101 RP chat posts

Hello all! this journal is a culmination of all of the official posts in my somewhat recent RP 101 chat, which was formed by me , , and It's purpose was to educate those who were showing signs of bad RPing, as well as giving touch-ups to those who wanted them.
 
    Hope it helps, to those who read!

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Our first subject is that of the Main chat... here, there is no story-effecting events or RP's, and this chat is meant for general discussion. It is usually a place of random talk, and some people are also known for making it difficult to have a legitimate discussion. There are also many problem times as well as what some Ancerious denizens call 'Insanity hour'... but we'll get to that later. First off, any RP's you see are usually referred to as 'impromptu RP's', and are sometimes used as story builders, but are not truly IC. This is one of the major reasons behind mistakes amongst some players concerning people thinking their faction is being attacked, or a major event is occurring.

A second major problem maker is that of people saying massively offensive things... this is the internet, but that doesn't mean some people don't get offended. Minor trolling is acceptable, but harassment is a negative, and a lot of people don't like it. It's a major problem, and happens every day or two, but it usually doesn't amount to much other than such occasions such as the '2014 mass ragequit', among other names. Harassment isn't just jokes or heckling, but sometimes it goes down to the most simple issue in this group, which is personal choice.

Onto the next point, since we've just discussed IC/OOC RP's, is that of RP itself. RPing when in a major state should usually be done with a moderator approved by the admin boards to tag posts as acceptable or not. They should be done in separate chats from Ancerious main, and is expected to be done without major issues. Due to the varying population of Ancerious, grammar and skill of RP isn't usually taken into account when it comes to this. Minor RP's are allowed to be done in PM's between two individuals, and are encouraged. No matter what, they should be edited before posting to a journal on dA. These are skimmed by the admin board before approval.

Continuing, there are then 'story arcs', these include the Uprising arc, the AGA conferences, the 1st Ancerious War(reffered to as the 1AW), and other things. When making an RP on these, it is preferred that you speak to the owner(s) of the arc before writing it, and the journal should be skimmed and approved of by both themselves as well as a member of the admin board. If the owner is an admin, please confer with a second admin. It is expected that journals extending an arc will include historic references of the arc, and may even intertwine. Our next sub-subject of RP is that of RP abuse. This is when a player decides he wants the spotlight, forgets everyone is equal in a joint RP(with the exception of setpieces),  or other such rule-breaking action(By the way, we have an extensive rulebook on the Ancerious front page. please read it if you haven't already.). One of the most common examples is #1ing, and this is when a player oversteps any form of boundaries in order to make themselves or their faction look good. This can also extend to descriptions of your art. For instance, it is accepted in the descriptions of units if you make them seem pretty powerful after all it makes sense, however IC when someone deploys something big and your infantry have the ability to kill it easily through 'advanced training' which conveniently is better than the enemies training or that your armour is conveniently better than theirs, or so on so that your race is far superior just by you 'saying so' without hard facts. This and the fact if a faction has a particularly unique ability or technology and your nation conveniently has something exactly the same or similar or develops such. This is generally regarded with extreme suspicion in the group and you will likely be accused of stealing. This is a regular form of one-upping and has happened quite a bit in the group since its start, though its inevitable please try to be courteous and try to stay original with other arcs.

Another form of RP abuse is writing anothers' post responsibilities, or godmodding. This is when one tries to write the actions of the other player, their faction, or their units. This is an action common among new players, and sometimes occurs amongst older players that are excited by a good intense arc. It is an extremely despised form of abuse, and usually doesn't make it through an admin review without notice. it is discouraged and is likely to make the other RP participant(s) angry. A generic example:

[1]: As the primary force opened fire and shredded into the measly armor of the secondary force, the secondaries huddled in fear at the damage done by the primary's advanced weaponry, unable to fire their weapons or co-ordinate in any way. As if their weak weaponry would be capable of doing anything of any sort of effect.
[2]: (Dude wtf are you doing?)

