What did you say?

The dove dove. The singer was singed. You're reading your tales of yore! They're having their party over there. Yeah, the dude said "Yea, verily". Nay, horses say "neigh". That really complemented your compliment. I'm really loath to loathe you. I thought they threw that, but you weren't very thorough. To have two kittens is too much. The procession preceded the proceedings. I told you not to lose the loose knot! I summoned the council to counsel and console me. A part of the pie is apart from the other part. The principal stuck to his principles. I'm wont to do this and I won't.

"hey did u guys go too another part of the castle i dont no were your going were are u"

English is a confusing language, but it isn't that confusing. In fact, if you don't speak it very well, you might end up confusing people who do. Or maybe you do speak English very well, but you don't put much effort into your spelling and grammar because you're insufferably lazy. As I've shown you above in the italics, spelling and grammar are extremely important in writing. Even a single omitted letter or misplaced comma can change your meaning completely. Role playing depends on your writing, and on other people understanding your writing, and when u typ like this too the other RPers, it sends a bad message. It says that you're probably an idiot who can't speak their own language, a speaker of a foreign language (in which case it's understandable), or that you just don't have enough respect for the other role players to put any effort into your writing. I'm not saying that your writing has to be flawless - no one's is -  but you should show that you're putting some effort into it. To elaborate, I'm splitting this up into two parts again.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

For those who failed grade school English, here's a crash course.

. <- This thing here is called a "period". It goes at the end of a sentence, for example, "If you do not end your sentences with this little dot we call a period, I will find something heavy and beat you with it."

, <- This is a comma. It separates two related thoughts within the same sentence. It's the difference between "Let's eat grandma!" and "Let's eat, grandma!" It can also separate items in a list, such as "squares, circles, triangles". There are many, many other uses, but if you're so inept at grammar that you need to read this now, stick to the basics.

! <- This is an exclamation mark. It goes at the end of a sentence. Unlike a period, the exclamation mark changes the tone of voice for the entire sentence. It makes it loud and implies that you're excited or angry about something. If you use an exclamation mark for "Look! A basket of kittens! Woohoo!", it shows that you're excited. If you just say "Look, a basket of kittens. Woohoo" it seems like you're some sarcastic jerk who doesn't like kittens. Shame on you.

? <- This is a question mark. It goes at the end of a sentence. It shows that your sentence is a question. It takes "You'll really beat me if I don't add a question mark to the end of my questions" and makes it "You'll really beat me if I don't add a question mark to the end of my questions?" The answer is yes, by the way. I will.

; <- This is a semicolon. You don't want to learn about semicolons right now; they're confusing.

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ <- These are capital letters. They go at the beginning of every sentence and every name. You make them by pressing the "caps lock" or "shift" keys. They Do Not Go At The Beginning Of Every Word. they may not be omitted to save time. THEY CERTAINLY SHOULD NOT BE THE ONLY LETTERS YOU USE.

-If you find that you're confusing words fairly often, keep this list handy as a reference.
-Find a writing buddy! If you know someone who's good with their grammar and spelling, ask them to correct you, and pay attention to their corrections. Don't get annoyed with them; after all, they are trying to help you.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

For the insufferably lazy arrogant people, if you're not willing to speak your own language properly out of a belief that your peers aren't worth the effort, then leave the RP. We don't want you.

I've heard the "this isn't an english class lolz" excuse more times than I care to count. It's a stupid excuse and I don't buy it. The entire point of an English class is to teach you to use proper English on a daily basis. If you haven't learned that lesson, then you should have failed the class.

The main problem, however, is this: You are choosing to spend time with a group of people who have all decided to write for fun. A majority of us really don't care if you have your obscure words, semicolons, and umlauts in a row, we just want to understand what everyone else is saying. If you purposely don't capitalize or punctuate anything, and you don't bother to make sure you're using the words you think you're using (you/your/you're, etc.), it's an insult to the rest of us. It's saying, "I don't care about you guys, your story, or your characters, and you're not worth the tiny amount of effort it would take to press the shift key every once in a while." Whether or not you mean to give off that impression, that's the way it's going to be interpreted. If you really believe that, then go away; we don't think you're worth the effort either. If you didn't mean it, then for the sake of everyone around you, USE THE BUTTONS ON YOUR KEYBOARD, DAMMIT.

