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Path: bloom-beacon.mit.edu!nic.hookup.net!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!math.ohio-state.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!cwatters
From: rg-frp-announce@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.announce,news.answers,rec.answers
Subject: [rec.games.frp.*] Welcome to the roleplaying discussion groups!
Supersedes: <2ga072$9fu@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>
Followup-To: rec.games.frp.misc
Date: 11 Feb 1994 22:09:43 GMT
Organization: NOT!
Lines: 263
Sender: news@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Approved: cwatters@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Distribution: world
Expires: 3/31/1994
Message-ID: <2jgvn7$ng6@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>
Reply-To: cwatters@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
NNTP-Posting-Host: beauty.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Keywords: etiquette, news.announce.newusers, roleplaying games, administrivia
Originator: cwatters@top.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Originator: cwatters@beauty.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Xref: bloom-beacon.mit.edu rec.games.frp.announce:792 news.answers:15080 rec.answers:4045
Archive-name: games/roleplay/part1
Last-modified: 2/11/93
Many FAQs, including this one, are available on the archive site
rtfm.mit.edu in the directory pub/usenet/news.answers. The name under
which a FAQ is archived appears in the Archive-name line at the top of the
article.
Welcome to the rec.games.frp newsgroups
Please send suggested corrections and additions to the following
address:
CWATTERS@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
* Asterisks are used to indicate new/updated information.
This is the first of a set of semi-monthly posts, all of which are posted
to rec.games.frp.announce:
1 Welcome to the rec.games.frp newsgroups!
2 Frequently asked questions, part 1
2a Frequently asked questions, part 2
2b Stackpole's Defense of Gaming
3 Archive sites with Roleplaying material
4 Roleplaying Mailing Lists and Digests part 1/2
5 Roleplaying Mailing Lists and Digests part 2/2
5a Mailing Lists and Digests
6 BBS's of interest to Roleplaying gamers
7 Roleplaying Net.*.books, Gaming FAQ Keepers
WELCOME TO THE REC.GAMES.FRP NEWSGROUPS!
The Charter for this newsgroup is in the following article, with the
answers to frequently asked questions.
This article collects important information which will help you use this
newsgroup. If you're new to the rec.games.frp newsgroups, please take a
few minutes to read the rest of this posting and the associated
administrivia postings. If you are also new to netnews, please read
through the net etiquette postings in news.announce.newusers, including
"Introduction to news.announce," "What is Usenet?", "Rules for posting to
Usenet", "A Primer on How to Work With the Usenet Community", "Hints on
writing style for Usenet", "Answers to Frequently Asked Questions", and
"Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette". Some of these
postings may be found most easily in news.answers,rec.answers.
Other postings that you should be familiar with, though you don't have to
read them all the way through at first, include: "How to Get Information
about Networks"; "List of Active Newsgroups"; "Publicly Accessible Mailing
Lists, Parts I, II, & III"; "List of Periodic Informational Postings";
"Alternative Newsgroup Hierarchies, Parts I & II"; and "A Guide to Social
Newsgroups and Mailing Lists".
Finally, here are some regular postings that new users probably don't need
to read unless they want to build newsreading software, create a
newsgroup, or get more involved with the network than most users seem to:
"USENET Software: History and Sources"; "How to Create a New Newsgroup";
"Regional Newsgroup Hierarchies, Part I,II,III"; "List of Moderators";
"How to Create a New Trial Newsgroup"; "Checkgroups message (with INET
groups)"; and "How to Construct the Mailpaths File".
WHAT DOESN'T BELONG IN REC.GAMES.FRP.*?
These groups are *not* intended for the discussion of wargames and other
board games, except as directly related to role-playing games; try
rec.games.board instead. Nor is this the proper group for discussing
computer games. Computer game discussions and spoiler requests for
Adventure-type games (such as Zork and Ultima) belong in rec.games.video,
rec.games.misc, rec.games.int-fiction, rec.games.mud, rec.games.moria, or
the relevant computer-related newsgroup (e.g., comp.sys.mac.games).
* The general consensus is that the ROLEPLAYING aspects of games which are
primarily tabletop or board games, i.e. BattleTech and WarHammer 40k, are
welcome here, postings of a tactical or "wargaming" nature should be
posted to rec.games.board* OR rec.games.miniatures.
MUDs, MOOS, MUSHes, etc. These online gaming systems have their own
hierarchy, rec.games.mud.*. Discussion of these games, other than in the
roleplaying sense, are inappropriate for rec.games.frp.*.
SUGGESTIONS FOR POSTING
The following suggestions are intended to SUPPLEMENT the general
guidelines for posting to the net. You should already be familiar with the
guidelines contained in "Rules for posting to Usenet", "A Primer on How to
Work With the Usenet Community", and "Hints on writing style for Usenet",
which can be found in the newsgroup news.announce.newusers.
The most relevant parts of these postings, or rather the parts of these
postings most often ignored on these newsgroups, are:
1) Don't post anything that is intended for only one other person, send
flames and arguments through E-mail;
2) Read threads through to the end before adding to them, often other
people make your point first (M or m is a very useful keystroke in rn)
3) Don't post "yeah, me too" articles
4) Don't quote excessively, especially don't quote the entirety of
another person's posting and then add two lines at the bottom, if
someone wants to read the entire first posting they can go back and
read it for themselves.
