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The Great Roleplayer's Pawbook


by Talzhemir


Dear Friends,

      This list isn't a bunch of do's and don't's. It's meant to be, "Here's some things to be aware of." There's no universal rules for what makes good RP, but I've realized the people we like to roleplay with the most have a number of things in common.

Some of what I've learned might surprise you.

  • What makes a great RPer?
  • The Etiquette of Strict RP
  • How to run a Guild: Political Techniques of the Powerful and Popular





    • What makes a great RPer?

    #1. The great RPers play only one character at a time.


          Playing multiple characters is called "multicharing" or "multiworlding". It's considered rude because while you're writing in another window, everybody polite in the first window is forced to wait, staring at dead silence for three minutes or more. Multiworlding has the added bad feature of encouraging OTHERS to multiworld.

          That you should only play one character at a time is nothing new-- it's an extension of real-world politeness. If you were on the phone, would you put somebody on hold, then just start alternating between two different conversations? Of course not, because it's rude. Can other people tell? YES!

          Chances are very good that if somebody has a problem with you being distracted, they will not complain to you. They'll just find somebody else to RP with next time. Multiworld lagging is the bad breath of online.

          "Lag" is by far not the worst problem that multiworlding causes. A bigger problem is, lack of concentration and attention. When you split your attention between two alts, your natural curiosity drops. You don't ask questions or find things interesting the way you normally would.

          It's possible and realistic that someone might sit in a bar and pay no attention to others. Once a conversation has been engaged, however, the realistic person has a certain amount of curiosity towards the other participant(s).

          One of the many give-aways that somebody is multiworlding is that their alt is purely responsive. It's easy to pose in ways that prove you've read the last twelve lines on your screen. It's easy to prove you're "paying attention." It takes more than merely "paying attention" to be a good RPer. You've got to donate your fair share of "interestingness" (for example, by making IC commitments to other characters, introducing new IC topics of conversation, and taking actions whose outcomes you don't already know). That can only happen when you're not distracted by another scene.

          Last but not least, multiworlding interferes with memory-formation. Players who multi-character don't remember what went on several days ago nearly as well as those who play a single-character at a time. Even if you don't expect to RP with somebody a second time, you're at least expected to OOCly remember who they were and what they did with you.

          If you're playing in a "Strict" RP Dream, where events are taken seriously, like Leirune or Ansteorra, clear memories are vital. Forgetting what went on hurts the Continuity. The most popular roleplayers are the ones who can remember and play off of past events!


    #2. Great players, if they need to leave or wish to play a different character, apologize and excuse themselves from the current scene.

          If you feel you have an especially good reason to multiworld, you should ask those you are already currently RPing with, if it's okay. They might say yes, but most would rather you did not. (Similarly, it's polite to tell others when you're going AFK, away from keyboard, for more than 4 minutes.) Let people know that you value their time and they'll often do the same for you.


    #3. Great online RPers usually know touch-typing, and can pose reasonably quickly.

          There's a certain amount of alertness and intelligence conveyed by how fast one poses. If you pose that your character has fast reflexes but you took four minutes or more to say so, your actions speak louder than your words; the pose will be unconvincing.

          In Furcadia, there's no "Reflexes", "Dexterity", or "Intelligence" statistic on a character sheet that you can wave around. It's purely up to you, the player. Want your character to come across as dumb? Just take four minutes or more to pose. Want to be perceived as bright, alert, and combat-ready? Often, that will only happen if you, as player, can take three or less real-world minutes. Like it or not, though, the speed with which you pose influences how alert and smart your character appears, IC.

          What can you do if you're a slow typist? You might want to put it in your desc, in brackets. Many people are very understanding and will be happy to cut you slack. But, they aren't psychic, and it's important to communicate with them. :)

          Touch-typing is easy and there are free online tutorials for learning it. I can't stress this enough: Trying to be a great RPer with "Hunt and Peck" or "my own made-up system" is like entering the Tour de France on a tricycle. Take the time to learn touch-typing; it really pays off.


    #4. The great RPers don't go IC when they're exhausted!

          Being tired also hurts natural curiosity. I've known for years that RP tends to be crappy around 4 am FST because the players are often sleepy and exhausted. 'Nuff said.

    #5. The poses of the great RPers usually aren't that long.

          What??? Not write a full paragraph? You heard me.

