Some RP specific questions

Wyrmrest Accord
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First of all, Hi everyone! I’m a new arrival on the server, rerolling from level 1 with nothing to my name. I’m in search of a new wow experience with an emphasis more on social/RP rather than raiding mythic or pushing 20+ mythic+ keys (though I do very much enjoy end game content).

I’m also excited to try roleplaying for the first time. I’ve been doing some reading to prepare, and I have a rough outline for my character’s biography. However I wanted to ask some rather specific questions.

For the first: I intend on engaging with roleplaying as I level my way to 120. From the perspective of my character at this point, Garrosh is still warchief, I’m a wet behind the ears troll who hasn’t left Durotar, etc etc. I’m not sure if I should roleplay from the perspective of a troll that grows in experience as he levels, or if I should just act as if I’m level 120 and I know all the content that has gone on. Is there a consensus amongst the RP community which is more appropriate?

I see a ton of opportunity in just RPing the character as ‘growing up’ between expansions (Busting in to the bar wearing a distinctive Pandaren hat after going to Pandaria, for instance. Showing off the battle pets from Northrend. That kind of thing.

However, I am also intending my character to be adamantly opposed to Sylvanas, to the point of excluding any interaction with undead. It seems odd to RP that character motivation before my character is actually at the level he would know of the burning of the World Tree.

Second question: How much do people put into their bios? And on that point, how do people make their bios available for other people to see and react to? Is this an addon functionality? How wordy should I get in my bio?

I don’t want to my post too terribly long, so I’ll stop here for now. Thanks, and I look forward to interacting with you all soon!

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To address your first question, I personally find it works best when you come up with a backstory, no matter how small, for your character before you begin to really engage with others. I know that many who roleplay prefer to throw their characters out into the world and let them take shape as they experience things. However, for me, having that backstory – that framework – helps to explain and inform how my characters will view the world and react to it.

An issue you may run into trying to have your character basically grow up as it levels is that many other characters will wonder how yours isn’t aware of things that are a few expansions old or rather common knowledge at this point – the belief that Garrosh is still the warchief and the burning of Teldrassil being good examples. Not that you have to write your character as having their finger on the pulse of every last bit of meta knowledge, but certain things will be more common knowledge than others.

Another issue you may run into is that “growing up” your character as they level may cast them as being incredibly young – a child even. So that may be something to consider unless that kind of age range is what you’re actually going for.

If you choose to create a framework and something of a backstory first, you can cast your character as already being a certain age. You can have them follow a certain profession or lifestyle that can then suit your character’s breadth of knowledge or lack thereof. And then while you’re out in the world questing and leveling, you can absolutely still interact IC. Your reasons for being where you are and doing what you’re doing can come from a place influenced by the details of your framework.

For your second question, Total RP3 is the most common addon for RP. You can use it to include bios for your characters along with descriptions, custom names, and all sorts of other things.

If you write a bio, it can be as long or short as you want it to be. Most of the time, if you spell out your character’s entire history in a bio, people will not walk up to you assuming they know everything in it right away. Doing so wouldn’t make much sense if their character doesn’t know yours and would remove the aspect of introduction and getting to know each other.

If you do want people to know some things in your bio, you can always label those things as being more likely to be known. In addition, one thing many people do is to include RP hooks in their TRP profiles. So you can do something like, “Your character may recognize my character if they were in X place during Y time,” or something like that.

One last word on RP profile length, do keep in mind the general attention spans of most people when you go to write it. You can get as wordy as you’d like, but many people may not spend the time to read everything if you do. Conversely, you might make your bio so short that people aren’t particularly hooked when they read it. Something I personally do here is think about a length that would both spark curiosity but not lose my interest upon first glancing at someone’s profile.

Anyway, I’m sure others will chime in as well. I hope this helps give you some direction in any case. And most importantly…

Welcome to Wryrmest! Have fun and enjoy!

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First Question: There is no consensus on the topic, it’s down to personal preference. The best advice that I would give is to break down the expansions into chunks and decide what your character did during them. Roleplaying the leveling experience actively gets pretty convoluted.

Second Question: Once again, it’s just personal preference. The advice that Feyahni gave is more or less my response as well.

