Copyright
© 1999
TOS Enterprises
All Rights Reserved. Acknowledgements
Velvok is the character-name of Mark A. Poncelet, a professional writer and longtime Romulan on TOS TreKMUSE. He has served as an administrator for TOS TrekMUSE for several years, donating his skills toward and gaining experience with many of the internal workings and systems of TOS TrekMUSE. His true devotion is to the players of TOS TrekMUSE.
Here at TOS TrekMUSE, you are an integral part of an ongoing story. Everything you do has an effect on the rest of the universe. You have the unique potential to become part of the history here. Think of this place as a massive book whose pages are blank. When you utter a sentence, it's written into the "book" as a line of dialogue. When you pilot your ship to safety or rescue a dying Organian, your actions become a scene.
A wise person once said, "Role-playing is what makes TOS TrekMUSE so much
fun! That's good, too, because you get more out of role-playing than you put
in!" Can it be that role-playing is the one thing that leads to excitement
and fun?
Yes. Yes, yes, yes!
If there is anything that we want you to remember, it's that when you role-play,
it tempts others to role-play, and that's what makes this place so exciting!
Before you know it, role-playing as an obscure humanoid will begin to become
more real to you, until the time comes when your character seems to be speaking
on his own, or seems to make her own typical gestures. It happens. And when
you get to this state, the hours just melt away. But the only way you can achieve
this state is to role-play, and role-play well. That is why this class will
discuss the fine art of role-playing, from gestures to combat.
Let's start by covering speech. This is the simplest and most direct way of communicating. By using the "Say" command (or by using a double-quote: "), you can get your point across in a hurry. But, just how interesting is dialogue alone? It's like talking on the telephone -- nobody can see you smile, frown, or wink. In fact, it's worse on TOS TrekMUSE because the other players can't even hear your tone of voice!
Remember: the more interesting your performance, the more others will want to
role-play with you, and the more fun you're going to have. Dialogue is very
important, and it's still a vital method of communicating. But what can you
do to spice it up, so to speak? Pose, that's what. By using the colon (:), you
can make a gesture, and gestures carry more impact than spoken words. There
was once a short-lived Fvillha (a Romulan Emperor) who delighted in casting
iron glances at ship crews as they performed under pressure. To this day, nobody
can remember anything that he said, but almost everyone remembers those blood-chilling
stares.
From experience, it's these gestures (not necessarily the cold gestures of the
Fvillha) that make your experience much richer. As a general rule, speech is
reserved for times when you need to communicate quickly (during a ship battle).
Poses are always preferable.
For those of you out there who are familiar with writing terms, you'll remember the Rule #1 of writing: Show, don't tell. It's been recited so many times that nobody remembers who came up with it. It applies here just as much as it applies to an author. Poses where a player just tells what he is thinking are boring. Poses of a player's facial expressions, movements, and demeanor, on the other hand, are just surface reflections of what's going on inside of one's head. They can be dissected, analyzed, and overanalyzed by other players.
We can take this a step further with dialogue. Often, what is unspoken is more interesting than what is said. Good logs of role-playing almost always have more body language than speech. It is a secret that few learn, and even fewer master. Those that do achieve mastery of showing instead of telling, however, stick out in a crowd.
It's going to happen -- you'll be role-playing and someone else is going to do something totally out of character. Maybe she'll start talking about a bug in TOS TrekMUSE's code, or perhaps he'll blabber incessantly about a sports tournament. How do you handle a situation like this and still keep the story (and therefore the fun) going?
If it's someone else that acts out of character (OOCly), then the answer is
simple. Just ignore the parts that don't fit the story. If the problem persists,
you could do what one of our super-ancient players used to do: take it literally.
If a player says, "Oh, no! There's a bug with the code!" You could
respond with, "What is this 'bug' that you speak of, tr'Vaebn?" This
is a bit overboard, though, and is only a way to tell someone "Please don't
chatter about out-of-character things" without being OOC yourself.
If you have to say something out of character, like "I have to disconnect
soon" or "there is lots of lag, and I can't keep up," then go
ahead and say it. OOC chatter is strongly discouraged while you're in RP Mode,
but you can get away with making an occasional comment unrelated to role-play.