Class dismissed.

A Penny for Your Thoughts?

I have no idea what you're thinking right now. Do you know why? Because I'm not telepathic. Telepathy (in any form) is a huge taboo in role playing, and it's one that I wholeheartedly agree with. It would be unfair of me, however, to say that there are no arguments for using it or that it doesn't have its occasional uses. So for better or for worse, I'm going to tell you both the good and the bad, and how to write a telepathic character.

-Bad goes first. Why? Because it's the most important. Telepathy in role play is taboo because it's too close to godmoding/metagaming/the rest of the bad words. The reason for this is that you are playing with other people. It would not be a problem at all if you were writing a novel by yourself, but you don't control all the characters here. Other people wrote them, and only they can know or say what they're thinking. Only they can decide whether or not to let you/your character know what's going on in their heads. Furthermore, I don't like it. I know, personal opinion, but I don't like it for some very good reasons.

• It's misused. You can give people all the guidelines you want. You can give them good reasons, and well thought out arguments, and anecdotes, and some of them will listen. The others will blatantly ignore you, call you "n00b", and rape your character's brain for giggles. That's the internet for you. Telepathy is one of the things that if permitted goes overboard fast. It's like tossing a loaded gun to a crowd of preteens. No matter how much you tell them to be careful, some idiot is going to pull the trigger. There are a lot of idiots on the internet.
• You can't emote it. In a forum/narrative style RP, sure, you could describe it pretty well. In a game/action-based RP, however, all that anyone is going to see or hear is what's going on in front of their faces. Anything in a character's head is not in front of their faces. You could do telepathic conversations (I'll get to that), but psychic battles, trying to break through someone's mental barriers, etc. are all off limits simply because of the play style. The most you could feasibly do is "Felodious scrunches up his face in concentration" or "Felodius looks glossy-eyed and distant in Amy's general direction." It doesn't matter what's actually going on in there. That's all that anybody near you would realistically see. There's an exception. Be patient. I'll get to it. But even with the exception, people standing around you will have no idea what's going on.
• It's a little bit too Special Snowflake. I've seen people play telepathic characters very well, with good reasons for and good reactions to the talent. They're not the ones this is directed toward. More than likely, you're playing fantasy. Magic exists.You can heal people with a thought, throw around fireballs, make pretty flowers grow on a whim, and kill dragons. Do you really need to read people's minds on top of all of that? Most people I've seen using telepathy with their characters have just been doing it to make themselves different from everybody else, without any sort of thought as to why everybody else isn't telepathic. For every character I see who is politely restraining themselves from reading everyone's thoughts, there are ten who go around flinging shadowy mind-sparrows at you just to spice things up (this has happened to me, I kid you not).

-The Good. Even I have to admit that characters with telepathic powers are occasionally fun. It isn't common, but someone who knows how to write them can write up some interesting plots or help out when no one else can. So for the sake of people who can do it successfully, here we go.

• It's handy. Say that Our Brave Hero Felodius has a telepathic friend - we'll call her Thedria - on the other side of the world. Now Thedria's pretty good at taking care of herself, but suddenly some jerks show up and kidnap her. Oh no! But what's this? She can mind-call Felodius and all will be well. Maybe the group needs to see around a corner because they don't know whether or not a troll's there. Astral projection to the rescue. It has perfectly legitimate uses, so long as nobody misuses it.
• It's a fun plot device. Imagine a psychic villain stealthily using his powers to pit Felodius and his compatriots against each other in an attempt to bring them all down. I've played that plot before. It's incredibly fun. Especially if the person playing the villain is a better writer than you (Yes, better than me. Shocking, I know).
• I really can't think of anything else. Feel free to add things in the comments.

Alright, so we've got all of that covered. I'm going to cover the how-to now, but I'm going in with this disclaimer: Only once in a blue moon is there ever a good telepathic character. Unless you absolutely know what you are doing, unless you are a very well-read and experienced writer/role player, please, oh pretty please, sweet mother of ice cream sundaes with mountains of whipped cream and cherries on top, please don't play a telepathic character. Please? For me.

Here we go.

