Guide to Roleplay

Friendly introduction

The pillars of storytelling
why they matter

Setting

Character

Plot

What is Roleplay
Roleplay - It is to act and speak as the character that you are portraying. Whoever, and whatever that character may be, it is your job to get into their mindset and do what they would do, in the chosen environment. Let's give a small example, in the form of Joe Fixit. Joe Fixit as you can guess, is a born and raised mechanic, who works on cars, trucks, motorcycles, anything with a motor or a plasma core. To roleplay as Joe Fixit, you'd have to know his personality, how he would act to the situations surrounding him, and how he fits into his chosen setting. Now with that being said, depending on the kind of RP, you might play him out differently. There is Light Roleplay(LRP/Light RP), Medium Roleplay(Medium RP/MRP) and Heavy Roleplay(Heavy RP/HRP).

 Light Roleplay  - Think of this as the, "Everything is loose-" kind of RP. You don't actively have to stick to the specific personality and actions that your character would do, and can namely go around doing memeing and all. However, there is still some suspension of disbelief to be kept, since you are still actively engaging in roleplay. Let's go back to Joe Fixit in this example. Normally speaking, Joe has never seen a medical tool in his life. But you as the player know exactly how to perform surgery on someone else... So you drag your dying friend and get them back up to health, with no prior training what so ever. Without being said, tossing aside the character's experience, personality, or otherwise to do what you want to do that doesn't fit what they want to do(memeing or otherwise) is LRP.

 Medium Roleplay  - Already much more serious than light, but let's go back to our name-brand Joe Fixit. In a MRP scenario, you would stick much closer to acting as how the character actually is, and their specific skillset. Joe wouldn't be able to actually stitch his friend back together should they get blown up, but maybe through some stroke of luck they succeed. Never the less, when engaged in MRP, the memeing and blatant out of character options need to be dialed back by a pretty substantial amount.

 Heavy Roleplay  - Now finally, we get to the meat. Where as with light and medium, you might do some things out of character for your character to do just because, when engaged in HRP, none of that can be done. Joe Fixit has never touched a medical tool in his life, so his attempts to stitch his friend together will only end up butchering the person he tried to save. Why? No medical training of course, he's a mechanic, not a god damn doctor. The same as how the doctor he drags his friend to, can't tune up a damn car to save their life. When in HRP, always understand that the suspension of disbelief must be kept at all times. Joe Fixit isn't just a character, he's a person living in an actual world. You're just the pilot guiding his actions for some fun/interesting scenarios. So, to put all of this in some basic words, don't think about what you would do in this scenario. Think about what Joe would do, if confronted with any amount of problems.

Roleplay on Desert Rose
what's particular to this server

Character
start here. what is a character? how do I make one to roleplay? why would i want to play someone that isn't me?

The basics
physical and psychological attributes

Backstory and the importance of setting - put your character on a timeline to understand where they developed skills and competencies

where did your character come from? The west in the NCR, the east from Legion territories? From the south in central or south america, or north from canada?

different places you can learn lore for story inspiration:

Fallout Fandom Wiki

Fallout Gamepedia Wiki

Oxhorn's Youtube channel

The Storyteller: Fallout

why context matters. how can the setting enrich my understanding of this character. how can i tell interesting stories?

character development
the importance of consistency and the role of immersion. persistence plays key.

Common pitfalls
mary-sue, powergame and other cliches to avoid

How to make a non-organic
what's particularly different when making a robot

IC and OOC
A character's thoughts, actions and motivations are different and distinct from the player's, ie. the person behind the screen, and this can be hard to keep in mind sometimes. Their memories are different, the people they know and the things they know are different, and each character should be distinct from each other. Keeping things as in-character as possible is important not just for good roleplay, but to also avoid any toxicity or negativity.

Distractions - What to avoid
The entire goal of roleplaying is to immerse someone in an environment and have a shared experience; something memorable. The more distractions from the experience, the less satisfying overall the experience will be. This includes low RP, excessive LOOC, use of discord or the OOC channel while roleplaying, or anything else that breaks the sense of connectivity one feels with good, immersive roleplaying. When too much OOC is brought in, it no longer "feels" believable. The opposite also holds true: the more things are kept IC and the "flow" is maintained, the better the roleplay (this is a similar effect in the brain to watching an excellent movie or reading an engrossing book, something akin to self-hypnosis!).

Metagaming: IC != OOC
Players should avoid sharing knowledge between IC and OOC both ways, either their character knowing simply too much (due to the player knowing the mechanics of chemistry, let's say, they decide their character knows chemistry), or the player knowing too much (they know a person they're interacting with is a spy lying to them thanks to ghost knowledge, and grill them uncharacteristically hard until they give in). Using OOC knowledge or any other kind of out of character help in an in-game way is called Metagaming. This includes things like collaborating with people on Discord to clear a bunker or even just convene at a location, despite how apparently harmless it is - it's still using out of character knowledge. A better way is to tell in-character friends a location to meet up each round and go from there. Knowledge should not be shared between different characters played by the same player - these should always be entirely separate from each other, otherwise it's just more mixing IC with OOC.

Persistence: ICA = ICC
An important rule of roleplay is "ICA = ICC" which means 'in character actions have in character consequences'. The 'actions and consequences' are just as important as the 'in character' part. Things your character does should be recalled in-character, not by ghost knowledge, or even never discovered at all if nobody actually saw it. OOC knowledge of something ahead of time can "spoil" what would otherwise be a fun surprise or interesting experience. Character change and growth are important to keep things in character, otherwise, again, the sense of immersion is broken. This should include aging!

Retcons
In the same sense, a retcon is something that sharply breaks immersion and ideally should be avoided at all costs. A retcon should only really be used in the case of a genuine rule break, as otherwise the flow of continuity is spoiled. A player's character is not the protagonist, the entire game is, and part of maintaining immersion is the feeling that things will happen that are outside their control.

It's the story that is ultimately what's important, and the primary driver of all good roleplay; a collaborative storytelling effort with many parts and players, all equally important. If all players aren't "on the same page" and in the same immersive experience, the story falters.

Getting Started
how do i express my character on the wasteland? how do i approach other people? how do i roleplay proper?