This is a simple and condensed version of what a godmodding post may look like. Try putting yourself in the position of player 2, and imagine how annoying the actions of player 1 would be. This is a major reason this sort of abuse is despised. It is advised you try your best to stay away from accidental godmodding, because it can likely erupt into an argument.
Yet another form of RP abuse is when you disrupt the course of a pre-planned arc without consulting an admin or the host of the arc. This is extremely disrupting if it makes the way past admin editing, and I should know because it's the reason i earned one of my black marks. It usually occurs when you don't pay attention to planning, and makes it to where you're spitting on the creator's hard work. This can be extremely offensive and usually occurs at least once in every major pre-planned arc, so as long as you stick around and participate you're sure to hear something about it happening.
Our next subject will break the negative trend of the topics so far... Now we'll go over the points of making a good RP. As stated earlier, RP's usually aren't judged by grammar or skill, but those two areas can make an RP even better to read. If you're a good writer, look at an RP like an improv story. You write one part, your partner writes the next, and so on. Our irst sub-topic is that of having a good nation to work with. You should know that a nation in a sci-fi/fantasy setting needs some sort of way to travel, fight, trade, and live. This means planets ans ships, yes? so you need to have a way to write up ships and planets... there's something you can use to help you with that!
www.projectrho.com/public_html…
donjon.bin.sh/
These two links can help with more realistic writing of your faction's territories and fleets, and should help you a lot. Remember to keep anything you create well-balanced, or earn dislike. But these few things so far don't cover any of the fantasy aspects you say? Well, we don't have anything to link you to in order to help with this, I apologize. If you really wish to help, you can look around for such things and link them here if you know of them though! Now, ships and planets need logistics. It's up to you to write these up, and many players who do resort to Handwavium(RP slang for things created in order to simply give a BS description and excuse things(I use it too i must say lol)), but it really isn't all that important to write up in this group. Other than this, the main things you really need is at least one major city for your capital city, and the capabilities and statistics of your ships. "Why do i need statistics?" you ask? So admins can look over your ship details and judge combat RP's you partake in, as well as make people interested in your faction. You don't need to draw them, but art is another part of the group many people partake in. "Why does my capitol need a major city?" You also ask? Well, It's really just a personal thing, but I believe you should always have it there to have a setting for government journals and the possibility of it being besieged. It can also be a nice place for meetings between leaders or diplomatic RP's.

What makes a good RP you now ask? Well, many factors. This can vary depending on whether it is a diplomatic RP, a combat arc, a detailed sub-story, and any other RP that may show up in this group. We'll start with what most see as the fun stuff: Starship combat. This form of RP is looked upon as entertaining and interesting. What many people don't realize is that it is portrayed in a terribly incorrect way. First off is speed; many people don't realize that it takes eight full minutes for light from the sun to reach earth. As you can see, light speed really isn't all that fast when it comes to space. Also, the amount of space between each celestial body in the solar system increases with each body farther from the sun. people don't realize for the most part that a system's invasion would take hours just to get to the first target after exiting FTL at the system's edge, and anywhere from days to months for the elimination of defenses and targets themselves. Also, people don't realize that weaponry doesn't go massively fast in comparison to ships, either. Lasers may go the speed of light... but then again, eight minutes for an AU. that's like using a very long, slowly arcing whip when at long range. If you want to have a more logical RP, you would do best to follow the rules of physics with the exception of magic and additives. On top of this, space has three dimensions. this means you're not playing battleship. it's more like playing a game with flying submarines... and no water... and very little light. You're going to need more detection options than visible light. you go up, down, left, right, forward, backward, and more, considering there are literally infinite directions to go while in space. Formations will be complex should you choose them to be. Players may flank by ignoring the solar disc and going above, below, or around them. Again, put thought into this if you want a 'good' RP. A good book to read for this subject is 'Ender's Game'... please don't watch the movie.

So, you have the planets and military fleets? We've still got more to go through. This first includes filling out the fleet declaration sheet and faction  info sheet if you haven't done so already. After this, you can go initiate an RP with anyone who wants to join you! We'll cover proposing story arcs later, for now we'll discuss individual RP's with other players. If on skype, ask via PM(Personal Messages) or creating a group chat with 2-5 people including yourself. If on DeviantART notes, this may be tricky to RP, so try making a chatroom, which is creatable via hovering over the logo in the top left of the site page. When initiating the RP, the host should write a paragraph(s) that introduces the setting and foreshadows the subject of the RP(Sometimes the purpose of the RP will be held for revealing until the end of the journal or a few RP's later, or even sometimes an arc it is a subsidiary of.). After this, players may begin their responses. RP usually occurs in 'turns', which are initiated by the host, and after his posts the other players reply once until the next turn begins, or until they have another's post to reply to. Posting rounds are usually marked by posts made by the host, yet can be marked by a host's post clearly stating something along the lines of 'Shall we move on?' 'We will move on from that point', or something similar.

