Making THE character (third try)

[gamestarmike]

My old paradigm was:

1 Choose Faction
2 Cookie cut religion, race, class that suits the faction gear
3 Make up trope background that will likely never be explored past initial interactions unless its a long night at 2nd wind
4 Look up db/Mournas' builds and see if we missed any power build exploits (my favorite character was this build)
5 ???
6 Profit

Now that we aren't tied down to factions, instead cities, I think we can finally have the freedom we've wanted in building characters outside of the past archetypes we've been forced to build around the factions for the characters to be optimal. Now that the majority of items will be player made or monster dropped from the sound of it our characters shouldn't be shackled to the faction/city we align with.

We can see thayan swashbucklers running around in Aquor or dwarven wizards of whurest. Clerics other than helm or bane etc. Time to be creative!

That being said, all this creative freedom is really making it take longer to decide what I want to play. I've gone through about 5 elaborate character ideas that have been shelved for a later time if the server picks back up at full speed.

The way im going about making my new characters is by choosing a god's mythos I want to play around. The god you pick usually heavily influences the character lore/class/location so its a great place to start. Of course characters don't have to be railroaded into one god but its easy to ground them around one and then incorporate the others that orbit that god's mythos later. Then it becomes an easy check list:

1. Whats a fun class to play with this god
2. Think up a simple background and build on it as time passes, elaborate backgrounds slow you down
3. Where do you think your character fits in sundren? This city here!

Create, click play!

[Kaybrie]

My personal experience has been that the more I pre-build into the character (socially and mechanically), the harder a time I have of integrating that character and making it stick.

For example, if I tell myself, "I'm going to make a character who's really good at killing undead," I end up making some kind of trope vampire hunter shoehorned into the appropriate religion. If I tell myself, "I'm going to make a well-intentioned character who's very devoted to his god," I give myself a lot of room to adapt to the "evil" stimuli that most affect my character, which better threads my character into the campaign's fiber.

This, most of my character's are fairly nebulous at the time that I put them into the game, I have more of a tendency to build them over the first few days after putting them into the world. Some I have a better idea of what I want from the beginning (optimistic multhorandi lathanderite) Others I have no idea what I want when I make them, I don't even know if they'll make it anywhere, or if I'll go back to them down the line. (Gabrielle was an example of this, made as a support character for the triad, which died out only a few months after I made her so I shelved her, then re-visioned into a mage-knight later who could fight and operate on her own after Anasath died.)

One thing I do like to make sure is on my character when I create them, is at least one flaw, something that cracks whatever mask they're wearing for appearances sake. Though again, these sorts of things can be created over the length of time that you play the character. (The day of broken blades struck Gabrielle with crippling self-doubt and despair). Though I generally try to make sure this is some part of my character when I create them.

[Lotus]

My personal experience has been that the more I pre-build into the character (socially and mechanically), the harder a time I have of integrating that character and making it stick.

For example, if I tell myself, "I'm going to make a character who's really good at killing undead," I end up making some kind of trope vampire hunter shoehorned into the appropriate religion. If I tell myself, "I'm going to make a well-intentioned character who's very devoted to his god," I give myself a lot of room to adapt to the "evil" stimuli that most affect my character, which better threads my character into the campaign's fiber.

[[DM] Grinning Death]

Ah, my favorite kind of thread, an RP thread.

I haven't made a character in ages, but my process is similar to those above in certain respects. Nailing down a theme and motivation is key, at least for me. Everything else stems from what I think that character would do, given his outlook on life and personal goals.

Keep it up guys, I love this kind of discussion.

[Thief Of Navarre]

This site helps me quite a bit. Just something to refer back to!
http://www.ashami.com/rpg/

[Sparkie]

Hey Fuzzy! Making characters can be difficult, but I've a way of going about making them that I find makes things pretty easy. I'll go over the steps I take, and how I've used them here, via two of my characters, in this case Allan and Hogar. These steps aren't set in stone, as far as order goes, but the order I give them are the usual order I go about it in.

