Anything Goes

[DerpHaven]

So I was browsing the roleplays, and I realised they all had rules, and were more or less controlled by the host. I am not the kind of person who follows rules in a medium like a roleplay forum. I have been in one roleplay. It was hilarious and fun, like Whose Line is it Anyway. None of the roleplays on here are like that (that I've found). So, without further ado, I present

THE MULTIVERSE

A roleplay where ANYTHING can happen.

Starter setting:

Earth, 21^st century.

Rules:

1)No Mary Sues.

2)Don't be a dick.

Character format:

Name:

Age:

Species:

Appearance:

Weapons:

Abilities:

Other:

Like I said, ANYTHING goes. This means any fandom. Just not too OP.

Have fun!

Edit: Yes, I realise voting on my own poll is shameless self-promotion.

Edited November 20, 2015 by DerpHaven

[Felicity]

Character format:

Name: Dobbinus

Age:Over 9000

Species:House Elf, M.D

Appearance: A hulk of gruesome shifting muscles and sinewy gore in a large humanoid shape, totally exposed without any skin. Stands on all fours, leaning on its knuckles like a gorilla would. Has eyes on his hands, forehead, knees, elbows and along his spine. on his knuckles, knees, feet and pecs he has an extremely dense skeletal growth. No visible mouth... but he can speak so he has to have one. Right? Even the creator doesn't know.

Weapons: Himself.

Abilities: Feels virtually no pain, you get used to it when there's no skin to cover your nerve endings, an incredible amount of strength, seeing as he is literally a hulk of muscles and incredibly dense bone, and sight all around him due to his eyes. Oh, and his age gives him plenty of combat experience to draw on. Not strategic or social knowledge though, what self respecting monstrosity SPEAKS to people? Oh, and incredibly quick regeneration. Walk around with no skin to protect you would kind of wear you away after a hundred years or so, naturally he has this.

Other: I MADE AN ANTI-DOBBY CUZ NO OTHER RP WOULD POSSIBLY LET Me OUTSIDE OF MAYBE HUKS MONSTER ONE SO BLEGH

[Grizzlybrand]

Name: Vosco

Age: 8

Species: Bear

Appearance: Six foot tall brown bear in a newspaper cap. Scar on his right eye.

Weapons: Claws

Abilities: Incredible strength and speed, substantially high endurance, is a bear. Can juggle while on a giant beachball.

Other: Idk man he's a bear.

I thought why not let's do it

[damurdara]

Character format:

Name: Leonard (Lenny) Johnson ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Age: 42

Species: Human

Appearance: 6ft tall, Blonde hair and green eyes. glasses.

Weapons: Vodka Bottle

Abilities: Basic boxing training Highly intelligent.

Other: He's border line racist. Alcoholic.

[Shamitako]

There was actually a discussion on sandbox roleplays not all that long ago and why they tend to go badly here. I think the only currently active and successful sandbox-style RP is Fate/Reborn

Personally won't be joining, but I wish you the best ^^ You may soon realize why they all have rules and if I were joining I would totally not abuse the lack of rules

[Sutoratosu]

Given I'm personally not a fan of nigh lawlessness and anarchy, I don't think I'll be immediately joining in this one just yet. I'll be keeping an eye on it though, just to see how it all plays out. Still, Hope you guys all have fun.

Like Lexi said though... the rules in most of the RPs here have legit reasons behind them, and shit occasionally still tends to get very messy in certain cases even then; hence why I wanna kinda just stay back as an observer for the time being...

but yeah, have fun you all. And please... try not to wreck the place

[Felicity]

I just feel like being stupid with a character. Plus, I haven't seen any RPs finish, most not getting past their first few parts, in the 1 1/2 years I've been around. New is good.

[Grizzlybrand]

I dunno I was thinking why not

[DerpHaven]

Ooooooooookaaaaaaaay... Dobby, please see a therapist. I'll probably have to go there too after reading that. (also I forgot gender. oops.)

Name: Katherine "Kat" Spinks

Gender: Female

Age: Well, she says she's 19...