• YOU NEED PERMISSION. Not from me, obviously; I'm probably not going to give it to you - from the people you're playing with. If you have plans to do absolutely anything at all that involves the mind of another character, then you need the permission of the person controlling that character. EVERY TIME. A simple "Hey, can I read Amy's thoughts really quick? Thedria's feeling nosey today" will probably do. You need to do this every time you want to read anyone's mind because at any time they may not want you to. That is their choice. It is their right to tell you no, and you have to respect that.
• Communicate! In order to read someone's mind, you obviously have to know what they're thinking, and because you're not in control of that other character, you have to ask the person who is to tell you discreetly and OOC.
• Remember your perspective. Everything that you're doing telepathically is only going on in your head, and the heads of people you're affecting. Remember how I mentioned in the list of bad things that it's practically impossible to emote? Well it is, to everyone not involved, by which I mean everyone not included in the mind link or what have you. Thedria very well could be having a psychic battle with her evil twin Badria, but even if Felodius is standing right next to her, he's going to see nothing but a couple of very concentrated-looking women. One of them might wince every once in a while. That's about it. Thedria and Badria, however, could be having the fight of their lives in private party chat or a whisper. Felodius will have not one fracking clue. So if you're going to have a psychic battle with other people standing around, for their sake, wince, or stumble, or something to make it interesting. Maybe say something out loud by accident. Also, please no shadowy mind sparrows.
• Concentrate. How many times did you drift off and look at something else in the middle of reading this? I'm not mad at you, I have a short attention span too. I'm not personally psychic in any form so I can't know for certain, but I think it's reasonable to assume that doing anything with telepathic skills is going to require a lot of concentration. Your character will probably have had to train themselves a little to deal with that. They may have to concentrate hard to use their powers or to consciously not use their powers, but you can bet that it will probably enter the game at some point. If they lose their concentration, things could backfire. Remember that any time they spend meditating, in a trance, trying not to implode people's brains, etc., is time that they're not spending on training with swordsmanship or beer pong (or the fantasy version of that. Mead pong?).
• Be nice. This is more OOC than anything else, because people you don't know are probably going to be iffy about you playing out a taboo, no matter how good you are. They might ask what's going on when a group of you are huddled around in a park emoting blank stares. They may even insult you. Don't snap at them. Just explain that this is what you and your friends have decided to do right now, all of you have consented to it, and they don't have to participate if they don't want to. And if that doesn't work, there's generally an ignore feature. ;)

I think you're prepared now. You know the basics, at least. You know why it's considered something that people generally shouldn't do. And so I am asking you please, if you have any measure of restraint at all, pretty please, oh please, oh please, refrain from playing a telepathic character simply for the sake of playing a telepathic character. Play one because you're a good writer and the character makes sense. Play one because it's an insidious villain. Play it because your usual group gave you the go-ahead. Don't play it to put words in people's mouths.

A Character's Best Friend

I once had an elf character with a pet transparent snow leopard. In my favorite book series, there is a race of people who mentally bond with falcons. In some other favorites, there is a family with children who can see through the eyes of their pet wolves. I am endlessly amused that there is a RPG that allows druids to have pet velociraptors (seriously, it's right in the core handbook). In just about every fantasy setting, your best mode of transportation is a horse.

Pets are fun. They can be cute and cuddly or fierce companions in battle, mundane or exotic, realistic or fictitious, and they can all add a little something extra to your role play. But how do you play one? As far as emotes go, just be creative. I know that most games don't let you just plug names in there, but generally I go with "/e watches in awe as Betty, his faithful pet rhinoceros, sniffs a rose bush", but "/e 's pet rhinoceros Betty picks up a snake that was hiding under the rose bush with her mouth" or "/e | Betty the rhinoceros plays with the snake like a cat would play with ribbon" would also work.

Alright, so you know how to say what your pet is doing, but what is your pet doing? What is it interacting with, what's its personality, does it have a favorite teddy bear? But that would be putting words in your mouth. That doesn't teach you anything. Your pet can do whatever the heck you want it to do. I could have our brave hero Felodius ride into battle on Betty the Trusty War Rhino whenever I damn well please, but that doesn't make it believable. No, to play a realistic pet all you have to do is think about a few things.

