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Doomboy911
2013-09-19, 08:51 AM
In writing one of the most interesting features is that we put a little bit of ourselves in the characters you create; the villain lives a taboo you either love or hate, the hero could hold the bravery and kindness one wishes they could have and etcetera. The same is true in these games we play. So I ask of you what does your character say about you?

Kol Korran
2013-09-19, 10:27 AM
Depends on the character really, different characters have different aspects, but my friends did notice that I have a recurring paladin-ish/ unlikely hero/ "wants to be the good guy" general theme to it. In a way I think I'm looking to play more courageous people than I am, ones that stand more for what they believe, and make a bigger difference.

I often also plays some sort of a healer type, to which I'm attracted. I study medicine in real life, so yeah- not far from the tree and all of that.

The last theme is that I often play religious characters, even if I'm not playing a divinely powered class or profession. I'm an atheist in real life, but I consider myself spiritual, and existential questions fascinate me. I love to explore them in a world where actual divine beings exist? I find that a great opportunity at roleplay and something that draws me.

I did play characters that break the above themes, but they are the exception, not the rule.

The Fury
2013-09-20, 01:58 PM
I used to really enjoy making obnoxious characters. I think this is because I was/am a bad person.

More recently I try to come up with characters that I think might make for decent fiction. I guess I generally think of "What would I be like if [character backstory]?" At least this is true of characters I really liked playing.
Though I took a different tac when thinking of villainous PCs-- I thought of what might make for someone that would be really satisfying to defeat?

DigoDragon
2013-09-20, 02:11 PM
For heroes, I seem to give most of them either my dry wit for sarcasm or my love of bad puns. I also love to give them a vivid imagination like myself.

Villain-wise, they tend to be of the "road paved with good intentions" variety as I often the options I have of what should be done to fix society can be the kind that will probably have bad consequences I don't think about until I'm nearly there.

Yeah, never elect me mayor of any Sim City. :smallbiggrin:

Jack of Spades
2013-09-20, 02:59 PM
I almost always start off a character concept by figuring out a couple of ways they are my opposite and at least one way that they are an exaggeration of myself. It's created a level of variance that I've always been a bit proud of, and makes it a lot easier for me to think in-character, whether I'm playing a hot-headed religious fanatic or a quick-witted trickster or a loyal and gentle giant.

I guess one thing that comes through a lot is that I always tend to make characters that don't trust easily but will follow a friend to the ends of the earth. Hell, even the evil sorcerer that I've been wanting to play for ages has this quality. But part of that is because as a player it's my responsibility to make sure my character has a reason to stand by the party through thick and thin. Most of it is my own personality, though.

The furthest I've ever gotten from that quality was the first character I ever played in an RPG, an agoraphobic halfling named Mouse. He was fiercely loyal to his party-- except that his "party" consisted of himself and exactly one other character in the group, who he had known since before the game. There was some really great roleplaying that occurred when he clashed with the appointed leader of the primary group (came into the game in the second or third session). Imagine, if you will, a dwarf and a halfling with steel drawn at one another's throats as they argue in the center of a group of humans (and an ettin!). Such great imagery that we actually felt the need to LARP it out.

Tengu_temp
2013-09-20, 03:59 PM
My characters tend to be good people who are not afraid to help even total strangers. The kind of person I'd like to be in real life if I was less lazy.

My characters tend to have geeky interests. Just a little bit of self-insertion.

My characters tend to look good, because I'm horribly vain.

The Fury
2013-09-21, 02:27 AM
For heroes, I seem to give most of them either my dry wit for sarcasm or my love of bad puns.

Haha! For my part I generally make heroes that give nicknames. Though I do appreciate a good bad pun.

Bosaxon
2013-09-21, 04:54 AM
Well, I think most of my characters represent responses to my feelings of alienation.