Species: She doesn't really know.

Appearance: 5'7", Silver hair and eyes, always wears black clothes, a long black coat and a black scarf. Four arms.

Weapons: Whatever she feels like.

Abilities: Hammerspace coat. She can pull anything out of it.

Other: Likes mystery and being mysterious.

Edited November 26, 2015 by DerpHaven

[DerpHaven]

*runs out of a door, then quickly shuts it behind her*

Phew. That was close. *slides down and sits* *sighs* Never again.

[Shamitako]

Psst, you should make a separate thread for your IC posts

[K_H]

I just thought that a Link to the IC Thread might be useful, so here.

http://www.pokemonreborn.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=18817

Also, are Sign-ups still open?

[Felicity]

I did my best with the supreme lack of any context. At all.

[K_H]

I'm guessing that it means Sign-ups are still a go.

I'll be posting a Signup in this Post momentarily, just let me build my Character.

[EDIT]: welp, here's my Signup.

Name: Isaiah

Gender: Male

Species: Undertale-style Monster (Subspecies: Boss Monster (the only two non-spoilery examples are Toriel and Asgore))

Age: even he doesn't know anymore, other than being older than 30000 years, but he looks like he's in his late 30s thanks to the fact that his Species doesn't really age unless they're children or have children.

Appearance: 7'9", white fur, small white horns, broad muzzle, and wears Copper Armor under an indigo-colored robe.

Weapon: a Copper Bo-Staff that's eight feet in length

Skills: an extremely honed skill in battle due to his age, Electrical and Fire Magic, and a highly intelligent mind.

Other: The Magic is not very strong in single projectiles, but he's able to make complex patterns from his projectiles that are akin to a "Bullet Hell".

Edited November 26, 2015 by K_H

[Felicity]

OK, Derphaven, we can't RP like this. For one, **Action** is nowhere near the standard of writing necessary for good RPing. We have no context, no idea of what our surroundings are like, what our goal is, the specifics of what your character is doing. Buck your writing up boy or this will die.

[K_H]

I believe that this is where Co-hosts and Writers come in handy.

[Felicity]

I believe that this is where Co-hosts and Writers come in handy.

This is the first time I've seen a lone host pull this standard of writing out here. It might sound harsh but it's true.

[Honchy]

Name: Momit Gorog

Gender: Male

Species: Half-ogre, half-elf (very conflicted since the two races have been fighting for centuries)

Age: 20

Appearance: Scaly, 7 feet tall, has elf ears, has a light-green shade, usually wears a white scarf

Skills: Amazing in melee weapons

Other: Very shy, yet always protects his friends, usually found at local tavern, and is met in the arena (if this is an option )

[Chevaleresse]

Actually writing more than a line per post tends to be conducive to a healthy RP.

[Commander]

I'm going to try and put this in a way you can understand. Writing is one of those things where while you can do what you want, there are standards. It's like making a cake. Chocolate seems to be the kind of cake people like the most for those who like it, but vanilla is usually much easier to make as it requires less ingredients. It's a weird analysis, I know, but it's probably the best to describe this situation. Everybody makes their cakes (or writing) differently so not one style is right or wrong.

Here's what you're doing right now: all you have in front of us is a plate of sugar that you are calling cake. It had potential to be a cake, but it's not a cake. I mean you don't need to make a five paragraphed post but longer posts are usually more insightful. Details are very, very critical especially in the first post as you are making a brand new world from a blank sheet of paper. You should be setting up a world and scenery, but instead you give us an action. It's impossible to react from an action if there's no world to even step into.

You can take what I just said with a grain of salt as I kind of only glanced over this topic to know I wasn't interested in it. I've been doing writing since forever ago, but that doesn't mean I know everything. The most important thing in writing though is creating a clear picture and slowly let the less important stuff start coming into play like characters and the plot (yes, the world is the most important part of a story or that's my belief).

[K_H]

That's a good analogy, but I'd say that it's more like a plate of flour and sugar mixed together than a plate of just sugar. the setting is 21st century Earth, as already stated in the OP.

