ISRP Glossary

AFK
Abbreviation for "away from keyboard," OOC information exchanged between players during role play.*

Backstory
(n.) 1. The history of a character prior to the player's actively portraying him or her in a role playing environment.
2. Any past history of a character.

BRB
Abbreviation for "be right back," OOC information exchanged between players during role play. Should be communicated bracketed in parentheses [i.e., ((BRB)) ].*

Character
(n.) The fictional persona (human, animal, or thing) who appears in the story.

Cross genre
(adj.) Referring to the mix or blend of role playing categories (see Genre).

Doublegaming
(n.) Playing your character and someone else's by request, due to a punt, a player needing to go AFK, etc. For example, if PrinceValient and LadyDamsel play lovers, and trust each other as players enough, they may agree that when one of the players has to leave the keyboard (or gets punted) for a brief time, the other will doublegame them in the meanwhile.*

Erasure
(n.) An OOC agreement in which all players involved declare that a scene or IC event never took place.

Freeform Role Playing
(n.) A style of role-playing which allows a player complete freedom to control his or her own character within the inherent restrictions of a setting.

Genre
(n.) A distinct category of role-playing, usually defined by setting elements. Ex. fantasy, spacer (science fiction), historical fiction, cyberpunk, etc.

Godmoder
(n.) A player who creates a character with so many powers and defenses, it's invincible.*

Host
(n.) An OOC term that refers to a staff member of EN World ISRP, also called Magi. A host's OOC duties include facilitating interaction among players, policing for Code of Conduct violations, and maintaining an atmosphere conducive to freeform role-playing in the ISRP chat rooms. All official hosts are able to assign custom avatars to their names in the chat room listing and some have the prefix "Magi" infront of their names (eg Magi_Trelian).

IC/OOC Confusion
(n.) The condition of mixing player/character realities or knowledge in either active role play or off line circumstances. An undesirable habit, and usually considered poor form.

Transferring an affection or romance between characters to the belief that the players behind those characters necessarily feel the same way. Or transferring an anger or animosity between characters to the belief that the players involved feel the same way.
Having your character acknowledge, in role-play, the situation of Flashchat or Flashchat and Internet functions. [ I must leave. ::kisses her hand regretfully:: my mun must go to work. Or ... I must recommend, good lady ::kissing her hand regretfully:: that you click ignore on the SN that just entered the room]
Inappropriately role-playing knowledge that you learned through OOC means, such as by reading posts or through conversations with other players. An example would be if a player read on an out of character message board that the character LadyAllana is really a man in disguise, but such information has not yet been revealed IC, it would be in poor taste indeed for them to refer to Allana in the third person in IC conversations as "he".*

IC/OOC Separation
(n.) Maintaining the disciplined separation between IC story and OOC reality. Good form in advanced role-play.

In Character (IC)
(adj.) Referring to all the elements that are inherent in the fictional reality-a character, a setting, visual cues, history, etc.

Interactive Story Role Playing (ISRP)
(n) Freeform role-playing with more guidelines, and a defined setting.

Lurk
(v.) To enter a role-playing room and watch without participating as a character. Many beginners prefer to lurk and learn before actively joining in, and they are fully welcome to do so.

Narrative
(n.) The IC information that appears within double colons during . [Demeter: ::running towards Siani at top speed, smacking right into her chest:: Hey there, beautiful! Give me a kiss!]*

Non-player Character (NPC)
1. (n.) A participating character that is not represented by a screen name in a story or scene . An NPC's lines are manually represented by the player. [Siani: [Knuckles] ::running in from the kitchen: NPCs may be ongoing characters that are played by any or all members of an RP community, or they may be creations of a single player and owned specifically by that player.
2. (v.) To NPC. To portray a character in a scene in addition to the character represented by a player's screen name. ["I'm going to NPC the doctor in this scene."]*

Out of Character (OOC)
(adj.) Referring to elements that relate to the real world of the player, such as EN World, Flashchat, email, PMs, punts, lag etc. These are things a fictional character could never be aware of.*

Player
(n.) The real-life person behind the keyboard who portrays the fictional character on the screen.

Powergame
(v.) To overstep the bounds of freeform role playing courtesy and make a decision for or attempt to control another player's character and/or story line without his/her consent. Considered very poor form and often leads to disruptive player conflicts.

Private Message (PM)
(n.) A chat feature that allows players to communicate with each other privately without the entire chat room seeing the conversation.*

Punt
1. (n.) An involuntary loss of connection to the Internet.
2. (v.) To be punted. To lose one's Internet connection. ["I got punted four times last night."]*

Role Play (RP)
1. (v.) To mentally place oneself in the position of a fictional character and react to situations as that character.
2. (n.) The act of role play (also ROLE PLAYING).

Scene
1.(n.) A single session of role playing that takes place in the same room and/or setting.
2.(n.) The portrayal of a single IC situation, which may span across multiple RP sessions, such as a battle that takes several nights to play out.

Setting
(n.) The fictional universe in which a story takes place. A setting may be immediate, such as a room, or broad based, such as a country or planet.

Story line (SL)
(n.) The sum total of a character's history and ongoing story.

Vaporgame
(v.) To advance or enhance a story by OOC agreement rather than by role-playing.

ISRP on ENWorld