Metagaming, Power Playing, and God Mode

In role play, you may hear any one of these three words often: Godmod (Godmodding), Powerplay (or Powerplaying), and metagaame (metagaming). They are sometimes used interchangeably, but the truth is that each of these words has a different meaning. 

I'm going to begin by explaining the first of these words, since it is the most commonly used, and it is used incorrectly by the vast majority of people. "Godmod" is an incorrect term. The expression is Godmode, which refers to the god mode in video games that allows the player to not suffer damage or death and to therefore be able to complete the game without the usual obstacles.

Many role players (and administrators) use this term to refer to moving another person's character as well as your own. This is an incorrect definition of godmode, which actually refers to making your character invincible. In "God Mode," your character never takes a hit.

To use an example in age play, let's say that an adult is wrestling with a naughty child who is fighting the sound spanking that they richly deserve. The child is thrashing and struggling and kicking and flailing. In order to avoid taking a fist to the face or a foot to the chin, the adult enters "god mode" in order to not take any damage.

In traditional literate roleplay, this is verboten. "Godmodding" is to be avoided at all costs. In ageplay, however, god mode is sometimes necessary in order to prevent the child/innerkid/little/bottom from overpowering the adult and ruining the thread.

Power playing is the next term that I'd like to address.

This term is, once again, often mis-used or over used. Power playing refers to your character making contact with another person's character without giving them the opportunity to block that contact.

Power Play is harder to explain than God Mode, but allow me to give you an example from ageplay again: You are playing a child character playing with another child character, and a fight breaks out between them. Your character is upset, and being young and out of control, reaches out and smacks the other child. This is power playing, because your character successfully hit the other character without giving that player the chance to have her character dodge the blow.

In ageplay, adults (guardians and parents, otherwise "spankers") must rely on power playing in order to accomplish the simplest of desired tasks, such as spanking an errant child. Without the privilege of power playing under these circumstances, a spanking thread would go something like this.

John (Daddy)

John attempts to smack Jamie's bottom with the palm of his hand.

Jamie (Son)

Jamie squeals as Daddy smacks his bottom!

John (Daddy)

John attempts to smack Jamie's bottom again.

There are people who role play like this, but it's not desirable. A good spanking post (in brief) could look more like this:

John raises his hand and brings it down crisply on Jamie's bottom, reddening it where his hand fell. He pins his son down and continues to spank hard, finding his rhythm and ignoring his son's protests. 

In the second case, John (appropriately) power played Jamie's character by saying that the spanking actually made contact with Jamie's body.

The third term that we're addressing is the most complicated: Meta-Gaming.

As to its roots, this term cannot be broken down into the sum of its parts, so bear with me as I attempt to explain both definitions.

Some people use the term "meta-gaming" to mean a character reading the mind of another character through narration.

For example, if Peggy says (but does not say) that she is thirsty, Donny is "meta gaming" if he mentions her thirst in his post.

At Birchwood Isle, we use the term "meta-gaming" to describe one player moving another player's character.

For example, Donny metagames Peggy by saying that she takes a drink of water because she's thirsty.

At Birchwood Isle, we allow limited power playing in order to facilitate spanking.

Metagaming and God Mode are strongly discouraged on Birchwood Isle.

Reasons not to Rush Your Inner Kid at Birchwood Isle

Every age player I know has been there at some point or another. You're new in a group, and everything seems to be happening around you. Being new makes you nervous, and you're worried that if you aren't careful, you're going to be overlooked by the people who are "in charge" in the group. You have to do something to get noticed. Eager to get it right, you weight your options, and you probably decided that you have two or three possible options for dealing with the terror of going unnoticed.

1. You could make a thread in which your character acts like a brat, forcing an adult to pay attention because somebody needs to punish him.
2. You could have a "crisis" in which your character becomes injured or is triggered by some activity that requires adult attention.
3. You could wait it out and hope that somebody notices you, but since previous experience tells you nobody will, you revert to option 1 or option 2.

Most groups are short-lived, lasting a matter of weeks before vanishing into the ether. Those that last rely on quickly-formed bonds between characters who then post almost exclusively with one another, leaving new members out of the loop and without anyone to create threads with.

In short, new members often have to take what they can get, when they can get it, and they often resort to using extreme behaviors to solicit a response from an adult. After all, you never know how much time and how many chances you're going to get to accomplish your main goal with a character (and specifically an inner kid). If you're only going to have one thread in which to express your character's feelings about his or her past, you have to do it quickly.