I've got an idea for how the premise of this RP could be further enhanced:

The walls between reality and fiction are weakening, and the first signs of this weakening is small ripples appearing in the locations that are weakest, which are then called "Ripplepoints". Then, object start appearing and disappearing without warning near these ripples, with the ripples intensifying when this starts happening. Then, a step up from that could be characters appearing, seemingly manifesting from people's imaginations. And that could be where the RP begins, when the Characters manifest and the ripples intensify enough to reveal their true nature as cracks in the very fabric of spacetime itself, regions where what is fact and what is fiction are more fuzzy than normal, where dreams and nightmares turn into reality and vice versa.

Now, this is just a base for the "Cake", and it needs fleshing out before it can become the backstory of this RP. I'll let you decide how to do that.

[Sutoratosu]

I don't usually do this, but... since I am observing this thing and all, I think I kinda have an excuse for this intervention.

like everything that Commander and Dobby and Murdoc have already said- there's a pretty glaring issue here with the post and content quality. And it doesn't matter what type of forum RP it is, free for all, fantasy, sci-fi, Magickal Kawai Girl, Supernatural Beast hunter, etc, there is one fact that is constant throughout all of them:

Forum RPs live and die based on whether or not the Host adheres to and exercises at least some kind of writing quality.

There are many other factors that go into determining whether they live or die as well, but this is the biggest because it's always the first one to come into play. Right off the bat, you should be coming out swining with your opening posts- as these are easily the most crucial to a young RP. If you do a crap job setting up the world and setting and premise of the story with that first post, chances are you are going to hit rough waters not long after and end up capsizing into a cold and merciless ocean. That sounds harsh, yeah, but it's true.

Let's put into even simpler terms than Commander's cake analogy- in an RP, the host is like the director and set crew of a movie, and the Players are the actors in said film. Now, any good movie needs, first and foremost, a director who is capable of giving good...well, direction- it's in the very name -to the actors. It is the job of the director to ensure things go smoothly and the final product is of acceptable quality, which, as said before, can only be done if the director is competent enough to give the actors a solid premise for each scene.

Which brings us to the point I'm trying to make- If the director does not give solid direction, then what happens to the film? It fails and falters. The actors get frustrated and tensions grow, things become an utter mess because the one who is supposed to be leading the production won't do his job properly. Things result in mediocrity, and some rather dreary stuff begins, careers are destroyed, people are made into laughing stocks within the industry, etc...

Alright, got all this? What we're trying to warn you is that you're uh...you're definitely gonna need to step up the quality if you want this thing to stay alive. Just because this is a "free-for-all" type of RP is no excuse for one liners with barely any details or set-up; not in the least bit, no sir. Even if the atmosphere here is supposed to be alot more relaxed and whimsical than any other currently existing RPs on here, you're not gonna get away with half-assing something for long. The player base will eventually get frustrated with the issues that crop up because of it, and well... look, it's obvious where I'm going with this.

TL;DR- This shit is gonna deteriorate fast if some basic improvements aren't made immediately.

Now, I am not the type of man to just come on stage, vehemently shout to the heavens all the things that are wrong with something, and then leave without even giving an attempt to provide a solution for what's wrong... so...

There is a very important concept in the field of fiction writing. Coupled with creativity and individual style, this is where all other things more or less build from, IMO (And many other fiction writers Opinions as well, mind you). This concept is three simple yet powerful words...

Show. Don't Tell.

Yes. these words. When you show something, you are giving the reader a series of separate and smaller details within a scene or action or dialogue, and you are letting them take those details into their mind and creating their own conclusions and drawing their own mental images for the scene. When you tell the reader something, you are still giving them the basic information of the scene, but you are condescending it down to such a point where it is little more than a "TL:DR" tag in comparison to the details used for showing.

