A lot of people I talk to think they are terrible RPers for one reason or another. They make spelling mistakes. They are slow, and forget tags. They have a sue character. Nobody likes their characters. They don’t know X language very well. They are not creative. They only RP X character types. They RP a trope. All their characters are gay. All their characters are straight. Their characters are all male/female/both/neither/some mystery gender they made up or I don’t know about. Their characters no one likes. No one likes how they RP their characters. Here’s the thing my fellow RP rabbits:
RP is a constant learning process.
And no one, and I mean no one, is the best RPer and exempt from this. RP is something we as writers, as story tellers, build upon. Each one of us is guilty of something. If you don’t think you ever been guilty of some RP faux pass, I will break it to you, there is a good chance you have and a good chance you didn’t even know it. But, that’s just the thing. Most of the mistakes we make at first, we don’t even know. We often don’t care because we’re having fun, we’re learning. Occasionally we as RPers can hit a wall. It might be our muse, it might be real life, it might be faith in our own skill level. But that wall? It doesn’t always last forever. Many of us climb over it, break it down, go around it, under it but that wall does not stop us. We look back at that wall, at that block and we learn. We grow. We sometimes get, let’s face it, shitty RP partners. We can be assholes to them. We can be their friends, but the basic fact remains that we judge them. Now, let me go back to the overall message of this submission: RP is a constant learning process. Just like us, they are learning, and when things like this happen, it can be a gesture of kindness, of friendship, or of being simply fed up that we try to help them, teach them in some way. With luck, they will learn, and they will grow as we have. If they call us an asshole surprisingly we might deserve it, we might not, but we as RPers need to remember that we are just like them. We are still learning as well. No one is perfect. All that glitters is not indeed gold.
So RP rabbits let me conclude this submission with this. You are not a terrible RPer. You’re learning. Growing. Adapting and changing. Each time you feel like you’re a bad RPer, take a step back and look at what is going on. Look how far you have come, and look at how far you have to go, and NEVER GIVE UP. By submitting anything at all, by placing your words, you have put a part of you out there that is often close and precious to you. That step alone is often the hardest part. When you think someone is bad, it is human nature to judge them, but it should be our love of RP that reaches out to them and helps them as best we can. We all started with a goal in mind. To have fun, to write stories. RP is as fun as we make it. Our growth as RPers is only limited by our willingness to grow. It’s okay to be afraid RP rabbits, to be afraid to try new characters, to look for new RP partners, to try a new setting, to try a new RP style. All I want you to know is that is does not make you a terrible RPer. It only means you’re learning, you’re trying. I have been RPing for 3 years, and I still make a lot of mistakes, I still think I drive my RP partners nuts. I’ve made so many friends, written so many things that to this day can make me smile, laugh cry- And I look forward to RPing even more. I want to improve, to make more friends, to break out of my RP shell. I am not a terrible RPer, and neither are you. But the both us, we’re learning, and I am willing to learn with you if you’re willing to learn with me.
submitted by stolenvampires
