Why I Love Roleplaying

I love roleplays. If you and I have met on a forum, or on Goodreads, you might know that already; the roleplay threads are where you'll find me posting the most. I love it as much as I love writing- maybe more at times, since it combines some of the best parts of both reading and writing: the excitement of finding out what'll happen next, the thrill of creating characters and a story. But that's not the only reason I love to roleplay . . . and this week, I'm going to tell you why.

Why I Love Roleplaying

1. It's telling a story, but with other people. I love writing things by myself. But I also love writing with other people, seeing what happens when different people work together to tell one story. Each person has a different view on the situation, different expectations on how it'll go, different ideas for the story they're trying to tell. Put those together and you get something special- something that never would've happened without collaboration. And while sometimes those differences can end up being explosive . . . more often than not, they turn into something pretty awesome.
2. It teaches you to improvise. In a novel, you're in control. No matter what you say about characters surprising you, you're the one who creates the plot and tells them where to go. In a roleplay, it's a different story. You can't know what the other players will throw in your way, what the other characters will do. You have your own characters and, depending on who- if anyone- is running the story, certain plot elements. And so when your roleplaying partner (who happens to be the GM of this particular plot in all but name) throws your Jedi against four scarily powerful Sith ghosts (not all at the same time, thankfully) and everything those Sith and the traitor who let them out can come up with . . . well, you learn to think your way out of situations you never would've come up with on your own.
3. It teaches you how to plan (and to write convincing villains). On the other hand, if you happen to be the one largely driving the plot, well, you need to be able to plan ahead- at least a little bit. Otherwise, you'll find yourself spending a lot of time stalling while you try to figure out where to go, and that's the best way to kill a roleplay. And you need to be able to write a good villain- one who'll raise the other players' interest and who'll give them a good fight before going down, but who is possible to defeat . . . one way or another. 
4. It gives you ideas for your own stories. I'm sure I've said it before: at least half my characters owe their origins, one way or another, to roleplay threads. The Battle! thread, one of the longest-running roleplays I've ever been a part of, gave birth to my Berstru Tales novels and the Alyron and Firhirt families that make up most of the characters in those stories. And some of those characters came from other roleplays before Battle!; Jared Alyron in particular- along with Jason Silver and Jarek Gilleth- came from Jared Siver, a character on a dying roleplay who I just couldn't seem to let go of (and still can't). Outside of my own experience, I know that two or three of my other friends (including the one who came up with the four Sith ghosts) have written or are writing their own books based on roleplay threads.
5. On the other hand, it's a good testing ground for your ideas. For example, there's the New Generation- an idea I came up with after I watched The Avengers for the first time. What happens when the government decides the existing superheroes are too inclined to be loose cannons? When they decide to try to create their own heroes, more loyal to them than the originals? I thought of writing it as a fanfic or a novel- but I had enough projects going on already, and I knew next to nothing about writing superheroes anyway. But the next summer, there came a surge of superhero threads . . . and so I grabbed the opportunity to test my idea, and I think it's turned out pretty well.

Of course, there's one last, very simple reason I love roleplaying: it's just plain fun to come up with characters and see them interact with each other and with the challenges you put in their way. It's one of the same reasons I enjoy writing.

Have you ever roleplayed? If you have, what are some of your favorite roleplaying memories? Please tell me in the comments!
Thanks for reading!
-Sarah (Leilani Sunblade)  

This one's for you, Rye.

Hello, everyone! I'm here with a very special announcement concerning this blog!

As you probably know if you've been reading this blog for any length of time, when I started Dreams and Dragons with my parents' help, it was a private blog. That meant that the only people who could view it were those my parents and I invited. We did this mostly because we didn't want to take any privacy risks. After all, creepy people aren't just in fantasy books.

Time passed. The novelty of blogging wore off slightly. I joined WI and the UG, two forums I'd been interested in for some time, and which now are a large part of my life. I was stepping past Dreams and Dragons, which remained private, into a bigger world. I still kept blogging, of course. But no one on those sites knew I had a blog.

Then, a week or two ago, we opened Dreams and Dragons up- temporarily, we thought- so some of the posts could be used as examples of my writing for a writing class I hoped to take. While it was opened, one of my friends from the UG found my blog, quite by accident. One friend turned into two. I'd like to say I took it calmly. I didn't. The truth is, I freaked out slightly. Even opened up as it had been, Dreams and Dragons was still supposed to be fairly private. I hastily explained things to those who had found it, and they were quite kind and understanding about the whole situation. I told Daddy about it. He was much calmer about it than I was. I still had plans to return the blog to its invite-only state as soon as possible.

However, the experience had gotten me thinking. I rather liked the idea of having a blog that my friends on the UG could read, and those on the UG who'd discovered Dreams and Dragons seemed to like it. I posed the idea of starting a new blog to Daddy. He suggested that, rather than doing that, I clear Dreams and Dragons of anything that could give away personal information and leave it open to the public. I liked this idea much more than my own, and I started work the very next day. Five days later, he approved the clean-up job as complete.

And now, with that backstory laid out, it's my pleasure to declare Dreams and Dragons officially open to my fellow elves of the UG and for any other friendly passerby who happen upon my humble blog. I hope you enjoy it!

And, Rye, if you read this, this post is for you.

Calo anor na ven!*

- Sarah (Leilani Sunblade)

*May the sun shine upon your road!

This Week . . .

Hail, all ye who cometh to my blog! Since today is Friday, it’s time for an update on my life!

·        My stories, sadly, aren’t going as well as I’d like them to be going. So far, I’ve only gotten the chase scenes and the attacking, but no answered questions. I hope to remedy this today or tomorrow, if possible. My Easter story isn’t doing much better, as I only have two scenes in part two. Fortunately, it’s a short story and I already have Part One written. Also, I finished typing Ovulum this morning, which is good. However, I need some help with one of my other stories. You see, I need a name for a certain group of bad guys. These bad guys are evil, twisted humans (and possibly elves as well) who, at the moment, wear all black, typically have hoods on so you can’t see their faces, and wield swords and some kind of taser-type weapon that looks like a black staff. If anyone has any suggestions, they would be much appreciated. (And please do not suggest “pretzel people.” Someone has already suggested that and the humor has worn off.)

·        I have started and finished Pilgrim’s Progress. It, quite obviously, went a lot faster than I expected. It was also a bit, dare I say it, boring. And while I’m quite aware that it’s an old book and an allegory, I highly prefer the Kingdom and Knights of Arretthrae series, both of which are by Chuck Black.

·        Now, the piece of news that I’m most excited about. As some of you may know and most of you probably don’t, I spend quite a bit of time reading the Webkinz Insider and Underground forums. These are two forums, the first of which is primarily for Webkinz-related stuff, though there’s considerably more than Webkinz on it, and the second of which is a forum for The Berinfell Prophecies by Wayne Thomas Batson and Christopher Hopper, one of my favorite series. I have wanted to get an account on one or both of these for quite a while, and this week, I actually got accounts on both of them! My past week’s computer time, other than what I spent on my blog and stories, has mostly been spent exploring these new accounts. And, I like both of them even more than I expected to.

Well, that’s about it for this week. Please comment and vote in my surveys! I always like to hear what you think!

-Sarah