via Intellectual obesity.

The GMs of the dice games relied heavily on planning – but after an intense planning session, they could fill out most of a storyline complete with several foreseeable forks. After the (admittedly intense on the creative lobes) preparations were done, the GM role involved guiding players such that they could discover that GM’s genius plot. Some improvisation was necessary.

The GMs of the play by post roleplay are up against a set of completely different expectations, ones that are not always explicitly clear to them. While dice-rollers knew that the GM of their games would lead the story, the writers in a play-by-post RP all appear to be on equal footing (but have unequal strengths and weaknesses). Some players expect the GM to create the plot and move the players along it, while the players themselves plan to just fill in the gaps. There are also those who wish to exercise their creative spark, veering the plot off of the GM’s course for their own devices – so as to make the story more fun and dynamic for everyone (they think). How are you, the GM of a play-by-post roleplay, supposed to cater to an audience whom you cannot gauge as the static, dynamic, or mixed until the story is already underway? There are no proven methods that work, but I have been having a pretty good experience so far with Verdanus and Tertius: War of the World (see the Activity tab for the actual roleplaying) and want to share my “good practices”.

Create a setting and plot that you are interested in. As writers, we often have creative sparks that we can whip into an introductory post to a roleplay – but ask yourself, could you see yourself enjoying another plot in the same setting? Another character? A world that isn’t intrinsically interesting to you will eventually sap all of your creative juices, leaving you contemptuous enough to abandon it. I’ve experienced that quite a few times – but not so with the Verdanus story: I want to novelize it. It’s the kind of story I would (did, and will) keep writing even without others.

Give yourself (and others) leeway. While dice-roleplays had to be linear (straight, curved, zig-zagged, but always moving from A to B to C), there is no such necessity with play-by-post. Players posting in the same roleplay need not have their characters interact, or even appear in the same location. The mere possibility of one affecting the other in the distant future is enough to warrant coexistence within the roleplay. Give your players multiple starting points, and as the GM cycle through all of them, periodically adding content. This lets players avoid interacting with those with whom they don’t jive – and lets you, the GM, use some untouched segment of the roleplay as your idea spawning pool. It also allows for more writers to participate, disintegrating the ~6 player limit in dice games.

Emphasize writing over anything else. If you were inspired by a fantasy great like Tolkien or Zelazny, or a sci-fi grandmaster like Heinlein, Asimov, or Dick, you probably judged their writing as top notch. Their grammar, literary devices, and dialogue were the sugar that helped the medicine go down during the slower bits between critical plot events. Imagine if their spelling was shoddy, their punctuation misplaced, and their sentences run-ons or fragments? Would that have deterred you from reading? I assure you that having to trudge through poor writing from your players will kill your creative appetite, and vice versa for them if you’re careless.

Fight the “role playing” mentality. When dice rollers came together, their character sheets gave them an identity that they had to maintain. It was an escape from their daily lives into a wondrous world where a natural twenty saved you from the direst poison. Well, escapism isn’t as worthwhile a hobby as is writing (which has gotten some writers very very rich). Rather than focusing on a single character to live vicariously through, encourage your players to make active use of NPCs. When a character walks into a convenience store to buy a twinkie, the clerk is the NPC. No player’s character needs be present for someone else to write about that clerk’s run-in with the local gang, all of whom are also NPCs. In fact, if there are no “player’s characters” then every character is up for grabs – the plot becomes the focus, rather than the metagame. (With seven players in a traditional roleplay, all seven are trying to turn their characters into the “main” character. With seven players in a plot-centric roleplay, all seven have a hand in the “main” plot, yielding collaboration rather than competition.) However, some players might have an affection for some characters – let them reserve them, so long as they remember to focus on plot.

