If someone doesn't know how to use speech marks, I don't think I'd fancy playing with them anyway - it would be too much of a pain in the arse trying to read whatever they wrote. Putting some of it in colour wouldn't make any difference if it was just a big mass of text. It would just be a big mass of text with some of it in a different colour to the rest of it. I still maintain that speech is by no means the most important thing in any narrative. Important, yes, but no more important than anything else. Like the example I mentioned much earlier in this thread, if someone says "hey there, nice day today, isn't it?" whilst pulling out a knife and sticking it between your ribs, the speech isn't the part you're going to care about. If all you're looking at is the speech then things are goign to get very confusing when you post something like "Why yes, it's pretty sunny, isn't it?" and give no reaction to the fact that you're now supposed to be leaking vital fluids all over the place :P.

There's another difference between roleplaying and a narrative, though. In a narrative the reader sees everything the author wants them to and isn't expected to respond. In roleplaying, the players are expected to respond, and only to parts of the narrative they can perceive. So speech might not be the most important, but it's something that all present can be expected to notice even when they're looking elsewhere.

Besides, most games I've seen also call out specific actions like attacks anyway. Although I guess that might depend on whether you play freeform or with a system.

It doesn't even have to be mechanical things like attacks. Just...well, anything, really. Anything that might be detected by another person in any way...gestures, movement, facial expressions, picking up/putting down/manipulating objects, anything like that that might be mentioned in half a sentence outside of speech and yet potentially of great significance.

Just because it's not in color, doesn't mean that no one is going to pay attention to it. Color breaks things up and makes it easier for your brain to process all of the data being shoved at it.

Consider the same post, both with and without color.

---

"I guess I won't be going to the dance on Friday," Bob lamented.  From the angle he was sitting, it was clear that his leg was broken.  "Tell Suzie that she can take Paul if she really wants."

---

"I guess I won't be going to the dance on Friday," Bob lamented.  From the angle he was sitting, it was clear that his leg was broken.  "Tell Suzie that she can take Paul if she really wants."

---

Is the one with color any harder to read and understand than the one without?  I would say that I, as a reader, find the one with color much easier to process because things are broken up more.

Posts that make good use of color and blank space are much, much easier to read than a wall of monochrome text.

Pretty much exactly what I'd have said.

If you turn off colors altogether, it's beautiful in black and white.

Consider this, written by a GM running several NPCs and whose punctuation is less than ideal:



Without colours, that little post will take you about six PMs to sort out...

Sadly, these days people are more likely to get colour right than punctuation.

The bottom line is this: Rpol allows you to switch off colour if you don't want it. It offers no facility to add colour to a wall of text.

I think my brain sees a bunch of coloured text and automatically treats it as a separate thing, not part of the rest of the text, so I auto-skim over it and then have to go back and make myself read it, or something.

As for the punctuation thing...well, that might be where my suggestion of laziness may actually be relevant - some people may get used to using colour for speech and just not bother using speech marks or anything else. I'm used to playing with people who actually do know how to write properly so there is no issue. If someone were to just neglect proper punctuation/spelling/grammar (whether related to speech or not) in a game, I doubt I'd be playing with them for long if they didn't at least make an effort to maek their stuff readable. It's like people who use "N00bspeak", putting stuff like "u" instead of "you" and "w8" instead of "wait", <shudder>...in the case of those people, I figure that if they can't be arsed to write in proper English, I can't be arsed to try and translate it. Note that anyone for whom English is not their first language is different - usually such people seem to have better English than a lot of "English" people and certainly their English is a zillion times better than my <insert non-English language here> :D. That tends to just be a case of some words spelt wrong and maybe some words in a slightly odd-looking order due to different grammatical rules, or something. That's fine, I can deal with that. American spellings bug me but I can just sort of...not spend too long looking at them ;).

All of the people I'm playing with who use coloured text, also use correct punctuation.  The colour is just an add-on.

In reply to bigbadron (msg # 51):

Same here. Color is just a nice feature which has uses that don't diminish the need for good grammar and punctuation.
This message was last edited by the user at 15:22, Thu 25 Feb 2016.

I use proper punctuation and grammar when writing (aside from texting on my non-smart phone), but find the colored speech helpful for going back and finding a specific quote. X's character said something about that... I can then scroll back through looking just for X's color, ignoring posts where X said nothing, and where others than X were speaking. It's a tool. It doesn't mean I ignore the rest of the post.

It's also a helpful tool for more easily understanding those who don't, or don't reliably, use quotation marks. It makes their work readable enough to deal with comfortably.

