Staffing Advice on Making Horror . . . Horror

[Uaithne 543]

Hey guys, I run a survival horror site.  I'm sure most of you have seen enough of me posting around here to know the general gist, but here's the quick recap in case it's relevant: There's a town that is being overcome by the Decay, this strange rotting/rusting phenomenon that brings with it death and monsters.  The town as a whole is cut off from society due to this Decay, but otherwise most people can live a normal life.  We recently had an event where the Decay "surged" across the entire town, and for about 24 hours the town was ripped apart by monsters.  Then it subsided.

 

The event was really fun, but I don't want the entire board to be a face-paced monster mayhem all the time.  It gets boring really fast (I've played on similar sites before) and I also like to allow members to play their characters with some "down time" where they aren't running for their lives.  The problem is that I'm trying to pump up activity and interest and to make the board actually . . . somewhat scary.  It's hard to make a roleplay site scary, but it's even harder when people likely dismiss it because it's not 333/premium.  (I'm poor.  That's why it's not.)

 

My staff and I came up with an idea to give people a miniature "event" when they reach a certain post count.  (I believe it was 15 posts.)  This event is very simple, such as a mysterious phone call in which the character receives information about themselves that nobody should really know, or they start to hallucinate dead people, or something.  The member is supposed to incorporate it into their RP somehow, either by referencing it in another thread, or by actually using it as a plot device in the thread (RPing it out).  Then at about 50 posts, I'd do a more direct one-on-one thread with the member that fleshes it out a little more.  Personalized, if you will.

 

I made the first post goal 15 because it's relatively low, but I'm not wasting ideas or energy on people who aren't sure if they will be sticking around.  The next one (50 posts) is higher because it requires me being able to put time and energy into creating a personalized quest/storyline for the character for a thread, and I want to make sure that the member is invested in it well enough.  There is no time frame, so it's not like they have to reach the 15 or 50 posts in a week or a month - it could be after a year, though opportunities may change based upon the general site plot.

 

Members wouldn't be able to choose which event they received (a phone call verse hallucinations verse whatever), though somebody could politely decline to participate if they really didn't want to.  In order to assign the events, I'd try to roughly match it up with the charcter's profile or personality or history or whatever so that it's something that would be relevant to the character.  (I wouldn't want a character who never answers a phone because they have some anti-phone religious belief to be given a plot involving phones, for example.)

 

At first I wasn't going to publicize it because I wanted it to be a bit spookier with the element of surprise.  But now I'm wondering if it would be better to let people know up front as a selling point for the site so that they know that there is an advantage to participating and being active.  People were really interested in the Decay surge event I had, and then activity backed down afterwards which wasn't entirely unexpected, but I'm afraid that people are going to rely entirely on said events and not participate when they don't exist.  So I wanted your guys' thoughts about it.

 

I'd also love to know if you have any ideas for a survival horror site.  We have no vampires/werewolves/witches/demons.  Our monsters are literally monsters, but they stay mostly in the limited areas of town affected by the Decay.  I also don't want to rely on them too much because, as mentioned, it'll get boring after awhile.  So having some other spooky happenings that are personalized to each character would be really neat and add an element of horror I have never seen on a horror site.

[webs 14]

I would say to advertise that it's a thing you're doing, a particular feature, but also consider what would happen if you suddenly had a lot of members all at once. What if you have 20 members all hit 50 posts within a month? Or within a week? Is it just you who will be doing the storylines, or will the other staff be doing it too? I really like the idea, it's fascinating and very different to what I've come across. Definitely prepare for the worst though, just in case so you don't get too overwhelmed.

 

Do you have a set calendar for events? Like once every two months, three months, four months, etc. Perhaps you could have an expedition into the Decay, people who are geared up, wanting to explore it to know how to stop it and so on - but you'd probably need some people to die to keep up the horror tones of it not just being easy to survive (which NPCs could of course be used for). What are supplies like in the town, are they already running low or should they start running low? If you haven't already, encourage the characters to start working out how they're going to survive long-term.

[Josie 198]

I will be upfront and say that I've never been on a horror site, or a survival site. However, horror is a genre I love, and so I have opinions on this.

 

From an admin point of view, I came across three problems with your proposal: if you have a lot of people, that is a significant amount of planning for you to be doing, and a fairly big time suck. This is potentially not the sort of system which can be kept in use if you want to have the time to play your own characters, at least not without additional staff members or moderators to lend a hand with this with the growth of the site. You also need to keep tabs on when people reach those post limits, which is not so difficult, but is still something that requires your attention. And, all of these personalized stories lead to a lot of different plot lines that you may or may not be expected to guide people through. If that is what you want as an admin, that is more than fine! Personally, though, that sounds like a nightmare (and not the sort I'd enjoy).

 

As a roleplayer and a horror fan, two other thoughts occurred to me: this requires you to have fairly detailed knowledge of the character in question. Otherwise, if that phone call (or what have you) is made and the person on the other end says something that is incorrect about the character- it's not scary anymore. An element of horror is also not knowing when something is going to happen, so as a player I would personally not find this as frightening, as I know when it's going to happen. The character would still be surprised, yes, but I watch horror movies because I want to be spooked- and I'm guessing that's why people join survival horror RPs, as well.

 

This is not to say that I think it's a bad idea, however. I think it's something you most certainly could go along with, so long as there are other events going on as well that aren't focused solely around one individual. 

