Post by Dean of Hazelton on Jan 20, 2009 22:27:20 GMT -5
REGISTRATION.
• Please don't post anywhere on the forum until you've completed your application and it has been accepted by a member of the staff. Make sure that you post up your completed applications in the character creation forum, and please try to be patient whilst you are waiting for your application to be checked by an admin. Acceptance should take no longer than a day or two.
• I understand that at times it can be frustrating to wait around when you just want to get on with things and start posting, but I do have to ask that you remain patient when waiting for a member of staff to look through your application or do something for you. If you do finish an application, then make sure that you post a reply to your app with the same account saying something as simple as 'finished'. This not only makes it easier to tell who has finished their applications and who is still working on them, but you'll find that your character will get accepted a great deal quicker this way.[/color]
MEMBER PARTICIPATION.
• As a member, you are fully expected to enjoy your time here on City Lights, so if there is anything that is bothering you, you need to step forwards and let a member of staff know. The admin here at CL are pretty awesome, we know, but you're going to have to work with us on making this an enjoyable experience for you.
• Remember that as a member here on CL, you have a responsibility to remain respectful of all the other members on the forum. We have always tried to promote a friendly environment and do our best to make all of our members here feel welcome and as though they're part of a community, not just a role-playing forum. So, if someone upsets that balance and starts offending or upsetting the other members, we will remove them from the forum without a warning.
• Activity is very important on any role-playing forum. We don't expect you to crank out a post or a thread every day, that's just insane really. What we would like to see however, is all of our members logging on at least once every other day and maybe just posting so much as a small hello in the c-box or a reply in the ooc section. We just like to know that you haven't dropped off the face of the earth completely.[/color]
ROLE-PLAYING.
• City Lights is an R rated forum, which means that at times there might be scenes of a graphical or sexual nature. Plus you'll probably see certain Druggies swaggering about, cursing and getting drunk like there's no tomorrow. Because that's what they all like to do, right? All threads with mature content in them must be marked however, to protect our younger members from reading anything that might damage their unadulterated innocence.
• No God-modding. This one should be pretty obvious by now to everyone who role-plays. People do not like having their characters controlled by other people. You cannot control another person's character, you can't make them talk, you can't make them move and most of all you can't determine whether they live/die/get punched in the face. Make sure you don't do anything that could be considered God-modding, because it really is a serious offence.
• Posts are written in third person and third person alone. For example; "Johnny Truant gazed through the window protecting him from the harsh weather of the outside world, wondering what would happen if he perhaps decided to smash his head right through it." is correct. Just remember, you're writing about your character from the third perspective, narrating their story if you will, not pretending that you are your character and that you're writing their thoughts. "I looked through the window..." NO, NO, NO, NO, NO! See the difference?
• When it comes to post count, I'm slightly dubious as to whether or not there should be a minimum. I would personally like to see everyone write at least 3 paragraphs per post, not because length is important, but because that way you're sure to provide the other person with enough material to work from. Unfortunately, people do find it hard to bulk out their posts a lot. So, as long as you're giving back as much to the other person as they're giving to you, I think that should cut it. In other words, I don't want to see a thread where one member is writing four paragraphs for every post, and the other member is only just scraping by with one paragraph. It's not fair and I know you can all do better.
• Always make sure that you post in the correct area of the forum. If your character is sitting in the Canteen, then the thread itself should be posted in the Canteen. This makes sense really, doesn't it? Whilst we're on the subject, if your thread starts out in the Canteen but then moves on to the Athletic Fields, your thread should be moved as well. To do this, you can either ask a member of staff to move the thread for you, or you could start a new thread in the Athletic Fields and leave a link to it in the thread in the Canteen.
• If, like me, you type at such a fast pace that you often make typo's whilst you're writing a post for someone, then I'd suggest writing your post in a program like Microsoft Word first. Not only does it catch typo's that will make you cringe, but it's also got an awesome feature called the thesaurus, which I use constantly to make myself sound smart. Or even better is that Proboards has it's very own spell check for when you are posting threads.[/color]
CHARACTERS.
• We are presently accepting both canon and original characters. Obviously we would love it if you picked up one of the many canon characters we do have going, but if you decide to make an original, we'll be equally as happy.
• If you decide to take a canon who already has a sibling on the forum, please try and make sure that your character's history matches up with that of the other sibling's. Don't hesitate to send a PM to the other member playing the sibling if you need to ask any questions either.
• Personally I don't mind how many characters you make, I myself am notorious for making an insane number of characters, so I'm not going to stop any of you from creating an entire world's worth of people to play with if you want to. All I do ask however, is that you try and keep on top of all your characters and their respective threads.
• Multiple characters are fine, but make sure that you spread your characters equally amongst the member groups and the two genders. So, say your first character was a female, contemplate making your second a male. Also, we don't want to see everyone making Scene Kids and Gangsters, so change it up!
• No Mary-Sue's or Gary-Stu's. Enough said really, right? No, your character is not perfect. No, your character couldn't possibly have fit in any one of the cliques at Hazelton, but got placed as a jock because they're too amazing to be anything else. And finally no, everyone does not love your character or think they're amazing and awesome, super-special. Everyone has flaws in real life, even your idols have flaws. So please, try to be original and creative when it comes to making your characters.
• On a similar note, if I see one more character who's been raped, has lost all their family, ended up in an orphanage, got shunned because they were weird, self-harmed/still self-harms, ended up an Emo because they've become very bitter about the world, still has no friends, I seriously will go stark raving mental and start killing people myself. Rape is something I don't want to see on anyones applications, EVER. Anything else is questionable at best. You have been warned, so write your histories carefully.[/color]
• Please don't post anywhere on the forum until you've completed your application and it has been accepted by a member of the staff. Make sure that you post up your completed applications in the character creation forum, and please try to be patient whilst you are waiting for your application to be checked by an admin. Acceptance should take no longer than a day or two.
