The only response I have to that is no one is perfect.

For the average age level (what I've estimated, at least) and purpose of this website, your spelling and grammar look just fine to me. In fact, better than what I have seen many times over. Writing is hard, and completely subjective, after all.

If constructive criticism is hard for you to take, and it is for many people, don't ask for it and don't follow it. Write at the level you're comfortable with writing and anyone who says otherwise can stick it somewhere else.

Honestly, the only way to get better at something is to practice it, but also to practice it in the best way. Often times, you don't notice progress, but your brain functions like a muscle. It requires exercise, but also warm up and cool down periods. Just keep working and add difficulty when you feel like you can progress. Challenge yourself. Step out of your comfort zone.

Hope this helps.


As for me, I often get irritated at those who are completely passive or benign in a roleplay.
Those who join a roleplay yet make no effort to interact with the other characters, then get upset when they are ignored.

I usually take one or two posts to situate myself and establish my goals, and I'm usually not afraid to start something. After all, I can just edit the post if it doesn't turn out the way I expect. But it usually is successful.

_________________
"It's better to be a lion for one day than a sheep all your life."
Elizabeth Kenny

When people create several characters for a group roleplay and then refuse to interact with anyone other than their own characters. I feel like asking "hey, why are you even here if you aren't going to get involved at all?".

And of course, if their 'contributions' are ignored, they get mad because they're not being involved in the story.

YES! This happened over in Arwen Undomiel just recently. Someone joins, introduces several characters, and writes novella posts of interaction between them (and with a couple characters of one of the other writers whom they personally knew). It was close to godmodding in some ways. I wasn’t hugely invested in to it with my one character, and the writer who interacted with me the most and I have since continued the sub-story here.

Another pet peeve of mine is when you throw ideas for an RP up and some express keen interest, and you go into the work of writing up a starter after discussing the plotline and such, only to have them never post, or post once and disappear, or the polite ones will say they can’t write now for (reason here). I get that it is usually legitimate, and have been guilty of it myself, but when it happens too much, I begin to think my starters are crap.

Another pet peeve… personal drama. Sometimes real life partners don’t like it when their significant other is spending too much time writing with a stranger. This happened to a great RP I was in back in 2006 when I was still in school. The story was epic, and we could write well together. But then I got stalked and had some drama issues with their partner when she registered on the site. After a month, I ended up having to walk away.

This one. Them being in my head doesn't make them me at all. Some beloved characters actually take a lot of time to write because they are so very far from ME that they take thought and research and effort.

So yeah if you find me to be kind of a jerk, still give my characters a chance haha (oh wait maybe Shades meant that the other way around though)!

Lack of Details: This one is something which seems to always grate on me. Details make up the threads to any story, and without such makes the story threadbare. One of the main reasons I am picky about my partners and write mostly in Alpha is for the details. Those who do not take the time to add the specifics to their posts makes me want to vanish from the story. Along with this particular peeve is when details are ignored by the companion writing with. This leads to confusion. Sure, it happens on minor levels from time to time, and even an important one can be missed by the best of us. Yet, when such a thing is consistent...that is when I get annoyed. When details don't flow together from the partners; the story thread gets messy and confusing. I enjoy my writing entirely too much to let my own reach such a state of chaos.

That is one...there are others, but enough of about such things for the moment.

_________________


"One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them."

~J.R.R. Tolkien

I have to kind of agree with this, lol. Had a really good story going once with an amazing roleplayer, until their SO joined the same site and then writing with this roleplay partner felt awkward since our characters had a relationship going and the SO would often make passive-aggressive jokes about it. Some people just need to chill as there is nothing wrong with collaborating a story with a complete stranger.

Some of my RP pet peeves are as the following:

- For the creation and development of one of my characters who is a serial killer, I spent a lot of time studying psychology and time studying biographies of serial killers and the causes for their behaviors. So it drives me crazy when some people mention a 'mental illness' as a character's personality quirk.

- I love to read me a good dialogue and have a good dialogue with a character, but I don't understand why some people think writing mute characters as leading characters in a group roleplay is a good idea.

- I hate it when I spend time and effort writing down a post and clearly writing down my character's actions and then the other writer completely ignores a major action and replies with something completely different. Example: You mention that your character entered a building alone with the car key, but the other person writes that the two characters entered together or that your character entered alone and theirs drove away in the car using the keys. Not only it makes me uncomfortable because I will have to reach out and ask them to re-read my post again, but they will have to take extra time to re-write their post because of that. I mean, it happens sometimes that people make mistakes like these, but when they happen over and over again with the same person it makes me lose complete interest, not only to the story but to the writer as well.

- When people make a mental illness, a major phobia or an alcohol/drug addiction a big part of their character biography for example, but never once play their character suffering the consequences.

- People who write couple words in a dialogue in response to my own or do little things to help the flow of the scene. In a situation like that, I dislike being the one who always has to find things to say to keep the interaction going. You end up provoking most of the action and dialogue for the sake of getting them to support the interaction as well.

- When you have multiple roleplays open and you post by order for a while and then someday you decide to skip one of the roleplays because you want to think more about your 'long and detailed post' instead of throwing in whatever, but your roleplay partner instantly assumes that you're skipping the thread because you've lost interest.

- When the term 'some' is used in terms of action every time. For example: "They laughed some..." then an action later, "they nodded some." There are so many descriptors out there for terms such as 'some' or 'a bit'.