Find the perfect posting length. If you’ve had the chance to read my article on Building Mood through Preconceptions you will know my stance on both one-liners and fluff-hills: they make for crappy writing. When I wrote that article, I had no idea how to achieve the perfect medium. Having spent over a year on Ficly.com however, I think I now have the solution: a 1024 character limit. The number is somewhat arbitrary to use with writing, since it only carries significance in data storage, but it is less than the ~350 words of a paperback page (actually a little more than half on one page). As an experienced reader, you likely recognize how difficult it is to expand on several different topics in only half a paperback page. And as a roleplayer, you know that a post without a punchline is boring to read. By imposing a limit, like the 1024 of Ficly, you force yourself and your roleplayers to keep your posts focused, concise, and interesting. The strain of fitting into 1024 characters forces some ideas to be put on hold – yielding only more raw material for the next “microstory” to add later into the roleplay. And, with a limit being imposed, players will feel a subconscious yearning to get as close to that limit as possible – I myself fall between 1017 and 1024 every time, after some revision and syntax decisions, and I’ve found that my roleplayers do the same (unless they forget about the limit, in which case they feel bad enough for breaking the simple rule that they avoid breaking it again). The limit also makes for easier reading – no one has to suffer through walls of text like this article that are tl;dr.

In summary, I encourage you to use (or modify) my rules for roleplaying, especially if you are using Eric Martindale’s Roleplay Tab system. I use them in Verdanus and Tertius, and my friend uses them in Despot (both of which are open for your participation!). Here they are:

0) The plot is more important than any character.
1) Write no more than 1024 characters per post, or no more than ~ one paperback page at a time.
2) Make every detail count – don’t fluff it up, but do make it sound interesting.
3) Any character that appears in the Characters tab is reserved by that player.
4) Any character NOT reserved is then free reign to roleplay as anyone wants.
5) Avoid contradictions, and correct them if you are made aware of them.
6) Spelling and grammar make everyone happy.
7) Talk things out with others over PM or in OOC when involving their characters.

When you decide to roleplay, a whole new world of imagination opens up to you — soon you realize that all the World of Warcraft is a stage, and all the orcs and humans merely players.

There are degrees to roleplaying. Some people like it "light," so that it never gets too intense, you never have to actually "work" to make your character profound or lore-worthy, and it's generally just a fun way to pass some time. Others like it "heavy;" they view their characters as works of art, taking special care to make their characters believable and interesting, and sometimes planning special roleplaying events for their guild to enjoy. Some even try to do everything in-character, from repairing armor to marking out targets with raid symbols.

Recently I joined just such a full-immersion roleplaying guild, and have been trying out their particular style. To be fair, I still have a number of friends on my server that I usually speak out-of-character with, because that's what we're used to, but for everyone in this guild, I do my best to stay in character at all times, with everything my character says and does. To some this may seem like an unnecessary pain, but to others it's a fun experience. Here are a few of the advantages and disadvantages of this type of roleplaying.

via All the World’s a Stage: Pros and cons of total-immersion roleplay.

Where to Start

First and foremost, you must decide what sort of character you are creating. This will depend largely on the roleplay. For example, you wouldn’t create a space pirate in a Tolkien-esque fantasy roleplay. So you need to ask yourself a few questions:

• Is my character of a race that ‘fits in’ with the roleplay?
• Will my character be a lead character or a supporting one?
• What role does my character have?

Of course, these are very basic questions to ask, but they allow an initial outline idea of your character. By answering these questions, you’re on the way to creating an awesome character.

Names

For myself, I start by naming my character. Certain races have expected naming conventions, but that doesn’t always matter – your character’s name needs to simply fit in with the roleplay.

Names can be difficult to make up, but help is available! Check out the following links to name generators:

• Seventh Sanctum has a good name generator section, with many generators for all kinds of situations
• Dragon’s Mark is another service that offers multiple name generators, focusing mostly on fantasy names
• Another good name generator can be found at fantasyrole.org which again focuses on fantasy names
• PHP Geek is another site with a name generator. It’s pretty basic and works based on your own information – surname, first name, mother’s maiden name and the name of the city you were born in. Of course, you don’t have to enter real information though.

Others exist, of course, and you can use Google to search for them.

Appearance

Your character’s appearance is important. Often it can be a reflection of your character’s personality, an indication of their position, or simply what they look like. A few things should be considered:

• How tall is your character?
• What build? Slim, muscular, chubby, some alien-looking abomination?
• What does their face look like? Hair colour, eye colour, ugly, pretty, handsome?
• What clothes do they wear?
• How does your character ‘carry’ themselves? Do they seem confident, nervous, arrogant, flirtatious? This is often directly linked to the character’s personality.

Personality

A character’s personality will determine their of the world, how they interact with others, and predominantly, how you play the character. A personality can also change over time, as in real life. Often, the character’s history will link into their personality – perhaps being the cause of the personality.