• I understand that at times it can be frustrating to wait around when you just want to get on with things and start posting, but I do have to ask that you remain patient when waiting for a member of staff to look through your application or do something for you. If you do finish an application, then make sure that you post a reply to your app with the same account saying something as simple as 'finished'. This not only makes it easier to tell who has finished their applications and who is still working on them, but you'll find that your character will get accepted a great deal quicker this way.[/color]
MEMBER PARTICIPATION.
• As a member, you are fully expected to enjoy your time here on City Lights, so if there is anything that is bothering you, you need to step forwards and let a member of staff know. The admin here at CL are pretty awesome, we know, but you're going to have to work with us on making this an enjoyable experience for you.
• Remember that as a member here on CL, you have a responsibility to remain respectful of all the other members on the forum. We have always tried to promote a friendly environment and do our best to make all of our members here feel welcome and as though they're part of a community, not just a role-playing forum. So, if someone upsets that balance and starts offending or upsetting the other members, we will remove them from the forum without a warning.
• Activity is very important on any role-playing forum. We don't expect you to crank out a post or a thread every day, that's just insane really. What we would like to see however, is all of our members logging on at least once every other day and maybe just posting so much as a small hello in the c-box or a reply in the ooc section. We just like to know that you haven't dropped off the face of the earth completely.[/color]
ROLE-PLAYING.
• City Lights is an R rated forum, which means that at times there might be scenes of a graphical or sexual nature. Plus you'll probably see certain Druggies swaggering about, cursing and getting drunk like there's no tomorrow. Because that's what they all like to do, right? All threads with mature content in them must be marked however, to protect our younger members from reading anything that might damage their unadulterated innocence.
• No God-modding. This one should be pretty obvious by now to everyone who role-plays. People do not like having their characters controlled by other people. You cannot control another person's character, you can't make them talk, you can't make them move and most of all you can't determine whether they live/die/get punched in the face. Make sure you don't do anything that could be considered God-modding, because it really is a serious offence.
• Posts are written in third person and third person alone. For example; "Johnny Truant gazed through the window protecting him from the harsh weather of the outside world, wondering what would happen if he perhaps decided to smash his head right through it." is correct. Just remember, you're writing about your character from the third perspective, narrating their story if you will, not pretending that you are your character and that you're writing their thoughts. "I looked through the window..." NO, NO, NO, NO, NO! See the difference?
• When it comes to post count, I'm slightly dubious as to whether or not there should be a minimum. I would personally like to see everyone write at least 3 paragraphs per post, not because length is important, but because that way you're sure to provide the other person with enough material to work from. Unfortunately, people do find it hard to bulk out their posts a lot. So, as long as you're giving back as much to the other person as they're giving to you, I think that should cut it. In other words, I don't want to see a thread where one member is writing four paragraphs for every post, and the other member is only just scraping by with one paragraph. It's not fair and I know you can all do better.
• Always make sure that you post in the correct area of the forum. If your character is sitting in the Canteen, then the thread itself should be posted in the Canteen. This makes sense really, doesn't it? Whilst we're on the subject, if your thread starts out in the Canteen but then moves on to the Athletic Fields, your thread should be moved as well. To do this, you can either ask a member of staff to move the thread for you, or you could start a new thread in the Athletic Fields and leave a link to it in the thread in the Canteen.
• If, like me, you type at such a fast pace that you often make typo's whilst you're writing a post for someone, then I'd suggest writing your post in a program like Microsoft Word first. Not only does it catch typo's that will make you cringe, but it's also got an awesome feature called the thesaurus, which I use constantly to make myself sound smart. Or even better is that Proboards has it's very own spell check for when you are posting threads.[/color]
CHARACTERS.
• We are presently accepting both canon and original characters. Obviously we would love it if you picked up one of the many canon characters we do have going, but if you decide to make an original, we'll be equally as happy.
• If you decide to take a canon who already has a sibling on the forum, please try and make sure that your character's history matches up with that of the other sibling's. Don't hesitate to send a PM to the other member playing the sibling if you need to ask any questions either.
• Personally I don't mind how many characters you make, I myself am notorious for making an insane number of characters, so I'm not going to stop any of you from creating an entire world's worth of people to play with if you want to. All I do ask however, is that you try and keep on top of all your characters and their respective threads.
• Multiple characters are fine, but make sure that you spread your characters equally amongst the member groups and the two genders. So, say your first character was a female, contemplate making your second a male. Also, we don't want to see everyone making Scene Kids and Gangsters, so change it up!
• No Mary-Sue's or Gary-Stu's. Enough said really, right? No, your character is not perfect. No, your character couldn't possibly have fit in any one of the cliques at Hazelton, but got placed as a jock because they're too amazing to be anything else. And finally no, everyone does not love your character or think they're amazing and awesome, super-special. Everyone has flaws in real life, even your idols have flaws. So please, try to be original and creative when it comes to making your characters.
• On a similar note, if I see one more character who's been raped, has lost all their family, ended up in an orphanage, got shunned because they were weird, self-harmed/still self-harms, ended up an Emo because they've become very bitter about the world, still has no friends, I seriously will go stark raving mental and start killing people myself. Rape is something I don't want to see on anyones applications, EVER. Anything else is questionable at best. You have been warned, so write your histories carefully.[/color]