An Instructional Guide To Role-Play

[Sycophant]

This is going to be a thread where I chronicle events and instances I've come across on role-playing sites by parodying them in a post of my own. My style of humour is very on-the-nose, we'll say.


I tagged this "humor" because all of this will be funny to at least one person. Extra points if you get a kick out of it too.


Fair warning: if you generally don't like or understand sarcasm/satire, often feel personally attacked by generalizations made by internet strangers, often feel the need to defend against judgment, or think that long posts are pretentious rants, then don't continue reading this. If you later read my entries and recognize that one of these things is something that you do yourself, well, I hope you've learned to laugh at yourself. I know I have.


Otherwise, feel free to comment:

Spoiler

"I Am God": How To Establish Your Power As Game Master


Part 1: Rules


Out Of Character: The Typical Manner Of Forum Decorum


Part 1: Maturity


Part 2: Friends


Creationist Theory: A Criterion For Conscious Character Creation


Part 1: Name

 

[Sycophant]

"I Am God"

How To Establish Your Power As Game Master

Part 1: Rules

​

It's very often that we find ourselves in the position of making our own group role-play. It's pretty treacherous territory since you're opening up your plot to be unwittingly exploited by children who are just seeking a good time shoehorning in their self-insert Mary Sue as a participant. As Game Master, or GM for short, your job is try and get past the character application process by defending your role-play from people who technically follow your sign-up sheet properly, but whose characters you know are just so bad that once your RP is finally completed (your RP is so good; you know it won't die this time), you'll have to edit out their character from the RP's novella re-write that you plan to publish as your own on Wattpad.


So, how do you scare away these people whom you know they know that their characters are just bad and are deliberately trying to troll you by bothering to sign up? How do you tell them that you really, really take your gritty, realistic, post-apocalyptic sci-fi role-play very seriously? Well, you make a set of Rules for your role-play, is how!


Step One: Go Fuck Yourself


The first step to ensuring that you only get mature people into your role-play is by setting a tone in your Rules. Just completely mask each guideline of any objectivity with your personal malodorous musk, something people often confuse on a literary level for "voice". The best way to do this is to abandon all tact and the basic idea of being a welcoming human being by asserting yourself. The more you impose, the better!


This is easily accomplished by stating a Rule or Guideline, followed by your unnecessary personal input that you confuse for clarification:

VII.

Use proper grammar.

This roleplay is for literate people only, that means that I




have to be able to read your posts and actually understand them too. It's "you're" not "ur",




it's "and" not "n" and don't use smilies or "lol" or anything like that because it's amateurish




and completely unnecessary. I'll accept if you have a few typos in your posts, but if it starts




to bother me or other people then you have to edit them. Too many people don't proof-read




their posts and it's a real pet peeve of mine, so do it if you don't want to get kicked later for




breaking this rule too many times. Do not argue with me or you will be kicked.



Another tip is to make sure you tell them every chance you get that you can "kick" them from your role-play, because some people do have short attention spans despite being on a role-play forum, refusing to read every word of your rules, so drill it into their thick skulls that you can and will take away the privilege to participate in your very realistic role-play if they fuck it up for themselves. Bonus if you mention more than once that no one argue with your own rules. All of this leads to the next step:


Step Two: Blatantly Shun Amateurs


You've effectively frightened away timid players who still exhibit social anxiety online! It's time to crack down on the ones who still think they have a shot at completely staining the integrity of your role-play with their crappy characters. Some people can't take a hint, so you have to be very direct about your preference of characters. Basically, as a GM, you have to know what a Mary Sue is. A Mary Sue is a character that you don't like because you personally feel like it isn't realistic enough for your superior standards and all your many years of role-play experience. Those people need to learn to stop making bad characters and role-playing with them, because it's annoying, and it's annoying to the only person here who matters: you.

3. Be Realistic. I know this is a role-play and it's not real, but it's

based

on the real world.




I don't want and Mary Sues, Gary Lues, special snowflakes etc because they're unrealistic




and they could never happen in the real world. So basically, I don't want a character whose




family is dead and they were raised by a pack of wolves and they learned how to be an




expert assassin from an inu demon. That doesn't even make sense.







Make sure your example of a Mary Sue doesn't even make sense. The point is that people understand that when these kinds of people read this, they will know that you are talking specifically about them and how they make their characters, and they will stay away because they know their special snowflake has equal levels of uniqueness as what you just described in your rule. Bonus points if you decide that instead of just ignoring or politely declining someone who signs up with a character you don't like, that you generously decide to give them advice on how to improve their character. Be sure to berate them under the guise of critique and taunt them with the possibility of letting them join your role-play if they clean up their mess of a high school magical girl in your magical high school role-play.


