Tips for beginner roleplayers

[Aura]

In my time here, I've come across a lot of people who seem to struggle with roleplaying in one way or another. Maybe they find it difficult to retain attention or to maintain a roleplay for as long as they had planned, or maybe they just struggle with playing a specific type of situation they've found themselves in among a whole series of other problems. I thought it would be nice to start a thread where people could share and discuss advice on how to be a better player and make the experience a lot more fun for everyone involved! Keep in mind, the following are just guidelines and don't necessarily have to be followed, and if you disagree with anything I suggest, feel free to respond to this thread and I might update this post!

Let's start with finding someone to roleplay with:

1. Try to find someone you would be interested in

This is a roleplay site, so this shouldn't be too difficult. There are often people on the homepage posting statuses asking if anyone would be interested in roleplay, but if nobody there catches your interest, you can search around on the private roleplayers bulletin board for ideas that catch your interest. If you still find nothing, feel free to create your own post! If you're comfortable jumping straight into public roleplay, I would suggest taking a peek into the various roleplay clubs. EcchiTown is a nice place to start 

2. Get to know your partner first

Before you send a PM to some stranger with a cute pic asking if they'd like to roleplay, you should try to make a point to get to know that person first, and I don't mean just sending them a message that says "hi," and nothing else. Introduce yourself and try to mention what about that person, in particular, caught your interest. On this site, in particular, it's easy to see somebody's roleplay preferences or to see how they interact with other users to get a feel for their interests and personality. Don't be embarrassed about bringing anything like this up, these things are public for a reason. 

3. "No" means "No"

Just like real life sex, not everybody you're interested in will be interested in roleplaying with you. If somebody says they're not interested or ignores your request, don't take it as some sort of personal attack and definitely don't try to contradict them. People are busy with their own priorities and by no means are you entitled to anyone's time. Even if somebody's status or signature implies that they'll be willing to roleplay with anyone who asks, don't assume that reflects their current mood. Most people probably haven't updated these things in days, weeks, months or even years. 

4. Discuss what to expect ahead of time

Part of this circles back to getting to know your partner. Don't assume they are or aren't interested in something just because it says so in their preferences. People's tastes change over time and they might not go back to update their interests very regularly if at all. You should always discuss things such as characters and personalities of course, but it also helps to discuss details such as how long the roleplay should be. Is it going to be a simple one-off sex scene, or are you more interested in a long-term story? If the latter, you should probably also discuss how the story will begin and where it will go from there. You don't necessarily need to set up a script that needs to be strictly adhered to, but a rough skeleton to help understand where you're going will be more than helpful for avoiding dead-ends or loss of interest around slow points in the story.

5. Compromise your writing style

This might be one of the more difficult things for people to get behind, but you and your partner are going to have very different writing styles. It's inevitable and it will probably make things a little awkward early in a roleplay. Do your best to try and match your partner's style and your partner should do the same for you. If one person is writing three paragraphs a post and the other person is writing two lines, there's a major problem and neither player will probably be having any fun. In order to stop the story from falling apart, both players should be considerate and try to meet the others' expectations. The one writing three paragraphs should try to write a bit less. This can be accomplished by omitting unimportant details, you don't necessarily have to describe your clothing, body, or scenery in every single post. Try instead to focus on whatever is relevant to the actions at hand. The person writing only a few lines should do their best to write a bit more. Try to consider what your character is thinking in the moment or how they feel. Are they scared? Excited? One thing that helps me when I find my posts getting shorter is focusing on the five senses. What does your character see, hear, smell, taste, and feel? With practice, you'll find that writing longer/shorter posts comes a lot more naturally. 

6. Don't stress too much about replies

This goes both ways. If you aren't feeling up to the task, do not reply. Pressuring yourself to respond when you're distracted or just not in the mood will only stress you out and result in a lackluster post. Try to send a message to your partner and explain why you haven't replied, but sometimes life gets busy and you can't even do that, again, don't stress about it. On the same note, keep in mind that these same things will happen to your partner occasionally, too. Never under any circumstance is it okay to pressure your partner into replying. Instead of demanding a response, try to be considerate and check up on them first. Maybe shoot them a message asking if everything's okay. If they don't respond to that, just assume they're preoccupied with something else and move on. Do not blow up their inbox with angry messages, even if you notice they've been active elsewhere on the site. It will only make you look childish and desperate. One message is enough to get your point across. If your partner has lost interest in the roleplay, they have every right to stop at any point.

7. Do not do anything that would cause a permanent or semi-permanent change in your partner's character without consent

For example, if you have a vampire character, you should make sure your partner is okay with the idea of their character becoming a vampire as well before having your character bite their's neck. If you bit your partner's character and they didn't want to play a vampire, then your partner is now burdened with a character trait that they don't enjoy and it will lessen their enjoyment of the story. Consent doesn't necessarily have to be given out of character, obviously, if your partner's character asks to be bitten, then your partner is obviously okay with their character being bitten. But if consent isn't clear, always ask out of character.

8. "Yes, and..."

