Forum Tips and Tricks

[Aoiroo]

Hey, Aoiroo here, or Roo. Now I'm not the best player on the forum (or even one of the really good ones, bout average really), but I have found a lot of handy things about the forum that can be used by other players and I'm sure other players have some of there own to add so here are some shortcuts and tips about the forum in general that might help you navigate a little better.

My first tip though is of course,

Read the Newbie Guide and the House Rules, it just saves time.

Character Building Tips

Character Edits Tips

In Character Tips

Out of Character Tips

Chat Tips

Wiki Tips

Contrabutions Page

[Aoiroo]

Character Building

First step in the process of course and something covered very thoroughly by the Newbie guide. Here's a tip or two about character building.

Make A Thread In The Character Building Section FIRST

This little tidbit is added like on the very last line in the newbie guide, but it's really something I'd advise anyone new to the forum to do with their first character. The fact of the matter is, what you expect to get out of the game and what's actually allowed via site rules probably varies greatly(I know, I had trouble with this at the start). Understand that the refs have had a LOT of bad experiences with characters of all varieties ESPECIALLY if your basing your character on anything anime. If you have a concept, fill out your profile and post it in the building section.

Make Your Profiles as Neat As Possible

Now by neat I mean that everything in your profile have A: Correct Math, and B: Be alphabetized. The math part is because a lot of game mechanics break down if you don't do the math right and it is super easy to miss something simple. The alphabetation is because it's easier on the eyes and some refs really like it (Shaen for example, very nitpicky about that sort of thing).

Look At Other Character Builds

There's no such thing as an original idea. Whatever concept or character you have probably has some overlap or similiarites with other characters on the forum. The trick is making your character unique by looking around at other characters that might be similiar, a good way to do this is to look through the wiki, also look at Giz's thread on Good and Bad Overlap.

Another good place to go is the archetypes threads made by the refs, AAs Oddballs is my favorite simply because of the sheer number and variety of builds there. Of course you don't have to copy the builds but you can take some ideas for powers and backgrounds from those as well, I mean a lot of them are very well written and there's probably something there similiar if not identical to what you had in mind anyway.

Use Specialized code blocks

What it says on the tin, you get a basic build of a power array on the sheet, but if you want to code without skimming down the list it's,

[power=power name][/power]

[array][/array]

and in practice it looks like this. Array Descriptor Base Power (Power & Rank (Additional Descriptor, Extras:, Power Feats:) [Total PP])

Alternate Power Power & Rank (Additional Descriptor, Extras:, Power Feats:) [Total PP] Alternate Power Power & Rank (Additional Descriptor, Extras:, Power Feats:) [Total PP]

Again this is a neatness rule, also alphabetize this too, it's easier on the eyes. There's also the

[device][/device]

code blocks which has a slightly different look.

Power & Rank (Additional Descriptor, Extras:, Power Feats:) [Total PP] Power & Rank (Additional Descriptor, Extras:, Power Feats:) [Total PP] Power & Rank (Additional Descriptor, Extras:, Power Feats:) [Total PP]

Then there's Equipment that goes right under feats it's

[equip][/equip]

and it looks like

Equipment Name Powers Price

Equipment Name Powers Price

Equipment Name Powers Price

These were made by Sorus specially to be able to differentiate Device from Arrays (or Devices with Arrays which are also common) so please use it.

Whatever the Refs ask you to do or change just DO IT.

Seriously, just do it okay. You may be a veteran Mutants and Masterminds player with years of work on your belt, you may be super familiar with forum roleplaying and working out threads. You may be a GM from freaking Atomic Think Tank, the fact of the matter is though no matter what YOU know about the game or the powers and what works for you the refs know best what works for HERE. This forum is unique and functional because there has been tons of trial and error (and I mean a lot of error) that have proven what does and does not work here. You want to do everything in your way and only your way, make your own forum because if you play here you need to know how to compromise with those who have more experience then you do.

[Aoiroo]

Veterans Rewards and Character Edits

So now you have a character, and it's the end of the month. You've been posting and you get veterans rewards and you need to submit edits to your character sheet. So here's some tips on that.

