Newsletter RpNation Newsletter: August 2018

[div class=container][div class=header][div class=tri][/div][/div][div class=headertxt]August 2018 Newsletter[/div][div class=ofthemonth][div class=headerf]Housekeeping Announcements[/div]
August's Supporter Badge
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Many thanks to @Alteras!​
Whether you're returning to school or just enjoying the (hopefully) cooler fall temperatures, we hope August finds you well!

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[/div][div class=info]Member of the Month
fluticasone fluticasone [/div]
When did you start roleplaying? What were your early experiences like?
I started roleplaying when I was eight(!!!). Back then I'd dreamed of being some sort of author, which continued up until I was around 12 to 13? As a result, I never went through a quick one-liner phase and was picky with how I wrote even back then. I did have a few mary/gary stu's, but because I was friends with the daughter of a comic artist/writer, she took me under her wing and taught me how to flesh out my characters. In retrospect I was actually very lucky to have had such a mentor.

How did you discover RPN?
I'm pretty sure I just used google since I was getting tired of the repeated faces in my usual forum.

What features would be in your ideal roleplay? Do you have a favorite genre?
To be honest my favorite feature would definitely be a communicative and responsible GM. I can honestly deal with subpar plots and lacking settings if the GM is amazing. As for favorite genre, I favor modern settings with a twist. This can be a dash of fantasy, involve some superhero-esque shenanigans or introduce technology just a couple of years from our current time.

Follow up question! What's your favorite roleplay you've been in?
Oh this one's easy! If it's a roleplay I've run, it's this old rp I had called Sealed Realm that was a spin-off of the FE series. It ran for 3 years until shit happened and I bailed on the site it was on. As for one I've joined, my favorite is by my friend Beth called The Weight of Soul which revolves around a secret society set in WWII. It's full of intrigue, drama and action, with suspenseful storytelling that uses a writing style that reflects the mood.

What got you into BBCoding?
So the site I first started roleplaying on had css and html enabled for posts!! At the tender age of 8, I was already applying design to my posts and character sheets. This continued to other websites I joined after that website eventually went defunct. Surprising how something like that lead a lot of my future life choices.

What type of BBCode designs do you usually do? Any sources of inspiration for them?
I can typically divide my designs into three distinct styles: contrast, minimalist and fancy graphics. Contrast usually just involves me using different attributes to create cohesiveness with interest. Minimalist is typically just sticking to boxes and neutral colors. Fancy graphics is probably the hardest for me. I rarely do it nowadays. It involves a lot of work on photoshop. :'D
For inspiration, I really like looking at websites and advertisements. Websites are normal, but a lot of people may find the latter strange. I like using ads as a reference point because they're specifically designed to catch your attention. And that's basically what I want my designs to do. I also enjoy looking at game UI's for inspiration, especially for character sheets.

Being an avid BBCoder, do you have any tips for people starting out BBCode, and for people who are already familiar with BBCode?
Save yourself guesswork and create a mock-up of your work before starting any design. It's a simple step, but many overlook it. It's easier to build something when you have an image of what the final product should look like. You should also make it a habit to close every single tag you make as you open it. This makes it easier in the long run as you're less likely to forget closing it. I don't know how many times I've had to fix someone's code only to realize that the main issue was they forgot to close a tag.
This next tip is one aimed at people who have some familiarity: learn the logic behind something. It's easy to copy paste a script or string of css, but if something goes wrong, you won't know what to do. If you take the time to learn the philosophy and reasoning behind why something is being done, you'll have an easier time figuring out what went wrong when your code explodes. Knowing how and why something is done helps you build your own stuff.

Favorite joke?
My college career. I've changed my major three times, lmao.

Are there any books or authors that have been influential to you?
My favorite book of all time is Markus Zusak's The Book Thief. Generally I've always enjoyed his books. Another one of my favorites is Ten Billion Days and One Hundred Billion Nights by Ryu Mitsuse. Then there's Project Itoh's Harmony. My taste in books tends to be very eclectic. You'll see Conan's Brethren next to an encyclopedia of local Philippine mythos, followed by a Nora Roberts novel. I'll read anything and everything. Except horror, but even then I occasionally cave and keep myself up for a couple of nights.

