Playing by Post (Rant)

[Torger]

Alright, this is going to be a little rant from me, because it's driving me nuts.

We're on a forum, here. Our only means of communication is the written word. The written word that has, for the better part of two hundred years, been standardized, codified, and taught to us since we were four years old.

This is the language, people. You're supposed to use it. This is the only means we have of interacting, here. So tonight, instead of reading my textbooks, like I should be, I went cruising the recruitment threads for a new PbP game, as several of the ones I was playing in died in quick succession. So I go, and I start reading through the initial flavour posts, and with most of them, I don't even get through the first paragraph.

The spelling and grammar are atrocious, and these are the people that want me to dedicate my time, effort, and mental faculties to helping them craft a neat little story, while they sit there and throw things like "thy art next, O King," "The region was known for its prosperiosity," "The tounament(sic) will begin with a preform(sic) check with the fighters waving their weapons for the people who are watching" at me. Honestly...

It's enough to make me want to weep bitter tears. Now, I know that the English language isn't perfect, and doesn't always make sense. I know it's one of those jerk languages that lurk down dark alleyways, beat up other languages, and rifle through their pockets for spare vocabulary. I know that there are no hard and fast rules for its usage, but come on, people. Give me a friggin' break, here.

So this is my request, my appeal, my plea for mercy -- if you are intent on running a game, or on playing in a game (at least, one that involves me) please, please, PLEASE come equipped with regular, grade-nine English or at least an electronic spell-check installed in your browser and the ability to form a cogent sentence. It will do us all a world of good, and will probably help attract more interested players.

Thank you.

[Talya]

Everything you just said.

[horseboy]

Ditto

[Wooter]

*Uproarious applause*

[Darkxarth]

As an obsessive English major I agree.

Everyone makes mistakes (I'll probably make one or two in this post even) but sometimes it's just too much. My primary pet peeve lies not with minor spelling and grammatical mistakes (abundant though they may be) but with the shortening of words through overuse of abbreviations and the like.

Now, this isn't to say that I myself don't type "lol" or "rofl" or "brb" while chatting to my friends through an instant messenger. However, in a forum, one has the time to type full words and complete thoughts without getting left behind in the conversation.

Unfortunately, ranting isn't necessarily helpful in the least, except to release all of that pent up annoyance at people on the internet.

[EndgamerAzari]

*Slow clap*

Bravo, sirrah. (Oops.) As an English major, I have trouble not screaming when I see some of the atrocities committed against the language, even in such a... cultured establishment as a roleplaying forum.

[wadledo]

In defense of those who DM these games, I have to say that some times you miss a couple problems. I know I've missed grammatical errors for days

In agreement, yes as spell check should be used by everyone, including players.
How would you feel if the only good character power wise was a player who
posts like this all the time!!?

Which wasn't in agreement, but you do raise very good points.
I'm going to have to bookmark this.

[The_Snark]

Agreed.

I will point out, as a possible, partial mitigation, that English isn't necessarily everyone's first language here, and given how annoying grammar can be even for us, it's probably far more difficult for them. To a lesser extent, the same goes for spelling. They are, very probably, doing the best they can. It only applies to a few of the people doing it, but it's still worth keeping in mind.

Capitalization, on the other hand... there is no excuse for not capitalizing.

[Torger]

I don't mean to come off as an elitist (Which I probably am. I'm an English minor, tested out of Freshman English, and definitely judge people when they use poor grammar), but this is getting intolerable.

I'm not talking about people who make little errors (my W key is spotty, and I often think faster than I can type, leading to errors), but these are the initial, pre-generated flavour posts setting the tone, timbre, and character for the world. "Thy art doomed?" Please! I can hear Marlow and Shakespeare spinning in their graves like a pair of out-of-control auto-tillers.

This is meant to be catharsis for me, yes, and if it scares people away from me because they don't know the difference between there, their, and they're, all the better. This is a hole in our social education, and as a literocentric society that's supposed to pride itself on its literacy rates and ability to communicate (Even going so far as spearheading the attempts to communicate extra-terrestrially), we really need to fix this.