Veteran Rewards Tips 1: Organize Your Thread Listings

Okay so if you know about Veterans rewards you should know about how to post your format for the current Active Threads thread. It usually says Active Thread for said month. Anyway, the usual format for your one post there(you only post once by the way and then edit that post throughout the month if you gain any new threads) is you have your character name and a list of the In Character threads they are in that month as well as anything else you have done to earn points that month like the Hell Q or a character wiki page.

[b]First Character[/b]

[url=]Thread One[/url]

[url=]Thread Two[/url]

[url=]Thread Three[/url]


[b]Second Character[/b]

[url=]Thread One[/url]

[url=]Thread Two[/url]

[url=]Thread Three[/url]


[url=]Character's Wiki Page[/url]

Including links to each of these is important as it gives the refs a good place to post count, also only include links to threads you may happen to be GMing and tell the refs when you are GMing the thread so you can get half credit for the GM posts. Veteran Rewards Tips 2: Don't try spending points or rewards before you get them. Okay, so a lot of people count their posts and know how many additional PP they'll get for their character that month, that DOESN'T mean you shouldn't wait for Dok to do a proper count himself when going through the thread. One you might be wrong, two it's just rude. This doesn't mean you can't plan to spend your points, like go ahead and build new powers for your characters or make future versions of them when you have enough points for it, but don't post it in the edits thread until Dok has officially given the announcement. Character Edits Tip 1: Be Clear Okay, so you have points or you want to change something on your sheet. Well if you want the refs to not pull their hair out over your sheet submissions you. Tell them exactly what your changing. If you're adding or changing fluff, changing age, adding points to any part of the sheet switching around the array, anything make it clear what your doing to your character. Character Edits Tip 2: Provide Code Blocks This part just makes things go faster, but you know code blocks

[code]

[quote][/quote]

boxes of course when you do it, but it's a quick and easy way to get the most up to date version of your character right off your profile page even though you can't edit the page directly.

[Aoiroo]

In Character Tips

Tips for things to do about in play, of course Shaen has something like this in Common Mistakes That Kill: A Manifesto so yeah, read that is my first tip here.

Posts don't have to be long, but they can't be too short

Basically, try and keep to the sight minimum of 400 characters. Now based on your style you can do long fluffy posts, I mean there's no harm in it at all. If you're feeling bad or having writers block or can't find something very descriptively fluffy to put in your thread you can still manage a few sentences. You shouldn't try to only keep to the site minimum but you don't have to make them too long if you are running low on ideas. Heck this short paragraph covers the site minimum.

Proofread your posts.

English is weird. That's just my take on it and I'm a native speaker, but yeah there's a lot of common grammar and spelling mistakes made often in this forum. So putting your post in a spell checker like word or maybe open office helps. You can also look for the troublesome words like it's and its or there, their and they're to make sure you used the right ones in the right context.

Try and make your character not a douche.

Another thing I have trouble with sometimes, but yeah you have to watch that. There's a fine line between cranky but helpful, or dark and broading to full on douchehood. Now they can probably play up the Good Is Not Nice stick, but if other players are questioning how heroic your character is you need to stop and re-evaluate how you've been playing them.

[Aoiroo]

Out Of Character

OOC threads, the foundation of the dice rollers and something that always needs to worked out in any action sequence before a story can run properly.

Don't play without your book.

Okay some threads like social don't need the book. They're more about roleplaying then dice rolling but those can't be the only threads your characters are in or they wouldn't be very heroic would they. That's why if you're in a thread always have your book. No matter how well you know the game, there's always something iffy about some aspect of play that you'll want to look up just to make sure. Also remember to keep the House Rules in mind.

Have an account on Invisible Castle and use it.

Invisible Castle is our dice roller of choice which while not perfect helps keep things random (though if you think that it's trying to kill your character, don't worry it does that to everyone). Anyway, if you're logged in you can add things like character name and descriptors which say exactly what your roll is saying which is great to have for OOC book keeping since most rolls are links to that particular invisible castle page.

Can't find a campaign to play in. Make your own.