What are some pet peeves you have? Roleplay-wise? BBCode-wise?
Shitty communication in roleplays. And also propagating misinformation when a quick google search can rectify it.
For BBCode, it's less about the BBcode and more about design? I see so much plagiarism from famous tumblr themes that it makes me want to slap some sense into them. Being a parasite isn't cool.

Anything interesting you're into these days? Books? Movies? Songs? Games?
I'm into MAMAMOO and NCT these days when it comes to K-POP. Favorites are Solar, Doyoung, Ten and Lucas. Other than that, I've been playing Love Nikki on my phone a lot! o: If you happen to play, send me a message and let's be friends. Gimme that stamina.

Got any RpNation projects? Tell us about them!
In the roleplay side of things, I've got ENDGAME! It's this fictional augmented-reality sport thing and the roleplay basically follows the trials and tribulations of four teams in the LA County area. As for BBCoding, I have these two joint threads with @Alteras. The first is called Fever Dreams which is basically a showcase with brief explanations on the designs we post there. Our newer project is called snippets. These are more in-depth explanations of short codes, hence the name. Feel free to check them out and ask a question!

Is there any wisdom you’d like to impart to the readers of the newsletter?
I've seen shit like practice, take a break, don't be a dick, etc. I don't think those need repeating. So mine will be more practical: plagiarism is when 55% of your work is from one source. While it's not definitive, it's a good eyeball/rule of thumb to base off of. I think this is especially important in creative efforts. Copying someone is basically killing your own creativity; you limit yourself to what you can see. Just a word of advice from a dropout art student.
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[/div][div class=info]Roleplay of the Month
Count Gensokyo Count Gensokyo [/div]
Give everyone a quick summary about what your roleplay is about.
Beyond Infinite Crisis aims to be a long-running crossover rp of epic proportions. The Beyonder and Bat-Mite—two reality-warpers from Marvel and DC—have created a couple of neighboring planets filled with fantastic settings, characters, and creatures from across the vast reaches of fiction, with more being added as they see fit. So far, we've mostly been focused on taking an MCU approach to the stories we're telling—we're starting off with smaller arcs that introduce the characters and leading those smaller arcs into much, much bigger things later down the road. From fighting Nazi Dinosaurs from the satirical Aussie comedy show, Danger 5, to the Phantom Thieves of Heart from Persona 5 trying to make the twisted super-villains of Marvel’s criminal underbelly have changes of heart, it's all exciting stuff. We're always looking for more people who want to share in this vision of ours. Whether you want to add a new setting from your favourite fictional franchise, create your own stories that add to the lore, or just jump right in and start rp'ing as your favourite character, there's a spot here for you!

What inspired you to create this roleplay?
After being in so many "multifandom" rp's on RPN that eventually died, I wanted to figure out what caused people to slowly lose interest in them. I wanted to make one of my own, but with my limited experience as a GM, I needed people I knew I could count on to help me run a roleplay that would make it past a meager 5 pages.

Truth be told, this rp was actually the idea of Phantom Thief of Hearts Phantom Thief of Hearts , my partner in crime. He already wanted to do something Secret Wars-inspired (one of the really big crossover stories in Marvel Comics), and after he saw this crazily obscure show called Danger 5 and showed it to me, he wanted to create a big crossover rp with Danger 5 having a series of lighthearted, action-packed story arcs in it. Since then, we've been working hard on including as many fandoms as we can and finding meaningful ways they can contribute to the story and interact with the world at large. Later on, we want to try experimenting with different story genres besides "Action" in this bizarre world of fiction we've mashed together.

Were there any difficulties that you came across when making your roleplay?
Being unfamiliar with many fandoms is a weak link of ours, and in order to fix that, we have to consume those fandoms' source material and get to understand the characters. This isn't an easy task, as getting familiar with another fandom requires a good amount of time (and possibly money) to accomplish.

