Welcome to the Blue Onyx Roleplaying Campaign!
Role playing is key to character development and often character actions will be tailored to what a player does. Posting style is simple, allowing for quick response time - multiple postings most days required. This document covers basic terminology and writing examples as well as tips for playing in our game.
Instructions for creating a character are in the 'Orientation Package' but there is a lot more to consider when creating a character for this game. We're more focused on character background and personality than stats - though the stats and skills are important and should the character concept.
Tim, the Keeper, will work with anyone wanting help with the process. Not being a numbers oriented person, I've always created a detailed background, and a 'concept' and let Tim work up the numbers for me. That option is open to other players as well.
So what is a character concept?
Basically, a quick way to summarize your character. The character might be inspired by someone in a book, movie or a TV series or a blend of several other characters. It might be based on someone in your life (but be careful with this!) or someone you just envision as being interesting that is totally unique.
My concept for this game was inspired by my life in NYC when I was younger, influenced a bit by my love of archeology, a bit of Temperance Brennen (of both TV and book fame), along with a bit of old fashioned comedic Goldie Hawn... more or less.
Jessica is a New Yorker by attitude and 'breeding', but absent minded at times when consumed by her work, totally hopeless in the kitchen, good natured if socially inept, etc. She's something of a workaholic who doesn't quite get modern culture. yeah, pretty basic, but I want to leave myself some room to make adjustments once the game starts. Often I'll get inspired by someone else's character enough to want to do a 'counter-point' and so leaving it in general terms allows me to do that.
Another thing to consider is a character's habits - both good and bad. These often get them into trouble later in the game as the GM will pick up on these things and play on them.
Jessica's habits? Too much dependence on Take-out, overdue books, a compulsion for being tidy and organized... being somewhat stubborn and argumentative in her professional work, sucker for helping out kids.
So once you have a 'vision' of the person you'll be playing, it almost always helps to find a picture to represent them. If you have an actor or actress in mind - great! Let me know so I can update the staff directory. I also dabble in photoshop so I can eventually make a 'group' picture of the characters... :)
So, you've gotten your character all set. Picked a hunky male or pretty woman to represent her in the game. Now what?
Tradionally the GM will send out a post describing where your characters are and what they should be doing. Then it's fairly open - ie., characters are free to chat with each other, initiate some action, etc.
Posts are written (usually) in the present tense, 3rd person -
Jack goes to set up the projecter, and curses when he realizes the slides he'd packed so carefully are gone. He turns to the others, "I don't suppose... ?"
OCC: Actually, I can't remember what Jack did with them... after that fight at the pub he wasn't really paying attention.
BIC:
Jack grins when Jenna holds up the missing box.
Which brings me to a quick list of abbreviations we use in this game:
IC: In Character
OCC/OOC: Out of Character Comment
BIC: Back In Character (usually after some OCC statement)
BTW: By the way
OMG: Oh My God!
GMTA: Great Minds Think Alike
LMAO: Laughing My Ass Off
ROTFLMAO: Rolling On The Floor Laughing My Ass Off
NPC: Non player character - ie., some flunky created by either
GM/Keeper or even a player for the sole purpose of adding to the story.
PC: Real characters... or we hope so! By this we mean a main character
created for the purpose of this game.
The format of this gaming environment is such that all players have OCC information about a great number of things - the trick is always to separate that from IC knowledge your character has. This can be difficult sometimes, but adds to the challenge I think. Be sure your character can reasonably know some bit of information before using it IC. Yes, maybe there was a post where Joe learns that Mary is to be assassinated - but my character has no way to have that information and so can not use it. At least not until such time my character can weasel that information out some way... which is the tricky part. This goes for names and locations and the like as well.
The following is not something I've ever had an issue with in previous games - but I'll mention it anyway as we have some newcomers to our game --
Never assume someone will react in a certain way just because you think
they should. Always give others the chance to react in their own way,
and don’t get upset if the reaction isn’t what you expected.
Any action you perform on someone else’s character, no matter what the
action might be, should be phrased as an attempt. By making an attempt
instead of just doing it outright, you give the character’s player the
chance to consent to the action or avoid it if it’s something they’d
rather not have happen to their character.
For example - assume that Joe and Frank are PC characters.
Joe CAN'T write the following (unless he's spoken privately with Frank's
player to agree to the outcome):
Joe swings at Frank with a wicked upper cut that sends him sprawling to
the floor.
What should be written:
Joe takes a swing at Frank, hoping to send him to next Tuesday...
