DWRP Terms

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The contents of this page are hidden under details tags. The contents of each heading are revealable by clicking on the triangle icon beside each one.

Basics

player (mun)

These days people on Dreamwidth tend to use the term 'player' for the person RPing, but you might run across the term 'mun' as well. These refer to the same thing.

character (muse)

Similar to the above, you may occasionally run across the term 'muse', but people usually just call them 'characters' these days.

played-by (PB)

This is what DWRPers refer to it when you chose an actor to represent a book character or other character who doesn't have much visual media to represent them. People on tumblr and other RP sites often refer to this as a faceclaim.

CR

This is short for 'character relationships' and refers to any interaction your character has with another, whether good or bad.

IC/OOC

'In-character' and 'out-of-character'. Can refer to whether you're doing something IC/OOC, or whether your playing is IC/OOC.

thread

The whole string of replies, starting with the top-level tag.

tags/tagging

A tag is what players refer to a reply to a thread as. When we are going through and making replies we refer to it as tagging.

OTA

You may see OTA posted in the subject lines or content of posts in memes or games. This stands for 'open to all' and means any type of character may respond. It's sometimes best to still check the character's journal for any permissions that have been posted, however, like if you're responding on a smut meme.

starter

The first comment in the thread that contains a hook to reply to. This may be the top-level or may be the comment you post in reply to a blank top-level.

tag-in

The replies made to an open post or post in a meme or game.

tagging out

The act of tagging various characters in a meme or game.

tagbomb

A term RPers use to mean they've lined up several tabs of replies and hit send on all of them at approximately the same time.

backtagging

Tagging a thread weeks or months after it started. Some people will happily send tags years later if a notif got lost and you find it again later.

handwaving

This is when you and the other player agree on what would have happened without explicitly playing it out. This may be done in PSLs and games to move action along without playing out every little detail of conversations and things like that.

metagaming

Refers to a character reacting to something they wouldn't have any way of knowing about but that their player does know. This can be caused by introspection in the tag that's being replied to, or general knowledge about the canon. This is a big faux pas and should be avoided as stringently as possible.

godmoding

Deciding actions of another character on the other player's behalf. It's most commonly done by accident in PVP threads (for example, tagging "Darth Vader knocked him on his back" when it would be better to tag "Darth Vader strikes out to attempt to knock him on his back" and allowing the other player to decide if it works).

notif

This is short for 'notification' and is a shorthand for the emails that DW sends to alert you that someone has tagged you. Occasionally DW has problems with the email servers and notifs will disappear or get lost; also, some email providers will randomly decide emails from DW are spam. Luckily, there's also DW's inbox that you can use as a backup. If a tag you were expecting doesn't come in after a while, it's a good idea to check there.

voicetesting

The process of trying out playing a new character.

canonmate

Characters being played from the same canon you're playing from, e.g. Star Wars. This can become granular, depending on how separate you prefer to keep media from the same source. For example, in most games the MCU would be considered a different canon from Marvel Comics.

lone canon warrior (LCW)

The term for if you're playing your character in a game and they have no canonmates.

headcanon (HC)

This is the player's ideas that fill in the gaps of what their character's canon doesn't say explicitly, but that informs how they play the character. This can include things such as how they grew up, how they like their coffee, whether they like knock-knock jokes, and plenty more. For the most part we prefer it if characters apped to games are played as explicitly from canon as possible, with headcanon filling in the gaps.

alternate universe (AU)

This is when a character is played as being from different circumstances from canon. For example, if you take your character and play a thread on a Pacific Rim AU meme on a meme comm, that would be a full AU.

Character journals

open post

This is a post a player will place on their character's journal to invite open play. You may be expected to write a starter to begin play.

how's my driving (HMD)

This is a post on the character journal where other players can post comments about that player's characterization or make other notes about their playing.

opt-out post

This is often combined with the HMD post. It's a post on the journal made to allow other players to opt out of play with that character or player.

permissions

A post on the journal that lets players know what to expect out of play with your character. This comm hosts a permissions template here.

kinks

A list of kink preferences for your character and for yourself. This is sometimes combined with the permissions post.

Places to Play

museboxes

Some players prefer to post to a comm called a musebox, where they may put open posts, memes, or PSLs for their characters and sometimes even their friends' characters to play out.

private storylines (PSL)

A storyline for just yourself and one or a few other players to play out. This will often take place in a musebox but may happen in a special comm made just for the PSL.

dressing rooms

These are less common these days but are basically a comm made for open play. There are usually few rules in a dressing room—unlike games, which need to be applied to in order to play in them, characters can come and go in dressing rooms as the player sees fit.

Examples:

• hotelmultiverse
  
  
• kishima

sandboxes

A sandbox is similar to a musebox or dressing room, but is more open. Most of the currently existing sandboxes are games that closed to applications.

Examples:

• nexus_crossings

memes

A post on a comm or musebox where you are responding to the prompt in the post, without structured play or continuity with other posts on the comm. Many memes will have blank top-levels to reply to, in which case you will need to write the starter; in other cases the meme will explicitly require a starter to post to it.