• What is the general attitude of your character? Fun-loving, happy, enthusiastic, serious, stoic, loud, bashful?
• In what way do they view others? Friends, acquaintances, enemies?
• How does your character view the world they are in?
• What standards/morals/principals does your character have?
• Is your character liked by others? Immediately, after getting to know them, not at all?
• What is your character motivated by?

History

A character’s history is one of the keystones in character creation. It is what ties everything together. Much like a real person, a roleplay character will inevitably be moulded by the events in their life. The history of a character can also explain why there are where they are in a roleplay. A few things to consider, when writing a character’s history:

• What was their childhood like?
• What events in their childhood helped to shape them, if any?
• What have they spent their life doing up to this point?
• Are there any influential people they’ve met ‘along the way’?
• What jobs has the character had?
• What trials helped to make the character stronger, weaker, less trusting etc?
• Has your character moved from their home town?
• If so, why?
• If not, why?

Some people like to have a very detailed history, some don’t. The choice is up to you. If you write a history, try to keep at least to the key points in their life that led them to ‘now’.

Abilities and Equipment

A character’s ability and equipment needs to again fit in with the roleplay. Your character wouldn’t have a phaser in a fantasy roleplay, typically. A few things, without going into specifics, should be considered:

• Do the abilities and equipment match the roleplay?
• Are the strength of my character’s abilities too strong? (After all, you don’t want to god mod.)
• Where did the character learn these abilities? Do they match up to the history?
• Do the abilities coincide with other character points? (For example, would a 15 year old really have mastered a technique that takes fifty years to do so?)
• What equipment does my character have?
• For what purpose?
• How many of each item?
• Is it realistic for my character to carry all this equipment?
• How does the equipment assist in my character’s role?
• Are these abilities and equipment necessary, or do I just want an ‘uber character of doom’?

Part 2

We’ve looked at the basics of creating a character here. But, we’re not quite finished yet… We need to keep balance. A balance character is generally more interesting, and helps to suspend disbelief.

In the second part of this tutorial, we will look at how to maintain balance in your characters.

Lord Saladin is an experienced veteran RolePlayer and wordsmith, and long-time tutor of RolePlay and writing. He runs his own proof-reading business and has been published on several websites for his articles about sales and business.

It is with noble sentiments that bad literature gets written.

André Gide says it pretty well here: We sometimes want to focus on the aspects of RolePlaying aside from the literary, which is perfectly acceptable. Yet, it does sometimes mean our writing suffers as a result. So, we must be entirely certain that we make words just as important as everything else.

Why?

Communication and understanding. To put it in a nutshell. As writers engaging in a collaborative effort to write a story, it is of utmost importance that we all understand what it is the other has written. How else can we expect the next person who posts to understand what just happened, and then continue the story in a coherent manner? Can we at all?

But remember also that we write not only for ourselves, as a RolePlayer, and our group of writers; but also for people who may be reading what we have spent valuable time and effort in creating. That’s an important fact to remember, one we often forget – even myself.

So…

Be sure to write in a way that makes sense, follows a logic that most can understand, and most importantly, make it an enjoyable read. What are the easiest ways to do that?

• Spelling: Spell your words out in full. There’s no need for ‘txt-tlk’ at all. I know that, perhaps, it will save you a quarter of a second here or there, but not everyone uses the same ‘code’ for writing shorthand. This means that your readers may have to spend a few minutes deciphering exactly what you mean; this will detract from the post itself – meaning your actions, narrative, character development etc could quite easily go unnoticed.
• Grammar and Punctuation: Grammar – which includes punctuation – adds to the meaning of your words. Emphasis can be placed in certain areas through punctuation, grammar and sentence structure can help convey the feeling of your character and their mindset or personality of your character better than the words themselves sometimes. Now, I don’t know the origin of this, but Miyumi quoted the following on RolePlay Gateway:

  Dear John: I want a man who knows what love is all about. You are generous, kind, thoughtful. People who are not like you admit to being useless and inferior. You have ruined me for other men. I yearn for you. I have no feelings whatsoever when we’re apart. I can be forever happy–will you let me be yours? Gloria

  And, in comparison (also from the same quote):

  Dear John: I want a man who knows what love is. All about you are generous, kind, thoughtful people, who are not like you. Admit to being useless and inferior. You have ruined me. For other men, I yearn. For you, I have no feelings whatsoever. When we’re apart, I can be forever happy. Will you let me be? Yours, Gloria

  Notice, if you will, firstly that the words and their order are identical. Then take note of the entirely different meaning and tone. That’s the importance of grammar.