Step Three: Get Anal


Now that you've showed those pussies what the fuck is up, time to continue imposing your no-shit persona with direct threats against the person behind the character. Everybody knows that in the world of role-play, there are people who are just dicks. They are just some mean, shitty assholes. Make sure you call those people out for who they are at the very start. It makes a lot of sense because most assholes know they're assholes, so when you call their dumb ass out on an internet forum, they know they've been found out before they've even had a chance to troll. This is how you effectively ward off assholes:

4) Don't be an asshole. If you're an asshole, nobody likes you, and that includes me.




So if enough people tell me they don't like you, then you're kicked. No second chances.



Be sure to add a little extra snark as well. Bonus points if you don't distinguish whether or not their characters are allowed to be assholes, but that you just don't like assholes, period. It's always best to get them before they get you. If you happen to segment from this basic form to include obvious things that are already probably not allowed on the site on which you're hosting your role-play, then you've already included the next step!


Step Four: Redundant Reminders Of Civility


You can't always be tough as nails. You have to show your compassionate side as well: one for justice! There are too many injustices in the world, and you have to make sure that these things do not occur in the safe haven that is your role-play. This is a good way to redeem yourself if you feel like during the course of writing your rules and not intending on proof-reading before posting them, that you may have exerted your no-shit persona a little too hard. Just be sure to tell everyone what you expressly do not want:

WHAT I HAVE ZERO TOLERANCE FOR:




- racism, sexism, or homophobia.




It isn't cool. If you're a bigot, go spread your hate somewhere else.







You really showed those ignorant bigots by telling them not to join your role-play and that their defiant, learned behavior and fearful lack of understanding isn't winning them any cool brownie points. Bonus if you undermine the authority you project to own by mentioning that if anyone breaks these likely-already-listed-intolerable-behavior-in-the-site-rules-and-terms-of-service rules, that you'll get a forum moderator to discipline them.


Quick Tips:


Some children are still dumb. You can't fix dumb, but you can act like you've tried. Here are a few Quick Tips for making rules as a GM:

• Take your time to thoroughly explain useless details because you have little faith in your own role-play community's ability to comprehend. Be sure to make extra rules that explain different aspects of the same idea, like your expectation of posting activity.
  

• Caps Lock is a great way to show that you mean business online. Giving the impression that you're shouting at people earns you respect from your peers. It LITERALLY ALWAYS works!
  

• Try to bolster your role-play's uniqueness and feign the impression of diversity by making restrictive rules that force people to make "creative" characters, such as dictating what kind of names they should use for their human character when it has no significance in your own plot's universe, or demanding that people who make more than one character in no way share the same species and history.
  

• Stress that your role-play is "literate" and imply that your manner of writing is the standard, even though your writing needs a lot of work on not being incoherent jargon that's puffed with fluff and doesn't get to the point in any way that's considered a fluid, enjoyable read by anyone else except you.
  

• Finally, always remember: You deserve the people you allow in your role-play. After all, they've made it past character sign-ups at this point. Everything from that point onward should have been expected.
  

 

[Sycophant]

Out Of Character


The Typical Manner of Forum Decorum

Part 1: Maturity

​

It's a struggle being mature on a role-play forum. You often interact with people who are novices--not just to creative and immersive writing, but also to social integrity in general. Why else do they come here and pretend to be someone they aren't? You have to face the facts at some point: outside of role-play, you're you. So when you come across other people Out Of Character, or OOC for short, their true selves shine and the facade of a genius cyborg scientist or an ice elemental elf is no more. Sometimes, you'll meet a new friend to very often remind to join the role-play you made three days ago that has 112 views but no posts. Other times, you'll clash against someone who is just, well, just plain mean. Everyone should know that being mean online means only one thing: you're immature.


How do you fight against immaturity? Well, if you learned anything from real life, directly pulling someone aside to privately and civilly inform them that you didn't appreciate their behavior only gets you bullied. Instead of risking the chance of making peace in private, be the bigger person and make a public announcement so that everyone else knows about it too.


Step One: Spotlight The Attack


The attacker said that your opinion had less value than theirs because they've been role-playing longer than you. That was a personal attack on your intelligence, but that's not the worst part. The worst part is, if that person was so bold as to attack you in public, they're probably shameless enough to go out and attack others as well, and likely with the same hurtful, genuinely baseless comments. Meanies know the difference between sharing a negative opinion and an attack, and so should you: an attack is a negative opinion that hurt your feelings. The remark is purely inflammatory, and as such, they are immature. The best thing you can do is to warn people about this person's behavior in a topical thread dedicated entirely to your experience.