          Even if you mention what others are doing in your pose, long poses still tend to give the impression that you're not paying attention to what others are doing. Most furres I know would rather have a short pose NOW than a long pose LATER. I've said it before; it deserves to be said again: Like it or not, the speed with which you pose is being interpreted to show how interested you are in the other furre(s) and the current scene.

          Teachers often tell young writers, "That needs to be longer". They send the confusing message that "wordy is good". Detail can be good. And, clarity can sometimes take more words. But, good writers try to cram the most meaning into the shortest number of words. They do this by choosing the words that have the right "color" to their meaning.

          Try not to interpret this as a rule that poses MUST be short. It's just that "long pose doesn't always equal cool pose" --and it NEVER makes up for multiworld-lagging. Remember: fast pose replies send the message that you find others' RP interesting. Finding others interesting makes YOU more attractive.

          In general, if there's more furres present, it's good to make the poses shorter. To bring in a tennis analogy, you "play close to the net", for more intense and lively "volleys". Furcadia (like many games today) has a TINY screen and we need to share the "bandwidth". (The addition of voice, live chat, is unlikely to solve this issue because text is more efficient-- only one or two people can talk at a time. With text, half a dozen can be speaking at once, and in a sophisticated roleplaying online game, they usually are.)

    #6. The great RPers generally pose once and let everybody else pose once before posing again.

          This is A BIGGIE. Important. Although freeform roleplaying doesn't have a rule that everybody gets a "turn", over the years, this has become an unspoken convention.

          This leads to a kind of unfortunate but understandable elitism amongst veterans. Newbies don't know that there's a kind of obligation to participate. By not posing, the newbie may be "holding up" the informal "round" of poses. (By the way, I try not to use the word "post" for speech/poses. "Posting" is what you do on a Forum, while the word "pose" has been in widespread mud/MOO/MUCK/MUSE/MUSH use for a decade.)


    #7. The great RPers make up the background after playing the character on at least five separate days.

          Wait a minute, not write up a "character sketch" with all the character's actual skills and powers in advance?? Isn't that twinky, like a blank check? Well, not necessarily, no. Limiting your character's powers is a *separate* matter. I'm talking about fitting the character to the world better.

          Players who write up elaborate backgrounds beforehand generally end up dumping the character because the RP doesn't live up to their grand expectations. Waiting about a week before setting down a character background helps fit the character to their Continuity better.

          Experienced roleplayers have learned that what they want to play may not be who others want to interact with. GMs tell me all the time, "I made this throw-away character (usually a bum, bartender, orphan kid, or guard) and everybody loves him/her!" Throw-aways often end up being great characters because they were made to fill a role that already existed.

          Now, I'm not poo-poo-ing having put thought into your character's background. Thinking about who this character really is, and where they're coming from, and what they did before the first time you play them, is GREAT. But in my opinion, you should save writing anything beyond four sentences for AFTER you've decided you really want to play that character.

    By the way... For RPers, I now recommend using Psumonix's Furcadia Profile URL in one's desc. They are not official Dragon's Eye affiliates, I just think they've done a great job.     Furcadia Profiles (and remember, never use the same password in two places!)

    #8. The great RPErs play "locals", and not "outsiders".

          In general, an "outsider" concept gives other players less to play off of than a "native". A wanderer or mercenary might be more exciting but the guy who has lived their all their life "here" has more stake in the Continuity. Arranging to play a relative of an existing character can be a great aid to Continuity-building, too.


    #9. THE most amazing RPers almost always use two monitors.

          Of course, not everybody has this luxury, but this is one of those things that you don't know what you're missing, like the telephone. Playing Furcadia takes up alot of screen-space. Being able to access web pages without disrupting that, and being able to record notes in a separate window, works better when you have two screens. (Frankenstein voice:) Double-screen mode gooood.

          What are they doing with that second screen? Although Furcadia has a very small text area, some roleplaying fanatics are using proxies or bots to channel the "text output" from Furcadia into a larger window. They can go over old logs to refresh their memory, or refer to a web page with details about their current IC game world.

          Furcadia's screen layout is limited to what the typical user possesses, and, right now, that happens to be a 13 inch monitor. Artists and designers call this screen "real estate". I often wish everybody had more; bigger screens do for roleplaying games what 3D accelerator cards did for first-person shooters.

