Uaithne 543 Share Posted March 12, 2018 We talk somewhat frequently about posts not having appropriate content for the next person to reply. We say that we need the other person to "move the thread along" or to "give me something to work with." Or we say a member is not "pulling his own weight." What do you think these phrases mean? If you could describe concretely what elements in a thread need to be present to move it along, what would they be? How do you illustrate the back-and-forth flow of conversation/action/narrative that must be done in order to create a smooth thread? I'm having a bit of trouble figuring out how to put this into writing to explain to people, so any insight on this would be great. 3 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shades 676 Share Posted March 12, 2018 Oh, boy, that's a hard one to explain, but I'll try. Basically, it's literally giving the other person something to respond to. Think of it like a conversation. We're talking, and you're engaging me, telling me things, asking me questions. I'm sitting there and saying nothing but 'okay'. At some point, you'll run out of things to tell me about, or of a willingness to talk to me. In roleplay, it's the same. It's not about how much you write, it's about what you're providing. In a conversation thread, a simple 'okay' can be appropriate for that moment. In an action thread, not so much. The repeated 'okays' on a conversation could be equated to '(character) just sat/stood there'. If the player/character is not contributing, regardless of how much they write, they're not 'moving the thread along'. I've had people write long multi para posts and not move the thread along, because their character was just doing their own thing and not reacting to the narrated events, so maybe something along the lines of "For your post to move the thread along, it must be related to the events happening around your character?". I'm bad at that, but maybe someone else can elaborate a bit further and be more helpful. 1 1 2 Shady McShaderson Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elena 546 Share Posted March 12, 2018 It is a matter of "Yes, and..., then..." I am struggling with explaining this to some people who don't react to the conversation or thought/ action clues I am giving all over my posts too. 1 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post StormWolfe 557 Popular Post Share Posted March 12, 2018 (edited) 4 hours ago, Uaithne said: We talk somewhat frequently about posts not having appropriate content for the next person to reply. We say that we need the other person to "move the thread along" or to "give me something to work with." Or we say a member is not "pulling his own weight." What do you think these phrases mean? If you could describe concretely what elements in a thread need to be present to move it along, what would they be? How do you illustrate the back-and-forth flow of conversation/action/narrative that must be done in order to create a smooth thread? I'm having a bit of trouble figuring out how to put this into writing to explain to people, so any insight on this would be great. Such a great topic and what a challenge to discuss! Congrats @Uaithne. In my opinion, moving a scene forward is very subjective. Some of us can take next to nothing from the other writer and turn it into a good story forwarding response. Others need more substantial signals. I class RP writers into two categories: reactive writers and proactive writers. The best are those that can shift from reactive to proactive. This is purely subjective - just fyi. Reactive Writers: These are the hardest to RP with. They have to be fed virtually everything in the scene/plot and rarely provide substantive responses. Repeatedly asking them to include what their character perceives, feels, touches, tastes, and sees is usually totally ignored. I know this sounds like a totally negative category and it can be, but doesn't have to be. Someone who tends to be a reactive writer can, with a little effort, do a decently substantive post which allows the more proactive storyteller type writer to move the plot forward. Proactive Writers: These are the RP writers that are geared toward storytelling. Their posts are not always 500+ words, but what they provide tells the story, adds meat to the plot, sets up scenes well, moves them forward, and provides a good basis for the next writer to tag onto. They can usually shift to a reactive writing style where they need to so that their writing partner(s) can take the lead as needed. Even with my two classifications, I think it takes some behind-the-scenes collaboration to really keep a scene flowing. You don't necessarily have to discuss the minute details, but touch base to see where you stand and if either of you have new ideas for the direction of the scene. Note: For intense dialog and interaction, I am a huge fan of joint posts (JPs)! IMHO, it makes the scene read smoother, less repetitiveness, etc. This is not to say that post-by-post scenes cannot flow well! Edited March 12, 2018 by Stormwolfe Fixed typo 3 1 1 Someone somewhere went to sleep and dreamed us all alive. Dreams get pushed around a lot, and I doubt if we'll survive. We won't get to wake up, dreams were born to disappear. And I'm pretty sure that none of us are here. ~ None of Us Here by Jim Stafford ~ *your one-stop RPG resource site! