Be creative; be bold

Wyrmrest Accord
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long post, there’s a TLDR for you if you need.

Kazimir made a delightful post about magic and wanting to hear about how people use it.

There were what I feel, legitimate disappointment in the thread about how magic is underplayed for fear of god mode accusations.

I agree.

Let momma n00dl be here to encourage you to be your wildest self.

Let’s start with the elephant in the goddang: “mary sue” and “edgelords.”

We’re nigh ubiquitously aware of this demographic’s reception… but you know what they have that many of us have indirectly renounced?

Creativity. Unbidden, child-like creativity. They create the wildest and most outlandish things, things we snob and deride—but honestly, and being honest, there’s just a lot of potential that our more rigid compunctions are keeping us from utilizing and wild stuff we wouldn’t come up with. They’re having fun, too, which is also great.

Please, yes, don’t break lore—or at least don’t take it public. But to bend it or fill in gaps? Oh my god, do it!

My own RP and personal writing was inhibited and even crippled by fear of snowflakey, Sueish, edgy, try-hard, lazy or whatever accusations, for a long time. Wrote myself into a corner of good ideas with muted execution.

Recent months though, training myself not to be afraid, has only improved my writing, and the experience of players brought into my stories.

With reason and proper handling, it’s very rewarding to just relax and ash-pull dumb or gharish stuff out of your brain and share it.

So! Here’s my list of TL;DR suggestions for you.

  1. Be bold. Don’t be afraid. Brainstorm and speak tongues with your ideations.

  2. As long as you don’t try to make it give you advantage in interplayer combat, it shouldn’t matter. Take your hits, even if you give it a wild flair. Only Warchiefs get plot armor.

  3. RP is fluid, and there’s workarounds for any hole you’re stuck in. YOU OWN THIS TIME. You hold the cards, your character is just a puppet. Brainstorm barf in a word doc. It’s so worth it.

  4. Take consequences as a chance for free, radical chardev. It can spawn arcs sometimes.

  5. Eat your n00dls.

I know this is a long post, but I hope it was formatted well for easy parsing, and that it helped.

:ramen::ramen::spaghetti::ramen::ramen:

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For a crazy void cultist that will eventually become raid trash, probably - you’re alright in my book. <3

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I don’t want to.

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Did I stutter?

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Did you?

Yes

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I will say again, people should be built up in their creativity, never torn down. That doesn’t mean no criticism, but critiquing in a kind way, not in a way meant to simply rip on them in front of everyone.

That behavior only serves the ego of mud slinger and discourage the person being insulted. That kind of behavior should be socially unacceptable. We’re all here to have fun! Stop the chest pounding. Encourage, don’t discourage :heavy_heart_exclamation:

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How often does it actually happen in the ideal way though? Serious question. Because I’ve only ever seen criticism used to freely beat the living day lights out of people, publicly or otherwise.

Not once have I ever, myself, received criticism that wasn’t lined with condescension at best, or (usually) swung with confidence-crushing force at worst.

Let’s be honest here: it’s possible, even likely, that those most in need of keeping this in mind don’t care and aren’t being critical out of benevolence. They’re doing it because it’s exhilarating to watch someone crumble under their onslaught. Even better if they can line up vocal back-up to support their nitpicking.

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In my personal experience? Speaking in terms of what I’ve seen, and what I’ve experienced? More times than I can count. Do people use “criticism” as a veil to basically just browbeat people into feeling terrible because it makes them feel better? Yeah, for sure. And that behavior should always be pointed out. People like that only get worse over time when nobody wants to say “Hey, can you ease up? It’s their RP.”

That doesn’t mean I’m not going to remind them. The behavior thrives on apathy. The community is important to me, and I don’t know if saying that bullying is wrong will do anything, but I know that saying nothing certainly won’t.

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The environment of the forums is very different from the environment in-game. We had this situation on Moon Guard. Plenty of outspoken voices denouncing the practice of bullying under the guise of constructive critique.

Take a wild guess how well it worked out, trying to foster a positive environment.

Even better, a lot of the really nasty ones, the absolute cockroaches who just wouldn’t stop bringing others down no matter how often they were confronted? They just scuttled over to Wyrmrest.

Maybe I’m just bitter. I used to be fairly, vigorously vocal in opposing that sort of bullying both in-game and on the forums. Changed nothing in the long run and got me, personally, nothing but silence.

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I’m not sure what you’re asking me to do, or not do?

