Writing and Roleplaying: New Podcast!

[Karuka]

Hi everyone. I'm going to be recording a podcast on Tuesday, and depending on interest it might be one episode or it might be a few episodes.

Instead of asking you to ask me questions, I'd like to ask you questions and then discuss your answers on the air. Without further ado:

What is your definition of roleplay?
What is Althanas to you?
How does Althanas differ from any other rp outlets you use?

Come on... tell me about yourselves.

[Logan]

Roleplay - playing the role of a character or persona. This can be done via writing, via speaking, via acting, etc. Actors are roleplayers, as are writers in a sense, at least those who focus on a primary central character.

Althanas is a community, first and foremost. It is a site wherein writers can improve and collaborate or even compete with other writers. It is a site where roleplayers can take on the persona of any character and write about their adventures, and can do so collaboratively with others enjoying the same. It is a site where gamers can adventure into a new realm of gaming, wherein a gamer can take a character from low status and develop them over a long period of time into almost anything they so desire. Althanas, at its core, is about imagination and being able to share whatever your mind or heart can come up with the world.

Althanas was one of my first rp play-by-post sites. I had done some early D&D campaigns, some chat rp, and played on a few text-based games (MUDs). All of those, at the time, paled in comparison to the openness of Althanas, which allowed me to have this singular character I could take from my mind and put out for the world to see and read about his adventures. Althanas is one of a few sites I have seen to ever allow pure openness to creativity, whereby your creativity was truly the only obstacle to whatever your dreams might be. Obviously, the biggest difference, however, was writing out in post format, as opposed to chat rp or campaign-styled rp (similar to chat rp really). It took some getting used to, but it is a ton of fun.

[Medeia]

What is your definition of roleplay?

The best definition of roleplay I can think of is that it is a series of interactions between one or more people that creates a story. There's many different versions of RP, from the old yahoo speed posting that was so common ten years ago, to the newer Tier based systems common these days. Some people exclusively write their roleplay, while others either cosplay or LARP their created characters.

For me personally, it's a creative outlet. As a person who grew up watching D&D, and graduated from that to the tabletop rps, (Die hate me. I won't bother trying to remember how many times I got eaten by a dragon or exploded by a trapped chest. e.e), I found turn-based RP on the old yahoo chats, almost by accident, and have been participating in them since somewhere around 2003 actively. I love writing, and have a very overactive brain that I need to keep occupied. Roleplay helps with that. I'd like to eventually write or co-write a few stories of my own and get them published, and RP helps me figure out what people like reading, and ways to improve my character construction and personal interactions.

What is Althanas to you?

My husband and I found Althanas last year via a link on another chat site. We'd been looking for a new place that wasn't infested with trolls and people with ridiculously under/over-developed characters who weren't interested so much in writing as in impressing others. We tried a few places, Valucre being one that comes to mind here, and finally found this site. We loved the play by post set-up, and were intrigued with the leveling up system that is very unique to this site. We've usually built up our characters from nothing anyway, and a site that insisted on that premise to writing seemed like a perfect fit for what we wanted.

I think I've pestered pretty much anyone who would listen with a volley of questions, and unfailingly, every was nice, responsive, and offered as much help as they could offer. To me, it's our new online home, and we look forward to writing here and adding to the stories for years to come. n.n

How does Althanas differ from any other rp outlets you use?

Like I mentioned before, the leveling system you guys have incorporated here is awesome. It really sets this place apart. Aside from that, the people here are actually interested in writing, like challenges, and the level of cooperation between a lot of you guys in your collaborative writings is impressive. You helped make it fun to write again! I do think that you guys sometimes overload yourselves, (as in moderators), but it's something you all seem to be working to constantly improve as well. Althanas nurtures new writers in a way that a lot of the older and more established sites have forgotten with time, I think, and it's a refreshing thing to see.

[orphans]

What is your definition of roleplay?
When one or more people take to writing from the perspectives of characters that come together to resolve a set of circumstances. Or attempt to resolve.


What is Althanas to you?
Althanas is a community and a place of learning, to me. It's wonderful to see different people progress through the years and it's always sad to see people leave due to outside circumstances. We may not always get along, but I'd like to think that we pull through together in the end.


How does Althanas differ from any other rp outlets you use?
Character building focus. Characters have much more to tell at the beginning of their journey rather than at the end, yes?

[Storm Veritas]

Roleplaying is simply taking on another character or assuming another identity in multiple forms, including video games, writing, or live action play.

Althanas is a gathering point, which comes with a set of structures, boundaries, and rules that are used to allow a universe of writing-based roleplaying to take place. Althanas was originally described to me as something as a "writers workshop", however there game which arose from the results of rules being upheld offers a new, interesting tweak for deeper immersion into the Althanas universe.

Althanas tends to attract passionate, committed writers as there is both a long learning curve and satisfying reward for diving in. Althanas isn't easy to start writing at. It isn't a place that can quickly add new users in large waves. It does, however, offer a more tightly knit community and enjoyable writing experience than other sites.

[Shinsou Vaan Osiris]

Hi everyone. I'm going to be recording a podcast on Tuesday, and depending on interest it might be one episode or it might be a few episodes.