This was a lesson I learned in Theatre class in regards to improvisation, but I've found that it works wonders in roleplay as well. The basic idea is that you never say "That didn't happen," and you always add to what happened. Neglecting either of these things points in roleplay will cause the scene to come to a screeching halt and, depending on the situation, might even be taken as an insult by your partner. This is a big reason why communication is important when it comes to roleplay. If someone makes a mistake, such as assuming you were wearing a different outfit, you can send them an Out of Character message that explains their mistake and request for them to modify their post. For example, let's say your partner says "he pulls off her top and gropes her bare breasts..." but your character would be hesitant to allow him to do so. You can't respond to that and suddenly say "She stopped him from removing her top and didn't give him the opportunity to touch her chest." He's already established that he did what he did. Your options in this case are either to have your character react appropriately to their character abruptly pulling off her top and groping her without consent, or you can voice your concerns with your partner out of character and have them adjust their character's behavior. Please make sure that you always give your partner a chance to react. Even if it would split one post into two or three, you should never assume you know how your partner's character will react. Nobody knows their character better than them. Assuming that they'll do nothing in response and playing ahead as if that was the case is known as powerplaying and is frowned upon in roleplay in general. If you want things to play out a very specific way, either discuss it with your partner or write a story solo instead, there's a place for that in the creative corner! If you and your partner can't come to an agreement on the matter, then you just might not be very compatible for roleplay, which leads into my next point.

9. It's okay if you aren't compatible with your partner

There are countless different combinations of grammar level, writing style, sexual preferences, etc. out there. You are not going to be compatible with anyone and everyone. It is ultimately your decision whether or not you're comfortable roleplaying with someone, and it is their decision whether or not they're comfortable roleplaying with you. Do not take it as an insult if your partner decides to stop the roleplay because they don't think you're compatible and do not hesitate to stop the roleplay yourself if you feel you aren't compatible. If anyone in the roleplay isn't having fun, the roleplay isn't worth it. Roleplay is supposed to be fun.  If there is one thing I say in this post that you should follow, it should be this: Never, under any circumstances, roleplay with someone out of pity, and never use pity to try and guilt someone into roleplaying with you. These are the types of situations that can lead to toxic and abusive relationships. Yes, even online.

I might expand on this list later on, but I hope I've been able to help some fledgling roleplayers out! Please keep in mind that this is not intended to call anyone out or to make fun of anyone, it is simply a list of guidelines to follow. I'm not trying to tell you what to do and if you have a different method that works for you and those you play with, feel free to share them down below! I and many others would love to hear! Happy dreams~

Also, mods, if there's a better or more appropriate place for this thread to be, could you please move it there?

[Youko Kurama]

 Fantastic post. I agree with all of the above. May I add, it helps to be aware of what you are doing. As a beginner, pay attention to your habits. Post length, the types of scenes you enjoy playing, the types that you don't. Are thereany character archetypes you are drawn to? (Either playing as or with.) 

    Do you like exploring the depths of a character's personality? Or do you prefer to play certain stock scenes? Knowing your own style will go a long way toward helping you find enjoyable roleplays.

      Sorry for the pretentious lecture... I'll see myself out... *walks into a wall* "Excuse me. Pardon me."

[Warning]

Some of those tips are subjective to opinions but some other ones are logical as well. There are many variables in roleplay and the way they are done and the people they include. I know that I'm personally someone who can roleplay with about anybody, given the theme is one I accept to play with. Obviously, nobody should begin a story with no directives at all. There's always a base to begin somewhere. Starting characters, starting town, etc. But the way I've been doing it is that one person will usually direct the story toward what they want while other people will follow up with it. I used to do legendary long roleplay so I would often trade who lead the story between RPs. For shorter RP, I leave the lead to the "gamemaster" except that rules of roleplay for characters are ALWAYS applied without exceptions. One cannot decide what happens to characters they do not own. R4-R7

This is in priority the most important rules. "Attack" and leave the target to choose their outcome. For the actions, none should be done that act like something IS done. At least I never did, otherwise there would be a mess of incomplete actions. Well, this is where I find that action based RPs worked well since characters can try things and see the outcome. Usually, I never really did things that appeared off the consent unless the situation demands it. Such as the action mentioned above to undress another character though in my case, I would write it as "begin to undress X" before a bath time, by example, which leaves space to the other character to either let it continue or stop it and proceed with a line of action and dialogue of their own. As we can see, roleplay is an art with many variables and methods but some will vary in similarities, all leading to a common understanding. R8

About the writing style, I'd say that it is also more or less something we can adapt to. I sometimes write long responses but can deal with someone who writes short ones as long as the action made or dialogue said is clear. And sometimes, I'm only able to write short responses and expect as much as possible the other to understand my own post. A thing to remember and I know it was mentioned above is that whatever OOC tool we can use is and will always be a valuable tool to use when roleplay. I know I could not live without it. It's beneficial because often, roleplay WILL require justification of details, possible correction, suggestions of events and etc, questions about certain things, etc. Every roleplayers should always have a method of communication for OOC to keep headaches away. As it was said, a good communication at times makes for better stories at the end. R5

If I only had one comment about R9, it is about the same as I just said before but with a little more. I never really found incompatible roleplayers before but granted, some might be stubborn or godmodders or even some might have other tastes and kinks that one may not like. I found some by example who didn't like my style of characters but I've made sure that they're aware so no time was wasted for anyone. However, I also have the habit of using that wonderful OOC tool if something didn't feel right or when a story felt like it needed something more or different. Because communication is always important and something might need a change mid story, it's always good to let the other(s) know about it. I think what matters is to have fun and teaching what we know to others can go a long way if we feel something is weird. Even if it's just harmless chitchat or thoughts.

Forgive my wall of text. This is not in the intention of arguing or anything. I know I tried to explain my own perspective based on my experience before but it didn't go so well so I thought here would be the perfect place to do so, in the calm of a forum post. I hope nobody will see a problem with it. It will have lot of similarities to what Aura said but this wall is my own personal thoughts about how I see things when it comes to roleplay. I wish for the best to all roleplayers of EcchiDreams.

~If anyone have any questions, my chat is always open whenever I'm online. I won't mind helping anybody the best I can.~

[Adverse Deactivated]

This is a great thread. I'm new here, but not new to role playing, and these tips resonate with me. I hope they do the same with everyone else, too.