Now... generally, it is better to show something than to simply tell the reader. Why is it? because of the "Creating their own conclusions" part. If you're writting contains nothing but Telling- just spouting a list of condensed and simplified facts at the reader, then you are denying them their right to draw their own conclusions from the work; people don't like to be told what to think or what to feel or what to do or say- they generally prefer being left to their own free will and their own mental processes and creating their own perspectives and thoughts on a story, not simply being spoon fed everything from the author's overbearing quill and ink well.

In addition to letting people make up their own damn minds about the content of the story, it also has a secondary effect of padding out the narrative to be longer than it would be if one were to just dick around and fire off fact after boring and unspecific fact. Now, in the vast majority of places, More is actually good. More detail makes the story feel more alive and dynamic- makes someone feel like their actually reading an outlet of entertainment instead of some history text book. Now then, of course, too much of anything is always a bad thing, and the same applies for details and showing if they are overused, as then the narrative becomes drawn out and long winded and actually becomes just as boring and unappealing as Simply Telling everything would be; readers want to draw their own conclusions, sure, but [most] of them also don't want to have to trudge through detail after monotonous and excessive detail in order to draw those conclusions.

Now, all that may sound contradictory and confusing, but it really isn't in the end. It all makes sense when one learns that is best to focus on what is truly important in a scene and spend their Showing Points on that particular facet, rather than on things that aren't crucial to the development of the plot and the characters within it. If a character is in a conversation at a pub, and they take a sip of their grog and put the mug back down on the table, it's generally not a good idea to go droning on for three or four pages describing the speed of their arm, the surface texture of the table, the sloshing of the mug as moves through the air... not unless that shit is crucial to moving your story towards the next part- which I highly doubt any action so utterly minuscule and forgettable in magnitude would really be.

Now then, though... say the same character who has just put down that mug says something that offends their fellow bar patron across the table and a fight starts. Now this... this right here, you would focus on, because presumably, it's going to be used as a vessel to carry the narrative to it's next phase- whether it be the town constable having to come and break up the fight, resulting in the protagonist being taken to the town jail for the night, the protag accidentally killing the other fellow in self-defense [or intentionally killing them, if your protag is the colder and merciless type or the actual Villain of the story], Other patrons joining into the brawl, resulting in a massive bar fight which requires some badass entry of the local sheriff who fires a single shot into the air, causing every last body to freeze and rocket their attentions right to the doorway, only to find the imposing, uniform clad lawman chewing idly on a single strand of straw; his glossy, pitch black shades scanning the pub with a nigh pervasive sense of disgust in his grimace at the scene, trying to single out the man who started this mess...

whoops... getting a bit too deep with that last hypothetical transition. But that's entirely my point. I was in the middle of creating a basic scene there, wasn't I? I didn't just say:

"The sheriff took out his gun and used it to stop the fight. Everyone looked at him and stopped fighting because they were afraid of getting shot. He looked around the place and tried to find the one who started the fight."

No. I went into detail. I gave information on the facial expression of the sheriff, his eye where, the general sense of his presence and attire [iE, he's obviously wearing a uniform because... he's the town law enforcement and all.]. I went to the length of providing the reader with all the details they would need to draw their own conclusions about the Sheriff, rather than telling them outright about him. They know from the imagery of the scene that he is:

A- at least some degree of badass- given the dark shades and the straw strand in his mouth, a rather classic trope.

B- At least somewhat intimidating

C- Probably a no-nonsense type of guy who don't play around, given that instead of more conventional or subtle methods of getting everyone's attention such as shouting like an idiot over the din of the brawl, he instead automatically chose the one he knew would be loud enough to succeed- the sound of his own service arm firing. Also is reinforced by the grimace and disgust on his face at seeing how the patrons are behaving so lawlessly.

Now, all these things are important. Why? Because, in this hypothetical story we're telling, Sheriff is important. It doesn't really matter in this context the reason why he is important, just that he is, and the story needs him right now. Perhaps while he's tough and no nonsense, he's also quite fair and will let the protag off easy after they prove that they were not the ones who started the altercation, which again...opens up the way to the new scene of the story and so on and so forth, until the story is at the conclusion. The details though, that I give in just those few words, provide a decent enough introduction for Sheriff without having to do too much in term of actual raw exposition explaining who in gods name he is. They give a first impression right from the very first scene he's involved in- an impression which can be further reinforced by Sheriff's actions and dialogue, etc, throughout the rest of the story to consistently portray his character.

