Post by Fuukami Haruka on Oct 31, 2014 20:48:14 GMT -6
Muse Building Activity Kit
Table of Contents
Basic Random Scenario Generator
Myer-Briggs Personality Quiz
Writing Challenges Involving Your Character
Stepping into Other People's Shoes
Plot Ideas
Write or Die
Overview
Table of Contents
- Introduction (being rewritten)
- Writing Ideas (being rewritten)
- Basic Random Scenario Generator
- Myer-Briggs Personality Quiz
- Writing Challenges Involving Your Character
- Stepping into Other People's Shoes
- Plot Ideas
- Write or Die
- Overview
Basic Random Scenario Generator
In a basic random scenario generator, you can choose whichever two characters you might be interested in roleplaying with. This is a challenge for two and builds up muses for two roleplayers. A well-known side-effect is that your muses may or may not develop together. Depending on the chemistry these two characters have, it may end up in perfect chemistry or a recipe for disaster. Anyway, this is how it works.
Using this generator, you put in the two characters you want to put in your thread. Let's say, for instance, we have the two Fuukami cousins in the same thread. In this one sentence scenario, we already have a very interesting dynamic:Haruka suspects Iryna is a vampire. Iryna is actually hiding a much more mundane secret.
Take their family life into consideration. Who are these girls? They are two cousins from a very wealthy family. One is half-Russian while the other is pure Japanese. Now that you have a scenario to roleplay them, you will need to think, as you post, about a) how does this affect their family dynamic? b) what would lead Haruka to believe this? c) and what are the consequences? When you do a thread between these two, this can be expected to be funny. But you must consider the same questions in possibly more serious situations that have occurred naturally or have been orchestrated by the two girls' roleplayers.
Myer-Briggs Personality Quiz
One of the most famous personality quizzes for psychoanalyzing yourself and your friends is the Myer Briggs Personality Test by Humanmetrics. So, you might be wondering, how does this tie in with my character or characters? Simply put, you take the test for them and try to figure out which personality types your characters possibly have.
It still is rather fun to take it for yourself. Perhaps it can gauge how well you can roleplay them, seeing an apple cannot fall too far from its tree. Or it can have no bearing whatsoever on your roleplaying performance. In all cases, however, it may or may not be entertaining to see whether certain characters' or roleplayers' personality types match up with yours or your own characters'. Maybe it will give you inspiration to test out the waters of possible relations between your characters or out of character.
Within the following link contains the list of various pairings of compatible personality types. If you find your character is compatible with another's, try coming up with a good thread to spark something special in between them! it might be just on a capricious whim, but it can still be amazing fun. My personality type is INFP as is my character's.
What is your personality type and what is your characters' personality types too? Use the first link above in order to find out the test results. Afterwards, use Mass Match's Myer Briggs' Personality Type Compatibility webpage to determine what possible match ups are best for your character.
Writing Challenges Involving Your Character
In this section, we'll divide the challenges up between oneshots and threads involving more than one roleplayer. Oneshot challenges include the Redesign challenge, where one's character must completely remodel a popular, famous or classic product. They may also rewrite or take a new spin on a poem or article or story. In this case, they are free to use the first person narrative at their leisure (meaning you are too!). Or you yourself can rewrite a story written before 1970 and rewrite it for an audience in 2003 in Hikarizaka, involving your character!
Write for an unusual client. Let's just say that you are roleplaying your character as a writer. Have them write a story or poem that caters to a customer completely beyond their normal audiences. Extend your boundaries via the fourth wall. Won't it just be the coolest? Last but not least, go and visit an artistic venue such as a museum, restaurant, sightseeing trip or a movie. Then write as if your character is the one that visited such a cool and exciting place or such a repulsive and distasteful manhole.
Exercises like these are definitely not oneshots because they involve more than one author. They are a challenge because an entire party of several different people must participate. The first challenge is to make a collection. Agree upon a theme, character, setting or otherwise that must be present in all pieces of writing. Everyone has to make a contribution.
Secondly, another challenge could be designing for another writer. Work on their project, take a look at their draft, edit it and take it in a whole entire different direction. You will not only get a different theme or direction, but you may also be able to see a different perceptive from someone who dared to tackle the same task you did.