It's very typical in groups for existing players to exclude new players in favor of their preferred "clique.' If you're new, or if you're not part of the "in" crowd, your threads get dropped, your inner kid gets ignored, and nobody joins the open threads that you post. 

I'm the owner of Birchwood Isle, the one who pays the bills and who curates the site, and I cannot count on one hand the number of times that I have rushed into misbehavior for attention, or that I've pushed a "big reveal" in order to get adults to focus on my inner kids. It's happened to me, and not just in groups with frequent neglect, but in my own groups, when I'm not sure how long it's going to be before I have to move on to being the parent again (which can, admittedly, be stressful).

But here's what I've learned (the hard way), and the reason that I rush less often than I did before.

It's better when you take it slow.

I've talked about this before, and I will continue to hammer this home until every last person on Birchwood Isle understands it. 

We're not going to shut down next week; We've had a forum for Birchwood Isle (though it's moved a couple of times) for three and a half years. Ava and I are both very active and we both play plenty of kids, teens, and adults. We make a point of being available to you if you request a thread from either of us, and we commit to playing our character true to him or herself. In spite of our massive numbers of characters, each one is unique to the others and you'll get a different experience with each one of them.

Most of all, we're reading, and we're listening, and we're remembering. If you state, in one post, that your inner kid hates green beans, trust me when I tell you that we've either remembered that he hates green beans or we know that we should cross-reference dinner threads to establish which food it is that he hates. If you've said in one post that your character was locked in a closet every time she cries, we'll remember it and be able to apply this memory to the interactions with that child.

There's no need to rush information. That's why there isn't any application. Give it to us slow and steady, feed us a diet of your character and make that diet a rich one, full of little secrets revealed slowly, and not only will you get better results, we will crave threads with your character.

But what about spanking? What about those of you who are spankos who want nothing more than a good, swift kick in the pants? How do you go about getting that without "rushing things?" 

How often have you acted out in an arrival thread, knowing that it might be the only chance you're going to get to be spanked because after that, the adults aren't paying attention any more? Trust me, we get what it's like to want the catharsis so bad and worry about not getting the next one!

We're not like that. Give us a chance and we'll show you. Our adults notice things like (ADULT PLEASE) after the title of a thread. We're scanning threads to see where adults are needed and entering them appropriately. We're fully prepared to give you detailed spankings that you'll crave for the rest of your role playing life, if you let us. 

But if you push, we're not going to want to follow through. Take your time and enjoy the ride. We'll still be here next week as long as you're here next week.

We only ban predatory individuals who make it clear that they are interested in non-consensual situations or that they are interested in minor children (in real life).

November is Adoption Month on Birchwood Isle!

November is Adoption Month here on Birchwood Isle!

Most children arriving at Birchwood Isle are sent to one of three group foster homes: New Beginnings (children aged 4-12), Second Chances (teens aged 13-18) or Phillips House (teen parents aged up to 20, with their children). Each of these children is hoping that one day, a forever family will come and take them away from the foster care system. While they are being cared for well in their group homes on Birchwood Isle, they all dream of something more permanent, a family that will be theirs when they grow older and have families of their own.

Some months will feature adoption events. This month, in honor of the American Adoption Awareness month of November, we are celebrating adoption with a Fall Festival at the football stadium at Birchwood Isle High School. All foster children over the age of 8 will be given an allowance for games, rides, and food, and are encouraged to explore without leaving the stadium.

Adults from the community who are willing or wanting to adopt should attend the festival and speak with the children they meet. Parents should bring their children, as adoption is a family affair and not an act that an adult should inflict on a child.

Stay tuned to our Birchwood Isle Roleplay Guides Tumblr account for guides to interacting at adoption events, as this could make or break your opportunity to get your character (or inner kid) adopted by loving forever parents!

If you want to be involved in the November Adoption Event, you'll need to join us at Birchwood Isle!

November Event: Food Drive

Though many of the families on Birchwood Isle are quite well-to-do, there are still some very poor families who struggle to make ends meet. For this reason, the police department has come together in a food drive to support the community.

The officers of Birchwood Isle will be working closely with both public schools (the elementary school and the public high school) to raise awareness of the poverty-stricken areas of Birchwood Isle while also gathering donations of non-perishable foods. Community members are encouraged to also donate whole frozen turkeys, which will be stored for distribution on the day before Thanksgiving. 

Everyone is invited to participate. This is an opportunity to help the community and to come meet the police officers who keep Birchwood Isle a safe place to live, work, and play. Show your community spirit by signing up to help with collection and distribution, or just to spread the word about the food drive!

