Other Discord Roleplays: Yay or nay?

[Galaxy]

Before RPN, I did discord rps, and for some reason I never quite connected with them and always left the server in the end.
Maybe it was because all the places were in different channels? Or I couldn't get the plot by the millions of messages? Or I just didn't like discord's format for roleplays?
All the roleplays I joined had already started before, so maybe this was one reason I couldn't quite get it. Its not that I hate any of the roleplays themselves though, some of them were actually quite interesting. But everything was just all over the place, and I really couldn't get the system, unlike the roleplays here.

Do you have any opinions on this? Or maybe advice on how to work with the system in discord?

 

[Onmyoji]

Take it with a grain of salt, my experience with group roleplays is rather limited and outdated. But lately the only group roleplays I've been doing were Discord roleplays.

By what you said, it sounds like an issue of bad roleplay organization which isn't necesserily attributed to Discord roleplays, but just any group roleplays. Such as not providing time for members to react and not having a means to introduce new players to the ongoing game. Using different channels for different places is fine as long as (again) it's organized in a way that is possible to follow, which I feel like wasn't the case in those roleplays.

The best experience I had on discord was when, despite the rp had chat style and short posts, there was a fixed posting order and players didn't skip anyone's turn unless it was a dialogue between some characters that wouldn't make sense to interrupt. The channels were used for different 'places' but there was only one thing at a time going on in each of the channels. Then there was quite a heavy load on a GM that provided summaries of the rp episodes that were already completed. So every new (or less active) member could learn what happened when they were not there. Things like that made that rp experience amazing, despite all my general dislike for group rps. And to be fair, that dislike grew from exactly those things you mentioned. But I've had them happen on forum rps as well, not just Discord.

tldr, most of those issues can be solved by proper organization which (unfortunately) requires very heavy GM involvement, and (ideally) players that are willing to follow all the rules. Not everyone want and can commit this much, and this is why you get experiences like you described. It is possible to have a great rp on Discord though. Key words are organization and commitment.

 

[rae2nerdy]

yeah I will second above poster this sounds like a lack of organization to me.

Even thread groups can fall victim to this if you have a rapid fire group but don’t organize it properly to allow new (and existing) players to keep up.

I do 1x1 and I find Discord to be an extremely helpful platform.

I can organize information into easy to read chunks under proper subheadings.

my Partner can edit in any information they want to had without me having to transcribe it myself

And it just keeps everything in one specific space.


So maybe the next time you join a group see if it’s one that is maybe a little slower paced OR see if they have some kind of newbie helper system to get you caught up.

 

[Idea]

While I like discord for chatting and even roleplay OOCs, I don't particularly like it for roleplaying.

1. Discord does not fit my roleplaying style well: I am, as I have stated quite often, a heavy detail roleplayer. Furthermore I also like to take my time with posts, and encourage my partners on the matter that I am willing to wait for a long quality post. This doesn't work as well on discord where there is a character cap (or word cap) which often forces me to divide posts into 4 or 5 parts if I want to quote them there. There is also a much higher potential of losing my posts by accident as I can't just tab out in discord in the way I would in a thread.

2. I'm worse at organizing on discord: Where to roleplay, where to put the stuff that needs to be in a fixed and accessible place and other such areas are things which I just don't handle as well on discord. Now, I do have it on good authority that it can be done well, though I would still argue at some point you're just clogging way too many little cirlces on the side, but point is it'd be wasteful of me to have to learn it for this whole other platform when I can perfectly well just do it here.

3. Going back is harder: I often like to go back and read past posts and such. This is a lot harder to do on discord, which forces you to have to scroll up and then has to load the other batch of posts and that's if you didn't forget where it was etc... The pages and links method of organizing just seems far neater and more pratical to me.

4. Aesthetic and Formatting: For starters, I just don't like the discord post aesthetic as it naturally is, compared to the more boxed format of thread posts. The way discord sometimes blends stuff together with weird spacing, doesn't suit me. Then there are also just the number of tools you have available here on the site, namely coding, but certainly not exclusive to that.

5. I'm on this site to roleplay: My last point is a bit more emotional than the rest, but I would say true to my reasons, and that is, I just feel that if I have a tool for an intended purpose then I should use it unless I'm given a compelling reason not to. In this case not only do I have said tool, but those that manage it actually benefit from me using it, as traffic to the site is important.

