It won’t take long to notice TOKoR doesn’t follow a standard format. Where someone would look for chapters, there are posts, and plot arcs are divided into days. This is because originally The Other Kind of Roommate started as a fast-paced, rapid back-and-forth-banter role play. Drawing on its roots, the story kept its easy-going outline. Here are some of the terms I use to help make sense of it.

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[E] is for the edit bar. I try to write in sprints, putting up raw posts (slowly) and painstakingly tweaking every word (even more slowly). The edit bar is just the line where earlier posts are about as far as I’d want to take them, and later posts still have their fresh smell. The post with an [E] is the one I’ve got in the hot seat.

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Background is the category used for any direct collections of TOKoR info. Glossaries, hierarchies – anything that comes up in the story but might be annoying to dig for to stay on track – would be in this group. The most important lists in this party are The Characters, which have their own spot on the menu (you’ll find it under ‘About’).

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Blogs are the behind-the-scenes thoughts of the writer, mostly describing the world of TOKoR.

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Days are the in-story days used to group posts together. You’ll see these used as TOKoR’s pseudo-chapters.

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First Draft is the original roleplay thread that this story grew from. You can find it here.

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The Focus is one of potentially several ideas or plot points that a post is written around. One will be the post’s high concept.

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The High Concept is the single major takeaway from a post. It’s the reason the post was written.

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Posts are scenes that either alone or grouped together make up a typical chapter or story arc.

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Post Zero is the post a character is introduced in. It isn’t always the character’s first appearance, but it’ll often include a physical description.

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Post [some other number] is shorthand for a particular post.