(09-21-2015, 09:33 AM)LiadansWhisper Wrote:(09-21-2015, 09:30 AM)Ignacius Wrote:(09-21-2015, 07:43 AM)Kage Wrote: I've finally decided to ask.
What is the reason why some roleplayers I've found are more likely to use future tense? In some or all of the cases, it's not even about compromising whether or not the other roleplayer they are interacting with will allow an action.
Sometimes it's just:
Quote:Kage Kiryuu would throw himself at the ground and then tackle the others' feet in an attempt to make him stumble.
Is this a common way to speak / roleplay in tabletop? Where does the future tense usage come from?
Edit: I've emphasized a point that has been brought up already. I know this. That's why I already mentioned it and now I've bolded it.
You will always see it applied to actions, and generally in the conditional tense. Â It denotes someone trying to do something, but doesn't place it in the present since you can't auto an attack.
It's important because, grammatically speaking, RP shouldn't be done in the past tense. Â It represents current actions in the context of the game's setting, so the correct tense for an actual in-game RP interaction would be in the present tense. Â Many are confused because a novel, generally, is written in the past tense and therefore many believe all writing is done in the past tense.
Also, technically speaking, you can't use the past tense to interrupt an action. Â If, as in this example:
(09-21-2015, 09:18 AM)Kage Wrote: It can easily be handled in past tense.
Kage went to the store in the attempt to buy an apple.
Stepping in Kage's way to the store, Marshall attempted to grab his arm while pointing a knife at the Lalafell.
You wrote in that you were attempting to buy an apple. Â However, in RP, we don't generally write that we are "attempting" to do anything that doesn't inherently involve another character. Â By the time you're writing, obviously, Kage is already at the store. Â You don't have to conditionally write that he went there (in the game, he is there).
This doesn't happen in the present tense because it's deliberately describing temporal action. Â Everything that is typed is specifically what is happening in the moment; there's no indication that this was completed beforehand. Â That's why your above example doesn't work; in the past tense, you'd have to correctly predict via conditional notation that your character didn't buy an apple. Â In the past tense, of course, you'd know you'd have bought the apple or not.
If you're going to have truly random roleplay where people can just hop in or out, you can't plan everything out like a book. Â So in addition to being technically correct, the present tense is often more mechanically useful.
That means that, if you're speaking in the present tense, any conditional action becomes future tense. Â That makes sense. Â Whereas in a book all actions are simply being retold after the fact (and by the time of the telling are preordained), RP in real time doesn't happen after the fact. Â So the use of the present tense and future conditional is the most applicable for our uses.
You'll find this is different in forum RP where you're typing out stories which may well be in the past tense and that the past tense is generally accepted to be the de facto standard for writing your own closed stories.
I fail to see how "Liadan throws herself towards the ground, attempting to grab onto his legs" isn't grammatically correct. Yet, it is in future tense and completely allows for the other party to interrupt the actions.
It's in the present tense (in the future tense, it's "Liadan will throw herself...").  However, "...attempting to grab..." is a conditional future tense.  It is indicating an action which has not happened yet, hence the use of the future conditional with the present tense, as I explained.
