Experiences Character profile pet peeves

[Idea]

To be fair there's people like this in real life. There's people who actually do seem to build their entire identity around their sexuality or some cause they care strongly about. Sure, it might make for a boring RP character, but it's not inherently unrealistic. That being said, preaching is better left for one's personal writing, imo.

If it was contained just to a self-aware contained version like the character merely being convinced their identity is built on their sexuality and acting accordingly, I would be inclined to agree with you. But what is often the case is that every single aspect of the character is warped for the message, and again, this wouldn't be entirely unrealistic, except that one of the things most commonly changed is the backstory. It's not just the character themselves which are warped for the message, but the behavior of the entire plant seems to be designed to glorify whatever the message might be and villify opposition. For instance a "messenger character" on the topic of abortion might have every single bad thing that happens to them be directly caused by the abortion or by people who typically are against abortion such as priests. One for a disorder of some kind will be extremely specific on what that disorder is on the character (typically because the player themselves has it, but regardless), almost every single entry will reference the fact they have that disorder and the backstory will center around the fact the disorder is there, quite often the person being discriminated against or just a particular problem of the disorder, which again will appear to shape every bad thing in the character's life.

It is understandable that someone might overly rely on one aspect of their identity. I might even praise people who make such a character, as doing so in self-awareness would probably indicate they wanted to explore the matter, both the good and the bad. A "messenger character" takes this to the extreme where every part of the character and everything around them gets warped in this bubble of agenda.

I also don't like "likes" and "dislikes" lists. There are many things that a character is going to like and dislike.

I don't know if this will help any, but what I typically use the likes and dislikes for isn't for a comprehensive list of everything a character likes or doesn't like, but rather as a sample of likes and dislikes meant to help organically bring to the table certain reactions, as well as flesh out/humanize the character to an extent. For instance, using a like you can generally expect a positive reaction from the character, so it could be used to help break the ice between two characters. A dislike might serve as an organic way to get a character angry/upset or to have them not interfere in a plot point which might've otherwise been resolved too easily. Etc...

 

[Fable]

As a Christian this one peeves me too. Like, if you're going to use religious themes, fine. Just be respectful with them and do proper research. A lot of the portrayals of demons, angels, etc. use a lot of incorrect tropes.

6.Demons and such
Really personal one, I just have a pet peeves against the usage of religious stuff in general without it being given the appropriate nuance or understanding the idea, demons in particularly annoy me because they are often used because it's edgy or because the word has just become so standardized it has lost all meaning among the general public.

The thing is modern day demons aren't really taken into a 'religious' consideration, much like how modern vampires are romanticized compared to the terrifying story of what they used to be. Vampires were made more human and relatable. The same can be said of most 'monsters'. You can look at movies like Hotel Transylvania, the TV show Lucifer spins the story a different angle, Charmed focused on witchcraft, Buffy, Angel, True Blood are vampire based. Midnight, Tx is a show with an entire town of supernaturals living together. In Inuyasha you have a variety of characters under the umbrella race of demon. And you have Hellboy, a demon who was meant for evil but chooses to do good.

I use demons in RPs, but Demons are just another fantasy race to me and have no religious weight at all to me. I'm not saying your perspective is incorrect, but rather just subjective and that not everyone views the word/race demon within the same context as you. :3 So what you view as proper/improper use is just a different viewpoint. I always see you bring this up Idea wherever peeves is mentioned in some manner and figured that I would reply.

I'm someone who, on another website, used to review people's OCs, and one slight trend that I saw which annoyed me was when they compared their original characters to cannon characters. For instance, "My character is smarter than [insert cannon character]", "My character is better at [blank] than [insert cannon character]," "My character's power is like [Insert cannon character's]," "My character looks like [Insert cannon character]," Etc. Often times with this trend I see it whenever they're essentially trying to create a better version of whatever the cannon character has. Like removing the flaws. Other times it's done out of laziness.

I've only seen this a handful of times, but it's been enough that it bothers me as well and makes me avoid group fandom roleplays these days. Sometimes the worst is when someone clones a canon character, buffs them up, and calls them original. It's like those terrible sonic re-colors that swarmed dA.