Threads will take place in a special board in the Police Station, with opportunities to meet the officers and other people in various age groups. Teachers are encouraged to spread the word through their students via threads in their classrooms or simple announcements.

If you would like to participate in this monthly event at Birchwood Isle you may join us now!

The sign-up form for existing members is located here.

November Activity Night at Second Chances

What better time for a roaring bonfire party than November? In the hopes that the teens are capable of behaving responsibly, Second Chances is giving them a chance by throwing a (supervised) bonfire party the first week in November. Refreshments will be provided for the teens, and there will be music, dancing, and social times for everyone! 

Adults will be on hand for supervision or for any kind of assistance that the teens may need. Teens are reminded that they are not permitted to engage in any illegal activity and that the house rules apply during activity nights, meaning that they must maintain respect for the adults and for their peers.

Everyone is expected to participate in this activity night. This includes the teens at Phillips House!

Use this opportunity to get to know other characters in your age group as well as to socialize with the adults who work at Second Chances. This is a great social opportunity and not intended as a chance to get your character into trouble.

If you're interested in joining our foster teens for bonfire night, then you should come along and join us at Birchwood Isle!

It's November on Birchwood Isle!

Birchwood Isle is quite probably the best literate ageplay site on the internet today. We're different than most role playing groups of our genre because while we encourage physical discipline (spanking, paddling, caning, and so on) of the errant children and teens living on Birchwood Isle, we stress the importance of building relationships within the peer group and with the adults who take care of our inner children. In short, we're not just about spanking.

Ultimately our goal is to help every child or teen who wants to find a family to find a loving adoptive family with parents who are able and willing to make a commitment to that child. We understand the flighty nature of ageplay, but our goal is always to provide a stable environment for your inner child to grow and flourish on. Stability is important for the healing process many of us come to ageplay to achieve, and we want to provide that stability for our members.

We would like for Birchwood Isle to become "home" for your muse(s). The real world is the home our bodies live in, but the inner people (our muses) that occupy our minds need their homes as well. Birchwood Isle serves as a fully-developed and overwhelmingly solid "world" for your characters to inhabit. On Birchwood Isle, you will find shoppes, services, restaurants, bars, and coffee shoppes. You will find Community Parks and Recreational facilities. You will find three developed foster care programs for children, teens, and teen parents and married youth. Your inner kid (in foster care) will be well cared for by a team of up to five individuals looking out for his or her best interests. This team consists of a guardian (ad litem), a social worker, a therapist/counselor, a medical doctor (pediatrician or g.p. in most cases unless there's a medical history), and a teacher (elementary school children only). 

Our goal is to get every child adopted, and we have a fully developed Adoption Policy to help ensure that we achieve the best matches. When you find the right person, your inner child will also have a sponsor, foster parent, or adoptive parent to help support and guide them.

Nobody on Birchwood Isle gets ignored. We're active (between 20-60 posts a day), with a relatively large member base (17 members) and the best part? The events and activities! We provide plenty of opportunities for your inner kid or adult muse to get involved in the community and to interact with all of the characters on the Island. Our November Announcement will give you the information you need about the current events going on, and we have even more planned for December!

We don't have an application. Instead, we interview new members in our New Member Interview Room. This room isn't always open. I'll send you an e-mail when you register to join us there so that we can chat about your character. All we need from you is your age, your character's full name (first middle and last), age, year in school or occupation, face claim, and your alias. That's all there is to it, and we can get you started right away! We're very accepting and loving as a group, and we'd love to have you with us!

Join Birchwood Isle Today!

November Activity Night at New Beginnings

At New Beginnings, the kids have a lot to be thankful for. For most of these kids, they have a safe home for the first time in their lives (or at least in quite a long time) and they now have the opportunity to be adopted by members of the Birchwood Isle Community.

November's Activity night focuses on two things: Being thankful for the things these children have been given that they might never have had without New Beginnings, and learning to prepare a meal together (something that's usually fun for most kids!).

This month we're going to be doing things a bit differently than we did with the October Activity Night. Each child is going to be placed into a group with their legal guardian, who will help them to prepare the Thanksgiving dish of the guardian's choice. Groups will consist of one adult with up to five children and threads will be completed with rotational play. All characters at New Beginnings are required to participate.

November provides an excellent opportunity for the children to get some time to spend with other people in their group as well as with their guardians, getting to know them. The age groups will be mixed, allowing for social opportunities with a variety of different ages. 

The Activity Night will continue through the end of November, and new characters can be added to the existing groups right up to November 30th, so if this sounds like something you'd have fun doing, please come along and check out Birchwood Isle Family Discipline Role Play.