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RE: Making Interesting Characters (Discussion)

 
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5/23/2013 16:08:34   
TJByrum
Member

Nice post Eukara, heh. I always tend to make normal, cardboard, simple characters, so I could work on stuff like you're talking about.
DF AQW  Post #: 101
5/23/2013 16:23:19   
dethhollow
Member

I think it's awesome when characters unexpectedly change mid-RP. Not exactly like develoupment or just pulling some random crap out of your rear and they're different now, but when things happen between themself and another character that give them new weapons or abilities. Like when someone's character dies and they give you thier sword or if you're attacked by vampires who convert them.... It's so fun when stuff like that is natural and not planned out! Maybe I'm just wierd, but I really do like that type of unexpected change that you didn't really put in the original concept.

And I know there's some people who will get a dying man's sword and just be like "I can't use this, my guy fights with his fist!" But seriously, just if there's the oppertunity, do it. It's intresting to see how small things like that completely change thier fighting style.

Also, random point, never got half-demon/dragon/whatever breed characters. Not pointing any fingers, but some people have really just abused that troupe *is it a troupe? I really don't know, but it feels like one.* I know one guy who tried to justify that because his character was half demon half human, he had eternal life because the demon cells would regenerate and the human cells would age... so he'd eventually be full demon. It's a fun concept, but I'm pretty sure for a fact it doesn't work like that. If the human half of your body dies, then you're not left as a full demon. You should be left as half a demon which means you'd be dead, right? It just doesn't add up.

Huhh? Oh right, I was going to say some kind of point with this.... Anyways, I never got how being half a race became an excuse to be absurdly powerful or transform or whatever. Like say you're a half-demon half-human. Why would that be an excuse to become unnaturally powerful? Demons might have magic and I can get where that would make you a little magically or physically stronger, but why would it make you more powerful than normal demons? Or say your character's a half dragon. Dragons have been known to have some magic. But when your half dragon begains throwing meteors the size of minivans at people, I just have to roll my eyes and say "really?" If dragon magic makes you that much stronger, there wouldn't be people hunting them.

I dunno, alot of people seem to use that as an excuse rather than an actual race. I mean, how would a half-dragon even happen without shapeshifting? Just saying, I know love comes in all forms but I'm not completely sure how that would even........... Yeah..... Just a thought. They lay eggs, people don't. I'll just leave it at that.

Side note, never exclusively rely on troupes to make a character. The reason the troupe even exists is because whatever it's about is done ALOT so......
AQ DF MQ  Post #: 102
5/23/2013 16:59:27   
Eukara Vox
Legendary AdventureGuide!


quote:

Huhh? Oh right, I was going to say some kind of point with this.... Anyways, I never got how being half a race became an excuse to be absurdly powerful or transform or whatever. Like say you're a half-demon half-human. Why would that be an excuse to become unnaturally powerful? Demons might have magic and I can get where that would make you a little magically or physically stronger, but why would it make you more powerful than normal demons? Or say your character's a half dragon. Dragons have been known to have some magic. But when your half dragon begains throwing meteors the size of minivans at people, I just have to roll my eyes and say "really?" If dragon magic makes you that much stronger, there wouldn't be people hunting them.


I understand this. I am very careful when I create a half-character. I don't want to be guilty of OPing everything or pretending absurdity so I can have my character. My half dragon characters are by no means overly strong or perfect. Ask Kellehendros, Superjars and a few others I have played with over the years. And Go'Alle, who is in the RPA, waiting for my partner to be done, has pitfalls. Yeah, she can use the Cherubim side of her to hit the ground to enforce an impact, but she is going to hurt like hell for a long time. She may not have broken anything, but the pain will linger for weeks and muscle, tendon, bone, ligament are bruised or rearranged and it will inhibit her fighting. She will live for a long time, but mentally, it is taking a toll on her. She is indebted to He Who Watches, and until that debt is paid, she is cursed to be in the world, even if the curse isn't her fault. She suffers, a little of her dies emotionally and mentally as the years go on, or she has to confront something incredibly painful and difficult.

