how to write goooder

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fulminea
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by fulminea » Mon Apr 26, 2021 9:51 pm

this is my RP in a nutshell, and I dont want it no other way

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbZdhl5NI6Y

ElvenEdibles
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by ElvenEdibles » Mon Apr 26, 2021 11:03 pm

1) Less is more
2) You don't always need to emote
3) Take breaks from the game
4) Roleplay with different characters
5) 3 & 4 can be summarized as 'break your patterns'
6) Read literature
7) Aerobic exercise will boost your creativity

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Kriegos
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by Kriegos » Mon Apr 26, 2021 11:26 pm

Party in the forest at midnight wrote:
Mon Apr 26, 2021 9:20 pm
To build off what others are saying, I don't want people to feel intimidated by this thread. I legitimately do not care how people spell or type as long as they're telling a good story.
This. Extremely this.

There are good tips in this thread, but none of it I would treat as gospel because writing in real time is so extremely situational. Want to write an essay on how dramatically your character poses and points for the exit before giving a detailed escape plan while running from a dragon? Probably not the time, nor is it the time to open up a dictionary. Roleplaying a elaborate and fancy meal or something? Maybe write more than ‘He ate dinner and it was good, the end.’

But everyone is trying. We all have different skill sets. Many are writing in a different language than they grew up with. Importantly, people have different styles.

Read the above thread and see how the tips may help your writing improve, definitely. We can always get better at the things we do, but decide for yourself how to incorporate (or not) the ideas being floated here. Some are rules of language and grammar, others are personal preferences.

If you’re trying to engage with your fellow players and write a story? Your writing is already good enough for me, so don’t get scared off.
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Marsi
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by Marsi » Tue Apr 27, 2021 2:56 am

The most important thing is to learn how to structure your writing, and how to use that to the effect you want. Structure and placement is all I think really matters, because a well-structured sentence can support as many adverbs as you'd like. I think this is something of a lost art, because I struggle to find contemporary writers - in our age of first person with its cruise control prose - who take it very seriously. I find that turn of the 20th century writers are very good at it - Rudyard Kipling is my favorite.

Word choice is also important. Words have a "mouthfeel". Simple language will not open every door for you. The context matters - archaic or baroque language doesn't belong in a modern courtroom setting perhaps. Likewise, technical "essay-speak" full of zombie nouns and modern terminology doesn't belong on a bounty poster in a medieval town. I've got a bone to pick with overtly contemporaneous government/legal language in Arelith.

Other than that, I think it's really up to you. You've got to think about what kind of story (or character) you want, and tailor word structure/placement to it. No rules can really help you with that, so read as much as you can and deconstruct the artifice of authors who impress you. That means reading impressive authors, and challenging oneself as a reader. If you're serious about writing, I don't think it's enough to read for pleasure/plot.

In an Arelithian context, I got better at writing because I stopped hanging out with players who didn't push themselves or take the creative experience seriously and started hanging out with those who did. I stopped being intimidated by powerful roleplayers when I started to pay closer attention to what they were doing and reverse-engineer their craft. This doesn't mean copying - it means being able to lay the process bare and think about how you might execute as much but with your own ideas.

TBH, I don't really care about grammar or spelling. The nature of the writing is what matters. People who get fired up about spelling/grammar strike me as compensating for something - it feels classist and excludes those with dyslexia.

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Eira
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by Eira » Tue Apr 27, 2021 5:45 am

Maladus wrote:
Mon Apr 26, 2021 5:49 pm
In this way, there is no conditional requirement to be met for the emote to happen, it just happens because it's occurring right now.
To riff on this, I agree BUT!

If you are doing something that would directly affect another character, I find it acceptable to do "He would blahdy blahdy blah" because it's conditional on their reaction.
He would try to pat her on her shoulder.

So that leaves it open to the other player to either accept said action or do something like "She pulls away before he can touch her"

And yeah, I know, you could just say "he tries to pat her on the shoulder" but idk, there's something about the flow of it, and honestly, I think either works so not gonna be too nitpicky about one versus the other.