    ----
    I hope you found these observations helpful. They aren't ironclad; there are exceptions for all of them. But they are at least very strong tendencies amongst the best RPers. 

                                           Pleasant Dreams!
                                         --Talzhemir
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    THE ETIQUETTE OF STRICT ROLEPLAYING
    by Talzhemir


          Over the past few years, a number of fine points have arisen in the strict roleplaying communities of many online games. If you're wondering whether or not many people actually play by these rules, the answer is, yes, and they really do help alot. Here I've collected the ones I think will be most useful in Furcadia.

          #1. Backgrounds that impose large world-assumptions on the Continuity require approval in a Strict Roleplaying setting. In Persona Roleplay they might get ignored. If you say you're a mind-reader, you've just imposed ESP on the Continuity. If you say you're a vampire, you've just imposed life-beyond-death on the Continuity. If you say you are a king of a country, you've just imposed the existence of a nation on the Continuity and possibly bestowed a large amount of IC power upon yourself.

          #2. OOC speech is heavily avoided, and kept in brackets (or similar convention) when it's necessary to address everybody present. Strict Roleplayers hate the distraction of OOC talk being used for OOC chit-chat, complaints or insults. If you're idling and waiting for others to come RP, run an alt in an OOC area for the purpose of OOC. This is one reason RP Dreams generally need an OOC lounge area separate from the RP areas.

          #3. Keep information that you know only OOCly to yourself. If your character knows something IC, they must communicate it to another in-scene. Revealing IC information OOCly ruins the drama for the other Strict Roleplayers. Do not hint OOCly that somebody should come ask your character something IC because you have interesting information for them.

          #4. Abilities or equipment that put others in an awkward position require rules and/or a neutral authority to see that their acquisition and use are fair. This includes poison, traps, invisibility, mind or emotion control powers, and missiles that "home". You can pose having a broken bottle or a knife, but some Guilds require that special items (such as a pistol in a modern-day game) be cleared with the referees first.

          #5. Keep your Alts (your different characters) apart. They may not work for another of your Alts. They may not communicate with each other, except through another PC (player character), and they should be kept out of each other's existence and plots as much as possible. Exception: A Guild may decide that it's acceptable to roleplay your own character's henchmen, etc. They may require that assistant characters be tagged with the name of their boss.

          #6. Favoritism towards your OOC friends is not accepted. There's nothing wrong with playing IC alongside your OOC friends if you can keep your character's actions reasonably credible. But going around in a gang because you're obviously friends OOC is more appropriate for Persona Roleplay.

          #7. You have a right to protection from an OOC grudge. If you suspect your character is being attacked for non-IC reasons, ask an authority in your Guild to talk to the other player and get their IC rationale for attacking you. If they're not satisfied that their motivation makes sense, or if they are concerned that the game is being used to disguise harassment, that referee should have the power to cancel the IC conflict. This kind of protection requires a Guild and referee to enforce; it is not done by Guardians on Furcadia.

          #8. A "Timestop" is assumed to take place just before any combat occurs. Negotiating combat requires a sort of "slow motion" and if you arrive in the middle of a fight, assume that you *aren't* seeing it. Sorry, but it was over before you got there and all participants may leave before you arrive (Fair Escape). This prevents use of OOC communications to summon friends into a fight. Please do not even ASK to be included in an ongoing combat scene if you were not present at the start.

          #9. You have the right to the resolution of an IC conflict. If you get disconnected or have to leave just as a conflict is imminent, or in the middle of a fight, make arrangements with others present to continue later. Do your best. Use email as needed.

          If your opponent fails to show up, you should ask the head of Continuity for a resolution. Especially if others are somehow involved, you aren't necessarily entitled to make up the ending. Loose ends injure the Continuity and a player who disregards Continuity should be removed from Strict Roleplay.

          #10. Within reason, you have a right to take back actions. This is called a RetCon. (Retcon is short for 'RETroactive CONtinuity.') Sometimes a player makes a mistake, for instance posing that they polish their sword when the sword was dropped elsewhere earlier. The polite thing to do is for the player to make a quick OOC announcement that the previous action didn't occur, and for other players to go on. (Acknowledge the retcon with PRIVATE pages please.) You can only Retcon something that just happened. You can only Retcon your OWN actions.