It seems like we’re mostly in agreement that criticism shouldn’t be used as an excuse to insult and humiliate people for their writing.

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Oh, we are. I just don’t believe the people who really need to hear as much will actually change their behavior. They never have, and they never will.

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That’s what we don’t try to make them change their behavior. We just make it unwelcome here.

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The best way to deal with big egos who like to crush other people is to starve them of attention. Keep doing you, do not acknowledge them or their antics, report wherever possible and use add-ons like Elephant to record their shenanigans.

You’d be amazed how quickly you can let someone build up enough evidence to get themselves into a banworthy situation by simply sitting back, recording their self-impressed screaming and ranting and just forwarding it to the mods.

The ultimate punishment for the kind of narcassistic personality that has to be right and in control all the time is to have them run up against something they can neither exploit nor control.

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I remember the times of, ‘if you are RPing a dragon, you can never tell anyone, because dragons are secretive!’. ‘Why do you want to rp something if you’re never able to tell anyone?’. ‘You just want to be OP.’.

‘Actually, the mere thought of RPing a dragon makes you a bad RPer!’

This train of thought stifled my creativity for too long, and not just in terms of dragon rp.
It’s just plain fear.

You see, I’m the kind of person who enjoys both: the normal, run off the mill character, but also the out there concepts.
I want to rp a plain elf…and my other alt, as san’layn! Nothing wrong with either, because both will have different worries. Dare I say lives?

I’ve made mention of a character I’ve retroactively made into a dragon before, and I had a clear vision for it: I’ll let folks now ooc, but ic I’d keep it on the down low. Now my boy got into trouble and had to reveal his secret - on the first meeting! - to some smug warlock. I was taken by surprise with this development, but it’s given so much to think about.

IC, my char is pondering about this and that, since this is the first time he’s had to tell anyone so early. He’s putting his trust in this fellow, not knowing where it’ll get him. But he is wondering, if he’s being treated different now: is it better or worse, as opposed to being seen as ‘just an elf’?

That’s some, ic conflict you see? Plus, being a dragon doesn’t mean being flawless! My char and that warlock had a few misunderstandings already, where this mortal chastised my dragon. Now my char is working on being in the clear.

Furthermore, I got a good laugh out of the thought of a dragon doing quests for mortals…
You know, dragon quests wink wink

Anyway. Point being.

BE CREATIVE AND BOLD INDEED.

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Your suffering will be legend. D:<

But about dragon RP, I’ve also had a big 180. I think as long as it’s handled maturely, then it’s a story I’d love to jump innon.

n00dl had a rival paladin, and they represented Liberation/Conservation, earning the paladin the loving title of Comservatrix from Neddie. Mutual respect, big intrigue and this whole, “We’re doomed to kill each other in combat.” vibe.

But after a bit I spoke to her a few times OoC, joking about the paladin being a bronze drake. She toyed with it seriously, I encouraged it, and the story became so beautiful and tragic afterward. The scale of it exploded too.

When she finally “saw the truth” of the Light/titans, and broke as a person, it was emotionally intense in such a way that her not being a dragon would have robbed it of tragic power.

This whole thing probably really cemented my mind on the issue. Anecdotes nobody asked me to vomit out, aside. >_>

So more dragons, more weird things.

I wanna meet your scalebutt now. :ramen:

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Dragon RP is usually best done subtlety, to the point where it’s not even in your TRP. Only the most trusted players even getting that knowledge, with minor hints at some story moments.

People who play a blue-clad elf mage named “Totallyadragos” who are just eager to tell anyone with the ability to look at them that they are a dragon, are people that should be actively ignored. >_>

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Just randomly felt this needed reiterating for no particular reason.

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I just don’t get why being a dragon would be that taboo. It’s not like they’re even powerful anymore. They’re basically just strong lizards who can self-polymorph.

Which is way less extreme than half the stuff the players can be.

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It shouldn’t be. But I’ve seen people go into foaming, screaming tantrums about Kalecgos hovering over Orgrimmar somehow breaking lore so its whatever I guess.

My pandaren (previously orc) mage was in fact an old blue wyrm, but I generally kept it unspoken not because I really cared about subtlety but because I knew I’d be ostracized if I didn’t. The “a good player is quiet about it and never brings it up, ever” construct is just that. A construct. It makes no sense but good luck dispelling it.

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It’s not, unless someone were looking for a chance to assert themselves and bolster their own ego by tearing others down and assuming authority or superiority that is entirely in their minds.

Not that anyone is arrogant or delusional to do such a thing.

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