[Morrigan]

The Ickle’s Guide to TBHE

Welcome to The Best Hogwart’s Ever! If this is your first time on a Harry Potter Role-Playing site, or just your first character on this site, please take some time to read over these rules before beginning. They’ll help you out a ton!

I. Getting Started
II. Common Role-Playing Terms
III. IC Rules
IV. OOC Rules
V. In Character vs. Out of Character Knowledge
VI. Role-Play Etiquette
VII. Questions?

[Morrigan]

I. Getting Started

First things first, take a look at your name. Do you have a first name and last name? Like Teresa Lancaster, Karim Levis, or Elliot Danby (please don’t use these names, they are already taken)? If you don’t, please go here and post to change your name. On this site, your user name is your character's name.

Famous names not allowed without permission. Period.

Keep in mind though, that there are certain names you cannot use. Canon characters (such as Harry Potter, any of the Weasley’s, or anyone else of JK Rowling’s creation) must be applied for. Please check the National Puppet Association boards for a list of current available Canon characters. Also, please try not to use the same last name as another character unless you have permission from them to be related. Here you'll find several other things that you might want to look into as well!

Once you’ve got a name, it’s time to get sorted! Pick a school, year, and house for your character.


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Make sure to stop by this forum for help in not creating a Mary Sue character.


(edited January 8, 2009 by Godric Gryffindor)
(edited January 14, 2009 by Cerridwen)
[edited September 1, 2009 by Lorraine V.

[Morrigan]

II. Common Role-Playing Terms

Hello, and welcome to your crash course on learning about the terms used in common-day RP-ing. There are people of you out there who do know all of these terms, and there are those people who are new to this. This is for the latter section of people, though the former are of course allowed to look here for reminders.

I'm sure other moderator's, and other members, will be sure to add to this, so you can see this as a dictionary of a sorts that we're all collaborating for you! Of course, it's all for the members and to help them understand.

Terms

Role-Playing: Commonly referred to as 'RP-ing'. It means to take the role of a character and play them out, writing on sites called after the word. There are also such things as RPG's, which stand for Role-Playing games, which is similar, but they are involved in animated games, while for our purposes, role-playing here simply means to write out a character as we see them and have them respond to other characters in plots/threads/other.

God-Moding: It is mostly known throughout the RP-ing forums as 'God-Moding' but TBHE has it's own name for it- Authoring. It is against the rules in all RP-ing sites, and it is when you take control of a character who is not yours in a post. There are occasions when you can be given permission to author someone in a post, if you continue without that person's explicit permission, you will find yourself with a sentence.

Closed/Open: We all see the Topic Description when we click on the link that will take us to a thread, and they most often say whether the thread is open or not. If it is open, it will say that somehow, but if it's closed, it will either say 'closed' or include character's names, thus closing the thread off to the people mentioned. Open is when any character is allowed to post, and closed is for only people allowed by the topic starter.

Third Person: I can see you scowling at me, please don't. I am well aware that most (possibly all) people on this site know what third person is, but give me the benefit of the doubt. Third person is when you write (or talk) using words such as 'he, his, she, her, they, them, etc-' This is not first person, where you use 'I, me, us, our, etc-" Clear? Good.

Plotting: This is where puppeteers talk about possibly situations and how they could play out with their characters. It's very simple, and very good for your character when you plot.

Personal Messaging: Also known as 'PM-ing.' It's a way of contacting other members on this site, and is similar to emailing. Be aware that the Mods and the HM can read every PM you send, there is a disclaimer easily visible whenever you PM someone.

Muse: Everyone seems to have one- and it's hard to describe in words. It's what gives a person the ability to write, but not quite. It gives you ideas, how to phrase something exactly right, and helps you to write along. Music seems to help most writers with their muse, and muse block. When your muse is blocked, it is harder to write as the idea's don't flow as well, which is why some puppeteers may take a break when they become 'museless'.

OOC: 'Out of Character.' This is when you can start talking in that first-person. When posting, puppeteers tend to have these at the beginning of the post, or at the very end, separating the note from the post they have written. It is usually because they wished to share something (e.g.,- authoring having been permitted). There are OOC forums, where people are not writing as their characters (though sometimes, for the fun of it, people do) and can share such things such as graphics, plot ideas, and much more.

IC: 'In Character.' In a post, this shows when puppeteers can go from OOC, to IC, and sometimes in OOC forums they will write IC, it helps to distinguish who they are talking as in a post.

