Lesson 3 - Introduction

[Drogo]

Ormelor arrives early at school. He wants to be sure that none of the students can enter the classroom before he does.

He sighs in relief when he finds that the door is still firmly closed, just the way he left it the previous day. He enters, and walks straight over to the closed basket.
He pulls his chair right next to the basket, turns it around, and sits on it backwards, facing the basket.

“You can come out in only a few more minutes. But I want you to behave yourself, you hear?  No eating of the students, no exploding fruit throwing, and you will not brag about the 101-things-you-can-use-a-koala-for... Understood?”

The basket didn't answer, neither did its inhabitant.

“Understood?” Ormelor repeats as he menacingly holds up another bottle of kiwi-juice, from the worst vintage ever.

From inside the basket sounds a soft yelping, then a grunted “Yes…”

“Wonderful!” Ormelor replies cheerfully.

The first students enter.

“First I'll answer a question I received yesterday, posed to me by Amethist.”

Ormelor takes a piece of paper out of his pocket and reads out loud.

Thanks for the tips, Ormelor.
I think this will be very helpful. Something I could also use some info on is the different weapons used and dress in this type of RP. If you could give a brief overview or a link to some info in one of your future posts it would be greatly appreciated.

“And then... Then you will get a very important lesson... So pay attention.”

Edited by: Drogo at: 8/28/01 4:05:49 pm

[Drogo]

The basic rule in RP'ing would be anything goes. It is fantasy, so per definition you make up what your character uses as a weapon.

You can be a barbarian with a 6ft long bastard sword, you can be a magician with a staff that's been engraved with powerful runes, you may be a dwarf, wielding a broad axe... But there is no law that states you can not be a giant who prefers whacking his enemies with freshly picked trees, or a farmer who has a scythe as his favourite weapon. And though people will probably look somewhat strange when you are a fishmonger, going about slaying goblins with a herring, it will be tolerated. (But remember the realism comment again... You could at least claim it to be a frozen herring...)

In some places, modern and ancient times mingle.

My guess is that in the world of Santharia, they don't. Here you are in a medieval world. This means that though unicorns, zombies, giants and dragons are real, rubber, cars and bazookas are not...

You can brandish a sword that sprays around flames and gives you the ability to fly, but you can not draw your Smith & Wesson to get rid of that one evil lizard warrior that bugs you.

Amethist also mentioned clothes...

I never really thought of this. But I suppose the same thing goes. Usually people don't go into depths with this though. (At least I haven't really seen it yet.)

Oh, sure. It is common for people to describe that they are wearing black robes for instance, with one remarkable gem as a pendant or something. Or they are dressed in a cloak that hides their face, same thing goes for hats. You can have ladies telling they wear an astonishing dress, or battle armour.

But I don't think there are really guidelines, or a Role-Playing dressing code.

There aren't many wrongs you can commit in this regard I think.

Then again... If John entered the tavern, showing off his sneakers-with-air. He put his motor-helmet on a nearby table and sat down on a chair, wiping it off first not to dirty his fluo-coloured spandex pants. He put his sunglasses in one of the pockets of his Armani shirt and waited for the waitress on rollerblades to take his order: One Big Mac, fries and a large coke. you are not following the unwritten rules...

If it is really important for people to know what you are wearing, but you don't know for sure what is and what isn't medieval, make it up. Chances are the readers don't know it for certain either.

But back then, people didn't wear rubber boots, skirts weren't kept together with safety-pins, and shoelaces, if any, didn't have the little plastic thingies (flugelbinders for those who've seen Cocktail) on the ends...

If this is important to you, let your character wear wooden slippers. You can keep skirts together with a jewel. And if you must have laces, let them be made out of something that doesn't need those plastic things...

“I hope that answered your question,” Ormelor says to his student.

[Drogo]

Interaction...

There are do's, and definite don'ts... It is very important you remember what follows next. Violate this one thing, and people will more than likely not enjoy the way you "play". You may get flamed, and told to pack your bags and learn to RP before you return.
I am not kidding...

This is an example of how not to RP!

In this example, let's imagine I'm into some RP thread with one other poster: Shadowhawk. I have my character: Cool.One. (I use my regular RP character Cool.One in this example because I kinda know my Keeper better than this thief.) The person behind the keyboard on the other end of the world has his character, I have mine. And in the thread, these two meet.

In some RP, somehow I could end up catching Shadowhawk inside a basket and drag him over to some classroom. Then when I think it is time, I could post this, and after this, I could kiss my RP-career goodbye.

