Experiences How have you changed as a roleplayer?

[BackSet]

like the title says. How have you changed from when you first started Roleplaying? Have you gotten better at writing? Have you increased your paragraph count? Have you acquired new tastes? Have you tried out a bunch of different character types?

 

[rae2nerdy]

Well technical improvement ( character design, writing style , etc. ) where never really hallmarks of how I judged myself as a roleplayer. I pretty much did what was expected of me in terms of making characters for roleplays or matching whatever the GM asked of me in terms of length.

The biggest change I think I've seen is in attitude towards roleplaying. I started it out as a fun way to essentially play with made up characters in either fandom universes or universe I made up. That was my favorite part from the start and it still is now.

But you spend enough time in roleplay forums and you'll inevitably run into the kind of people that convince you that roleplay is some kind of competition. Where the people who write the most/best and put the most work into things are the winners and everyone else should just not bother to breathe the same cyber air.

And for a long time I was the same way. I like to think I was at least polite about it but in all honesty I was kind of a witch.

But I learned from that experience that at the end of the day this is meant to be an enjoyable experience. If you are so focused on meeting some arbitrary set of standards put forth by other people than it becomes less enjoyable than it's not worth it. I started to not only dislike the people I was around but the whole roleplay experience.

So I took a break, got some perspective, and came back with a much more up-beat attitude.

I like to think that I have kept that initial joy of playing in made up worlds and just added a bit of experience with navigating different people and writing styles.

So best of both worlds I guess.

 

[Corrosion]

When I first started roleplaying back in early 2014, I was really, really terrible. As in, I wrote several lines max, made shitty characters, and (god no) controlled other peoples' characters. Yeah, the last part still embarrasses me to this day.

But I've been doing this for more than three years now, and I think it's safe to say that both my writing and roleplaying skills have improved significantly. Before, I could only write up to around six hundred words max, but now, a thousand and more easily.

I suppose I can say that roleplaying for me went from being just a novelty interest to being an actual dedicated hobby and a way I can express my creativity and ideas with other people.

This site also allowed me to make a giant meme album, so there's that.

 

[BackSet]

This site also allowed me to make a giant meme album, so there's that.

This is the most important thing. Everything else is commentary.

 

[IMadeYouReadThis]

OH BOY WHERE DO I START! I started RolePlaying without even knowing what RolePlaying was and was just doing these actions through text with terrible writing. All, and I mean all of my characters were just self-inserts of me. I played only in the first person _{(Which is something I absolutely hate now.)}, my posts were a paragraph at most and was littered with incorrect grammar and punctuation.

Fast forward a year-ish and everything improves just a bit. School has drilled proper grammar and punctuation into me, my post lengths now exceeded a paragraph, my post perspective was now a weird mix of first and third person that I constantly switched between. _{(Even mid-post.)} My characters were no longer me, but were now all basically the same generic semi-edgelord type.

Go present day and I have improved a ton. My grammar has improved significantly, if I were to really try I could make a post be a small essay long, I play strictly in third person. The most important improvement I feel is that I learned how to make DIFFERENT CHARACTERS. Some of them may not be entirely original but I can actually say they are DIFFERENT.

Kinda nice to look back and see how much I've actually grown! _{(Minus the really cringe parts I try not to remember.)}

 

[Necessity4Fun]

Well, for starters vocabulary improvement. Writing in your own language is already difficult, but here I am writing in English. I went from very simple phrase constructions to more elaborate ones and I also learned a lot of new words! Sometimes I will overuse a new word I like even XD

The narration that was a bit confusing and I would say... blocky? Nowadays seems to flow a lot more naturally and I dwelt more into my own narration style, which often includes character monologue into it. I'm not afraid to explore metaphors and go more symbolic here and there, which I probably wouldn't even dream of doing a couple years back.

I tried exploring different concepts, whereas in the start I would stick to what I knew best... Mostly cat girls. I have a lot of catgirls ^^'
It started as simple as trying out a male character for the first time and then expanded beyond to making a character with my most hated stereotype (a very veeery girly teenager) to an over the top possessive-obsessive psycho. (I picked everything from my box of crazy and made a character out of it!!! Fun!!)
But yeah, I got out of my zone of comfort and challenged me to do new and exciting things! I enjoyed it all throughly >w<

I could go on and on and in with all the new things I explored, but I think the main points are really: vocabulary improvent, writing construction improvent, new character concepts explored, I have more confidence to try said new things and the level of dedication and effort put also changed as I got more and more into RPing.