Sometimes people are forced to cook without the proper tools, but how can you lose the equipment you use as a roleplayer? The answer is that you should work in threes when doing this challenge. One can't use adjectives, another adverbs while another can't use gerunds/gerundives. The trios participating must finish each other's posts by adding the missing parts of speech they are allowed to use. Essentially, this is one big messed up Mad Libs.
By the way, did I forget to mention that each post has to be finished in thirty minutes' time?
Stepping into Other People's Shoes
Here we delve into an even harder writing exercise. By stepping into other people's shoes, we find the different kinds of paths people chose to -- or are made to -- walk upon in life. Tracing these paths ourselves may develop an important kind of empathy needed to roleplay those people and the characters we roleplay already by providing insights into how different people may or may not react to them. Maybe they won't even react; perhaps they'll reach out.
But expanding beyond what we know and breaching new territory is nothing to be ashamed of, as long as we treat our task diligently, carefully, and respectfully. In this activity, we are not here to parody other people's experiences or mock them. Stepping into other people's shoes means that we have to try and understand what other people have to go through.
If we cannot, then that is a shame. In that unlikely event, then you may be better off trying one of the other exercises provided to build up enough experience so you are ready to perform this task. Remember, even if things are difficult, you must never give up until you give it your best shot. Afterwards, it is a sad but true thought that your skills may decline after birthing your magnum opus or your best shot. This is why we have to continue on believing we haven't made our best shot yet. We cannot let ourselves believe we have ever reached our full potential but that is not to say we shouldn't believe we have done something profound or good.
Anyway... In this exercise, you may roleplay some character you have never tried before as they reflect on the character you hope to gather insight on. Or, if that is too much crunchy granola to bite off, try recording the first impressions your character has of other people. Then, compare and contrast your characters' first impressions with the true selves of the people who have made an impression on them. You may be surprised with how different and skewed views can be at first sight. We are humans after all. Our sight is so flawed yet we rely on it the most -- even though you may just as well call us blind.
Plot Ideas
Plot ideas are vague little games of telephone played via roleplaying. If you need help trying to fit in your character, including them in a plot is a good idea. By having a theme or concept or a simple issue to work on, characters can interact and work together. For instance, let us say that foreigners are steadily becoming unwelcome. Who will break the mold, and how does everyone react to the situation? Or, for another example, the cast of a certain franchise could visit Hikarizaka. Who will become their friends, foes, or otherwise? How will they fit in? Can they fit in?
In the end, a lot of this involves generalizations, but the ideal kind of plot may involve a quest, such as putting the end to a serial killer's string of murders. There will be problems to solve, teamwork to be done, and allies to be gained. How can bringing up various ideas in a group be any more fun? Creating plots allows us to explore our characters' development.
But if we are to try and fully explain the sheer genius of creating plot ideas and then acting on them in just one minuscule section like this, then feel free to call us fools! It would take multiple threads, several pages each, to explain the brilliance of a site-wide plot as well as the incredible downfalls once might face in turn. The best way to understand this exercise is to try it yourself, but you need to cover all possibilities your plot may have, even if it seems impossible.
If you don't have any structure or ability to moderate a plot's progression yet while being in charge, you are on thin, thin ice. The best way to go about making plot ideas is to talk with someone experienced in making plots and actually giving it a go, as flawed as your attempt may be. You can only learn so much from success, but failure is an impeccable teacher if you are sensibly reliant on hindsight. Foresight is an important quality to have, however.
Write or Die
This website is purely to keep you motivated and writing. It does not necessarily fill you up with creative juices, although they are working on something can help generate writing or plot ideas.
If you have procrastination issues like me, the website Write or Die will be an invaluable resource to you. Whether you need to get some soul sipping homework done or finish a post draft or two that has been collecting dust, use this website to get the posts or homework done so you can use your time as you please. But until you get all that pile of trouble done and over with, you can't be comfortable yet.
How this site works is simple: there are several functions. Being the metaphorical stick in the universal donkey-and-carrot style of motivation, Write or Die provides a conducive environment that can startle you if you don't write -- or even start unwriting your words as soon as you get too lazy.
