Sukino ✦ Findings
Finding AI RP learning resources is tricky — most of them are tucked away in Reddit threads, Neocities pages, Discord discussions and Rentry notes. It has this nice Web 1.0, pre-social media feel to it, where nothing is really indexed or centralized.
To help make things a bit easier, I am putting together this collection of cool, updated stuff I've found online related to SillyTavern and LLMs in general. Think of it as a crash course to get you up to speed on how everything works and where to get things. Want to learn more? Check out my Guides page, where I share little quality of life things I have discovered.
If you know of any other cool stuff, or if you want me to look at yours and add it to this list, contact me at: [email protected] or @sukinocreates on Discord.
Latest Updates:
2025-02-21 — First draft of theGetting Started
section and updated relevant sections to accommodate it.
2025-02-20 — AddedPygmalionAI
to the bot providers, reworked Prompts and Jailbreak sections, and thePList + Ali:chat
introduction.
2025-02-17 — Added a calculator and a quick guide to theLLM Models
section to help new users figure out which models they can use.
2025-02-16 — Moved things around again. Reworked the Basic Knowledge and Botmaking sections to try to create a proper learning experience. Added a few more links.
2025-02-15 — More links, reorganized the sections AGAIN. Highlights for the themeMoonlit Echoes
and the guideSamplers Settings and You
, check them out.
Getting Started
- Install SillyTavern: https://docs.sillytavern.app/installation/ — SillyTavern is the recommended frontend for AI roleplaying. While there are alternatives, it's the most mature and feature-rich platform, consistently receiving updates first and offering extensive customization options with broad system compatibility and ample community support. Follow the official guide for step-by-step instructions on Windows, Linux, Mac, Android, or Docker. For iOS users, check out the solution below.
- Access SillyTavern Remotely Via Tailscale: https://sillytavernai.com/tailscale-config/ / https://docs.sillytavern.app/administration/tunneling/ — Tailscale is a private and secure tunnel that connects all your devices. This means you can host SillyTavern on one device and access the same instance on all your other devices, or share it with your friends. This is the best way to use it on Android, and the only way to really get it on iOS, if you have a dedicated device to host it — like a computer, unused phone, Raspberry Pi, or homeserver. You can even rent a small, inexpensive remote server or VPS to host it on, it's pretty lightweight.
- If You Want To Run a Model Locally: Uncensored, free, private. Requires a dedicated GPU or a Mac with M-series chips. You'll need a backend to run your chosen model format and connect to SillyTavern via a local Text Completion API. Choose one and go pick a model.
- KoboldCPP: https://github.com/LostRuins/koboldcpp / https://github.com/YellowRoseCx/koboldcpp-rocm (For AMD users on Windows) — Runs GGUF models. Most feature-rich. Self-contained, just download the executable and run it. Don't know what to pick? Go with this one.
- TabbyAPI: https://github.com/theroyallab/tabbyAPI — Runs EXL2 models. The fastest backend if you have enough VRAM run everything in it.
- LM Studio: https://lmstudio.ai/ — Runs GGUF models. Simplest one to use, but pretty barebones.
- TextGen WebUI/Oobabooga: https://github.com/oobabooga/text-generation-webui — Runs GGUF and EXL2 models.
- If You Want To Use an Online Model: You need a service that provides an API key. Censorship and privacy are a concern here, as you are sending everything to these services, and they can block your requests or ban you at will. Be careful not to accidentally send sensitive information, as most of the time your data will be used to train models.
- The Free Ones: These change all the time, but I will try to keep this updated with the options I know of.
- Google Gemini: https://aistudio.google.com/apikey — Google currently offers free API keys through AI Studio. Generally high quality for roleplaying, but the models are constantly being updated, so it is hard to tell which is the best one to use, and your experience may change suddenly. Heavily censored, so a good jailbreak is a must, and you will still get refusals. Requires a Google account, and your data will be used for training (if used outside the UK/CH/EEA/EU), but well, it's Google, you can't expect much else.
