How to Create Great Posts
Some of you may be wondering, "Oh, who is this girl that is trying to teach us how to create posts? Who does she think she is?" I think I am the person to help you create posts, because, if you're reading this, you are a newbie who wants to learn how to post. Or, you are the mod (at this time, RHCP) who is wondering if you should sticky this insane guide. Or, better yet, you just want to read this because you are bored. Yeah, the latter should just leave now. Unless you are me in the future since I
know I will read this over again when I am bored. Well, I am rambling on; I think I should use the strikethrough. This guide will touch on a bit of grammar (although there is another guide that goes into grammar as well), length, ideas…just anything that really has to do with posting. Be prepared for long winded rants. If you just want the facts, skip through the strikethrough. Warning you now, it will be very long winded since I ramble. A lot. Okay, here it goes…
Grammar and Spelling
Grammar and spelling are two things that go hand in hand to make your posts look great. If you don't have grammar and spelling, then most likely you will not be accepted by any GMs and you should really take English at elementary school and pass it. Seriously. We all understand typos, everyone has typos, but if it seems that every other word is misspelled or something along those lines, Houston, we have a problem. If you do get trapped on the spelling and your internet doesn't have spell check (my laptop doesn't), then write your posts on Microsoft Word or anything like that. It is not going to kill you people.
Dialogue, Dialogue, Dialogue. As I read through the RP section, I see a lot of mistakes. Sometimes, when I read dialogue, I see something like this:
"I need to leave." said Timmy.
No. That is a no-no kiddies. Never do that. Unless it is at the end of a sentence and you are not sticking "said…" or anything along those lines, it is a
comma. The correct way to say the italicized is:
"I need to leave," said Timmy.
However, if you want to put some emphasize in that sentence, an exclamation mark will do some good.
"I need to leave!" said Timmy.
However, there is still a slight mistake in that. If he is exclaiming something, than he is not
saying something. "Said" is used more as a calm tone of speaking. This would probably be better if you are using an exclamation mark:
"
I need to leave!" yelled Timmy.
Or something along those lines. This concludes the grammar and spelling…
No, wait, not yet. I need to put something in here first.
Text Talk is a
no-no. There is no 'u' or 'r' or anything else of the sort. Some of us don't text (myself including) and it just looks very messy and it seems that you didn't work hard on the post at all. And there isn't any text talk on OOC threads either. If I see any text talk…I'll let that hang and you can use your imagination.
That concludes grammar and spelling. For realz (
ß Hypocritical~!)
Conversations
It is really annoying when you realize the person that your character is talking to hasn't posted in like fifty days and will probably never come back on. If that happens, say that the person didn't answer you and just bail out.
Also, if it turns into one of these;
RPer 1: "Hello, how are you?' asked Timmy.
RPer 2: "Good, how about you?" replied Jimmy.
RPer 1: "Bad, actually," stated Timmy. "I've been having a bad day."
RPer 2: Jimmy winced sympathetically. "Really? How come?"
By RPer 1 and 2 and then the colon, I mean that is their posts. If it starts to go like that, then please, either had some substance on, or create a joint post. More on joint posts will be later. This will be more on substance.
Now, what you can do is to show what Timmy is thinking, or what the emotions on his face are. Try to shoot for the length that is given to you in the rules. If you can go above that, go above it. This would be a better post.
Timmy nervously shuffled his feet back and forth, bouncing lightly on the balls of his feet. He wasn't that good at conversation; in fact he felt quite awkward just being talked to. He tried to avoid human confrontation as much as possible, although it seemed that his luck ran out. He smiled hesitantly at Jimmy.
"Hello, how are you?" asked Timmy.
What if he was sounding too polite? Is his awkwardness shown on his face or voice? Timmy had to conclude that his nervousness was probably shown more on his actions. Was his smile on his face too awkward? Will Jimmy just ignore him and continue on? He hated human interactions. He, nervously, waited for Jimmy's reply.
See, the above has substance, although it is pretty bad substance (I just randomly came up with it on the spot; hopefully your substance would be better). How is your character acting as they talk? Are they confident, nervous like poor Timmy, casual, happy, mad, sad, were they crying recently, or what are their actions? What are they thinking? If your posts become too short during conversations, then these could be some things that one could say.
