Originally Written by Celticwolf1990.
While role playing, you are creating a story. You control your character and the actions they perform. It is an interactive novel in which you may be a main character, or a support character. Regardless of your position within the story, you must make it flow. When a story flows gently and the words are placed in an easy to recognized fashion, the novel becomes much more interesting. In the experience I've had role playing, I've found that the easiest way to achieve this flow is to use past tense while role playing.
Many people don't start out there. I didn't start out there, however. As I grew a bit more, I found myself starting to use past tense. It sounded more realistic to me because the actions my character did had already occurred, I wasn't attempting to do it. In the end it comes down to a style of role play which you are most comfortable with. If, however, you chose to role play on a post by post forum, this will most likely be the style that is used.
I had to touch base with past tense before I moved onto the core of this topic, how to fight. This is what I consider advanced and respectful fighting.
First, you should never control another character's actions without explicit permission from the other player. This is considered a huge disrespect, as well as god modding. This rule includes giving the player no choice in being hit or not. An example would be "John hits Jake" which would be an improper thing to do. A more reasonable and respectful post would be "John threw a punch at Jake." which means John has thrown a punch, but it hasn't connected. It is now up to Jake to decide if it has hit. Never use absolutes in a fight.
Secondly, be realistic for the world you are in. Its kind of common sense. If everyone is of average strength or real world strength, don't go beating down huge gates or ripping doors from walls with your bare hands. It is all a matter of looking at the world you work in. However, just because one person god mods doesn't mean you should. The blind swordsmen is still blind, he isn't Daredevil. The muscleman is strong, but he isn't the Hulk. Keep yourself in check, and try to limit what your charcter can do and learn.
Onto the third thing, be willing to take hits. If you do not want your character to be hurt in a fight but you are a warrior, your a bit cracked. You must be realistic and take blows when they would hit, and not weasel out of every thing that comes your way. That in of itself is god modding, that you are never hit or if you are, you are only slightly injured. If you are fighting, you have to realize anything can happen to you.
Finally, be descriptive. It makes it much more interesting, and allows you a much wider range of things to do if both people are descriptive in the role play. It can often help you in a battle, or turn around and go horribly wrong. That is the fun in it. You can setup traps in plain sight, and so can your opponent. There are some techniques people use to get around these things, but the majority of them are rather underhanded and frowned on.
Most of these can be translated into regular role play.