In Conclusion

The above two points are only the very basics of the importance of words. Utilising the above will certainly put you soundly on your way to creating exciting, gripping and easily read, easily played RolePlays.

I know a lot of new RolePlayers, and young writers, feel that spelling and grammar are unimportant when RolePlaying, as this is ‘only the internet’ and just some harmless fun. We need to remember, though, that just as the writing is collaborative, so too is the fun made by each of us working together. A lack of understanding, like trying to decipher post-graduate algebra, can take the fun away. Unless you’re a mathematician with a post-graduate degree.

Help is Available Though

No-one expects each RolePlayer to have perfect spelling and grammar, or to be able to maintain a high level at all times. We all make mistakes, which is perfectly fine. The following tools and methods can help you improve, though.

• Word Processors: Microsoft Word, or any other word processor with a spelling and grammar check will make sure that most errors are removed from your posts. Type your posts first there, and copy/paste into your forum.
• Mozilla Firefox: This awesome, free, web browser has built-in spell checkers though (as far as I’m aware) no grammar checker. Its default is American English, but you can easily install most languages, meaning it doesn’t matter in what language you are writing (unless made up), you know you’re spelling things correctly. It can be downloaded here.
• Proof Reading: Read through what you’ve written after you’re finished and before you hit ‘Submit.’ You will likely spot errors. Then read it aloud, you’ll notice grammar and punctuation mistakes. Read it once more. Then maybe let a friend or family member read your post – they’ll notice things you may have missed. Now you can hit the ‘Submit’ button with a secure knowledge that your post makes sense and is easily read.
• Time and Effort: Writing a 500-word post in five minutes may well mean you have a pretty decent typing speed, but likely you’re going lack the quality of someone who takes ten, or even fifteen minutes to write the same amount. If you’re going to write something, do it well. People can generally see when effort has been made, and they will respect that from you. Spending a little extra time, making that bit more effort, will also make your work all the better.

Lord Saladin is an experienced veteran RolePlayer and wordsmith, and long-time tutor of RolePlay and writing. He runs his own proof-reading business and has been published on several websites for his articles about sales and business.

 
When starting a forum based roleplay, char sheets are often used to screen players and identify godmoders while preventing Mary Sues. When dueling, a character sheet helps set limitations on “power level” to prevent powergaming. When casually roleplaying multiple characters, good character sheets can help the player manage the various personalities.

Whatever your reason for using a character sheet, make sure that the sheet you use is functional. If it is meant for other players to read, make it concise and informative. If it is for personal reference, make it detailed and well organized. If it is for player screening, make sure you follow the GM’s rules. If you are the GM, make sure that you set a sheet that you actually care about. While a character’s vocation is important, their hair and eye color are often not. An aside to GMs: if you require a character sheet, don’t use it just for screening. Integrate bits and pieces of characters’ histories into the plot.

I generally partake in freeform RPs and thus rarely read others’ character profiles (except for research). I highly doubt that every player takes the time to read mine, so my primary reason is to create a comprehensive reference for my own use. My characters are often of much varied temperaments than I, so roleplaying “what I know” is a rarity. I build my character sheet the same way that I build my character: given a set of personality traits, I produce an anecdotal history that explains why my character has those traits. Alternatively, given an event in my character’s biography I determine the effects on their psyche and demeanor. This reference is a way for me to tell myself what things make up my character, so that when he or she or it discovers a new situation, I can use their anecdotal past to determine their reaction. Just writing down that reference helps me ingrain it, so I might not even return to it.

A criticism I often receive after making that statement calls me out as bland and “too rational, preventing my characters from ever being spontaneous”. If you feel like making that criticism then you are missing my point: if my character is spontaneous or has the potential for spontaneity I will explain that potential via some event or sequence of events in their life. So when he risks his life to save a little girl, he will be thinking back to his sister’s death that no one risked their life to prevent. Or he will be going out of his way to impress a maiden, fooling himself and others that he is chivalrous. When my character leads a battalion into the fray, my history will reflect either childhood board game endeavors leading to a profound understanding of strategy, or perhaps a con-artisan streak leading up to the commanding rank. Or perhaps he will have spent his entire life working towards the position, and has finally reached it.

