continue without them* unless the player specifically asks them to wait.

### **Get Real**

IRP (in-roleplay) events are separate from the real world, Players should never take personal offense when something unfavorable happens to their character. Likewise, players should never let real-life conflicts or grudges affect their IRP choices.

### **Powergaming**

Powergaming essentially is controlling the actions, thoughts or choices of another player's character. Forcing actions upon another player's character is FORBIDDEN! A good way to avoid powergaming is to emote your character's actions specifically, waiting for others to respond to one action at a time before emoting again.

For example:

* UNACCEPTABLE: *Sam shoves Mo down the stairs, breaking all of Mo's arms and legs. He then ties him up and throws him in the closet.*

In this example, Sam shoves Mo down the stairs and decides that Mo is injured. He doesn't explain where the rope comes from either. Most importantly, he doesn't wait for Mo to respond after pushing him down the stairs; he continues ahead and performs another action.

* ACCEPTABLE: *Sam jumps behind Mo and **attempts** to shove him down the stairs.*

### **Metagaming**

Characters may only know things that they have personally learned in their own experiences. Using information learned OOC or through a separate character is called metagaming, which is FORBIDDEN!

### Godmodding

Godmodding is when someone makes their character invincible or nearly invincible, and constantly triumphs over others in fights. They have an unlimited amount of power and have no limitation to their actions. They never fail, never make mistakes, and have no weaknesses.

For example:

**MO:** *Mo avoids Sam's attempt to push him down the stairs and strikes back with his dagger, which he pulls out of the sheaths on his leather belt.*

**SAM:** *Sam quickly sprouts wings from his back and flies out of the way. He then summons a portal with a wave of his hand and appears behind Mo, swinging his heavy Greatsword of Might with one hand and cutting off Mo's head.*

In this example, there are no explanations for any of Sam's abilities. He gains wings out of nowhere, summons a portal, and has super-strength. He allows no time for Mo to respond, deciding everything himself and not even allowing Mike to hit him at all. Sam has committed both godmodding and powergaming.

### **Touch Grass, Not A\*\***

ERP (sexually explicit roleplay) is FORBIDDEN! Romances between characters is allowed and encouraged, but for the safety and comfort of all players, displays of physical affection cannot exceed a PG13 rating.

## Writing Good Characters

Interesting, well-rounded characters are essential for a good roleplay experience.

### "Breaking In" a Character

Creating a new character is like meeting a new person. Even though you created them, it can take days or even weeks of roleplay for you to become comfortable with how your character talks and behaves. During this time, it is good practice to refine your character. Become very familiar with their species. Research personality types and determine your character's habits. Research your character's occupation and hobbies.

### Tropes to Avoid

Certain character stereotypes or "tropes" make for poorly-written, boring, and annoying characters.

* **Mary Sue:** a super-strong, super-powerful character who does everything perfectly on the first try and has zero flaws. Mary Sues are boring because they never make mistakes, which never gives them the opportunity to grow. Characters should learn and change over time. Let your characters make mistakes!
* **Babytalkers:** an immature child character who talks in a 'babyish' manner. These characters often have dramatic, tragic backstories and beg other characters to *"pwees adowpt me, a poor wittle orphan!"* This dialogue is universally infuriating. No child speaks like this. There are many resources online to help you write child characters realistically.
* **The Apostate:** a character who denies the existence of any deities for no explainable reason. Elysium is a magical fantasy world with real gods who have personally interacted with the world and its people on several monumental, historic occasions. While no character is required to practice any religion or actively worship any deity, the gods are irrefutable beings in Elysium. Denying the existence of gods would be akin to denying the existence of say, bears.
* **The Lone Wolf:** the dark cloak that lurks in the back corner of every tavern. An edgy, mysterious character who likes to keep to himself is not necessarily a bad character trope. However, you may find it difficult to use these characters because they keep to themselves so much that other characters have to go out of their way to interact with you. Roleplay is a multiplayer game-- be sure to take initiative and start encounters yourself!

## Combat Roleplay and Permission to Kill (PTK)

Death consent, often called as PTK or Permission to Kill, ensures that character deaths are fair and just.

#### **Consent Rules**

* The ideal consent-based exchange is to have both parties discuss what they're comfortable with/where they'd like the violence to go as early as possible in a fight or other potentially violent encounter. Any agreement made in this manner overrules any other conditional consent levels. Neither has any obligation to go further than what their counterpart agrees to, and any players entering the fight are bound to the level of consent that has been established. Should newcomers wish to escalate the level of violence, it's done selectively with any that wish to participate in that higher level.
	+ **Aggressor's consent:** A spontaneously aggressive party, without prior communication, may not kill or permanently maim their target without explicit consent or a pre-existing circumstance that would remove the requirement for consent. However, if the aggressor attacks in an eminently lethal manner (i.e. attacking with a weapon), the aggressor automatically consents to wherever the combat RP leads, including death or permanent maiming.
	+ **Defender's consent:** A party spontaneously attacked by an aggressor can be subject to nonlethal violence, and will not automatically consent to more severe violence if they protect themselves by any means. However, their assumed level of consent changes should they escalate it, such as by killing an attacker or counterattacking in a lethal manner that would *immediately incapacitate the aggressor should he not defend*. To clarify, the defending party may do whatever they must to keep themselves free of harm, including causing injury to their attacker. It's only considered to have escalated if they land an attack that *summarily results in* the death of the aggressor, or make an attack that would immediately kill the aggressor should they not defend against it.