          The purpose of a Retcon is not to explore a tree of possibilities relying on different decisions or let a player make up for an action that results in something they don't like. The purpose of a Retcon is to repair damaged Continuity as quickly and smoothly as possible. (For Guilds that play with dice, Retcons generally can't be used to "take back" an action with a dice roll involved.) Whether you succeed, fail or fumble, that action has already taken place in the Guild's Continuity.

          #11. You don't have OOC control of the consequences of your IC actions. For example, in Persona Roleplay, you may freely say that you're ill or you've recovered. But in some Strict Roleplay Guilds, a character who has had contact with "the plague" may get sick whether the player wants that or not. For this to be handled in a fair fashion requires a referee, and possibly an appropriate random die roll.

          #12. Your Alts' experience and knowledge of the game world are separate. You may not assume that your character spoke to others and therefore your alt may also know. Resist the temptation to recycle the things your other characters knew.

          #13. In Strict RP, you agree not to invoke outside Continuities. References to concepts, powers, character types, families, factions, etc., from books, movies, and novels are unacceptable. So, no Jedi, no Drow, no Saiya-Jin, no Malkavians, no "speaking Feral", etc., etc., etc. UNLESS these are agreed-upon parts of the Continuity.

          #14. At some point, in order to participate, you need to knowingly agree to a Continuity. This doesn't happen by accident. Control of the Continuity can be enforced by membership in a Guild and one's presence in the Guild's Dream, but it starts when all of that Guild's players mutually agree to adhere to one. If you haven't done so, then you're not a part of the Continuity yet. Expecting someone to adhere to ANY Continuity, when they haven't already agreed, is very unfair to them, so it shouldn't be done.

          #15. Ultimately, somebody has to be in charge of the Continuity. (Normally that defaults to the "Rah", the one who owns the Guild.) Somebody (or a group of somebody's) needs to be able to demand a change in an individual's background or played-out story events to preserve the believability of the story. Generally, a storyteller/referee/gamemaster does not interfere, but players do have a right to request interference for the good of the Continuity, even to the point of forcing the RetCon of previously played-out events.

          #16. Players have the right to be a valid part of the Continuity. If Continuity is being violated, the Continuity's owner or referees must act, by removing the "offending" character or insisting that they be changed. You should not take matters into your own hands and act as if someone else was not there. You may not announce that another character is not a part of "your" Continuity. Unless you're told otherwise, it's fair to assume there is only ONE Continuity for everyone in your Guild.

          #17. Every player has the right to fair representation of their character's IC abilities. Whether or not you may refuse to consent to another's IC actions is decided by each individual Strict RP Guild. As a general default: Unless specified otherwise, if the character has the approval of the Continuity's owner, you may not refuse to consent to their use of their IC abilities on your character.

          #18. It is up to the Guild to regulate which kinds of action players are expected to roleplay-out. Some Guilds do not permit rape plotlines. Some Guilds permit you to "fade-to-black" on any scene you do not wish to play, but require you to play out the consequences later. Some Guilds offer multiple levels of commitment to the Continuity, within the same playgroup.

          As you can see, departing from the simple Consent Rule can mean a LOT of special-case rules to handle different kinds of situations. For example, a Guild can make a special rule that if you did nothing to provoke an attack, that you may automatically choose a non-death outcome.

          #19. Upholding the Continuity is everybody's job. For example, if your character looks like a demon and the setting is a typical medieval village, they would probably get attacked and driven out or captured. Your character should take appropriate measures to hide their frightening aspects, or be prepared for that mob of villagers with pitchforks and blessed arrows.

          Similarly, the other players have an obligation to react with suspicion and hostility if they see your true features, unless they have a good IC reason not to.

          #20. You may not take an action with natural consequence that would cause major change to the Continuity unless those in charge of the Continuity say it is okay. This includes such things as destroying a major location, starting a war, or becoming the ruler of a nation. For example, suppose your character is a mad scientist. You could only assemble and set off a nuclear bomb to wipe out your city if your Guild had arrangements for that kind of IC action. It helps if the major tenets of the Continuity are recorded on a web page; these are the Continuity's Plot Assumptions. (For example, it's generally assumed that in a medieval world, nobody is going to invent gunpowder and machine guns.)

          Here's another example: Your character might be a vampire completely capable of revealing their secrets to modern society ("pulling a Lestat"). Because of the major ramifications, either refereree(s) must oversee the plot, or, it is not permitted to take place.