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Sage 289 Popular Post Share Posted March 12, 2018 Stormwolfe put this very nicely! Being proactive vs. reactive in your posts is something I've talked about with people often, and being a reactive writer isn't really helping anyone. It's great to have reaction in your posts, acknowledgement of what's happened and how it relates to and effects your character(s), but unless you're proactive about what happens next, the thread's not going to go anywhere. It's going to get stagnant. And you're all gonna be essentially rewriting the same thing over and over. Your character needs to do something. Hell, even the act of doing nothing is doing something as long as it provokes a response from the other character, but you have to craft that act of doing nothing as an action. If your post is all introspection, what is the other person supposed to do with that? Sometimes, people don't realize that it's ok to take the reins a little in a thread. I've found that a lot of times people are afraid of overstepping or godmodding. But sometimes...you need to? To really move a thread along and give some action, to be proactive and move that thread into something great. Sometimes, there's a fine line you have to walk, but rp is all about collaboration, so get in there and actually collaborate! Pull your weight and make things happen instead of waiting for your partner(s) to do it for you. 1 2 2 a dark, urban fantasy; inspired by sailor moon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Quell 249 Popular Post Share Posted March 13, 2018 I will do my best to help. A roleplay is a collaborative story, so a roleplay post is like a few paragraphs in a novel (or a few scenes in a movie). If these paragraphs or scenes would be cut from the final edit, it is not pulling its weight. More concretely, a roleplay post must have something to which the other character can appropriately respond. This will vary drastically depending on the roleplay, but to put it simply -- the writer and character must be active (as opposed to passive) in the post. This merely means that the writer is giving movement and intrigue, so that another character has the opportunity to respond to something. This is especially important with shy/quiet or abrasive characters. Good: Tony eyed the man across the bar like a snake ready to bite. When Arthur introduced himself, he snorted and rolled his eyes. Despite the gaping hole in the conversation, Tony reached over and downed his shot, stood up, and relocated to sitting beside Arthur. The real question was, was he going to start throwing punches or words. ^ This gives someone something to respond to. There is no dialogue, but there are actions and clear emotions. Something is going to happen and is happening that the player and character need to anticipate, organize, and work with. Bad: Tony looked at the man across the bar as he considered how much he missed his family. He wanted to hold them in his arms and kiss them, but he never would be able to. Arthur spoke, but Tony ignore him thoroughly. There was no reason to speak with a stranger. He wanted to go home. That was all he could think about now. ^ This doesn't give something to reply to. The player might give you another shot because RPers are a surprisingly forgiving crowd, by in large, but Arthur's player no has no reason for Arthur to keep engaging. There is no interaction; there is no "in" from a character perspective. Narration is great and it adds to interesting characters, but internal monologue is mostly useless for the stake of giving someone something to reply to. TL; DR: Respond to the previous post and then add something new 3 1 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Icewolf 258 Share Posted March 13, 2018 The responses that I have come across that I find I can't react to are things like: Okay *Smiles at you* (There are probably other examples that I've come across but forgotten about them.) I would take Thyme's second example over those because at least it shows the writer is willing to put work into stringing more than two or three words together. However, my experience (mostly) with this type of rp is when people literally post only a few words. Occasionally, rp can become stale if all people ever do is talk about the same thing in rp, such as preparing food. I know of one rper who only ever does that and stopped responding to their posts because they give me nothing to do but respond with the same thing. (Of course, I could spice it up by saying my character didn't like the food, but with how people tend to react on twitter to 'negative' things, I decided not to.) There have been a few times where I've been able to direct it towards something more interesting, but it gets tiring when you have to constantly come up with something different because they don't, and I hate having to talk about 'my character' all the time in these situations because if you do that, it looks like you're only interested in 'your' character and not theirs. Sometimes when I'm asking questions of other characters, it's not because I don't have anything to talk about regarding my character, but the fact that I want to learn about yours. Sometimes, even this produces nothing. Another problem with twitter in general is the lack of proper profiles, espeaically for OCs. Sometimes all people have is a name, a face, a race, a title/family connection and that's it. These types of characters leave me with nothing to go on because even though I might be willing to rp with them, I don't have an opening to because I know nothing about the character. All I have is what's given to me and it's usually these kinds of rpers of OCs who only write Okay, *Smiles at you*, etc. If I knew something about the character, then at least I can find a common connection which could lead to them meeting and becoming friends. Then there are people who don't make npcs or expect you to be the one to create them all the time. Peoples ideas that regard are finite and you don't always have the time to make them yourself. A little collaboration with this would be great. 