Character Background

Character background focuses mostly on you. I am a firm believer in the K.I.S.S (Keep It Simple, Stupid) method. When I first started every one of my characters I started with only a sentence to describe them: Let's take my CO RP main for example, Helldozer. "What if a hillbilly was given force powers?"

Example: I decide to make a character tonight. First we start with your archetype. Are you a glacier, a behemoth, or something else? These archetypes will change how your character interacts with others, thus changing who they are as a person. Free forms have more range to their background because of their ability of pick and choose powers to suit who they are.

Our sample hero will be "Flamus" the Inferno. How does a teenager cope with powers to control fire?

This simple question alone opens up a whole new can of worms. More questions and answers would follow.

What would others think about him? Would he be trusted by others or would they find him dangerous? How does he feel about his powers? Is he flashy with them or tries to keep them hidden? Has there been any accidents with his fire control powers?

Once you get a picture of who your character is with questions like these, take it a step further. What kind of things would he do in certain situations? Is he a hot head or even tempered. Is he accepting of others like him or intolerant?

Now the questions focus back to "Why?" What brought him to this academy? Was there an event that put him in this situation? Was it his choice?

Each question that is answered fleshes out your characters back story just a little more. However, don't answer every question that you create for yourself. You may always want to change a detail later and if you know every small thing about him you may even bore of your character too early. Leave a little mystery for yourself and others to reveal through RP.

Your character is not defined by his powers.

Two characters stand side by side, both can control ice. What sets these two characters apart?

On has a fully fleshed out back story. He is able to recite specific events in their history that makes him who he is today. He has hopes, feelings, opinions and dreams based from those life changing events in his life.

The other is a cardboard cutout in tights. A nobody that controls ice. They have little to none history or even a reason for what they do today. They just "are".

Here are a few things to think about when creating a character, beyond just his powers. Each one you answer is one more breath of who your character is as a person, making them more realistic.

1. Who is your main character?
Gender?
Age?
Religion?
Politics?
Race?
Place of birth?
Birthplace of parents?
Birthplace of grandparents?
Siblings - how many? How old?

2. What does he/she look like?
Appearance?
Body type?
Hair color and eye color?
Vision - glasses or contact lens
Style of dress
Personal hygiene - immaculate, needs a bath, haircut
Style of movement - graceful (former dancer), awkward - put on weight, never lost it after the baby, slow?

Speech:
Accent? Affected?
Style of speech? Breathy? Girly? Campy? Fast? Soft? Loud?

Financial category?
Low income?
Lower middle class?
Middle class?
Well off?
Incredibly wealthy - privileged?

3. What does he/she want?
Money
Power
Respect
High social status
Awards
Love
Justice
Freedom
To own a home?
To become a partner?
To get married?
To own a business?
Get a new job?
Live abroad?

4. What is she/he most afraid of?
Money
Power
Respect
Freedom
A new job, ect

5. How far will he/she go to get it?
Lie?
Cheat?
Steal?
Betray? Who, spouse? Friend? Employer? Government?
Sabotage?
Kill?

6. What does the character need?
Food? Shelter? Clothes?
Love? Companionship? Social status?

7. What will the character do to fill that need?
Lie?
Cheat?
Steal?
Betray? Who, spouse? Friend? Employer? Government?
Sabotage?
Kill?

8. For whom would he/she break the law?
Spouse?
Child?
Parents?
Siblings?
Friends?
Lovers?
No one?

9. How far would your character go to hide his/her deepest secret?
Lie
Steal
Bribe
Betray a stranger
Betray a friend
Betray God
Betray a loved on - who?
Give up material possessions
Leave everyone familiar and assume another name and life?
Kill?
Sacrifice...what?

10. How does your character evolve?
What does he learn in the course of the story?
How does he change because of what is learned/experienced?
Does this knowledge add to his happiness? Self-worth?
Does the knowledge have a negative effect?

11. What obstacles are in the path of the character's objectives?
The law
Social customs
Morals
Ethics
People

12. For whom or what will your character make sacrifices?
A friend, lover, child, parent, principle, religion, self?

13. What does your character sacrifice?
Material wealth/possession?
Personal safety?
Status?
Honor?
Respect of others?
Freedom?
His or her life?

14. Why does your character make this sacrifice?

15. Is your character inspired by a real person?

Someone in your own life?
Past life?
A historical figure you've studied?
The image of an actor or actress?
A character in a book, film, play?
The public persona of somebody in the news?
Yourself, or aspects of yourself?
The "you" you wished you were?

