Darth Abyss
Eldritch
General
Official Chaos user Guide - A quick overview about everything you really need to know
Character Creation
Darth Ignus Guide - Story driven Character Creation
Jaxton Ravos Guide - Dice roll based Character Creation
James Justice Guide - General Character Creation Guide
Fairness, beeing a decent Human being
Liliane Lancaster Guide - How to stay out of drama
Sarge Potteiger Guide - How to behave as a Sith/Jedi/etc.
Posts
How to use spoilers
Rules
Post Prefixes
Tirdarius Guide - How to write a detailed post
Oddball Guide - Quality posts from your Phone
Happiness
Blog post by Miss Blonde
Here a bit of text to lead you through the guides: (Not mandatory)
Hey you (Yes you), you are new here right, and this whole thing looks pretty interesting, but also very confusing and you have absolutely no idea what to do and how to start.
First of, to say it with the words of Douglas Adams: Don't panic. We all been there, confused and trying to make our first steps into the greater world (of online roleplaying, don't get your hopes up.)
For the start, look here. The link you just opened is the official chaos guide, it got criticized for being not complete enough, but honestly I believe that everything in there is a mandatory read before you do anything here on Chaos. Sure there are a few details lacking, but there is a short bit about the rules, additional links, and it helps to get a general idea what exactly we are doing here, and how we do it, so you can see if you even interested in that. Chaos might be a roleplaying community, but don't expect any dice rolls and stats like you would in a tabletop game or a pen and paper campaign for the most part. Combat is a part of what goes on here, but in the end almost everyone here is more about writing a good story, even if that means taking a few liberties from the way roleplaying works normally. Also it is based in the star wars universe, in case you haven't noticed that just yet. The fact that you made it here already tells me that you have basic reading skills, know how to turn on your computer and type a URL into Google, so you already have all the skills needed to have fun her.
Step two, build your character: Everyone and their mom has already written a guide on how to create the perfect character, so I will keep this short and rather give out a thank you to all the awesome guys that have written them. My personal favorite is this one, made by [member="Darth Ignus"], which takes a very story based approach right in the spirit of chaos, is very detailed and even can give all of us that spend some time here a new, good approach to creating a new character. If you have a background in the world of pen and paper, and you really, really want to let chance decided about your character, we also have this guide by [member="Jaxton Ravos"]. Still not satisfied? Take a look here, on this other guide I like, made by [member="James Justice"]. No one says you have to use exclusively one of them, or any of them at all, but simply reading them will help you to get an idea, even if it is just a little one. There are a ton of guides that are designed to write specific kinds of characters (like sith, jedi, etc.) but I simply advise you to look through the Tutorials & Guides section (yes the one this guide is in) and keep a look out for the keywords that fit what you have in mind for a character. Or just write [member="Tirdarius"] 15 pms to ask questions about his famous sith guides (That was joke, please never, ever do that (Expect he asks you to for whatever reason.)) But well there is some truth in this, mainly in the "ask" part. We are a community here, and once you manage to keep your social anxiety on a minimal level you can start asking question once in a while. Most of us are rather helpful people on our good days (Just don't ask me anything because I have literally no idea what I am doing.)
Step three ...
No wait we do something else first, something that is more important than any rules or guides on this side. One word: Fairness.
So this wouldn't be my guide to guides, if there weren't a few guides I can link you to, but there is one easy rule. Don't be a douche. Ever. First guide on this list is this one by [member="Liliane Lancaster"], dealing mainly with issues of keeping our community drama free. The core message of it is a simple one: Always remember that there's a person on the other side of the screen, not a made up fantasy character. But to be honest, I will be pretty mad on anyone who skips reading this guide and the others mentioned here (YES YOU, CLICK THAT LINK). So now one for all of you who plan to play a sith, jedi or anyone else who has heard about the force once, made by [member="Sarge Potteiger"]. This guide doesn't only tells you about fairplay as a force sensitive character, but it is also a perfect transition to ...
Step three (finally), getting started, for real this time. So what have you learned yet? How to build a character and how to be a nice, decent human. Looks like you are all set to learn how to actually play. First of, chaos is big, full with things and characters others have created, and even as a certified star wars lore nut I had my troubles to fully grasp everything at first, especially when it came to the world this all takes place in. Don't get worked up if things are confusing, either use the search function for a planet or location, or just ask the writer what is going on (In a short, firm and friendly message.) Now to to the real meat of all of this, posts. Like a lot of posts.