- MistralAI: https://console.mistral.ai/api-keys — Mistral currently offers trial API keys through Le Plateforme. Mistral Large is their best model. Requires opting into data training and may ask for phone number verification.
- Cohere: https://dashboard.cohere.com/api-keys — Cohere currently offers evaluation API keys. Command R+ 104B is their best model. Requires registration and is rate limited, read their documentation to know more.
- Model Providers With Free Key Rotations: https://github.com/cheahjs/free-llm-api-resources — There are providers/revendors that host the same AI models that people run locally, and offer some of them for free in a rotation.
- AI Horde: https://stablehorde.net/ — A crowdsourced solution that allows users to host models on their systems for anyone to use. The selection of models depend on what people are hosting at the time. It's free, but there are queues, and people who host models have priority on them. By default the host can't see your prompts, but the client is open-source, so they could modify it to see and save them, even though no identifying information (like your ID or IP) is sent to them. Read more on their FAQ to be aware of the real risks.
- The Paid Ones: Most of these options operate on a pay-per-request model, so the more you play, the more expensive it gets.
- There are providers/revendors that host the same AI models that people run locally, at all price points. The most famous is OpenRouter, but you can find cheaper alternatives if you look around. Check the section on Where to Find LLM Models to get an idea of what are the good models.
- You can also pay for the big, corporate models like ChatGPT, Claude and Deepseek, they are pretty smart and will give you the best experience you can get. But only go this route if you have disposable income because they are quite expensive and it turns into a money sink pretty fast. And remember, you need the API key, so don't buy a ChatGPT subscription or anything like that.
- /aicg/ meta: https://rentry.org/aicg_meta — Comparison of how the different services/models perform in roleplay. Don't take this as gospel, they vary depending on the jailbreak and bots you use, but it can help you set your expectations for what you can pay for.
- The Free Ones: These change all the time, but I will try to keep this updated with the options I know of.
Where to Find Stuff
Chatbots/Character Cards
- Chub AI: https://chub.ai/ — Need to find characters? This is the main place to get them. But the site is flooded with criminally bad bots. It's hard to find the good stuff without knowing the good creators.
- Chub Deslopfier: https://gist.github.com/khanonnie/b357f20bfe4e920d8e05fd47f1e6fa75 — Browser script that tries to detect and hide extremely low quality cards.
- Chatbots Webring: https://chatbots.neocities.org/new_chatbots — Index of bots from multiple creators directly from their own personal pages. A great way to find interesting characters without being drowned by the pages of low-effort sexbots on Chub.
- Anchored Bots: https://partyintheanchorhold.neocities.org/ — Consistently updated list of bots shared on 4chan without having to access 4chan at all, what a blessing.
- The meta list of various bot lists from different boards: https://rentry.org/meta_bot_list — More 4chan bots.
- AI Character Cards: https://aicharactercards.com/ — Repository of bots that promises higher-quality cards though stricter moderation.
- RisuAI Bots: https://realm.risuai.net/ — Bots shared through the RisuRealm from RisuAI.
- JannyAI: https://jannyai.com/ — Allows you to download JanitorAI's bots as character cards.
- PygmalionAI: https://pygmalion.chat/explore — Pygmalion isn't as big on the scene anymore, but they still host bots.
- Character Archive: https://char-archive.evulid.cc/ — Archived and mirrored cards from many various sources. Can't find a bot you had or that was deleted? Look here.
LLM Models
- LLM Model VRAM Calculator: https://sillytavernai.com/llm-model-vram-calculator/ — Want to run a model locally, but are confused by all the model names and numbers? No worries! This simple tool will help you find out which AI models your system can handle. Just enter the VRAM amount of your graphics card and the desired context length (for long roleplaying sessions, 16384 is pretty good), and you'll get a handy list of compatible models. Look for the model with the highest number followed by
B
(like 8B or 12B), this tells you what size models you can run. For example, if your system can handle an 8B model, you'll be able to run pretty much any model in that size range or smaller. - HobbyAnon: https://venus.chub.ai/users/hobbyanon — This page offers a curated list of models of every size, along with an easy-to-follow tutorial for getting started with KoboldCPP.