16. Who is the most important person in your character's present life?
Spouse, child, parent, boss, friend, lover?

17. Is that person in the story?

18. Who is the most important person in your character's back story?
Parents, authority figure, teacher, priest, object of character's passion? Object of character's obsession? Wife or husband? A child?

19. Is that person in your story?

20. What's your character's religion?

Does he go to services?
Regular or just High holidays?
Is religion important to his/her behavior? Praying before meals, missionary, ect?

21. What difficult decision must your character make?

22. Has your character been labeled by others?

23. Does your character have a sense of humor?
Practical jokester?
Quick verbal wit?
What strikes him as funny?
Who's your character favorite comedian?
Does he have a favorite cartoon? Cartoon character?

24. Who's your character's best friend? Is he/she in the story?

25. Does your character keep up friendships?
Writing letters, email, phone, gifts?

26. Has your character ever been the victim of a crime?

27. What kind of car?

How it's taken care of? Bumper stickers, ect
Who taught him how to drive?
What's in the trunk?
Does he pick up hitchhikers?
Does he eat/drink in the car? Shave?

28. Does your character have a pet?

29. What makes your character vulnerable?
Plight of loved ones? Pets?
Strangers?
Appeals to sense of honor?
Appeals to sense of gilt?

30. Do they act on that vulnerability?

31. List your characters favorite leisure activities.

32. What accidents has your character been in?

33. What does your character feel guilty about?
Act cruelly in the past? A lie? A betrayal? Not being able to prevent a tragedy? Not believing somebody til a tragedy happened?

34. What is your character's career or job?

35. How much money do they have?

36. What would they do with an unexpected windfall?

37. What would his/her friends like to change about the character?

Stubborn? Judgmental? Unreliable? Temper? What makes him angry? What makes him happy? Impetuous? Form opinions quickly? Impatient? Swearing to excess? Over exaggeration? Unfocussed? Spacey? Indecisive?

38. What kind of trouble does he/she get into?

Romantic trouble?
Legal trouble?
Mortal danger?
Takes on someone else's troubles?
Big risks?

RP Interaction

RP interaction between characters is much more important then some may realize. When done properly it can be something that you will always remember. A moment in your characters life. The quality of the content has much to do with it.

Imagine artwork. All artists struggle with knowing when their project is finally finished. Each of them wishes to please the critics by creating the perfect finished product.

RP is no different then art. You are putting your work on display for anyone in earshot anytime you post something that can be seen by others. Take care in what you are typing and look over what you are about to press Enter for. It is our goal to be the best RPers in Champions Online and some careful posting can get us to that point.

- Check your spelling.

We are all subject to typos or just not knowing how to spell certain words. Learn simple rules of spelling such as "I before E except after C." Take your time when you type, look over what you are about to post. It is much better to have a slow response then to look like an ignorant, babbling fool. If there is a word that no matter how hard you try to spell, can't, find another word that means the same thing and use it.

- Avoid "texting" your reply.

When you type "lol" in your chat window you may think your character is laughing but to the rest of us we see "lol" and that looks dumb. Put a little effort into what you do. We should never see "lol", "c u l8r", or a sideways smiley face. With some amount of effort you can {laugh}, /s See you later.", or {smiles}.

- Emotes are just that. Emotes.

Sometimes a person can figure out what someone is thinking but only from body and facial expressions. The rest of the time you just can't. So please avoid the occasional {thinks that pears are better then peaches.} because quite frankly, I don't think I could tell that just by looking at you. Use {takes a look at the peach and scrunches up his nose and reaches for the pear instead}"

- Avoid critting others with emotes.

This is a personal pet peeve of mine although others prefer this style of RP. Here is an example.

Carolina Mitchell: "How are you today?"

Bob the Emote Critter: {sniffs the air enjoying the faint smell of fruit from a nearby vendor. Quickly he turns his attention to Carolina and gives him quick look over, noticing her standing beside the old, faded park benches. He slowly reached out to shake her hand.<cont>

(I join zone chat to keep myself entertained while waiting for the next post)

Bob the Emote Critter: {He does so with a slightly firmly, noticing her lack of strength in her feminine grip. Looking directly to her face he notices the green eyes and hair. It was unusual but still pleased him.<cont>

(At this point I get up to cook a turkey and read War and Peace)

Bob the Emote Critter: He speaks slowly and deliberately. "I'm fine."

