That's easy, just stay in your apartment.

Unless your neighbours get stupid, too...

I'm the kind of person who tends to write a long background that staff are happy about and use to gague my performance and decide I'm a good Roleplayer before I even hit the grid with.

I really don't like writing backgrounds, and most of the ones I've seen (including mine) I wouldn't want to read.

I agree writing ability helps roleplaying, but improvisation and quick thinking is honestly one of the most important factors for a good roleplayer. I've played with people who wrote a novel (2 pages, I'm serious) per pose, but I couldn't stand RP'ing with them because it was either like I was roleplaying with a wall that talked, or I was roleplaying with a narcissitic d***.

The sad thing is many people tend to think these people(who write a novel, instead of interacting) are good roleplayers. It doesn't matter how big the words you use are, or how many you can pack into the simple explanation of smoking a cigarette, it doesn't make you a good roleplayer.

Honestly, I think a questionairre system, with option for background would be a good idea because in my experience ALOT of people who are good roleplayers end up behind or in CG for months because they can't write well. While I tend to get punted out on the grid, clueless, with people thinking I know what I'm doing, just because I use lots of cliche'd similies and don't know how to shut up (or stop typing on a computer.)

That, and I know from experience a staffer who has to read BG's more often than not will begin to gloss over them, looking for important facts or just forgetting them as they read, since it's so repetitive and can often be boring. Having bullet points for goals, past, personality, etc, would be alot quicker (if less artistic way) To get things done, so I agree with that sort of reasoning.

I've also seen quite a few ripoff characters given immense power because of their good bg, when the staffer who read it had no idea that they were a carbon copy of another character. (Once saw a character that was basically Anne Rice's 'The Witching Hour' to a tee. The only way I found out she was a ripoff of those books is by seeing the Trek Episode 'Sub Rosa' and realizing 'Hey...that character was a doctor with red hair and green eyes, always talking about witches, with a spirit who haunted her family, a long line of witches, and looked the episode up to see tha IT, in it of itself was a ripoff of The Witching Hour. So...) Background reading and writing may be classic, but alot of mu*s stick to the same tried and true formulas, it doesn't mean they're the most efficient.

I've read people's BG's that were excrutiating tales of rape and child abuse and if I were a staffer, I would dread reading another BG, because no matter how well written it is...it can really be a chore, and is counter-intuitive to coming up with plots and situations during a scene. I mean, if you see a player you've never seen before on grid, and want to run something for them, just because, you're notgonna read their entire BG while playing, but you COULD look at their bullet points of characterization, background, etc, and come up with something. I also know alot of people who don't know what to write when they start with a BG, and answering questions would help them immensely.

And btw this is a late reply, I've been meaning to post this for a while and forgot, so forgive me if it's after several topics I haven't read since I decided to write this. Also, forgive me if I already replied and forgot. The mind goes when one ages, they say. So I'll be screwed when I get old.

Pfft! Like my apartment will be safe. As a starting runner, I'll probably be stuck in a tiny, low lifestyle efficiency apartment in Redmond that's just BEGGING for the chunky salsa rule to pop up and ruin my morning cup o' soykaf.


Nah, in all seriousness though, I accept that people die in SR, and mostly intended to comment upon the good ol' roleplaying arms race. ?Let's face it, if you're in the sort of group where everyone's minmaxed to hell and the GM's reduced to pulling panther cannons, skilled mages, and Seven-7 out of the woodwork just to keep things interesting, your average pc ends up just spending a helluva lotta time with their head down. Likewise, a minmaxed character in a group of "lesser" characters is more likely to have his weaknesses focused on constantly. These issues often aren't easily rectified in small groups where the GM has less characters to worry about than the staff on a MUSH might. I just hope we end up with a enough activity that I don't feel like I'm missing out on much if I pass up on running with that gunbunny troll 'cuz I just KNOW his mouth will get me in trouble. ?

I still don't get why people think this.  Or why people think a huge background will get them approved.  Or why people think that's what PHS is looking for.  Or what they think RP is about.

But dude...  One line posing is more horrible than filling the screen, although the upper limit isn't too nice either.  But if you just pose 'Bob sips his drink,' then what is the person you're RPing with supposed to do?  There isn't anything there to work on and it's boring. Completely and utterly and you'll find me out of a scene just as soon as I can come up with an excuse. 

Same thing goes for a background.  One paragraph shouldn't be enough. Three word answers to questions shouldn't be enough.  I can randomly answer a list of questions off the top of my head and get a character, but then you know what? I won't have a clue how to play that character. And staff wouldn't know either.

In my experience as player, player helper and staffer (and that's a few years of my life I won't get back) a background was never, not once, used by staff for a plot or a scene.

