Vampyre Rulebook - Basic RP Rules and Building Character

On this forum, almost everything is allowed. From smut to graphic blood scenes. Nonetheless, there are a few essential rules we hold to keep things in order. The rules include things like godmodding, metagaming and autohitting. Please follow and abide by these rules. An occasional slip-up can sometimes be overlooked, but disregarding these common rules is frowned upon and can be met with a warning or ban. 

1. DO NOT God-Mode and / or Overpower

Godmodding is when a character features unrealistic abilities and powers that don't fit the lore. Overpowering is where a character has an unreasonable and unfair amount of power, interfering with the ability of players around you to have fun. Characters like these are invincible and refuse defeat or death in fights. They tend to ignore other players when they attack them. 

Nobody is good at everything! Try and keep yourself in check.

If you are unsure of certain powers or abilities when engaging another character, contact their player and communicate. You are allowed to overpower another character with permission from the other player, but don't forget to mention this in the post.

2. DO NOT Metagame or Mix IC and OOC

Metagaming is when a player applies OOC-retrieved information to their IC character. 

For example: Gaining information through a conversation your character wasn't present at, because you read the text. Or knowing a character's name because you saw it in the profiles.

Related to this, and considered taboo, is mixing IC and OOC. Players should not direct information and events that occurred between playing characters on themselves. OOC and IC information are two different things and are to be kept apart. 

If character A insults character B, and player B takes characters A's insult as a personal attack from player A, rather than exclusively an IC attack on character B, it is considered mixing IC and OOC. 
ANY INSTANCE of holding against a player what his/her character said or did violates this rule! (not to be confused with holding against the player any rule of violations he/she made while controlling his character). 

A smaller, but still a violation of this rule, is when character A says something which character B doesn't understand or takes in a different way, and player A tries to explain himself in OOC to player B. Allow a character to mis-react for the sake of adding interest to the game of being true to the character's nature.

3. DO NOT Auto (autohit, autowalk, etc)

Autohitting is when a player performs an action without giving the affected players a chance to respond. Running up to someone, attacking them and running away, would be autohitting. 
Example: 'He slipped past the man in the hallway and into the room nearby.' This can easily be fixed by adding 'tries to' or 'attempts to', to clarify that your character intends to perform this action. His succes depends on the responses from those around him. 

4. DO NOT Powerplay

Powerplaying occurs when a player operates someone else's character without the player's consent. The player takes active control of what the other character does. Not only is this not fair to the other player, but it also misconstrue the behaviors and personalities of the characters they didn't design. 
This can also happen in subtle ways. All characters should always have a chance to react. Instead of saying: 'He charges him so fast that he can't react.' should be changed to 'He charges him so fast that it's unlikely he could dodge it'. Unlikely, but still possible, if the character has the ability to dodge.

5. DO NOT Lorebreak

You can find information on this topic under Vampire Lore.

Lorebreaking is when a character breaks lore, affecting a character or scenario. The basis of the lore is origin, culture and known historical events. When a vampire is unaffected by something all vampires, no exceptions should be affected by, it is considered breaking lore. 

Lorebending, a similar term, is allowed! Lorebending is when existing lore is lightly modified, but not in a way that ruins the role-playing experience. These are usually ideas that are neither supported or contradicted by the existing lore. 

As a sidenote to the Lorebreak, people are encouraged to add their own things to the books, as long as it doesn't conflict with what is written as fact already. If you have any questions about this, ask the admin or a moderator.

6. DO NOT play Mary Sue

This rule also cohabitate with the previous rules. A Mary Sue is a character considered unlikeable and generally not fun to play alongside with. They are usually perfect characters without flaws, in an attempt to make them the 'best' character, but instead making them uninteresting and boring. A character who doesn't struggle to get what they want or need can get old.

A Mary Sue character fits one of the following descriptions:

• A character who is too perfect, lacking realistic or logical flaws, or whose flaws do not affect them in real ways.
  
• A character who is exactly like their creator, except idealized or made 'better'. It inserts the creator into the story, without the flaws, quirks and limits that make them interesting and real. This comes with the extra risk of violating the Mixing IC and OOC rule.
  
• A character who is far too powerful, especially whose abilities exceed that which is possible for his / her race in the setting of the story. Particularly abilities that do not exist within the boundaries of the story's world. These characters can be legitimate, but it is important to keep a good balance. 
  

----

These rules can sometimes be bend or broken, but should only be done with permission from the moderator and owner of the role-playthread. 

Always keep in mind that the purpose of role-playing online is to have fun.


This text is derived from [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.].

Building a Character

Building a character can be a fun and enlightening experience. The choices you make for your character, will make them come 'alive' in his or her early stages of development and begin to assume the identity you are making. The better you build your character, the more substantial and believable the character will be. 

For the Vampire Roleplay, we have tips to build a basic character to start with. This will contain information about your character's background, appearance, strengths and weaknesses.  

1. Choose a race
There are several known species in the Vampire Lore. Each have their own traits and story. Read on them in the Vampire Lore and pick a race.

2. Choose an appearance
Describe the features of your character. You can make use of images to show what he/she looks like. Use accessories that can show your character's background or has an interesting story.

3. Building a list of strengths and weaknesses
Using both common traits and the known race traits, you can use them to enhance your character and make them more believable. Perhaps your vampire can move swiftly, or is known to be very educated in Vampire Lore.
Do not forget: everyone always has negative traits! If your character is good in archery, he might be poor in hand-to-hand combat.

3. Create a background and personality
Write down a few words that embodies your character's personality. Is he charming, cheerful or romantic and intense? Form one sentence that can describe your character perfectly.

Using these traits you can then describe your character in more detail, building a background story fitting in the Vampire Lore. The more detailed your background story, the more solid and real your character will become. Character's shouldn't be predictable. They should be complicated, multi-dimensional and a bit mysterious.

Ask questions to yourself regarding your character:

• Where does your character come from?
  
• What is your character's age? 
  
• What happened to make them who they are now?
  
• What are their beliefs?
  
• What is their zodiac sign?
  
• How would they react in certain situations?
  
• Does your character have a middle class background? Upper class?
  
• Did your character's father come from a poor family and work his way up?
  

Etc.

4. Choose a name
Pick a name that works with your character's identity. 


-----

Example template (please feel free to adjust it to your satisfaction):

NAME

Basic Information

Preferred name:

Age:

Date of Birth:

Race:

Gender:

Sexuality:

Blood type:

Clan:

Titles:

Affiliations:

Prior Affiliations:

Occupation:

Appearance

Appeared age:

Height:

Weight:

Build:

Skin Color:

Eye Color:

Hair Style:

Hair Color:

Fashion:

Abnormalities:

Tattoos:

Personality

Base Alignment:

Personality description:

Abilities and Powers

Weaknesses 


Equipment

Miscellaneous

Brief Biography

Friends:

Family:

Enemies: