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| Welcome to the Black Star Storyboards. We're a small, backwater, literary roleplaying community who takes pride in our very realistic writing styles. Have a read, and register an account if your interested in joining us! |
| Move it along now...; Tip to get your stories kick-started | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Jun 8 2008, 08:31 PM (249 Views) | |
| KodeTen | Jun 8 2008, 08:31 PM Post #1 |
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BADministrator
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Hey guys; I'm going to start this by saying you are not doing things wrong. Everyone writes the way they please and that's why we're here. What i aim to suggest to you is a simple idea that will help you guys ramp up the pace of your stories and hopefully we'll see a lot more come to fruition and be locked away in the Archives to be all prettied up by Phoenix and Shadow. What suggestion is this? Narration. Storyguiding. As some of you may have noticed, the staff are beginning the process to assign a Storymaster to the Black Star story. This one guy or gal will basically be there to narrate a bit, act out on his own, and pretty much keep things moving like a well-oiled machine. My suggestion to you as writers and story starters is to take this concept and practice it on a smaller level. If your story is pretty well stagnant, don't give up hope, the moderators won't archive it until you agree for it to happen. If you want it to keep going, pop in a narrate a bit, give a brief rundown as to what should have happened, move the story on to the next section, and pick it up from there. Give it a shot at least, and let's see if the pace of some of our stories can ramp up at all. In fact, here before too long I think I'll put this concept to practice on Twilight. Oh, and just to make sure we're clear...
Thanks for your time; ~Neostar |
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| Shadow Walker | Jun 9 2008, 05:04 PM Post #2 |
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Assistant Editor
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Alright, I just find myself forced to disagree with you. To me, it sounds like you have this idea that only one person in the story should actually write anything. I find the idea of the "Narrator/Storyguider" thing almost useless in the way you've put it down. In the stories that I head, I take a lot from table-top and live action role playing. Now, anyone who is familiar with these will see them in my stories. Most predominately in the Vampire story, where I am running a cast of secondary characters to everyone else primary. As well, I have a story arc planed out for them. Because of this, there will be time when a conversation or a single seen will take some time to get through. All this being said, I do encourage people to take initiative with their characters. If someone has a plan or plot or anything else they wish to do with them, they are always free to send me a PM or get me on Messenger and talk with me about it, and see how we can work it into the main story. |
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| KodeTen | Jun 9 2008, 08:33 PM Post #3 |
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BADministrator
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You confused me. I nowhere mentioned that only one person should write. I made it clear that when a story is started, the person starting should perhaps think to take the initiative to pop in and guide his or her story with narration and acting in-character if need be to move along a story that is pretty much ground to a halt. Obviously this demands the use of common sense, if two fellow writers have just kind of dropped off mid-conversation, PM them and ask them to continue it. If they won't and the story leader wants the story to move on, a Mod could get involved with permissions and some judicious editing and the story can move on. I'm not saying crack the whip like a slave driver, but if a story is dead and the person wants to bring it back to life, some narration and storyguiding, or moderator intervention, will do the trick. I'm not saying it's up to one guy or gal to write the story, but it IS up to the principle author to guide the storyline as he/she sees fit for his/her storyline. |
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| Andune | Jun 10 2008, 01:27 AM Post #4 |
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Proven
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Just to throw my two cents in.. I've had stories that you're supposed to follow a pre-set storyline and so forth like that. now, you may not be saying that this is how it needs to be, but it comes off that way.. That the narrator will tell people where to go and so forth like that, and the characters just react to situations.. Now, if i'm wrong, I'm sorry, but, If that's the way you're saying it, I have to agree that it's a bad idea. It limits what a person can do..it limits their character capacity as well... limits their creativity. |
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| KodeTen | Jun 10 2008, 12:34 PM Post #5 |
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BADministrator
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Let's try this again, I really must suck at explaining my ideas lately. If you start a story in the general storyboards, it is your responsibility to drive your story along. Let the other characters put in their plot twists all you like, but at the end of the day, you're the one with the foot on the gas. If Your story seems to be just sitting there and not moving at all, get in contact with the authors included and see what the deal is, if it just seems like everyone's in a rut, or you can't get a good response, then narrate or act in the capacity of your character and move the story forward. You don't have to move it far forward, something as simple as posting the closing of a conversation or the closing of that particular quest the key characters were on or the closing of the day and the start of a new one should be sufficient to get the creative gears turning again. Do not act in the capacity of a narrator in another person's story unless you have their permission to do so. Now do y'all understand? |
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| Castille | Jun 10 2008, 01:00 PM Post #6 |
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Inquisitor
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Alright, I'm going to clear every single one of you up on this entire thing. Now shush and listen. Hehe. There is only one position that NeoStar is looking to fill - this is the StoryMaster position. This person will have a seperate account from their character and will use this username ONLY to move along the Black Star main story (Darklands) if it falls into a rut. The timeframe that has been discussed for this is most likely a week. The StoryMaster will not be glorifying any specific characters, including their own, and will be posting to ONLY move along the storyline to inspire our writers to continue with the story. We understand that it's summer and people work or go on vacation, etc. but you can't tell me we're all going on vacation at the same time. Secondly, NeoStar mentions people narrating stories. He may have not worded this correctly but what he is mentioning here is for the creator of the individual stories (i.e. - Vampire: The Masquerade, Nightfall, etc.) should practice what the StoryMaster will be doing for the main Black Star story...such as if no one has posted in your story for over a week, move the story along at a pace that will get people able to post in it again. As NeoStar had mentioned, no one is doing anything wrong here, but we're simply recommending it so the site doesn't go completely dead after a week or two of waiting on just one person to post in a storyline. And this is also just something I want to add in that I know a few of the Staff members have discussed. PLEASE try to refrain from posting crucial information within your personal quarters that is also information that is important to the main story. To use myself as an example, I'll be honest, I do not read every single thread in the personal quarters. If someone posts something regarding my character and we have a conversation that also involves the main story it's going to confuse the hell out of every other poster within the main story. I'm not trying to tell people what to do, but this is an issue that has been discussed more then once not only among staff but among all of the writers on these boards as well. I hope this cleared things up for everyone. Thanks and happy writing! |
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| Ariel Serenity Brightwing | Jun 10 2008, 09:22 PM Post #7 |
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Chief Medical Officer - USNF Black Star
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speaking of which are we starting another chapter for the main story??? there's alot of conversations that were going on ---and need continuing.. |
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9:25 AM Jul 11