As you might have noticed by now, Chaos is basically a forum, and it works like one. Stories are written in post chains: Someone starts out, another answers. For the most part, people will keep to the order that a thread starts out, meaning if you share a thread with one person it will go first him/her, than you, than him/her, than you, than him/her, than you, than him/her, than you, than him/her ... And so on. Doesn't sounds that hard right? But on chaos we often threads that include more than two writers at once, but the idea stays the same. Keep to the order established at the start of the thread. Sure sometime it will give you an itching feeling in your finger while you wait for someone to make their post, but then just think about what I said early. Fairness. Post orders doesn't exist to annoy you, they exist to guarantee no one gets buried under a ton of posts because everyone else couldn't wait and ignored him/her. There are exceptions to this, but they are obviously exceptions. What these are exactly are thing you will be learn by simply playing on chaos, and by being observant to how others do it. Another important thing @Mention. For example @Darth Abyss (Hi), will not only make my name look shiny blue, but also drop me a mention in my notifications (That yellow bell on top of the layout right next to the that thing that most email services use as symbol and that I don't know because I was raised by the internet, that is used to read and write pms/Personal messages.), so I know that someone has done something that involves my character or me OOC.
Good question, what is OOC? OOC = Out of Character, the opposite of IC = In character. This is a simple way to make clear if you write something as yourself or as your character and is used fairly often here on chaos. As far as OOC goes there are times and places for it, but for the most part we keep IC and OOC separated. If there is a need to state something OOC in a IC thread, please look into this thread. There is a ton more I could say about posts, post time etc, but this was a guide to guides at some point before I began writing about step three, so have some links: Here and here. So next one, post quality: No one says how long or short you post has to be, or how you structures it but I would advise you to read this guide by [member="Tirdarius"] (Hi) and this one if you intent on playing chaos on your phone a lot, made by @Oddball. There a three million more things I want to point out, but for the sake of simplicity I will leave this as it is, with only one piece of advise to round this of: Don't be shy and jump in a public thread. No one will be mad at you for that, as long you follow the rules and the advice given here. Just touch the water for a bit, see how everything feels, have fun.
Step four: have fun. Yes that is actually a very important part of all this. If roleplaying feels like work, than you are probably not doing it right. I mean it is literally in the word "playing". We are here to have fun, have a good time, and take a time out from the boring world outside of our screens once in a while when there is nothing good on TV. So don't get worked up about anything. Or just read this blog post by [member="Miss Blonde"].
Thanks for taking the time to read this, I know that you are literally more confused than before now, but to draw the connection right to the start: Don't Panic. There is no one forcing you to rush your first post, take your time and get comfortable with everything. Post to Post rp (That means roleplay in rp language) is a rather slow thing, so don't feel like there is something you are missing out if you don't make your post now. Okay, I think that's it for today. Also any spelling mistakes are placed deliberately to make this less intimidating to read.
Edit: If you find any spelling mistakes, please don't tell me, I already feel bad enough with the few I find myself.
Official Chaos user Guide - A quick overview about everything you really need to know
Character Creation
Darth Ignus Guide - Story driven Character Creation
Jaxton Ravos Guide - Dice roll based Character Creation
James Justice Guide - General Character Creation Guide
Fairness, beeing a decent Human being
Liliane Lancaster Guide - How to stay out of drama
Sarge Potteiger Guide - How to behave as a Sith/Jedi/etc.
Posts
How to use spoilers
Rules
Post Prefixes
Tirdarius Guide - How to write a detailed post
Oddball Guide - Quality posts from your Phone
Happiness
Blog post by Miss Blonde
Here a bit of text to lead you through the guides: (Not mandatory)
Hey you (Yes you), you are new here right, and this whole thing looks pretty interesting, but also very confusing and you have absolutely no idea what to do and how to start.
First of, to say it with the words of Douglas Adams: Don't panic. We all been there, confused and trying to make our first steps into the greater world (of online roleplaying, don't get your hopes up.)
For the start, look here. The link you just opened is the official chaos guide, it got criticized for being not complete enough, but honestly I believe that everything in there is a mandatory read before you do anything here on Chaos. Sure there are a few details lacking, but there is a short bit about the rules, additional links, and it helps to get a general idea what exactly we are doing here, and how we do it, so you can see if you even interested in that. Chaos might be a roleplaying community, but don't expect any dice rolls and stats like you would in a tabletop game or a pen and paper campaign for the most part. Combat is a part of what goes on here, but in the end almost everyone here is more about writing a good story, even if that means taking a few liberties from the way roleplaying works normally. Also it is based in the star wars universe, in case you haven't noticed that just yet. The fact that you made it here already tells me that you have basic reading skills, know how to turn on your computer and type a URL into Google, so you already have all the skills needed to have fun her.