5.All-purpose pre-made OCs

I've re-used a character before, but mostly because the GM rebooted the RP over and over so she really didn't need to change, but I stopped using her because I can only use the same character so many times before they lose enjoyment. I've had people come to me for my RPs bringing in pre-made characters that don't even fit the requirements of the RP before, even after explaining for days on end as to why x and y thing won't work and getting a response of "But they can fit in anywhere" grinds my gears.

 

[Idea]

The thing is modern day demons aren't really taken into a 'religious' consideration, much like how modern vampires are romanticized compared to the terrifying story of what they used to be. Vampires were made more human and relatable. The same can be said of most 'monsters'. You can look at movies like Hotel Transylvania, the TV show Lucifer spins the story a different angle, Charmed focused on witchcraft, Buffy, Angel, True Blood are vampire based. Midnight, Tx is a show with an entire town of supernaturals living together. In Inuyasha you have a variety of characters under the umbrella race of demon. And you have Hellboy, a demon who was meant for evil but chooses to do good.

I use demons in RPs, but Demons are just another fantasy race to me and have no religious weight at all to me. I'm not saying your perspective is incorrect, but rather just subjective and that not everyone views the word/race demon within the same context as you. :3 So what you view as proper/improper use is just a different viewpoint. I always see you bring this up Idea wherever peeves is mentioned in some manner and figured that I would reply.

This is why I started the pet peeve's description with "really personal one". I'm well aware that it's just a thing that bothers me and doesn't really have an objective issue overall.

 

[Shuusuke]

I used to make more extensive and detailed CSs and might still make them if required by an RP I really want to join, but they've become more of a chore than something fun to make, and I think there is such as thing as being too detailed to the point where it does more harm than good. Getting a "feel" of the character through their CS is much more important to me than knowing their exact height and weight for example, and unless those numbers are central to the plot, I see no need to say more than "taller than average and a bit on the scrawny side" about their physique, for example.

I also dislike when the CS has significant coding. I'll deal with just a basic amount of it if it was employed to make things look more organized, but posts can easily be organized without the use of any coding or fancy text boxes. In my opinion, when you're making a CS, you're in a way advertising your character, so why would you not want it to be easy to read? "So why would I want to RP with your character?" "Click here to see his face, zoom in to be able to read about his personality, place your mouse in a very specific spot to be able to scroll down and read about his backstory", is kind of how I feel like it goes. And if you require coding, you'd better share the coding so people who don't care about it can just replace the info with their own.

Now to list them and a few others more directly:
-Coding with intents other than simple organization.
-Setting hard limits to words or paragraphs. Forcing people to write more/less than what they may want to is usually a bad idea.
-Requiring detailed information about height/weight or other details, especially if they're not central to the plot. Give people the option to list likes and dislikes if they want to, and it's good enough for me.
-"Mysterious" backstories. Not only does it hint at some undesirable attributes of the RPer, but if it's a mystery whether that character will be interesting to RP with, chances are I won't feel like solving it.
-Attempts at throughly describing personalities. It's a thing I used to do too. It's a dynamic part of a person and if you want to make a perfect description, you'd have to list every kind of situation and people so that every possible reaction is listed. Give the core of the character's personality and any sensible person will know that the character is more complex and not limited to that, and should be enough to give a forecast of how they'd react. Otherwise you're probably going to have contradictions there, trying to sound well-rounded.
-Characters that aren't very different from previous ones. I know there's nothing wrong with people being similar, but it's usually more interesting when there's some kind of conflict going on between the characters, and different personalities and backstories are a good way to provide that.
-Characters that have backstories tied to another character. It might not be necessarily bad, but it sounds too much like a self-contained RP to me, which is not desirable for the actual RP. Particularly bad if the characters were made by the same player.
-Faceclaims that don't fit the genre. Is this an anime RP? Then don't use real people as faceclaim. Is this a medieval RP? Then don't have a modern-looking faceclaim. And so on.

I'm sure there's more things I could think of if I kept going, but feels like those were the most immediate and meaningful ones to point out for me.

 

[Yunalescaa]

I honestly think the biggest pet peeve is just people who don't include the relevant information. Their bios are all just fluff and useless information that won't come up ever. If it doesn't include the basics (name, age, gender, sexuality, bio, personality, what they look like) it drives me crazy. People who don't include even that usually get mad that I didn't somehow know it already. I think having that fluff is good for the future but it should be at the bottom of the bio and what not. Or on a separate page. I dunno *shrug* I see way too many people who don't know how to prioritize.