I don't like making half breeds for the sake of power, or perceived advantage. I make half breeds because there is something about those halves that create an interesting character with issues, problems, loves, hates, successes, failures and needs. If you create a half breed with teh purpose of creating an incredible story and struggle, implying need and return, challenging the status quo, then you are doing it right in my opinion. That said, I don't do it often. Overdoing it in your repertoire can become stagnant.
AQ DF MQ AQW Epic  Post #: 103
5/23/2013 17:19:05   
TJByrum
Member

@Dethhollow: I know EXACTLY what you mean. I actually sort of dislike any kind of 'halflings'. But it's all good, everyone should have the freedom to be anyone they want.

Any beast character has to fit in and fit in right. If your best character sticks out like a sore thumb, I tend to dislike them. "My mom was human and my dad a draconian!" just doesn't do it for me. Perhaps if you attempted to slay a dragon for riches and a mage fused the two of you together, and now your blood runs with the melted gold you tried to acquire, that would make (more) sense.

I also dislike any character with over-the-top weapons. Huge giant swords about four times your own size, or ginormous bows, or massive hammers just.... no way man.

I also dislike those characters who can do anything. It doesn't matter what you throw at them, they'll overcome it. I remember one time me and another RPer teamed up to take down an opponent. Now my ally's character was classified as someone better and stronger than the others (each faction got 2 of them), and yet our opponent just seemed to shrug off our combined attacks, when he could not have done so.
DF AQW  Post #: 104
5/23/2013 17:39:27   
Lord Darkblade
Member

How you guys treat those kind of characters make me feel like just completely changing my style of character making, I like characters that stick out, but, then again, I'm a munchkin(somewhat, not so much now).
AQ DF MQ AQW  Post #: 105
5/23/2013 17:53:50   
TJByrum
Member

I just prefer the more practical, realistic, and overall normal approach to character building. I think the more human a character is, the more interesting. Of course everyone has their own tastes, but I like humanized characters.

Halflings, elves, dwarves, and dragons and whatnot are fine, but I can assure you I won't be RPing as one anytime soon, and it is very doubtful I'll ever play as one. They just don't stick out to me. It just feels like a hand with four good fingers and huge thumb with a nail stuck in it.

Riffus and BK made some fine characters in the Tempest to accompany Torik, and I like them. They're... 'human'.
DF AQW  Post #: 106
5/24/2013 3:35:01   
Legendium
Member

quote:

I also dislike any character with over-the-top weapons. Huge giant swords about four times your own size, or ginormous bows, or massive hammers just.... no way man.


I second this. When you hold a normal sized warhammer in your hand, you can already feel it's pretty darn heavy. Then you look at the stuff in video games..... Not that those kind of things are bad, I just don't think they have a place in RPs that try to be realistic. Now, if your character has incredible strength, I can start to understand that. I once had a character with a great big granite warhammer, but it took him years and years of training before he could even lift it, let alone swing it.

quote:

I like characters that stick out, but, then again, I'm a munchkin(somewhat, not so much now).


If you compare a character that's a werewolf with super strength that's written in a hurried manner to one of Eukara's characters on her homepage, you can see a lot of difference. I find the characters who seem more realistic are the ones that stick out more than characters who try to make themselves stick out by being overly powerful and awesome. Since so many people make overly awesome characters, all the overly awesome characters become mainstream and go unnoticed. In the case of making characters, be a hipster.
DF MQ Epic  Post #: 107
5/24/2013 6:27:40   
Lord Darkblade
Member

My characters are actually very detailed, they just are different, often godly champions because of predestination which means that what ever happens to them has happened and will happen in such a confusing way if you look at it linearly, you have to follow their timeline to follow it, take The Doctor from Doctor Who for example, if you see doctor who chronologically(by that I mean not show chronologically, history wise chronologically) it will be very different than if you saw it all jumbled up. That is how I determine the past present and future of characters, somethings just happen.
AQ DF MQ AQW  Post #: 108
5/24/2013 10:42:45   
dethhollow
Member

I always thought that, considering the world is full of giant man-eating beasts, large weapons are pretty justified. They have to be realistic, of course, and you would need someone strong or some kind of magic involved.... But you would be able to take on a Chimera easier with a Claymore than you would with a Rapier. And no one in the right mind would fight an elephant with a dagger, they would use something that had alot of weight to it. Granted, oversized weapons are a horrible choice against a person most of the time, but still.