In low-power games, or games where these characters have built in authority from some source (Dogs in the Vineyard or 40KRPG), my characters cling to the trappings that give them their authority, to a point of near fascism. This is not me in real life, but I think this reflects my desire for protection of self

In high power games, such as D&D or Pathfinder, my characters are either paragons of freedom or outright trolls (the manner of behavior, not the creature type). I think this has to due to the fact they have the ability to strongly alter the world, or at least protect themselves from being powerless.

There are also certain games I will not play, because I know they will hit too close to home and the character and myself will become one in the same. My Life with Master being the paragon example.

Arcane_Snowman
2013-09-21, 06:22 AM
It entirely depends on the character, but I enjoy playing the prodigy, outsider and the genius. Sometimes all in one:
At the moment I'm playing a Mage who is literally working towards becoming the most awesome librarian the world has ever seen. He's got a daughter, because I'd like a kid at some point.

In another game I am playing a aloof socialite who specializes in dueling, and who is intent on bringing glory to his house.

Milo v3
2013-09-21, 08:11 AM
I don't think I've ever played a character that isn't a jerk in some way... Which is a bad sign...

Ionbound
2013-09-21, 12:33 PM
My characters (with the exception of things I don't take too seriously) all tend to have tragic backstories. They also are the type to put on a rather fragile mask of braveness. I wonder what that means about myself.

Hyena
2013-09-21, 01:57 PM
My characters are vain, sneaky, cowardly backstabbing scumbags, just like me. Even if they are paladins.

Bulhakov
2013-09-21, 04:02 PM
My NPCs (and whole campaign worlds) always seem to be extremely rational/reasonable - villains always have a good motive or psychological backstory for irrational actions, bandits don't start fights they would lose, defeated opponents negotiate/surrender, all actions have logical consequences, and the world just "works".
E.g. If there's a spell that druids/priests can cast to magically multiply the harvest from a field, you can be sure of two things - one, I'll houserule some logical limits on the spell (once per year limit for a field), and two, I'll make it a rational piece of the world (every village will have a yearly visit by some druids and will surely make a holiday/festival out of it).

As for my characters - they are always good, usually intelligent, versatile, highly optimized, very efficient in combat, but least likely to recommend violence as a solution. In real life I also am a nice guy, I have a Ph.D., I'm a jack-of-all-trades (master of none), I'm a big guy with a jujitsu blackbelt, but I've never started a fight in my life. The only thing my characters lack is my laziness and ADHD :)

Mono Vertigo
2013-09-22, 08:33 AM
Most of my characters share some aspect with me, but it's different with each one; in addition, these aspects are often seen through a different lens. Some share the same behaviours as I do but not the intents, and some the intents, but not the action.
... my characters can all be horrible people in the right situation (and it doesn't even have to be extreme cases!), safe for those who are too neurotic or stupid (hey, it's fun to play morons sometimes!) to do much evil, though, that's the one thing they have in common. Dunno if it says more about me, or the way I view people.

mucat
2013-09-24, 12:57 PM
Interesting question...as I think back over the last dozen or so characters I've played, there is more of a pattern to them than I would have expected.

Profession / Role:
I'm an academic scientist in real life, and about three-fourths of my characters are curiosity-driven, the sort who take apart reality to see how it ticks. Scientists, alchemists, wizards, engineers...whatever makes sense in the campaign setting. Some of them are professors. Their approach to their job, though, seems very different from mine. I have always put a lot more energy into teaching than research (not a great career move in academia, but hey, I enjoy it.) My scientist-type characters are often obsessed with their research or inventions. In that sense, I guess they explore an aspect of the scientific mindset that I no longer get much chance to live out in real life.

Alignment and Ethics:
My curiosity-driven characters tend to extremes on the law-chaos axis, but often can't be bothered to take much of a stand on good vs. evil. (This contrasts with the real-world ideals I try to follow, which might be classified as Neutral Good.) The Lawful ones are often curmudgeonly bastards who chase away distractions through gruff indifference. (If they were Terry Pratchett characters, they'd be right at home as Unseen University faculty.) Chaotic ones might be manic, hypercreative types who are too busy to notice distractions. I am dangerously absent-minded in real life, and I like to use "selective impatience" to push a student to think for themselves, so both these extremes are real traits of mine, exaggerated out of control.