          #21. The beauty of Strict RP is that your character *can* affect the Continuity, in a way they could not, in Persona RP. Whether or not something *is* a Plot Assumption can be discussed with those in charge. For example, suppose your mad scientist character wanted to unleash a hideous disease on society. The Rah or referee(s) might decide this is a plot they want to have happen. All player characters would then be informed of the visible effects of the disease (looting and riots? hospitals overrun? city gates closed? suspected victims barricaded into their homes?)

          #22. In-Character Actions yield In-Character Consequences. This is the ruling philosophy of Strict RP. If you mouth off to somebody, you might end up in a fight. If you commit a crime, you might be the target of law enforcement or the angry grief-stricken relatives and friends of the victim. Although the actual consequences might not happen in the game, you should try to play your character as if it was a possibility.

          Strict RP Guilds can also use a variation on the above philosophy. "In-Character Actions should yield FAIR In-Character Consequences." In real life, if you mouth off to someone in a bar, they might assault you but it would not normally be with lethal force. Therefore, attacking you with lethal force would not be a fair In-Character Consequence. Note that "fair" here does not mean "both characters have equal IC power"; it refers to whether or not you had ample OOC warning about what you were ICly getting into.

          #23. To protect the Continuity, Plot Assumptions sometimes must override what players want. Sometimes, to maintain a "dark" atmosphere", a Guild may have a rule that certain Plot Assumptions of the Continuity override being able to avoid IC consequences because they don't seem fair.

          These include established motives that one type of character has to spontaneously assault another type of character with deadly force. Here's an example: The pencil-and-dice roleplaying game "Werewolf: the Apocalypse" has a Plot Assumption that werewolves are expected to attempt to kill vampires. A vampire might walk up to the werewolf and just say, "Hello.", be detected by an IC power, and end up in a fight to the death. Without this provision for "Deadly Animosities", this Continuity could not be properly portrayed.

          This situation can also arise due to specific character situations. For instance, a character might have an accepted background they are a psychotic killer, or deranged combat veteran subject to flashbacks in which they mistake those around them for enemies. Guilds may insist that you submit a written background or character sheet, so that what is fair is more clear. They may alternately opt to disallow backgrounds that would tend to lead to such unpredictable or unfair IC consequences.

          To prevent players from complaining that these "nasty surprises" weren't fair, we recommend listing them under Plot Assumptions. You may not get a specific immediate warning that you are going to be attacked, but you deserve to be warned in general if that is the kind of IC event that you are expected to accept.

          #24. Unless the game system says otherwise, you may only have secret knowledge if you learned it during actual play. In a game with character generation, you may be able to buy the appropriate lore skill. This would enable you to know, for example, the details of what destroys a specific supernatural creature.

          Possession of such a lore may require clearance with a referee. They may deny your request because a) your character background doesn't merit it, b) they do not want too many characters starting out with that IC knowledge, c) they would rather you had to learn it by roleplaying, and facing the dangers such investigation normally incurs, and/or d) they simply don't want characters to start with that information.

          In most games with vampires, the default for mortals is NO knowledge of their existence, and many games do not permit players of mortals to buy vamp lore during character generation.

          In Guilds that use character sheets, a referees might even require you to submit logs of any scene in which you acquired IC knowledge of this sort, before allowing you to buy a relevant lore skill.)

          #25. Scenes with pre-arranged outcomes are inappropriate for Strict Roleplaying. For example, OOCly agreeing to meet for the first time and become instantly lovers is unacceptable. OOC agreements of this kind are more appropriate for Persona Roleplay.

          Asking OOC questions about ICly relevant matters is generally frowned upon, as well. Strict Roleplay is kept exciting by being spontaneous. Strict RPers may not whisper, "Is your character lying?" "Are you a shapeshifter?" "Do you intend to attack me?", etc. unless they have an IC power to back it up, such as mind-reading or magical divination that actually works. The best answer to such a question is, "Find out IC."

          #26. In OOC speech, be respectful to your Guild's staff and all the other Players. This is just common sense. We all do our best to be fair and ethical but we're all humans and we can acquire biases. Do yourself a favor by not giving people reasons to personally resent you.

    --------

    After reading this, I hope you understand that a LOT more effort goes into Strict Roleplaying than into Persona Roleplaying. Many of you will decide that Strict Roleplaying is more hassle than you want. That's okay! But hopefully you understand why many furres find Persona Roleplaying very unsatisfying, and why Strict Roleplaying is relatively rare. In either event, we encourage you to find a Guild that's to your liking, or even form a new one.