I want to be RPed with. Not RPed at. I am a firm believer that if you cannot post what you are trying to say in one emote post, you need to be writing a novel some short story about the characters involved instead.

- Mix up what you do

Too many times I have seen players use emotes only in there RP, much like Bob did above. Mix it up. Use say when your character is simple speaking then toss in an emote post every so often to describe what your character is doing while the conversation is taking place. Personally, I use a 3:1 system. For every 3 posts I make in /say, I preform 1 /emote. Anything else to me is a tedious read and I lose my attention to what is going on.

Shooting yourself in the RP foot.

Do you stand around waiting for RP? Do you ask in SG chat for people to hang out with but nobody seems "available"? Does your character have only one friend, not counting "Teddy"?

Chances are you have broken one of the unwritten rules of RP.

These rules fall into several categories and some of them may not even be mentioned here.

"The Wet Blanket"

You are the brooding anti-hero, and the shadow in the night. You sit alone, walk alone and fight alone. Now you are really wondering why you are alone? This is what you wanted in the first place. However, you didn't expect the loneliness involved in being a one man band.

"The Jerk"

You are the baddest of the bad or the wisest of wise guys. You are tougher the anyone else, can beat up most of the UFC and you are proud to let everyone know about it. You might even be the type that treats everyone like crap, giving an earful of bile to anyone that is in earshot. Nobody want's to be around these type of people in RL or RP so don't expect to make friends easily.

"The Nut Job"

You have just got done going Hulk on your circle of friends, beat them up, spit in their face, tinkled in their cereal, and kicked the family dog. Now that you are Bruce Banner again, you wonder where your chums went. Really?

"The Mind Bender"

If you have the habit of mind controlling other peoples players or making them forget moments of their lives, chances are your RP circle is pretty slim. Nobody wants other players to control their characters. If they did, they would give you their account info and let you have at it.

"The God-modder"

This one is pretty self explanatory. You control the RP to a point you snuff out any interest in any player to RP with you. You don't allow anyone else's character to do what they feel their character would do because for some reason you only focus on what you want happening in the story. I think you forget it takes two to tango.

"The Taboo"

I'm not getting into the details of this type of character but there is always that one guy that decides to be edgy and cover RP content that is a little risque. My advice to you is this...Don't.

"The RP Hijacker"

You wander up to an event that has been planned for a month now. Since you have everyone together, now would be a GREAT time for you to not only tell us everything about your character, his world breaking powers (even though he is still a level 6), his nemesis, thoughts on Kim Kardashian's divorce, your aunt Martha's world famous meatloaf recipe and how you plan on stopping world hunger. Don't forget to tell them all about some mission you need help with right now and how you will be best buds with anybody that helps you. Hate to break it guy, this is downright rude and nobody wants to play second fiddle to you when you only log in once a week. This is a MMO and other players would like the spotlight once in a while too.

"Mr. Over the Top"

You just got done saving the world for the second time today and now you want to involve all your closest friends in a little game of Russian Roulette. The catch is you fill all the chambers with bullets, and you get to go first, second, and third. You catch each one in the teeth, without a scratch, then inform your friends that 6 races of aliens are going to hold Armageddon in your back yard and everyone is welcome to join in on the fun. Holding buddies to RP of this magnitude day in and day out make something like fixing a baloney sandwich seem like heaven.

"The Recluse"

You make your character a best friend and RP with them daily in your penthouse. Then tragedy strikes and your friend now has some strange thing called a "full time job" and cannot continue RPing with you. You go out, play the field and wonder why nobody in your SG knows who you are. It's because they don't. You have locked yourself away and not made yourself accessible to other players.

"The Needy"

This type of player is the one that always asks in OOC chat, "Hey guys, I want to RP, where is everybody at?" and never gets any response. Usually this is because they already broke one of the earlier rules of RP and has become pushed aside by the group.

How to fix this.

Just like with any Alcoholics Anonymous group you have to admit you have a problem. If one person is ignoring your RP attempts that may be a personal issue. But if everyone is sweeping under the RP rug, chances are the one with the problem.

If your character falls under one of the above RP suicide arch-types above, they will quickly need a change of heart. Create a story twist for your character, not needing to involve other players and hit the reset button. Usually this is the only way. Change the way they think, say "sorry" to everyone you did wrong and rebuild socially in a much calmer fashion. Worse case scenario, the character vanishes into the sun set and you re-roll.

OOC issues are much harder to get over. Players many times become labeled because of RP style or content and shaking that stereotype is harder then it looks. This can only be done by effort to change your ways, much like you can with your character, just in a longer time frame.

