General Premise and RTJ
GENERAL RULES
All of the rules and decisions made by the GM are in the interest of having fun. We're all here to have fun.
Bad things will happen to your character, if you can't accept that, don't play.
Conflict is the heart of drama and storytelling. If there's no conflict, there's no drama and no engaging story. This game will try to emulate the ebb and flow of modern fairy tales.
BEHAVIOR
0. Don't Be A Dick. Wheaton's Law is always in effect.
1. Narrative first, rules second. We're all here to tell interesting and engaging stories. That's infinitely more important than the rules. The rules are important, but they are just a guideline to facilitate telling interesting stories. Don't worry about optimizing the mechanics, focus on telling an interesting story-that is why I enjoy White Wolf's storytelling system.
2. Respect. If you haven't been told, please remember to use "please" and "thank you". Always be respectful. IC, play your character's personality, but be respectful to our fellow 'lings OOC. Characters can be disrespectful - that's roleplaying (and is sure to have consequences) but nothing gets me boiling more than players making demands and questioning my judgments after I have slaved on creating this game.
3. Problems. If you have problems with another player, remember we're all adults and bring it up with that player privately. If you can't resolve the issue, bring it to me privately.
4. Rating. This game is mature, not general or adult. Keep gore to a minimum and any sex will fade to black.
POSTING GUIDELINES
1. Frequency. In-character posting frequency of at least once every few days (48 hours). If you haven't posted by the 48 hours mark, I will skip you. Two skips in a row and I will remove you from the in-character group. If I don’t hear from you and you haven’t logged in for a week, I will write your character out in a genre-appropriately nasty fashion. ;)
Most games slow down on the weekends so those are a gimme.
2. Real Life First, Always. Real life will get in the way. In this crazy COVID-19 world people are dealing with a great amount of stuff but all I ask is that you drop me a message to let me know something's up.
3. Description. Always use standard prose formatting for in-character posts. Keep your posts interesting and entertaining. Please use present tense (ie “shoot” “run” “kick”) rather than past tense (i.e. “shot” “ran” “kicked”). It feels more immediate.
Push for evocative descriptions as they add to the tone, drama, and everyone's enjoyment of the game.
Pick a color for your character's dialogue. It helps avoid confusion when writing out conversations.
4. IC vs OOC Text. Unless you have to invoke game mechanics your post should be free of OOC text. Any OOC conversation should be in the OOC thread, not the IC threads.
Please write any out-of-character text at the bottom of your post, and in orange.
5. Rolls. When posting an action or reaction, please list what you are rolling as OOC text in orange at the bottom of your posts. For example:
OOC: Sammie Satyr gives Tod the Troll a cloven-hoof-flavored curb stomp. Sammie rolled 1 using 4 dice ((1, -1, 1, 0)).
6. Presumptive Rolls. Describe what your character's goal is and how they're trying to achieve it. Assume I'll ask for a roll and include it at the bottom of your post. I ask players to do this just in case it's needed and to cut down the handling time of the system. If I think the roll is unnecessary or the action was impossible, I'll ignore the roll.
In the case of a presumptive roll that would fail, I will let you know and we can go from there.
7. Rounds. To speed up combat and dramatic scenes with rolls, do not wait to post, just go for it. But only post once. After everyone's posted once I will make a single group response. After I've posted, everyone's free to post again.
There is no initiative order for posting. Just post. I will adjudicate the round using initiative and make my best guess for resolving any issues that might arise. If I think you're intentionally waiting to post for some kind of advantage, I will point this out.
If you're just role-playing without engaging the mechanics or moving around the room, feel free to role-play. Once you start using the mechanics or wandering around, be sure to fall back to the round structure.
Note: This only applies to in-game / in-character posts. Post your brains out in the OOC thread.
8. Investigation & Searching. This game will include some investigation. I want you to be specific rather than general with what you're searching for and what area you are searching because where you are searching and what you are searching for will effect your search time.
Be as specific as you can for the thing or type of thing you're searching for. Also be as specific as you can about the space you're searching for it. "I search the room." Not specific at all, that's bad. "I search the top of the desk for anything with a name or address that's already come up in the investigation so far." Specific about both item and area, that's good.
I'm more lenient with places than things. If you're looking for X on or in a desk, and there's something else worth finding, you'll still likely find it. If you're looking for X near where it actually is, you'll still likely find it. If you're looking for X on the wrong side of the room, you'll not find it. Better rolls get you more leeway.
If you're planning on searching for 2-3 specific things, in 2-3 specific places, post them. Stick with things that are covered by one skill and make one roll for the lot. We might negotiate how long it'll take or how much noise you'll make, etc. The more things you're searching for and places you're searching the longer it'll take.
This message was last edited by the GM at 15:25, Sat 30 Jan 2021.