An RP will usually continue like this until the RP is finished, with exceptions of the entrance/exit posts and some host's 'special' posts(EX: references to past events, foreshadowing, hints to the RP if it of a 'game' RP type, and so on). RP's will usually be moderated by an admin of the host's choice, Myric's assignment, or admin-approved non-admin Host's choice. These moderators exist to promote RP balance, enforce rules, and prevent major arguments that can potentially effect OOC relationships between players. as stated before, these RP's are to be held via PM or chat aside from main chat. players speaking OOC should use Parenthases, ' ( ), [ ], { } ', and OOC things should not be said via IC posts.
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Now, finally, how to RP. The following RP will be an OOC RP, but modeled after an ideal IC RP. You don't have to follow it 'by the book', and is actually encouraged that you create your own RP 'style':

(Start)

Hargun looked out the window, the Carnaith rep behind him "So you really think we can take all these factions lined up against us?" He asked gazing at the open expanse of space, his blue uniform pressed and immaculate, medals hanging from his chest.

"Only if we play it smart," Said Kate Varan. "It'll be tricky, but if we play it right we'll be able to isolate them and take them chunk-by-chunk. The trick is to not let them reinforce themselves... somehow..." She said pondering, and the plans on her armpad casting a glow over her worried face.

"That's going to be the problem, intelligence shows they are mostly working together, the AGA and the Confed may have to pull together on this one. I wont lie things are going to get bleak" He said stern faced as he watched some ships fly by the window.

"Anything the union's got up their sleeve, Hargun?" She said, a shuttle departing off of a nearby umbilical to return to it's parent ship. several small dots, appearing like suns, flashed in and out of existence in the middle of the darkness as a squadron of patrol vessels warped out on their next assignment.

Hargun turned to her and smiled "Oh we have plenty up our sleeves, we just need the right moment to use them. Do not worry the Union will be at the forefront this time. Its time we brought peace to this galaxy, by any means necessary"

(Alright, keep going tomorrow?)

(End)

As you can see, player's grammar will not always be exactly the same as eachother's, while still being comparable. This is another way to identify two player's posts. Now what's good about this RP? Well, take for example, no-one said anything about anyone elses' faction in the non-dialogue text. They also didn't manipulate the other's post responsibilities. As you can see, there was also no OOC text related to arguments, which isn't a requirement but is -always- a plus.

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So, now for the space combat area of RPing. This is the form of RP many new plyers are likely to think of immediately when they see the group page and description. Space combat can be done in a nigh-infinite number of ways, from Star Wars-esque, to ultrarealistic and ultrapunishing. There are so many forms of doing this that this will likely take a few posts before the next sub-topic. First off, have some links from Atomic Rockets. This site is meant to be realistic and logically correct, and you don't need to know the many mathematical equations used by it to get the general gist. Remember; you don't need to follow this site to the letter, only of you want it to be realistic.
www.projectrho.com/public_html…
www.projectrho.com/public_html…
www.projectrho.com/public_html…
And, a link from Myric's own page. I have read this, and it' been linked on this chat already, and it is a very good example of learning material on the subject.
emperormyric.deviantart.com/ar… Mind you, it's a PDF.
Now, the most common form of space combat done is generally for fun, with some disregard for actual logic but is still grounded in it. Remember, Magic is allowed in this group, but it should be minded that magic and technology shall be balanced, not with magic blatantly flaunted. Aaron is a major user of magic, and talking to him and an admin combined should help you with balancing any magic you decide to field. Space combat is done with some sort of number of ships being fielded against each-other. This can range from measly escort craft to mighty super-dreadnaughts, the latter may be fielded as a superweapon under permission by Myric. Ships are almost never micro'd, or moved individually, unless it is in a group of up to about twenty ships. anything larger is generally thought of as a standard-sized battle. Instead, ships are 'moved' by the player saying something along the lines of; "...as the counter-attack ensued, a detachment of fifty ships moved upwards in relation to the solar disk, planning to move 'above' the hostile forces, as the other two hundred staged an assault on the hostiles' primary defensive positions...". This would be an example of a portion of a space combat post. The largest forces seen in action as of yet are those of the mass assaults on Immortal Empire territory during the 1AW, where some thousands of ships were deployed amongst the belligerents. These ships were deployed by long-member players who had amassed somewhere between 3k and the maximum 4k ships under their wing. The battles were vicious, the Tenebraen and IE fleets using unique jumping between dimensions to repair and re-arm ships in split seconds. The standard, as well as the way of, RP has changed since then, now done in jointly posted journals amongst players, and done in 'parts' of the conflict. We will take a short break before the next post.

