I noticed a lot of people have Journals on these forums and I think that is really awesome. I myself would love to brag about my interesting IC life lol but I do not know how these Journals work and am a little intimidated by how well developed some are. Makes me feel that any journal I make will be pretty bad compared to theirs. Heh. So does anyone mind explaining how Journals work and how I can get started making one for my own character on here?
Journals are highly personal. If your character isn't the sort to sit down and write out their life experiences, you're still okay to make a journal. Anything your character writes, essentially, can be considered a journal.
So, say for instance you're a researchy type, and you decide to start taking little notes here and there. You can post them here as a little bit of insight to your character.
Day One,
Nothing yet. Will wait a little longer. Disappointed.
They don't even have to be particularly well written. Hell, if my character wrote a journal, it would probably look like this:
I DONOT NO WHY I CANOT FIND THE LETHER STRIPP I WAS LOKING FOR TODAY BECOS A ORDOR CAME TO ME TO MAKE GLOVS FOR A MAN BUT I CANOT MAKE THE TO GLOVS WITH OUT THE STRIPPS I DONOT NO WHAT TO DO . THE DEDLIN IS COMING UP AND I FEL SO NERVIS I HAV TO MABE BY SOM FROM ANUTHER LETHER PERSIN .
Course, typically, a literate character will just go on ahead and write out a nice detailed recollection of what happened to them recently. It's a good way to track your character's experiences, and to develop your character further in the process by analyzing their private thoughts and reactions to certain events.
To start one here, literally just go to the appropriate forum and open up a thread of your own, then start typing. Nothin' to it!
My character keeps a Lightbook which he records all research on Eorzea sense he arrived from running away from the Garlean Empire. I was thinking about posting entrys from my lightbook in the form of a sort of journal. So thats why I asked. Would that be alright to do?
As others have said, if it is in your character's character to write things down, simply figure out how they would write. Simple, complex, elegant...
Alex's Journal has the thoughts of Alex Silversheath, one of my characters in it. It (kind of) starts with directly following Dalmund but I quickly skip up to several months ago and his journey of trying to remember his dad and sister, joining Crystalline and relationship with Costia Demora. His writing style is scatter-brained at times to reflect his ever-working and over-thinking mind. He makes frequent digressions to reflect his spoken word, though it is much neater as he doesn't stammer when writing!
Some characters, simply, aren't cut to write journals. My other character, JJ, is not one to divulge much about himself to anyone, let alone a piece of paper.
Perceptions of a Madman is my attempt to do a third-party narration of some of what goes on in JJ's head. Not exactly a journal but it reveals thoughts that otherwise wouldn't be known my anyone OOCly (unless they asked). JJ is a HIGHLY private individual when it comes to deep things like that.
Everybody's is different, yep.
I had a character once who had a "journal" per se, but he was the kind of person who would never have technically written down anything that was in his journal because he was just that kind of paranoid. I wrote it as though I were writing essentially what he would sit and think about before going to bed.
I've had a character who didn't know how to write, but who would narrate the events of her day to a voodoo doll she had, so that's what went into her journals, the stories she told aloud to an inanimate object in a private setting.
My current character, though, it's right up is alley to write down summaries of his thoughts. He's torn pages out of his journal to send to people, filled pages with doodles, torn up his journal and glued it back together - for him, it's a "real" thing, rather than just the player recording what's going on in his headspace for entertainment's sake.
Me, I like to write my IC journals when something interesting happens, and I like to do it ASAP so the thoughts are all fresh in my head, so it's "live" in a sense. I'll sleep on it, and say the character slept on it, too. I know some people take notes and write the journal entries later when they have the time.
You can really do whatever you want.
(12-17-2013, 12:07 AM)Darien Cadell Wrote: [ -> ]Me, I like to write my IC journals when something interesting happens, and I like to do it ASAP so the thoughts are all fresh in my head, so it's "live" in a sense. I'll sleep on it, and say the character slept on it, too. I know some people take notes and write the journal entries later when they have the time.
Omg. I miss being able to do that.. Anymore I have to log things and re-read them to write my journals because RP goes up to or past my bedtime.
It is important to note that you don't have to keep a journal in an actual journal format, as Darien just mentioned.Â
I haven't kept one any characters in this game, but for one of my old characters, after important RP scenes, or even just random imagined scenes of no particular importance, I would write down bits from my character's head. They could be in a play by play manner, or a aftermath reaction, the important part was that they were a time for me to sit down and sort out the thought processes and reasons for why my character was the way she was. As she was really, super, crazy (or super sane?) it could be easy to let her get caught up in nonsense. The journalistic approach, really helped me keep a grip on her and keep her consistent throughout RP scenes. I formatted it as thought snippets if someone were to tune into her brain at various points in time.Â
I know that the 'journal' probably really confused anyone trying to read it, and they weren't aware of the factual happenings of the event, but it was really just an RP tool. A tool to help step-up my RP game.
Anyway, just giving another take on how to use journaling to your advantage!