What these anecdotes allow me to do is extrapolate other details from the situation. Is my character ecstatic or anxious? Is he confident or doubtful? Is he emotionally stable or unstable? Rather than make a random guess I am able to use my character reference to portray truer actions, ones that will certainly affect the course of the roleplay. More importantly, this reference prevents me from living vicariously through my characters and overlaying my own psyche with their abilities. It prevents my lover from forgiving his cheating significant other, and prevents my brute from solving a simple puzzle.

Of course, the character reference is only relevent or useful if you actually use it. If the roleplay is a duel with no plot then the only relevant details are fighting style, ability to taunt, and attributes of the body, then only those features should go on the sheet. If the relevant character is meant to be an extension of yourself then only the physical appearance (for the benefit of others) is a necessary aspect of the sheet. Whatever your purpose for creating a character sheet for a forum roleplay, make sure that your sheet is targeted for a specific audience (or yourself) and that if fulfills whatever purpose you set out for it.

There are various ways to create a World. In most novels, the world is narrow, detailed like a corridor through which the storyline paths. And yet, many of us have read Tolkien, or Brust, or scores of other authors who persist with the same world. We as forum roleplayers seek to create worlds post-by-post, thread-by-thread. We gather several friends, toss together enough information to have a setting, drop a character each into the fray, create a bit of history, and starting moving forwards and outwards.

Let me first caution you, from my own experience: stick to a single time period, and only move forward. I have partaken in a world so fluidly created that we moved back and forth through history (at the same time) days, months, decades, centuries, millenia. We created three concurrent planes of existance, at least four ranks of beings, and five times as many characters as we had players. Had we need one person, this would have prospered and grown. Unfortunately, there were too many nuances to keep track of in space and in time. At some point, any world will become too thick for many players to keep it free of contradictions.

Let us say that you seek to create a world, and start with a continent, a town, a day, and some characters. You are a group of perhaps ten avid writers, all looking to participate, all with equal pull as to which direction thir world moves in. One way to go about it is to write, each creating lore, writing quests, beasts, enemies, events, and more of the like. STOP. Do not do this. You are not the lone writer, the Tolkein who has free reign of his domain. Passive Writing, where your work is simply added to that of your fellows, is a killer of worlds. Your work does not engage your fellows, nor are they necessitated to read it, given that they too are people, with lives, with limited time, and are currently busy with their own Passive Writing. In analogy, if all of you start bricking out a building from different places with no rules as to how your bricks should be stacked, your building will either have many holes, several clashes between builders, or no structural integrity if you all manage to still come together.

I prescribe Active Roleplaying.

We are all used to in-character topics where we all throw together our PCs and write NPCs in as we need them. This is, of course, Active Roleplaying, as it requires your fellow players to take heed of your character’s actions, and of any world-fleshing information you include among those actions. But how many times can you ‘Kill the Were Bear’ or ‘Save the Princess’ or ‘Recover the Golden Goblet’ before you and your fellows are bored and want to move on to another world, or maybe their girlfriends? Active Roleplaying doesn’t always have to be quests, and most importantly doesn’t always have to involve PCs.

One mode of Active Roleplaying that involves only NPCs is what I call Conversation Topics. There is little description (of the scenery, at least) and there is almost no action (apart from “stood” or “sat”). If your world was Rome, there could be a Conversation Topic at the Forum or at the Senate. If you were following Aladdin in Agrabah, a good place for a Conversation Topic might be the local bazaar. In Alexandria, the Lighthouse Library would serve well. In the small town of Sleepy Grove a perfect Conversation Topic would be the Town Hall Meeting. In a college setting, an engaging discussion class would work. Given a corporation, a meeting of the Board of Directors. At a high school, the PTA meeting. In a Fraternity, a Regional or National Conference. Etc. For any setting except for the travels of a quest, there is likely some location where several NPCs are likely to meet.