Just another little snippet, TRP3 allows people to make these little things called ‘at a glance’ and they’re basically buttons that can inform people about stats that may change. Some people only use these as their RP profile, which is fine and well but some people take strange offense to players who only have these ‘at a glances’ filled out.

;n;

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Thank you. This has given me some definite food for thought, especially:

I have to say this wasn’t what I had in mind at all, so I will go with the assumption my character is max level and aware of what has occurred, regardless of what my actual character level is. Thank you for helping me decide that!

You raise some excellent points about making a bio, and I appreciate that. Especially your points on being wordy. I will have to work out how to translate my character traits/quirks into a palatable, brief format.

How much leeway are people going to give? For instance, the character idea I have kicking around my head is, in essence, a troll who mimics the Tauren way of life, the ideals, even uses some of the same phrases. My IC justification for this is he was orphaned and raised in Thunder Bluff. Are people going to buy this sort of thing? Do I need to have some lore-specific justification for it?

I suspect I’m way overthinking this (it wouldn’t be the first time) but I just want to get a gauge of how strictly I need to adhere to the lore.

At any rate, thank you for such a top tier response and your kind welcome!

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Typically people will give characters a “pass” if the concept is believable or convincing.

This Troll concept sounds perfectly reasonable but may I suggest that perhaps this Troll had been mentored by a Tauren and decided that the Tauren’s culture was more appealing to them. The only reason being that Thunder Bluff is a touch far out of the way to send an orphan to instead of the one in Orgrimmar.

Just something to consider!

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Ahaha. Your response to this made me realize that there will be undead that don’t support the Dark Lady so maybe I shouldn’t be so hasty. It may be my character just opposes Sylvanas and her allies to the point of ostracism, with undead treated with suspicion. My goal here is to have something interesting that prompts RP possibilities (and it also plays well with the fact that I really do not like what Sylvanas has turned into).

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The shadows are always watching…

Also, on Sundays at 6 server time in Mullgore is “story circle” its put on by on of the Tauren centric guilds of this server and is always a huge hit, something you are going to want to check out and could/would help you in a lot of the RP as in it would give you a place to tell your stories.

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First question - while that could be really fun if you had dedicated partners to RP and level through expansions as if the events you are doing is current. Most people don’t really count level as having any baring in RP and RP whatever is current in the game, in this case Legion and Deathwing are defeated and BfA is going strong.

You’ll meet a lot of level 1s, 30s, 100s and 120s all RPing their characters from all walks of life. You might meet a level 120 that is a simple baker dedicated to making pastries to a level 1 character that might be a war torn veteran that’s seen combat across three different worlds.

You might also run into a few ding dongs that are gonna be like I’M PVP GLAD WITH ILEVEL999999 but just ignore them because they’re not going to be fun to RP with.

Second question and this is all personal preference. My suggestion for a character bio is to keep it short and brief and focus on creating hooks other people can use when attempting to RP with you, so usually focusing on any important events is a good way to do this. That way should someone read your bio and you note that you totally did something at this totally specific event, perhaps their character was there and it creates an opportunity to start RP between characters.

This is all personal preference but if I’m shopping around RP profiles, I’m likely to skip over ones that are excessively long or just skim the details to find a hook I can initiate walk up RP. Almost think of it like online dating? Do you write a lengthy bio detailing your life from the day you were born? RP you’re trying to sell your character to potential RP partners.

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My two cents:

It’s ok for your player knowledge of current events to also be known by your character - at least in the main outlines. While levelling (OOC) I’m thinking about how my character would have reacted to that IC - either as participant or having heard about it. But my character isn’t stuck in the past waiting for 120 to be able to play.

TRP (Total Roleplay) seems to be the most popular addon - at least in the RP circles I move in. It has a section for what people would notice right away & a whole tab for a backstory. Opinions are very divided on TRP bios. Some people write long paragraphs & enjoy reading other people’s. Some people keep it very brief - more hooks & hints of where to start interacting & prefer to learn the details by playing with you. I’d suggest installing TRP & looking at profiles while you are hanging out around the AH or whatever - sort of like people watching. That way you get a feel for what you like in a profile & do the same for yourself.

I’d suggest as a general start to rp that you go to a variety of open events. They can be intimidating, but it’s also easier to hide in a crowd than in a one on one. Don’t be too quick to jump into a guild. Once there’s a few people you regularly enjoy rping with you’ll know what guilds appeal to you.