1 1 1 Legends of Arda Character Archives Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VirusZero 176 Share Posted March 18, 2018 Replying to a topic is a start to moving things along. I mean no replies, by definition, means nothing is happening. But even with people replying they have to add something of value for people to reply to. The next step is for them to give enough content to be useful. In the past I've said: "Quantity doesn't equate to quality, but you can't have quality with no quantity." This doesn't mean you need 500 words in a post. (In fact, I've said the opposite. Having a lot of words doesn't guarantee that those words will be useful. People can absolutely make 500 words and have most of them be all internal monologuing, which is useless unless your character is a psychic.) But it does mean that there has to be enough given for the next person to use. They don't have to be all spoken statements either. People communicate a lot with their body language, so taking time to describe this can go a long way. (Though it also entails consciously knowing what the body language is and what it means. ) But it also adds a lot of imprecision (and, by extension, interpretation) to posts. I mean if a character places their hands down on a desk does it mean they're guarded and on edge or that is they just behave? Or take larger actions that actually affect the world around them. Doesn't have to be something as dynamic as shooting a missile that makes a crater... but even things in a bar setting like bumping into someone, spilling a drink, tripping on something, etc... all could be used to drive a scene forward. If the entirety of a person's post, that others can respond to, boils down to them saying one word... there can only be so many times before others just give up. And it makes sense. To use a real life type example, if you talk to someone and they only respond with one word replies... how long would you talk to them? Probably not very. So at that point, if they want to be in topics they kinda can't just make a character who exists in their own little bubble or is super introverted. Any character who seeks only to escape any situation they're in is going to run into problems staying in threads. The proactive vs reactive is a good way to put it. 2 2 "There are three sides to every story... Your side, their side, and then somewhere in the middle is the truth." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Sadrienne 242 Popular Post Share Posted March 18, 2018 Posts that don't provide much to respond to are often entirely internal to the character. That is, they generally contain only thoughts and narrative that can't be seen/acted on by other characters in the thread. So I think the main key is to have at least one thing external to the character that can be responded to. A movement, dialogue, or even a change in the setting (it begins to rain, what do now?). Something that ensures the characters continue to interact with each other. I have a small belief that a lot of the more closed/internal-only posting players are the product of extreme RP rules. I once wrote an opening post where at the end, my character called out to another character (as yet unknown, it was an open thread) to ask where a classroom was. I was accused of god-moding, because what if there wasn't another character there? What if that character didn't want mine to call out to them? I didn't last long there, but rules enforced at that level can make people very scared to write actions that impact any characters outside of their own. My general formula for posting is to acknowledge what has been posted before me, react to the elements that my character would be impacted by, and provide at least one external element that another character can react to. 5 1 the australian potterverse | we're back in black CREATION GUIDE | HOW TO APPLY | PLOT | POSITIONS AVAILABLE | NOT AUSTRALIAN? | JOIN US ON DISCORD | TUMBLR Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kit the Human 758 Share Posted March 18, 2018 Someone who consistently provides no external reactions in any thread is someone who isn't pulling their own weight in my eyes! I thought about it, and decided that someone who doesn't come up with plots, or doesn't provide brand new elements to a thread doesn't fall in the category of 'not pulling their weight' because their reactions in the thread can carry it forward in an organic way anyway, and I personally appreciate that! 1 1 PSI: an Occult Investigations RP Roleplay Architects: Grab a friend (or many friends!) and just write. You can also find me at: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Samantha 64 Share Posted March 18, 2018 I think one of the most extreme examples I can think of for not moving a thread along are those posts that are written in such a way that it doesn't make sense for your character to continue the interaction. I don't mean that the other character is mad at yours or it's an uncomfortable situation, per say. What I mean is that if your character is doing a standard kind of meet and greet and the other character walks away or doesn't seem like they want to talk: what makes sense about my character going after someone they just met to continue an interaction that didn't leave any kind of impression on them? If I get threads like that I will usually just write up my next post to be a closer and then if the other person replies and offers something to the thread that provokes an interaction then I'll reply and try to move the thread along. Reactive and Proactive writing has been covered here pretty well so I don't think I have much of anything to add to that at all. I will say that I feel like I'm a little bit of both, I try to react to everything that happened in a post (where it makes sense) and then add something new to pull the thread forward a bit. On the topic of conversations especially I have one example of how my RP partner and I skipped about 4 posts by just doing one thing. Our characters were having a conversation before they got to the main reason they were threading and while the conversation was important we didn't want to waste a bunch of posts on it, especially since another person was going to be included in the thread once they were done with the conversation. So in discord PMs, my partner told me what her character was going to say and I gave my character's responses. She put both sides of the conversation into her post and then I was free to move the thread past the conversation and on to the next bit. I understand that that can't (and maybe shouldn't) be done all the time, but I think smaller things like that can be. If you need to know if a character is going to agree to go on a walk with your character before you can continue your post then g ahead and ask your RP partner if they would say yes and then if it's okay for you to include that in your post so you can push it along further and you don't have to end at "Do you want to go on a walk with me?" Simply because you need a yes or no answer. I think most people are fine with things like that, especially when they're small things that can push past some of the build up to threads. 1 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elena 546 Share Posted March 18, 2018 (edited) And, for God's sake, don't add only to the dialogue! (But yes, the cues in the narrative should be prompts for more dialogue too whenever appropriate! Don't just respond to what you were asked, ignoring everything around). Add also to the narrative, on the previously agreed story direction. Make your characters do something while they are talking, and I don't mean fidget and look at their watches, but actually do what is their role in the story! I had plenty of high action threads where some characters were merely talking, instead of complying with the orders in the meanwhile. Edited March 18, 2018 by Elena 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rune 1,099 Share Posted March 18, 2018 Interaction. Your post should not be solely internal monologue. If there isn't conversation, there should be approach. If there isn't approach, your post should be open to it. Don't put your character in a situation that would be weird for someone else to walk up and start a conversation. (Sitting at a table in a restaurant, in their own home, actively avoiding people, etc.) Every post should be looked at as though you had to respond to it yourself. If you struggle to think of how you would do that, then some editing may be advantageous. (Assuming the posts are written with no previous planning.) 1 1 2 Heart of the Community 2018 Cry Wolf - 18+ AU Mercy Thompson (Urban Fantasy) RP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Uaithne 543 Author Share Posted March 19, 2018 Thank you, guys. You have great insight, and I appreciate that people are taking the time to respond clearly on a topic that is difficult to articulate. I look forward to any other thoughts or additions on this topic since it's something that comes up quite often. To me, "moving the thread along" shows that a member is interested in that rp thread. But on the flip side, there have been times in which I have not moved the thread along because it didn't feel natural to my character to do or say something to get the other character to stick around. Sometimes it's hard to move the thread along when you're tired but you need to post and you think that getting SOMETHING up is better than nothing. Any of these over occurring several times in a thread is more than enough to make the other person miserable. What are some solutions you have come up with to help yourself or others move the thread along? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elena 546 Share Posted March 19, 2018 For me, I am trying the best even when my writing partner doesn't give me anything to work with and doesn't notice my cues. I try to ask questions, to give descriptions and more cues which can be commented on or acted on, to give orders when it is appropriate (which should break the conversation by actually doing what was ordered, progressing the main action of the thread, not only the side conversation), etc. In rare cases I tell my writing partner that I need a bit more (eventually a suggestion what, either they take that suggestion, or they come with something similar) in order to be able to reply. An example was when a noblewoman was supposed to have an encounter with a commoner woman in the market place, and the noblewoman didn't understood that the commoner can't be the one to address to a lady without being asked first. More times I am brainstorming with my writing partner, so that both of us have the same idea what the thread's purpose is, and how we can achieve it. Sometimes I suggest my writing partner, who obviously is struggling, a few ideas - lately I told one of my writing partners that a general cleaning thread had, besides the general purpose of three people getting better acquainted during working together, describing the newly bought building which was to be turned into a shop at the ground floor and the living quarters at the first floor, and the owner's dreams about how to furnish it, how to make his dream come true. There are, however, some writing partners to whom nothing suggested can change their style of simply reacting or not even... and not driving the story forward. (Or maybe not even paying attention to what I wrote). 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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