So I am all for bullet point system - especially if it's indexed. If the staffer needs to know a specific question, he can get the quick summary, without wading through the entire novel. Like cliff notes: "What happened to his parents?" "What kind of education he got?" "Where did he get the cyber?" etc. Organizing the background in a 10-20 or even 50 question format should be a good thing, esp. if RP staff has access to them. If every staffer knows that question 14 is "Who are my contacts and how do I know them?" they can look up and use that information in a plot custom tailored to a runner, all inside a couple minutes.

Backgrounds, as they stand now, are a database dead weight once the character is approved and on the grid. They could be so much more.

Backgrounds are not database dead weight, or they shouldn't be. Even if staff doesn't use them they are still useful. Without a decent background, then how can you truly know how the character thinks? Will he be so morally ambiguous that he flip flops from white, to grey, to black hat on the drop of a dime? What personality quirks does that character have? What makes him more than a +sheet?

To me a background is fleshing out the character for the -player- not for the staff. If someone is not willing to write a decent background, then it proves to me they don't have any real interest in playing a -person- and would be much happier playing a +sheet. That's fine, it's a fully acceptable practice. On a MUD. In an RP environment I think it's a good thing for staff to be able to read a background and go 'Ok, this person has this characters personality down. This character will be a part of the world.' rather than 'Ok this character has all these skills, and look, a bulletpoint. His uncle Fastjack taught him how to deck!' Okay, extreme example, but still.

If we don't have a background, then we end up not knowing for sure how the character thinks IMHO. We don't have as clear a grasp on the personality, or what mindset the character might have about any given situation. We don't know -how- that character ended up as they are today, and thus, the RP is more shallow, more meaningless, with less to give in return since what is there to find out about the character if the player themselves don't know?

Some people can pull this off, inventing stuff on the fly and sticking with it. Most I would dare say, probably can't. They'll forget, they'll contradict themselves, they'll accidentally end up playing someone with MPD.

As you can tell, I am still a pro-background individual. If someone cannot put together a decent background (Note a decent background and novel are not co-dependent on one another) then chances are they're not going to be able to put a solid -real- personality into the characters RP. As mentioned above, good RP has nothing to do with writing a novel either. It's about being interractive. Reacting to what's going on, being said by other characters whom are RP'ing with/near you and by being able to pose well enough to give something back to the scene, to progress it forwards.

I think the idea of a questionaire with another section for narrative is great.  We could put it all down in a simplified skeleton format for reference but still have the real deal written for developing the char.

Alright, the usefulness of a "full background" insofar as you've described it, can be described with three detailed answers to these bullet point questions:

* Give brief timeline of character's life's turning points:

I'll just give an example of a reasonable answer:
January 31, 2017: Born in a family of human farmers in Kansas.
September 3, 2021: Mother dies in a car accident. Father becomes alcoholic.
February 14, 2022: State takes custody of the child.
<<...insert 15 more one liners here...>>
August 18, 2069: Jericho "Nemesis" Johnson breaks out of Hollywood Correctional.

* Describe the character in his own words, by quoting him as he would introduce himself to a prospective employer (no more than three paragraphs):

"Name's Nemesis. Thayt's awll y'awll need to know, hey. And yeh, them's muscles are awll real. Awll mine. No cyber, baby. Y'awll can stop starin' now befowre I stawrt thinkin' you like me. Cuz I'm awll proportional, and you wouldn't like thayt! Hu-hu-hu. Awlright, awlright, who do you waunt smowthered?"
"Hey now, situatiownaol homowsexuality down't make me gay. I'm whautcha mah caull an oppourtunist. Are we goin' to tawlk biz or are we hittin' on each owther? Cuz, no offense, bud, thayt girl ova theyre, looks mighty prettier than your five o'clock shadow, I reckon."
"Don'tcha get your panties in a bunch, chummer. I'm just makin' counversation. Siddown, relax. I'm not gounna make you mah woman tonight. Let's taulk biz. Whautcha gowt four me?"

* Describe the character's personality:

Having spent 15 years in prison, Nemesis is a dirty old man who's seen the worst of it and lived. His latent adept powers have caught up to him in the middle of his perverted life of crime and thanks to them, he doesn't feel his age in the slightest. He's the sort of demented psychopath that feels mellow regardless of whether he's making small talk in the bar or turning a knife in someone's kidney, both of which he could do at the same time without blinking an eye. His creepy toothless smile, combined with a southern drawl, as well as attention to detail and obsessive compulsive disorder (he likes to spy on people) make him the ultimate stalker. He is bysexual, thanks to Hollywood Correctional, where he ended up on murder and armed robbery charges.

