A very important thing to remember when playing make-believe is the distinction between fiction and reality. While it's natural to become attached to or even identify with your character, you should always keep at least a little part of yourself separate.

• Remember that your character's successes and failures are not your own.

• If a scene is making your character uncomfortable, that could be a fun thing to play.

• But if a scene is making you uncomfortable, call for a pause and sort things out with the other players.

• Try not to let your positive or negative feelings for characters spill over into the way you think of their players… and vice versa.

• Ask yourself what your character would do in a certain situation. How is it similar to or different from what you would do?

Fairness is a pretty basic principle. Treat your fellow players the way you'd like to be treated if you were in their shoes.

• Good poses could be a couple lines or big paragraphs, but try to provide at least as much detail about how your character is acting as other players provide about theirs.

• Don't overwhelm the other player with too many different actions in the same pose.

• Let players respond to your pose before posing again.

• Give fair warning (IC or OOC) if they might be walking into a dangerous situation.

• Make sure you character isn't always the fastest, strongest, smartest, or best prepared one.

• Let your character lose, be embarrassed, or look silly sometimes, especially when it brings out the best in another character.

• Don't try to dictate the emotions, actions, or location of someone else's character.

Every story has a setting that helps establish what is possible and probable. Furscape's setting, for instance, is hard science fiction; players know that if they see magic or teleportation, it must be an illusion or hallucination. On the other hand, it's possible (if highly unlikely!) that members of a previously unknown alien race could show up in the lobby of a capitol building and start tap dancing. (This would require staff review first, and characters would likely suspect a movie filming.)

• Feel free to invent minor details related to your character that nobody else would know about, but don't mess with the already established facts. If you have a question about what's appropriate, consult a staff member.

• Likewise, don't impose knowledge or memories on other people's characters without their permission.

• Try to incorporate the established theme into your character's background a bit. You don't want a generic character that would fit into any story just as easily.

• Figure out what's 'normal' for the place and culture you're in. Are the people nearby giving your character funny looks?

• While we're on the subject of 'normal' for place and culture, be sure to check 'realm rules' for special information for your locale.

Continuity is the flow of the story and what makes this one big unified whole rather than just a collection of independent scenes. Characters' actions have consequences, and the future is affected by the past.

• Unlike some combat MUDs, time in Furscape flows (more or less) at the same rate as in real life. That is, the IC date is simply the RL date plus 200 years. (see Ending a scene for an exception)

• If you are painted green in one pose, don't suddenly show up squeaky clean in the next without showing what happened in-between

• Don't make alterations to events that someone has already roleplayed if you can possibly help it.

• If you have to correct something, be sure to do it as soon as possible and get the full agreement of everyone involved

• Let the current scene be affected by things that happened in previous scenes and in scenes with other players.

• Let other players feel that they have at least a little influence over the world, even if it's through unintended consequences.

• Make sure that people can see when a conflict (whether physical or social) has been revolved or when it's still ongoing.

Show, don't tell. Paint the picture so that your RP partners will be able to imagine the scene as clearly as in a movie or book.

• Provide rich details for all the senses: sights, sounds, smells, textures, etc.

• Add additional meaning to dialog with tone of voice, body language, posture, facial expressions

• Remember that the 'rooms' of the MUCK can be rooms, city blocks, or large areas of countryside. Make sure everybody can clearly picture where in the 'room' your character is, especially in relation to other characters.

Starting up a scene in a MU* is a little more involved than just entering a chat room, but the addition of setting makes the illusion of presence more powerful.

• Ask how to get involved in an ongoing scene or ask to start a new one. Scenes don't magically materialize. Even if you don't think you have a way in, just ask; someone might offer a way you hadn't thought of.

• One player should start by setting the scene for everybody else. What time of day is it? Is the area busy? Is there already something interesting going on that people entering couldn't help but notice? Where is that player's character in the 'room'? Is the character doing something visible to those arriving or is the character hidden or disguised?

• Remember that just because the MUCK says “Alice has arrived” or shows Alice in the room contents doesn't necessarily mean that Alice is actually in the area. Alice's player may have other plans, so you should wait for that first pose to find out.

All scenes must eventually come to an end. It may be IC reasons like everyone splitting up to take care of separate errands, or OOC reasons like the player being too tired to continue. Whenever possible, try to end it gracefully.

• If the scene seems to be at a natural stopping point, try to end the scene in an IC fashion. For example, your character gets tired and goes home to bed.

• If the scene doesn't seem to be done when the players need a break, everyone may choose to call a pause and agree to change the IC date to some point in the near future.

• If the scene is interrupted at a critical point, particularly one that may alter future events in a major way, the players involved might call for a scene-lock, agreeing to not RP with anyone else until the conflict is resolved.

• Changing the IC date in more than one of your scenes at a time can lead to sticky continuity issues and so is usually not a good idea.

Many of the places on the MUCK where you can RP are full of other people: spaceports are full of travellers, malls are full of shoppers, streets are full of pedestrians, and even a darkened military base must have a few guards on patrol. Don't forget about the NPCs just because there isn't a username associated with them.

• Remember not to pose that an area is empty except for player characters unless it's reasonable to believe that no NPCs are around.

• Don't pose having been in someone's super-secret research facility unless you have RPed it with the player and/or staff or OOCly worked it out ahead of time with them.

• Don't use NPCs as your personal playthings. Just as with player characters, give them reasonable abilities, then respect their abilities.

• Use poses about NPCs to add color to your scene. They can be simple innocent bystanders that stare at your character for behaving strangely or full-fledged peronalities that get an important interaction going between PCs.

• You can even use NPCs when your character does not belong in a scene but you'd still like to participate.