The worse offenders for misuse/sloppy use of written English do tend to come from native English speakers. :/

I disagree.  I don't need colored text to read anything else that I read.  Websites, novels, magazines, newspapers, all use black and white.  I don't see any need for it here either.

This is the only place I've ever seen colored text used on a regular basis, outside of MySpace pages.  And that's what all the colored text makes me think off, early 2000s MySpace pages.  It makes things look cluttered, unorganized, and unprofessional.  And I find it much harder to read.

I do like color for some minor things, like OOC portions of posts.  But I've turned off color entirely and deprived myself of that simply so that I can read game posts with some semblance of normalcy.
This message was last edited by the user at 23:23, Thu 25 Feb 2016.

It's funny that the discussion on coloured text always attracts so much attention; in the end is just a tool and people should use it or not depending on their preferencies and the rules of the game they're into.

I would like to say though, that it's true that colouring text tends to make people ignore gestures and sign language when those are included in the text, and the opinion that text needs to be emphasized because "that's what other players need to answer to" has been expressed in this very thread, and that's a concept I'm entirely against - if somebody made a long post, there's likely a reason for it, and no portion of a text is less important, it should be read in its entirety. Ignoring any part of another person's post is a gesture of disrepect toward that poster, I would think.

I have a player in the game I'm running whom character speaks about once every three posts they make, and that has helped a lot to convey their personality to the other players/characters, and whenever that character speaks more than a few lines in their post, it immediately conveys to the others that what they're saying is important. On the other hand, I have another player who puts up long speeches often, often literal walls of texts, but the other players follow because that particular player is both the scout and face for their team, so others read what they say in full despite their text not being coloured. And I've had mute NPCs who had no trouble being understandable to the players who interacted with them either.

In the end, color text is an useful tool to have, and I am happy RPOL gives it to us, and everybody has the full right to use it for anything they feel needs it. But the idea that speech is the only important part of a post, or the only portion of a post other players need to read/answer to, that's an idea I disagree with.

I think that's pretty much what I was trying to say, Egleris, but I think you just said it better :D. Wait, why is your name familiar...I think you're actually one of my GMs :O. In which case I know who the Wall of Text character is. And the one who doesn't really talk much (but spams the GM a lot with descriptions of the psychic "conversations" she's having with any non-sentient creature in the local area :D).

My general experience is that the reason is that they suck at writing in third-person objective.  Which means you get to have an impromptu reading comprehension test as you dissect what your character can actually sense from what they can't.  More than once I've seen this turn into an OOC fight when someone accidentally reacted to thoughts or the like.

What a horrid assessment... =(
By horrid - I mean: sheesh, if your 51%+ view is that everyone is a failure; you certainly interact with a lot of failures!

My first post in any major chapter/scene change is usually long (when narrating) - as it is about setting the stage.  Usually the first paragraph (3-4 sentences) covers what the CHARACTERS should know that the PCs wouldn't.

Then describing the first scene so that the players/PCs can interact with something other than following a plot-train can take a paragraph.  Then again - I may not know what you mean by "long" post.

I think swordchucks more means players making long-winded posts habitually, and yes I'd agree it shows a lack of skill in concise and compartmented communication.

If you write what would be a solid page in 12 point font on a word processor for every post, you're writing too much. Some posts need to encompass somewhere between six seconds and a minute of time, and a character shouldn't be able to have a detailed reminiscing about their painful childhood and analysis of everyone around them.

Often these same players will complain of not having time to post.

I'm not talking about GM posts as all the things you cite are perfectly reasonable.  I'm also not talking about PC posts that are solo or semi-solo in nature (this often applies to introductory posts in threads or first posts in games, since the posts tend to cover a lot of communication to the GM and then end with the group meeting up).  A solo game is generally attractive for that very reason.

What I'm specifically talking about are posts by PCs in games where the PCs don't have a huge amount of control over the environment (and thus would be relating GM-type data) that break about 200 words in length and don't include at least a third of that as dialogue.  Even then, one every now and then can make sense if there's a lot of stuff to describe, but my experience is that folks that tend to do it routinely can't write in an objective perspective consistently.

Maybe there are players out there that can pull it off... but I don't recall playing with them.

As a part of that, I did do a survey of games I'm in, looking at posts and assessing their content.  I found that, in general, PC posts without dialog tended much more toward the "he thinks..." and similar styles than posts with.  Those that didn't were almost always shorter, sub-100 word posts concentrating on actions.

Short of having the first RP Forum designer who included colour in their design to be used as a tool, weigh in on this, I doubt much of a real answer will be found. We can all speculate as to how or when and everyone can make some sort of argument as to whether there is even a need for it.