• Food: Pets eat things. Which things depends on your pet. Obvious, right? Well, most of the time. If you have some odd pet like a pygmy mouse-lion you might have to look that up. Regardless of what it is, if you're traveling with said animal you had better carry food for them or they're going to starve. Pets un-eat things too, by which I mean both ends. Who takes care of that? Your character, a stable hand, a lowly servant? You don't have to overtly mention that in your RP (please don't), but if you happen to have a cat and you're describing your house, a litter box will probably be there.
• Stuff: Anyone who owns a pet knows what I mean. You don't just own a cat, you own a litter box, kitty toys, kevlar gloves for bathing it, a little bed, a light saber, and maybe a brush. Pets will also affect your character's stuff. Cats and dogs destroy your furniture, birds crap on everything, snakes like to hide under your couch pillow when you least expect it, Betty...does whatever rhinos do. I don't know anything about rhinos. You will also have stuff from your pets lying all over the place. Fur, feathers, headless mice, etc.. I can tell you first hand how difficult it is to keep fur off your clothing. If your character has a furry pet, his friends will know.
• Maintenance: Your pet will occasionally need to be washed, it might need a healer of some sort to attend to any injuries or illnesses, and it will certainly need to be snuggled and loved every now and then. Different pets require different amounts of maintenance, but they all need some. Horses need their hooves cleaned sometimes, and they also new horseshoes every now and then. If you don't want your expensive pet parrot to fly off, you'll need to have its feathers clipped. If these things don't happen, mayhem can ensue. The mayhem could make for an interesting thing to throw into a conversation ("Man, the stable boy forgot to polish Betty's horn again this week, and she is pissed.") or you could just leave the maintenance implied, but I'm offering this for possibilities. You can decide what to do with them.
• Training: If you want your pet to do any sort of trick, it will need to be trained. For many breeds of dogs, the first trick they learn is not to bite people and they learn it only if you let them be smothered by people (with love, not pillows) while they're puppies. I can only imagine that this is true with other animals, especially if they tend to be aggressive. Horses have to be trained for riding, and they definitely have to be trained not to panic when you ride them into battle. If you want any animal to come here, sit, stay, heel, not pee on your leg, or chew on your neighbor, you have to teach it to do these things.

There are many more things you could take into consideration, but those are the basics. Honestly, they will probably only exist as background, but they should give you a basis for actions and interactions your pets will have. Maybe you've got this awesome mastiff but it was never introduced to people as a puppy so you're in a constant struggle to keep it from eating your leg. Maybe you're sick of having horse tack everywhere and you're trying to save up money for a decent stable. Maybe your war rhino is trying to headbutt the walls of your house. Or maybe you have a loyal and trusting pet owl who kindly rips out the eyes of your enemies. Whatever you choose, I deem thee now prepared.

P.S. The wikipedia article on rhinos has a picture of a sculpture of one with a saddle on its back. Do people actually ride these things?

Break a Leg

I was just eating some gummy bears and bit my tongue. And you know what? It hurt. Now imagine a wolf biting your arm. That would hurt quite a bit, yeah? So why didn't your character say anything about it? The vast majority of living critters have functioning nervous systems. These things sense pain, which turns out to be a good thing. Pain tells you when things are wrong. It's the difference between "Huh, something's tugging on my arm," and "Holy deity! Bleeping cursewords! WOLF!"

See what happened there?

When people are in that much pain, they're kinda vocal about it. They scream, and shout, and invent all sorts of fun new uses for curse words. This lets other people know that something's up (your life span, for instance).

I fully understand that it's a pain to type while in combat. It's much more prudent to type in 55832 (your personal favorite rotation for "slash slash maim kill eviscerate") than "Woe is me! Oh holy Shandrook, who art the patron deity of the rare but lovely yellow-bellied pansy, why is there a dragon chewing on my face?!" Mostly because if there were a dragon chewing on your face, you'd die while typing that. But how hard would it be to make a couple macros to the tune of "AARGH!" "Ouch!" "#$%#ing dragon!" and just hit the buttons when your health gets low?

"But Kittious! Nobody does that!"

Well no, they don't. That's the point. We send our heroes out fighting all day, realistically accumulating a large number of wounds, and they say not a word. For a group of people who like to point out when things don't make sense, this is a weak point.

"But Kittious! We have healers!"

I hope they're very attentive healers, because if they're not watching your every move and you don't indicate that you've been hurt, they're not going to know about it. Furthermore, have you ever had to recover from a serious wound? Something like surgery or broken bones? Prolonged recovery hurts like crazy. Imagine how it feels to cram all of that into a few seconds of a healing spell.

