Escapism Through Roleplay

Okay, so I’ve mentioned this frequently so far, always with the promise to come back to it, so here it goes. Escapism isn’t anything new, and it’s kind of tricky to define, but I’m going to do my best to clarify and reiterate the idea of escapism, specifically its connection with roleplay. I will say right off the bat, though, that I think escapism is innately harmful to the quality of your roleplay, and I’m going to be focusing mostly on how to detect and then how to avoid it. If people are inclined to disagree with this and find escapism to be a perfectly acceptable aspect of your roleplay, then you have a choice here.

1. Stop reading
2. Bear with me
3. Re-evaluate

Compulsion isn't Enough for Roleplay

So it’s been a while, and a lot of that is due to generally stagnation in my own roleplay, but that’s no excuse. I said last time I would do a recap of my “Character Building” series, but after dragging my feet on that for so long, I guess I’m just going to cut my losses and roll with what’s next. It’s getting kind of late, my legs are starting to hurt, and I have a quiz tomorrow, but right now I’m waiting for something; if I stay up late enough I might get a chance to see the blizzard start that’s supposed to slam us. I really love the snow, and I love storms even more, so a snow storm ranks up pretty high in favorite things to watch, but why should you care? Segway!

The thing I love about snow storms is that there’s so much anticipation leading up to it, and then you get several glorious hours of being surrounded by the storm, and then the aftermath seems so… tranquil; you might even spend some time out in the storm, and that’s fun, but you don’t spend too long in it. Being in it is the most intense part of the experience, maybe the greatest amount of consolidated “pleasure” during the whole event, but the beauty of the storm isn’t being stuck in it, it’s being surrounded by it. Roleplay, in fact, is very much similar to this.