Think of thought-provoking thread titles that you know will pique interest and will get the crux of your message across, like these:

Public Service Announcement: Immaturity




Respect




This comment really hurt me...




Why are people so rude?







These thread titles are all good examples. The first two present themselves objectively. The PSA one takes on an official tone as if you really did get over the attack and are trying to take on an authoritative role as the forum maturity police, and are your fellow peers' voice of reason who just didn't make the cut on the moderator team for some reason. The "Respect" one is a single word, gets straight to the point, yet leaves people wondering what about respect you're even talking about. The second two appeal purely to emotion. Stating that a vague comment hurt you makes people feel not only empathetic, but wondering what was this hurtful thing that was said to you. The last one is a rhetorical question, but as we all know, blanket accusations worded as questions incite people to respond because they think they're doing you a service replying so that you see a situation in a different light. That is, until they read your actual post.


Step Two: Disclaimer


Before you even mention what this insensitive person did to you, you need to direct others to do what you obviously did yourself before making this thread, and that is to block and report them. When you block someone, you are essentially ignoring them by wiping their existence off of the forum through a string of code as an extra measure of protecting yourself from accidentally reading a post from someone who wasn't nice to you a couple times before. When you report them, you are sending a form to a moderating team so they can see what it was in their post that hurt your feelings and will undoubtedly hurt others. Make sure when you report to use strong words such as "flaming", "negative", "rude", "hurtful" and of course, "immature".


Please be sure to tell other people that when they come across someone who is immature, that they should block and report, like so:

If you ever come across someone who says something that's very rude, instead




of trying to reason with them, please

please

PLEASE don't engage them. Block




them and tell a mod

immediately.



Bonus points if you didn't follow your own directions and actually did not stop engaging your attacker as you may later describe in the next part of your PSA:


Step Three: Describe The Gory Details


This is the important part. It's time to set an example of maturity by describing how the other person didn't. Be sure to do your best to be as partial to yourself as you can, because you are the victim here, and you did nothing wrong in your actions by merely talking to someone whose history of posts prior could have maybe been some kind of indicator to you that engaging them would end up with you getting the same, predictable treatment. Now's your time to really stick it to them by making them feel just what you felt: public shame. It's important to show that you respect other people's boundaries by leaving out names, but don't skip out on any circumstantial details, otherwise we won't know exactly who you're talking about from the "Why are there BOY Lopunnys..?!" topic in the Pokemon General Discussion sub-forum:

It's actually upsets me how some people act towards others. I was in a




discussion thread earlier about the gender ratio of a Pokemon, and the OP




responded back to me, insulting my opinion that I preferred one gender over




the other because it clearly had the appearance of a girl instead of a boy. I




wasn't allowed to have an opinion apparently, because the OP in that thread




was being mean to anyone who would have dared to have an open discussion




on sexism.




Really, what I want to talk about here today is this: Immaturity. If you're going




to be on these forums, you should understand that there are other users who




have different opinions than you, and you should respect them, NOT call them




dumb or belittle them with jokes because they decided to take your thread




seriously.



The tone of your post should have fragrant undertones of moral outrage at best, and a mother's disappointment at least. If you don't come off to your peers as someone who has felt an unnecessary injustice and who just wants to make a passing comment to remind the rest of us not to take on the same behavior, then you'll only come off as passive-aggressive and whiny. Both of those things are equally immature.


Step Four: Bask In Your Pity


Your enlightening thread has finally attracted a post, despite being the most viewed thread on the board for your personal notoriety as someone who doesn't take bullying sitting down, and for your incredulous recount of a minor event! It seems to be a response by someone who is either 1) your friend, 2) another user who was lurking or participated in the thread whose name you did not mention, or 3) both. Their response is something that either corroborates what you said with hints to details that happened in that thread, or is just blind support for a fellow victim of textual abuse. While you're free to to make a thread that's only made for awareness sake and ignore the following posts, it's actually kind of rude not to respond to every post in your thread in your defense. This is a model of how the following conversation should go:

Evil_Nurse_Joy_003 said:




Yeah, I saw that thread and it was just an overall toxic place :-(




FreedomxFrighter said:




And I just realized: you also shouldn't have a thread that supports sexism




against body image in the first place, honestly.




Evil_Nurse_Joy_003 said:




At least it's over with. Sorry you felt attacked in there.




