What are some tips to starting a new para in an role-play? Also, how can you make writing paras good? As in detailed, word paras?
It’s been awhile since I’ve given any sort of advice so please bear with, and forgive me if I don’t answer the question fully. However,
This is an obvious approach to beginning a thread of some sort. You approach the other role-player in their askbox or grab their Skype/AIM if they’ve got it (whatever it takes to get in touch with them) and you both lay out the basic facts about your characters. Where it would make sense for the characters to meet, how they would meet, through a mutual friend or by mere chance? Plotting is fairly basic but it’s a back and forth exchange that gives you the groundwork for the initial para.
However, if you aren’t plotting and are just posting an open starter for other writers to respond to then I’d consider the following:
You can make your character start anywhere but I’d recommend they start not only in a location that your character frequents, but a public venue of some sort. What you want to make sure you’re able to provide for other role-players is accessibility. If someone reads your opening thread and your character’s in a warehouse and a character whom is a schoolteacher reads it, what are the chances she can actually respond to that? Not very high. Why? Because it has to make sense for both characters to be where they are at that specific point in time. If my character doesn’t frequent a warehouse for whatever reason, much less has never been in one their entire life, there’s no reason for me to respond.
So, accessibility. Make sure your setting is a fairly open one. The bar is typical setting that’s overused and rather boring in my opinion, so I’d get creative with it. Here are a few setting that might jog your brain into thinking of a creative open space for characters to meet:
From there, I’d focus on your character’s background. While you want to think general in order for other writers to be able to better connect and find a way to integrate their storylines to yours, you’ll also want to think specific. By specific I mean, what is your character doing at that time and place and why? What is their purpose for being there? Are they at the airport to catch a flight, or are they a volunteer at a Film Festival? The important thing to remember when structuring the purpose of this para is that oftentimes people are never in public spaces simply to meet completely random strangers. They are often with a group of people they already know, or going about their business.
Perhaps what makes paras that start in bars so boring is that to me, they’re lazy. They’re lazy starters. They’re ones that expect others to do the work because all you’ve got is your character sitting at a bar, drinking a drink, and ruminating over their lives. That’s not to say all starters that start in bars are horrible, but a lot of the time people don’t focus on the action or the “why” of what their character is doing in that specific place. The more reasoning and purpose behind your character being in a certain setting, the more you have to go off of as the thread builds. For example, if a character is studying for an exam, chances are that the entire time another character is talking to them they may be restless, nervous, checking their watch constantly, or multitasking and going over notecards while simultaneously talking.
I don’t need to tell you that this builds character, but I’ll tell you: it builds character. You shouldn’t just drop your character somewhere and expect a thread to take off. By having them in the middle of an action or busy doing something it makes the conversation more dynamic because oftentimes people are always busy doing or thinking about something. Their mind is almost never fully on the conversation. People are always on the move, and when considering the background of why it’s very important you consider that in order to make the paragraph more lively, more human.
Overall general tips? I honestly believe by focusing on a character’s action/presence within a piece and giving them a sense of purpose allows you to build the space around you and really milk the setting they’re in.
If you want to make a detailed para focus on the setting, but you don’t need to go into lengthy descriptions about the setting that is unimportant; simply focus on the aspects of the setting that are important to your character. How will they utilize a hotel’s lobby to their advantage? Are they looking around for available seating, wanting to get a souvenir from a gift shop, or hoping to catch the elevator to get to their floor, 5 stories up? Focus on what’s important for your character in that moment. Giving an elaborate description of the entire hotel only to focus finally, on your character’s debate between taking the elevator or stairs is useless. Try and keep it concise but pertinent to your character. Setting matters but it matters in terms of how it will be manipulated in the story later on. That is just my belief, anyway.
Second, like I’ve said above, action. Action makes a difference. Every action counts because it not only speaks to the interactions between the characters but the developing of them. Body language says a great deal, and while dialogue assists in pushing the thread forward, writing a para is far from that of a movie script. You have so much room at your disposal to describe what your character is doing and where they’re doing it while simultaneously moving between an internal dialogue versus an external one. That is a lot at your disposal, and I would take advantage of it for all it is worth.
Personally, the paras I work really hard on utilize all of the above. They don’t simply focus on what my character is saying or doing to the other character, but they’re building their own world and presence in relation to the objects around them, and it’s a mixture/balance of both that makes a para work well.
Ultimately what you do is up to you, but it’s a way to give other writers an idea of the sort of character they’re dealing with.
