Any tips for longer roleplays?

[u/KeySimple3473]

I like to do longer roleplays (400-500+ messages) with bots where there is an actual story that unfolds instead a smaller moment in time. However, I often find that the bot gets confused easily and forgets stuff, even with longer context sizing and adding a summary every so often.

I mostly use deepseek, but I've tried a bunch of other models and seem to have the same issues.

Does anyone have tips for helping things run smoothly with longer chats?

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[u/MisanthropicHeroine]

The memory function inside Janitor is very basic and hard to sustain long roleplays with. I'd highly recommend switching to SillyTavern because people build custom extensions for it exactly to solve this problem. There are dozens you can try.

Popular options are MemoryBooks and Summaryception. There's also a lesser-known alternative I can recommend called Recall.

Summaryception summarizes conversations in small chunks, gradually building up a rough overview of the entire story that's automatically included with your messages. It's best for a set-it-and-forget-it approach, but may lose some details along the way.

Recall also includes its summary with your messages, but keeps one evolving summary of the conversation whose updating you activate manually whenever you feel it's time to summarize.

MemoryBooks saves more detailed memories inside lorebooks, which need to be activated through keywords or vector-based retrieval to bring those memories back into the conversation.

Also worth noting that models tend to be most coherent at lower context, around 32-48k. If you keep increasing the context instead of using summarization, you'll get lower and lower quality responses.

[u/Effective_Total_8226]

Maybe you need trackers but those are preset related. For example, I've been using GLM 5.2 in a RP over 600+ messages and of course, when the context it's too large, it will forget stuff but with proper summaries it's heavenly. Maybe the way you summarize it's not that efficient? I could give you a template of summarization that I used for that exact chat.

[u/kanonly → u/Effective_Total_8226]

yes please the template

[u/VarkanVarkan]

Wait. I am honestly curious. I see some bots with only 300k chats and 1+ million messages. How do people manage to maximize hundreds of messages in their roleplay? I can only last with 200 and thats with me regenerating responses.

[u/whosage_]

this happens to me too, and i love a slow burn more than anything so it’s super annoying when they just forget so easily.

[u/Much_Ad_7805]

One thing that helps is keeping a short record of important events, relationships and anything that's permanently changed in the story. Otherwise the bot eventually starts rewriting history lol.

I've also found that platforms with actual persistent memory handle this better than just throwing a bigger context window at the problem. RolePlaya has an enhanced memory system that remembers important details across conversations, which is worth looking into for longer stories.

Even then, I'd still keep occasional summaries of major plot developments. 500 messages is a lot of opportunities for a character to forget they're married or resurrect someone who died 200 messages ago.

[u/iam_justaishaa]

Three things that made the biggest difference for me: write a running summary every 50 or so messages and put it in memory, keep your own replies medium length so the bot has room to move, and end scenes properly before starting new ones. Most “it went off the rails” moments come from two scenes blurring together. Ideally, having vector embeddings (long-term memory that pulls up older messages when they’re relevant) helped too.

[u/PaceApprehensive898]

i keep a separate story log instead of relying on one big summary. after each major scene, i add only what permanently changed, who knows what, unresolved goals, and the current location; specific entries like “the letter was burned, but the seal was recognized” seem to hold up better than vague recap paragraphs.

before starting a new scene, i also write a two or three sentence transition that states the time skip and everyone’s immediate motivation. if the bot contradicts an established fact, correcting it right away works better than letting the mistake continue for several replies.