FreedomxFrighter said:




Thank you! At least I know there are some people on these forums who don't




have a bad attitude and parade it around like they're better than everyone! \o/







Please remember that extolling everyone who agrees with you in your respect thread by obsequiously complimenting their behavior is definitely not a manipulative tactic of passive-aggression toward the target user you hope is reading your thread, at the expense of being disingenuous to the people you're using as vehicles. It's just you telling the truth!


Quick Tips:


There's a steep cliff between the moral high ground and the plebs in the furrows. You should always watch what you say before you end up looking like a pot to the kettles! Here are a few Quick Tips on how not to compromise your maturity:

• Keep calm during a shit storm. Your actions may invoke the people in question to go on the attack after you calmly mentioned the incident. If you don't have them blocked, make sure you tell them that you don't know what they're talking about, that your thread was just about a general instance and they can't prove that it was about them, and also that you will not be responding to them any more before you block them. If you do have them blocked, thank your friend for making you aware of the incendiary comments directed at you by someone whose comments you've made a point not to know, unblock them, and then do the steps above.
  

• Never use your attacker's words against them. If someone is being immature to you, you shouldn't stoop to their level. Instead, you can give them a taste of their own medicine with a more mature level of put-downs. Calling them immature, rude, and mean is a good start, but use words like hypocritical and contradictory so that you point out not only their state of being, but also their instabilities and habitual behaviors, too.
  

• Finally, always remember: If a moderator posts, you've made an impact. It doesn't matter what astoundingly untrue assumptions that moderator also said about your own maturity, or if they repeat to you the proper reporting process as if they didn't read the numerous reports you made of every post in the perpetrating thread after you realized that you couldn't reason against a bully. All that matters is that it got the attention of a higher-up. If it means that they also see that another user is causing problems because you brought it up, maybe that person will finally get infractions against their account for just being plain rude. Even though your thread is now closed, remember that you brought attention to the issue, and you should feel good that someone paid attention to your public crying about it.
  

 

[Sycophant]

Creationist Theory

A Criterion For Conscious Character Creation

Part 1: Name

​

Creating a character for a role-play is no joke for some people. Some players will spend copious amounts of time detailing every aspect of their character so as to reflect the true essence of their creation, to the point of personal satisfaction--or at the very least, to quell their tragic desire to obtain perfection. Those people have a lot of time on their hands, which is kind of sad when you think about it. Thankfully for the rest of us who don't waste away on daydreaming pretend people, there are some things on a character sheet for which you can afford to cut corners. One of these such things is, of course, your character's name.


What's in a name? First and foremost, a name clearly distinguishes a person, place, or thing from other persons, places, or things. So long as it does that, its purpose has been fulfilled. That, though, is as basic as naming a character gets. Giving a character a name should be a reflective process that tells something about your character, whether by the literal definition of the name, by invoking an image and associated feelings or symbolism, by the language/nationality of the name--whether real or in a universe's established lore--or by the texture of the name, meaning how it phonetically sounds and sometimes feels when you pronounce it. All of these things are very crucial to choosing a fresh name for your character. Let's put it into perspective: your own mother took her time to name you. It's only fair that you take the same care and dedication for your future brain baby.


Traditional Names


The plot of the role-play takes place in modern times on Earth. Your character is just a regular, unassuming high-school student in a working-class nuclear family of four. They dress casually in neutral tones and their hair and eye colors are natural. Everything about your character is to be expected from someone so... plain. It would only make sense then to give him a name like Chris, or to give her a name like Anne. These names are traditional: boring, typical, unimaginative, bland names for the average everyman. A first name constitutes as traditional if 1) you knew at least three people in school who had the same name, 2) it's the name of a middle-aged or senior citizen adult you know, or 3) you read it in a history book. As a rule of thumb, all real-world surnames are traditional, due to the grandfather clause. People don't just make up last names, you know--there are birth certificates and family trees to that say otherwise.


Here are a quick list of first and surnames you can use for a common character who doesn't want any kind of attention whatsoever just by the looks of their name:

First Name	Surname
Thomas (nn. Tom, Tommy)	Smith
Benjamin (nn. Ben, Benny)	Johnson
Catherine (nn. Cat, Cathy)	Lee
Abayomi (nn. Aba, Yomi)	Duodo
Susan (nn. Sue)	Esposito
Guilherme (nn. Guil, Hermes)	Lévesque
Nghia (nn. N)	Cojocari
Yevpraksiya (nn. Yev, Ksi)	Schneider

