Roleplay "The new beginning"

[The Icemann]

This thread was originally intended to give a young rookie some pointers. This n00b was not only participating in the PCW, but a network of feds under the GFed Banner. His time spent there saw him getting his feelings hurt in that community, because he was completely immature on their forums, and it discouraged him from wanting to participate in eWrestling.

I decided to leave this thread here, for, the roleplay below can be used as an example of a bad roleplay, and the advice given can also be applied to one's own writing improvement.

Use it for its purpose.

-PCW Owner, "The Iceman" Luis Malave

---

Tonight is the night I make my debut match. This means the world to me. I am just arriving at the arena,tonight is the night I am going to prove everyone wrong. I am gonna try to make myself prominent with the staff. I see a fellow security guard he doesn't look chipper.

Guard-"Where,the hell do you think you're going?"

Jacob-"I,am a new wrestler here. My first time here. Is there a problem?"

Guard-"Whats your name?"

Jacob-"Well,they know me as Jacob The rookie Denocide."

Guard-"Let,me see you're pass!"

I unzip my bag and reach in to seize the pass,I couldn't find it. So I kneel down put my nike bag on the floor and take everything out. I cannot find the pass,I look up and smile at the frowning guard put all the stuff back and get up from my knees. I now have to confess the fact I don't have a pass.

Jacob-"I,must've left it at home. Maybe I am on a list of some sort?"

Guard-"We, have no list."

I see someone approach the guard from behind. Looks very content and is staring at me.

Maddogg-"Excuse,me!What is the problem here?"

Guard-"This guy claims he is a new wrestler."

Jacob-"I am it's just...

This man I seem to recognize smiles and shuts me up.

Maddogg-"He,is Jim. This is Jim head of security."

Jim-"I apologize TBA.I thought he might be lieing.I am sincerely sorry.

Maddogg-"Don't worry about it Jim. Please don't harass everyone that comes in here."

I now understand this is the boss. Not the man I signed the contract with but is the boss. I feel I must get close with this man,he is after all my new boss. He smiles at me and puts his hand out,I shake hands with him and smile to.

Maddogg-"Thanks for helping me out with that. I thought I was gonna have to sign another contract and get a new pass."

Maddogg-"No,we try and treat new guys nicely. Let me lead you to your locker room."

Jacob-"That'd be great!"

Maddogg-"By,the way my name is TBA and I am the chairman of this company."

Jacob-"Thanks and I am...

Maddogg-"I know who you are."

As we walk people salute and wave at TBA. He walks with a strut of power and a high ego. He leads me to the locker room full of guys I don't know. TBA smiles and turns to me.

Maddogg-"Well,this is it. I wish you good luck in your match tonight!"

Jacob-"Well,thank you. One question. Which locker is mine.?"

Maddogg-"Number sixty four. Trust me most of these guys are nice!Also, tell your father hello."

He just reminded me I still must tell my father that I am going to wrestle. My dad was a great wrestler with an ego the size of the moon. I am now discouraged and search for locker sixty four. I find it,I see it and the locker is filthy. I sit down on a bench and think. I don't want to be remembered by my dad,he is old news and I am the next generation. Tonight I will show everyone what exactly I mean.

[A Ghost in the Wind]

I don't usually offer feedback, so consider this a rare occasion.

The first thing I noticed right off the back is your spacing. A lot of the time, after you hit a punctuation mark, it seems you forget to hit the spacebar, leading to a lot of sentences appearing like this: "You won't see it,for you'll never know what i can bring to the table.i'm too quick to catch." The lack of proper spacing hurts the presentation of the roleplay and is poor grammar, which, at least in the PCW, will get you docked some points.

Also, as hinted in my example, proper punctuation seems to fail you at times. This particular roleplay doesn't seem to have many improper punctuation errors, but I have noticed in some of your other work that you'll forget to capitalize words.

That's all the feedback I'll leave for now. I'm sure the others will touch upon other areas of improvement. If you heed their advice, you'll improve quickly.