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    How to Run a Guild:
    Political Techniques
    Of the Powerful & Popular


          The leader of a Furcadian Guild can be a president, a queen, a king, a dictator, a high priest, a head storyteller, etc., but the generic term is "Rah". The word came from Richard Addams's book "Watership Down" and simply means "Honored One".

          The first power of the Rah lies in the creation and control of their Continuity. If Youlanda, Rah of Leirune, writes that there are "Complementary Elemental Mages" in Leirune, then, by gosh, there are. The Rah controls who has access to the web page, the Dream data, and so forth. But that power isn't held purely through "brute force" methods like Eject. According to the "social contract theory" (by Hobbes the philosopher, not the tiger), it's held through a kind of bargain with the players.

          It's a funny bargain because the Rah doesn't promise to do everything. The most effective Rah doesn't quite give him/herself to the Guild members. The skillful leader gives the Guild members to each other.

          Some Rahs are in charge because they're willing to do everything. Some do nothing but are good at delegating. Whatever the Rah's style, leadership in Furcadia can't be about 'making others do what you want'. It's a combination of being able to explain clearly why you want what you want, and figuring out what the furres themselves want.

          The most effective Rah is somewhere in the middle between the selfless martyr and the modern major general. They do alot, in order to set a good example, but they must also spend a lot of time asking many others for help and assigning chores and checking to see those chores are accomplished. Most requests for help actually get turned down, so don't ever get discouraged. This is normal. A Rah has to be persistent and keep shamelessly asking around.

          Then, there's the willing furres who accept a task but then forget about it. What can you do about that? Nothing, Furcadia is all volunteering, right? Not quite! How can a Rah get volunteers to do what they say they will do? The secret is "public commitment".

          "Public commitment" is loud open announcement whenever anybody agrees to do something. Successful Rahs tell me that the web page or web forum is the key because this is where promises of responsibility to the group can be posted.

          "Public commitment" is an important factor in whether or not things actually get done. Studies in psychology have shown that folks are far more likely to fulfill their promises if other people know those promises have been made. So, telling the group that someone has agreed to do something is better leadership.
    ( http://www.insideinfluence.com/year02/06/ScientificAm-2001-Article.pdf )

          Rahs may be tempted not to publicize commitments for fear of looking bad when a volunteer doesn't come through. Fortunately for Rahs (and wannabe fortune-tellers too), the natural tendency is to forgive the failures and remember successes.

          It's important to remember that there is no mystical quality called "charisma" that causes things to get done for Rahs. What a Rah actually uses, is their "honor"! They do this best by openly praising the accomplishments of the other furres. If it looks like the Rah will hog the credit for themself (by not citing their Patchers and Dream-maintainers, for example), how is a volunteer going to get the appreciation they deserve? They need to feel they are going to get a fair share of the "glory".

          If something fails to get done, it's not because the Rah wasn't "popular" or "charismatic" enough. Furres don't just help out because they want brownie points with the Rah! Just about everybody craves validation within their community. If their commitment is noised-about, their accomplishment should also be announced. This way, they don't just get a pat on the back from the Rah. Through control of communication (loudemits, the web page, the entrytext, and so on), the Rah leads everybody in awarding approval.

          The Rah must show that are willing to grant Guild members creative freedom. How much creative freedom? It's a trade-off. The more freedom you allow, the more players you'll get, but the less serious the roleplaying is going to feel.

          Next, the Rah must also show they have respect for players' feelings and would only exercise their power for the sake of the other players. Nobody likes a power-tripper. What roleplayers get out of supporting a Guild and a Rah is a coherent setting and someone willing to keep the OOC peace.

          How can the Rah communicate their benevolent intentions? The best place to do that is through a web page. Your choice of words on that page show a lot about your attitude. Some Rahs are autocrats and write the whole web page themselves. Some are more democratic, and let the key members give their input. This is different for every Rah.

          You should insist on having ten active members before you start. That puts a little bit of power in their paws. But it also does something else: it makes the Dream and Continuity belong to them as well as to you. They gave it their approval. Now they also have a stake in seeing that it's followed; it's something of a matter of honor.