So, the steps I go through are:

1) Think of what I'm in the mood to play; This goes for both class, and general theme of the characters. When it came to Allan, I was in the mood to play a sneaky, lying bastard, who you could never be fully sure you could truly trust, who was brutally efficient and perhaps a bit suave at times. For Hogar, I was in the mood for a big meat shieldy sort that chopped things up with a big cleaver, but was perhaps a bit smarter than he let on. So, that's where I start, basically asking myself "Wouldn't this be cool..?" And then following that train of thought.

2) Fleshing out; So, with the thought of what you're in the mood for in mind, time to start fleshing that idea out. Here's where the personality starts getting worked out, and I find helps with working out a background for the characters in question. Speaking of questions, when it comes to fleshing the character out, I suggest playing a game of 20 questions with the character, which is something I wish I'd done for Allan earlier in the creation process with him, but did quickly when I made Hogar. I'll list some questions, and I'd actually encourage answering them again at certain points of the character's development.

"What sort of jobs would hold interest to this character?"
"What drives them on onward and upward?"
"What are their fears?"
"What prejudices have they dealt with when dealing with members of other races?"
"What will always drive them to action?"
"Who or what do they put their faith in?"
"What are their beliefs/morals?"
"After coming back from a successful venture, the character has some extra coin in pocket, and perhaps more importantly, some free time. So, how do they spend this free time?"
"How did they come to lead the adventurer's lifestyle?"


3) Background; This is something that I always finish in game, but I get the most important points out of the way before they're rolled up. Things from their past that motivate them, or maybe things they wish they could forget. I'm sure you'll have noticed that at least a couple of those earlier questions have had to do with this, and I find it's actually helpful to have a few questions like that to help form a baseline, the starting points for which to help set the whole of their past. So, starting from those, start working out a story, that would fit the aforementioned answers. Don't worry if the story you first get isn't exactly something you like, or the tone you were hitting for with the character, because that's exactly what this first go at the story is- a first draft. But do make sure it's a first draft, and that you go over this with a fine tooth comb until it feels perfect.

4) Religion; This I usually leave for later in the character creation, since I so rarely play very divinely motivated characters. But, this can help out with the background. In Allan's case, he was pretty much indoctrinated into a cult at a young age, and in Hogar's, he was a Half-Orc raised among human mercenaries, and saw worth in praying to Tempus, if to at least assure him an afterlife of battle, and was also one of the more prominent faiths he saw in that youth. This also brings up a question: Given their experiences with religion, how do they view it?

To give example answers, Allan's views on the gods could be called heretical, heathenly, and perhaps even somewhat atheist. It was observed from how the gods were described, and the nature of their dogmas- The gods, for all their power, were no better than mortals, no matter how flowery their dogmas, or how much they said they "loved" and "cared" for mortals. Thus, he respected deities who had less altruistic dogmas, like Mask.

Hogar's views were that the god that governed over the domain his job was in was most worthy of offering prayer to, and he should take extra care to not piss them off, since if the lord of battle's not happy with you, next fight you get in may be your last.

5) Statistical and Mechanical side; This gets started a bit early, but finished late in the character making process. Here's where I pick my class, my starting feats, figure out what route I'm thinking I'll want to go as I level. How do I pick class? Generally, it goes with what's covered in the first step, though the route I choose to go with will flip flop for a bit before I finally end up with something I'm satisfied with.

6) Name; This is always the toughest part for me. Picking out a name that both fits my character, and the setting. And in some cases, I end up ignoring this step, and going with whatever I can come up with on the fly, usually from something I've dealt with IRL, and whatever's around me or outside my window. (much like how Steven King writes his books) To be honest, I can usually get a given name in a few minutes, but a surname? That's where I find most of my trouble.

Wow, this wound up more long-winded than I intended it to be, but I do hope this helps! See yas server-side!

