Writing style
Creativity is always welcome, but there are some standards to follow so that everything stays coherent. Use the best grammar and spelling you can, be attentive to the flow of time, and don't overuse internal monologue / character-perspective narration. |
We aren't hyper-critical grammar freaks. Don't worry if you think your writing needs a little polishing up. The most important rules to follow when writing in our story are some of the easiest.
1. Use the best grammar you are able to use.
As long as your grammar is clear enough to be easily understood, and isn't cluttered with piles of unnecessary or misused words, or otherwise awkward, you'll probably be alright. Remember that readability trumps all else. If you have any problems or aren't sure of certain things, never be embarrassed to ask. RP is actually a great way to become a better, more literate writer if you take it seriously enough to try to learn! There is a limit on how much we can really help, though, and with that said, this is not the right place for a nonnative English speaker to begin trying to RP for the first time.
2. Use the best spelling you are able to use.
What excuse is there for misspelling anything these days? The Firefox browser comes with a built-in spelling checker. Use it. See a squiggly red line under a word you just wrote? You probably misspelled it. Right click that word for suggestions. If nothing sounds right, see m-w.com or dictionary.com. Watch out for homophones and easily-confused words, too; take a peek at the writing tips article for some of the most common examples seen in RP.
3. Don't write entire posts in script format.
This isn't fanfiction.net. Don't write scripts. Support your dialogue with well-written narrative. It doesn't need to be long or flouncy. It just needs to be there, and clearly tell the story of your character's actions.
4. Don't write like the whole story is about your character.
While it's not a bad thing to get inside a character's head once in a while, using super-extensive narrative that shows the character's every thought and reaction to every single thing that happens is tiresome. It can also be highly detrimental to your efforts to make your character interesting. After all, if you splay out your character's guts for all to see in every single post, what intrigue is left?
5. Write posts in third person, past tense.
There's nothing else to say. Unless you're doing a special solo story from your character's personal perspective (or some other kind of special segment focused entirely on your character), stick to third person perspective. And, obviously, please write posts in past tense wherever grammatically possible. (Character profiles can be in present tense, though, of course.)
6. Keep your narrative somewhat neutral.
This is best illustrated through example. Pretend that the following lines are an excerpt from someone's post. (Also, remember that this is an utterly simple example, and is not intended to reflect normal writing quality around here.)
- Good: Jim, irritated by Joe's behavior, shoved him away. "Buzz off, moron."
- Bad: When Joe started acting like an irritating, stupid moron, Jim shoved him away. "Buzz off."
In the good example, the narrative expresses that Jim was irritated, and tells what Jim did, but makes no value judgments (stupid, smart, irritating, not irritating). Instead, the character himself calls Joe a moron.
In the bad example, the narrator (as in, the writer of the post, not the character) is the one who declares that Joe was being irritating and stupid, as if it is universal fact. If you do this excessively in your posts (in all but the most tongue-in-cheek ways), you will probably be considered crass by your fellow players. Remember, players aren't offended by characters being rude—they're offended by their fellow players being rude.
7. NEVER use retroactive dialogue in conversations
This is a problem almost entirely unique to RP. It's hard to explain, so I will write a corny example.
- Player 1: "We were at the airport all night," said Matt. "We went to pick up John. Apparently, he thought it'd be a good idea to take an international flight to a strange country without owning a mobile phone. We were starting to think he had disappeared into the twilight zone or died or something, but we eventually found him by dumb luck."
- Player 2: "The airport?" repeated Derpington McBadwriter. "Oh, I didn't know John was visiting. He didn't bring a cell?" he asked. "How terrible." He looked relieved when he heard the outcome, though. "Oh, I'm glad you found him!"
This is a really deliberately stupid example, but bear with me. In this example, you can see that our fictitious player 2 responded to everything player 1 said, bullet point by bullet point. DON'T DO THIS. You are not allowed to insert dialogue between the sentences of other players unless it is actually with the intention of interrupting and stopping them from talking, because anything your character says should reasonably affect what the other character says from that point onward. If it must be done, ask permission from the other player.
I know this sounds complicated, but it boils down to something very simple: Don't answer character dialogue point-by-point as if you're having an IM conversation. Treat it like a real conversation. If your character is unable to reply to everything that was said in a realistic-sounding way, then maybe the other player's character is just being a motormouth, and it may be valid for you or your character to react accordingly and point it out.