My oppinion, characters should never start out at thier full power or ability. Start them off with thier basest of base skills and have them get more powerful as they go on with the RP. If you start off as "Da Best Mage Evah!" then people are going to just ignore them because they're never in any danger. But if you grow your character into a really powerful mage over the course of the RP, then people will already be able to relate to that character and what they've been through. For example, if you're just like "This guy can throw massive lightning fish around" and he's still 18, people will just look at the other 30-60 year old mages who can't do that and it sounds bad. But if you start out with really small lightning fish and as the character learns more they can be formed bigger, it makes more sense because you're with that character through thier journey figuring it out.
AQ DF MQ  Post #: 109
5/24/2013 10:54:41   
TJByrum
Member

Exactly Dethhollow, that's a form of character development, and that is encouraged by many RPers. But let's not forget that another part of development is emotional/mental.

Unfortunately, I've never been in a RP long enough to have 'character development', so I can't really speak. :(

Which leads me to ask this question: How many of you have had characters that has dynamically changed because of another RPer's character in the roleplay? I don't think I've ever really 'connected' my characters to other characters in a RP (like I said, never been in one long enough), but I envy the chance to form a long-lasting friendship with another player's character over the course of a roleplay. To have our character's really get to know each other, enjoy each other, and have each others back at all times. And then see them die together even, side by side.

I don't know if any RP's have had any characters that end up like that though. Maybe it's just me, but I've never really felt a sense of 'interaction' between the characters the whole time I've RPed here, except maybe the returning characters in Lord Cod Cod's RP "The Raven Tower" (they had roleplayed together already though). I just want to see some dynamic interaction between characters. And not just simple combined attacks, I'm talking about dialogue and brotherhood.
DF AQW  Post #: 110
5/24/2013 14:44:53   
Starstruck
Member

Isis and I had a plan for our characters in Welcome to the Clubs, but it died before anything could come of it. Perhaps someday, Isis and Kai will meet again.
DF MQ  Post #: 111
5/24/2013 16:36:11   
Vanir
Member

During my time as GM for Assassin's Guild, I turned Shadow into more of a fatherly figure then a mysterious necromancer. I also connected Shadow with Terraminator's characters (I can't rememeber the names of them). The plan never flourished completely, but was developing and hinted at before the RP died away.
MQ AQW Epic  Post #: 112
5/24/2013 20:57:29   
TJByrum
Member

Good deal Vanir. I honestly intended for Shadow to be such a father figure, but yeah I did mean to make him a mysterious necromancer as well. I really liked Shadow, and Politheus (the warrior who died so the assassins could escape the city). I had bigger intentions for Shadow though. I believe you killed him off with your character Forsaken.

EDIT: I actually remember one time Forsaken's arm fell off. Haha. Crazy Scarecrow. He was a unique character and he's actually one of the few characters I remember being made by fellow forumites. The other is Rakuji, a lion-like assassin who was in a later Assassin's Guild, but he was killed after shredding one of the enemy NPC's apart.

EDIT2: Now THAT is how a unique character should be. They should stick with you forever.
DF AQW  Post #: 113
5/25/2013 18:51:51   
dethhollow
Member

@ TJB

Thanks. I really wish I could've done more with Rakuji, but I think I just got through less than 3 posts before getting lost in the story and giving up.... Unfortunately, I never even got to get him from energy magic to storm magic like I wanted to. At the height of his power, he's suppost to be able to form wings with storm clouds and fly around, set floating balls of clouds to hold a charge and zap people from various angles, and even dash around leaving streams of electricity floating behind him.