Be careful, however! You might irritate some of the other players who are trying
to role-play. Try restricting your OOC comments to a whisper, or try adding
"OOC:" to the beginning of your statement. Both methods work equally
well.
There's one other suggestion that might even win favor for you from your comrades
and superiors. If you can think of a way to say what you have to say without
stepping out of your role, you can say quite a bit. If you have to disconnect
soon, you might say, "The end of my shift is coming up, sir." Are
you lagged? Try, "My controls are sluggish, sir." Whether you are
in the military, in the civilian sector, or in the government, your fellow players
will understand what you mean, and you will appear suave and talented.
There is one other iron-clad law that you should know about. That is, anything you learn while you are NOT in RP Mode is NOT KNOWN by your character, no matter what. This rule is in place to keep people from cheating, but also to enrich your role-playing experience. Under this law, you can talk about how you were marooned on Talos V when your shuttle went down, but nobody will know where you are unless you contact them with a transmitter, just as it would be in the real world.
Other people may OOCly come to you for help because they got lost, or because
there is a problem with the code. That's fine. Just remember that your character
doesn't know that this happened. And even though other people may discuss what
is happening to them on a far-away world, you may want to keep your IC activities
secret. It's risky to reveal your activities to less-than-lawful ears. Someone
might just tell an enemy of the Empire where you are.
Some players have taken this rule one step farther by living a special lifestyle
-- they completely ignore everything that is OOC, even when they have to jump
into the OOC Zone to fix their description or read TOSNet. They are called RP-Only
Characters. They are regarded with the utmost of respect, and are generally
known as the most capable role-players on the MUSE.
Anyone can become an RP-Only character---you just have to start ignoring OOC
things---but not everyone can live up to the title. Because the Romulan Empire
prides itself as being the best role-playing environment anywhere, it has had
the most RP-only characters. You are likely to see some in the future. If you
do run into one, make a special effort to role-play with them. You're guaranteed
to have a good time. If you want to become an RP-only character, then the Administration
tips its hat to you. We owe you some respect for even entertaining the idea
of going to that much trouble to make the role-playing experience more enjoyable.
So, do the RP-only characters enjoy ignoring everything OOC? Do they secretly
hate that they can't talk about their exploits with the other players? Unfortunately,
nobody knows, because the RP-only characters never revealed themselves. Some
of them spent more than a year like this, never acting human or breaking a rule.
(As far as we were concerned, they were true Romulans.) We assume that they
liked it -- we've had many RP-only characters in the past, and they don't get
tired of the role-playing.
Star Trek wouldn't be Star Trek without communicators, phasers, and transporters. Since TOS TrekMUSE tries to provide an environment that is as close to living in the Star Trek universe as possible, all of these things are available to you. You will find a huge array of devices, from ID Cards to devices that enhance the latent telepathic abilities of humanoids as you travel from place to place. These objects are designed to be props, to help you role-play, not to do the role-playing for you. This may seem like an obvious statement, but let's explain further.
Imagine that you're reading a book called "The Wrath of Khan." Inside
are three hundred pages of text just like this:
Kirk fires his phaser at Khan and misses!
Khan fires his phaser at Kirk and misses!
Sulu swings his sword at Khan and misses!
Chekhov vanishes in a transporter beam.
I suppose it gets the point across: Kirk and Khan are trying to kill each other,
Sulu is trying to kill Khan, and Chekhov has been beamed away. One might assume
that Sulu is fighting on Kirk's side, but how could you be sure? Players sometime
fall into this trap when they start pulling triggers and swinging swords. It's
not very fun to participate in something like this, and it's less fun to watch.
Now imagine this kind of text in the book.
Kirk fires his phaser at Khan and misses!
Kirk peeks over the navigation console and squeezes the trigger of his phaser,
sending a beam of blue energy just to the left of Khan's face, singeing his
cheek.
Khan fires his phaser at Kirk and misses!
Khan screams out in surprise more than pain, and fires back, a wild shot. The
phaser beam strikes a coolant vent on the wall, explosively filling the room
with a thick white gas and a choking smell.
Sulu swings his sword at Khan and misses!
Sulu, sensing his opportunity, leaps over the rail and rolls across the floor
under cover of the thick gas. Huffing with exertion, Sulu flanks Khan's position
and swings his sword in a wide arch. But Khan's superior sense of hearing detects
Sulu's approach -- Sulu misses as Khan rolls out of the way.