I went from this shy and very insecure writer to a more expressive, deep and sliiightly perfectionist one ^^'

My writing prior RPN is just cringy to me now : P
Past me did some stupid stuff XD

 

[BackSet]

Everybodies embarrassed by their past self. I'm embarrassed by my past self. And ipmy future self is probably embarrassed by my present self.

 

[prussian]

i've definitely improved over the years since i first started roleplaying lmao.

at the beginning it was just like crappy one liners or even just a little thing of dialogue and i really can't imagine roleplaying like that now. i'm way more detailed and write multiple paragraphs now and i feel like it leaves me more satisfied. i can't stand one liners now. and i've gotten into character development more, and i've discovered new types of plots and roleplays that i like to do.

i honestly feel like i've made huge improvements since like, 2014 and i'm pretty proud of myself tbh.

 

[Lorsh]

more erp

 

[BackSet]

more erp

*slow clap*

 

[iFreedawg]

I have broadened my character spectrum a little bit. Before I only played mysterious nomads and horizon-gazing travelers, but now I play some easy going chap's as well.
I've slowly tried to figure out what's important when writing with another person and have started trying to think of everything in a story as tools or circumstance.
So before when I establish a sunset in a meadow scene, I'd just write some pretty lines about fluttering butterflies, billowing grass and singing birds - because that felt good in my heart. But now I might write about bees and thistles instead, because if it's bees the characters could follow them back to their homes and raid their honey. And the thistles might hurt the character, forcing a change in the circumstance which could lead to something interesting.
Now that I look back, I'm not sure if I've grown or just grown jaded huh...
Anyway, I also try to set up more choices.

 

[crumbelivable]

I'll let this speak for itself

"Enid awoke, trapped under a few rocks. It was dark, and she couldn't see much"
-Posted October 29, 2014

"Aric still had his face deep in the logs when he heard a few loud sounds from just outside the control room. He figured it was just ground maintenance crews doing some routine inspection and maintenance. But after a while, the noises stopped, and Aric spied what appeared to be a small girl staring at him. She questioned him why he was sitting in her boss's chair. A sadness came over Aric. The former captain of the Fundy had been transferred to the Carnwennan while the Fundy had undergone maintenance. He had died in the catastrophic pirate attack along with the then-current LDE and many others. It would be hard for him to tell the bad news to her. Just then, a Pyrusian, likely a new recruit, arrived in the control room, apparently waiting to talk. "Uh.." Aric said, turning his attention back to the small technician "Something happened to your old boss..." he began to explain, but was cut off by what a rather advanced android or cyborg, another new recruit, entering and explaining to the girl, Stormbreak, the logs said, that he had replaced her old boss, before leaving just a quickly as she had appeared. "Yeah..." Aric said, confirming what the android had said. "I'm your new boss. Name's Aric. I'm sure you've seen me around." He reached out to shake hands with stormbreak, while the Pyrusian remained hardly moving, on one spot."
- Posted August 10th, 2017

 

[BackSet]

How I've changed as a rolepalyer:

I've gone from one lineing wierdo who used *s to indicate actions and didn't write them out like a normal person and who's characters were blatant self inserts to multi-paragraph (when I can) badass who loves to come up with great stories and personalities for all his characters. (Ironically my favorite characters started out as self inserts before they evolved into something better).

Granted, you've gotta cut me some slack for how I started out since I started out on a minecraft server. The place was kind of a craphole now that I think about it.

 

[Necessity4Fun]

Granted, you've gotta cut me some slack for how I started out since I started out on a minecraft server. The place was kind of a craphole now that I think about it.

Well, you've got to start from somewhere, right?
If anything, you should be thankful of your craphole for opening up such a cool and fun new world up for you~ The fantastic world of roleplaying!!

 

[BackSet]

Well, you've got to start from somewhere, right?
If anything, you should be thankful of your craphole for opening up such a cool and fun new world up for you~ The fantastic world of roleplaying!!

You've got a point. And I am sort of thankful. There were so,enfun people on there in between the crappiness.