 

Some general thoughts I have on horror:

• Horror is psychological. If there is an ax murderer running around town killing people, you want to emphasize that anyone could be next. Give just enough details about the killer so that people might start seeing the suspected killer everywhere- dark hair, tall, thick build. That could be lots and lots of people. In that vein, once you've seen the monster, it becomes less frightening. Now, you know your enemy- or how they look, at least. Showing bits and pieces but keeping people in the dark on the whole thing creates anxiety and anticipation, which is key in something being scary. An example of this from recent media would be the Indominus Rex in Jurassic World, though older horror films also did this very, very well.
• Time is a weapon, and timing is key. Back when clocks in public places became a thing, they were targeted in war times because not knowing what time it was disrupted the flow of the day and therefore morale, but also drove people nuts. It is important to metaphorically attack the clock, sometimes. Don't always let people know when something is coming. Something you have to prepare for might be scary, but it's not as scary as having no warning for it at all. Remember also that stretches of time wherein nothing frightening happens are frightening in and of themselves. People will wonder when the next thing will happen, what it will be. Surely, it must be getting closer...
• Events and horror don't always have to be based on the supernatural. What if the town has its own holiday that it celebrates? What if there is an ax murderer on the loose? Misdirection from the main threat is a good thing, for all the above reasons.

A final thought on the system: if this was something that I was personally in charge of, I would combine all of these elements into it.

• The event might happen around 15 posts, but not exactly at 15 posts (or 50). The point is to make sure that people are invested a bit, and I think I can get a feeling on that based on interacting with the person vs. how many posts they make. But this also adds an element of surprise: no one knows for sure when their event will happen, and it keeps them on their toes.
• Perhaps the event doesn't have to be personalized. Perhaps it's just one small piece of a puzzle, and in order to figure things out, the character will have to talk with other characters. Maybe it's not a phone call to tell the character a secret about themselves, but about their neighbor. Their child. "Are you sure your parents picked Kelly up from school today?"
• I'd probably have these little events be caused by one entity. The overarching plot of all of these, then, would be to try and figure out who/what is behind it, and possibly destroying it (if possible). This means that if there is success in destroying it, the system can be done away with and something new can be put into place when more members arrive on the forum. A natural step into something different, rather than having to go "stop, wait, this needs to change."

Final thought: make an NPC account anyone can sign in to and make creepy things happen. Could just be one-off things, like seeing a UFO or a ghost or whatever, but it'd be a way to encourage people to make things scary on their own terms and would mean they could have their own little moments if they felt enough weren't happening in the story at that particular time.

[Uaithne 543]

You guys have such great thoughts.  Thank you so much for taking the time to help me out.

 

I don't have many members right now so this isn't going to be too big of a work load for me.  It might change in the future (that would be cool!) so I'll keep in mind and adjust it as needed so that I'm not completely overloaded.

 

A note on the personalization of events: I think I might have lead you astray with too specific of an example. XD  I have a list of ideas and I don't want to give them all away.  But multiple characters could receive the same event.  I'll try to change it up a little, so several characters may get a phone call, but the calls may say different things.  Or maybe there's just shrieking or nonsensical babbling.  I will also be keeping track of who gets what event because they're going to be tied together somehow.  It's "personalized" in the sense that members can feel like something weird and random is happening to their character and not just like the same ol' thing they've RPed over and over again.

 

It would be great if I could say that the events occur "about" a certain time, but I fear that I, personally, need more structure in order to be able to run this appropriately.  However, I'll keep it in mind because once I get members who have participated in both the 15- and 50-post events, I may go the "random" route to build onto their storylines.  (There will be fewer characters achieving these, so it won't be as hard to keep track of.)

 

The calendar idea is a great one, but I fear that I'll come up with events and no one will be active enough to participate, so I'll postpone the event waiting for people to arrive, and then it won't really fall together as anticipated.  Any advice on how to keep on track with events even if there aren't "enough" members around would be great.

[CovertSphinx 710]

Quote

" It's hard to make a roleplay site scary, but it's even harder when people likely dismiss it because it's not 333/premium.  (I'm poor.  That's why it's not.) "

^ My exact problem. I have it labeled 3-3-3, with a  note that I'll up to a premium account when memberbase deems it appropriate (my friend and I interact more like scholars than we do jackrabbits in thread so it would be a waste of money without at least a third RL member) but I don't think anybody believes me XD

 

Anyhoo, I love the idea of throwing PlotCrumb PMs out there at random intervals. If you want to make it a little more...."random" sounding, you can leave out the bit about post count brackets and just run your Spooky Events on a system of "when I feel like it, for whom I have an idea for" (at least as far as your members themselves know). And members will have the added suspense of not having a time frame at all for Secret Events.

On an older site, I used to get in character with requesting threads with certain other characters. So it wouldn't be unheard of for my friend to get a PM reading something along the lines of:

"My Darling Netami,

It behooves me to extend this invitation to the gala I am composing. There are several guests with whom I believe an association will be beneficial to your position as Prime Minister. -XYZ thread information/link, flirtatious language inviting him to be her +1 guest of honor, fluff fluff characterization-

Most Sincerely,
Vesta"

It generally was well received as an immersive flavor.

 

 

[Uaithne 543]

Great letter. XD

 

I am going with a post count for two reasons:

 

1) I need it to make sure I'm fair. Sometimes you end up with members or characters you just don't wanna go the extra effort for, and that's not cool. This will help keep me honest and organized.

 

2) Members know right off the bat that there is a way for them to be involved. There won't be favoritism. There will be fairness. And it's something that will hopefully entice them to join / participate.

 

I'll probably go the random route for other things.

 

Oh, I added campaigns. Small group RP opportunities. I'm going to start one soon as a trial. Hopefully these will add horror.