Continuing from where we left off, we will speak about how posts are, and were, done. In the 1AW they were predominantly done by the individual belligerent posting a self-written journal with little collaboration with the other player. This led to some hairy arguments as you may imagine, and the war is -technically- still going on, though posts on it have been stagnant for months. A few months ago, we began to start using jointly written journals in the group, usually done by Skype chat. This is the form of RP that you all know, and it is pretty much a compressed form of the journal-to-journal RP's that were done during the 1AW. These journal RP's took up much time and effort, and actually led to quite a bit of art block, as well as dragging on a single maneuver on for a twenty minute period of reading. Now, a battle can be done in a single journal post, where a single post by a player taking the place of a much longer journal post. In the example of the 1AW, it led to many OOC relationships turning sour from people refusing to edit journals and foul play and the like, but now moderators can keep tabs on an RP and prevent hard feelings. Now, you should know how to RP decently by now, but juuust for a refresher course, we will be holding another OOC RP in the next post. Take thirty, people.

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EDIT: An OOC space battle was never completed, instead a couple of members were kind enough to allow us to use theirs as an example.
docs.google.com/document/d/1Ez…
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So, we will start in on ground combat RP's. Instead of like a space combat RP, the ground combat RP has a 2-D platform of play, with the exception of things such as caves and mountains and the like. The units on the ground also differ from those in space. From types of units like Infantry, Tanks, Aircraft of hover/heli and fixed-wing flavors, jeeps and trucks, and more. And then there's the sub-units, being light, medium, heavy, command tanks, AT, AA, Sniper, Rifleman, Grenadier and more infantry, and so on and so forth. And then there's the fact that many nations use their infantry to control their vehicles. This allows you to write in scenes of individual soldiers, allowing extra layers of emotion and character development to take hold in the RP. From this, you can either make your ground combat include the extra flavor-building details, or make it shorter than the space battle and avoid the attempt to write in your conflict. Your decision.

Now, on to the next part of Ground and surface combat. Often, people like to spam one type of unit. If you're willing to play an RTS game that actually complies to a lot of real-life logic, try looking at 'Wargame: Red Dragon'. If you like it enough, buy it! It's just enough to be fun and not go simulator on you. Aside from that and back to the point, there's a lot of realism to make an excellent ground war RP, and sure you can go all Elysium and COD:AW, but it's more fun if you go more like Avatar's RDA or Killzone's ISA and Helghast factions. In other words, many people prefer it if you keep your factions somewhat grounded in reality... which means, no mach 10 basic gunships, no uber-infantry for your standard... and please no explosive AK-47's. You can use the fun sci-fi stuff, but many like to make it part of a special forces group or a separate species of an empire, and again, it is -preffered-, not at all the group standard.

On the next point of ground warfare, there's the fact that sometimes there will be urban combat. Or moving to another continent. These are interesting situations. You want to pick up and redeploy your troops or attack amphibiously? Do you want a lot of infantry or firebombing? it's up to you, but you have to remember some things. If you go with an amphibious assault, remember Tanks shouldn't be available for at least one turn. If attacking a city, tanks are an absolutely stupid idea and a waste of deployment... Infantry generally win against tanks in an urban environment, especially when entrenched in a building. Tanks are also bad ideas in swamps and extremely mountainous terrain. But, they are amazing when deplyed in wide-open areas like a plain or desert where infantry stand zero chance of survival against an enemy force. Other units however are required to allow Tanks to survive, such as AAA or SAMs. The reason i focus on Tanks here is because of the 'tanks are useless/invincible' argument that sometimes erupts around the internet.