​

Symbolic Names


Let's take a look at symbolism. Symbolism is make-believing that one thing represents a deep, psychological character analysis of another thing. For example, let's say your unnamed character carries around a giant bastard sword. What is the symbolism of the sword to your character? Well, the sword is obviously representative of your character's father, the village's best samurai who died when the rival ninja clan took to the dead of night and ambushed the village, taking all the samurai hostage in their own homes, where your character who was only 14 years old at the time had woken up from smoke, and he went downstairs into the living room to see the Black Star Clan's strongest shinobi had tied his father up in spiky chains, and he saw that his mother who wasn't tied up and was being held by another male shinobi had a regretful look on her face, and then at that point he finally knew that she was the betrayer of the village, and then he watched as they cut his father's head off, and then they set the house on fire, and the Black Star Clan and his traitor mother fled, and your character only had time to salvage his dead and headless father's sword before he ran outside, just in time because the house exploded, but then it started to rain, and it put the fires out, but it left him feeling dead inside, and it was then that he vowed that he would avenge his father and the village by fighting the 7 Black Star Death Shinobi, and the strongest of them all--his own mother.


In that very good plot fit for a Tier-1 role-play, you would want to pick a name for your character that is symbolic of either his past, or forebodes the future, but not in a way that literally expresses his actions or intents. You want a name that is an actual name, but when you look it up on various baby name websites and Wiktionary, at least loosely associates with something or someone that already carries strong connotations of symbolism. If you still don't get it, try these on for size:

First Name	Surname
Usagi (traits: quick, cute)	Yagami (eight, god)
Eros (traits: loving, sexy)	Rosenberg (romantic)
Hannibal (traits: calculating, sexy)	Scrooge (greedy, stingy)
Sodom (traits: evil, sexy, gay)	Faust (evil, sexy, gay)
Richard (traits: jerk, prick)	Eastwood (rugged)
Blaze (traits: passionate, hot)	McCartney (legendary)
Abdoulaye (traits: liberal, foreign)	Poe (depressing)
Kenshiro (traits: beefy, juicy)	Christ (holy, chill)

​

Literal Names


This speaks for itself. Literal names just flat out tell you what this character's all about. It tells you their hobby, tells you their prestige, it physically describes them, and some just straight up tell you their plot importance. When it comes to surnames, being literal can even come in the form of adopting the last name of an important figure in an already established universe, like naming your character Mary Oak in a Pokemon story, or naming them K in a Death Note role-play. It is important to note that as is often the case, a literal name is often mistaken for being "literary" by the misinformed.


You thought you were being clever and different by looking up some words in a dictionary, and this is what you came up with:

First Name	Surname
Archer	Vanguard
Bella	Bedouin
Rebel	Devil
Gonzo	Kraut
Yukihime	Yamauchi
Guy	Armstrong
Phantasia	Eldritch
Skulduggery	Pleasant

​

Aesthetic Names


Sometimes, you don't much care to be too literal or too symbolic with your name choice, but more so if it looks and sounds appealing to you--not just if the name fits, but if the name has a certain flair to it, a grace, an elegance. You want your character to have a soft edge to their name, but a presence to be recognized. These names roll off the tongue and set a high, almost noble air around your character. It creates an aesthetic. An aesthetic is something that attempts to be beautiful by constantly describing itself as such. Aesthetic names are always given to naturally beautiful characters as just another accessory to their unearthly charm. If you don't give a beautiful character a beautiful name, it's extremely out of place, and fellow players will make fun of your character's bad name OOC and behind your back, making their characters troll yours.


Most people who make aesthetic names for their characters typically find that just having a first and surname don't quite cut it. You need at least one middle name in order to properly portray the aesthetic. In my examples, I will not use one middle name, but two:

First Name	First Middle	Second Middle	Surname
Amaranth	Eleanor	Rosaline	Merriweather
Sebastian	Ashleigh	Josselin	Petticrew
Bellamy	Cymbeline	Carbrey	Valentine
Zephyr	Willoughby	Orpheus	Wikstrom
Lupine	Cypress	Amadeus	Wolcott
Algernon	Augustus	Lucien	Alucard
Dimitri	Iosif	Khrushchev	Loginov
Absinthe	Melody	Priscilla	Montague

​

Gibberish Names


Sometimes, you have a character in mind whose entire portrayal cannot be encompassed by existing words or names. Is your character too cool to be called Swift, Hero, or Chad? Is your character too cute to be named Ichigo, Mimi, or Penelope? Is your character too different to be named Aaron Chauncey? Your only solution would be to come up with a gibberish name. Gibberish names are just a big mess of letters that you claim to be foreign and unique. These names often come in handy when you want your character to come off as otherworldly, estranged from a distant land, or just totally different because they are special and uber awesome.