[North]

Typos happen. I dont mind. But muder genocide of word after word hurts my eyes.

[Voyager_I]

Save the Kobolds!

[mikeejimbo]

"thy art next, O King."

Now now, 'thou' and its forms, and 'art' have fallen out of use, you can't really blame people for not knowing the proper way to use them. And he did use 'art' correctly, he just should have said "Thou art next, O King", if I'm not mistaken.

[Icewalker]

Yeah, this is a very good point which bothers me quite a bit. But I can spell, and I just run my own game!

Of course, one of the people in one of my groups keeps writing Dwarf as Drawf no matter what I try to say...

[Rutee]

Alright, this is going to be a little rant from me, because it's driving me nuts.

We're on a forum, here. Our only means of communication is the written word. The written word that has, for the better part of two hundred years, been standardized, codified, and taught to us since we were four years old.

This is the language, people. You're supposed to use it. This is the only means we have of interacting, here. So tonight, instead of reading my textbooks, like I should be, I went cruising the recruitment threads for a new PbP game, as several of the ones I was playing in died in quick succession. So I go, and I start reading through the initial flavour posts, and with most of them, I don't even get through the first paragraph.

The spelling and grammar are atrocious, and these are the people that want me to dedicate my time, effort, and mental faculties to helping them craft a neat little story, while they sit there and throw things like "thy art next, O King," "The region was known for its prosperiosity," "The tounament(sic) will begin with a preform(sic) check with the fighters waving their weapons for the people who are watching" at me. Honestly...

It's enough to make me want to weep bitter tears. Now, I know that the English language isn't perfect, and doesn't always make sense. I know it's one of those jerk languages that lurk down dark alleyways, beat up other languages, and rifle through their pockets for spare vocabulary. I know that there are no hard and fast rules for its usage, but come on, people. Give me a friggin' break, here.

So this is my request, my appeal, my plea for mercy -- if you are intent on running a game, or on playing in a game (at least, one that involves me) please, please, PLEASE come equipped with regular, grade-nine English or at least an electronic spell-check installed in your browser and the ability to form a cogent sentence. It will do us all a world of good, and will probably help attract more interested players.

Thank you.

Incidentally, Firefox comes with spellchecker now. It's quite handy, and you (The generic you, not anyone specific) should upgrade to it! Yeah, though, while I'm not a nazi about it, I do have some minimal standards about what people's grammar 'should' look like.

[Zincorium]

Incidentally, Firefox comes with spellchecker now. It's quite handy, and you (The generic you, not anyone specific) should upgrade to it! Yeah, though, while I'm not a nazi about it, I do have some minimal standards about what people's grammar 'should' look like.

Right on.

It's actually one of the reasons bad spelling ticks me off. We live in a world where, with an internet connection (and c'mon, all of us have one if we're on the board), a nearly illiterate person can get help spelling every single word in a sentence, and go back and fix any errors with the 'edit' button.

[Seffbasilisk]

It's something that irks me as well, but at least most folks who start out doing such end up improving.

Spoiler

Show

cogent? Powerfully persuasive sentances?

[Ascension]

Now now, 'thou' and its forms, and 'art' have fallen out of use, you can't really blame people for not knowing the proper way to use them. And he did use 'art' correctly, he just should have said "Thou art next, O King", if I'm not mistaken.

Stuff like that is why, though I know how tempting it can be, I tend to discourage the use of "King James" English in fantasy roleplaying. The occasional archaic word or phrase adds a nice bit of flavor, and I certainly encourage fantasy roleplayers to abstain from using modern slang, but any attempt to fully adopt an outmoded form of the language for roleplaying purposes stands about as much chance of success as an attempt to RP in Chinese (Well, unless you're a native speaker. If you are a native speaker of Chinese, think French or something instead.). It's just not practical.