**Castle Law:** Characters found unlawfully in the residence of another character automatically consent to violence and death if given express warning by the resident, either IRP or OOC. The homeowners assume a level of consent equal to what they establish. This can be escalated or deescalated by discussion, as explained above.

* Characters actively stealing or otherwise jeopardizing the property of another automatically consent to some flavor of violence, within reason. Petty theft may be worth a beating, whereas significant property damage/loss may incur more severe consequence. This gets subjective with all the various degrees of larceny, and as such I heavily advise any attempts at theft be first discussed with the intended target to determine and agree upon the severity of their reaction.

* Characters that intentionally put another character in a position of harm without directly doing harm themselves automatically consent to whatever violence is necessary for the victim to escape from their circumstance. The offending character may also be held responsible for any harm incurred by the victim as a consequence of his actions, and automatically matches any level of consent that is realized. For example, should Character A sell B to some slavers who nearly murder him, B is then entitled to nearly murder A.

* Turnabout is fair play. Any action taken against a character is automatically grounds for consequence on the same level of violence by the character or those acting on the character's behalf (both ICly and OOCly). Established conspiracy for action against a character is also grounds for reciprocating the action should the conspiracy be reasonably serious; should it be in motion and not just an idle hypothetical. This also means that a character menacingly approaching another with a knife while saying something to the effect of "I'm going to shank you" may assume a preemptive retaliatory shanking to be in order.

* For any local laws where the punishment would otherwise require serious consent, such as removing a thief's hand, the perpetrator is only automatically culpable for crimes committed within the territory holding the law. It is their responsibility to know law and order in the town where they decide to break it, but they are not subject to it if they committed crimes elsewhere. Consent may be obtained for such, but is not inherent. However, punishment arriving as equivalent consequence for actions taken by the character assumes the "turnabout" rule in establishing consent.

**Levels of Consent:** By increasing severity:

* Nonviolent: Baseline RP, no combat. No consent involved.
* Nonlethal: Fighting with low chance of causing serious injury, such as a fistfight. Does not automatically consent the aggressor to more severe violence/death, unless it escalates to the point of preventing the victim from adequately defending himself further (unconsciousness, etc.).
* Potentially lethal: Fighting with a high chance of causing serious injury or death, such as with a drawn weapon. Whoever initiates action in this manner (actively swinging a sword, not just drawing it) automatically consents to violence up to death, unless its inclusion was previously agreed upon.
* Lethal: Actively trying to kill a character. Requires consent, unless consent otherwise voided.
* Permanent maiming: Anything that irrevocably impairs the physical function of a character, such as loss of limb. Almost always requires explicit consent separate to any automatic consent, unless there's strong precedent for the character to receive such.

* A character MUST have a real IRP reason to attack another. Mindless violence without due cause (i.e. insanity, possession) is considered disruptive and spam within roleplay spaces.
* Your character may not have infinite magical energy. When using ANY magic, your character should gradually become more and more tired. We expect you to require time to recover between spells.
* Allow your character to recover from wounds in an appropriate amount of time. Unless your character enhances their healing by magic IRP, we encourage you to research how injuries may affect your character and for how long.
* Attacks intended to permanently maim or disable another character may not be executed without OOC permission. This includes blinding or removing limbs. (This rule does not apply to Undead.)
* INITIATING COMBAT: You may not kill another character without explicit OOC (out-of-character) permission. However, by initiating combat with another character, you ***automatically give the other player permission to kill your character**.* Examples of initiating combat include:
	+ Challenging someone to a duel
	+ Attacking someone with violence
	+ Kidnapping
	+ Theft
	+ Trespassing

* Strike first at your own risk! PTK (permission to kill) exists because we believe that criminal behavior should be as risky in-character as it is in real life. However, experienced roleplayers understand that killing another character, even with PTK, takes away someone else's ability to have fun with and write stories for their beloved character. We recommend that all parties in a combat scene discuss the final outcome together in order to write the best story for everyone.

## Tuppers

Tupperbox is a Discord bot modification which helps roleplayers visually show the difference between multiple characters using special labels called "Tuppers". Elysium requires members to use Tuppers for roleplay. See a full tutorial here.