 

[Galaxy]

Thank you for all your insights!
After considering what everybody has said, yes its probably just bad organization in the server, although discord itself has some problems too.
Maybe I'll try discord rps some time later, although I'm pretty satisfied with what RPN gives me.

 

[MageoftheDixPaths]

While I like discord for chatting and even roleplay OOCs, I don't particularly like it for roleplaying.

1. Discord does not fit my roleplaying style well: I am, as I have stated quite often, a heavy detail roleplayer. Furthermore I also like to take my time with posts, and encourage my partners on the matter that I am willing to wait for a long quality post. This doesn't work as well on discord where there is a character cap (or word cap) which often forces me to divide posts into 4 or 5 parts if I want to quote them there. There is also a much higher potential of losing my posts by accident as I can't just tab out in discord in the way I would in a thread.

2. I'm worse at organizing on discord: Where to roleplay, where to put the stuff that needs to be in a fixed and accessible place and other such areas are things which I just don't handle as well on discord. Now, I do have it on good authority that it can be done well, though I would still argue at some point you're just clogging way too many little cirlces on the side, but point is it'd be wasteful of me to have to learn it for this whole other platform when I can perfectly well just do it here.

3. Going back is harder: I often like to go back and read past posts and such. This is a lot harder to do on discord, which forces you to have to scroll up and then has to load the other batch of posts and that's if you didn't forget where it was etc... The pages and links method of organizing just seems far neater and more pratical to me.

4. Aesthetic and Formatting: For starters, I just don't like the discord post aesthetic as it naturally is, compared to the more boxed format of thread posts. The way discord sometimes blends stuff together with weird spacing, doesn't suit me. Then there are also just the number of tools you have available here on the site, namely coding, but certainly not exclusive to that.

5. I'm on this site to roleplay: My last point is a bit more emotional than the rest, but I would say true to my reasons, and that is, I just feel that if I have a tool for an intended purpose then I should use it unless I'm given a compelling reason not to. In this case not only do I have said tool, but those that manage it actually benefit from me using it, as traffic to the site is important.

While I respect your opinion to not use Discord, a lot of these reasons don't really justify it.

1. I type all of my turns in a Google Doc, and then just copy+paste them into Discord. Google Docs automatically save everything you write, and obviously there's no character limit there. Yeah, that means I have to split up several paragraphs, but a simple "----" lets my partner know why my turn is formatted the way it is if I exceed the character limit.

2. Don't make a whole server for a simple group rp. Just make a group chat. It's easy to organize and add people, you can pin important messages, and you can make a separate one for OOC chat if you want.

3. There's a search button in the top corner. Just search for whatever you're looking for. If you can't be asked to do that, scrolling functions the same way on a website???

4. I have no idea what you mean by this, honestly.

5. All I use Discord for is roleplay, so does that mean that's not its purpose? I'm not hating on you for rp'ing on here or anything - I don't care - I'm just saying "RPN is for RP. Discord is for Discord stuff >" just doesnt seem like the best reason?

 

[Idea]

1. I type all of my turns in a Google Doc, and then just copy+paste them into Discord. Google Docs automatically save everything you write, and obviously there's no character limit there. Yeah, that means I have to split up several paragraphs, but a simple "----" lets my partner know why my turn is formatted the way it is if I exceed the character limit.

That implies, among other things
--->a multiple step process for what is otherwise a simple one-step process
--->more open tabs

2. Don't make a whole server for a simple group rp. Just make a group chat. It's easy to organize and add people, you can pin important messages, and you can make a separate one for OOC chat if you want.

Again, this seems to me like just overcomplicating- plus still leaves things unorganized in my opinion and has more limited options. Pinning exists but it has proven to me to be far less efficient a process, as it still requires scrolling, doesn't allow you to classify the pins in the way you would links for instance, and id just overall clonky compared to thread-based organization.

3. There's a search button in the top corner. Just search for whatever you're looking for. If you can't be asked to do that, scrolling functions the same way on a website???