[mikeejimbo]

Stuff like that is why, though I know how tempting it can be, I tend to discourage the use of "King James" English in fantasy roleplaying. The occasional archaic word or phrase adds a nice bit of flavor, and I certainly encourage fantasy roleplayers to abstain from using modern slang, but any attempt to fully adopt an outmoded form of the language for roleplaying purposes stands about as much chance of success as an attempt to RP in Chinese (Well, unless you're a native speaker. If you are a native speaker of Chinese, think French or something instead.). It's just not practical.

With a basic grasp of grammar though, and a link to the Oxford English Dictionary, I think you can even get the older modern English forms down.

Of course, I didn't know grammar very well until I took Latin.

[tbarrie]

Now now, 'thou' and its forms, and 'art' have fallen out of use, you can't really blame people for not knowing the proper way to use them.

Then they shouldn't try to use them.

[Faithdreamer]

Someone may have been hurt. Pretty please try to be considerate of feelings. Sensitivity isn’t a bad thing. This is your friendly tap on the shoulder:

TRY TO BE GENTLE AND POLITE!

Have a nice Evening GitP Forum.

[Talic]

As an obsessive English major I agree.

Everyone makes mistakes (I'll probably make one or two in this post even) <add a comma> but sometimes it's just too much. My primary pet peeve lies not with minor spelling and grammatical mistakes (abundant though they may be) <add a comma> but with the shortening of words through overuse of abbreviations and the like.

Now, this isn't to say that I myself don't type "lol" <remove or, add a comma> or "rofl" or "brb" while chatting to my friends through an instant messenger. However, in a forum, one has the time to type full words and complete thoughts without getting left behind in the conversation.

Unfortunately, ranting isn't necessarily helpful in the least, except to release all of that pent up annoyance at people on the internet.

Done to prove the gentleman's point in the first sentence of his second paragraph.

[Quietus]

This is where, as a DM, you have to be reasonable about who you accept to play. I try and get a feel for whether players are able to type coherently when accepting their characters - I'm hardly elitist, and I've been known to accept those whose English skills are less than perfect, but I DO make it known as necessary that they'll need to improve in order to keep going, and I try and support that.

[Darkxarth]

Done to prove the gentleman's point in the first sentence of his second paragraph.

... darn. I thought I had done a good job of ensuring I didn't actually make any mistakes in that post. Parentheses and quotation marks tend to screw with my comma placement.

However, I do want to thank you for proving my point.

[Bosh]

Now now, 'thou' and its forms, and 'art' have fallen out of use, you can't really blame people for not knowing the proper way to use them. And he did use 'art' correctly, he just should have said "Thou art next, O King", if I'm not mistaken.

Also it would be HORRIBLY rude to refer to a King as "thou." Thou is only for your social inferiors, for your equals and superiors you should say you.

[mikeejimbo]

Also it would be HORRIBLY rude to refer to a King as "thou." Thou is only for your social inferiors, for your equals and superiors you should say you.

It is, however, not grammatically incorrect. I suppose that this is true, however, isn't "you" plural?

[Moral Wiz]

And the sentence sound like it's being said by some sort of king killer. Rudeness is fine.

[Talic]

... darn. I thought I had done a good job of ensuring I didn't actually make any mistakes in that post. Parentheses and quotation marks tend to screw with my comma placement.

However, I do want to thank you for proving my point.

Yes, grammatical errors do abound. The point is to not riddle a post so severely with them that the reader spends more time interpreting than reading, and you are among the many who succeed quite well at that.

[Swordguy]

Alright, this is going to be a little rant from me, because it's driving me nuts.
...

I simply consider the language used by a given poster to be living proof of the bell curve of intelligence scores.

[Voyager_I]

I simply consider the language used by a given poster to be living proof of the bell curve of intelligence scores.

What about elegantly written, carefully structured, entirely moronic arguments?

[Emperor Tippy]

I'm dyslexic and can't spell at all, I have an excellent vocabulary though, but I agree 100%.

As has been said, Firefox comes with a built in spell check that will catch most things and a few errors are no problem (we all make them), but you know its bad when someone has to translate your posts so that others can read them (and I have had to translate other's posts on these boards before).