 

[huckleberrie]

The incorrect proportions bother me a LOT for some reason. I'm very picky when it comes to them because, to me, just slapping numbers on there for their height and weight without research or seeing if it's accurate feels LAZY to me.

I once came across a character sheet that was written as follows:

Height: 5'5

Weight: 110lbs (chubby)

Putting their character at a BMI of 18.3 which is actually UNDERWEIGHT. I know BMI isn't always an accurate representation of weight to health but it's a guide to go off of. The fact that they believed 110lbs to be chubby was just.... mind blowing to me.

 

[Delinquent]

When people write the CS from the perspective of their character. 90% of the time it's just used to add jokes that are so bad that they physically hurt and the other 10% are just attempts to hide important info about the character.

 

[Damafaud]

Zodiac. On what scenario, disregarding Zodiac Magic RP, is this relevant.

"You killed my sister."

"Sorry can't help it I'm a Libra."

No Karen it's because you're a psychotic bastard with unstable mind as written in your CS.

 

[CrowOuttaHell]

Character sheet pet peeves? One word.

FONT.

Choice of font color, size and whatnot can make or break reading a CS for me. How the hell am I gonna read a character sheet with a font size the size of an ant and colored in all the colors of the rainbow??

 

[Vanira]

Nothing against people who like playing them, but I personally am weary of playing against brooding, macho characters that are rude to most things they interact with. I won't say no to playing against them. Hell, I've seen it done really well, but more often I just get bored or my characters would honestly not hang around them.

 

[Nue]

This is less about things I see in people's character profiles that annoy me and more about what people ask to include in character sheets, but hopefully it still counts-
I dislike when you have to do an intensely detailed CS, and all of it is required. Partially because half the time it's stuff that isn't necessary to know (a character's favourite colour might come up in an RP, but it's usually not something you absolutely need to know going into it) and the other thing I have is that it's way more fun to.. learn about the character's through the RP, I guess? It's not really as fun when you know everybody's deal from the start. I can understand when it's like, say, asking for a character's bio or abilities so that you're not accidentally letting characters who are OP or don't fit the RP slip through, but a lot of other stuff doesn't make sense imo, like knowing an exhaustive list of their likes and dislikes and experiences at the beginning.

Slightly petty but I also dislike when faceclaims are required, esp when there's restrictions on the type you can use. Like it's totally okay if you have a certain vision for the RP and anime faceclaims ruin it, or realistic faceclaims don't fit, but in that case I think allowing people to just put a written description is helpful. i say its petty bc the only reason I find it annoying is that I draw all my OCs and feel weird using a faceclaim when i already have a specific look in mind haha

 

[Idea]

i say its petty bc the only reason I find it annoying is that I draw all my OCs and feel weird using a faceclaim when i already have a specific look in mind haha

I don't know if this helps at all, but I'm pretty sure that if you ask most GMs will let you use the drawings you made for your OCs as the faceclaim, regardless of what type they otherwise require. It's just that most people either can't or don't draw, so the generall assumption is that those drawings don't exist until stated otherwise.

 

[Wandering Seraph]

Using pros and cons as your entire personality form
I.e., when there's space on a character sheet/form for you to write about your character's personality and instead of putting together a paragraph, you just slam down a pros list and a cons list. It always comes across as lazy to me and it's super subjective, especially because not everyone even considers the same personality traits to be positive or negative.

Role Stealing
This is something that's happened to me a little too often, so I might be overly sensitive about it, but basically, role stealing is when someone has a submitted character sheet with a character who fits a specific role/fills a position in the cast and then someone else submits a character who attempts to fill that same position in some regard. For example, if it's a fantasy setting and there's already a rogue with a heart of gold, submitting another "rogue with a soft side" type of character, no matter how nuanced, feels inconsiderate. This is worse if the RP is smaller.

Soft UwU Boy
I'm definitely familiar with RPs being overfilled with female OCs with a male cast of two, but you know what's worse than having no boys? Having the "uwu soft feminine sub boy" character copy-pasted into every setting. That's not to say that you can't play gentle, sweet, or feminine boys. You absolutely can and it can be done beautifully, but there's a trend of making a slim, cutesy, feminine male character and then essentially basing his entire personality off of some kind of sub stereotype or just being "soft". I can't stand that.