-scrolling on a website doesn't imply anywhere near the kind of loading
-RPN posts don't blend in the way discord posts do, reading posts on discord just doesn't feel up to par with the reading experience on the forum to me
-dividing things by pages and tracking the right page is an option I find far superior than one continuous roll of posts and tracking one post from the bunch of results that probably appears when you use the search funtion tracking a person or keyword.
-no post links

4. I have no idea what you mean by this, honestly.

I like the aesthetic
+
There are more options and tools available for on-site posts
+
I don't like the way discord deals with spacing when posts merge, as text that is not supposed to be put together can no longer be spaced out (discord automatically eliminates such attempts)
+
Coding exists here

5. All I use Discord for is roleplay, so does that mean that's not its purpose? I'm not hating on you for rp'ing on here or anything - I don't care - I'm just saying "RPN is for RP. Discord is for Discord stuff >" just doesnt seem like the best reason?

Discord was not built specifically to be roleplayed on. You can use discord for all kinds of things, chatting, games, and of course roleplay. The roleplay subforums specifically exist so that you can roleplay on them. That in a more subjective sense makes it so they make more sense to roleplay on to me.

But yeah, it isn't the best reason. Why do you think I prefassed this one with "My last point is a bit more emotional than the rest". All of my other points are my more utility and more objective reasons to prefer threads. This one is just the impulse, the cherry on top of the cake if you will, it reinforces what works otherwise even if it doesn't sustain it by itself.

 

[Tove]

While I respect your opinion to not use Discord, a lot of these reasons don't really justify it.

1. I type all of my turns in a Google Doc, and then just copy+paste them into Discord. Google Docs automatically save everything you write, and obviously there's no character limit there. Yeah, that means I have to split up several paragraphs, but a simple "----" lets my partner know why my turn is formatted the way it is if I exceed the character limit.

2. Don't make a whole server for a simple group rp. Just make a group chat. It's easy to organize and add people, you can pin important messages, and you can make a separate one for OOC chat if you want.

3. There's a search button in the top corner. Just search for whatever you're looking for. If you can't be asked to do that, scrolling functions the same way on a website???

4. I have no idea what you mean by this, honestly.

5. All I use Discord for is roleplay, so does that mean that's not its purpose? I'm not hating on you for rp'ing on here or anything - I don't care - I'm just saying "RPN is for RP. Discord is for Discord stuff >" just doesnt seem like the best reason?

Actually, I would kind of agree with Idea on his last statement. I mean, everyone is going to roleplay where they feel comfortable and that's fine but for me I'm not going to join a community to write and use another medium such as discord to do that. If I wanted to write via discord I would get discord. I didn't take from his message that he was saying RPN is just for RP stuff and discord=discord stuff, I think he's meaning that he is on the site for numerous uses one of is roleplay and like I said I kind of agree.

 

[MageoftheDixPaths]

Idea Several times you referenced "too many tabs" and called really simple technical functions "overcomplicated." How shitty is your Internet, homie?

 

[Idea]

"too many tabs"

I keep the tabs open while I'm replying to a post, which can take a good deal of time with me. On top of that I also have other tabs open for other stuff I have in progress, sites I need regular access to and the like. Needlesly and pointlessly piling more tabs is not a good idea.

overcomplicated

This has nothing to do with my internet, and specifically has to do with how your method requires some 5 steps for something you can do in one and without complication by simply continuing to use threads. Why should I work on a post separately on google docs (involving getting google docs if I didn't have it), making sure that is typed there adequately translates to the discord post, then segment the thing to copy it and finally copy it to discord...when I can just make the post on a thread and go through none of that trouble.

How shitty is your Internet, homie?

It has days

 

[Lord Food Person]

It’s takes a special person to stick to a Discord rp. I personally luv Discord 4 rping but I have had many partners dat don like it. So it rrly depends on ur patience level n wut u were introduced to first

 

[kevintheradioguy]

It sounds like you had a problem with roleplayers, not the roleplay. Just because someone plays something random and without a story does not mean it's a fault of a platform: it's the player's fault.