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Opustus
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by Opustus » Tue Apr 27, 2021 9:58 am

I usually let the way I write emotes somehow exaggerate the character's persona, or sometimes contrast it. What your character does and how they're described in the third person are two layers of narration, and this can be a great source of enjoyment.

A serious character? Exaggerate with earnest emotes. Or contrast with irony. A taciturn character? Exaggerate with concise emotes. Or contrast with long and extravagant emotes.

Also, some may not like this, but it brings me immense pleasure to ever so gently prod at the fourth wall and let my personal feelings about my characters (mostly derisive) seep into the description of their personas.
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Babylon System is the Vampire
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by Babylon System is the Vampire » Tue Apr 27, 2021 1:58 pm

Party in the forest at midnight wrote:
Mon Apr 26, 2021 9:20 pm
To build off what others are saying, I don't want people to feel intimidated by this thread. I legitimately do not care how people spell or type as long as they're telling a good story.
I'm going to third this one, since it was already seconded. I misspell words all the time in game. Sometimes I misuse a word. Hell, sometimes I make a word up. I do this all without any shame in my game, because it's just a game. There, I even used the same word in a sentence twice for the guy who mentioned that :) While its true I enjoy a player who can fire off a descriptive emote in a few seconds or use words that make me google later, that's just because I like to read. A good player on Arelith in my estimation not only has their own story line but cares about yours as well. It's really that simple, and has nothing to do with how anyone writes.

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Re: how to write goooder

Post by Kessarin » Tue Apr 27, 2021 2:10 pm

Discussing methods by which others can improve their writing skills is little different than discussing methods by which others can improve their IG builds. Neither affects the enjoyment of a good story, and both can improve game play.

Offering technical writing advice is fine and in no way suggests that players who do not use those methods aren't good roleplayers.
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Sundial
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by Sundial » Tue Apr 27, 2021 4:06 pm

1. Emotes are most useful when your character's different body language is different from what they're actually saying - it gives PCs a nice underhanded pitch to pick up on subtext.

2. Every interaction with a PC should be a scene with a specific purpose - the pursuit of your character's desire - which can be described by a single verb that affects the other person in that scene. Every sentence you type should serve that aim.

3. Emotes and descriptions do not need to contain things that someone can tell by looking at your character model or portrait. They should have the express intent of providing your scene partner something they can play with.

4. Emoting is a great time to play with narrative voice: a way of viewing your character from afar to provide clarity to other PCs.

5. Unless you're correcting a typo in the moment, don't press the delete button on your keyboard. Let 'er rip.

6. Spelling and grammar mistakes barely matter - you rarely need to waste time correcting them.

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Maladus
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by Maladus » Tue Apr 27, 2021 4:07 pm

Eira wrote:
Tue Apr 27, 2021 5:45 am
Maladus wrote:
Mon Apr 26, 2021 5:49 pm
In this way, there is no conditional requirement to be met for the emote to happen, it just happens because it's occurring right now.
To riff on this, I agree BUT!

If you are doing something that would directly affect another character, I find it acceptable to do "He would blahdy blahdy blah" because it's conditional on their reaction.
He would try to pat her on her shoulder.

So that leaves it open to the other player to either accept said action or do something like "She pulls away before he can touch her"

And yeah, I know, you could just say "he tries to pat her on the shoulder" but idk, there's something about the flow of it, and honestly, I think either works so not gonna be too nitpicky about one versus the other.
I would agree with that. There are many ways of leaving that open for other characters, doing it like you suggested is definitely one way of that. Last night, I was in a situation where I interacted with another player's spider animal companion. I did it in the present tense:
Tathnolu: *kneels down and reaches his hand out toward the spider, waiting to see it's reaction to him*
There are a lot of options available to interact with other players to leave room for them to respond. I just don't like using the contractions I stated in my OP for general emotes.

seppuku me senpai
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by seppuku me senpai » Wed Apr 28, 2021 5:39 pm

Wow, so many great takes in here. You love to see it.