Use them. Rather than starting off with the “Slay the Dragon” quest, take to the town hall, where all sorts of mundane and otherwise matters are likely to be discussed. One man will whine about someone’s urine on his white fence. Another will comment about how ugly that white fence is anyway. If nothing else, it is a place to create a one-time or even recurring character with a personality that you want to test out. It also sets the mood to have Gerta, mother of three, bust through the doors yelling and screaming about bandits who kidnapped her son and demand the town’s harvest for his safe return, where failure to comply will involve taking the grain by force anyway. Now you have a quest to work with, with a proper setup. Your fellows were playing equally useless townsmen until this quest came about, but now all know about it. When they go to the new topic you’ve created for the quest they wont be surprised: they will be ready, eager, and thinking of what their NPC will say when the heroes come back.

NPC Conversation topics can be revisited over and over again, or can be abandoned with no loss and no harm done. They give players a chance to stay active in the world between quests, while at the same time serving as spawning point for quests. As the world grows, they become perfect starting points for players new to the world. Most importantly, they give all of the players a chance to practice roleplaying with little consequence – a rowdy townsman can always be bounced out of the meeting, while a boring senator can always just stop talking. And if the annoying teacher gets hit by a car, well, not only was that a good solution to a failed experiment, but it also spawned a murder mystery that a bunch of dumb kids are likely to investigate.

NPC Conversation topics aren’t purly theoretical – I have tried them, and in my limited experience they have worked wonders. If you have a world to try them out, please do, and give me your insights and your suceess (or otherwise) stories. Good luck, and happy world building!

In its most basic form, roleplaying is just that: playing a role other than yourself. The most prevalent and well known form of this would be acting, where someone becomes a character either for the stage or screen. They study the character, his/her personality, accent, thoughts and then throughout the film/play, the actor essentially ‘is’ that character. Another place we can see roleplaying, and perhaps in its most ‘innocent’ form, is in childsplay – a perfect example would be when kids play ‘house.’

However, what is more pertinent to this site is Play-By-Post Online Roleplaying. This is generally played on forums, and takes upon itself a role similar to acting, in that you are taking the role of a character (or several) and throughout the roleplay you essentially become that character. The major difference, of course, is that online roleplaying is performed through writing, rather than playing the actions yourself.

Writing the varying aspects of your character with other players who also are writing their character, you work together to create a story. Each character’s actions and individual histories come together and through each post your story develops. It also is the job of each player to not only write their character, but also the environment in which the characters are in. In this sense, then, online roleplaying could very well be more aptly defined as ‘collaborative creative writing.’

You are working in collaboration with other writers to write creatively – each person taking the point of view of one character in your story. That is what Play-By-Post Online Roleplaying truly is.

I find the majority of writers dichotomized into two groups, neither of which produces ideal works, in my subjective opinion. I generally class myself to the second group, but am aiming for the idyllic middle ground. The first group are the minimalists: not only do they not avoid adverbs but they also cut adjectives, simplify actions, reduce nouns, and produce very skeletal projects. The finished works are functional, yes, but very dry. An entire book in this style is horribly boring to read through, and roleplay posts, while shorter, are often too short, lacking, and interesting. To escape this minimalism, many other writers go too far, and fall into the second group: fluffers. Nouns are padded with strings of adjectives, adjectives and verbs are modified by adverbs, active sentences are cushioned by passive ones, and the result is so fat that is has lost all semblance to a dog and looks more like the inside of a pillow. The second group also over-extends metaphors ;]

One problem with finding the middle ground is determining what is “bad” from the second group. The minimalists pretty much set the lower bound, but how fluffy is too fluffy? A generally accepted rule, according to such books as Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style is functionality. Every action, every adjective, every description, all need to either serve some purpose now, or in the case of roleplaying need to be usable for some purpose later. Of course, noticing that there are mountains behind the lake might have little significance to your character in a roleplay, but another player might make use of them and direct the action right up their slopes. However, taking the time to describe the particular colors of the rising peaks, the contours of the snow coverage, or even the random orientation of caves is a step into the fluff: the other players who plan to make use of those elements can just as easily describe them on their time. In solo works, if those details aren’t on the agenda, don’t toss them in. Another good rule for minimizing local fluff is to reduce the quantity of “ly” adverbs within any piece. any “ly” adverb modified verb can be replaced by a more applicable and descriptive verb. “Gently touching” can be replaced with “caressing”, “lightly laughing” can be replaced with “giggling”, “jumping forcefully” is easily swapped out for “leaping” or even “lunging”, depending on direction.