Step two, build your character: Everyone and their mom has already written a guide on how to create the perfect character, so I will keep this short and rather give out a thank you to all the awesome guys that have written them. My personal favorite is this one, made by [member="Darth Ignus"], which takes a very story based approach right in the spirit of chaos, is very detailed and even can give all of us that spend some time here a new, good approach to creating a new character. If you have a background in the world of pen and paper, and you really, really want to let chance decided about your character, we also have this guide by [member="Jaxton Ravos"]. Still not satisfied? Take a look here, on this other guide I like, made by [member="James Justice"]. No one says you have to use exclusively one of them, or any of them at all, but simply reading them will help you to get an idea, even if it is just a little one. There are a ton of guides that are designed to write specific kinds of characters (like sith, jedi, etc.) but I simply advise you to look through the Tutorials & Guides section (yes the one this guide is in) and keep a look out for the keywords that fit what you have in mind for a character. Or just write [member="Tirdarius"] 15 pms to ask questions about his famous sith guides (That was joke, please never, ever do that (Expect he asks you to for whatever reason.)) But well there is some truth in this, mainly in the "ask" part. We are a community here, and once you manage to keep your social anxiety on a minimal level you can start asking question once in a while. Most of us are rather helpful people on our good days (Just don't ask me anything because I have literally no idea what I am doing.)
Step three ...
No wait we do something else first, something that is more important than any rules or guides on this side. One word: Fairness.
So this wouldn't be my guide to guides, if there weren't a few guides I can link you to, but there is one easy rule. Don't be a douche. Ever. First guide on this list is this one by [member="Liliane Lancaster"], dealing mainly with issues of keeping our community drama free. The core message of it is a simple one: Always remember that there's a person on the other side of the screen, not a made up fantasy character. But to be honest, I will be pretty mad on anyone who skips reading this guide and the others mentioned here (YES YOU, CLICK THAT LINK). So now one for all of you who plan to play a sith, jedi or anyone else who has heard about the force once, made by [member="Sarge Potteiger"]. This guide doesn't only tells you about fairplay as a force sensitive character, but it is also a perfect transition to ...
Step three (finally), getting started, for real this time. So what have you learned yet? How to build a character and how to be a nice, decent human. Looks like you are all set to learn how to actually play. First of, chaos is big, full with things and characters others have created, and even as a certified star wars lore nut I had my troubles to fully grasp everything at first, especially when it came to the world this all takes place in. Don't get worked up if things are confusing, either use the search function for a planet or location, or just ask the writer what is going on (In a short, firm and friendly message.) Now to to the real meat of all of this, posts. Like a lot of posts.
As you might have noticed by now, Chaos is basically a forum, and it works like one. Stories are written in post chains: Someone starts out, another answers. For the most part, people will keep to the order that a thread starts out, meaning if you share a thread with one person it will go first him/her, than you, than him/her, than you, than him/her, than you, than him/her, than you, than him/her ... And so on. Doesn't sounds that hard right? But on chaos we often threads that include more than two writers at once, but the idea stays the same. Keep to the order established at the start of the thread. Sure sometime it will give you an itching feeling in your finger while you wait for someone to make their post, but then just think about what I said early. Fairness. Post orders doesn't exist to annoy you, they exist to guarantee no one gets buried under a ton of posts because everyone else couldn't wait and ignored him/her. There are exceptions to this, but they are obviously exceptions. What these are exactly are thing you will be learn by simply playing on chaos, and by being observant to how others do it. Another important thing @Mention. For example @Darth Abyss (Hi), will not only make my name look shiny blue, but also drop me a mention in my notifications (That yellow bell on top of the layout right next to the that thing that most email services use as symbol and that I don't know because I was raised by the internet, that is used to read and write pms/Personal messages.), so I know that someone has done something that involves my character or me OOC.
Good question, what is OOC? OOC = Out of Character, the opposite of IC = In character. This is a simple way to make clear if you write something as yourself or as your character and is used fairly often here on chaos. As far as OOC goes there are times and places for it, but for the most part we keep IC and OOC separated. If there is a need to state something OOC in a IC thread, please look into this thread. There is a ton more I could say about posts, post time etc, but this was a guide to guides at some point before I began writing about step three, so have some links: Here and here. So next one, post quality: No one says how long or short you post has to be, or how you structures it but I would advise you to read this guide by [member="Tirdarius"] (Hi) and this one if you intent on playing chaos on your phone a lot, made by @Oddball. There a three million more things I want to point out, but for the sake of simplicity I will leave this as it is, with only one piece of advise to round this of: Don't be shy and jump in a public thread. No one will be mad at you for that, as long you follow the rules and the advice given here. Just touch the water for a bit, see how everything feels, have fun.
Step four: have fun. Yes that is actually a very important part of all this. If roleplaying feels like work, than you are probably not doing it right. I mean it is literally in the word "playing". We are here to have fun, have a good time, and take a time out from the boring world outside of our screens once in a while when there is nothing good on TV. So don't get worked up about anything. Or just read this blog post by [member="Miss Blonde"].
Thanks for taking the time to read this, I know that you are literally more confused than before now, but to draw the connection right to the start: Don't Panic. There is no one forcing you to rush your first post, take your time and get comfortable with everything. Post to Post rp (That means roleplay in rp language) is a rather slow thing, so don't feel like there is something you are missing out if you don't make your post now. Okay, I think that's it for today. Also any spelling mistakes are placed deliberately to make this less intimidating to read.
Edit: If you find any spelling mistakes, please don't tell me, I already feel bad enough with the few I find myself.
