Share your RP tips and tricks!

[Studenterhue]

Hello farty spacepeople RPers, as you might have noticed, there's been lots of new faces on the RP server lately. Some of them are Goonstation main players trying out RP, some are curious people joining RP from the BYOND Hub, and some are fans looking into Goonstation because their favorite streamer or youtuber's into it.

With that in mind, I have a simple request: what's one roleplaying tip/trick/piece of advice you'd give to someone who's interested in trying out the Goonstation Roleplay server? It can be something for a specific job or aspect of the game, some advice on using LOOC, or just something about roleplaying in general.

I'd also like to highlight this wiki page, Roleplay Tips and Tricks. It's quite useful. It's always been open to new additions, but now that RP server's blossuming into something beautiful, I figure it's time to give it some love and try to get people to contribute to it, or at least provide some potential content, so it can be the best it can be.

[aft2001]

If you're gonna roleplay as the AI or a cyborg, try to experiment with speaking and behaving like a machine! It's quite fun, at least to me.

A little knowledge of technical jargon also helps a lot, as does trying to figure out a specific personality and way of speaking. You don't *have* to talk like a machine, you can just talk like a regular person, but try to drop subtle nods to the fact that you're a robot and not an actual human! Again, it's really up to you.

Also, remember that the AI and cyborgs are more of a service/support oriented role, so being helpful (sometimes imposingly helpful) is a pretty solid way to play. Though, again, it's really up to you.

For general tips and tricks to talk more like a machine: Try to use specific, clinical language and diction - instead of saying "A huge explosion just wrecked the bar!", you could say "A large detonation within the bar has caused considerable damage." Essentially, you want to be exact and descriptive with minimal flowery language. If you'd like examples of clinical tone, the SCP Wiki's articles are (mostly) entirely written in it!
Another tip, especially as the AI with your in-RP access to a fuckton of knowledge, is to purposefully obfuscate (make harder to understand/more complicated than necessary) information, especially pertaining to antagonists like changelings. So, for example, instead of calling out a changeling, you could state "A potentially non-human entity on-board the station, which has demonstrated alien capabilities such as mutagenic properties, precise manipulation of physical appearance, and regenerative abilities. Advising caution.", or even more interestingly, just state "Caution: Potential non-human entity detected on-board the station.", and provide more details as requested. Bonus points if you only relay this information to the Security frequency!

This is all based on my own personal preferences and experiences as a silicon player/AI main, and others might say something different! The best thing to do is to just ask someone whose RP style you enjoy how they do it for tips and tricks and some explanations.

[jan.antilles]

My best advice about RP is to prioritize the group's story over your own. Look for opportunities to involve others in what you're doing, and engage them in conversation. Be willing to get out of your comfort zone! We are all doing this by the seat of our pants, and sometimes you will look/feel ridiculous, but we will love you for it.

[Mordent]

Instigating engaging roleplaying "subplots" can be tiring, and it's okay to not be doing that all of the time. Conversely, reacting to the things that others are putting effort into setting up is comparatively easy, and the more people who do it the more it's rewarding it is for everyone.

There's nothing more disheartening than putting time and effort into making something engaging for people to interact with and then not only does no one come out of their way to take part, but also passer-bys just ignore it. Take some time out of your shift to go and check out the things people put announcements out about!

[Kamades]

Try and engage the jobs your role has reasons to interact with! Ask the miner to stock the Rock Box, get the QM to order you things, ask the mechanics to rennovate! Not everyone will engage, but we're all on the station\ship to make the thing work - as a team. Be a team member! Ask that staff assistant if they want to be your sous chef, or botany assistant, and teach em!

I've been enjoying trying to keep the work space actually look like a reasonable place to work - in medbay, tidy things up! Ask the janitor to get the blood though - let them do their job too! But maybe don't make them tidy up the dozens of auto-injectors you tossed everywhere trying to desperately save someone's life, if you've got a minute to pick up trash.