What do you believe are your strengths as a GM?
I tend to give my mods a lot of freedom. They're able to collaborate with Phantom Thief of Hearts Phantom Thief of Hearts and I about what they'd like to see more of, professionally critique one another's work, etc. The admins and mods are all working together towards a common goal of keeping a fun, welcoming OOC environment and an ongoing IC environment, and that's about all that you need to keep an rp stable.

How about weaknesses?
On the flip side, this means Phantom Thief of Hearts Phantom Thief of Hearts and the mod team do a lot of the heavy-lifting on the IC side of things. When I'm not making my weekly posting rounds, I'm making sure that all the members are comfortable with the OOC environment and where the rp is going. Thanks to my time constraints, I haven't even headed up an arc of my own, which is something I wish to change.

How did you come about roleplaying?
I've always been interested in scenarios like "what would happen if X met Y?" "Would they fight or be cool with each other?", and so on. That's almost half the reason I joined RPN in the first place—to see some of the unlikeliest of crossovers come to life. I've been hanging around on the fandom side of the site for the better half of two years, and I've gotten to know a lot of the "usual" people who hang around on the multifandom slice of the site.

How did you discover RpNation?
It started when I wanted to try my hand at a Touhou roleplay. It turned out there was already one running at the time here on RPN, so I decided to join in. I'm surprised that rp lasted as long as it did; it must be because everyone was so active OOC. We ended up just sending each other a bunch of in-jokes instead of actually posting though, haha. After that rp died, I branched out and started applying to crossover rps I could find as canon characters I liked, and that's how I started becoming so involved in this small section of RPN.

What is the most unique roleplay you ever participated in?
Millennium City was an absolutely absurd crossover rp, but it was also insanely fun for me. It's actually still ongoing, and I know @Infuriated Infant would be tickled to death if I name-dropped his pride and joy here.

What stood out most?
Basically, think of a pick-any-character-you-want GTA game, but it's an rp instead. You could apply as any character you want (even one you made yourself) and participate in a slew of bizarre quests that would earn you money to spend on getting your characters snazzy new weapons, armours, and even randomly-generated superpowers. I hadn't seen such a game-ified rp until then, and the simple-but-effective quest-based system was nothing short of addicting.

What is your fondest memory of roleplaying?
My fondest memories involve hanging out with those I've come to know through roleplaying. If I had to pick a specific IC moment in an rp that stuck with me, it was in that first crossover rp I joined that just ended up being dumb fun. I used Satori Komeiji from Touhou's psychic abilities to sneakily wipe the memories of Kira Yoshikage from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure to prevent a fight from breaking out between him and Puella Magi Madoka Magica's Homura Akemi.

What are some roleplaying tips and tricks you think others could benefit from?
I'm a pretty relaxed roleplayer, so you won't find me in an rp with particularly stringent rules about post length unless I am deeply interested in the subject matter. As such, I've been a "semi-lit" rp'er for as long as I've stayed on RPN, so my advice is mostly for semi-lits and casuals.

If you're looking to improve your roleplaying, improving the clarity of your posts goes a long way. English is a confusing language with a lot of exceptions, so take a little time each week to learn a new grammar rule or two that you think you'll immediately need for your posts. Knowing where to place commas is absolutely vital when writing something, and make sure to use a new paragraph whenever a different character starts talking.

Lastly, find a few rp buddies who are more experienced than you and who won't be afraid to criticise your writing to help you improve. If everyone just keeps telling you that your posts are great, then you probably won't improve your writing skills very quickly.

Do you have any roleplaying pet peeves? If so, what are they?
Two of my biggest ones are grammar mistakes that make a post difficult to understand and characters being played jarringly out-of-character from their source material (a problem you won't see in any original rp's).