Chekhov vanishes in a transporter beam.
Chekhov says, in his characteristically Russian accent, "Scotty! The keptin!
Lock on to the keptin and beam--" But before he finishes his statement,
he vanishes in a bright blue transporter beam.
(Notice how each player reacted to what happened (phasers and swords missing
their target, transporter beam activating). This is because the MUSE has to
decide whether or not a given action succeeds before the players can start writing
about hits and misses.)
You don't have to be Chief Engineer to notice that the second example is more
fun to read than the first. It's exciting, upbeat
Is this an exercise in the no-win scenario? (Type "help" for help.)
"Okay, fine," you're saying, "but how do we do that?" That's
a tough question to answer, mostly because you're going to need the cooperation
of others to make it work. You see, you only have the power to declare what
your actions will be. Declaring the actions or responses of another is very
rude, and against several unwritten rules. But the more you say -- the more
expressive you are, the more likely others are to do what you want them to do.
Here's a very famous example:
The Romulan Emperor (Fvillha) mentioned earlier in this lecture was talking
to a human double-agent who had delivered some information to the Romulan Empire.
This spy became agitated and tried to escape when she was pressed for more information.
She escaped into the hall and encountered one of the Fvillha's aides.
The Fvillha, being a good shot, came out with his disruptor rifle charged. He
emerged into the hallway to find the aide and the spy fighting, hand-to-hand.
The spy was battered, and was some distance down the hallway. The Fvillha took
aim and fired, but not before the spy had drawn her own weapon. The aide jumped
in front of the Fvillha to protect him from the spy's shot.
Technically, the Fvillha's shot hit the spy, who never pulled her own trigger.
But since the aide had posed,
Kulan jumps in front of the Fvillha to protect him from the shot!
It was decided that the aide (Kulan) had actually jumped in front of the Fvillha's gun just before he shot. Everyone paused for a moment, the Fvillha turned around, aimed his rifle at Kulan, and stunned him. Then the action resumed as normal.
Who decided that Kulan should be shot? The Fvillha, the spy, and Kulan. Right
in the middle of the action, someone spoke up and they decided that it would
be more exciting if the bolt had hit Kulan. He was, after all, standing in front
of the weapon before it discharged. The Romulans made a sacrifice in favor of
the human spy simply because they thought it would be more fun that way. They
were role-playing.
Another thing that you can do is to embellish your actions. Instead of posing,
"Kulan jumps in front of the Fvillha to protect him from the shot!"
you could try "Kulan lunges through the air, summer-salting along the deck-plates.
In a flash, he rights himself in front of the Fvillha, arms extended and ready
to defend him from the spy's phaser blast." This works because the people
who read that are entertained. They get to read an exciting chunk of action.
People tend to like this sort of thing so much, in fact, that they'll go to
great lengths to see it continue. That means that they will make sacrifices
in your favor if you suggest that they should. Here's another example:
Posing "Romulan1 pummels you senseless with his punches" puts words in your victim's mouth, namely that they were "pummeled senseless" by your attack. Remember, this is a bad thing to do. What if you were attacking a Klingon? There's a lot of bone in those heads. Your blows might hurt your hands more than his head.
You might try posing, "Romulan1 lets out a piercing shriek. He runs at
Klingon1 so quickly that his feet hardly seem to touch the floor. He wheels
his fisted hands around ridiculously, but with great, rage-driven strength.
In a flash, he collides with the Klingon."
Notice that you've only discussed what you did. Now, the Klingon will read that and naturally think "So, what happens next?" The natural answer is that the Romulan will collide with the Klingon and wound him. Pow! What's interesting is that the Klingon will most likely recognize your extra effort and reward you by allowing himself to be hit. After all, he hasn't lost the fight until the MUSE decides that he's unconscious. He can afford to take a dive for drama.
The moral of all of this is that if you role-play, others will role-play with
you and you'll have more fun. In some cases, you'll have an advantage by taking
the extra time to role-play politely and verbosely. Not only will the other
players start to like your style, but you're going to attract the attention
of your superiors (and maybe your Administration!) as a very capable player
who should be included in the exciting missions and events.
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Copyright
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