Gibberish is pretty easy to do on your own. You can fumble and mumble around out loud until something sticks, you can smash your hand on the keyboard and then fit in consonants and vowels where you think it would sound good, or you can tweak or combine existing words or names and be surprised by your own ingenuity. Here are some names I just made up on the spot:

First Name	Surname
Qaoaro	Blufelk
Peperi	Darleft
Gyrwrey	Snep
Avtirln	Zeckorn
Valgr	Cindslate
Whove	Kioshlum
Koervel	Liodaef
Higgersby	Orvelkauchster

​

The Exception


So now we've learned the four basic categories of names, you may be asking yourself about something very crucial to your character making process: what about your name? Self-insert characters are characters who are basically you, but better. There are two types of self-insert names: the one that is your real-life name, and the one that is your username on a role-playing forum. Your actual name most likely falls under the Traditional or Symbolic category, although if your family is upper-middle class or higher, you may have inherited the more charming and noble Aesthetic names. Your username may either be your attempt to be Aesthetic, pretends to be Symbolic, or is likely a mesh of alphanumeric Gibberish with something Literal, if not just a flat-out declaration of self.


Self-inserts are the exception to the naming guide because self-inserts are very clearly all about you and your flimsy whim, and therefore, using either your real or username for your own character is completely above all manner of critique, suggestion--or, quite frankly, relevance. So yes, you can name your seventeen-year-old rogue assassin vampire half-breed Molly Fletcher, and no one is allowed to judge you if your mutant high school maths teacher character is named Xenith_Zero, minus the underscore.

 

[Sycophant]

Out Of Character


The Typical Manner of Forum Decorum

Part 2: Friends

​

No man is an island. People admit that friends are the fuel that keep them going throughout their day. Don't let those woe-is-me Debbie Downers tell you otherwise, either: even misery loves company! How many friends do you take the time to invite for a lunch date, routinely meet-up at the gym for a workout, or casually talk to at school or work? How many friends do you consider to be close friends? If you happen to be that one unfortunate person who has no real friends, there's a quick and easy solution for you: Internet forums are places where you can easily connect with others who are also searching for surrogate friends, harvesting friend requests and "Like" counts as these sites attempt to be like social media, and pretending to be seriously engaged in each others' business by opting to receive real-time notifications of their every post!


If that sounds like the perfect blend of "I need a readily-accessible visual reminder that I posses friends" and "I have a difficult time discerning social cues in person and require a remote alternative" sentiment, then you're in luck! Internet forums accommodate for those such specifications. Now, the only thing standing in the way of you making a new friend is your own anxiety! Quit lurking around and ease into the action of a role-play forum! Trust that having friends make the role-play experience that much more tolerable.


Step One: Introduce Yourself


These forums always have a place for you to come and exchange first impressions. It's your time to tell your new peers everything you choose to make them believe about you, since they otherwise have no way of knowing who you really are behind the screen. Not by themselves, anyway.


If you choose to take the formal route of getting acquainted with the forum instead of sneaking into discussion threads as if you're some kind of savvy somebody, create an introductory thread in the allotted sub-forum. You likely haven't yet read the site's Terms of Service, general Site Rules, or the rules of the introductory sub-forum in which you're posting now. That's definitely okay--a helpful user will be sure to post these links in response to your thread, just like they already did in all the other threads in that sub-forum, every single one, one after the other, waiting to be the first to welcome in a new member the second they wander into the den.


Come up with a thread title that greets users in a way that shows off your personality, like some of these examples:

hi




Hello




Heya :3




bored




what do i do here




So I found this place from [ competitor website ]




♕ || вσω ∂σωη, ғσя үσυя qυεεη нαs αяяιvε∂




(づ｡◕‿‿◕｡)づ come haz free hugs !




WWW . B R E A S T E N H A N C E R S (DOT) CO.HK




Yeah I guess this place looks good... Smells good...




I'm nothing special.







While these titles all express a different aspect of the poster, they all have on thing in common: they're fun!


Now that we've created an interesting title, it's time to make your post. It's always important to remember that in making your introduction, you want to be welcoming if you plan on making any friends. Here's a good way to view your situation: think of the forum as a group foster care facility. You've been wrenched away by Child Protective Services from a horrible family situation and now you have to settle for this temporary arrangement before you are inevitably ejected and forced to move on to worse, more pressing real-world matters, like school or a part-time job in retail. It's your duty to make a good impression with the people who share the hostel with you. At this point in time, you are a guest in their shack of a home, so watch your tone before the other kids make it a point to steal your porridge and beat you into your place.


