Guide: Getting started in roleplay

Welcome to the world of roleplay (RP) in TSP! We are a friendly bunch and love to roleplay and experiment with different things in the various canons we have been creating throughout the last years. We would be more than happy to welcome you to our community and invite you to make your own contributions to our roleplay world. We understand that getting involved might be a bit daunting at first, but hopefully reading this guide and asking some questions will help you get a decent grasp of how to do things around here.

This guide discusses the rules and standards of roleplay and provides an overview of how everything in TSP roleplay is structured. It also introduces the official canons we have and how to get involved. You will also find links to additional guides on certain aspects of roleplay and a list of common abbreviations and terminology.

General structure and where to find everything

Roleplay in TSP mainly happens on the Treasure Island off-site subforums and in dedicated NS regions Knowhere and Psomewhere. It is supported by an official Discord server and the wiki - TSPedia!

In the Treasure Island subforums you will find our three main canons: Pacifica, A1-0, and Aurora, as well as a subforum for roleplay that doesn't belong to either canon, simply called Extra-Canon. You will also find the Handbook, which contains various guides (which are being transferred to TSPedia) and meta-discussions. In the NS regions, you will find a more casual roleplay On TSPedia, articles that contain In-character information are marked with the name of the respective canon, e.g. [Pacifica] for in-character information about a nation. More on the specific canons and areas of RP below.

Standards and rules

The most important rule is that any roleplay or fact that involves nations that belong to other players must have their consent. Remember that roleplay is collective writing. Another long-standing rule from our roleplay community is that whoever starts a thread is free to determine its rules. If you start a roleplay, you are free to decide if everyone may participate or if only certain people are invited. You can decide if certain kinds of posts shouldn't be allowed (like one liners), and can ask for moderators to remove posts that break your thread rules.

Another thing to take into account is that there is a difference between posting in-character (IC) and posting out-of-character (OOC). We will all be posting as different characters or entities with different personalities and functions. It is important to remember that no matter how disgusting a character might seem, the person behind the computer should always be treated with respect and is most likely a pretty normal person OOC. We all want to have fun, and being respectful helps us achieve that goal.

In Treasure Island roleplay and on Discord you will see that some threads/channels have the tags [IC] and [OOC]. IC threads/channels contain the actual "story" and OOC threads are used for discussion and questions. Many threads don't have a tag, and in such cases you have to read the posts to determine if it is in- or-out-of character. It is up to the OP if there should be an OOC thread.

In addition, we have a set of general community standards for a safe and friendly community.

Treasure Island roleplays

Like mentioned above, roleplay on the forums is divided into three main canons as well as a "miscellaneous" canon. Find below and introduction to the canons, how the subforums are structured, and perhaps most importantly: how to get started!

Pacifica canon

See also: Roleplay in the South Pacific § Pacifica

The Pacifica canon is the oldest and most well-developed canon in TSP roleplay. It is modern tech and the setting is the official regional map. That means all Pacifica use technology similar to whatever already exists in the real world. However, we also roleplay in a universe different to that of the real world, meaning you cannot use real life maps to describe your nation or events, like European colonisation, to describe your national history. Exceptions are made for languages, religions, inventions, ideologies, and similar. Similarly, avoid statistics from NationStates when providing data about your nation. Most of the time our nations here have very little in common with those on NationStates, except maybe for the name. Everything we do must make sense with respect to the real world.

Subforum structure

• Main Canon: this is where all the canon roleplays take place, including wars, presidential inaugurations, sport events and national histories. Threads in here can be both in-character and out-of-character.
  • Diplomacy: this is where nations can hold diplomatic events and international organisations hold their meetings. You will mostly find national embassies and international summits.
    • Embassies: this is the place for all embassies.
    • World Forum: this is where our equivalent to the real-life UN resides, called the World Forum.
  • Media: this is where all nations can post articles from their various newspapers. You will find threads where anyone can post short snippets, threads where you can exclusively post news from your own nation and social media.
  • Facts: this is where all nations can post their various national histories and information. You will find threads where people exclusively post about their national information and survey threads where everyone can answer a specific question with regards to their own nation.
  • Maps: this is where you will find the official regional map and will be able to claim your own plot. You will also find national maps made by individual nations, and a guide on making your own map.

Getting started

1. To participate in the canon roleplays, you need to claim a plot on the regional map. As long as the claim complies with the rules, you may start roleplaying before the map has been updated. The map is updated once a month.
2. Build your nation. Decide the basic facts, like the size of the population, what political system your nation should have, languages spoken, etc. See Additional guides and useful stuff for some tips and inspiration.
3. You can introduce your nation with a brief thread with the basic facts and answer surveys here or in the master thread.
4. Have your nation react to ongoing events in Flash News
5. Browse the TSPedia for more facts about other nations and other interesting articles. The main page provides a selection of interesting articles.

Take your time, there's no hurry!

A1-0 canon

The A1-0 canon is TSP's official sci-fi canon. A comprehensive guide can be found here.

Extra-canon

But what if you do want to start a roleplay where everything happens in the real world, or perhaps a fantasy or Star Wars roleplay? You can always do that, just remember that it will not affect the other canons or be part of their history. There is nothing wrong with that of course, and chances are everyone who participates will have lots of fun.