Timing is Everything

I was having a conversation with someone today about timing in RP. Let's get down to the basics.

tim·ing [tahy-ming]
noun
1. a synchronizing of the various parts of a production for theatrical effect.
2. the result or effect thus achieved.
3. (in acting) the act of adjusting one's tempo of speaking and moving for dramatic effect.

As you can see, timing is a big deal in any RP situation since we are all. to a point, doing impromptu acting. We need to play off one another for the sake of dramatic effect.

This goes for planned out stories as well. Let's look at our current storyline. The school is being attacked by what appears to me a mutant hating group. These attacks happen weekly at best but have now picked up the pace some for an unknown reason. Questions about timing form.

How would the average player know the attacks have increased if I was throwing attacks into the storyline at least once a day? If attacks occurred daily, would it lessen the feel of the attacks? Would players eventually become numb to the attacks? If attacks occurred on a daily basis would less players want to be involved? As you can see, timing plays a huge part in our SG's RP.

Let's now take this on a more personal RP level. Is the timing of your characters RP right or is it off a little bit?

Back in my World of ******** RP days, I was RPing a husband of a husband and wife duo and she had her character die during child birth. I researched about death in families and death as a personal journey for those that experience it in real life. There is even timing in this journey.

Denial. "It's not possible for my wife and child to die."
Anger. "Why couldn't they be saved?"
Bargaining "I would trade my life for theirs."
Depression. "I want to die and be with them."
Acceptance "It's time to move on with my life."

So as I played out the character another female character came along days after the wife's death, jumped the gun and wanted to have a relationship with him. If I remember right she popped the question during the anger stage of coping with death. True to my character's timing, it ended with a slap on her cheek and some hurt feelings. But also because of that timing it led to very dramatic and memorable RP which I hope we are all here to find.

I read a forum post the other day about a player that was bored of CO. I know this player and have been involved with some RP with them. They are the type to have a catastrophe at least once a day. As I read the forum post I understood why they were bored. Because of their lack of timing and pacing, they had come up with virtually every story they could ever dream of in the span of a few months. This is called RP burnout. I have seen this with WoW guilds and CO SGs. They come out like balls of fire with ideas but because of lack of pacing, they run out of ideas, fizzle out and die off.

Soap operas are the masters of pacing and timing. They do this by having a wide range of characters to choose from. Just as one pair of characters are fighting over another man, another pair are experiencing a peaceful lull in their story. Not every character on a show is having major drama at all times.

What is your character's timing like? Is the end of the world coming on a daily basis for them? Are you in a creative hole because your character has done "everything"? Maybe your timing is off or your pacing is a little fast. Take your time and enjoy your RP sessions.

Be original.

I used to collect comic books. We all had our favorites, Spider Man, Batman, X-Men. I always liked a small group of Marvel superheroes called Generation X. In fact, our super group is inspired by them. The group lasted from 1994 to 2001, not long in the world of superheroes.

Yes, it was yet again another group of teen superheroes learning about their abilities. Not a very fresh idea in many people's minds. At the time there was a long list if books being published under the mutant group banner. X-Men had at least 2 published titles. X-callibre, X-Factor, X-Force, not to mention many one character books like Wolverine were in publication. Other mutant groups had already fallen, like the Hellions and the New Mutants. At this point in mutant history yet another mutant group seemed pretty stale.

But it wasn't. This group was different.

Led by the lack luster older characters Banshee and Emma Frost, however, this group consisted of 8 new character twists and original ideas for mutations.

Let's start with Husk. This mutant was able to shed her outer layer of skin and reveal a new layer or shape underneath. To this point in superhero lore nothing was ever seen like this. Totally original.

Mondo, could touch something and become it. Harder then a rock, mushy like jello and as durable as steel. A new original power set.

Then there was a mutant student named Chamber. His ability was to emit a scream like Banshee, Siryn and a few others. Not so new huh? He was different. He had a huge hole torn from his chest and jaw from the first time he used his powers. His torso was a chamber of raw energy. A disturbing but new twist on an old idea.

What does your character do? Is he the typical fire wielder? What if he became flame? I have seen some characters lately that can speak with technology. What if your character could absorb technology and become it?

Do something new. Stand out. Don't be average. Make your character's powers memorable.

Unfortunately, the title suffered at the hands of poor writers after the original collaborators left the title. Not long after, it was canceled.

What was the lesson learned here?

Some good advice to be had here. Thanks for sharing it with us!