That being said, I never had a good game on Discord, and I am not really looking forward to. It's... okay, I guess, but I usually make posts that are long, and its requirement of a message not being longer than 2'000 symbols is really uncomfortable. And I just dislike to read it for some reason. I dislike the formatting it provides, I dislike uneven spaces between the messages, I dislike that if you don't time it you'll get your broken in two parts message show your icon twice... bah! It sounds like nonsense, but I take great issues with the looks of things.

 

[kevintheradioguy]

I keep the tabs open while I'm replying to a post, which can take a good deal of time with me. On top of that I also have other tabs open for other stuff I have in progress, sites I need regular access to and the like. Needlesly and pointlessly piling more tabs is not a good idea.

Lemme scare ya.

I cleaned them recently.

 

[Idea]

Lemme scare ya.
View attachment 557325
I cleaned them recently.

Oof, quite impressive. I recognize google, wikipedia, instagram, youtube, pinterest, F-list, fur-affinity, deviantart, tumblr and what I'm gessing is google docs

 

[kevintheradioguy]

Oof, quite impressive. I recognize google, wikipedia, instagram, youtube, pinterest, F-list, fur-affinity, deviantart, tumblr and what I'm gessing is google docs

Yeah, those are google docs. Most of the others are specific tumblr blogs, though. Others are wikis of different kinds.

 

[turanga_blazing]

Before RPN, I did discord rps, and for some reason I never quite connected with them and always left the server in the end.
Maybe it was because all the places were in different channels? Or I couldn't get the plot by the millions of messages? Or I just didn't like discord's format for roleplays?
All the roleplays I joined had already started before, so maybe this was one reason I couldn't quite get it. Its not that I hate any of the roleplays themselves though, some of them were actually quite interesting. But everything was just all over the place, and I really couldn't get the system, unlike the roleplays here.

Do you have any opinions on this? Or maybe advice on how to work with the system in discord?

From extensive experience, I can say that Discord RP servers are usually awful. One-on-one DM RPs have always worked for me.

 

[obieblu]

I spent years on active group chats, and that's my natural space for online RP. However those were easier to keep track of being older systems where scrolling wasn't live. I've happily restarted my RP hobby on Discord, and it's got the same feeling of being actively engaged real-time. Though, large group discords for anything get overwhelming. The idea of channels for different games or rooms sounds awful.

 

[Jannah]

I'm typically a nay, but only because of the stupid character limits. Since I do novella type RP I don't like those limits.

 

[Damafaud]

Discord is a-okay when the group isn't very large and I can afford the quick pace. I can't though ^^'

 

[melz]

if its a small group or 1x1 i'm all down for it! mostly because i'm ALWAYS on discord and i forget to come on other sites a lot.

 

[Yunalescaa]

Discord is great for 1x1s but in a group setting it feels too chaotic to me. The only thing I don't like about discord is that you can only send so many characters at a time, so I find that I have awkwardly break up replies just to get them to fit. And then I hate the formatting :C

 

[soapteeth]

I'm pretty fond of Discord as a platform to RP. Typically, though, I use the DMs for the RP itself. The only time I use an actual server is if it's a 1x1 server; group RP tends to make me a bit too anxious, and I lose track too easily. The only downside I see for Discord RP is the character limit. Sometimes I get really into the plot and want to write a really long response, but I can't do that without busting the response up into more than one message, and I hate doing that /:

 

[rae2nerdy]

I'm pretty fond of Discord as a platform to RP. Typically, though, I use the DMs for the RP itself. The only time I use an actual server is if it's a 1x1 server; group RP tends to make me a bit too anxious, and I lose track too easily. The only downside I see for Discord RP is the character limit. Sometimes I get really into the plot and want to write a really long response, but I can't do that without busting the response up into more than one message, and I hate doing that /:

So something that I do is type my responses up on google docs. It works whether your on Discord or PMs.

It allows you to keep the roleplay if the PM is deleted due to inactivity or the site is down.

And for discord you can just type the reply up in one chunk and then break it up as necessary.

 

[Califaxian]

I love Discord roleplays, because they are live, however good ones are difficult to find and organize, so I will say neither.

 

[Jannah]

I love Discord roleplays, because they are live, however good ones are difficult to find and organize, so I will say neither.

Being live is exactly part of the problem with them. It makes it nearly impossible to get people together to actually RP. There's one I'm in now that has stagnated for weeks precisely because of that issue.