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| RP 101: Character In Character | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Apr 12 2009, 09:11 PM (362 Views) | |
| ♦ Lead Admin | Apr 12 2009, 09:11 PM Post #1 |
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LESSON ONE: SPEECH: A big part of staying in character while writing is trying to get down a character's way of speaking. Each character is a bit different in the way they talk or communicate, and its fun to try and mimic that style in writing. In addition, it really helps a person visualize the character they are reading about, as if the character themselves really WERE saying those lines! Example. Beryl would have a more sleek and sly way of speaking, while Serena might be a bit more....bubbly. Think about their personalities from the shows/manga/whatever. Think about their speech patterns. Try to impliment them in your own writing! Now. We've covered how a character should SPEAK. But what about the actual bulk of a roleplay post...the actions? In my opinion, I feel that a roleplay post should be done in the 'style' of the character, to further bring across their personalities and who they are. So instead of writing just your average post...why not attempt to write their whole post in a way that they might? Not only does it expand your writing skills, but once again, it paints a better picture of the scene occuring for those reading through a thread! Try it, and see that happens. LESSON TWO: STICKING WITH YOUR PROFILE: Alright, now this is a big one we're ALL guilty of...but something that should be brought up and pointed out in any case, so that we might work on it as a whole. When you first pick up a character here, you are asked to fill out in detail your character's likes, dislikes, fears, flaws and other such information that help us to flesh out your two demensional character and make them more lifelike. The question is...how many of us actually USE this information after we've written it? We CANNOT write off our profiles once we have had them accepted. We need to make sure that our characters remain compatible for what we wrote for them originally. We can't expect one thing, and then find the character is acting in a completely different manner. Say another character uses a weakness against you. Your character needs to react accordingly, and not just shrug it off or ignore it. Ignoring your weaknesses makes your character a bit of a super, and that would be godmodding, which nobody really likes around a rpg. So be mindful always of what you've written in your profiles, and make sure you use it accordingly stick to it -- its technically your own canon that you've set up for your character, or the canon that WAS created for said character and needs to be kept with. LESSON THREE: NOT A MINDREADER!: This is another big thing. I've seen it happen at other boards quite frequently, and while I can't say I've seen too much of it here, I figured I'd mention it just to squash any future cases that might occur. We KNOW most of the characters here. We know their stories, their personalities, their weakness and strengths. We know what they've gone through and how they've lived their lives. Your character should not. Please remember, that unless your character was there, or if your character has been TOLD by another character something...you should not know every inch of another character's history. If senshi A has not told your character of her secret identity, and nobody else has either, then your character should not know. Now, if you have discussed with the character's writer ahead of time -- and its okay with them -- and your character maybe catches that senshi transforming... then yes. Perhaps you could guess. You are not a mindreader. :P Same thing with weaknesses. Unless you've SEEN it, or have been told it, you should not know that perhaps one of the cats is afraid of/dislikes water. If you've seen them react in some way to water, then yes, you might have a guess of this phobia. And maybe even since they ARE cats, you could make an educated guess. But it should not just come to you off the top of your head. And finally...thoughts. Oftentimes in our posts, we will mention our character's thoughts. How they feel about someone, or a situation, or any number of things. You should not be able to guess these, either. Just because you read them in the last post, doesn't necessarily mean that your character is aware of them...because hey, your character did not read that last post. If one character is thinking about how horrible another character is, that other character should not be aware of it...unless the other character's writer has made it obvious by hinting to any faces or gestures the character might be making. THEN you may guess. All in all, it sums up to: your character should not know what you read. Use your best judgement when it comes to what your character knows about someone else, or about a situation at hand. Simple enough, but I've seen it happen, and it causes drama. So just take care and watch out for what you're writing! ;) LESSON FOUR: DRAMAZ: Drama. We all love it, so long as its in a situation WE can control. Roleplay drama is exciting, it gives us something to do with our threads and makes them wild and on-edge. But the question is...is there any such thing as too much RPG drama? The answer is YES. Just like in real life, sometimes too much is too much. And more often than not, when people get tired of the drama in the game, they start to get irritated and find themselves quickly losing the muse and desire to post at an rpg. This is what often times kills them off. We obviously don't want that here at TIWAB So what's the problem? Most of the time, its a character who gets into trouble WAY too much. A sort of damsel in distress character, who is always causing trouble for themselves, or getting hurt, so on and so forth. While this is an occasionally fun scenario...it shouldn't be your idea for every thread, and it REALLY shouldn't happen MULTIPLE times in a thread. Yes, this is usually the scenario for a 30 minute episode of Sailor Moon...but we're going to have to get original if we don't want to keep repeating ourselves. ;) There are other scenerios you can roleplay that would be just as fun as a kidnapping/dramaz one. Why not give your characters a puzzle to solve? Throw them into a maze? (Though don't let your one character somehow set off every trap in the maze and get them injured each time they do. :P) I am certainly not suggesting there never be drama again, because lets face it, we all love a good drama. Just be very careful HOW much drama you make. In addition, to add to the 'things people don't like' category...the opposite of the damsel in distress. The glittering personality hero. The one that everything bad possible happens to, but they are never truly affected by it. They can jump up after any blow, they can avoid conflicts before they happen because they are aware of them. (Remember, you are NOT a mindreader!) They basically get annoying really fast because they seem like they are the golden superhero, and they are untouchable. We don't like those. Those sorts of characters really fall under the godmod category, in addition to the annoying one. Don't make your characters untouchable! Don't give them such glittering personalities! EVERY character has their weakness, and as stated before, we need to make sure that we keep these in mind, and use them when required. There is a very fine line balancing damsel in distress/glittering personality hero, but you MUST find it and attempt to stick with it for the most part. I don't care if you tip the scales every once in awhile, but it should not be a reoccuring thing. I might start calling people on it if I see it TOO terribly much, because again...it is absolutely detrimental to a board to have too much drama going on IN the roleplay threads, as well as out of them. People generally seek out roleplay to get away from their REAL LIFE drama. Why set them up for more of it here? --- These four steps are just scratching the surface when it comes to how to roleplay a character IN character, and how to portray them to the best of your abilities. I'm sure I'll think of more steps to add to this at some point, so just like all our other tutorials here, this could always be updated. Please, read this over every so often, just to remind yourself of the steps. Ask yourself: do I follow these guidelines? Does my character 'speak' the way they should? Do I cause drama? Do I mindread? If you ask yourself these questions, and answer them honestly, and try to work on your weak points, the chances are you'll become a stronger roleplayer, and will enjoy your experience on the boards more -- as will everyone else. |
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7:02 PM Jul 11