Roleplay by its very nature can be done in a variety of
sizes. Whether it’s two people isolated as they roleplay in the big-wide world
or whether it’s a thousand people on the same forum in the same universe, you
can make roleplay either way. Typically speaking you’ll probably roleplay with
a group of two to four people, but the background is important. It makes a
difference whether or not you’re sharing a universe with one other person or a
hundred other people. Sure you can fill in enough non-player-characters so that
technically the place is “full” like a city full of people would be, but it’s a
different experience entirely when there are hundreds of other humans in the
same vicinity.
Most people don't pay attention to this factor. They assume that
roleplay is, as a hobby, identical in every circumstance. They get used to an
environment to the point where they’re very comfortable there and assume themselves
masters of roleplay, and when they go someplace else and see things different,
they instantly assume it’s bad. While I think there are actually a lot of
constants in roleplay as far as quality goes, that it’s not simply a bunch relative-truths,
one of the things that certainly does change is the size. I’ve begun to call
this scalability in roleplay, and it’s important.