Most introductions include a little something about yourself that you're willing to share, and a wish to make some new friends during your tenure. Here's a model of an exemplary introduction:

Hello! My name is WrightfeltExodeus, but I just go by Ethan. I am




17 and a daydreamer. This is my first time on a roleplay site but I have




4 years experience writing my own slash fics and playing Debasement




of Defenders (18+).




My other hobbies are BBCode (I just started) and anime.




I don't really get the navigation here. It's really confusing.




I am looking for new friends since my old ones decided to stop talking




to me out of the blue. I am very loyal and I will listen to anyone who




feels lonely. I'm LGBT+ positive. I'm up for anything and I make a great




friend!



What an inviting post! We were reminded of his username despite the fact that he posted this on his account; we learned his preferred name, his age, that he enjoys playing a text-based adult flash game, and that he is open to sexual minorities. If that wasn't welcoming enough, he mentioned that he was searching for friends and that he is both "loyal" and "up for anything". This is how you open up the possibility of being a prospective friend, and as people post to warmly welcome you into this new space, you have the option to hover over their usernames and click on a certain action in the resulting drop-down menu:


Step Two: Follow Every User


"Follow". What does this feature do? Following is a euphemistic term for aggressive cyber-stalking. With the advent of social media, tracking everything anyone dares to post in public has never been easier! Forum websites now adopt these measures because it's the trendy thing to do, and who can blame them with such successes as Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr? Everyone wants to stay connected, even if it means that you don't know who's stalking your little digital trail of footprints. If you feel like that's some manner of unnerving that you can't control who can actively track your comments, then maybe you shouldn't exist on the internet where everyone can see what you're saying on a public forum if they searched hard enough, and go crawl back under your rock. You can't make friends if you don't sacrifice a little bit of self-assurance that you can't control every aspect of non-interaction that still somehow directly involves you. Why, without that trade-off, you by the same coin couldn't scrutinize every aspect of a list of users who could potentially become your friend--if you ever decided to talk to them after reading everything they do!


Following every single person you could possibly interact with makes you aware of not only what they're into, but also shows you some cool topics and sub-forums that you probably would never have checked out yourself, or have even known existed. Waking up every morning to 50+ notifications of other people actually doing things makes you feel like a busy person with a lot intrude upon. You may as well be friends already with how much you can learn from people in one week's time! Your news feed could be filled with snippets like this:

SPAMvonDAMN commented on a profile





Whatever happened to telling people you were going to quit their rps?




myself 2 blame posted in the thread "

[solved] Table BBCode and Script Error

"




"

The editor is wrong. I've done everything right. Here is photo evidence:

"




Yuki posted a status





My friggin mother is kicking me off the computer for tonight. WHATEVER




God_Save_The_Bean posted in the thread "

This isn't goodbye... not yet.

"




"

I won't be responding for a while, guys. The doctor found a small lump...

"




SexyDemonboy posted in the thread "

This isn't goodbye... not yet.

"




"

I am locking this thread as it has turned into a heated debate over religion...

"







With a stream of active alerts like this, you're bound to make a new friend soon!


Step Three: Post Weepy Status Updates


No one has made it a point to interact with you after a week of milling around, voting in poll and survey topics and creating threads asking if people are also into your very niche interests of coiling clay pots that you can't properly fire because you don't own a kiln and watching full-episode English fan dubs of Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko. It's disheartening, really.


This is where utilizing such things as status updates and the forum shoutbox comes in handy. A shoutbox is a public instant messager accessible to all members who are free to flood each other with messages as they all simultaneously attempt to get a word in, edgewise. If the role-play forum you're on thinks it's hip and offers a huge feed for status alerts, that is equally as useful. Using either or both platforms, openly express your disappointment and personal concern of your current friendless state. Let this status display inspire you:

WrightfeltExodeus posted a status





Idk what I'm doing wrong. I haven't made a friend yet on this site




and I'm starting to think that I'm actually not that interesting. Doesn't




anyone here like anime?







Using these public venues as often as you can, you can fish for the attention of people who often make it a point to publicly address those who are just having a rotten day. Be sure to interact with the ones who don't tell you to get over yourself and stop attention-seeking. Those people are trolls.


This is a sure way to make a new friend out of the entire experience:

dokidokigoku > WrightfeltExodeus





Hey man, don't feel bad! I love anime! Do you like DBZ?




