General Discussion and Pitch Zone

[techmaster-glitch]

(I waited until after the december holidays to post this, as everyone was pretty much gone during that time, but now should be filing back in.)

   So, I was skimming through the archived RPs for this board, and it occurred to me that a thread about CMF RPs in general would be useful. So, here we are.

   This is a general-discussion thread about RPs on the CMF, meaning that it is not specific to any one RP, though specific RPs can be discussed. This is basically the "talk-about" corner, pick an RP related topic and bring it up. The main purpose for this thread is to hopefully attract some new players, or inject some extra activity in general for this board, or just provide a place for players and GMs in different RPs to come together and hang out.

   Ask or talk about character and player types and styles, and tips for good writing. Ask or talk about various GM styles and strategies for dealing with in-game situations. Ask or talk about RP genres and themes, and what seems to work best around here. Ask or talk about relationships between currently-active RPs and players. Just talk about anything RP-related.

   There's another use for this thread, and since I'm think it will probably be the most useful and used, I made a specific note in the thread title. Got a basic idea for an RP that you haven't fully fleshed out, and you want to see if there's any interest first? Pitch it here for discussion. People can express interest or offer tips on how to make it interesting. Alternatively, if you are a would-be player instead of a would-be GM, bring up some RP themes or ideas you would be interested in joining, and if anyone else has the same interests and is willing to run such an RP.


I'll also have a handy little index to keep track of of notable topics right here, just in case there are actually any topics important enough to warrant it (and if the thread gets off the ground).
Topic Index

[SquirrelWizard]

Prefered Accuracy of a Post.

Okay, I'm not a major military buff. My medical knowledge begins and ends with a first aid kit. My understanding of Quantum Physics is nonexistant. But in many cases my character might have more knowledge about the subject than I do. Now, I understand that I can do some research into the field to make my post more "accurate" but when people start bantering about specific weapons, or exceptionally technical stuff, I find myself out of place (unless it deals with customer service and the depths of human idiocy). I was wondering what people prefered accuracy wise with post?

[techmaster-glitch]

Ah, that's an interesting question, and a good one to inagurate this thread

  I can't exactly speak for any other players or GMs around here, but for me at least, I just go with "do the best you can", and approximate as close as you know (or think you do ) The whole point of roleplaying is that your character often knows and can do things that you'd never be able to do, so it'd be expected that you wouldn't be able to bring real experience to the table. However, as with the aformentioned technical specifications of weapons, while it is possible to be quite familiar with such things, many (or I, at least) wouldn't consider such things common knowledge except for the people who actually study such fields. In all the time I've spent roleplaying on this forum, I've never seen anyone truly disadvantaged for lack of knowledge on a non-household subject that their character is supposed to know, nor anyone given any specific advantage for knowing their stuff along with their character.
  To be quite honest, for me, it's all just aesthetic detail. For example, I knew precious little about how computers worked half a year ago. After finishing a full college course on introductory computers, I know far more about exactly how computers work, and why they work. I've actually been trying to incorporate this knowledge as detail into some posts for my Traxen character, who is a slightly-futuristic roboticist and techno-savant in The City RP. Does this actually enable my character to do anything new that wasn't originally in his character profile listing his abilities? Not really. But in some cases, I can explain better how he is able to do some implausible feats of techno-manipulation. As said, it's all just detail. Power to you if you can pack more of it into your posts.

Of course, there's always the possiblity you could end up with this kind of situation...

[techmaster-glitch]

(apologies for the double post, but it seems I need to take a more proactive role in keeping this thread afloat, or at least give it a nudge towards being useful)

So, during the winter holidays, understandably, all RPs have slowed down. However, coming out of the holidays, a few seem to be having trouble picking up momentum again. So, in the interest of getting everyone on the same page, this is an after-holidays RP Roll Call!

So, whether you're player or GM, let everyone in this board know your status! If you are active, or in active and planning to come back to -any- RP, drop a line here. State all the RPs you are in/going to continue, and if possible, your own estimated posting activity in the near future.

And alternately, another use for this thread; In multiple RPs, and going to go on a temporary hiatus? Instead of posting the same message in all the RPs, just drop one message here!

[Corgatha Taldorthar]

Active, in two Rps, both of which seem to have sputtered to a halt. Quite irritating.

And why not, I'll post up a question/comment.
I've got a world built. It was originally made for a long prepared Dragonquest (old tabletop RPG) campaign, which never materialized due to family relocating. It's quite complete, I've got demographics, geography, cultures, weather patterns, religions, politics, the works.

I've tried to get it started up here, twice, neither attempt succeeding. Now, I was a stripling noob then, but I'm wondering why they didn't take off. Partly, it was a self-contained world, and in the original sales pitch, it wasn't in a DMFA friendly cosmology. No Cubi or Demons or Angels or whatnot. Partly it might have been the maybe intimidating amount of detail. *shrugs*

So it's a question of, what hooks you guys here, and secondly, anyone interested in the sort of world I've got?

[techmaster-glitch]

   Once again, I really can't speak for anyone else (and anyone else who saw corgatha's original RPs but never showed interest really need to respond now), but for the first one at least, yeah, there was quite a bit of detail. A personal suggestion from me would be, if you have that much information, to start an OOC thread with only the information necessary for players to get started, including a few hints to the plot and what the characters are going to be actually doing (this is very important, to hook a player, you have to let them know something about the central conflict that is going to motivate and drive their character through the RP), and put all the worldbuilding info in another thread, maybe in the Tower of Art. The second time around... it looked like you did have some interest, but yeah, it didn't seem like enough.

   But that's just how I saw it, and that's certainly nothing to go by. So you, yeah you reading this thread, and who also saw Corg's RPs, stop by and say something.

   And the after-holiday roll call is still going on, so come on! State your status, what's going on!