Alter: An alter is simple. You start on this board with one character. After that, any characters you create are alternate characters, or 'alters'. Please be sure that you can handle having more than one character before actually creating it. Check such things as how long you can be on the computer, how much creativity you have, if you're even keeping up with your single character's rps.

Thread: In which a character starts with one post, to which another character responds. Over time these posts link together into what is called a thread.

Thank you for reading this, and I hope it possibly could have helped you understand some points of this very large world of RP-ing. Welcome to TBHE, we hope you enjoy your time here!

* Thanks to Latis for writing up these terms!

(edited by Godric Gryffindor on January 8, 2009)

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[Morrigan]

III. IC Rules

Alright, so you have a name. Next step is the rules. We aren’t as strict as some HP RPing sites, but we do insist upon a few things.

The IC rules are the Hogwarts rules. Break them and get a detention. We know you're going to break them, everyone does, and OOCly, we honestly don’t care. It leads to better plots.

* Breaking these rules do not hinder your character’s chances of becoming a Prefect/Head Boy or Girl/Quidditch Captain or Player. Honestly, breaking these rules gives us something fun to read! We encourage creativity and good role-playing and we understand that breaking a few IC rules helps with plots and character building! So don’t be afraid! Wander into the Forbidden Forest, break curfew, wear clothing that’s against the rules, OOCly you’ll be fine.

Pets: Take care of your pets at all times. Do not forget to feed them. Also, don’t forget that if you do decide to bring a pet, you must purchase it! Please see the Personal Points/Gringott’s Account thread for explanation on handling your money.

Dress code: Uniform Dress code is strictly enforced in classrooms. Uniform dress code is not required after 6 p.m. Casual Dress code is enforced at all other times. Piercings and tattoos of any kind but on the ears for girls must be covered. This is a British boarding school. Casual dress code is in effect after school and weekends.

Boys: Shirts must be worn unless practicing or playing a sport. Quidditch games (when the time comes) will be played wearing a Quidditch uniform.

Girls: Your dress code is stricter than the boys code because you’re more likely to break it. Those under fourth year are not allowed to wear heels over two inches. The shoes will be burnt. No shorts may come more than three inches above the knee on females. No midriff is allowed. Spaghetti straps are allowed. Do not show your belly. The staff and the students don’t need to see this.

Piercings and tattoos (only acceptable on those already well into puberty) can be uncovered if on a normally visible area (arm, lower leg, neck, we don’t want to see your cute butterfly tattoo on your lower back.).

House Points: Notice the four hourglasses in the front entrance. The beautiful emeralds of Slytherin. The gorgeous garnets of Gryffindor. Admire the lovely topaz of Hufflepuff and the splendorous sapphires of Ravenclaw. Look at how they glisten in the light. Aren’t they brilliant? The stones in the top of the hourglasses are possible points that you may earn. The ones in the bottom have already been earned. But that doesn’t mean that they won't go back to where they came from! Oh no! They can. Behave and earn your team the House Cup!

Student couples: (A little OOC and a little IC) Okay be reasonable. Not all eleven year olds snog. (Go on what you did around that age and I don’t want to hear “I can’t remember!” Because I can. And I’m well older than 11. Be realistic or you won’t last long on this site.)

Sexual acts: I don't want to see them happen. If older students want to say they "got friendly" they can. It can be vulgar and dirty but no one needs to read the act written out in explicit detail. When the fingers start walking it’s time to fade. There are other boards for that. Keep this reasonably clean. You can talk about it as being past tense or giggle to your girlfriends that it's going to happen or have locker room convos with your boys that it's going to happen in real life and Hogwarts is similar in the human way to real life. But I (nor anyone else) wants to see it happen on this board. Got it? Good.

Any such posts that violate this will be deleted and the account will be frozen for one week. No warnings.

Our server host does not allow even minute sexual context between depicted minors/children. I don't want our board deleted so don't even think about it. Allusion to it is okay. No depiction.

Any such posts that violate this will be deleted and account will be frozen for one week. No warnings.

Students smoking and using Alcohol: It isn't allowed. It's one of those IC rules that will be broken. It happens in real life with teens. Just don't talk about blowing chunks in too graphic of a manner, some people have weak stomachs.

Teens sneak and do things that they aren't supposed to. At any boarding school, high school, University, etc. It will happen in real life. It will happen on TBHE.


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[Morrigan]

IV. OOC Rules

Contains spoilers for anyone who has not yet read Deathly Hallows.