Instead of asking you to ask me questions, I'd like to ask you questions and then discuss your answers on the air. Without further ado:

What is your definition of roleplay?
What is Althanas to you?
How does Althanas differ from any other rp outlets you use?

Come on... tell me about yourselves.

What is your definition of roleplay?

When I first started roleplaying it was all about "how cool and powerful can I make my character?". Now, I look at roleplaying as creation of a digital avatar to live a second life and be amongst people who are likeminded. Yes, most people would look upon that, point a finger and say "wow, how sad must your life be to need a second life?". But that's not it at all. My current life rocks anyway. Roleplaying is playing the role of a fictional character. But to me, it's much more than that. This is the chance to vent my creative build ups, to make something intangible as real as possible with people who care. For me, that matters more than anything.

What is Althanas to you?

Althanas is no longer just a roleplaying website. It is an institution, a bastion of creativity and ideas from every corner of the world. Here, provided you respect the rules and each other, you can flourish and it doesn't matter whether you are the Monet of literary genius or just here to pick up as you go along. There is always a place for someone at Althanas. The community here is nigh unbreakable. It is a fantastic, wonderful place where the time you invest is paid back to you in dividends of respect, friendship and pride in your writing. I have been here or hereabouts since 2002, been involved with roleplaying since 2000 and there simply isn't another place like this in the world. The members of this website are the kinds of people you want on your "zombie apocalypse" team, people who, no matter how much of a hurricane of piss your day is, cheer you up and somehow make you feel you belong. I see oldbies like Storm Veritas, Cyrus, Dirks, ISOS (Visla), Sage and Gnarl and Root and company who have been around since the dawn of Althanas and it makes me fucking happy. I see more recent guys like redford, Rayleigh, Philomel, Logan, Tobias (sexy kid that Tobias) K-Zu, BABE, Fez, and if course Karuka / Mongrel and god knows how many others (sorry for namedropping) and I can see the future of this site is only getting stronger even after 14 years!

How does Althanas differ from any other rp outlets you use?

There are other RP outlets? Fuck 'em.

[Flames of Hyperion]

What is your definition of roleplay?

I tend to think of roleplaying (whether it be acting, writing, or gaming) as a specialised form of storytelling that focuses on investing oneself into a particular character. Its advantages are the ability to explore said character to its depths, to focus on the essential core of characters in conflict, and to collaborate with other such characters to resolve story plots. Its disadvantages to me can include less emphasis on the broader strokes of storytelling: setting in general and world-building in particular, as well as novel-arching plotlines (in the absence of specialist factors such as GMs).


What is Althanas to you?

On a superficial level, Althanas is a place to publish my stories, develop my characters, and hone my writing skills. A place to contribute to the stories of others, whether that be directly via collaboration or indirectly via feedback.

But in reality, like many people have said before me in a far better way, Althanas is a community. Some of us write, some of us play, some of us just hang out or lurk in the background, but all of us are here because we like characters, and stories, and imagination, and sharing and collaborating on these worlds within our minds.


How does Althanas differ from any other RP outlets you use?

I don't currently RP anywhere else, so I don't really have an answer to this. I can say what I like about Althanas, though: the play-by-post format because it allows telling long-form stories in both solo and collaborative fashion; the rules that allow for a focus on sharing such stories rather than competing or gaming, which I personally appreciate more and more as the years go by; an entry curve that weeds out the trolls and rewards commitment, dedication, and hard work. Althanas gives us this collaborative framework to overcome the shortcomings of roleplaying that I mentioned above. Althanas allows us the freedom for our characters to roam this world of ours, to affect it in ways that only we can think up of. It's amazing.

[SerCasimir]

What is your definition of roleplay?
Roleplaying is stepping outside your self to occupy another. Roleplaying at it's heart is theater. It's stepping into experiences outside those available to yourself, and doing it for any number of reasons

What is Althanas to you?
I haven't been here long, but Althanas to me is freedom. It's the ability to work out ideas and concepts I have from all manner of sources. I am a person who constantly comes up with ideas and concepts, and Althanas let's me experiment with them.

How does Althanas differ from any other rp outlets you use?
Althanas has much greater degree of freedom than most. I started RPing as a child before i really knew that I was doing it, inspired largely by video games and books. From there i took up message board roleplay on blackberry creek when i was young and we first had AOL and my parents had us on Kids settings. From there I occasionally found other sites, and spent serious time on a few of them. In recent years, most RP sites I have found have been fandom locked, limiting you largely to the "canon" of the particular setting. Althanas has a much greater amount of freedom, and that really gives me the playground i need to experiment.

[Gnarl & Root]

What is your definition of roleplay?

It is another life, another story, another world. It is endless possibilities with different restrictions and rules. It is a way of telling a beautiful story, or life of someone you could have been in another world. In other ways, it is seeing the world, or another world, from another point of view. Imagination and dreams.


What is Althanas to you?

Althanas is a hub of friendship and fun. It is a peace of mind that I enjoy and can escape in.


How does Althanas differ from any other rp outlets you use?

I don't use any other. Althanas is the only one for me!

[Taische]

Just a reminder to get your answers up!