The GM will then roll up the result and reveal what happens.
The same goes for 'writing for other characters' - something I've seen
ad nauseum in Trek games. Never actually saw an instance of it in
normal gaming. (Yes, I'm not overly fond of Trek games and gamers for the most part.)
About the only other thing I can think of is the importance of our
SUBJECT lines in the game. Tim will generally have the location, time
and some title and that may or may not include who specifically the post
is for:
[BlueOnyx]NYC Public Library - Sensing Evil 15:00 (Jesse)
BODY of the message will always include the following which should
remain in place - when we go hot and heavy on posting, it's a helpful
guide to know WHO is there with other characters:
Present:
PC: Jesse, John, Michael
NPC: Three men in black suits with bulging holsters barely concealed
Some description of the current scene and situation usually ending in:
Actons?
-----
The last thing is that we expect this to be a fast paced game -
therefore no one needs to rewrite things from their character's point of
view as in some other kinds of games out there. Simply hit reply to the
message and add a few lines from your character.
We do encourage posts where the player writes out what the character is
feeling or experiencing in response to things, thought processes and the
like. But we're not looking for novels, we don't expect a minimum of X
paragraphs per post or anything like that. WE DO EXPECT quick responses
throughout the day if possible or a catch up in the evening to keep
things moving.
Here is an example of a typical exchange:
Subject: [BlueOnyx] Hot on the trail, streets of NYC 17:30 (Nick)
Present:
PC: Nick
NPC: Joe, bartender, other patrons of the Quayside Bar
The man you've been following enters the Quayside Bar and takes a seat
at the bar. He looks a bit edgy or nervous and orders a beer. His
eyes keep darting around the room though it doesn't seem he's really
taking note of anyone.
Possible reply:
Re: Subject: [BlueOnyx] Hot on the trail, streets of NYC 17:30 (GM)
> Present:
> PC: Nick
> NPC: Joe, bartender, other patrons of the Quayside Bar
> The man you've been following enters the Quayside Bar and takes a seat
> at the bar. He looks a bit edgy or nervous and orders a beer. His
> eyes keep darting around the room though it doesn't seem he's really
> taking note of anyone.
Nick ponders his options and decides that it can't hurt to approach
the guy. He steps up and takes a seat next to Joe, nodding for the
waiter to give him a beer as well.
"I'm new to the area... where is all the excitement around here?" he
says to Joe.
OCC: If this guy seems very flaky or hostile, Nick will back off on active questioning. He'll keep talking and offer to buy a drink.
***
GM might reply in one of three ways depending on the importance to the
overall game, time constraints, other nefarious plot issues.
Sometimes the method of reply is a clue, or what the NPC says is a
clue, how he acts. Or sometimes it's just meant to make the players
paranoid. *grin*
Keeping the same subject and 'present' lines he'll add:
1. Joe stares at Nick, his eyes blinking as if seeing him for the
first time. He scowls and shifts on his seat, ignoring Nick's question.
2. "Huh? Excitement?" Joe shakes his head, "Dullest city in the
world if you ask me." He gets up and leaves, the door swinging sullenly behind him.
3. Joe turns out to be rather gregarious and during the ensuing
conversation you learn that he lives in a new apartment building on
63rd street.
------
What this does is two-fold - gets into the story and characters - but
also offers options. In option one, the way is left open for further
conversation if you decide to pursue it.
Option 2 offers the same element... but is it worth Nick following
this guy... maybe heading right into some dark alley...
Option 3 gives the information and offers no other clues... :)
So yes, there's likely to be more exchanges involved but we rarely try
to waste anyone's time in fruitless quests for information.
Several closing comments - the example is very elementary and doesn't cover the situations that will come up - a dozen posts arriving in quick sucession, creating some confusion as to what people are doing. Over long conversations that couldn't possibly happen in the time allowed - which we don't mind. Yes, there's half an hour of conversation in a space of time that shoudl have been 5 minutes... frankly, we enjoy the conversation between characters more than actual realism at times.
But usually we've worked all those issues out quite easily in the past. Once in a great while, we have to tweak something but generally do focus on realism (except for good conversation :).
We do ask for a heads-up if you'll be gone for a while - no explanation necessary, but just let us know you can't post so that the GM can put your PC in NPC mode - which means Tim will run that PC temporaritly and try to keep him or her alive until you return. :) No heroics, no going down dark alleys and such. *grin*
As always, you can direct questions and concerns either to me (Joy) or to the Keeper (Tim). We're all mature adults here so I don't imagine any real issues cropping up.