Echoing the sentiment by our friends to remind everyone that in essence, writing is expression of the self. Write how you feel is right! (haha) Use the tips in the thread to experiment with new techniques you can use to better convey yourself or just try out new things, they are by no means gospel or an instruction manual. Remember, the modernist movement was a bunch of weird people totally breaking convention and form to invent a totally new genre.

Some more hot tips from me, some of them expanding on other tips.

Less is more.
Quantity does not equal quality. Don't feel bad if you're setting out to write and the only thing you manage to make is a handful of sentences. It is better to write one perfect sentence then write a bunch of pee pee ones. (I also tend to pay more attention to people who write less, because I interpret that as them taking more time to be deliberate with what they're writing)

Tenses.
I know the "x would do this" convo has come up. My take is that it is a very bad no good habit to get into, especially if you RP a lot because it will bleed into your writing (if you do it) outside of RP. The nature of RP is collaborative speculative fiction, so it makes sense that you want to say "if you do this then I would do that, and then you would do this," and so on. You want to be open for the exchange with the other RPers. But also, its a bad habit and changes your narrative voice. Do you want your narrative voice to be negotiating what your character is doing in the scene, or do you want your narrative voice to be making a statement of what your character is doing. Personally. I prefer to make a statement, and then let people respond, and then bounce around from that. My style however tends toward a more precise and direct form.

Organic Dialogue
It can be easy to forget how people talk when you spend so much time in your own head when you write. Especially with Covid Times, and most of us haven't even seen another human, let alone had a face to face conversation, in a long time. So, I recommend, the next time you're on the phone with someone, or out in public, eavesdrop on some conversations and write down what they say. Then take a look what you wrote down. How did they speak? Probably not grammatically correct, for one. Maybe they had an accent, or a stutter. How did it manifest, what did it look like, how do they make their sentences, and so on. Super super good way to develop how you write dialogue, maybe you'll even get inspired!

Take a Break
If you're working on a more permanent piece (say your description or an item description or a regular writing piece), write it, then, take a break from it. Like a week. Then, go back to it and see what changes you want to make. If you're always in your head about what you're writing, its harder to edit and be objective. Take a break, let your brain refresh, then look at it with your fresh eyes.

"Kill your darlings"
I had to google who said this, its Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch. This quote comes up a lot when we talk about editing our work. It means, sometimes you got to cut the sentences you really really like because they don't work for the piece as a whole anymore. Which is hard to do (especially for me) when you're really proud of a turn of phrase or line. What I like to do is save all the lines I really like in a separate word doc, which is now just cluttered with random out of context lines I've written but liked to much to delete forever.

READ
Reading is the best way to really expand your technique as a writer, and as a storyteller. Read stuff! I saw a lot of people also recommended this. What are some books you recommend people read or were inspirational to you?

Mine are,
The Hobbit by our boy J.R.R Tolkien
Lies of Locke Lamora, by Scott Lynch (awesome thief heist crime intrigue in a fantasy venice-like setting)
Stoner, by John Edward Williams (dry fiction book about an english instructor at a university, really beautiful)



thanks for all the kind and thoughtful tips everyone. its wholesome to see people being nice and constructive to one another
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Curve
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Re: how to write goooder

Post by Curve » Wed Apr 28, 2021 5:57 pm

Sundial wrote:
Tue Apr 27, 2021 4:06 pm
5. Unless you're correcting a typo in the moment, don't press the delete button on your keyboard. Let 'er rip.
This is what I’m talking about. Be bold. Don’t be scared to make mistakes.

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Re: how to write goooder

Post by Miskol » Thu Apr 29, 2021 2:17 am

Alrighty folks, I think that's enough for this thread. Locked.

Edit: I am reopening this thread due to the prior value it presented. Please keep it civil from this point forward.

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