          Key members are a very valuable resource for the Rah trying to write up a web page. If the Rah discovers something is controversial, the key members can communicate their preferences through a vote.

          A remarkable new tool in the Rah's toolkit is "approval voting". Consider this situation: Ten people are voting where to have lunch. Four vote for Greasyburger, three vote for Chickenland, and three vote for Tacotime. Suppose you would be happy with Chickenland or Tacotime, but you don't want Greasyburger. So you vote for Chickenland. Under the traditional method of voting called "plurality voting", each voter is allowed only one option. Under plurality voting, Greasyburgers would win-- even though 6 out of 10 voters clearly didn't want that. So... you point this out, and, being fair-minded sorts, everybody agrees to vote again.

          You know that there had to be a tie between Chickenland and Tacotime, 3 votes each. Hoping to make it Tacotime, you change your vote. ...but your friend Bill, who voted for Tacotime, is thinking the same thing, and he switches his vote to Chickenland. Argh! It comes out Greasyburger again!

          With approval voting, all the options are listed, and you can vote for any option that you find acceptable. So you give Chickenland and Tacotime each a vote, but Greasyburger gets none. If Greasyburger still wins, it won't be because of a "trick" in which the opposition was divided. There are no "wasted votes" in Approval Voting.

          There are so many things that need to be decided when making a Guild. Web pages can outline what's valid and what's not, and what a group is intended to be about. Is it for strict roleplaying? or more freewheeling and loose? Or is it not really roleplaying-oriented at all? What's the history and world-laws like, what's the Continuity about? What is the Dream supposed to look and feel like?

          The web page of a roleplaying Guild usually includes a good description of the setting. In an interview about his "Redwall" series, Brian Jacques says that his moles "'They'm all talk'n loike that, bo urr aye, zurr!'" Redwall fan fiction is lovingly encouraged on a website called Lancepaw's Fort. She advises roleplayers: "if you are a mole/sparrow/eagle/hare/pirate etc be prepared to do the accents or be considered weird." Part of the fun of roleplaying is familiarity, comfortable fulfilling of expectations. A good roleplayer uses character hooks such as accents, and a good setting supplies them.

          But, authenticity and continuity in online roleplaying have a much deeper role than the "fulfilling of comfortable expectations". Whether you're Raph Koster, Creative Director of Star Wars Galaxies, or Bumblepaws, Rah of a little Furcadian Cafe Dream, bringing your continuity to life is a group effort. You need a clear single shared common vision. Respect for your Guild's Continuity leads to cooperation in a natural fashion.

          A Guild's web page is the place where members can be recognized for their contributions to a Guild. They might donate "Patch" art, or they might maintain a "Bot" that performs bookkeeping for the Guild, or they might share a log of a particularly good scene. But these can be alot of hard work.



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    AN EXPLANATION OF THE TWO KINDS OF ROLEPLAYING GUILDS

          On Furcadia we divide our roleplaying Guilds into two kinds because players tend to have two major preferences. The first kind is Persona Roleplay and the second is Strict Roleplay. The "litmus test" for determining which category fits your Guild best is a simple question: "Do you accept events from outside your Continuity as valid?" If the answer is no, then the Guild is classified as "Strict". If the answer is yes, then the Guild is classified as "Persona".

          In general, Persona Roleplay tries to have as few rules as possible, protecting the OOC peace and keeping the IC conflicts from souring play. It was originally called "Freeform" but that can be misleading-- many groups that call their style of play "Freeform" actually have lots and lots of rules. Since that's counter to what one might guess "Freeform" means, we now call it "Persona Roleplay" instead.

          If you haven't officially agreed to any kind of limit to your character's power or background, then what you're doing is Persona Roleplaying. It doesn't mean that you can't have a very coherent adventure, or that you have no background or that what you're doing is in any way inferior to any other form of roleplay. It does mean that the standard is (of necessity) relaxed.

          Most roleplaying on Furcadia is Persona Roleplay; it's the default for all non-private areas. Out on the main maps, there's no onus (social obligation) to go along with what someone else poses. Our default rule is the Consent Rule: "If somebody poses or says something that implies your cooperation, you can act like it didn't happen."

          Strict roleplaying shouldn't be confused with "gaming with dice". Dice are an independent factor, and can be used with Persona or Strict Roleplaying. Rather, Strict Roleplaying is playing with Continuity as the most important concern, possibly even more important than the survival of your individual character.