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15:15, 29th March 2024 (GMT+0)

Posting Guidelines.

Posted by NarratorFor group 0
Narrator
GM, 3 posts
Wed 20 Jan 2021
at 20:34
  • msg #1

Posting Guidelines

Be Respectful
We're all here to have fun! But, I understand that the world is kind of topsy-turvy, right now, and folks may not be in the best places in real life. So, it's okay to have a bad day. But, please, try to be mindful of the other players. If you have a problem, try to work it out peacefully via PMs between yourselves or PM me to act as an intermediary. DO NOT attack each other OOC. If you do that, I'm not even going to try to sort it out. I'm just going to boot whoever started the fight out of the game in order to maintain peace here.

No God-modding
I think this is pretty standard for all free-form games. The only character that you control is your own. You must always allow another player to decide how they react to whatever you post.

However, as the GM, I reserve the right to use small amounts of god-modding to further the story. For instance, I may post, "Character A glances to the left and notices a red tie hanging from the hat rack." I'm not going to move your character or make you do anything, but I need to have a little flexibility in order to get information to you, sometimes. (And, yes... that example comes straight from a complaint I got from a player that, "Their character would not look in that direction" in response to me mentioning something they noticed in a room they had just entered.)

Time Outs
If anything happens in the game that gives you pause, for whatever reason, you can call a Time Out. It can be invoked if you need clarification, someone has crossed a line, etc. Basically, it's used for anytime that there needs to be a quick chat about what is happening in the story between players or the player and GM.

Examples:

Time Out! Can we not use spiders? They really bother me.

Time Out! I'm not sure that Fred would actually be close enough to reach that place. How far away is it?

Time Out! Wait a minute. Didn't Barney actually take care of that in [other post?] Are we forgetting something or am I imagining it?

Moving Between Locations
If you move between locations, just add a quick note at the top or bottom of you last post indicating that you are moving. It's just a way to keep track of character movement.

Examples:

quote:
Character leaves
Imagine this is a nice post with lots of nice things happening. Now, a character leaves to go to another location.
[Character leaves to go to Location B]


quote:
Character enters
[Character enters from Location A]
Imagine this is a nice post with lots of nice things happening. Now, a character has entered from another place.


Rate of Posting: Unrestricted
I know that a lot of folks ask for restricted posting so that slower people have a chance to chime in. I've seen too many games wither and die because the enthusiastic players were hobbled by the slowest posters. So, I'm going to err in the other direction on this, and I realize that it will not suit some people.

I know that life gets busy. You have a job, a family, school, etc. Real life always comes first! So, I'm not expecting folks to post every day. I'm expecting maybe twice a week. But, that said... if someone else posts more quickly, I'm not going to ask them to slow down.

Absences
If you need to be gone from the game for a bit, please let us know! And, do write your character out of any scenes that they may be actively participating in. That way, no one else is held up by you being unavailable.

Leaving the Game
Hey, sometimes things just don't work out. Maybe real life makes it hard to keep up with a game. Maybe you don't mesh with me or the other players. Maybe you just don't like the way the story is panning out. And, that's okay! It happens. If you could just let me know that you are leaving, I'd appreciate it. You don't even have to tell me why. I won't even ask about it. Just a quick, "Hey, I need to drop out" is all it takes. (I want all of this to be as "no pressure" as possible.)

Ghosting
I have no problems with players ghosting. I would prefer to be told, but I completely understand that, sometimes, it's easier to just fade away. That's fine. I'm not going to get mad at you over it. Plus, I have a system in place for this!

If you don't post for two weeks in a row, your character will be placed in "ghost status." At this point, I'm keeping an eye on things and have noted that you're not around. I'll NPC your character out of a scene to free up others to play around you, but will leave them alone, after that.

After four weeks without posting, your character will be marked as either "abandoned" (see RTJ Rules) or "adoptable" (see RTJ Rules). If abandoned, then the character is allowed to fade into obscurity. Maybe they moved to another town or were abducted by aliens. Who knows! If adoptable, then I'll allow a new player to take over the character, if they so wish.
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:52, Mon 15 Feb 2021.
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