I have found that the best way to convey information while giving a good image of the scene is by writing out the mood associated with the actions, while allowing for each reader to see the scene with their own details. Any details left out will be filled in by the readers’ imaginations, each one differently, based on their general preconceptions of the detail at hand and the scene surrounding that detail. This allows for the reader to do much of the work describing static elements, giving the author the freedom to describe only the necessary and relevant dynamic ones.

Over the course of some of my attempts at teaching the arts of roleplaying I’ve developed a bare-bones process to take bare-bones actions and get them to a healthier “fleshed out” middle ground. I’ve since modified the process, but it is important to realize that I am working from the bottom up (rather than cutting from the top down). This can be applied to any piece of creative writing, but I will be describing it for a single roleplaying post. Most pieces of writing can be broken up into scenes or even parts of scenes.

1. Set a goal. Some writers write first, and their goal comes to them, while others brainstorm to get to the goal. The brainstormers will have an easy task: simply come up with the end result for this particular snippet of writing. Stream of consciousness writers, at least those who decide to make use of this process, might need to write a draft (which will then be tossed out, unfortunately), and will use that draft to develop their goal.
2. Take several steps from start to finish. The previous post or the previous scene set the starting point for this scene, and you have just determined a goal, which is the end to this post or scene. Now write out several actions, in the “bare-bones” manner, which will bring the situation from the starting state to the ending state. Play around with the actions, develop and order, determine the actors (your played character, any non-played characters, or even the environment).
3. Get some context to smooth those actions out. Your actions are steps, but writing should flow. So, those actions need to get modified and where appropriate, those jumps need to become lunges. To do this, imagine the scene (Durr, right? Bear with me.). Imagine what is happening, and imagine it first from the point of view of the omniscient author. You know all, you see all, you know what is playing out and how. Now imagine it from the point of view of the actors: what do they see and how do they feel about the actions, and how do their perspectives differ from yours? Now imagine yourself an audience member, watching the action unfold. You don’t yet know the goal, so how is the action making you feel at each checkpoint? Imagine yourself another player’s character, seeing it all happen. Most likely, that is who you are writing for.
4. Smooth and refine the surface. The imagination exercise gave you more than just one perspective on your own scene, and it is up to you to determine whose perspective you adapt it to. If the scene is meant to change the mind of another player’s character, include those details which might, based on that character’s personality, influence him or her. If the scene is meant to instill awe or inspiration, or to simply give some background on your character, describe from the point of view of an audience member (or omniscient author), focusing on those facets that you want associated with your character’s personality.

Example: The dragon rose above the water-line and hovered on an aerial within arrow-shot or the pirate ship, bearing her upon its back. Her wet skin glistened in the sunlight as she knocked an arrow. When the pirates did the same, she could not help but tense up. Still, she furrowed her brow and warned them. “You will lose much more than your cargo if you let your arrows fly our way!”

The goal here is to have an image in your mind: most often a beautiful, bright colored, well defined image. However, every reader’s imagination is different, so it is important to closely define only the most important features. These are the actions and their descriptions, more so than the nouns. You can tell from my example that the character is confident but realistic (and aware of her mortality) as she furrowed her brow but tensed anyway, respectively. The day is sunny due to the glistening of her skin, and the pirates are not standing idly, waiting for her to finish her actions or monologue. However, this scene lacks many fluffy details which every person can come up with themselves. While I envisioned the character as a blond with straight hair, someone else might envision her as a curly redhead: either way she is toned enough to wield a bow. The pirates have a ship, and while I imagined a single mast boat and the pirates in some generic tri-cornered hats, the important point is that they are on an open deck and also have bows. If you imagined The Black Pearl and its crew carrying bows, the important elements of the scene are unchanged.