Do you have any other projects in the works that you would like to share?
For now, I'm planning to stick with Beyond Infinite Crisis because I think I'll barely have time for anything else. I'm planning to run an arc or two of my own there in the future, which is about as big as I'm willing to plan for the time being.
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[/div][div class=sminfo]Featured Artist
Bang Bang Bang Bang [/div]
Bang Bang Bang Bang gives us wonderful digital works at his thread gay egg memes. His pieces are made with well done line art alongside light contours and shading, giving us vividly rich works. All of his works aren't quite realism, nor are they cartoony. It would be more appropriate to say that they are semi realistic portraits. So far, all of his subject matters are OCs or characters from other media, applying his art style to make them uniquely his. We highly recommend checking out his thread.
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[/div][div class=sminfo]Featured Discussion
@Her[/div]
Ever joined a lot of roleplays at once? Did you feel overwhelmed? Maybe it was too many characters, or maybe too much activity? How did you deal with it? Or maybe you didn't and burnt yourself out? Regardless, come tell us about it here.
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[/div][div class=sminfo]Featured Prose
BeastofLores BeastofLores [/div]
In BeastofLores BeastofLores 's work, In Your Shadow, we are treated to the dream of Balem, the Hellborn. It is quite the read and sets the stage for what we expect to be a great story of our protagonist. Despite only having one post, we recommend our fellow readers to check it out. It's length is just the perfect amount to get you hooked in to what we expect to be a wonderful story.
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[/div][div class=sminfo]Featured Forum Game
@cane suga[/div]
Its 3 in the morning, the blue and white glow of your screen is still occupying your face, you're surfing the internet. You decide to take a look at RPNation for the millionth time, checking to see if any of your RPs have a new post or update. Without the red notification bubble, you decide you should just look for something else. Then you come across this. Welcome to what is the person above you doing awake at three in the morning?, the latest forum game to show up in RPNation!!!! Go check it out!!!
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Beyond Infinite Crisis aims to be a long-running crossover rp of epic proportions. The Beyonder and Bat-Mite—two reality-warpers from Marvel and DC—have created a couple of neighboring planets filled with fantastic settings, characters, and creatures from across the vast reaches of fiction, with more being added as they see fit. So far, we've mostly been focused on taking an MCU approach to the stories we're telling—we're starting off with smaller arcs that introduce the characters and leading those smaller arcs into much, much bigger things later down the road. From fighting Nazi Dinosaurs from the satirical Aussie comedy show, Danger 5, to the Phantom Thieves of Heart from Persona 5 trying to make the twisted super-villains of Marvel’s criminal underbelly have changes of heart, it's all exciting stuff. We're always looking for more people who want to share in this vision of ours. Whether you want to add a new setting from your favourite fictional franchise, create your own stories that add to the lore, or just jump right in and start rp'ing as your favourite character, there's a spot here for you!
Oh shit that's us
 
What is the most unique roleplay you ever participated in?
Millennium City was an absolutely absurd crossover rp, but it was also insanely fun for me. It's actually still ongoing, and I know @Infuriated Infant would be tickled to death if I name-dropped his pride and joy here.
Millennium City? I wish I was in that RP ; )
 
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What is the most unique roleplay you ever participated in?
Millennium City was an absolutely absurd crossover rp, but it was also insanely fun for me. It's actually still ongoing, and I know @Infuriated Infant would be tickled to death if I name-dropped his pride and joy here.
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You guys should join! It's really good and we've just started the reboot! We're about to introduce some newer characters so you should hurry. It's more than just a normal multi-fandom roleplay that dies in a few days, we have an active discord.[/div]
 
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You guys should join! It's really good and we've just started the reboot! We're about to introduce some newer characters so you should hurry. It's more than just a normal multi-fandom roleplay that dies in a few days, we have an active discord.[/div]
We're already in it... I'm tasked on doing a quest that crosses over with our RP
 
I might do a short story about Balem's brother, Asalem, or the Hellborn Doctor, Ira. Or perhaps a short story involving the two brothers.

Either way, like I said before, I am euphoric.
 
the first sign of the apocalypse is when 'Gay Egg Memes' are deemed the pinnacle of artistic achievement. Good luck when the horsemen arrive folks, and thanks for helping usher in the end of times! <3 honored to be a part of it <3
 

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