Some of these characters are nominally good aligned; they are decent people who will go out of their way to do the right thing, when and if they remember that their actions have consequences. Evil-aligned ones tend toward ruthless efficiency in removing obstacles to their work. But few of them are crusaders for a good or evil cause; nine days out of ten, they could work side by side on a project with no conflict beyond arguing philosophy on a coffee break. (Whereas the organized, systematic Lawful ones and the madly inventive Chaotic ones would probably be at one another's throats.)

Politics and Religion:
In real life I...probably can't finish this sentence here. :smallwink:

My characters, though, run the gamut from apolitical to firebrands. When they do have strong political beliefs, they are often ones that I would oppose in the real world, but make sense for the character and setting. Right now I am playing an arguably insane surgeon/alchemist who still vocally supports the militaristic, authoritarian Empire of which he was once an officer. (The Empire considers him a rebellious criminal...but he sees that as a mark against his own honor, not against the Empire. He may or may not change his views with time; this character could end up evolving in a lot of different directions.)

On religious matters, these characters range from devout to indifferent to atheist, even in worlds where the existence of gods is an established fact. ("All right, so gods exist. That doesn't mean we should encourage them!")

I had great fun with an artificer who never quite grasped that she had become an ordained priest of Wee-Jas. (She just wanted a job in their arcane research labs, but ordination was a requirement...) The "real" priests tolerated her because she was good at her job, and she learned to echo polite phrases about the "Dark-Eyed Lady," with no real idea who that was. Clearly some kind of big shot, so she would remind herself to be polite to unfamiliar brown-eyed women, just in case one of them was the lab director or something...

Doomboy911
2013-09-26, 08:09 PM
Well this seems to be the end of the thread. If that is to be the fate of this thread than I must thank you all for your bravery. For but a moment you pulled away the character sheet and let us see the player behind. Thank you. Does anyone else have anymore bravery?

veti
2013-09-26, 10:19 PM
I generally play - cowards. I'm the one who won't take risks unless I can see a definite upside. I'm the last to stand up for principles, unless everyone else is doing it too. I like to do my killing from a distance, as an archer or a sniper, or alternatively to buff myself to blazes before combat. Out of combat, I like to not be noticed too much.

As a rule, I try to play my character as if Death Is Real, regardless of the setting.

I think this play style makes heroism more meaningful, when (what my character sees as) legitimate occasions for it do arise.

Shyftir
2013-09-27, 12:43 AM
I tend to play the Only Sane Man. Even my "out there" concepts usually end up being the Roy Greenhilt-type who keeps this mad unrelated group of crazies pointed at the bad guys. I play a lot of gruff straight-forward fighter types.

My characters are often devout believers, which is not surprising owing to my background and faith (no details here, lol).

The Fury
2013-09-27, 11:46 AM
Another thing that occurred to me: I sort of like to play against type. Y'know, that jerk that says "Everyone makes elvish wizards-- I'll make an elvish fighter. That uses a greataxe."

Maybe it's because I like to think that my character is special or unique in some way. By the way, yes; I'm fully aware that I'm not the first to think of doing stuff like that.

valadil
2013-09-27, 12:29 PM
I try to keep some aspects of myself but vary it up too. If a character is too similar to me, I get bored playing him. If a character is too different, I can't relate. My favorites are the ones that are at arm's length from me. Relatable but not identical.

Some common aspects...

My first character in a fantasy system is usually some sort of ranger. I don't know if that's a reflection of me or just coincidence.

I tend toward intelligent magic users. I can play a halfwit, but it has to be a deliberate choice.