My first forays into RP existed in a hosted chat room some 18-19 years ago. The chat room offered coloured text so each individual could personalize themselves in some way. Programs came about where you could further personalize by adding custom colours using the Red/Green/Blue system of shading. They went so far as to create the system so colours could shift through the text, fading and blending to whatever the creative mind could come up with. People would use this to make their character stand out in some way. So if there were 30 people chatting at the same time and trying to RP with separate people, one didn't have to wade through everybody else's posts. I suspect this is partly why colour was introduced in forums as well. Likely whole posts were done in one person's favourite colour so they might stand out to someone who might be in the same forum but location wise, were actually far away from anything else going on.

It wouldn't be hard to assume some colours were just not fun to read and gradually this was pulled back in favour of simply using the coloured text for speech. Many people are more likely to only return the spoken parts anyways. Maybe they are just unpracticed in describing actions and the like or maybe they are just lazy. Perhaps some who have issues looking through blocks of text for personal/medical reasons, simply found this easier to comprehend. Just because they were less capable of describing action didn't mean they should be ostracized when they are simply trying to participate in an activity they like. This is just a few suppositions on why the gradual evolution (if I may be so bold) of coloured anything came to RP Forums.

Is there a fundamental need? No. It is a tool to assist some in reading, some in separating their character and to others it is a hammer in a pottery class.
This message was last edited by the user at 16:48, Fri 26 Feb 2016.

Writing something that's not in objective third-person doesn't mean you can't, y'know.

ah-kha! I get you there.

Yes, this is far better suited to a solo-play environment.

Completely agreed.  It can be a bit frustrating to have run-on information for no reason.

But, I will say: I'd rather have the option to format my text and posts - than not have the option.

I like Orange.  Orange is good OOC =)

Oh, wow, I forgot about this, but this is totally where I started doing it, as well.  Well, on MUDs and MUSHs where the options were offered.  With everyone being a little name, it became infinitely better if folks color coded their contributions (often using elaborate macros) so that you could tell, at a glance, who was talking.


I think it's more a matter of not writing in third-person objective when that is the correct format than anything else.  I play in a variety of games and use third person limited and even first person as appropriate.  However, the majority of group-games should be done in third-person objective.

The one caveat I give to that is Eclipse Phase.  For some reason, Eclipse Phase just doesn't work like it should if you go with the objective point of view.  I think it's the loss of the Muse.  I'm sure there are a few other games out there where it's appropriate, too, and those get a pass.

You preferring it doesn't make it "correct."

It's a game. Writing a bit more about your character might be more fun, and it helps to communicate context which helps make what you're describing more clear.
Reading a bit more about other characters might be more fun--plenty of people in this thread are comparing reading posts on RPoL to reading other things, like novels, after all.
And not all communication is with other players. A lot of describing what you're thinking, what you're doing, and why, is for the GM. How's the GM gonna answer "Sarah leaned slightly to the right, looking over Alexander's shoulder," if she doesn't mention what she's looking for? Stuff the other PCs can't see still needs to go in posts sometimes.

In one of my games I just wrote a post describing what my character was doing while she was alone in a room. How's that different from describing her thinking for why she's doing something? Which, as some people have kinda expressed when talking about nonverbal cues, might be obvious to anyone watching her anyway.

I've seen it cause problems many times, especially when games are first starting out.  There are other ways to do it, but the GM ultimate establishes the correct format for a given game.  Even if the convention is only established by weight of everyone else, if you have one person posting in limited and four people posting in objective, the person posting in limited is not conforming to the group and thus "wrong".

If your group all decides to go with third person limited, then knock yourself out.  I wouldn't object to you doing so, but I'd probably also prefer not to play in that game unless other factors outweighed that.

Other points:

Being alone in a room is something I rarely see played out in regular threads.  It's usually done in PMs, PLs, or otherwise hidden threads.  I'm in a game right now where I'm doing something similar... but it's a private thread (and I'm posting in third person limited because of it).  I wouldn't call it "wrong" to do otherwise, but I prefer compartmentalization of knowledge in games for a variety of reasons.

As for communications to the GM... that's what OOC lines and private lines are for.  If Sarah is looking for something, she needs to call out the game effect she's going for in an OOC or PL.  GMs read and respond to a whole lot of text and, depending on the GM and the game, can easily miss things.  Clarity is critical, and relying on nonverbal cues that might be buried in the middle of a wall of text is just a bad idea.

Actually it does... for him.

I'm closing this thread now, since it's a discussion about personal preferences, and nobody is ever going to change anybody's mind.

Thank you for your participation everybody.