Once again: Do not do this! Ever!

(Ahem... Of course there is an unless, but first the example...)

Cool.One now finally paid attention to the basket in front of the class. Hesitatingly he approached it. It was closed, but not locked. The Keeper lifted the lid off the basket, and backed away quickly, afraid of how one angry half-troll might react.

I should stop here, and wait for Shadowhawk's response. But I don't know how to RP, so I don't know when to stop, and I just continue:

(*) Shadowhawk saw someone approaching, and when the lid was lifted, he jumped out of the basket, to face Cool.One. (**) The half-troll snarled at the Keeper: “What do you think you were doing? Locking me in that basket for two whole days? Feeding me disgusting cookies and kiwi-juice that I wouldn't even give to an alligator! I'm gonna kill you, damn bastard!”

The Keeper awaited the half-troll without flinching. As Shadowhawk approached the Keeper, Cool.One (***) made a patch of ice appear under the half-troll's feet, causing that one to slip and (****) hit the floor with a loud thud.

Shadowhawk didn't get the hint, and tried to crawl up again. When he finally stood up on his feet again, he was even angrier, and drew his sword.

Cool.One’s eyes narrowed, and then he drew his own ice swords. Before the half-troll could react, the Keeper quickly disarmed the troll with one hit.

(*****) Shadowhawk begged for mercy, but Cool.One decided that threatening to kill someone, wasn't something to be taken lightly. So he thrust again, in Shadow's arm. Shadowhawk collapsed to the ground.

(******) Cool.One planted the sword in the half-troll's heart, and watched his enemy die. Then he resurrected him, just to kill him again.

The easiest thing is to just remember this rule:

You do not take actions for any characters but your own.

Remember this, and you will be out of troubles...

In this post, I decide what Shadowhawk thinks (*), I decide what he says / how he feels (**), I attack him without giving him the chance to do anything back (***), I decide what damage he receives (or more likely: does to the floor) (****), I decide a brave warrior to turn into a whimpering coward (*****) and I kill him (******). Several times even...

I will write more on fighting/killing later on, and concentrate now on the acting of other characters alone.

The main reason you don't do this, is because you don't know what these characters would do under the given circumstance.

Remember what I said about creating your character? You had to think about how your character would think. You have the ability to do that, because you created it. You know its past, you know what kind of person s/he is, you know in what way s/he may develop, or if s/he shouldn't develop at all. (Once a bastard, always a bastard for example.)

Others don't know where you are heading with your persona, and you don't know that about theirs.

Nothing is as irritating as leaving a thread one day, sitting on a chair, happily enjoying the ale you ordered, and then, when you log on again the next day, other people have been dragging you all over the place, made you kill a dragon, got you wounded and carried over to some scum's lair. And all that, while you were only about to ask the barmaid if she could show you your room...

There are more subtle actions you may take for others without even thinking about it, yet they may (and will) still be disliked.

In my original guidelines, someone by the name of Talbain posted a message in which he assumed the role of a pupil in my classroom. He posted along the lines of "Talbain waves his finger and when Ormelor sees it and gives him the word, starts speaking,"

This was my reaction:

“Talbain? Nothing personal, but remember when I told you you already violated one of the most important rules? (In my opinion, this is the most important rule... Really.)
It wasn't up to you to decide whether I would notice your waving finger, that was my decision to make. You could have waved it around, hoping that I would see it. Or ask your question because you thought I had seen it. But you did not have the authority to write that I did, see the difference?

Another example: You may be talking to someone in a tavern under attack, proposing to head outside and face the dangers. You could perhaps assume that the other one nods, because from the tone of earlier conversations, you think you know whether or not the one in front of you would deal with peril or run from it. But even then, if you are very sure, saying that your partner agrees with your words, is assuming too much. You should wait to hear their answer. Or head out alone without it. But you can not write The other one agreed with my words, and together we left the tavern to kill some goblins.

These are things you sometimes do (involuntarily) to speed up the conversation. It is after all much easier to decide that the other one agrees so that you can finally get some action... But RP'ing is also about patience. (More about that later on.)

And yes, sometimes it may be difficult to make things happen when you have to remember all the "passive" people that surround me.

To take a recent example of how you might take care of that...

Once upon a time, there was The Jolly Roger Bar. A tavern thread of which Cool.One was the founder.