There is much, much more I can say on this one subject, but for now, that's it explanation wise.

So, show don't tell. Good stuff right? now... question is, how and where can you as the host start showing instead of just telling, and expand both on the quality and length of the post in the RP? Well...let's look at the first post of the IC as an example.

*runs out of a smoking door then slams it behind her* Phew, that was close. *sighs and sits down* Never again.

Alright... so what we have is alot of telling, and virutally no showing... except for the "Smoking Door" part (Given that Adjectives are more or less inherently helpful for showing things and adding greater depth, but again, subject matter for another time). The players and readers alike have little to no context or detail to help them build their own pictures- you have just told them verbatim what to think and see about the scene; the only real conclusion they can draw is from the smoking door part- which is just because of human logic: What produces smoke, generally speaking? Fire. Ergo, there must be a fire somewhere behind the door, or at least something capable of producing smoke such as an explosive, short circuit... point is, you ain't given people a whole lot to go off of.

Now then... how can we rewrite this to be a far better post? well, something a bit like this.

"Kat dashed through the doorway just as the haze of acrid, lung searingly hot smoke billowed overhead and began to waft out into the small enclosure, not wasting even a single second as she turned around on her heels and slammed the heavy slab of wrought steel behind her, breath catching in her throat as her fingers- in their adrenaline fueled and frantic state -struggled to lock the thick dead bolts into place. She threw herself against the glossy surface of the metal, grinding her teeth as the viscious, heavy handed banging on the other side grew ever more forceful and violent with every second she wasted, threatening to eventually send her toppling to the floor and the door flying open once more. Finally, she heard the click of the latches. The banging stopped nigh immediately, almost as if it's source knew it's vehement attempts at entry would now be for naught. She waited for a few precious seconds, not daring to take her weight off the portal, not until she was sure...

"Phew..." She finally sighed in relief, sliding down to the floor and tugging her knees in close to her chest. "That was close...never...again."

Now then... did I add some details not in the original? Yes... but that was because of just how friggin bare bones it was, I had no choice but to add certain details that had no real indication in the original, just to even get the redone version of it to a decent enough size. This is just one of many possible examples of how the post could be spruced up and made far more better.

Are there still issues here though? Hell yes. I didn't describe the place she was in [the setting] or any other context about the scene, but... the point here is pretty clear, that stuff can all come afterwards once there's some actual depth to the content. Right now the biggest issue is the lack of Showing and excess of telling, coupled with general lack of content even on the Telling side. The world building is also a heavy problem since it seems like... there really is none aside from "21st century earth"...

Anyways, I got soooooooo much more I could talk about and address, but I don't usually do these types of things, going into the threads all heavy handed and such... so... think I'll end my words here for now.

TLDR; The key to Show. Don't Tell is to be more specific.

In the end though, it's really all up to you. You can go ahead and take everything I've said with a serious grain of salt if you want to, just ignore it all and keep going like how you are if you really want to, but... well, like I said, this thing ain't gonna live long if some serious improvements aren't made ASAP. That's just from general experience and what I've seen over time over the course of numerous RPs. Quality tends to be king.

EDIT: real quick, forgot to mention it, but notice how I formatted the redone section? Using quotation marks to designate where pieces of dialogue start and stop? NOT using asterisk to mark basic actions? This makes things a bit more easier to read and understand if they're probably formatted with definite start and stopping points in the flow of the text and ideas ((IE, such as the indented paragraphs)) But proper technical formatting is a whole 'nother beast entirely, so I'll just leave this post dedicated to Show, Don't Tell for the time being.

[K_H]

Thank you for saying that, Strat. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got a bit of extra life to breathe into this RP. I'll be over in the IC Thread momentarily.