IC stands for In-Character.
OOC is short for Out-Of-Character.
Both are important concepts to learn when roleplaying — no matter the roleplay format. For a game to operate effectively, the line between IC and OOC must be understood and maintained.
Differentiating between IC and OOC
For the purposes of this game, players need to distinguish between IC and OOC knowledge of situations. The following definitions will help in understanding this further:
Character – the persona a player uses to play the game.
Player – You, the person sitting behind the keyboard controlling a character’s actions.
IC – In-Character. Everything that your character (not you, the player) knows, will be gained from what they have heard in IC news, to what they hear from their daily conversations and investigations while you roleplay on the game.
OOC – Out of Character. This refers to what you, as the person controlling the character, knows. In many cases, will know things that your character does not. This will include what you know about the overall structure of plots being run, to what another player told you in an OOC conversation about a crime being planned. Just because you as a player knows something, doesn’t necessarily mean that character knows that. Of course, your character may know that if they’ve had some sort of IC encounter where they discover the information.
For the sake of the stories we are all telling, it’s imperative that you keep these two types of information separate. If your character starts using OOC information ICly, not only will that ruin plots in the making, it may result in a scene (or scenes) being retconned1.
If staff receives complaints about this type of behaviour, the offending player will be given a warning and continued complaints may result in sanctions and/or banning.
IC Courtesy
From an IC perspective, your character can act however you choose to have them act. However, it’s important to remember that the way your character acts and presents themselves will have a direct bearing on how other react and respond to them. It is also possible, if your character is always a jerk ICly, that other players may begin to think that you are a jerk, OOCly. So, you need to be careful and be clear about distinguishing your character from yourself.
OOC Courtesy
OOC courtesy is as important, if not more so, as IC courtesy. The way you behave OOCly, generally determines how you, the player, are judged by your fellow players and how they react to you personally. Here are some guidelines to help maintain good OOC Courtesy:
- Try to avoid too much OOC chatter while in IC areas.
- Excessive OOC chatter can be very annoying for those trying to concentrate on roleplay. If the conversation does not concern the IC scene, converse through pages or on channels people can turn off.
- Always ask before joining a scene. We recommend paging the characters in a scene asking if the scene is open and if you can join.
- Don’t enter private rooms without asking permission, or announcing yourself OOCly first. Again, pages are a great way to do this.
- Remember the first rule of gaming etiquette: Treat others as well as or better than you would like to be treated. If you find something annoying, others may, too.
Footnotes
1. Retconning a scene, i.e. striking it from public record as if it never happened (a.k.a. re-constructing a scene), is not generally looked upon as a desirable thing. Staff will only tend to allow such a solution in the most extreme circumstances.
Revision History
- 2016-11-14 by Serenity – Policy Created