- Vulnerability is such an interesting quality/state of any powerful character out there, but no matter how powerful a character is, unless that character created the universe and everything in it, there is no reason as to why that character cannot have weaknesses. I dislike writing with people who have OP characters. Traits serve as an interesting starting point for any character and the story he's about to take part of and in my opinion, it's important to have a weakness/downfall for every superpower. And if there is no downfall there should at least be some 'limitation' to that power. Balance is important. Extremely wealthy characters exist. I play one myself who has a lot of wealth because of his position in the world and having lived a long lifespan for a non-mortal. He's also very fit with enhanced physical strength although limitless, I chose that his biggest weaknesses will be in his personality, in the very thing that IS him, instead of in the things that are physical and materialistic. He's an extremely vulnerable character despite the status of a powerful man. Character flaws, be it a personality, mental, or physical flaw, are very attractive. It makes them feel real.

_________________

I had the same thing happen to me as well. It's pretty annoying once it occurs, but I never had it where my writing partner's wife included herself in the plot (she did join the site) and I'm still writing the RP with him. It must be so weird to have it where another person inserted themselves into the RP though. It wasn't on this site.

@WildSpawn,
When it comes to writing characters with mental disorders it's one of the topics I haven't even touched on yet. Not because I don't want to, but because it feels like I have a huge fear in not representing people who truly have it. I could easily write about one of my characters being diagnosed with high functioning autism because I have it, I know what it's like growing up with it, and what occurs with it without falling into the tropes like Rain Man, the movie, created for the rest of us in the community. As a person that grew up in the special ed. programs in schools (where I was surrounded by other students with severe or minor diagnoses with other disorders or disabilities) and going to school to become a special ed. teacher, I don't feel like I have enough confidence to write for characters with those forms. For example, I've done a lot of research for depression (my fiancé and many of my friends have it) and taken classes at my university to try understanding it better but I still feel like I need to do more research before writing a character with that trait. It's so odd to see myself doing that when I see other writers just writing characters with depression and not having of the affected behavior.
One time I wanted to go deep into research about one of my characters using a shotgun as a weapon that I drive into the research behind it, I've watched videos, and eventually I got to train and use a shotgun in a shooting range, so I could get the feel of it. Honestly, researching could be tedious, and yet a very useful tool for writers.

_________________
°o° A Dreamer °o°

@dreamgurl42
Props to you! Range shooting is one of my favorites activities and I met couple people once who shot two particular guns just to see what they were like in real life because these two people were inspired by a video game, but I never met someone who went ahead to shoot a shotgun just to get a feel of it for a roleplay. Shooting shotguns is not difficult. I mean it still requires a certain strength to properly hold up the shotgun firmly into the shoulder, but what's difficult is to hit the target with a shotgun for beginners. Still I met a lot of newcomers who've tried different types of guns but the shotgun has always scared them. So yes, as far as I'm concerned at least, I'm quite amazed by what you did to get some sort of an understanding about the shotgun for your character's researchers.

As for depression, it is one thing that is difficult to write for those who never experienced it. I have chronic depression myself, also called Dysthymia. It's something that I currently live with. I can live my life like any other ordinary person and nobody would know that I have it unless I tell them or they find out by themselves after spending a lot of time around me. It's so deep-rooted that if you end up with an episode of major depression you will think there is still nothing wrong with you because you wouldn't know. Unlike an episode of depression, chronic depression is incessant and this is why some psychologists argue that Dysthymia is a personality disorder. Depression can be felt so deep because it takes control over your emotions when you least expect it. Depression remains one of those mental illnesses that others find hard to write about because you really have to experience it to understand it. Some even mistake a depressed character's abnormal emotional state for sadness, when in reality, sadness and depression are two separate things. It's a major misunderstanding to think that depression is all about feeling sad and angry. You can feel completely fine for a day until the all-consuming emotional trauma comes knocking at your door bringing mood swings along with it. Thanks to modern medicine and proper treatments, one can live a fulfilled and very happy life.

Remember that it's not a choice, feeling angry, irritated, sad and hopeless sometimes when depressed. You don't get to choose why you don't want to feel the joy and happiness. I chose not to take medicine and instead, find different ways to live with chronic depression. When I'm happy, I can really feel it because happiness spikes lightly above neutral, but on a normal day, my mood is neutral or below neutral because it really takes something extremely exciting to make me feel those sparks of happiness inside me and sometimes hobbies that I like can do just that. Fortunately, being a gregarious person who enjoys the company of people and loves to go out and socialize makes chronic depression feel less painful. And when I'm alone, I'm most of the times focusing on work. So I keep myself busy at all time so that depression does not lead me into darkness because feeling numbness and indifference towards most things is not living.

So while talking about Pet Peeves I thought I'd share this with you since you opened up about your own issue. I think it's still very interesting to see people doing the best they can to research an illness in order to write a character who suffers from that. Even if they don't get it 100% right, at least they would have tried.

_________________

@WildSpawn,
Thanks! I wish I was able to go back to the shooting range more often. Although some aspect of it was a result of research, it is fun especially with the competition of who can shoot the paper target the closest. I've been a little lucky to win those lately unless people are just letting me. Lol!

I've think I noticed that feeling coming back and forth with my fiancé. We recently started living together after six years being in a long distant relationship. It mostly occurs at work when he not busy or just one of those days. My mom used to think 'my love for him would cure him', but my research and going to professionals for his depression says otherwise. It's not true. Depression does seem like something the person has to adjust and learn to live with unfortunately. I appreciate your insight.

_________________
°o° A Dreamer °o°

_________________