One-liners/two-liners only make mods mad (alliteration!…ish). And ex-mods. Either way, just don't make one-liners/two-liners; you'd be breaking the rules and if you do it long enough…bye bye~!
Joint Posts
I mentioned something about Joint Posts earlier, but RHCP recommended that I go into more detail about Joint Posts.
Joint posts are posts in which case two or more people come together to work on one single post. These can be used for journey RPs when people are traveling in a group. It could work in other situations.
An example of a joint post will be one that myself and Athena's Phoenix created together. Now, this will only be the flashback due to the fact that that is the only part of the post that we worked together on.
She and her best friend were playing together by the forest near the Pokemon Tower. Suddenly her friend, Miharu, had pulled her behind a cluster of trees, and Yuumei looked up to see that both of their parents had come out of the Pokemon Tower.
"This is our chance!" Miharu had whispered. "We both know that they have been keeping something from us. Now is our chance to figure out what it is."
"O-okay," Yuumei said, a bit uncomfortable about eavesdropping. Both seven-year-olds crouched down closer against the tree, and Yuumei peered out from behind it beside Miharu. Miharu's mother spoke:
"All right," she said, pushing a strand of black hair behind her ear, "I think that we've taken every measure to protect the tower from Team Rocket. Is there anything that we've missed?"
There was a low chuckle from someone in the group, but Yuumei couldn't see who it was. Miharu, who had a better view, however, quirked an eyebrow in response.
"Masanori, what is it?"
"Oh, nothing if great importance....It is just that you have indeed overlooked something. I would have thought is obvious...But of course you idealistic fools who oppose Team Rocket could not see what was right before you."
"What is it? Why, Masanori?"
"I am a member of your most hated enemy; Team Rocket. And you never even suspected." With that, there was a moment of silence before a gunshot shattered the cool evening air.
Miharu had paled dramatically and started to shake, and Yuumei tried to look over her shoulder. She gasped as she took in the scene. Red. Red blood stained the grass a disgusting crimson.
Miharu's mother was lying on the ground, with one hand clamped over her stomach. As they watched, the hand went slack and fell to the ground. Blood was sluggishly gathering under her already cooling body, pooling around it. Her facial expression was caught in between shock and sadness.
Miharu had started shaking, and the look in her eyes was indescribable. Whether it was great anger or sadness Yuumei did not know.
"You deceiving bastard!" yelled Yuumei's father before charging at Masanori.
Another gunshot pierced the cool night air, quickly fallowed by a second. One of the girls gasped, and Yuumei didn't even know if it was herself or her friend.
The grass in front of the Pokemon Tower was stained an ugly, dark, crimson, a mockery of the sunset above them. Yuumei stared, eyes widening in shock as tears began to roll down her cheeks. For a moment, she felt detached, but then it hit her all at once. Dead. Gone. All alone.
Yuumei whirled, and ran into the trees away from the town, so overcome with emotion that she didn't see Miharu running herself; except in the opposite direction.
Joint posts are pretty much the both of you sharing ideas, creating a post, and deciding what you want to happen during the posts. How the joint posts are going to work is the choice between the both (or more) of you, but this is generally how I do things:
I usually PM the person, type up a basic idea, have the other person add onto the things and edit, then I do the same thing, until we both get it where we want it to be. There may be times where we would have to compromise though, but we didn't have to fight. If there is something that you agree on but the other person disagrees on, talk about each of the reasons why and see if the other can follow your logic, or the other way around. If you guys really can't compromise, just drop the whole thing entirely.
To be honest, this can be an extremely long process; especially if you or the other person cannot come every day, or something like that. However, it may be a bit better than just bunnying
or posting one-liners/two-liners of conversations…
Have I mentioned that mods (and ex-mods) hate one-liners/two-liners? I feel like I'm having déjà vu. Eh.
Well, at any rate, that is joint posts. If you have any more questions, please feel free to contact me, RHCP, or the current mod of the Roleplay Corner if that person is not RHCP.
