What Is Roleplaying

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What is Roleplaying?

Roleplaying, in the purest form of definition, is to act out or perform the part of a fictional character. There are many ways that this is done both in real life and online, ranging from parts in plays, to Live-Action-Role-Playing with others while in costume or garb, to tabletop gaming with paper-based character sheets, figurines, and dice, to text-based roleplaying. Regardless of how it is done, the outcome is generally the same; fulfill your fantasy of being someone other than yourself, doing things beyond what you would do in your life, or whatever it is that causes you to have fun and enjoyment.

Roleplaying in the Dark Jedi Brotherhood

Within the Dark Jedi Brotherhood, there are varying types of roleplaying. Which one you will encounter is largely dependent upon the clan that you belong to, with Clan Taldryan for example having Game Masters utilize the participating character's Skills from their Character Sheet to determine the outcome of events.

For those who want a more hardcore approach, a simplified form of d6 (the use of 6-Sided Dice) is used to further increase the chances of success, but also of failure, with the potential risk of permadeath of a character being on the table. Both regular players and hardcore players can participate in the same sessions, with rolls only affecting hardcore characters and having no effect on regular players.

Other clans utilize different types of systems, ranging from d20 (the use of 20-sided Dice), to a wider array of dice used strictly by Game Masters behind the scenes that help determine area/environment effects, sneak/investigation outcomes, and much more without player dice interaction.

From the Beginning: The Basics

These next sections are for those who are new to the Dark Jedi Brotherhood and have not yet fully immersed themselves in the intricacies of establishing their character, as well as those who wish to brush up on their basic knowledge.

It will walk you through what you will need to know to get started as a roleplayer, from Shadow Academy Courses that focus on specific areas of character creation to an understanding of how to utilize these features to their fullest, to character orders and traditions, Item Loadouts and Snapshots, and more.

The Shadow Academy

The first, and most recommended place to start, is with the Dark Jedi Brotherhood Shadow Academy]. The Shadow Academy, as written on the Shadow Academy Wiki Page, is is the primary training facility for new members of the Dark Jedi Brotherhood.

The key areas to focus on at the beginning are several courses within the Character Creation & Development] Department, focusing on the five different Order Cores and both Character Sheets courses, 101: Introduction and 102: Possessions & Loadouts. These will give you a basic foundation on which to begin developing your character. After you have taken the Order Cores, or if you know which order you want, continue to the next section.

Choosing Your Order/Tradition

Orders in the Dark Jedi Brotherhood are similar to your latent abilities and alignment. Choosing your order is critical for the former, but a recent update no longer affects your alignment. Below is a breakdown of each order, tradition, and discipline - and what they allow/enable.

One thing to note before selecting your order, however, is that while you can be anything you desire while in an order (military command, but a mercenary - or an assassin for hire with a military rank but no military affiliation), the only restriction to note is the separation of force sensitivity and a difference in available Disciplines. Loyalists cannot use the force or be an Infiltrator Discipline - but gain extra Skill points due to the loss of Force Points. While a Sith is able to use the force, but can not be a Director or Ace Discipline.

Non-Force Orders

Loyalist: Loyalists are more focused on military, security, political, or command-type roles, with their internal ranking structure being set with the military ranks. Traditional character career archetypes with this order are: Military Command/Officer, Starfighter/Transport Pilot, Bridge Officer, Mechanical, Medical, etc.

Mercenary: Mercenaries are more focused on payment-type roles, with their internal ranking structure being set with mercenary ranks. Traditional career archetypes with this order are: Smuggler, Bounty Hunter, Assassin, Infiltrator, Merchant, Transport/Freighter Pilot, etc.

Force Orders

Sith: Focused more on the usage of the Dark Side of the Force, Sith

Jedi: Focused more on the usage of the Light Side of the Force, the Jedi traditionally are the peacekeepers of the galaxy, with their internal ranking structure being set with Jedi Order ranks. Traditional career archetypes in this order are: Security

Force Disciple: Focused more on the broad usage of the force, Force Disciples traditionally see themselves as a form of Grey Jedi - force users that follow neither the light nor the dark unless they want to, and use force powers from both sides of the spectrum. Their internal ranking structure is unique compared to the other orders, with unique ranks.

Traditions

Unlike Orders, Traditions have no direct effect on your character. The sole purpose of traditions is to further identify your character's affiliation and nature beyond normal means.

The Imperial tradition for example, as seen on the character of Teebu Nyrrire, identifies him as a character of the Loyalist Order with a Director Discipline' that follows Imperial Tradition This means that it can be safely assumed both generally, and in roleplaying sessions, that his character follows some form of Imperial values or doctrine in his performance.

There are numerous other traditions as well, which can be found under the Traditions tab of your Characters section, located in your Administration Section.