Now, they are experimenting with forms of encouragement, too by providing a Stimulus Mode that allows a positively-reinforcing but neutral writing environment or a Reward Mode that showers you with rewards for keeping to your task and a custom playlist to keep you writing and in action. In this application (for Mac, Linux, and Windows), you can expect results almost immediately as the program eliminates writer's block completely by punishing procrastination and rewarding accomplishment. Go and give it a try! You may find it immensely helpful.
Overview
SummaryTo wrap things up, I would like to say that the list of various things you can do to build up inspiration or plans for your characters is endless. If anyone has any suggestions or questions, please Private Message them to me on the account made for Fujihara Ageha. Currently, she is out of action in character, but her account is still my main one regardless. In the next post, I will place the answers to your questions in an FAQ if people find themselves interested enough. All suggestions will be credited in the same post while put into action if deemed effective. Otherwise, I would like to say that just because certain muse building activities are not enumerated here on this list doesn't mean they do not deserve a chance. In fact, they deserve a shout out. As a result, I would be more than pleased if someone reports on how well their experimentations with any kinds of muse building activities.
Remember that each activity has their strengths and weaknesses, and some just may not be the ones for you. However, with an open mind and a desire to work hard to get results, you can do anything. I am certain that by building up inspiration and resolve for roleplaying your unique and wonderful characters, this site is capable of being revived again. In fact, I have tried out a few of these strategies, albeit not overtly. So far, these strategies have worked for me and they have been listed so you can try them too. With the activation of several possible candidates for OCs and Canons alike, I hope that these suggestions are capable of helping to establish a new, flourishing population that stays and remains active.
Regardless, we must return to our original objective. These ideas may contribute to building up muse for your current threads or they may contribute to a consistent stream of activity within the site, but they are not without their pros and cons. Within the following section, I would like to elaborate on the general pros and cons of using this activity kit. Although none of these activities are must-do's unless if one is completely lost, they are all strongly recommended because they are fun and aren't meant to be issued to you by a slave-driver. These activities are not solely for the sake of strengthening characterization. They are here to preserve high quality entertainment brought on by roleplaying with other people. I hope you all have an excellent time roleplaying on this site. I know I certainly will.ProsConsThe benefits to doing these muse-building activities should be fairly obvious. Practicing our writing and roleplaying skills keeps our skills finely tuned and ready to be put into action. If we continue writing for our unique set of characters, perhaps the will to roleplay them will grow even stronger as they -- and we -- change throughout time. We will experience things that will improve our own outlook of the world, and so will our characters. By building up the will to illustrate our characters' points of view, we can steadily increase the repertoire needed to illustrate our own. These activities can even be considered traditional roleplaying in and of itself. However, unlike normal roleplaying, the activities found in this activity kit are specifically created to help develop strong voices for our characters and for our own unique style of narratives. Above all, by promoting excellent writing and roleplaying skills, we can promote overall enjoyment of creative writing and roleplaying as a whole.There isn't that many problems that could arise with these muse-building activities other than the fact that it creates a dependency on collaboration with other writers and roleplayers. However, there is nothing wrong with asking for help or critique when seeking to improve yourself as a writer and roleplayer or yourself and your characters as people. Otherwise, there are minuscule problems you can only run into if you nitpick, such as a need to write when you have someone or something else monitoring you (but this is a rare case). Equally, there is one thing someone must avoid if they hope to do the exercises listed above or roleplaying in general. First, we must abide by the rules set in place within this roleplaying forum, and secondly, we must avoid repeating the mistakes we have been critiqued on. That is not to say it doesn't take practice and that one can't lapse, but if we practice the wrong skills (or better stated: blunders), then we won't be able to improve. But this is nothing to worry about if you carry a reasonable amount of thought when you roleplay in general or do these exercises.AfterwordHowever, a general caution is needed to not feel the need to commit utterly to these exercises. If reality gets in the way of the time you have scheduled for roleplaying or writing, it cannot be helped. No one has the right to get mad at you if you have school or work or your health to attend to. In the end, roleplaying is nothing but entertainment. The fact that life gets in the way is nothing we can fault you for. But it doesn't mean it's okay to abandon something you have chosen to commit to because of your fears. You have better things to fear about, and everyone knows you are capable of good things, as long as you have enough faith in yourself.