 

[DapperCat]

A trend that drives me crazy? Unfortunately it's a widespread one... and I'm afraid most will disagree with my pet peeve. xD

Characters that look (near) perfect, or like an idealized fantasy. For women it's huge chests, wide hips and tiny waists, face full of make up (if a faceclaim) whilst saying this is just how they naturally look. For men it's super muscular ripped bodies that may just be photo-shopped but no it's just their body because they hot uwuu. Same for faces, no flaws anywhere. Makes me go reeeee! Feels so boring and flat and wish-fulfillment like.

(This counts just as much for the personality, when either -no- flaws are listed or the only one is 'too nice' or 'needs to be understood'.)

 

[Nue]

A trend that drives me crazy? Unfortunately it's a widespread one... and I'm afraid most will disagree with my pet peeve. xD

Characters that look (near) perfect, or like an idealized fantasy. For women it's huge chests, wide hips and tiny waists, face full of make up (if a faceclaim) whilst saying this is just how they naturally look. For men it's super muscular ripped bodies that may just be photo-shopped but no it's just their body because they hot uwuu. Same for faces, no flaws anywhere. Makes me go reeeee! Feels so boring and flat and wish-fulfillment like.

(This counts just as much for the personality, when either -no- flaws are listed or the only one is 'too nice' or 'needs to be understood'.)

I guess that's the problem with photo faceclaims - you're more likely to use actors and models, because they're either so famous it doesn't feel weird in the way picking a random person off of Instagram would, or because they put their photos out for professional use anyway. But the thing with that is that theyre all usually conventionally attractive and photoshopped to the high heavens, which means you end up with a roleplay where every single character is just naturally a supermodel.. I guess it's one of those things that can't be avoided tho-

 

[Becker]

Agreed, i'd rather cuddle a handsome Panda like Jack Black than get my eyes poked out by a super-stud's steroid powered nipple ;3

 

[DapperCat]

I guess that's the problem with photo faceclaims - you're more likely to use actors and models, because they're either so famous it doesn't feel weird in the way picking a random person off of Instagram would, or because they put their photos out for professional use anyway. But the thing with that is that theyre all usually conventionally attractive and photoshopped to the high heavens, which means you end up with a roleplay where every single character is just naturally a supermodel.. I guess it's one of those things that can't be avoided tho-

Not just faceclaims though! It's also a thing with art or with descriptions unfortunately. >_<

 

[kevintheradioguy]

guess that's the problem with photo faceclaims - you're more likely to use actors and models, because they're either so famous it doesn't feel weird in the way picking a random person off of Instagram would, or because they put their photos out for professional use anyway

I cannot for the life of me find ordinary-looking FCs. When I google say "blond chubby male", I get supermodels with a gut that look like Greek gods. So FCs are very tricky.

That being said, while I too dislike the cokie-cutter characters, I see no reason to hate it, actually. If someone wants to be their best self in game, and be pretty/handsome, I'm inclined to support them. I don't mind. It's just the looks. Personality is much more important.

 

[rae2nerdy]

Not just faceclaims though! It's also a thing with art or with descriptions unfortunately. >_<

I can’t explain descriptions but for Art it follows the same rules as photos. Unless your drawing it yourself your usually using someone else’s work. And that person most likely drew their work to make money.

You aren’t making money by drawing ugly or ordinary people. Your making money by drawing idealized people.

Now you can actually fine pictures of overweight people or people with less make up. It just requires a lot of searching. Same with art.

Personally though if you want unusual looking characters I think descriptions are your best bet.

As there is absolutely no excuses there. You are literally only limited by your imagination.

 

[Fable]

It's just a struggle because media wise people want pretty, so it's what is uploaded more unless someone does special effects makeup. I would say on my pinterest prowling that maybe only 5% of any search results in something passable as not pretty/beautiful. You want to know what I found when I typed "ugly male drug addict" "ugly male model" "normal male model" and so forth? Pretty much the opposite. (I was looking for you kevintheradioguy lol). I would have more luck looking at real mug shots, but then you lose that clear photograph quality, lol.

That and much of what is "flawed" beauty are like facial scar tropes. I just don't really bother trying to hunt down these FCs because I already spend hours prowling for stuff and this just adds on futile more hours of searching which 9.9/10 times ends up pointless. :\ The only way I'mma get a less than pretty character is by drawing it myself and that's just because I lack the skill to draw well.

 

[Jannah]

It's just a struggle because media wise people want pretty, so it's what is uploaded more unless someone does special effects makeup. I would say on my pinterest prowling that maybe only 5% of any search results in something passable as not pretty/beautiful. You want to know what I found when I typed "ugly male drug addict" "ugly male model" "normal male model" and so forth? Pretty much the opposite. (I was looking for you kevintheradioguy lol). I would have more luck looking at real mug shots, but then you lose that clear photograph quality, lol.

That and much of what is "flawed" beauty are like facial scar tropes. I just don't really bother trying to hunt down these FCs because I already spend hours prowling for stuff and this just adds on futile more hours of searching which 9.9/10 times ends up pointless. :\ The only way I'mma get a less than pretty character is by drawing it myself and that's just because I lack the skill to draw well.

Stuff like this is why when I use FC's I typically prefer alternative models. They don't follow the outrageous mainstream beauty standards.

 

[Nue]

While we're on the subject of FCs I dislike when people use someone else's art and don't credit it.. I've begrudgingly accepted that most people aren't going to listen to why that's not good etiquette and can sometimes negatively affect artists (although I'll admit that using it in a CS won't be as potentially damaging as just reuploading it to social media) and mainly keep quiet about it but it makes me a lil sad. I know people as a whole aren't going to do it, but I wish before people use it they'd maybe spare a few seconds putting the artists name somewhere

(If it's official art like from a game or anime or something that's fine, I mean for smaller artists)

 

[AnimeGenork]

I don't understand when people say their character is an asshole but it's okay because they're nice. Not only is that contradictory, it's just plain weird. There is really not logical way you can make a character be an asshole and a nice person, unless of course they happen to show one of the two sides in certain situations. I'm also starting to get tired of the "isolated, doesn't talk to anyone" archetype. If it's a 1x1, yeah, okay, that makes a little bit of feasible sense, but what if it's a big group? Are you just planning to have your character dick around for a while as everyone else does something useful? I just don't understand what the thought process is behind that. It gets worse when there are maybe SIX characters in a group roleplay who fit that isolated emo trope. I'm sorry, but it's stupid.

Also have to agree with the person who mentioned Korean face claims. The occasional one is fine to me, but you can't honestly expect me to believe that an individual's every freaking character is Korean. If they are... I dunno. Something about them bothers me (maybe because I avoid K-Pop at all costs? Who knows.)

I also get annoyed when it's clearly real face claims and someone used an anime one. I don't think I need to explain that.

 

[peritwinkle]

While we're on the subject of FCs I dislike when people use someone else's art and don't credit it.. I've begrudgingly accepted that most people aren't going to listen to why that's not good etiquette and can sometimes negatively affect artists (although I'll admit that using it in a CS won't be as potentially damaging as just reuploading it to social media) and mainly keep quiet about it but it makes me a lil sad. I know people as a whole aren't going to do it, but I wish before people use it they'd maybe spare a few seconds putting the artists name somewhere

(If it's official art like from a game or anime or something that's fine, I mean for smaller artists)

This. This is so important. I put a lot of effort into my own art and while I don’t mind others using it as their own FCs (if that’s how they envisioned their own character as well, that’s completely fine), please do credit the artist. It takes a 2 second reverse image search most of the time.

A whole other breed, though - those who go as far as to crop the signature for ‘aesthetic’ purposes.

 

[rae2nerdy]

This. This is so important. I put a lot of effort into my own art and while I don’t mind others using it as their own FCs (if that’s how they envisioned their own character as well, that’s completely fine), please do credit the artist. It takes a 2 second reverse image search most of the time.

A whole other breed, though - those who go as far as to crop the signature for ‘aesthetic’ purposes.

In fairness I don't think most people know how to do that. Reverse image search. I am pretty sure most of them just google whatever they're playing and pick the first image they like. So they have no way of knowing who the artist even is. I go the easy route and use dollgenerators so I literally link the generator in the CS. And for photos I use a public domain website which will provide the artist link when you download the image.

But if you only use google and you don't know how to reverse image search than you're kinda SOL.