Introduction to Roleplaying (and the blog)

What better way to start off great rantings than an introduction!

INTRODUCTION

To start, this blog was created due to a series of events. I've been roleplaying since I was 11 years old (I am 21 currently), and one of the bizzare ordeals was that there was never any sort of written guideline on "how to roleplay." Roleplaying was this thing that you just had to sort of pick up while you went along. I personally got lucky and threw myself at an early age into Yahoo! Chat rooms, beginning to roleplay when roleplaying itself was still young. Hell, roleplaying still is young. A year or so ago I was asked by an RP group to create a sort of guide, per say. A standard. Something that they could hand to people interested in joining the group and say, “Hey! Read this, and you’ll probably be able to roleplay better.” I got about 20 pages into it before quitting and losing the documentation.

But the idea stuck. There really isn’t a guide for roleplaying, nor do many people really look into the mechanics of the situation. Sure, there are plenty of people who look into the mechanics of systems that support roleplaying (such as Dungeons and Dragons, World of the Darkness, World of Warcraft etc.) but not into the actual roleplaying itself. I’ve heard people speculate about their likes and dislikes in regards to roleplaying and different theories but much like the oral traditions of the olden days it is never written down.

And so while looking in a mirror in a bathroom while I was supposed to be theorizing the philosophy of labeling oneself suddenly I thought: why not, you know, write it down? Sure, the sheer amount of effort involved in writing something like a book might be a little daunting. But something like a blog? That’s a little more casual. But let’s have less me time and more time with the subject at hand: Roleplaying!

SO WHAT IS ROLEPLAYING?

“Roleplaying” is a term that can be broken down quite simply to find the definition. You play a role. If you wanted to look way too deep into matters, you could say that we roleplay every day—we play a role in society as a student, a teacher, a brother, a sister, a mother. We play ourselves. But describing roleplaying in that matter is rather lame, as you could really define anything as anything if you make it that vague.

If you mention roleplaying to an average joe, much of the time they’ll think of one of two things—either roleplaying in regards to competitions (such as DECA, a student organization about marketing and business) or in regards to sex. But the type covered in these essays is another less mentioned form—a type of acting done neither to convey a story to an audience nor to win awards, but for pure enjoyment. Haha, I guess you could say that recreational roleplaying is kind of like mixing sexual roleplaying and acting together… without all the naughty bits (alright, sometimes).

In any case, I would define the type of roleplaying we want to discuss as purposely acting as another individual in an entirely different set of circumstances with no clear “writer” in mind. One can roleplay a character in a story, where events are dictated to happen no matter what. But roleplaying is a social experience. While one person can play multiple characters, other people will “act” as other characters in the story, committing actions that the others have no real control over. That’s part of what makes roleplaying fun—it’s unpredictable and interesting, because unlike writing a novel, it doesn’t just feel like you’re talking to yourself.

Speaking of novels, that’s another great way to define roleplaying. As multiple people getting together and writing a novel, in real time. Even with two characters just sitting in a bar talking to each other, a story will generally emerge. Johnny Blowhards could have just broken up with his wife, lamenting to Susie Samson about how she slept with eighteen men before giving him gonorrhea. It doesn’t seem like much on its own, but it could be just one piece of a greater story—Susie could be enraged, go find Mrs. Blowhards and then murder her, thus leading to another twist in events directly caused by that simple interaction between the characters in the first place.

Roleplaying is, however, an art. Much like acting and novel writing, there are do’s and do not’s, there are stylistic elements… and there are of course stereotypes (much like Keanu Reeves is stereotyped as having a face made of rock and Stephanie Meyer is stereotyped as being a little creepy). That’s where this blog comes in! Rather than create a group directly involved in roleplaying to comment upon it, one needs to take a step back from their love to truly view it as it really is. With this, you. Readers. Yes, all two of you. Feel free to comment, share your opinions, ask questions, do dances, what have you. This is as much written for me as it is written for other people, so I’m all ears.

Happy roleplaying! Next week we’ll cover different types of roleplaying. Or this week, if I’m really pumped about it.

p.s. Here's a nice little introduction:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vw_3E5h1XIE