Chain of Command:
- Draco Malfoy is the head moderator, she has the final say on everything.
- The Four Founders - Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena Ravenclaw, and Salazar Slytherin. Most decisions will come from this group.
- The Moderating Team (Gods & Goddesses) are the HM’s right-hand men/women.
- The four Heads of Houses.
- Head Boy/Girl.
- Prefects.

Professors have power over their classrooms and offices. They set the rules for those domains.

Playing God: Only allowed when your are given permission from the other character’s puppeteer. This is called “Godmoding” or “Authoring” also. Godmoding without permission enough will get you banned.

There are certain people who can Godmod without permission. These people include the Headmaster, the HoH’s, Head Boy/Girl, Prefects, Creatures, Auror’s, and members of the Dark Rise.

Ghosts, Professors, Prefects, Creatures, Dark Rise, and Aurors and other Hogwarts staff members may pop into any thread whether it is closed or not. They do so at their digression and shall not be asked to remove their posts.

In the Vladislav, Darling, Mancini, and O'Bannon families, Leaders of the family may invade threads as they see fit due to the structure of their familes. They may only invade threads for their respective families unless otherwise agreed upon oocly by the puppeteers. This is their right as hard working members on this site.

If the thread is for plotting purposes and only specific plotting purposes may you mark the first post of said thread with "Thread for Plot" and something along the lines of "Please don't invade" This is still not enough to keep people out, and if the rules are being broken, unless it's important to plot not to get caught, then well.... There really are no guarantees, but you can request it. It would have to be a life altering experience for a Prefect or Teacher or otherwise to be asked to remove their post.

There are limits. Everyone knows what godmoding is. Keep it very low key. Not in excess. Some people don't mind it, so the rule of thumb is to always ask first.

Ask if you want your character to hit another character. Or if you want them to be tugged where you want them to go, ask them. No role-play has to be completed this minute to the point that you are able to move someone else.

Religion: It's not allowed. Merlin is okay. No other names for God at all. Mentioning Mythology is okay. "Praying" to Zeus: not okay. “Thank Merlin,” Perfectly acceptable.

1st offense: Detention of 10 posts of 100 words.
2nd offense: Suspension of account for 3 days.
3rd offense: Suspension of account for 7 days
4th offense: Banishment.

OOC Rules Violation: Which leads me to punishment for violation of any rule listed.

1st offense: Detention of 10 posts of 100 words.
2nd offense: Suspension of account for 3 days.
3rd offense: Suspension of account for 7 days
4th offense: Banishment.

The Grounds: Can I go into the Forbidden Forest? If you weren't 'allowed' then you wouldn't have access to it. But remember if a professor or a prefect catches you then your character will be punished according to the professor that handles it. That's usually a horrible detention. This is not a OOC rule.

Muggleborns in Slytherin: It is rare. VERY rare. Please PM the Headmaster before hand and he will let you know if you will be able to.

Student couples: (A little OOC and a little IC) Okay be reasonable. No eleven year olds snogging. (Go on what you did around that age and I don't want to hear "I can't remember!" Because I can. And I'm well older than 11. Don't do anything that you wouldn't do in front of your mum!)

Fourteen year olds and up can 'snog'. But it better be well planned out by both parties and not roaming hands. No one wants to read about anyone licking the roofs of mouths. Keep it tasteful. Make it sweet and innocent or something. Sweet NOT Smut!

Sexual acts: I don't want to see them happen. If older students want to say they "got friendly" they can. But no one needs to read it. There are other boards for that. Keep this reasonably clean. You can talk about it as being past tense or giggle to your girlfriends that it's going to happen or have locker room convos with your boyz that it's gonna happen in real life and Hogwarts is similar in the human way to real life. But I (nor anyone else) wants to see it happen. Got it? Good.

Any such posts that violate this will be deleted and the account will be frozen for one week. No warnings.

Our server host does not allow even minute sexual context between depicted minors/children. I don't want our board deleted so don't even think about it.

Sexual Innuendo vs Sex: Sexual innuendo is allowed. Being slightly dirty is allowed. Referring to someone as a part of the human body (ie: dick, arse, boob, pussy, etc.) is allowed. If you can't get away with it in a real boarding school, don't try it on here.

Abuse: Yes, your character can have in the past been abused. No flash backs, bare mentions and not in every post can it be referred to. If your character is currently going through it, be very tactful and be as vague as possible. No one wants to read how badly you were beaten.

Abuse happens, even in the Wizarding world. But there are those who face it daily in the real world and though I don't know/think any of our members are currently dealing with it, I know some have in the past so be tactful, please. This is the only warning.