Character Sheet

Now that you have those basics out of the way, next comes the fun part. For those who wish to participate in roleplaying, the most basic thing you will need to create is a Character Sheet. The character sheet contains all of the core information about your character, such as their Species, their Personal Details, their chosen Order and Disciplines, as well as a full breakdown of their Skills, Force Powers (if they are Force Sensitive), Feats, Specializations, and Aspects. Everything you need to get started in a session.

For a tutorial on how to create a character sheet, please utilize Roleplaying Overview: 02 - Character Creation Guide from the menu to the right. For additional information, if you have not already, refer to the Shadow Academy section above.

Loadouts

Once your character sheet is created, submitted, and approved, the next stage of preparation is to construct your loadout. A loadout is a listing of the equipment that your character has in a particular situation.

Using the main character of Alethia Archenksova for example, who is the current head of the Roleplaying Society for the Dark Jedi Brotherhood, you will be able to see that there are two different loadouts. (For your characters, you can have as many loadouts as you feel are necessary)

The first loadout details what Alethia's character utilizes for common everyday use, and the second is what they use for combat/battlefield situations.

In the creation of a loadout, available in Roleplaying Overview: 04 - Character Loadout, you must first buy equipment utilizing the various item stores that we have for member use. A direct link to these can be found at Roleplaying Overview: 03 - Item Stores.

The stores of note for starting use would be Antares Consolidated Armorers for armor, and Antei Armaments for basic non-lightsaber weapons. If you are a force-user who utilizes a lightsaber, then you also would want to refer to the Eos Exotic Kyber Bazaar for your lightsaber and lightsaber crystal needs.

If you find yourself short on credits, however, the easiest ways to gain them would be with: Promotions, Competition Participation, Competition Placement, Earning Clusters, Leadership Positions, and Awards.

The other stores offer more expanded options as well, such as companions (droids, pets, creatues, etc.), general equipment (belts, explosives, datapads, etc.), ships, and much more!

If there is something, in particular, that you are looking for but are unsure where it is, feel free to follow the link from Roleplaying Overview: 05 - Character Item Lookup which will guide you to a research section where you can pull up an item by name, and its details will tell you where it is sold so you can find it.

Snapshot

Some Game Masters will require participants to give a link to a snapshot. A snapshot is a picture of your character and one particular loadout that is created at that specific moment, detailing how your character was set at that time.

The reasoning for this is with a standard loadout, equipment, and your character sheet can be changed or updated at your discretion.

With a snapshot, however, even if you update or change the details of your character, the snapshot does not reflect those changes. This means however you started the roleplaying session is how your character will be until its conclusion.

Creating a snapshot is just as easy, by utilizing the last section of Roleplaying Overview: 04 - Character Loadout it will walk you through setting it up.

Once it is set up, you will have access to it through the Snapshot tab of Loadouts which will also give you a direct link to it. That link is what you will provide to a Game Master (or in fiction writing competitions that do not allow you to auto-select a loadout) that requires it.

Discord usage in Roleplaying

Now that you have your character created and ready, the next step would be to get your feet wet and jump straight into basic roleplaying!

The Dark Jedi Brotherhood utilizes a program called Discord for discussion and chat purposes, both in general and with special channels for each of the Clans. Roleplaying is also contained here as well. To join our discord, please follow this link and open the discord link at the very bottom. If you do not see it, make sure that you are logged in to the website!

Once you join the discord, you will have access to a very limited number of channels. However, when you join you will see a message in the #Welcome channel from a user named dbb0t that contains a button that can be pressed. This button (or link if that does not work or you are on mobile) will allow you to link your Dark Jedi Brotherhood website account with our Discord, and will automatically allow you to join your clan’s chats.

For our purposes, once you are authenticated, you will find a channel called #rp-lobby under the General/Society Chats area. This is our general RP section that most people who play generally utilize. Clans will usually create their own RPs, hidden for just their member's usage (or others if they ask to join, as most clans will allow non-clan members to join them in a lot of cases) in what are called threads.

The Sessions

When you join a session, you will see two special threads appear that are linked directly under #rp-lobby, both with the same name. However; one will begin with [OOC] and the other [IC]. The OOC chat, or Out-Of-Character, is where non-in-character roleplay discussions regarding the session take place. So questions, general banter, anything relating to the roleplay itself.

The IC chat, or In-Character, is where the session itself takes place. Most times these are Game Master lead, though in many casual cases it is just open for participation in general. In this chat, you want to make sure your posts are always in-character and written like a story. You don’t want to ask random things or anything that should instead be located in the Out-Of-Character chat.

For clarification on the session's rules and what to expect, when you join a session type you are unfamiliar with, feel free to ask in the Out-Of-Character chat for an explanation.