[Nyssis]

My methods for making a char are admittedly out in left field, but I hope it can provide some help. I start with a bare bones concept and tack onto it based on the emotions I feel while listening to music. I just take a simplified idea; I don't think too much about it or it'll be overwhelming to process all at once.

For Lasvi, it was "traditional sun elf." For the character I may play come reboot, it was "prisoner of war." Other examples of past character ideas include things like "manipulative priest," "very nervous bard," and "ugly nobleman." A trope or racial/class stereotype can serve as an alright base for this step, but I walk as wide a berth as I can around them. You can easily fall into the trap of hamming the trope too much and your character loses their identity, so tropes have to try harder to break the mold.

I put on some instrumental music with a theme (video game bgm most of the time) and write down what the tracks make me think about their personality. I skip around if I don't feel anything resonating with me. It's okay to write down what might seem silly or outlandish at the time. There's enough room in a single character for both subtleties and extremes, and you don't have to use every idea that pops into your head.

I try not to dwell on how exactly they fit into the overarching puzzle --- what city are they from? who is their deity? why did they come to Sundren? etc. --- and only consider personality/appearance details while listening. I typically limit my characters to having a single defining physical feature while looking normal for their species otherwise: for Lasvi, ears with tons of piercings in them; for my potential reboot char, rosacea that makes her face turn bright red when she's angry.

Personality is way more free-rein. If someone is poised to attack their loved ones, how would my character react? Would my character laugh at a bad joke? Does my character have an idiosyncrasy? How would they react to being pick-pocketed? It's okay to daydream about it. I feel this helps me paint a visual for what the character's opinions will be about different topics, as well as how they dealt with any hardships I happen to inject into their background story later. It makes them more human, I guess?

My reboot char's base is "prisoner of war," so I opted to find some music that sounded remotely war- or conflict-like to me. These tracks specifically gave me the most inspiration. From here, I start drawing an appearance to suit my character. Only once I have a basic look and personality down will I debate things like family tree, deity, method of speech, gait, and how they fit into Forgotten Realms.

[Fuzziebunny]

Making a character has always been difficult for me. I am not the most creative person so I find it a hard and long process to really scrap out all the details of just who my character is. For me, lining things out, then slowly narrowing how just who or what my character will be, can be a trial. While I was tinkering with new Sundren ideas, I got to wondering how other people make their own characters. I mean, there has to be a better way to get the creative juices flowing than the way I am doing it. As it stands right now I got to wait until the moon is full and do a little dance while I try to catch a chicken to sacrifice. Seriously... it is horrible when you are a naturally lazy person.

I guess I was just curious about how other people go about making a character. I thought I would tell you how I do it, and hope desperately that someone else will share a better (and easier) way to get to the awesomeness that is THE character.

1. Pick a religion: Picking a religion gives me my left and right limits. It is the basic structure I use to form my characters personality. I know FR is a world of polytheist but making a religious toon sort of lets me ... well... kind of cheat. Most religions have a basic structure and I use this as a foundation to build my toon on.

2. Pick a class: Again, this lets me narrow things down. I am a pretty simple person. I need simple concepts.

3. Back ground: Yeah... I suck at this. Often I use 1 and 2 to frame my back ground. It lets me have a frame work to try to establish why my character would have this or that personality.

4. Procrastinate: Seriously... this is always a part of my process

5. Attempt to understand local lore: This isn't as easy as it sounds. I want my characters to fit in. To do that, you sort of have to know the lore at least a little bit. So, a lot of the time I will really try to find out as much as I can about where my character is going to hang out and the groups or factions my character hangs around with. This is difficult cause I can be easily confused.

6. Try to have cool faults: So.. I will just point out that what I think is cool, has been known to suck... LOL. But I like to have faults in all my characters and be consistent with them.

This is kind of simplified. I don't want to write a book because I am hoping someone will give me some advice on how to do things better. I know there are a lot of threads on writing. I think I am just not connecting the doing with the actual planning if that makes any since? Hopefully someone will and can help.


PS: DM Hades is awesome!