A Philosophy of Producing Collaboratively Written Interactive Role-play Stories

[EmpressJosephine]

I enjoy collaboratively writing interactive stories of the sort listed in my signature below. I have had the pleasure of doing so with many excellent authors. In the course of that, we have often discussed our approach and philosophy of producing such works. Because many have found my approach worthy to adopt, I thought I would share it here.*

First, I'm not a fan of pre-planning scenes or stories. I like to set the stage, establish the characters, and then let each writer have her or his character react to what the other writers have written as they believe (and hope) their character would react.

To facilitate this, I have developed four simple guidelines:

1. Respect character autonomy. It is a basic courtesy in interactive role-play writing that you do not put significant words, if any, in another writer's character's mouth, and you do not assume another writer's character makes decisions or takes significant action without that other writer's permission.

2. Be consistent. Make sure you know what is going on in the other writers' posts well enough that you do not post some action, event, situation, or setting that contradicts what another writer has already established.

3. Be literate. It makes it easier and more enjoyable for everyone if writers follow the conventions of English spelling and grammar (the one exception being in dialogue if your character does not speak the Queen's English).

4. Proofread! See 3, above.​

In truth, that pretty much covers it. From my experience, if all the writers in a collaborative role-playing project adhere to these guidelines, then things go well and it produces a good story. I hope you all find this helpful.

Please share below your reactions, questions, comments, or suggestions.

* This short essay is a more general version of an earlier post at another thread.​

 

[sr71plt]

#4 could say "see 2" as well. If you filled this out a bit--possibly on how to find collaborators as well and what is needed in collaborators (i.e., someone who will work at the same pace as others involved; people with compatible, but slightly distinctive writing styles), this would make a good "How To" essay for the story file.

 

[EmpressJosephine]

#4 could say "see 2" as well. If you filled this out a bit--possibly on how to find collaborators as well and what is needed in collaborators (i.e., someone who will work at the same pace as others involved; people with compatible, but slightly distinctive writing styles), this would make a good "How To" essay for the story file.

Thank you.

I considered posting this in that forum but, as you point out, I would need to flesh it out first.

Perhaps some day I will.

 

[IvyMarquis]

The first one is more commonly known as "God modding/Power playing", and yeah it's a pretty quick way to drive off roleplay partners, unless y'all have discussed it prior to move a plot point a lil quicker.

I got started in writing by role playing (non erotic, of course. I was but a wee bab), and there's a few other cardinal notes to help keep an rp going and alive;

By and large, the RPs I've had that I was the happiest where ones where we naturally matched length. By that, I mean we were roughly within the same word count. I can write a post that's 800-1,500+ words (I was 'reared' to count words, not paragraphs), but that's a lot of effort so I'd much rather clock in at a low key 350-500 words. It moves things along quicker, is much more low pressure so everyone's happier.

If I RP with someone who's routinely cranking out posts at the upper tier of my writing limits (so basically 1k+), I feel pressure to give them as good as they gave. This stresses me out, makes me take longer to finish as I'm damn near always nit picking, and just bleg. On the other side, if it's someone who's giving me 3 sentences when I'm working ~500 words a post, it can get frustrating as I don't have much to work with in the response. Unless, of course, y'all have discussed it and no one cares and you're just gonna write however much you feel like and don't fuss about word count any (Been there and done that as well).

Another thing is to have a "Yes, and" with replies; you don't contradict what the other poster put (re: rule about consistency) and add something else so they have something to respond to, rather than simply putting down a reply and not adding anything for the other person to work off of.

I've currently spent the last month having a very pleasant RP with a friend of mine. It's a good little exercise in writing and helps get my creative juices flowing. Most of the time when I write, I'll do some replies as a "warm up" and then work a lil on a story after.

Like Pilot said, if you fleshed this out it could go nicely into the how tos. Roleplay gets knocked but in the right environment (like I was in), it can foster someone's writing growth. Getting that feedback and reading different styles from many different partners over the years helped me sort out my own style, though it's still evolving of course.

 

[NOIRTRASH]

I'm still trying to fathom the OP's #1.

Einstein and others warned: IF YOU CANT SAY IT IN A PARAGRAPH OR SO YOU DONT KNOW WHAT THE FUCK YOURE TALKING ABOUT.

 

[sr71plt]

The OP is basically a How To essay (or the start of one). If you have to limit a How To essay to one paragraph, there couldn't be a How To section on Literotica because of the wordage minimum.