 

[Best Trekkie.]

For me not much has changed except for my obsession with MLP meets Steampunk war.

 

[Best Trekkie.]

Necessity4Fun
Speaking of which do you want to partake in a private RP such as the one previously mentioned?

 

[Best Trekkie.]

Here is a sample:
Contact with Cloudsdale was lost almost right after the sounds were heard. With a loud deafening screech two massive shiny all steel airships decloaked in front of the two immortal alicorns' eyes. Then the order was heard, "This is the Eternal Imperial Airforce!! Surrender or be blasted to ruins just like your pitiful sky city!!" *The strange square objects which happen to be varying sized turrets begin to traverse towards the castle and lock on. Doors on the Broadsides of both the airships open up to reveal cruise missiles in the form of torpedoes* Twilight sends a magical bolt towards the airships bow expecting for it to cause severe damage. However the magical bolt impacts a form of shield which stops the bolt and disappears from vision once more. *The two main turrets traverse towards Twilight and open fire. The shockwave lifts Twilight from the ground and knocks her across the courtyard and through the castle wall*
The voice is heard again, "FIRE!" it shouts and all twenty turrets unleash hellfire onto the castle itself. Celestia and Luna do their best to halt the incoming fire but lose to the constant onslaught of high explosive.

 

[Lappi]

When I started I was a one liner machine, but I generally had good ethics (no auto hit, don't be a Gary Sue). Now I just write what ever the RP calls for and adjust my efforts to those around me.
I can type one paragraph just as easily as 15 modern day. Of course I am not a detailed roleplayers by blood. I had to learn detail. As normally I type 1-4 paragraphs in response.

more erp

I need to find a good place for that.

My first RP was a Steampunk Rp with 4 other close friends. It was all one liners but I turned my self insert into his own character. Even if I don't use him anymore.
How did he die you may ask over this year long RP?
A final stand against well over 10,000 combat steel robots, his preferred method of death? Drinking whisky so strong it actually killed him before being impaled did.
Ahh memories.

 

[ceolsige]

What a great question!

I started role playing as a kid, so at first I had some edgelord characters who were just horrible amalgamations of whatever I thought was cool at the time.

When I “improved,” my posts were laden with purple prose. Like, it was ridiculous. The bright side is, I learned a lot of words writing like that. I feel sorry for anyone who had to read those posts, though. Euuuck.

Nowadays I like to think my posts are much more palatable, though I’ve heard from some the comparative simplicity and conversational style of my writing (not the dialogue itself) isn’t their cup of tea.

 

[ceolsige]

Well, for starters vocabulary improvement. Writing in your own language is already difficult, but here I am writing in English. I went from very simple phrase constructions to more elaborate ones and I also learned a lot of new words! Sometimes I will overuse a new word I like even XD.

I have to say, I am incredibly impressed by role players who write in English as a second language. So many native speakers are terrible at it, and yet here are people writing beautifully in this language who are also fluent in another language. Ya’ll are amazing!

 

[yanastyboi]

Short and sweet answer . . . I am not longer a shit!!!

 

[ewolf20]

To be honest, my road as a roleplayer was more about devolving than improving. I've haven't rped in years and just spend my days lurking in the bbcode center.

I just blame it on my disability as it stops me from writing anything longer than 5 sentences which explains why I avoid advanced roleplays a lot.

I tired doing some interest checks but it doesn't garner traffic and the last thread I do on here has barely gotta any replies but a bump. I mostly blame this on either the wall of text or my horrendous grammar. No one noticed and just looks at another thread.

Sorry if this sounds very cynical but is it giving an example. I'm also apologise if this comes off as a whole please give me your attention post as well. Maybe, even some weird woe is me thing.

 

[Autodidact]

This is so embarrassing, but...

I started out when I was a hardcore weeaboo at age 10-11. It was all kawaii neko-vampire-witch-mage-goddess-human-werewolf-oompa-loompa hybrids left and right and everyone played girls, but if SOMEONE came in with a male character, the thirst got real.

Now, more than ten years later, I write dimensional characters and rather decent plots, and have published two books (third one's coming), so starting early had its ups, even with the shameful memories I'll have to live with :^))

 

[Strawberry Ink]

I couldn't even spell the word "laugh" when I first started. I like to think I've improved greatly since then.