Guest Author - Melissa Weise
Okay, so I admit it, I have “stumbled”, “slunk”, “sauntered” (and just about any word other than “walked”) into a random online role play game (RPG) chat room a few times in my many years online. (It is actually getting a little embarrassing that I am the oldest one in the room anymore.) You know the ones with the nondescript tavern that may or may not have a bartender who may or may not be able to spell the word “bartender”. And the reason why I persist in these admittedly geeky forays is because online RPG is a great way to practice writing. You can set up plot, characterization, dialogue and even have a captured audience who will often give you immediate feedback about your writing.
For those unfamiliar with this topic, online RPGs come in various forms and have evolved from the Dungeons and Dragons played in college dorm rooms decades ago. They are rampant online including such visual games as Runescape and World of Warcraft, but the purest ones for writing are in streaming chat rooms where you can "one-line" or "para" (write one line at a time of the role play or write in paragraphs before submitting). They can be on any of a plethora of topics from fantasy to horror to anime and beyond. Often you will encounter teenagers or rabid fans of the genres who could possibly be your future readers so be mindful of their feedback. The platform I most often use is imbedded in the Yahoo Messenger instant messsaging program but there are many more out there.
For those of you who have never ventured into one of these rooms, usually there are some characters (chars, for geeky short) hiding under tables, in the rafters, invisible. For the most part, everyone has a character with some sense of beauty, or wickedness and a terrible past “that they just don’t want to talk about” and are sitting in the corner, in a dark part of the room, or just at the bar in plain sight nursing a drink and moody. And then, of course, there are the other characters who try to get people’s attention by whining, being playful, flirting, or causing a ruckus. Other than annoying spammers, people who try to chat out of character (or OOC) without being in parentheses, and RPers who beg people to IM them, these are the basic characters you will meet in a random online chat room.
If you want to work on plot, you want to be the second kind of character. But there is a certain way in which you need to do it. By trying to raise a ruckus, you are practicing plot – which is a huge requirement of writing a good story. Plot, in its most basic form is just another word for conflict. Without conflict, there is no story. Unless Romeo cannot get Juliet or the Big Bad Wolf huffs and puffs, there is nothing interesting that keeps us wanting to read the story.
When you are initiating plot in an RPG chat room, you need to show that your character has a conflict. Describe how he or she feels. This is far more important than what he or she looks like. This also means that you will need to think about it in advance. For example, I have a pretty regular character that I use who is searching for something. This something usually changes depending upon my mood (a magical charm, a relative, her child, etc) but it sets up immediate conflict. She searches around the tavern, and I usually write that she is also being hunted down herself to add some more conflict. Searching for something, being hunted down. Poof! Plot.
But that’s not all. The added element of practice and intensity is that in a chat room, you can engage other characters. Rather than just sitting in front of a blank screen and typing away on your computer to write a short story, you can try to get other characters in the room to become a part of your plot. This can be tricky because each of the other characters in the room also has their own plot and you will need to compromise and incorporate. You will also discover rather quickly whether or not your plot and writing are clear and interesting by the responses from the other characters. If they are confused or bored, they won’t engage.
By doing this, you are getting immediate feedback and audience participation in your writing. You have to be quick and creative and keep up with the other characters. And after enough practice, you will not only have improved your skill, but you will also feel energized about writing your next story.
