Character sheets

[Brainess]

What do you think is the most important portion in signing a character sheet?? And what is the portion you suck the most when making signing character sheets?


For me, I think the appearance is the most important part of the character sheet, I always search for the appearance first and I've always love spazzing and downloading gifs and photos. The portion I suck the most is the personality part, my describing sucks a lot and most role plays needs to have like 1+ paragraph on their personality so I end up putting some of parts of their bio. Plus, I tend to make my character's personalities depend on my mood when I post that entry so it doesn't match !!!

 

[DamagedGlasses]

I think that Character Personalities are a really important part of the Character and really makes up a lot of the flesh, however you bring up a good point with the whole mood thing. Sometimes when you make a character in a specific mood, the character can seem odd if you look at it later. That is one of the many reasons some people prefer short personalities or vague ones that give them room, because of it giving it room for them to maybe react differently with their character, regardless of their mood and still sticking to the character's persona.


Appearance is also really cool as it not only allows others to have ways of describing them with their own characters, as well as comparisons with height and other physical appearances not covered by a picture. It also allows the writer to really get into the character, allowing them to visualise the scene with more clarity and kind of see it in the whole thing going through their mind.


Personally, I enjoy the history the most. While a personality is grand and very important, to me, it really only exists because of what a person has been through. Of course, by 'went through' I refer to what their family situation is, what kind of first encounters they have socially, what kind of influences that have around them, it all plays a big part in their personality. My advice for the personality, do the Bio first. If you write out what has happened to them, you can later come back and think 'Now how did this affect my character?' This will help out with the slight accidental melding of the personality and the Bio. Of course, there isn't anything wrong with that kind of merge. It sometimes helps if you give reasons in the personality for why exactly they are like a certain way they are.


Now, I think I have the most trouble with connections. Not of my own creation, I can make family and friends if they are NPCs just fine, but when it comes to talking over with others and thinking of ways to include them in my character's background, it is kind of difficult. Especially when I have already written it down. It's something I'm working with, and I've got better, but its still a work in progress.

 

[QuirkyAngel]

I consider background/history the most important part in cs. While personalities are fun and all, it can be really difficult to stick to a certain personality when rping with other characters. Personalities also change depending on the situation. Backgrounds, in contrast, are consistent and say a lot about the character and their motivations. I consider a well-developed background the hall-mark of a good, well-developed character.


The hardest part for me to write is also the background. Because I place such a high priority on a character's history I can be pretty ocd about it and take days before I have the character completely fleshed out--at least enough to write a cs.

 

[Aurelia]

Writing an effective background is challenging yet very rewarding.


The essence of roleplaying your character is in how he or she interacts with people, reacts to the environment, and meets challenges. If you have a 4,000-word epic on your character's life story but none of its themes are reflected in how your character acts... then that background might as well be filler. Tabletop roleplaying made me realize this, where you can pretty much only characterize your character through speech and actions. No excessive inner monologues to show what your character is like.


A great background anchors your character in the world and gives him or her a solid reason to be involved in the plot. I personally can't reuse old characters in new RPs for this reason. Especially because a character's history influences their personality so much.


(Not to suggest that I think it's useless to describe information like the names of family members, etc. I love thinking of that stuff. Flavorful details bring a character to life.)

 

[White Masquerade]

I'd say the personality is the most important part of the sheet. It's the only thing there, that actually affects how your character role-plays. History, just a smidgen. Unless it contains something debilitating like an accident that caused your character to lose their legs, the bio won't matter much. Even then, after the other characters get used to the physical disability, it's back to using the personality to navigate the world.


I say this because the bio is static, while personality is lasting. In every situation, a character's personality will matter. That can't be said for history.


Bios are what I suck at on the sheet. It's doable, but it's such a drag. Unless I do it intentionally, whatever I write in there never comes up to haunt my character in the role-play anyway. So what if she had her wisdom teeth removed when she was 14? Or her grandma died when she was young? ( ")


If there was a second place, it would surely be the history.