When you make a character you should have some adventures in mind for what you want to do with them, so use those ideas so you can A: Do it as a solo thread for your character, or B: game master the thread with your character and another character in it. Now game mastering isn't the funniest thing in the world (I really prefer not to myself), but if you're willing to GM your own threads you have a lot more opportunities to be in threads in the first place. I mean you can look at the campaign forums and look to sign up for other people GMing but you can't always find something you like or that fits your character. Also, if you GM, you can probably invite other characters you think you might want your character to get to know a little better like a potiential love interest, or someone you might want to start up a team with.

[Aoiroo]

Chat Tips

Chat's a big part of the site. It's a good place for discussing well anything, on forum or not, and it's also where you can get a good feel for the people on the site instead of just their characters. So here's some tips.

This site is run by grammar nazis.

It really is. If you want proof misspell something in the chat and nine times out of ten someone will correct said misspelling before you can get another post out. They aren't mean about it though so if you just watch what you type or correct a typo before they get to it you can usually avoid such scrutiny.

This site is run by comic book nerds.

It comes with the genre. If you aren't one you'll probably be a bit out of the loop when they start discussing comic things, but same as before they aren't mean about it. If you want to participate in any conversation that you don't know about or has things you don't recognize google is your friend in that matter. Tvtropes isn't though if you want to actually read some of these things because spoilers are always abundant there.

This site is run by Tropers.

I know I have effectively shot my chances of getting you to finish this thread by providing a link to TVtropes, but yeah a lot of this site is full of tropers. I found this site via TVtropes myself and a lot of tropes is used in conversation on the chat thread. You can Google them, but going to tvtropes and looking up anything is a guaranteed time sink so you might want to set your status to away before doing so.

This site is run by good people.

So don't be mean in the chat okay? Don't curse, don't imply stereotypes on other members and don't say a bunch of sexist stuff either about either gender (especially women, we do exist on the internet and we are here, one of which is married to a ref so you should watch it). If you disagree with something, keep it civil is all I'm saying and PG 13.

[Aoiroo]

The Wiki

Yep, like every other obscure sub genre we have a wiki of the happenings and continuity of this site. Which I'm not including a link cause it's right up there in the corner of the page right next to the chat.

Editing Wiki Pages

So if you're unfamiliar with wiki editing like I am you might have some trouble with this. There is an easy away around this namely that when you log onto the wiki you can click edit on any page and spy on the coding for anything on that page. Then you can just copy and paste from there and edit the information and your done.

The Timeline

The timeline of course is a timeline of the freedom continuity and if your character is a part of it a timeline of there exploits too. Now everyone people on the forum tend to forget, so if you want to keep it up to date every time you start a thread with your character log that thread link and the date it takes place right there at the start so you don't forget. It's a good way to keep up with you're character's past and the past of other characters.

Visual Character Guide

The Visual Character Guide is essentially the representatives of all active characters. Technically you don't get a character up there until you have 10pp earned in achievements for that character. It doesn't mean that you can't mess around in Hero Factory to figure out how your character looks ahead of time. Also, if you don't have a clear character description by the time you have 10pp for the character you'll make Gizmo the ref who makes the Hero Factory dolls for the guide (and alters them to fit the characters) and make his job harder so try and make sure you have a good description by then if not your own doll.

Character Pages

If you have an approved character on this forum, Shaen has probably added your character page to the wiki. However if you want to get points you have to expand on them. Now you can put whatever you want about your character on this page (well within reason), pictures of them, additional history about them, past threads, reasons for the character concept it's all up to you. But it is a page about your character so don't forget that.

Other Wiki Pages

You can make a wiki page about well anything, you want to build another universe your character visits you can make a page about that. You're character has a super special headquarters, you can make a page about that too. You have speculations about the offspring of the various romantic pairings throughout the site will look that, well we already have that one hehe. But yeah, you have an idea for anything on this site that should be on the wiki and you make a page for it you get a PP (it has to be a proper page of course).

[Aoiroo]

Contrabutions

Suggestions made by others for this thread. Basically suggestion box, any suggestions posted here will be added to the previous posts and credited in this post. Of course there are already contrabutions by,

Sorus

ShaentheBrain

Doktor Archeville

AvengersAssembled

Gizmo