Change clothes! A lot of roles have a closet with alternate clothing choices -there's some great ways to convey who you are through simple clothing choices.

[Frank_Stein]

Instigating engaging roleplaying "subplots" can be tiring, and it's okay to not be doing that all of the time. Conversely, reacting to the things that others are putting effort into setting up is comparatively easy, and the more people who do it the more it's rewarding it is for everyone.

There's nothing more disheartening than putting time and effort into making something engaging for people to interact with and then not only does no one come out of their way to take part, but also passer-bys just ignore it. Take some time out of your shift to go and check out the things people put announcements out about!

Yes can't stress that enough. Play along with other's gimmicks. Reward effort with engagement. Figure out who is carrying the scene and how you can help set the stage with them.

Roleplaying means adopting a role. Figure out what role the story requires that sounds like fun and helps move it along and play that part

[ToxyNPoxy]

I like to abandon any semblance of respect I have for myself in rp servers, once I roleplayed an insane scientist who was driven mad by tele-science. After which I crawled around maintenence acting like i was a caterpillar eating stuff like wrenches, floor tiles, a wirecutter. After an officer convinced me to do tele-science again, I attempted to beat myself to death after scribbling shit like "THE NUMBERS" on the floor. Eventually got straightjacketed and therapy in medbay, the situation kept getting more and more chaotic as the doctors realized the "butterfly game" where i "eat" random shit in maintenence, wasn't a VR game. Anyway, long story short. Anything can be an rp opportunity, including your incredible failings as a tele-scientist. The round was fun for pretty much everyone involved, including the doctors, the officer, and myself!

Don't be afraid to be unique with your rp ideas!

[Kotlol]

I like to setup smaller gimmicks in RP that can grow insanely problematic or can be ignored depending on engagement rate, especially as chaplain.

Also step back when the Antag is doing something, don't start hogging the spotlight infront of an Antagonist as they get special priveledge in my opinion.

If you think your clown act is so great and full of pranks you have to keep taking up Sec's time over the Antagonist who planted bombs across the station. You need a priority check sir.

Some people wanna META RP abit, others want an unique chill RP and others want to be engaged in their own things. But overall do not try to upstage others, even as antags, just don't do it unless it's someone you know is a SHITTER doing SELF ANTAGING then Upstage em and kill em :P.

Gimmicks are suppose to be fun and engaging, but never go for the killing/eleminating factor.

Also if security has an issue with your group. Don't step on their toes especially as non antag.

[Joe Feros]

dont just make dangerous chemicals. because like why does he do that ''uhhh he like fire'' o..k... but why? ''uhhhh i dont know''.
so dont just make a character and expect it to be like experiment with him think of his motives of his family tree what was he get to know your character, CREATE a universe around your character make some good shit

[Kotlol]

My 1st suggestion is figuring out why your charater is with NT as an ANTAGONIST or NON ANTAGONIST.

For example: The "Selena's" (yes multiplue depending on mood, role ,etc) are all working for NT to pay for eachother.
The reason one can die and another can take over can be used as "Cloning" but in my opinion it's just a different Selena being sent as they multiply like Roaches (get it?)
Also each Selena observes several traits but run the same base line:
"You are the incarnation of the Roach Goddess" Even though all of them know of eachother.
Some will just say it very rarely, others will keep instating it (moslty chaplain Selena's).
Heck Scientist Selena will never say it as she wants to scientifically prove the fact that she is the ROACH GODDESS!
Don't talk about Genetcist Selena.. she thinks gods are created.