- SillyTavernAI Subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/SillyTavernAI/ — Do not start a new thread asking for the models. Check the weekly
Best Models/API Discussion
, including the last few weeks, to see what people are testing and recommending. If you want to ask for a suggestion in the thread, say how much VRAM and RAM you have available, or the provider you want to use, and what your expectations are. - HuggingFace: https://huggingface.co/models — This is where you actually get your models, regardless of format. But browsing through it is not very helpful if you don't know what to look for. Once you've figured out what model you want, search for its name + the format you want (like
Mistral Nemo GGUF
) to see if someone has already quantized it to the format you use.- Bartowski/mradermacher: https://huggingface.co/bartowski / https://huggingface.co/mradermacher — I don't know how they do it, but these two keep releasing GGUF quants of every slightly noteworthy model that comes out really quickly. Even if you don't use GGUF models, it's worth checking their profile to see what new models are released.
Chatlogs
- Chatlog Scraper: https://chatlogs.neocities.org/ — Want to read random people's funny/cool interactions with their bots? This site tries to scrape and catalog them.
Quality and Updated Resources
System Prompts and Presets for Text Completion Models
The system prompts that come with SillyTavern, and most other frontends, are too simple. They make the model roleplay, but not much else; they don't give them rules to follow, they don't tell the AI what the player expects from them. Find out which instruct template your AI model of choice uses — you can usually find it on the original model's page — and grab a better one from one of those people.
- Sukino's Settings and Presets: https://huggingface.co/Sukino/SillyTavern-Settings-and-Presets — ChatML, Metharme/Pygmalion, Mistral — My own.
- MarinaraSpaghetti's Settings: https://huggingface.co/MarinaraSpaghetti/SillyTavern-Settings — ChatML, Mistral
- sphiratrioth666's Presets: https://huggingface.co/sphiratrioth666/SillyTavern-Presets-Sphiratrioth — Alpaca, ChatML, Llama, Metharme/Pygmalion, Mistral
- The Inception Presets: https://huggingface.co/Konnect1221/The-Inception-Presets-Methception-LLamaception-Qwenception — Llama, Metharme/Pygmalion, Qwen — This one is pretty big, so I wouldn't recommend for small models. Make sure your model is smart enough to handle it.
- Virt-io Presets: https://huggingface.co/Virt-io/SillyTavern-Presets — Alpaca, ChatML, Command-R, Llama, Mistral
Jailbreaks for Chat Completion Models
Always use a good jailbreak, these enterprise-level AI models need prompts to teach the AI how to play. Jailbreaks are not just for making these services write smut and violence, they are versatile and modular, and the NSFW part is usually optional.
- MarinaraSpaghetti: https://rentry.org/marinaraspaghetti — Gemini
- SmileyJB: https://rentry.org/SmileyJB — Claude, GPT
- Pitanon's Prompts: https://rentry.org/pitanonprompts — Claude, GPT, Deepseek
- XMLK/CharacterProvider Prompts: https://rentry.org/CharacterProvider — Claude, GPT
- pixi Prompts: https://pixibots.neocities.org — Claude, Gemini, Deepseek
- momoura's Presets: https://momoura.neocities.org/ — Claude, Deepseek, Mistral Large
- Holy Edict: https://rentry.org/Writing_Style — Claude, Latte, Gemini
- AvaniJB https://rentry.org/avaniJB — Latte, Gemini
- Lumen's Prompts: https://illuminaryidiot.neocities.org/presets — Claude, GPT
- Fluff Preset: https://rentry.org/fluffpreset — Gemini
- ArfyJB: https://rentry.org/ArfyJB — Claude, GPT, Deepseek
- CherryBox: https://rentry.org/CherryBox — Deepseek
- Quick Rundown on Large REVISED: https://rentry.org/large-qr-revised — Mistral Large
- kira's largestral prompts: https://rentry.org/kiralargestralprompt — Mistral Large
Themes
- Moonlit Echoes: https://github.com/RivelleDays/SillyTavern-MoonlitEchoesTheme — Pretty elegant theme, the way it modifies the character portraits is beautiful. I cannot praise this theme enough.