"Ouch."

There ya go. Now get back out on that battlefield and make the other guys put this to use. ;)

Hit the Road, Jack

No matter how hardcore you are, real life comes first. Things will occasionally happen that will pull you away from your role play, and that's okay, but don't vanish. No matter how new you are to this particular setting or group, you are now part of the story and people are depending on you. If you leave them hanging, they might not be so keen on playing with you when you come back. And what is your character doing while you're gone? If the people who normally interact with him don't see him, then he's not just going about his daily life. Leaving your role play for real life reasons is perfectly fine, but you need to take care of a few things first.

-OOC:


How many people are involved? Is there a note board or a forum you can post on? Are you part of an established group like a guild? Everybody involved needs to know, but depending on the circumstances there are several ways to do this.

-If there are only a few people, then send them messages individually. I have yet to encounter a role playing medium that lacks a method to contact people while they're offline. If they happen to be online, then find someplace private or create a private chat channel so that you can explain without interruptions.

-If you're in a large group of people, then there is probably a website or something similar where your farewell can be seen by everyone without you needing to send them individual letters. If there isn't or you don't have access to it, then message the group leader or an officer and ask them to either post it there or spread the news.

-IC:


When you are gone, so is your character. You know exactly where you're going, but everyone needs to know where your character is. If your disappearance is only temporary, then this can turn into an opportunity for a new plot and further character development. Maybe your character was kidnapped, and when you come back you can arrange for a rescue event (always fun). Perhaps he was spying on some enemies, dealing with family drama, or simply forgot his map and got lost somewhere. The possibilities are endless and some can provide very fun welcome back events. If you are leaving permanently, it may be time to think about writing the death or retirement of your character - death if there is absolutely no chance you will return, and retirement if you may.

-Both:


No matter what you are doing, tell the group! Obviously if you are leaving for something personal, you don't need to share the details, in fact "something personal" should do, but these people are your friends. They should have some idea what's going on. A simple note that you're going on vacation and your character was kidnapped by pirates should suffice. If you know beforehand that you will be leaving sometime in the future, then warn them in advance and maybe you can use their help to work out a really cool plot (or moving death scene). Whatever you do IC or OOC, keep the group informed. Leaving them in the dark can cause untold problems and I have seen it happen more times than I care to count. They've all got real lives too and most, if not all of them will understand if you need a little time off.

Set in Stone

Recently I’ve stumbled onto what seems to be a lovely place to role play. It’s a re-creation of King’s Landing from George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series that someone built in Second Life. The books are full of squabbling nobles, political intrigue, and captivating plots, and the Second Life role play in King’s Landing tries to capture the spirit of that. I can’t say yet if it succeeds or not because I haven’t been there long enough to see it, but it got me thinking that there are a few more considerations to be put into a fanfic role play than one set in an independent world.

– Canon – Lore is something you will obviously need to read the books to understand. It is assumed that when you join a role play based on some outside source, you are somewhat familiar with the source material. If you botch the lore, you could ruin the story for everybody else, so read (and re-read if it’s been a while) carefully and tread lightly.

Playing a canon character, especially an important one, is to walk on paper thin ice. Your interpretation of the character may differ wildly from everyone else’s and to ruin a good character is asking to be lynched. If you’re playing with close friends, good writers, and excellent communication it can be done. Outside of that setting I suggest you steer clear of them. In SL, allowing this would likely result in hundreds of Tyrion Lannisters in every shape and size, and twice that many misspelled Daenerys Targaryens (about 40% of which will think her name is Khaleesi). This setting in Second Life forbids playing any character in the books, from Robert I Baratheon to the smallfolk they mention only in passing. Good thought, King’s Landing.
Plot is another thing. In a world like this one where so much of the story and plot depends on the actions of characters, it simply cannot be the same without them. As far as I can tell, the people behind King's Landing gave us all of the setting and lore, but cleaned the slate of characters. People can play members of high noble houses, provided that they have permission from the head of the house. You could even raise your character from lower class to upper class if you're careful and don't get them killed on the way. From these new characters arise new plots and squabbles, which is rather interesting if you've read all the books and want something the same, yet different. This tactic will not work for everything, do if you intend to create your own fanfic RP, think long and hard about how much canon you want to use.