Examples:

• bakerstreet (bkst)
  
  

  This is the most popular meme comm on DW. Most other meme comms link their memes there to get more traffic. There are some popular memes that run every week—you can see the list of those here.

  Specific descriptions for how these memes work are in the comments below.

• the_love_hotel (tlh)
  
  
• fortanon
  
  
• dear_player
  
  

  Dear Player is a slightly different concept from the other meme comms—in the posts here, the idea is the character itself is addressing you, the player, in the post. Most people use this to voicetest or look for canonmates.

• sixwordstories

games

This is a more structured form of play, where players have to write an application for the mods to judge whether the character will fit into the game. Different games have different standards, so it's good to take a look at past apps of characters who have made it into the game to see what that game's standards are. Games will usually have certain requirements for activity as well.

Pretty much all games in DWRP are panfandom—that is, they accept characters from all canons, and usually OCs and malleable protagonists, as well.

test-drive meme (TDM)

A post that the mods will place on the mod journal or the OOC comm of the game in order for prospective players to try their characters out in the setting before apping to the game. This is also commonly used to gather a sample for placing on the app.

application

The form that is required to fill out for entrance into a game. This will be linked in the game's information pages. There is usually a sample of past play required for the app; requirements for the sample will be in the game's FAQ.

mods

The people who run the game. There may only be one mod but there are usually a small team of 2-5 people.

activity check (AC)

This is the requirement of activity that you have to show proofs of in order to remain in the game. Some games have check-in AC, but you may be asked to show that you have a thread of a certain length every month instead.

check-in AC

Games that require check-in AC will simply ask you to report in that you intend to continue to play in the game. There is the caveat, however, that if the mods notice you aren't playing at all for more than a month, you may be dropped from the game regardless.

invite-only game

Some games have moved to requiring an invitation from an existing player in the game in order to be allowed to apply. However, there is usually also a way to apply to the mods for a mod invitation if you don't have a friend in that game.

jamjar game

This is a game where characters are placed in a setting along with characters from many other canons. Most games in DWRP are this style.

ECATs game

A game where responses are allowed to be, or are even expected, to be very short. Some responses may be only one word, or even consist of a blank post that uses the icon expression to express the character's emotion in response to the tag.

murdergame

This is a short-run game based on the concept of games like Mafia, where characters have several rounds to solve a murder. They usually last only a few weeks and have scheduled sessions where people are expected to tag rapid-fire all at once.

memloss game

A game where characters arrive with no memory of their life before arriving in game. Most memloss games also have a mechanic where characters will receive their old memories as rewards from plots and activity.

AU game

A game where a character's personality is kept intact, but where the player is expected to come up with a complete alternate backstory that would fit the character into the setting. For example, a game where every character that is brought in lives in modern New York City would be an AU game.

fourth wall event

An event in a game where anyone is allowed to play, even if they haven't apped into and been accepted into the game. There is typically one specific post made by the mods on the ooc comm for players to play in the event.

Terms for Play

Veteran DW RPers tend to use very specific terms in reference to their RP starters that are unusual in their precision in comparison to other RP mediums. The distinctions between these things can be difficult for a beginner; this glossary section attempts to summarize the differences.

post

A post is a starter or header made using the "Post an Entry" Dreamwidth page, either to a community or to the character's journal. Practically by defintion, this is a form of starter - "post" is never used in reference to replies that continue a thread.

mingle post

A specific kind of post that can be used by multiple people as a starting place for top-levels. In games, these are often related to events that progress the game's story or events that affect the entire game. Generally speaking, mingle posts are intended to in some way set a stage for other people to then develop starters from; they are not intended for direct replies, and isntead the person who posted the mingle (if it was posted by a player rather than a mod/NPC) will have their own top-level on the post.

top-level

The other primary form of DWRP starting point. The term comes from the "view top-level comments" functionality (which will display only the top-levels on a post). It is made using the "Post a New Comment" text box, in response to the prompts outlined in a mingle post, test drive meme, or any other form of post with prompts that aren't character specific. Players take those prompts as a starting point, and then customize them for their characters in their top-level. On memes and certain other posts like open posts these may be left blank. To make a blank post, you need to put something in the tag, such as an empty html tag. This will make it so the post isn't read as blank to DW, but will still post as blank.

network post

A specific kind of post (and, rarely, an option for a style of top-level prompt) that is a character using some kind of network service, usually a text or video device, to make a post that other characters on the network can see and interact with through the network. These posts often have different formatting to threads in which characters interact in person—the bracket style mentioned in the Dreamwidth site guide and is referred to variably as actionspam, smalltext, or bracket text.

log

A non-network post. Usually, the term 'log' connotes a slightly higher level of formality (prose over actionspam, for example), but this isn't always the case. A word that is somewhat falling out of style, as logs and prose become the default for much of DWRP.

EMP/ATP

This refers to enablemeplz (or the former comm appthisplease) and is often used interchangeably. The journal itself is used for posting game and character advertisements, but individual games may post an EMP/ATP post to their OOC comm for drumming up excitement for apping to their games, as well.