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Vampireratz
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posticon Guidelines for In-Character IM Sessions

ICIMS Guidelines


These ‘guidelines’ are by no means set rules for how people should go about having an ICIMS, but merely provide an idea of how things can be done, and to give people a point of reference if they are unsure. At the end of the day, the aim of an ICIMS is to RP as easily as possible, and for it to be an enjoyable experience for all involved. So, as long as all involved are ok with the methods used by each RPer, individual styles and alternatives are perfectly acceptable. Basically, fun first, ‘rules’ second. :-)



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ICIMS are useful when one or more RPers cannot be IG itself (due to reasons such as RL issues/conflicts or technical problems, for example), if RP events are relatively simple in nature or are based mainly around character speech. They can also be helpful if only specific RPers are required for certain events, meaning the going-ons can still take place as RP events, but without uninvolved RPers feeling left-out from going-ons as they would were it held IG.




Unless otherwise stated, there is no mandatory requirement for an ST during the session, though obviously this may be necessary for specific sessions/storylines. As with a lot of RP situs – a certain amount of common sense can be used, and each RPer can ‘control’ the events involving their own character to some extent (but obviously this depends on the SL of the individual ICIMS taking place).




As with standard RPing, any OOC chat should be clearly separate from IC chat (in brackets/double-brackets etc, as is usually used IG).




Square brackets, i.e. [ and ], can be used for ST-style info, or to make it clear which character is speaking if one RPer is involving more than one of their own characters in the events.


Some different examples:

[Location] Apone’s club


[Alato] *Rolls her eyes*
[Milo] I KNEW you were going to do that.


[Scene] A dark alley-way somewhere in London.


[The door is smashed open by the cops]


They could also be used to give indication as to a different language that is being spoken if it is necessary for other RPers to understand them. For example:

Angel: *looks to Deacon*
[In Latin] Which book was it?




------(NOTE: In most IM programs such as msn, Skype etc, if you want to start a new line or new paragraph within one response, hold down the shift key whilst pressing enter - This will allow you to include line-breaks in what you write, before pressing the Enter key and ‘sending’ the response.)------




Most of the ST-style terms are self-explanatory, but just to make it clear, here are a selection that can be used (I can add more as I remember them).

[Location] – This is good when the RPers have a specific IG map in mind. This means that less typed description is needed and all RPers have an immediate idea of their surroundings etc.

[Map] - A simplified version of the ‘location’ ST-term.

[Scene] – A term used when a location description is needed – usually when it’s in an area that isn’t based around an actual IG map.

(The descriptions given with both of these terms can also include times, dates, weather etc if required, depending on how much detail is necessary).




Action descriptions: These can be performed in the same way they are IG when a RPer doesn’t use the : key before their action (ie not as blue writing when in IG text). For example:

*waves*
::sighs::




Combat: Combat is usually left to IG sessions as it can be provided via ‘hack & slash’ or the built-in dice roller, but it doesn’t mean that it is impossible in an ICIMS. In this situation, fights will usually need to be based on description, the RPers using common sense that attempts to realistically balance damage and skill etc via described moves, without relying on dice throws. It is for this reason that descriptive combat can be more challenging (one has to know when their character should get damaged, the extent to which they get damaged, and when they would be skilled enough to avoid this happening. In other words, uber-skilled, unable to be damaged types can get rather irritating for other RPers unless it is a deliberate part of a SL. Alternatively, descriptive combat can also be preferable in some RP sessions if a specific injury or type of damage is required as part of a particular SL.







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8/14/2009, 2:47 am Send Email to Vampireratz MSN
 


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