WrightfeltExodeus > dokidokigoku





DBZ is overrated. I like Hanasakeru Seishounen.




dokidokigoku > WrightfeltExodeus





oh







Step Four: Advertise


If you've yet to earn a friend by this point, it seems that you have to take matters into your own hands with a little bit of activism. As you begin to creep your way into general sub-forums, start posting in forum games and discussion topics with subtle hints to your current friend count of zero, and how you so desire to make a few friends in agreeing with someone else's post, or how if you had any friends, what you think they would have had to say about the subject as well.


Backtrack to former avenues as well, such as statuses, profile comments, and shoutboxes. Instead of pitifully complaining and hoping somebody hears, go in and and sell yourself as a potential candidate for a new friend, or list one or two crucial aspects that you're looking for in a friend of your own. Review this example of a stalwart attempt at advertising:

[5:21:12] Yuki: I'd have drawn my OC if I didn't suck butt with my tablet




[5:21:14] webkin: That's not how I remember the order of operations?




[5:21:19] WrightfeltExodeus: Hello, I'm Ethan.




[5:21:20] sassrahla: (2+10-6/2)^2 equals 81, how hard is that to understand?




[5:21:34] _dogge_: LOL you're fuking bad at math dude, read a fukin book




[5:21:36] Yuki: Plus my brother spilled Gatorade on it last week so its a spaz




[5:21:38] QUEANIE: yea i am very bad at art too just look at my shop its ugly




[5:21:52] webkin: You're wrong, it's PEMDAS, so that's not even right, Sass.




[5:21:53] WrightfeltExodeus: I'm looking for an anime friend.




[5:21:56] webkin: The answer is 1, not 81. Did you learn this in school yet?




[5:22:13] Yuki: I saw your shop, but yeah, your art is pretty bad...




[5:22:14] _dogge_: sassrahla, the answer is 1 smh dumb idiot learn2math




[5:22:16] QUEANIE: yuki can you teach me how to draw better with mouse?




[5:22:22] sassrahla: anime friend wtf







Remember, at this point in time, you can even go so far as to make a casual thread asking for some friends. If that piece of advice sounds familiar to you, don't worry: this is totally different from your introductory thread. For one thing, you've stripped your post of all fluff and now it's just straight up business. You're not here to be namby-pamby about your name or your little hobbies. No way:

WrightfeltExodeus created a new thread "

Urgent: Looking For New Friends

"




"

I've been on here for two weeks and no one has accepted my friend requests.

"



Quick Tips:


The internet is full of social outcasts. Everyone here is always looking for a friend, just as long as you fit in with the cool crowd! Here are a few Quick Tips on how reel in friends of your own:

• Post links to social media. Everyone likes over-sharing these days and connecting via popular online platforms. If you have a Tumblr, Instagram, Grindr, or YouTube account, shamelessly plug the links into your introductory post right off the bat, as people will get a much more honest sense of you as a person if you do so.
  
• If you don't want people figuring you out, pretend to be better than you are. Be whatever you think people often find to be cool and funny! You can't possibly miss the mark, because there's someone out there who thinks your act is just the model example of a totally awesome person. If you decide to tell flat out lies instead of little fibs and half-truths, be sure you keep a word processor on your device open so you can write and keep track of all the things you uttered.
  
• Say you like anime. Even if you don't, just say it. Everyone likes anime. You want friends don't you? All anime looks the same anyway, it's not even hard to fake it.
  
• If you're a girl, pretend to be super cute. Habitual use of smilies, cat and cupcake pictures, and fancy generated text attracts the average internet male. You may find that the attention you so crave may later end up being uncomfortably smothering by these males who attempt to care a little too much about how you are feeling today and why you didn't respond to their private message from two hours before, but it's either that or not having any internet friends at all. ♥(ˆ⌣ˆԅ)
  
• Be good at art. Everyone wants to befriend someone who has talent! Show off your digital art gallery of paintings, sculptures, or character costumes, and link to your DeviantArt and/or Etsy pages if you can. You won't just earn friends, but admirers as well! But beware: if you're actually pretty good at 2D art, you may attract a special kind of admirer who constantly requests that artists like you immortalize their original characters through your style of creative medium. If they aren't offering to pay you real money for a commission, and if you still want to stay publicly endearing to all, you cannot outright refuse them. That would be rude and unfriendly. Just pretend you're swamped with art requests and hope they go away after a week. (Please Note: Photography isn't art.)
  
• But most importantly: participate in role-plays. You're in a role-play forum, after all. The best way to make connections and acquaintances is to actually involve yourself in the subject of the forum you're on. You'd be surprised how many people will gravitate toward you if you just stop yourself from worrying about pretenses and freely be your creative, agreeable self.