- ST-NoShadowDribbblish: https://github.com/IceFog72/ST-NoShadowDribbblish — I have my own theme, but this person is doing some cool shit with their own and I am totally stealing CSS code from this. You should check it out too.
Quick Replies
- CharacterProvider's Quick Replies: https://rentry.org/CharacterProvider-Quick-Replies — Buttons to effortlessly add a bit of flavour to your RP and make it feel more like a videogame. I don't use them anymore, but I have used them as inspiration for my own buttons.
Build Your Basic Knowledge
- Local LLM Glossary: https://gist.github.com/kalomaze/4d74e81c3d19ce45f73fa92df8c9b979 — First we have to make sure that we are all speaking the same language, right?
- LLM Samplers Explained: https://gist.github.com/kalomaze/4473f3f975ff5e5fade06e632498f73e — Quick and digestible read to introduce you to the basic samplers.
- Samplers Settings and You - A Comprehensive Beginner Guide: https://rentry.co/samplersettings — A practical follow-up guide that introduces you to the modern samplers and helps you configure a streamlined sampling setup.
- Your settings are (probably) hurting your model - Why sampler settings matter: https://www.reddit.com/r/LocalLLaMA/comments/17vonjo/your_settings_are_probably_hurting_your_model_why/ — They really are! A little more context on why you want to streamline your sampler settings.
- DRY: A modern repetition penalty that reliably prevents looping: https://github.com/oobabooga/text-generation-webui/pull/5677 — Technical explanation of how the DRY sampler works, if you are curious.
- Exclude Top Choices (XTC): A sampler that boosts creativity, breaks writing clichés, and inhibits non-verbatim repetition: https://github.com/oobabooga/text-generation-webui/pull/6335 — Technical explanation of how the XTC sampler works, if you are curious.
- LLM Samplers Visualized: https://artefact2.github.io/llm-sampling/ — Tool that lets you simulate what you've learned above. Play with the samplers and see how they affect the generated tokens.
- Samplers Settings and You - A Comprehensive Beginner Guide: https://rentry.co/samplersettings — A practical follow-up guide that introduces you to the modern samplers and helps you configure a streamlined sampling setup.
- Further Reading: The following are guides that will teach you how to roleplay, how things really work, and give you tips on how to make your sessions better. If you are more interested in learning how to make your own bots, skip to that section and come back when you want to learn more.
- Sukino Guides & Tips: https://rentry.org/Sukino-Guides — Shameless self-promotion here. This page isn't really a structured guide, but a collection of tips and best practices related to AI roleplaying that you can read at your own pace. I recommend that you at least read the section on how to use your turns.
- How 2 Claude: https://rentry.org/how2claude — Interested in taking a peek behind the curtain? In how all this AI roleplaying wizardry really works? How to fix your annoyances? Then read this! It applies to all AI models, despite the name.
Handy Resources for Botmaking
- Character Creation Guide (+JED Template): https://rentry.co/CharacterProvider-GuideToBotmaking — Start here! Botmaking is pretty free-form, almost anything you write will work, and everyone does it a little differently, so don't think you need to follow templates to make good bots. That said, JED+ is great if you're a beginner, it helps you get your character off the ground by simply filling out a character sheet — think of it as a nice set of training wheels until you get the hang of it. In the long run, I think sticking to a template stifles creativity.
- pixi's practical modern botmaking: https://rentry.org/pixiguide — Succinct guide to introduce you to some botmaking good practices, and to what kind of cards you can make.
- How to Create Lorebooks - by NG: https://rentry.co/SillyT_Lorebook — A quick introduction to Lorebooks/World Info. They are a big step up for when you're ready to make your characters deeper and more complex.
- World Info Encyclopedia: https://rentry.co/world-info-encyclopedia — Learn more in-depth about Lorebooks, and how powerful they are.