On the final part of ground war focus, we will focus on Infantry, and a bit of combined arms. Infantry are the winners of every real-life war yet... not the tank, not the invention of the assault rifle, and definitely not the hand grenade. All of those are manned by infantry, and all of them need infantry to go in afterwards to make sure the listed item even worked. This is probably why Infantry have the most extensive arsenal of weapons throughout history at their disposal... from swords and crossbows to modern firearms, ranging from pistols, assault rifles, semi-auto rifles, battle rifles, DMR's, sniper rifles, LMG's, GPMG/MMG's, SMG's, ATGM's, rocket launchers, flamethrowers and more to use, infantry and their equivalent are the true stars of war. Think of chess and the unit known as the pawn... the knight, rook, king and others wouldn't stand a chance if they didn't have fodder or basic soldiers. But, they also need the tank and plane... otherwise all wars would be exactly as WWI was. The tank to keep the front mobile. The aircraft to keep artillery from ruling the battlespace. Trucks, APC's, and Jeeps to let the infantry keep up. AA to keep Air units from doing as they do to artillery and tanks. It's not just a circular chain, but more like a net, like the food chain... helos aren't only good against tanks, and SPAAG/AAA isn't their only counter. Same to tanks against other tanks and infantry in the open. Spam doesn't win, people.

Now, one final section before we turn around and finish the space section... Magic being used in RP's. Now, I don't care if you're against Magic full stop. There are several factions that use magic, a couple of them being focused around it. For the most part, we haven't had any problems related to magic yet people constantly target it for being 'godmoddy', which is untrue unless you have a troll and/or noob trying to make himself look cool or pull a win out of you-know-where. Now, the key with using magic, if you choose to do so, is to do it with moderation. That's a general announcement, because even Tech needs a bit of moderation... you can't spam millions and millions of fireballs just like you can't spam millions and millions of nuclear missiles. I think that we've yet to have a major showcase RP with a good magic-focused and a good tech-focused player, and therefore we have no way to base possible future RP's such as that. Instead, I'd like to say that there's nothing wrong with magic, but rather possibly bad players. It's probably a safe bet to say that the first magic-tech battle will be heavily moderated because of mass pre-assumption, though I'd only disagree if it was Aaron here as the magic player, who is literally the most magic-focused RPer in Ancerious, and is a very good RPer in general. Now, since I don't have anything planned lesson-wise for tonight, just take a few.

Next up on magic, It is preferred you keep your use of it limited(Example: Me), or have a limited/temporary use of it. It is an utmost priority to balance your IC assets in any form, magic and other less-used devices included. Now, balancing anything is extremely easy... you can brag and brag about the occurrence of the weapon/abilities firing all you want, as long as you don't write the other's faction in -any- way. But with magic-only/focused nations, this can get a bit trickier. Mind you this next sentence is mostly theory as we don't have any previously done RP's to base off of, but you may want to limit your use of larger, more powerful spells, or give them a 1-2 round charge time. Should you decide to make the spell a bit more powerful in exchange for the charge time, only do so marginally. But then again you can have weaker and standard spells, which can operate just like normal weapons, or with a twist. Example: Fire/Fira magic CIWS would be similar to plasma, while a heavy Lightning gun would be able to form/manipulate the casting after fired. If you have suggestions, please post them... "Magic is stupid" or "Magic shouldn't be used" don't count. Though i do say, if Aaron(:iconlordnagaetross:)posts on this, you should pay heed to what he says. Take a few, guys.

In some circumstances, magic cannot be influenced by tech and vice versa

Magic is its own force, mostly separate from the natural laws of the universe unless interacting with those that are affected.

Magic can be considered a sentient force all on its own, and follows its own rules most of the time.

However, this can backfire.

In many cases, magic can be manipulated by loop-holes or special coincidences which will alter a spell's original purpose.

You have to be incredibly specific with most magics which in and of itself is limiting. anything unspecified could be used against it.

It is not invulnerable. but you're going to need more than "science says so"

You'll find magic can at times be more logical or technical than actual science.

Part of why i oppose it being OP. it does a fine job of evening itself out