 

[DamagedGlasses]

[QUOTE="White Masquerade]In every situation, a character's personality will matter. That can't be said for history.

[/QUOTE]
Well, you have a point with how a Character's personality will matter in every situation, however, history is the basis of a personality. If your character is, say, biased towards Argonians, a Skyrim race that is lizard-like, and this a part of their personality, the question is, why are they like that? The history holds all the experiences, the times a character has a laughed, cried, been surprised, all of these things working towards something that many people work towards in their writing ventures. Bringing their character to life!


Look back, your childhood, actions, mistakes, family, friends, travesties, miracles, they all made up who you were, and to me, the best way to really create a character is introducing these things, no matter how trivial they seem, into the background of this character. It doesn't even have to haunt them, like you say. Personally, I don't look back at things like that, and really, bad situations like those are sometimes not brought attention to during the course of the roleplay due to lack of need or opportunity presented by the premise of the roleplay. Not to say this stuff is needed. Again, its really my own opinion, and if you don't want to write a long backstory as such, than that is fine.


I have actually had a roleplay where the death of the grandma was a prominent event that caused some major personality change. However, if you really thing about it, a history only really needs to conprise of what you think it is necassary. Kind of like writing a post. If it doesn't push the plot forward and is objectively needless, it really is up to the writer about whether or not it should be there. However, having referenceable stuff that is considered Useless can become useful later if the situation arises.

 

[White Masquerade]

Haha, Damaged, I can instantly tell you are a truer role-player than I am, or ever will be. You are completely correct. You see role-play as making beautiful art, while I see it as making an elegant machine. I will admit that I am a cold, heartless player, because I have not yet learned to appreciate the creative part.


I do still disagree, but understand why you feel that way, and where you're coming from. Many thanks!

 

[Bone2pick]

I'd rather not write up personalities for my characters, but most RPs require it. It feels like the ultimate tell vs show. My character's (and I'm not claiming anything unique here) morals, temperament, fears, and passions come out in my posts. I don't want to tell you up front what terrifies Mr.X; I want to pull it out of him for you.


And I rarely bother reading other PCs personalities — mostly for the same reason. I'll be the judge if Mrs. Smith really cares about others more than herself.

 

[NovaPheonix]

When I use characters for tabletop rpgs, I like to always think about Class being the most important choice. In a non-RPG sense, how my character acts or what he does, even if it's a job or way of thinking. I like to play magical characters for the most part, and how they use magic can define them. A sneaky person who casts invisibility verses a violent war-mage who throws fireballs! Big differences to be made there.

 

[Dusky]

Given how much I appreciate roleplaying as a creative endeavor, my History is what tends to shine and I find it most important. It provides context for the character being in the roleplay and impetus for them to help advance the game's plot and side plots.


I find choosing a character image to be a guilty pleasure.


I'm not very good at writing personality, for much the same reasons Bone2pick presented.


All that said, my CS's tend to be remarkably well-formatted.

 

[QuirkyAngel]

[QUOTE="White Masquerade]Haha, Damaged, I can instantly tell you are a truer role-player than I am, or ever will be. You are completely correct. You see role-play as making beautiful art, while I see it as making an elegant machine. I will admit that I am a cold, heartless player, because I have not yet learned to appreciate the creative part.
I do still disagree, but understand why you feel that way, and where you're coming from. Many thanks!

[/QUOTE]
Lol. Masky, you aren't heartless and you're right in a way.


Personality is what drives action(which is crucial in an rp. Without action there is no rp.)


History is usually what drives personality.


Except, I'm one of the people that believe action defines personality. Therefore, all the "personalities" described in the cs are simply flexible guidelines. A character may be described as nice in the cs, but if the character's actions during the rp aren't, then the character is not nice. History, on the other hand is concrete and unchangeable. That's why when reading a cs, I browse through history first. However, it's also true that history doesn't necessarily define personality and a character's personality is much more interesting in an rp(if done properly).