Hope that helps.

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People will generally give at least a bit of leeway. That said, your concept sounds like a workable one for sure.

I’ll give you one more tidbit to think about. When you decide what your final backstory will be and/or go with the troll who adheres to tauren culture angle, the more detail you can include in your backstory the better. Think of the reason for those details in terms of real life interaction. For instance: when you meet someone who is interested in learning more about you and getting to know you IRL, what do they tend to do? Ask questions of course! So given the backstory you have in mind, can you think of some questions a stranger might ask your character upon learning that they were raised in Thunder Bluff? A few I can think of are as follows.

How did you get from the Echo Isles/Durotar to Thunder Bluff?

Did you know your parents at all before you were orphaned?

Where are your earliest memories from? Do you remember any place other than Thunder Bluff?

Having answers to questions like that will both help you in IC conversations as well as help you understand and connect better to your character. Of course, you can always go with the explanation that you don’t know/remember/were too young. But having answers to those questions can make for some really interesting developmental angles and really get others interested in your character.

To touch on something else you mentioned about how strictly you should adhere to Lore, the answer is as closely as you want. Adhering more or less to it will impact the types of people who choose to interact with you of course. But at the end of the day, this is about you enjoying yourself. I personally choose to stick to the Lore pretty closely, only bending it slightly, well within the realm of believability and reasonable explanation.

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It’s kind of up to you, but don’t be surprised if you get a lot of confusion for RPing that things that have happened several years ago are still current. Generally speaking, most people I’ve seen just RP that their characters know whatever it’d make sense for them to know, based on the type of person they are, how much attention they pay to the world around them and so on.

TRP3 or MRP are the go-to mods for RP bio’s! You can download them from https://www.curseforge.com/wow/addons. How long or wordy they get is up to you - some people like writing biographies with such length that you think you’re reading a novel and others just prefer snippets, or not filling anything at all! I know I rarely fill out more than a characters personal information. Last name and personality sliders, essentially.

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Haven’t read all responses so someone might’ve touched on this already. Only “problem” I’d see with RPing a jump back through time to Cata or whichever point in time you’re starting with is if you RP with other people, nobody I’ve met in-game is currently RPing several years in the past. And any relationships you do form, you’re going to have to find a way to do several time skips as you level up and explain why your character has suddenly aged a few years and what went on in those years that have now passed and what effect that had on those relationships. But if you’re mostly RPing alone, I don’t see any potential roadblocks to that kind of time altering RP.

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When I’m doing a background on my characters I think of it like I just woke up in their life TODAY with all the actions of the past expansion having already happened. I then get the string out like a crazy person and put together where they were when, how did these events affect them? Were they there or were they busy? Did they hear about it from others second hand at the time or later? Did they fight or are they a humble citizen? Did they gain anything? Lose something or someone?

I like the idea of a troll picking up Tauren life and it’s totally believable that a nice Tauren would take care of a little blue orphan since they are usually all about preservation of life. You could have been raised in org, taken back to mulgor with your new parent, or lived the life of migration.

As far as a TRP3 I try to keep mine short, details of the character beyond a stats list with a little information to let you know they fight, or cook, or they smell like a fishery. Something you can skim and get the feeling of.

And of course have fun, read quests, Wikis, and build a love for your character’s story

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A lot of good advice already in this thread, but I figure I’ll offer one little snippet that might prove helpful. Specifically when thinking of your character’s backstory, it is one of the most important things you can do to not make it the most interesting part about them.

You should still try to make it interesting, of course, but never lose sight of the fact that no one will ever care about reading your character’s intricate backstory as much as they will care about interacting with them directly. I’ve met so many RPers who have written literal novels about their characters as raw prologue, but then leave themselves with nowhere to actually go from there once they start interacting with people because they already told a complete story.

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There’s not really a consensus because it’s getting increasingly impossible to figure out what the timeline is. If you make a Huojin Pandaren, you’ll see no less than four Warchiefs multiple times undergoing multiple nonsensical character shifts.

At this point, it’s basically whatever fits your style. An inelegant, but effective, solution is to basically do the content and then retroactively claim you were there, which is not a lie or inaccurate.

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