Awright, let me see if I can drag this thread back on-topic. Here's my thoughts on the matter.
1. This is something that sticks with me from when I was Temp President.
Read the stinkin' rules. If you're in NAPW, you can find them
here. Or
here. Rebel Pro can go
here. You're supposed to be doing this first thing. Not second. Not tenth.
And now, onto the writing.
2. Look gang, it's
Peter David,
writer of stuff. A fan-favourite of nerds for two decades, David really helped cement my love of comics, and if you follow him, you can see how he infleunces my stuff.
When I was a young'un, I picked up some great advice through one of his guest columns in
Wizard. I was looking to break into comics then, and lo and behold, there he was! And what was David's best advice for aspiring young comic writers?
Don't read comics.Or at the very least, broaden your literary diet, for crying out loud. In the early nineties, comics were feeding on themselves. (I know, so what's changed?) Every second character was a clone of Wolverine, everybody and their penciller were trying to do
X-Men,
X-Force or
Spawn. Predictably, these were all terrible. Why? Because these were comics being made by people who
only read comics. You copy something even once, and the product generally suffers.
This applies to your RPs. Please,
please don't just try to recreate the stuff you see real feds do. Go outside of this. Look towards other products for inspiration--horror movies, hip-hop videos,
yes, even comic books. And--I urge you all to consider this--regular books. Not even "high literature", you can pick Forgotten Realms or romance novels if that's your thing. Just so long as you're reading something by an author who makes their living writing.
More than anything, make sure you're reading books.Okay, sure. I manage a bookstore.
But honestly... out of any sort of media you can run across, can you think of a single RP of yours, mine or most anyone else's that isn't just basically words on a screen? What can you provide in your RPs, other than linking to video, that you couldn't do in a paperback book?
Exactly. You're a writer. We're all writers here. You have more in common with Stephen King than you do Samoa Joe. You already knew all of this; I'm just writing it out. Read other writers, and keep doing it.
Unless, of course, you're this next guy.
3. Pretty much the first video RP. Watch it if you haven't already. (Thanks to Holzerman for this.)Now, to be candid, I dislike this RP, but I'd rather go into my reasons elsewhere. What I love is that the guy
did it in the first place. He went out on a limb to do something new, something that breaks the "RP mold". He's an innovator, and honestly, wouldn't you like to see more video RPs in the future?
But even better, can't an RP go beyond writing or videos? If Scott wanted to take the time to flesh out a Caliban comic, you'd read it, right? If Darko's handler whips up an AKForty song that has all of the ingredients of an RP in the lyrics, then why not? And that's just from the top of my head. But it bears thinking about.
4. Yes, spelling is important,
yes, grammar is important,
yes, you have to use legible colours. If you don't own a dictionary, use the "Spell Check" button that's just across from the "Post" button.
5. Talk to other RPers. A few if you can swing it, more if you're one of those AIM-using social butterflies. Get their opinions on what you're working on.
Give opinions. Challenge someone else to do stuff, like I've done with Kyle Jago. Find another wrestler you're not immediately fighting and build a character relationship, even if it's a bad one--Ravager and D! started from humble beginnings, and more than two people seemed to enjoy that feud. Hell, I enjoy pretty much every encounter D!'s had with Predator or Nightmare, because Jacob's always been an earnest, hard-working collaborator, and win or lose, our characters always came out better-defined.
6. Feel safe to bust out huge risks. Back when D! was participating in the Tournament of Champions, Tom Holzerman set up an interesting second-round challenge. My RP in this challenge was fairly instrumental in D!'s win.
Check it out here, if you'd care to.Prior to this, I'd never deviated from the "shooting script" style that's overwhelmingly popular here. And Holzerman cut me off from it... I'd realized fairly quickly that I had to write it in short story form. But hey, while I was at it, why not take even more risks? Something that could crash and burn me very badly?
And that's why everybody who read the damned thing to the end found out that D! was turning heel at the anniversary show
five months in advance.Even telegraphed, the turn still went over huge, which amazes me to this day. But more importantly, it shook me out of the creative slump I'd been experiencing with D! and forced me to guide this character towards an actual
goal.A whole new direction, a major title, and all I had to do was start taking gambles.
7. Just because common sense doesn't seem to clear this one up--if you were to, hypothetically, ask your fed head for advice, and they take the time to give you said advice,
use the damn advice. It stands to reason that if you asked how to make your RPs better and you were told to stop over-using italics, your next RP shouldn't have more italics than ever. What are you, high?
8. Oh, and finally, when you've followed all of this advice, just start watching wrestling again. I don't see this as a contradiction of any previous points.
Anyone else?
![Stylin' Kyle Roberts [REBEL] Avatar](http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i91/jagok/napw/skr.gif)
![Ryan Ro [NAPW] Avatar](http://www.connexionsmusic.com/napw/avatars/ljpic_GOAT.jpg)
But honestly... out of any sort of media you can run across, can you think of a single RP of yours, mine or most anyone else's that isn't just basically words on a screen? What can you provide in your RPs, other than linking to video, that you couldn't do in a paperback book?