I attempted to convey many particular elements without writing them out directly and without over-describing them. Say you want to describe a bright and sunny day, because those are great for heroics, but you don’t want to say “bright and sunny day”, because that is telling. Instead, you want to give an image of something that is often associated with a bright and sunny day, like droplets of the babbling brook shimmering under the sun. It is a happy image, set most likely in a forest, and anyone who knows what a babbling brook might be will try and imagine it, applying that setting to whatever else you write immediately afterward. This is showing: you are showing somewhat what a sunny day feels like, and they are imagining the rest of the sunny day. What your character looks like is up to you, but that she has knocked an arrow makes the reader think she is lithe. Replacing “furrowed her brow” with “pursed her lips” might her a more appealing and feminine image, intrinsically conveying a possible ponytail and an I-take-no-attitude expression in her eyes (without saying either of those!). Of course, the particular details someone imagines will be different, but even if her hair isn’t in a ponytail, the expression on her face and the perception of her personality are likely to be the same among most readers.

You want to do this for every scene. Swimming through the water, rising out of the waves, confronting the ship, avoiding the arrows, breaking the mast, etc. However, for repeated actions, like gliding beneath the water, the particular elements of the mood need only be described once: simply mentioning a repeat of the situation will bring the same image back into the readers’ minds.

Returning to the topic of bare bones vs. fluff: just as there are adverbs that produce excess fluff, there are dull nouns and verbs and adjectives which produce no mental image whatsoever, or the wrong mental image. In dialogue, “she said” and “she announced” and “she prepared” are very dull verbs (although, “saying” and “announcing” carry very different tones).

Things like “circular room” or “in the castle” or “examining each man” are very dull adjectives/nouns/verbs. Yes, they convey an action, a location, and they do so adequately. However, they have no color or mood and thus produce no (or the wrong) mental images. Adding something like “Her voice had been sultry, almost arousing, but now they could hear the poison behind it” would most certainly illustrate a Queens change in tone while doling out the “but should you fail me, your death will be slow and painful” portion of her speech. This sets the mood, makes the reader feel like one of the persons being addressed, and gives insight to the Queen’s character and agenda. So even if she speaks with very regal structure and vocabulary, adding color to her tones will make her speech more enticing to read. I know I didn’t give you much on that example, but try to imagine that scene anyway. How much could you fill in? (Let me know if it worked!)

One of the descriptors for this article is the word “functional”, and I should return to it. Every descriptive element should serve some purpose: the sultry almost arousing voice that carried poisonous tones does well to describe the queen’s personality. However, taking a paragraph to describe the Queens bosom and buttock along with her facial expressions along the same lines of sultry and arousing but somehow dangerous would be fluff, because the task at hand had already been accomplished, and more concisely to boot. So, with every detail, ask yourself if the detail accomplishes something new, or can be replaced with something both more condensed and more telling.

Problems stemming from inflexibility:

• Overwhelming Content – when the prerequisite to becoming involved is reading a large quantity of material, that can form a barrier to players who would otherwise participate.
• Obstructing Contributions – holding an iron fist around what is occurring in the story, and maintaining a regimental environment, obstructs opportunities for others to contribute. 
• Poor Integration – a closed or tedious environment can make it awkward for those who are trying to involve themselves in the story.

To provide an example of the above items, imagine a story involving a group of friends playing a criminal, a victim, and a police officer. The setting is the criminal’s cellar, where he tortures his victim until the police officer comes and arrests him, rescuing the victim. This restricts the ways a fourth party could become involved, making for an example of poor integration. The basement environment is not conducive to people just wandering on in and participating. As an outsider, I would feel as though there was nothing to contribute without railroading the story.

Tools for developing flexibility:

• Open Writing – write in such a way that it is easy for people to respond to you, such as posing a question to nobody in particular or walking up to a vendor in a market square and inquiring of the local news.
• Length and Style – keep your posts of relatively average length, so others don’t spend an excessive amount of time reading them. By the same token, don’t make them too short, otherwise you won’t be able to keep their interest. Also write in a style that is familiar, and not overly obtuse. A narrative, third-person style seems to be the most typical.
• Acknowledging Others – when another person posts, do what you can to acknowledge what they’ve written; for example, noticing they’ve entered the area or responding to something they’ve said.
• Maintaining a Summary – just a short list of what has happened thus far, so people can quickly know what is happening or, if they have a poor memory, can recall it with relative easy.
• Foreshadowing - provide all the involved parties a sense of direction, so when they sit down to write they have focus. This can be done either by foreshadowing in the actual writing or by less discrete methods such as providing a summary of objectives, both short and long term, that is readily available for everyone to read.
• Autonomy - don’t let your character become trapped in a situation where you’re utterly reliant on other players if you wish to move forward.