Creating a Character [Under Construction]

[Virgil Lifeson]

Table of Contents:

1./ The Concept
2./ The Mechanics
3./ The Background
4./ The Details
5./ The Role-Playing
6./ Conclusion

Intro:

I like writing these things because I like helping people out. I don't claim to be the all-knowing expert, nor do I claim to be one of the best. But I've been through the roleplaying gig for the past seven years on the internet, and even longer if you take RPGs into account. It's just something to do, and if it helps somebody out all the better!  

[Virgil Lifeson]

SECTION 1 : SECTION I

#/#THE CONCEPT#/#

Start with a concept. Y'know, the one little characterization sentence that makes him or her unique. It's pretty much the idea of what the entire character will be like. It should be simple and to the point. It might include what they look like, what they do, whatever. But what it SHOULD include is the specialty(ties) of the character: What are they good at? What do they bring to the RP?

//To make a continuous example, I'm going to go through the steps I used to create one of my latest-used Character Alex Xylander. His concept was this: "An altruistic performer who likes music and mayhem." Simple, eh?

Then, expand your concept into a brief summary:

Be it in paragraph form, or just bullet point, begin to expand the concept into it's own little answer to the question: "What is my character like?" This will serve as the basis of your character design, and you can keep it as a short little reminder of how your character acts.

For the lost or "i dunno" category, this will include things like: name, gender, race, attitude, profession, and outlook. Great places to start. Perhaps you could comment on his/her social life, perhaps his/her appearance.

But these are all just suggestions: do what you think is needed. Leave out anything you think is unclear, and read it over to make sure it's consistent.

My example summary:

"Alex, fully known as Alexander Zeno Xylander, is a combination of performer and support. He is a student a Hogwarts, and is working to become a wizarding performer. Mostly of Japanese descent with some gaelic thrown in, he is also a minor metamorphamagus. He's a scintillating guy with a smile or witty comment about his face."  

[Virgil Lifeson]

SECTION 2 : SECTION II

#/#THE MECHANICS#/#

Hey, we've got a pretty good look at what our character is like, but we have not written down any numbers or details. This is actually kind of important in designing a roleplaying character (Mostly for Table-top, but hey, it can work on here too.) It's always easy to slap on numbers later, but it's harder to fit the story to the numbers. And it kind of ends up looking bad, shallow, and unfitting.

However, since we have the concept, we should be able to figure this out with a little work.


Rank the Abilities:

This step requires a bit of self control. What you need to do now, is consider each basic ability (Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Wisdom, Intelligence and Charisma) in the context of your character concept and summary, and assign either "high", "medium", or "low" to the ability.

Note: Don't try to put in any numbers or anything definitive at this stage - we shall be coming back to this later. You need to keep an open mind at this stage. If it helps, use terms like "good", "average" and "poor", instead.

It's really not good if you find that all your abilities are ranked "high"; that's easy to do. If this is the case, then rank your abilities from most important to least important, and then give the two best "high", the next two "medium" and the last two "low". A character that is all "high"s might be great, but will be flat and lifeless.

Continuing my example, Alex is very bright and fairly aware. He doesn't exercise heavily, but he is naturally flexible. Some people like his bubbliness, but he's not leader material. And he's a bit frail, so that leaves him:

Str: low, Dex: mid, Con: low, Int: high, Wis: mid, Cha: mid



What skills are essential

Your character probably has some talents or things he/she can do. It's all fine and dandy to have the guy who's really good at everything...but last I checked, role playing was a group experience. (That includes bard-of-all-trades-Eikre. Take a look at the mistakes he made in his spar against Fayette for example, and a few things will pop up later.)

So what comes next is picking out what your character does, and what he/she likes to do.

Going back, yet again, to Alex, I've already mentioned he's a performer. I wanted him to try and become an actor. But he also plays piano, and he can sing a nice song too. He's also a student at Hogwarts (Yes, it's an HP RP), and him being an altruist, I made him really great at defensive spells.

But with strength comes weakness. Again, you can't be good at everything. What your character probably doesn't like, or maybe for depth you can have your character struggle with what he likes, is just as important as what he/she's good at.

With Alex being the continual example, his scholarly deficiencies include his inability to do ANYthing in Poitions besides fail, as well as almost any non-spell class. In real life, he can't take care of himself, and over-exerts himself for others.

See what I'm getting at yet? Aim for a balance of good and bad. Good, yes, is easy. True depth of character comes a lot from his or her negatives than positives. But don't make them emo-negative, you CAN give them some goods.