How to play play by post roleplaying

1. Create a solid character. This is the make-or-break of your role playing experiences; a good character will inspire your partners to interact and want to know more about them; a bad character will make it hard to stay focused and motivated. In short, make a character they’ll care about! Avoid perfect characters–you know, the invincible, anatomically perfect, immune-to-contempt, know-everything characters that make it absolutely impossible to wring a good story from or even like. Imperfections and inner conflict in a character are key to any role play.

2. Pay close attention to your partners’ writing and respond in kind. There is nothing more distressing than putting a healthy few paragraphs or even sentences into scene, dialogue, or description, only to have your partner(s) completely disregard everything you said and write something different. For example, if Partner A’s character trips and falls, Partner B’s character should offer to help them up, or at least notice. Character interaction is essential to the anatomy of role play.

3. Give your partners something to play off of! The quantity of a role play post is never quite so important as the quality. One can write paragraph after paragraph and yet never say anything significant that will motivate others to respond and propel the story. That aside, writing up a lot of fluff can be difficult in mediums such as chat rooms, where there is usually a text limit. Sometimes, less means more. However, just remember that it never matters just how much you write, it’s WHAT you write.