Also, just for fun, if I was to grade your roleplay using the PCW Roleplaying Grading Policy, you would have scored: 28.5. 5.7 ppc. Comparing that to the *presumed* PCW average of 38.5, you can see you have your work cut out for you. But as said, with a little patience, and some hard work, you'll do fine. You have potential for someone as new and young as you are. Let's see if you can reach it.

[Heavy Metal]

Pretty good in my opinion, I’m looking forward to seeing your work on the RP boards. I've got just a couple things off the top of my head regarding your presentation:

Following up Luis in the Grammar Nazi department, I'd advise you to pay attention to words like "to" and "too", "there", "their", and "they're", "your" and "you're" etc. They’re going there to get their stuff.

Also (and I definitely have this problem myself so don’t feel alone) be aware of such sentences as "Where,the hell do you think you're going?". The comma after "where" should be gotten rid of - "Where the hell do you think you're going?" If you’re not sure, say the sentence out loud to yourself and see how it sounds. Not an enormous issue but it stands out in a few places and will be apparent to the reader.

I apologize if I sound like I’m trying to be an English teacher. Just throwin’ out stuff.

[Lantlas]

My first piece of advice would be ditch the script style as soon as possible. Maybe not so much here, but on the e-fedding scene in general, it's really looked down upon and can take away from your work. You can really get more out of your character through narrative, but take your time in that. If you feel script style is really the best for you, I'm not gonna tell you not to do it. I'm just saying it would improve your perception dramatically.

Second, take this as more of the view of a reader than a fellow RPer... Why do we care about what's going on? You've barely introduced us to your character, and you're just randomly talking to people who also aren't introduced. Who are these people, why do they matter, and with no buildup to who your character is, through a laiman's perception, it's some guy we don't know talking to two other guys we don't know. Plus, the name Maddog is just ripe for parody in PCW's past

Third, if you're going to do script, it can't also be first person. It doesn't make sense to read your thoughts, then have the dialogue typed out. Figure out a nice medium between the two. One thing that will always help you is description. Add to the dialogue, create the tone, describe the body language... There's always more you can add to make it more than just a seemingly random conversation.

[Grimm]

This is along the same lines as the previous posts...

There were quite a few commas that didn't need to be there.
Who is Maddog?

All in all , though, that's a good start for someone new to this type of efedding.

[Heavy Metal]

This may or may not help, but it’s a method I use. Start simple and get your ideas down so you don’t lose them. Then read it back to yourself, and as you go along you'll find ways to make it more entertaining. Just playing around with individual words will make a difference.

Thus:

Aug 24, 2008 1:27:18 GMT -5 @money456 said:

I see a fellow security guard he doesn't look chipper.

Guard-"Where,the hell do you think you're going?"

Becomes:

The goon at the door is a three hundred pounder at least and looks almost as chipper as a wolverine on crack. “Where the hell do you think you’re going?” he growls.

Or something like that.

EDIT: A lot of my pieces, be they movie reviews or roleplays, start out as a jumbled collection of what essentially amounts to total crap. Reading my first drafts would make your brain explode; they're fragmentary, full of typos, and not the least bit entertaining. But now I've got the foundation so the next step is to concentrate on making it actually fun to read, if that makes any sense.

[Pegasus]

I agree with what everyone said above, and yes like Roth said... I also dabble ideas down all the time. I actually have a notebook just randomly filled with ideas. But... as they said, punctuation is huge.

You are in the best place ever if you want to improve, as a lot of the people here will be willing to help out and give you advice. I willing to bet you've already noticed that though... haha.

[Heavy Metal]

Continuing what I started above (in what is hopefully a less rambling manner), here’s something very easy that will help immediately. I know you’ve been advised many a time to “describe the chair” – well, this isn’t a joke.

Let’s take the security guard again. A plain old security guard is not very interesting, but a huge security guard or an ugly security guard can be. Or you could hit www.thesaurus.com and make your security guard as massive as he is grotesque. Play with it. Just a few extra words inserted into your piece can make a real big difference.

[Grimm]

But don't get too carried away with the adjectives...there is too much of a good thing.

[money456]

Wow! you guys this helps me alot! I am excited to see what you think of my actual roleplays!

[Heavy Metal]

I'm looking forward to reading them.