Bitch Play

This is a role play board. There will be ooc issues between puppeteers off site from time to time. Don't bring those problems onto the board and use anger from your ooc life in your rps toward puppets played by the person you're pissed at.

This will result in suspensions and then banning. Bitch play? Bitch, please!



Special Ablilities and breeds
All need to be approved by one of the four Hogwarts founders or the Headmaster. This includes Werewolves, Hags, and Vampires. For more information see here.

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[Morrigan]

V. In Character vs. Out of Character Knowledge

Okay, there have lately been some issues with IN and OUT of character knowledge. I do not intend to single anyone out, but this is something that has not been fully addressed here.

It's really very simple. Though we all have a tendency to want to take knowledge we have from reading the threads and use it to our character's advantage, we can't do this.

This is not "Godmoding" in the classic sense, where "Suzy" would say in her post that "Mike" took her hand or performed some action like falling out of his chair.

This is taking what we know from one thread and applying it in another thread. For example:

Billy steals a book from Sally's room when she isn't in there to see it. Later, in another thread, Sally blames Billy for taking her book even though her CHARACTER has no way to know who took it because Mandy, Sam, and Lester were also in the house when the book went missing. THIS IS NOT ALLOWED!

OR

If Billy and Sam are both have big feet and Mandy tells Sally that she saw someone with big feet take the book, Sally still won't know if it's Billy or Sam. So she can't accuse one over the other, even though Sally's puppeteer can read the posts and see clearly that it was Billy.

So if there are fifty kids with big feet in the house, Sally will have even less of an idea of who did it than before - even with Mandy's eye-witness report of someone with big feet.

HOWEVER

If Mandy saw Billy take the book and knows it was him because none of the other people available have BOTH big feet and blonde hair, and she KNOWS FOR A FACT that she saw a wisp of blonde hair AND big feet, then we know we have our man.

ALSO

If more than one person has big feet and blonde hair, then Mandy must either remember something else from when Billy stole the book, or Sally will have to live with the fact that she may never know for sure what happened to her favorite fairy tales. Sorry, Sally. Deal.

The point is, in real life we can only know what we ourselves see or are told. We can't watch ourselves move about or know what is happening from another person's point of view.

We are not omniscient.

Neither are the characters.

And even in real life, we can be mistaken about what we see or lied to about something that has happened that we did not see.

We can make incorrect conclusions even with the presence of concrete facts. People can be wrongfully accused of crimes, infidelity, and a guilty person can be "found innocent" in a court of law. It happens every day. This board should be no different.

* Thank you Rhiannon for writing up this section!

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[Morrigan]

VI. Role-Playing Etiquette

Don't enter or invite people to enter into closed threads without permissino from the thread's originator. The person who starts a thread sets the mood, the scene, and the circumstances of a thread. Bringing in someone new can upset these elements and is therefore quite rude.

Unless you have been godmoded, or someone has entered your thread uninvited, or someone is breaking a rule, do not ask anyone to change or delete their posts to suit your needs. Be creative enough to roll with the punches and respond to any situation. We don't get to pick and choose what people do to us in real life, our characters are no different. UNLESS it is traumatic to your character. Please also see the section in this thread about Playing God.

Keep up with all your threads! Post in them! If for whatever reason, you want to leave a thread, then post that your character has left! This way, other people in your thread won't be looking for you or waiting for you to post.

If you've lost your muse for a character or for a thread, be kind enough to pm the people involved in the thread to let them know. They may have plots that need to be played out. It's not fair to make them wait.

If you've had to wait on someone for a while, days not hours, on a role play or for them to post, send them a kind pm asking them. It is possible that they forgot. Or they may have lost their muse.

If you have a question or a problem with an individual person's storyline PLEASE try to work it out with that person before bringing it to the Founders or Headmaster to resolve the issue, unless that person is breaking the rules, of course. We are always here if you need us, but nobody likes a tattletale, either. Whenever it's possible, try to work it out.

Also, Please, please, please, everyone READ THE THREADS CAREFULLY! By skimming them or not reading them closely enough, you can often miss things that are important that have already been established, or you can accidentally contradict things that have been previously stated, even by your own character!

If a thread starts out as an open thread, and later those involved decide to close it, please let people know. Otherwise, they could post in your now-closed thread, not knowing that they've done anything wrong.

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[Morrigan]

VII. Questions?

If you have any other questions that aren’t addressed in this Guide, please visit this forum and someone will answer it as soon as they can!

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