The reason why breaking down backgrounds into easily digestible and referenceable chunks like this is useful is to make staffer's lives easier (less crappy prose to wade through) and players' lives more entertaining, because your dirty past has more chances to catch up to you - if you left enough hooks in your background questions, who knows, maybe a staffer will use it to throw a custom plot your way.

Here's an idea: if the backgrounds are broken down into 20 questions, the staffers who review them should have an ability to "mark" some of the answers as possible plot hooks, and be able to add "invisible" comments to them, that only other staffers can read. So, suppose with a command like +bgscan /plothooks or some such, an RP staff member could get a listing of all questions that are marked as such and read the comments of the reviewer.

So, for example, from the three questions mentioned above:
Question1 (Timeline): Police are looking for the inmates who escaped from prison, including Nemesis.
Question2 (In your own words): An ex cellmate, who made Nemesis "his bitch" is out on parole and bumps into him.
Question3 (Personality): Nemesis runs into a lady "friend" of his, who has a restraining order against him for about 15 years now.

The problem with all of that is that you assume people are willing to put forth the effort not written into those questions.  In general, they don't.  Here's how most would probably end up looking...

* Give a brief timeline...

2042: Born
2050: Shot a guy in the knee
2060: Joined the shadows
2070: Present

* Describe the character in his own words...

Hey, I'm SuperMegaDeathKitty and I like guns. I'm the best with guns.  Give me money or I'll blow your head off.

* Describe the Character's Personality...

My character likes guns.  He's loved them since he shot some guy in the knee.  But he doesn't like blood and violence.  He has no emotions on runs but cries in his beer when he sees Urban Brawl.  He wants to be good but does bad stuff.

That is one of the problems with questionaires, especially brief ones.  Can you tell anything about that character other than the player wants to shoot a lot of things but yet don't know where he learned the skill?  I'm not saying Questions are a bad way of answering things, but the reality of it tends to go that way. 

Hey I never said we ought to approve someone like that onto the grid. All I'm advocating is that the "background check" becomes an indexable, easy to search check list.

Also, to prevent answers like this, we can have "example" character backgrounds in chargen, which has been done in the past, something to wave at noobs with, when they send two-line crap into bgqueue.

(Honestly, I'd prefer no bg's at all, but hey, if we must have quality assurance, we might as well make it as painless as possible for everyone)

Dammit Dreamer, you stole my bg! Now what am I going to do!?!

It seems to me that it doesn't matter which variant you chose. If someone isn't interested enough in fleshing out their character their backgrounds and/or questions would be crappy in their first draft, no matter which of the two you decide to use.

The big advantage I see in using questions is that it would help inexperienced players to think about area's they haven't thought of before. But this could be easily achieved with a full background as well if you use the questions as a guideline to create your background. It doesn't matter if you go right or left in this. All directions end up with the staffers for approval.

I really like one suggestion that already has been made. Let players create their full background and leave room in the database for staffers to add plot hooks and other interesting stuff. Downside of this idea is that it would take more time for the staffers. Upside is that it would force better background checks.

If what needs to be said, can be done in a single line, all the more power to the player behind the keyboard.? The golden rule of prose is make your point effectively, and don't waste a reader's attention or time.

If a dramatic moment called for a simple nod, and a quick phrase, what's so horrible about doing it in a single line?? Do two lines better capture the nod, and phrase?? If so, then by all means, use two lines.? But the notion that there is some length requirements, or limits, for words to be strung together is complete garbage.

Are there appropriate times for Novels to scroll across a screen?? Absolutely!? Everytime a world champion typist, and world champion speed reader get together to RP!? Are there appropriate times for single blips of text!? You bet!? Everytime the pace of a scene calls for rapid-fire interaction.? But please, don't imply that there is some golden rule for pose length.

There isn't.

-CM

Eh, I just mentally edited dreamers post to mean "2 syllable posing", since sometimes a line can be rather evocative. But yeah, either in real life or on a mux, I'm sure we've all ran into these lovely li'l scenarios:

GM:
"There's a a burst of automatic weapons fire, the wild spray of bullets stitching holes in the wall mere inches above your head, blurring your vision in a rain of plaster and debris. Either you're damned lucky or your attacker isn't the greatest shot, but you've clearly been ambushed. You haven't spotted your attacker yet but there's only one direction he could of fired from and now you're expecting him. So, what're you doing?"

Player: "I duck."

It's annoying, doesn't give enough information, and pretty much requires the GM to sit there trying to coax out a workable response, and leaves the player plenty of room to fudge on just exactly what they intended to do. Even if there's other discussion as to what everyone is doing, a crappy pose is still just sitting there telling people nothing at best or being contradictory at worst. It's truly god awful when that stuff carries over to social interactions and people treat their fixer like the drive through window at mcdonald's, or second guess just how rude they were being to that mob boss.