*sigh* I really should have stayed in that RP longer.
AQ DF MQ  Post #: 114
5/25/2013 19:37:36   
TJByrum
Member

Yeah, I really thought he was an interesting character Deth. Him, Forsaken, and Cod Cod are probably the ones I remember the most. Oh yeah, and that skeleton guy that I think BK1-7 made...
DF AQW  Post #: 115
5/26/2013 9:29:17   
black knight 1234567
Member

From which RP, TJ?
Also, i've never been in an RP long enough to form a relationship with another character or have much character development. Most of the time, I had unplanned leavings before ever getting anything off the ground...
So oh well. I'm hoping to try and get that to happen in The Tempest somehow, though.
AQ DF MQ AQW  Post #: 116
6/1/2013 1:32:45   
Alexandria Serthes
Member

In order to make interesting characters, I go to fun extremes in personalities, usually. I either make characters that seem sociopathic/psychopathic/just-plain-crazy in nature, or I make a character that seems relatively normal and boring, but turns out to be cruel, heartless, and just plain mean. However, this does have the nice benefit of making all my characters pretty safely Anti-Sues. One of my characters actually scored in the negative numbers on a Mary-sue test, and scored zero on all the tests that didn't go into the negatives. The most balanced character I had (actually fell smack-dab in the middle of the balanced-range on the Mary-Sue tests) was actually Alexandria Serthes, from WttC, and she started out with homicidal and sociopathic tendencies.

That being said, I think the reason I tend towards making characters like that is because writing is an outlet that I use for various issues that I wind up having to deal with IRL, and I generally get shunned by "normal" people, while my fellow whackos welcome me with open arms. Ergo, a lot of the inspiration for all of my characters comes mainly from real life, as far as personality goes. They're exaggerated, of course, but through my writing, I get to show that people who seem bad, or crazy, are just as human as people who are more socially accepted, and that sometimes, the crazy one is the one who's been wronged, not the one who is doing wrong to others.

As for history, I just base it off of how I want a character to turn out, and randomly mix and match stuff till I have something suitable!
DF AQW  Post #: 117
6/1/2013 4:17:42   
black knight 1234567
Member

How do you guys feel about reusing characters?
I for one, recently made a character I REALLLY like, for anyone interested:
spoiler:

Name: Achashverosh (Ac-asshev-orosh) or Ach for short.
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Age: 32
Rank: Apprentice

Appearance: Ach is a hulking human being, standing at over 6'5, he's a that of a beefy, heavy set build, having muscles protruding out of all his body. He is a bullnecked person, adding to his menacing physique, some dare say even statuesque. He has soft, somewhat long black hair extending to his lower, caucasian skinned neck. Most of his face is covered up by a black-dark grey mask, it covers all of his jaw, cheeks and back head, but there are some medium size slits on the side of the eyes that some skin. where the mouth should be, there are jagged pieces of metals coming out, almost as if the mask was hit by a hammer repeatedly, with the lower layers of metal showing. Fractorem wears dark brown, not too tight yet not too baggy pants, with knee caps extending from the bottom of the top of his shoes to just slightly above the knees.

On his upper body, he wears a black piece of steel armor, with big slits on the lower sides and upper sides, which a strong brown and grey piece of fabric can be seen underneath. This is his usual mission attire, but his casual attire includes a long dark grey coat, with stylish metal like ''fur'' from shoulder to shoulder, and at the very bottom of the coat.

Magic: none.
Spellcaster Type (Mage or Sorcerer): None.

Personality: Ach is an interesting man. He's extremely sarcastic, even at the toughest of situations, or most inappropriate. He's kind of hard to piss off, as most of the time he's able to keep a cold, still demeanor. He also has a certain dislike to modernism, refusing to hold any other weapons that his own fists, as he feels anything else is just a hold back for him.
When it comes to social relation, he can act all right. He can blend in with people and engage in conversations, but he has distance himself a bit, because most of the time he's looked down upon as odd, or simply a savage brute.