– Read! – Or if you’re basing this off a movie or TV series, then watch! And pay attention! The writers of these things have put a great deal of time and thought into how they would like their worlds to run. This is part of what makes the setting unique and is probably why you like this one in particular instead of something similar, but I’ll bet that most of you have never given that a second thought. What is the general vocabulary used by the characters? Does it vary by region or social class? What is the etiquette like? Which titles go with which social standing? Are there prejudices? Gender inequalities? What do the people wear? Read. Watch. Listen. Pay close attention. Apply what you’ve learned to your characters and watch them fit seamlessly into the world you love so much.

– Do. Not. Write. – The novel has already been written, and probably by someone with better skill and paid editors than either you or I can hope to claim. You are not here to rewrite it, only to experience it from a different perspective. If I had a dollar for every emote I’ve seen that involved some form of precocious narrative, I could pay off my student loans. YOUR ROLE PLAY IS NOT A NOVEL. If you would like to share all your character’s mushy feelings and personal developments, go write a short story – your friends will praise you – but in the middle of a conversation with a half dozen lords about the murder of Lady Whosherface is neither the time nor place to wax poetic about the injust deeds of man via emote. Not only is it pointless and inappropriate, it’s bordering on telepathy, which any decent role player will tell you is a definite taboo. I may write more about that later, but suffice to say that no matter how profound that narrative of yours may be, there is not a character in existance that can actually interact with it, and therefore it is a (rather annoying) waste of space.

TL;DR

Ah, the glorious wall of text, how cumbersome you are. How effective an indicator of inefficient role player and all-controlling god moder alike. How we scorn thee, yet how you fill us with nostalgia of the time when we, too, were drawn in by your siren-sweet lure of endless gilded prose, for how else were we to convey the depth of our characters? If not by mountain of adverbs or page-long emotes, how were we to describe precisely what our actions were? For who in the many endless worlds of role play would not wish to know how many boogers brave Felodious had harvested from his heroic proboscis or at how much length dear Amelenieghertevuincie the half-elven-one-eighth-gnome-one-fourth-half-ogre-two-fourths-drow had learned to pluck her first chord upon the-

Had enough yet?

Nobody wants to read your poetic ramblings, or mine, or for that matter, even their own. You have a nice vocabulary, we get it. You know your grammar, and that's fantastic. You know every detail of your character down to that chip on his left bicuspid. You have all your ducks in a row! Good for you! There is, however, one thing you missed: your audience.

In a forum role play, a page-and-a-half-long response can be okay in the beginning because there are no visual elements and there's a whole bunch of set-up you need to do. We may get to that in a later post. MMOs and chatbox role plays, on the other hand, are very fast paced. By the time you're done typing your flowery prose, the person you were talking to has wandered to the other side of the city because they thought you were ignoring them. Leniency will of course be granted to newbies and those who type slower than others, but nobody will have any pity for you if you make them wait 10 minutes between each part of a 4-part emote.

"But how do I let them know all the details?!" you cry. It is a good question. The thing is, we don't need a paragraph of description to understand what you mean. You have a good vocabulary, right? (Hint: Yes) Use it! You could say "Felodious scratched his head with fury as a thousand lice found shelter in his flowing golden locks and, finding his life's fluid to their tastes, bit down upon his scalp," but it would be much easier for everyone if you'd just said, "Felodious scratched his head vigorously. If an onlooker were to study him closely, they might spot a louse or two." Both of them convey the point (Our dashing hero has lice and is seriously not happy about it), but while the first option beats around the bush until the bush begs for mercy, the second simply tells you what's going on. Let's try another one.

"The sword that our dashingly handsom hero, Felodious, bore into battle shone like the smiles of angels and had not a single nick or scratch. Its blade was crafted of the finest elven blued steel that could be obtained and its hilt boasted golden floral decorations and tiny yet vibrant gemstones of ruby, emerald, and sapphire."

OR

"Felodious' sword was well polished and well tended. It had a blade of blued steel and its hilt was decorated with gold filigree and an assortment of small gemstones."

Your audience may not see the same mental picture of your character that you do, but they can fill in enough blanks from a general description that they can get a good enough idea, and considering that you'll only interact with most people for an hour or two before promptly never seeing them again, that's really all they need.