When posting messages to a large newsgroup there are several things you
can do to help readers cope with the volume. First and foremost is to use
the right newsgroup, and avoid cross-posting. If your posting is an
original piece of work which can stand on its own without comments by
other people, such as a story or poem based on a roleplaying game, a
scenario, campaign background, or the like, then post it to
rec.games.frp.archives, the newsgroup for "keepers." If your posting is an
announcement about a new roleplaying product, a roleplaying convention, a
pbem, and so on, post it to rec.games.frp.announce. If your posting
concerns official rules or official game backgrounds for D&D, AD&D1,
AD&D2, or BD&D, then post it to rec.games.frp.dnd. If you are posting to
buy or sell roleplaying materials, post to rec.games.frp.marketplace. If
your posting is intended to convince people that one roleplaying game is
better than some or all other roleplaying games, or other inflammatory
opinions, then post it to rec.games.frp.advocacy. Finally, if your post
doesn't fit into any of the above niches, as is the case with a large
plurality of postings, then send it to rec.games.frp.misc.
Rec.games.frp is a defunct newsgroup, please post new threads on other
newsgroups instead.
Second, no matter what newsgroup you post to, please use descriptive
titles. Whenever you post an article which is specific to a particular
game system, please include the name of the system in the Subject of your
post. Subjects like: "Combat initiative in AD&D" or "Champions Character:
Nightstorm" are much more informative than "Combat" or "Character:
Nightstorm".
If you're posting a story, you are urged to include the word STORY in the
subject, and to use a consistent title for your work. If you post an
article related to Tabolport Net City project, please include the word
TABOLPORT in the subject so that the appropriate persons will see it.
Here is a short list of keywords which you may want to include in the
subject lines of your postings to rec.games.frp.*
META: for meta-discussion about the newsgroup, like this thread
LARP: Discussion of "Live Action Role Playing"
PBEM: announcement concerning a play by e-mail roleplaying campaign
FORSALE: games for sale announcements
WANTED: games wanted announcements
CON: convention announcements and discussion
STORY: stories
FLUFF: non-story, non-game, anecdotes, like the bard songs, silly
knight names, and other basically humorous offerings.
When offering character classes, skill lists, magic spells, monsters,
character sheets, and the like, the name of the game system (or its
abbreviation) is appropriate for the subject line.
I (early in my Net.career) solicited the net for suggestions, yielding an
extremely comprehensive list of games and likely abbreviations for them,
of which I have extracted the following. If you must abbreviate the name
of the game, try to choose an abbreviation from this list.
Abbreviation System Name
AD&D Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, either edition
AD&D1 Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, First Edition
AD&D2 Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, Second Edition
Ars Ars Magica
Btech,btek Battletech
C&S Chivalry and Sorcery
CHAMPS Champions
CoC Call of Cthulu
CP2020 Cyberpunk or Cyberpunk 2020
D&D Dungeons and Dragons
FH Fantasy Hero
GBI Ghostbusters International
HERO The Hero System (Champions, Fantasy Hero, Star Hero, etc)
MEK2 Mekton 2
MERP Middle Earth Role Playing
MSH Marvel Super Heroes
Mtrav MegaTraveller
PAL Palladium
RM Rolemaster
RQ RuneQuest
SFB Star Fleet Battles
SRUN,SR Shadowrun
TFOS Teenagers from Outer Space
TMNT Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and other Strangeness
TRAV Traveller
TREK Star Trek, the Role Playing Game
T2000 Twilight 2000
VAMP WWG's Vampire: the Masquerade
V&V Villains and Vigilantes
WFRP WarHammer Fantasy Role Playing
WOLF WWG's Werewolf
DISTRIBUTION
As always, be sure to choose the proper distribution for your articles.
Most discussion deserves "world" distribution, but posters of convention
announcements might want to consider regional or even local distribution.
Posters seeking gaming groups to join should limit the distribution to the
area they're willing to travel. This is accomplished on most newsposting
software by adding a distribution line to your article's headers, ask your
friendly sysadmin for more information.
FLAMES
Some topics have a way of turning into enormous arguments which feed on
themselves and take over the newsgroup for long periods of time.
Probably the most frequent arguments come from comparison and criticism of
different game systems. That's why they have their own newsgroup,
rec.games.frp.advocacy. While discussion along these lines can be
productive, flames and put-downs are not. Try to remember that people who
play a particular system probably like that system; if a friendly
recommendation won't get them to switch to something different, personal
attacks and insults certainly won't work. At the same time, people should
remember that criticism of their favorite game doesn't constitute an
attack on themselves.
Several truisms invariably come up during arguments about game systems:
1. "The game system doesn't matter as long as you've got a good GM."
2. "Preference of one system over another is largely a matter of taste."
3. "The reason for playing these games is to have *fun*, and whatever
game you enjoy is the one that's right for you."
Few would disagree with the above statements--but if you post, don't just
repeat the obvious. Granted that you like one game better than another,
try to explain *why*. Other people may not agree with your preference, but
at least they'll be able to learn something about the games you're
discussing.
A second occasional point of dispute concerns whether Society for Creative
Anachronism dueling provides valid data for the purpose of reality-
checking combat systems. The prospect of a bunch of people who play games
with pencil and paper arguing over the realism of SCA tourneys is ironic,
to say the least. All that can be hoped for is that participants in any
such discussion will follow the rules of courtesy established by the
Society. (In-depth discussion of SCA-related issues should be directed to
rec.org.sca.)
OBVIOUS FLAMEBAIT
Occasionally, a single line posting with a line like:
"DND SuCKs PoND ScUm - GeT A LiFe You LUseers"
Will appear. This is usually caused by a couple of factors, the most
common being that someone left a terminal logged on and unattended, some
joker uses this terminal to post the idiot messages across as many news-
groups as they can. Another is someone who is about to lose net.access,
and just wants to eat up bandwidth they'll never see. These happenings
often occur near the beginning and ends of terms at the universities.
===============================================================================
The rec.games.frp general FAQ is maintained by Coyt D. Watters
cwatters@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Free or at cost distribution rights granted in all instances, for profit or
cost+ distribution rights require a signed release.