Session Types and Participating

For most roleplaying, there are several types that exist. These are as follows:

Open-Play: Open-Play means that you are able to place yourself anywhere in the fictional realm that is being used, and write yourself how you choose. So if the setting is in a city, and a large part of the group is at a bar, you could write yourself nearby taking part in a street brawl or working at a shop. You could use NPCs that exist around that area, writing them yourself how you feel they would be, such as patrons or general civilians, and more.

However, if you participate with others directly, a common courtesy of this type is to allow a full rotation of posts to take place. So if you do a post that interacts with two others, it is a courtesy to wait until both of them have responded before you continue with your next post. Exceptions to this would be if you posted, but then someone directly asks you a question. In this case, you can respond and react appropriately, and then the person after them would go as they would normally have.

Rotation-Play: Rotation-Play means that every post is in a specific order. These are commonly done during missions, particularly during combat, when people are together in a group. The post-order is generally set by the Game Master, who will inform participants whose turn it is in the [OOC] chat. In this type, players do not resolve outcomes; but instead leave that to the Game Master to do so either at the end of their individual turn, or at the end of the group’s turns.

For example, if Player A decides to try and hack an interface to open a door after enemies begin opening fire on their position, they make a post initiating that they begin hacking it. Player B then makes a post where they decide to defend the location and fire back on them. Player C then makes their post as well, followed by a Game Master update between each post on if they succeed and the door opens, fail and it stays sealed and another option will be required, or if it will resolve in another turn (Such as if the interface will take time to crack due to slicing). Then Player A begins again, and the rotation starts all over again.

Exceptions to this rotation would be if an enemy suddenly strikes, or a trap is triggered. An example would be if Player A opens a door to a giant tomb, and Player B decides to stroll right in without checking around them for anything and a trap is triggered, the Game Master would make a post directly afterwards that would require a resolution post from Player B. If they are unable to resolve it, that gives Player C the opportunity to try and rescue player B. The Game Master would then make a resolution post, and the rotation would start again from either Player C (If B managed to resolve the trap themselves), or Player A (If Player C had to help Player B.)

Split Rotation-Play: Similar in build to Rotation-Play, Split Rotation-Play also has posts that are in a specific order; however, those post orders are separate from each other both for missions and combat. The post-order is generally made by the decision of players and is confirmed by the Game Master who will then inform participants whose turn it is in the OOC chat. In this type, players do not resolve outcomes; but instead, leave that to the Game Master to do so either at the end of their individual turn or at the end of the group’s turns.

For example, if Players B, D, and E decide to infiltrate an Imperial Arms Depot from the front, and Players A, C, and F choose to go in from the back, this results in a split. The post-rotation for the first group would go between B, D, and E with rotation, and A, C, and F with rotation. If Player B makes their post, but D has not yet done so, Player A can make their post whenever they choose. And once Player A makes their post, Player C can then make theirs; even without Player D having made theirs yet. Each team is responsible for its own individual post-rotation.

Game Master Discretion: The final type would be Game Master Discretion. These generally go between the three types above but are based on specific scenarios or situations that occur and will be confirmed by the Game Master in the OOC chat. In this type, players do not resolve outcomes but instead leave that to the Game Master to do so either at the end of their individual turn or at the end of the group’s turns UNLESS the Game Master allows it. However, if a player resolves a post outside of their capabilities a Game Master can make a resolution post dictating otherwise and that they spectacularly failed.

An example of this would be a session currently in Open-Play at a forward headquarters on an enemy world, but suddenly an enemy force begins moving on their location. The Game Master may switch it to Rotation-Play for the duration of the engagement, or if the players decide in-character to split up to engage the forces from multiple directions, Split Rotation-Play. Generally, once the situation is resolved, the Game Master will return the session to its original Open-Play setting.

Utilizing Your Character

Your character sheet at this stage, is the most important as it will help dictate what your character is capable of doing - their individual strengths, weaknesses, capable feats, and specializations. As you play in a session using your character, you will want to reference this; particularly in a Game Master controlled session. Open-Play sessions won’t utilize it nearly as much, but courtesy is that you use it yourself for your individual character. The point is to have fun, and if you operate outside of your character's means or ability (such as an Ewok picking up and throwing a Wookie), it breaks that immersion and ruins the fun. So please…don’t do it.

The reasoning behind this is in Game Master controlled sessions, they will be looking at each participant’s sheet (or snapshot, if asked for) to determine how they resolve posts that are made by each individual participant. Sessions that use dice will look at the skill levels and force levels of specific abilities, as well as feats that you have set.

Using a non-dice session as an example, if you try and use a blaster and expect it to hit the target with dead-center accuracy from 50 meters, but your Blasters skill is only at Trained +1, more likely than not you won’t even hit the target. But, if your blaster skill is at Adept +4 and have the Down Scope feat, if you are standing with feet planted that allows for an additional +1 to your skill making it equivalent to Master +5. That means the same shot, nine out of ten times, will hit dead center just as you planned it.