As for Antag Selena's. It depends on the antag role.
Conspirators are very flexiable. I merely suggest a path we go for and how to do it, if people want something else I will go along it.
If it's a traitor. It depends on my mood... counter agent is something I do as traitor Selena or I do some mischief by giving people some silly gadgets like bowling balls and start a monkey bowling club. Heck one time I was a traitor RD and I used my tools to capture DANGEROUS ANIMALS to study.
Sec went hard on me for having contraband insted of telling me to go to the HoP. Became a whole chase for me not wanting to show contraband since i was trying to capture DANGEROUS ANIMALS! (wich i released)
If it's Changeling.. WOW BOY! That can go anywhere! From Bioweapon secret agent Selena hunting down other antags. To... "All shall become the roach goddess" to... "YOU WILL JOIN THE ROACH GODDESS IN BODY!" To... "Hehehe.. Shitty Bill infection! Everyone is turning shitty bill!"
Vampire is always more subdued, but 8/10 it's a hemovore bio weapon.
If it's a spy thief... it depends on what gadgets I can get my hands on. It can be like the traitor, to counter spying, to "KUDZU CULT!"
Arcfiend falls under vampire.
As for wraith I never touched but I got gimmicks for that.

As for general tips:
-What job your rolled go with it, if you don't like it go to the HoP.
-Don't hack doors and go into other sections cause the department is EMPTY, ask the HoP for access or Captain. Only do it as a last resort.
-Insted of punching an obivious antagonist/possible antagonist. RP with them. Just cause the changeling went abomination don't fucking go into a rage unless they are murdering crewmates, heck avoid fighting.
-As an antagonist, try to announce hints or interact. No one likes macrobombers cause it makes people go: "WELP TIME TO EXTRACT SINCE SOMEONE BOMBED MEDBAY WITHIN 15 MINS" On main it might be tolerated.. but on RP it's very frowned upon.
-As an antagonist, there is nothing wrong with helping a gimmick.
-As a normal player, helping an antag is not wrong as long as "YOUR CHARATER" doesn't suspect them being an antagonist. It might be fun to see where the antag gimmick is going even if you know BOWLING BALLS ARE ANTAG ONLY THINGS. Maybe that bowling alley will do fine!
-As security always ask 1st. You can play a paranoid case if you want... but don't act upon batoning and brigging someone. Security is "LITTERLY" suppose to prioritize being a team player to everyone. If security is too busy beating up the clown for pranks...it makes people unwilling to do RP. Also engage with people doing odd things, but don't arrest them.
- If you ever get Captain, try to show some sort of compitence. Incompitent captains are okay, but they can drag down a shift much easier then compitent ones. As a captain your gimmick can easily overshadow others due to your command status. If you want to be an incompitent captain, have a compitent HoS or HoP along side.
- If you feel the gimmick ain't fun even if forced upon. Just cryo or do something else. As long as you don't sabotage it, no one minds you leaving.

AND FINALLY.
"It's fine to meta a little if it means your gimmick gets more time to shine." No one is going to get angry at a scientist knowing mechanics to build a drug dispsenser.
Just don't take away other players who can engage with it. Also if you have to wait more then 10 mins, I think it's fine to "Meta" and do it yourself. Especially time sensative stuff.

[Emrsnn]

If you wanna write a huge quasi wiki-page of information about your character just to get to know them better, go for it. 
I've noticed coming up with unique defining traits for your characters helps make them more memorable, I'm generally shit with remembering who people are and why I know them IRL and even worse when everyone is little pixel dude- but if a char has a unique outfit they're always in or talks in a specific way, I remember them pretty easily.

never underestimate the possibilities that open up with [LOOC: may we please killmurder eachother now]

Your character doesn't need to be some perfect undefeatable god. In fact, I notice the ones that are pretty nerfed tend to get into more interesting situations/problems than the infinitely robust ready-for-everything never-make-a-mistake ones.

[Emrsnn]

resurrecting this thread because I felt like writing, lo and behold the last post was also me but three years ago. here's some new stuff i came up with. maybe some of this veers into writing advice but hey, im not a writer so who knows really. 
either way, here's some tips if you want to really start taking this game too seriously.