A lot was happening at once. And I felt I should reply to everyone at once, being after all the barkeeper. (Yep, being extremely modest here again, to take one of my own posts as an example...)

Someone by the name of ScareCrow asked me to show him his room, but he was still sitting at his table. A little bard had just entered, and needed medical attention (amongst other side-plots...) So I had to find a way to get to the rooms for ScareCrow, then down again to hand out orders, all in one post, because if I had to wait for ScareCrow to answer first that indeed he had found his room and entered, downstairs things might have got out of hand.

This is what I posted:

With that said, Cool.One left his bouncer, and returned to the table in the corner. He grabbed a lit torch from the wall and spoke.

“Your room, sir... Follow me...”

Cool.One mounted the stairs, and with a vague gesture of his arm motioned towards the long corridor with doors on both sides.

“They are all empty... Just choose one... The lock is on the inside, no key needed. However, if you choose to stay for a longer while, you can come to me and ask for the key so that you may close the door when you go out without your belongings...

Now if you'll excuse me... Sounds like things are going on... And I've got a cook to test...”

Cool.One bowed shortly, and made his way downstairs again.

He remembered vaguely handing over an empty bottle to a rambling woman. And she said something about cooking... Now that was a good thing...
He could do some fine ice creams... but hot cooking...

I could have said that ScareCrow was right behind me, but I didn't. He could still be at his table, or he could be behind me on the stairs, or already ahead of me in the corridor. That was up to him in his next post...

The fact that I vaguely remembered handing over an empty bottle to a rambling woman was because in one of the earlier posts, someone had made me do that. I didn't know about it until I read the thread again, 16 hours and 10 posts or so after I left it. So I had to find a way around it. I could have just ignored it, of course.
But call it an honour thing...

Now, I should also write something about NPC's, and acting with them.

[Drogo]

NPC's are Non Playing Characters. They are the ones roughly mentioned in a post, sometimes only for one time amusement, other times they are an important addition to someone's character.

The first type...

In another tavern, the Newbie World Tavern, originated by Viper, this was the starting post whenever the thread had filled up and a new one was started:

As you enter the tavern you immediately notice the rather large giants at the door. The smaller of the two giants has a name tag which reads BoBo, and he holds up a sign saying to leave your weapons at the front. As you squeeze by BoBo and his rather large brother MoMo you see several couches, and tables in a large open area, and a bar for your pleasure. Me and my partners Tanin, Anne, and Shadowhawk will tend to any questions. We serve a large selection of foods, both exotic and domestic and a large name of ales as well.

So there you had these two giant bouncers, BoBo and MoMo. They were, so to speak, kinda "free to use", as long as you didn't kill them of course. They were still Viper's creation, but no offence was taken if you made one of them nod or grin or smile or answer or take you weapons... (At least not that I know of...)

Another example were the goblins that attacked the inn at some point. Someone was playing them, but was playing an entire squad. There were some named goblins (like the general of the squad), but nowhere did the writer give exact numbers. So it was safe to post and say two goblins attacked you, but that you killed them.

For some NPC's, the one who brought them into the thread will not appreciate it when you use them. The first example that comes to my mind here, is the Egyptian Queen Cleopatra, who had a bodyguard and two servants who would follow her everywhere. They had more of a history, and were separate individuals with a detailed personality.

Apart from the first type of NPC's, there is another exception to the don't use others' characters rule...

Ask...

I said that in the example, (way on top, the one with Shadowhawk) I violated almost every rule.

In fact, I violated none.

Because I asked him in advance whether I could use him to show how not to RP, and I got his permission.

When you are planning to get into a fight, asking is usually a good idea as well. You can work out what is allowed, and who will win. (Yep... Fixed as hell, so don't bet on RP-title-fights, people...) Or just the rough outlines of course.
It gives you a little bit more freedom, since in that case you can choose to let the other one nod, agree, or even take a hit in your post.



Ormelor shuts up. It has been a long lesson, and maybe even confusing. But he hopes it was more or less clear to the students. And he hopes they will not break this one rule EVER again.

“Tomorrow, I will learn you how to fight, and kill.”

When the classroom is empty again, the Thief looks at the half-troll who has been sitting still all that time. He puts an arm around his friend's shoulder.

“What do you think? Did I make any sense? Or was I just rambling on again, as usual?”

The coal-black eyes of the half-troll didn't reveal his answer as much as the grin on his lips did.

Ormelor sighed, and poked Shadowhawk in the ribs. “You're mean, you know that? Let's go and get a drink...”

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