- Give Your Characters Memory - A Practical Step-by-Step Guide to Data Bank: Persistent Memory via RAG Implementation: https://www.reddit.com/r/SillyTavernAI/comments/1f2eqm1/give_your_characters_memory_a_practical/ — Probably overkill for most people. This is to make your character have long-term memory. I've never experimented with RAG myself, but this guide at least made me understand what it is...sort of.
- JINXBREAKS: https://rentry.org/jinxbreaks — Trying to make a crazy character but can't get it to behave the way you want? Maybe this page can help you get an idea of how to prompt it.
- Getting to Know the Other Templates: Again, don't think you need to use these formats to make good bots, they have their use cases, but plain text is more than fine these days. Read these guides to understand what they are and what they try to accomplish, while picking up some good tips and best practices along the way:
- PList + Ali:Chat: This format was really popular before we got models with big contexts. It maximizes token efficiency by combining Python/JSON-style lists for defining character traits with example dialogues to lock in distinct narration and speech patterns. This dual approach is particularly powerful for keeping established characters true to form, expressing subtle personality traits through dialogue, or handling complicated speech patterns. While plain text descriptions can lead to loose interpretations, PList + Ali:Chat provides precise control over character behavior, and prevents your own writing style from bleeding into the character. Just consider whether the added complexity is worth the benefits for your specific use case.
- MinimALIstic (Ali:Chat Lite): https://rentry.co/kingbri-chara-guide
- Trappu's Bot Guide: https://wikia.schneedc.com/bot-creation/trappu
- How to write in PList (Python list) + Ali:Chat: https://rentry.co/plists_alichat_avakson
- StatuoTW's Guide to Making Bots: https://rentry.co/statuobotmakie
- Ali:Chat Style: https://rentry.co/alichat
- W++: Honestly, this format is just an inferior PList — use it instead if you want to use a structured list. But, as obsolete as it is, you will still see it around, from old cards, and people who still like to use it, so you might want to understand what it does.
- W++ For Dummies: https://rentry.co/WPP_For_Dummies
- Pygmalion Tips: https://rentry.org/pygtips
- PList + Ali:Chat: This format was really popular before we got models with big contexts. It maximizes token efficiency by combining Python/JSON-style lists for defining character traits with example dialogues to lock in distinct narration and speech patterns. This dual approach is particularly powerful for keeping established characters true to form, expressing subtle personality traits through dialogue, or handling complicated speech patterns. While plain text descriptions can lead to loose interpretations, PList + Ali:Chat provides precise control over character behavior, and prevents your own writing style from bleeding into the character. Just consider whether the added complexity is worth the benefits for your specific use case.
Novel Roleplaying Setups
- Proper Adventure Gaming With LLMs: https://rentry.co/LLMAdventurersGuide — AI Dungeon-like text-adventure setup. Interesting way to roleplay that is less focused on individual characters.
- SX-2: Character Cards Environment: https://huggingface.co/sphiratrioth666/SX-2_Characters_Environment_SillyTavern — A complex modular system to generate starting messages, swap scenarios, clothes, weather and additional roleplay conditions, using only vanilla SillyTavern.
Misc
- sphiratrioth666's Character Generation Templates: https://huggingface.co/sphiratrioth666/Character_Generation_Templates — Nothing beats a handcrafted bot. But it's handy to be able to have the AI generate characters for you, perhaps to use as a base, or to quickly roleplay with a pre-existing character. These are prompts to be used on any model of your choice.
Other Indexes
More people sharing collections of stuff. Just keep in mind some of these guides and resources might be outdated or contain outdated practices. Pay attention to when things were made and last updated — a lot of these guides come from when AI RP was pretty new and people were still figuring things out. Back then we didn't have the advanced models with big context windows like we do now, and everyone was learning and experimenting with what worked best.
- The meta list of various bot making guides: https://rentry.org/meta_botmaking_list
- Chub Discord’s List of Botmaking Resources: https://rentry.co/botmaking
- A list of various Jail Breaks for different models: https://rentry.org/jb-listing