Give them a thing. Have a thing that functions like an in-joke, except everyone is in on it. Bonus points if you can find a way to pack it into their examine text. (Examples- currently, I play a captain who's used the same station name his whole career, A woman who wants to test her clairvoyance on everyone, and a dude with a very unusual look to him. There's a lot of examples played by other people in the community that come to mind as well.) The key point though is that it has to be simple and obvious enough that someone could pick up on it just by being in the same room as them. Aside from just making the character easy to recall from the 30 others in the round, it also serves as a very accessible way for someone to skip ahead in regard to how well they know them- it makes it easier to act like they've been working together for months already, if they wanted to, because there's already at least one surface-level talking point to fall back on.  "I heard you're into pod racing"; "I bet they never showed you this in medical school"; "Of course you'd know that, you're from Sol" etc. etc. etc.

Make a purgatory. Or a limbo. I have a google doc where I keep names that have a lot of personality, character traits I think would be interesting together, idiosyncrasies, and examine texts from character's I've scrapped. (I do that too, by the way. A character's served their purpose? I scrap em for parts. As of writing this, I've played three people with the word Mulch somewhere in their name and two secoff's perpetually experiencing their first day on the job.) I pull from my vault whenever I'm making a new character and need some personality parts to smush around, and I also use it in place of randomnameing because I think there's a lot of fun in a very noncommittal, "this guy will stop existing in 100 minutes", bare-bones-start-and-make-the-rest-up-as-you-go round. Having a receptacle full of starting points for a personality makes it easier to do those on a whim.

The perfect examine text is three sentences or less- for the same reason the examine text of most objects are no longer than a few words. It's whatever a person's first thought is when they see the character. Alt+Click should answer "what is this thing", not "what is the unabridged lore of this thing". The other character notes that appear in-game make more sense to write an epic for, if you're inclined to do so, because they all appear after someone's decided they have time to skim a paragraph. (i.e. looking it up in employee records). 

Read other player's stuff. If they took the time to write a security note, it's probably because they had something fun to put in there. A lot of the medical notes I see while I'm abusing my captain privileges revolve around some crazy incident at a previous job. A lot of security notes I see clarify what that job was. Syndie notes still exist and I think we should reanimate the surreptitious use of them in game that was alive when they were first added.

Several months ago, I took inventory of flavor texts I'd written that I was happiest with and came up with a shortcut for reaching something I'd personally be satisfied slapping on my characters. In no specific order, pick one thing about their appearance that was likely decided by fate (i.e. balding), one thing about their appearance that was likely a choice (i.e. wireframe glasses), and one thing about the way they talk or carry themself- something you'd notice within the first minute of talking to them. (i.e. insecure). Now combine it all together in a way that's easy to read, taking the liberty of cramming in bonus details wherever they fit without adding bulk. i.e. "A balding man in smudged wireframe glasses. He speaks as if he's demanding to be heard, despite being quite clumsy." and there you have it, George Costanza is ready to join space station 13.

We were just talking about this in the discord earlier today, a lot of characters don't have a syndie note because it's hard to decide what's worthy of going there. I personally use mine to suggest if the character has their traits stacked against them, does their job imply they're carrying a weapon (i.e. botanists have chainsaws; bartender has a shotgun), and on my captain character specifically, some allusions to easy ways to assassinate the guy. I've also seen a lot of people use theirs to store obscure character lore, like something that would make them easier to manipulate or something that would make them a target for traitors. So long as you don't make your note the bee movie script or "lol u paid 2 tc for this", you've probably got something that won't disappoint.

[Silent Majority]

My strategy:

Remember vibes not the past. Specific history is bext discarded for moment to moment vibe

Be dumb not brain dead. Falling for a trap is different then jumping into the mindhack clone scanner someone asked you too, but eating the obviously poisoned lunch is different

This id my work space. My character ino3s the people they work with. Even if not closely. I respond to people like i habe at least i have general social attachment . It makes it funnier