History: Born into a rich aristocratic family, Ach's first few years of life were those of kings. He got what he wanted, he was treated well by his family and parents....
Or at the very least, that was until his father took a dark turn. He lost his money into projects that failed, and resorted into gambling. Soon, he was filled with debt. He came off every night, worse than the other, at times, he would beat Ach's mother, or even Ach himself. It was the final straw when he threatened Ach's mother with death, the young man was filled with rage, as he grabbed a vase, and hit his father with it. He hit him one hit too many, as soon, he realized his father was...dead.

Ach was put into an institution, where he constructed a mask for himself, to conceal his shame. From the age of 9, to the age of 31, he was kept out of the light, out of the world, but he didn't waste his time mourning. Instead, he educated himself, he developed great willpower and strength, and when he was let out, he realized....
Maybe nothing is wrong with him, but something is certainly wrong with the world.

And i've been using him more than once. Making alterations if need be, and having one thing seperating the last from the other. In the RP I originally constructed him for, he fought with just his bare fists, in another, I adjusted the history so he can hold a dual set of knives. stuff like that.
Is that a bad thing, or good thing? the problem of reusing character arcs and stories was brought to my attention, but are there ways to get over those obstacles?
AQ DF MQ AQW  Post #: 118
6/1/2013 9:43:30   
TJByrum
Member

Some people don't like when you reuse characters cause it messes up the 'continuum' or something, like how can he be fighting werewolves in Darkovia if he's out killing people in Assassin's Guild. Personally, I don't care. If you feel comfortable with a character you should reuse him, but don't forget the level of joy a new character could bring to the table. So in other words, reuse them if you want to, no big deal, but never use them when an opportune moment presents you to make a newer, better, more interesting character.

I think the greatest example of reusing characters is when one roleplay ends and a sequel begins. For example, in The Raven Tower 2 several players returned and used the same characters, and while Raven Tower 2 only caught 5 pages of IC it was still neat to see those characters together (shame I wasn't one of them). I mean those guys already had full-blown relationships, already been together, and to start a new RP with them is... awesome.
DF AQW  Post #: 119
6/1/2013 9:45:09   
black knight 1234567
Member

The problem when it comes to bios for me, is appearance. Most of the time, my mind simply blanks when it comes to appearance. And when that happens, I don't like copying another characters looks, because when I do that, it's generally almost word for word.
AQ DF MQ AQW  Post #: 120
6/1/2013 9:56:05   
TJByrum
Member

Description of appearance is easy for me. I just seem to have this picture in my head of people I like and tend to describe them. For some reason, I like having characters with a stubble, for no apparent reason.
DF AQW  Post #: 121
6/1/2013 10:09:03   
Riprose123
Member

I was always troubled with personality. It's easy for me to picture how my characters act, but sometimes it's hard to write on paper, or type for that matter. I always end up getting ideas mid RP and it usually involves emotional stress for my character. >.>
DF MQ  Post #: 122
6/1/2013 12:53:51   
TJByrum
Member

@Riprose: Agreed. It's hard making my characters actually feel... but I suppose personality should not be something you determine. I feel like the characters may take on a form of personality themselves. In other words, don't work for it, let it do it itself. Make sense?
DF AQW  Post #: 123
6/1/2013 13:20:25   
Vanir
Member

I understand TJ. For my character in the Tempest, I wrote out a fine personality in the bio; but now that I am thinking about posting with him and putting that personality into action, I think it will turn to be a little different than I originally wrote him to be.
MQ AQW Epic  Post #: 124
6/2/2013 17:08:13   
black knight 1234567
Member

The only problem I ever had with personality was showing not telling. I used to find myself telling the reader of his personality, rather than showing. But i've been getting a hang of the entire thing now, so it's kind of getting easier as I go.
AQ DF MQ AQW  Post #: 125
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