Introducing… THE STORY-BASED E- FED.
Now what the freak is the Story-based E-Fed you may ask (and yes, you may). Well, I’m sure you’ve heard of the Role-play Fed, the Hybrid Fed and the Angle Fed. Well, the Story-Based E-Fed is the natural progression of things in the e-Wrestling world. Let me back up a few thoughts first before we get to that.
In terms of this game, roleplaying E-Feds were the first on the scene. You wrote short story-type segments where you pretended to be a wrestler in an imaginary world. Next came the Angle E-Feds, where you concentrated on writing complete feuds, backstage storylines and matches. Finally, came Hybrid E-feds which have aspects of both Angle and RP feds. Right now, those are the only three types to compete in…but soon, that may not be true if I had my way.
It all started a couple of weeks ago… there was a bit of debate on my local Fed boards about what sort of role-playing people use. During the discussions, I’ve found that most old-timers have progressed onward from the RP style to the longer story telling sort of role-play. These people are 100% convinced that story-telling RP’s are the natural way to do things. You know the kind, the players that churns out 15 to 20 pages of material talking about their character’s life, loves and emotions. They pride themselves on their supposed writing ability, waxing poetically the pomp and circumstance of proper prose. This elitest way of Rp’ing looks down on other styles, mainly because they believe that e-Wrestling is all about writing ability. It’s because of these traits that the long story tellers always seem to be in flux with others. A lot of owners, in my opinion, falsely believe that the story telling RP’s are the best RP’s and consider them to be the championship style that everyone should strive for.
But if you consider just what role-playing really is you have to look first, at the dictionary meaning…”the modifying of a person's behavior to accord with a desired personal image, as to impress others or conform to a particular environment.” What that means is that someone (the writer) disregards their original personality to assume another by conveying to others (through written RP’s) the traits of this new personality and the new situation they are in. Well, guess what, in the world of e-Fedding players are asked to assume the role of wrestlers who are competing in a professional wrestling environment. That is the “ROLE” you must “PLAY” RP based E-fedding is based upon whom does the better job of assuming the role of wrestler. So, regardless of what you write about in your RP’s you must never deviate from this role. You are not a world-class poker player (who fights in the ring each week on the side), you are not some unholy vampire (who fights in the ring each week on the side), you are not a millionaire playboy (who fights in the ring each week on the side)…etc…etc. You are a professional wrestler (who fights in the ring each week BUT also does various other things each week other than wrestling). Most story writers seem to have it in reverse.
Even thou it is obvious that story-telling writers no longer fit the mold of “roleplayer” but have assumed the task of “storyteller” instead, I see no reason why they should stop. After all, there are tons of them out there. Instead of becoming the pinnacle of our game, these storytellers have become a separate entity unto themselves which can be utilized for the betterment of the game.
So, what I want to introduce to the e-World is a place for these story tellers to compete in…THE STORY-BASED FED. I would love for owners out there to consider this new style of E-Fed. A fed based upon a roster full of players that display their so-called writing abilities in the form of longer structured stories. No longer do they have to try to convince people that their RP style is the best way to RP. No longer would you get players asking, “is my style right for this Fed?” No one would complain that your RP’s don’t contain any reference wrestling, any longer. The only thing that would matter, would be the story-telling. Everyone would know what to expect. What better E-Fed environment can you ask for than a Fed that asks you to write to your fullest potential?
Such an E-Fed would still be setup like any other Fed, with a website, belts, roster pages, Forums…etc. but there will be subtitle differences that would set it apart from the crowd. Instead of things like “QUOTE OF THE WEEK” or “BEST TRASH PHRASE” this new writer’s based Fed would have “BEST GRAPHIC DESCRIPTION” or “SURPRISE OF THE WEEK” or any other writing award you can think of.
I predict the first few of these Feds to open will have tons of people joining as story-telling players scramble to get in on the ground floor, hoping to win a title, that to them as writer, means more than titles won by other RP methods.
So, in conclusion… if you like to write RP’s by assuming the role of a pretend wrestler, join an RP E-Fed. If you like to write wrestling material in general and love building storylines and feuds, join an Angle E-Fed. If you like a combo of both, join a Hybrid E-Fed. But if you are convinced that your writing ability has taken you down the road of storytelling, than maybe one day… and one day soon… you may just have the chance to join the latest E-Fed incarnation…
THE STORY-BASED E-FED.