My characters almost always have a sense of humor. I'm prone to cracking wise and I'd rather do it in character than have to talk OOC. The exception was Joren, who I decided was the comedic straight guy. He never made jokes, but I was still able to be funny by setting everyone else up for jokes.

I don't do religious characters well. It's something I have trouble relating to. The best I managed worshipped the entire pantheon and went to church, but didn't dedicate his life to god service either.

I really like playing impulsive characters. This is the opposite of me and that's why it's so fun. It's also helps keep the game moving if at least one character instantly presses every button he finds.

TeChameleon
2013-09-27, 03:14 PM
I'm not sure that I've played enough different characters for it to be any real kind of trend or anything, but my handful of characters thus far have a few things in common... let's see. None of them are terribly concerned about their own deaths, although the death of a companion will make them go into an utter rage. They've all been highly creative, to the point of being kind of off, and they adhere strictly to their principles.

All of them have had significant combat prowess, and considerable self-assurance in that area. And, while they will promptly and willingly apply violence to the deserving, it's almost always to protect those weaker, whether directly or indirectly, and it's not usually their first choice. Although they won't hesitate in it once they've decided that the situation calls for it.

They also tend to be mind-blowingly stubborn, a bit arrogant, frighteningly impatient and with zero tolerance for fools.

... the non-combat bits really do sound like me. Hmm <.<

AgentofHellfire
2013-09-29, 09:01 AM
Hrm...

--Very few of them have healthy relationships, first of all. The reasons for this vary from character to character, but it's true a lot of the time.
--For a lot of them, class is a major concern. Like, economic and social status class.
--Arrogance and a sense of superiority figure in somewhere in many of my characters, either in backstory or personality.
--(For some of them this arrogance is actually a mask for an inferiority complex)
--A lot of my characters (though not all) are possessed of some form of prejudice. (Though in this case I think it's a result of that being a fun form of flawed hero to play)
--Whenever I play Evil characters, I play characters that are flashy and ostentatious; that love to show off their power. Whenever I play Good characters, I go the opposite direction: People who are subtle and don't need to show off.
--Actually, I almost never play heroes of the "typical" vein, where they come crashing in to save everyone, wrecking things in their way. If I ever do play that type of character, they're an antihero.
--I almost never play characters that are of average or lower intellect, and I never really play characters of average appearance. I generally go with attractive or better, or hideous. No in-betweens except maybe one.
--A lot of my characters are smarter than the typical member of their social group, as well as more interested in technology.

Terraoblivion
2013-09-29, 09:09 AM
A big one is that on some level they're all good guys, but rarely classic upstanding heroes or typical gritty antiheroes. They tend more towards quirky weirdness or strong ideological devotion than towards either of those themes, but even when they're technically antiheroes they tend not to be of the overly violent kind. It also means that there tends to be limits to how far they can be from me politically. I can't really elaborate due to forum rules, but there are some positions that I can't make a character who takes and still view them as a good person.

I also tend to make introverted characters, which probably simply reflects my own introvertion and how trying to make someone outgoing ends up bumping against the limits of my social skills.

I also tend strongly towards either warriors or courtier/politician types rather than the kind of characters who cleverly uses a large toolkit of skills and abilities to their advantage.

My characters also tend to have some kind of personal issues, whether shyness, grief, guilt, hatred of family members or similar.

Subaru Kujo
2013-09-29, 01:45 PM
I've noticed, in the 6 characters I've played, all but one of them was lost in one way or another. Bastard son to orphaned child. Probably means something, but can't be asked to figure out what. :p

BWR
2013-09-29, 02:39 PM
It depends. Sometimes I will start out with the mechanics, some class or similar mechanic I'm interested in playing and personality will develop during play. For instance I wanted to play a big dwarf fighter type, heavy armor, heavy pick nothing fancy or terribly powerful but just because I wanted that type of character. He had two stats at 7, which I put in Charisma and Intelligence, called him Bonehead. I play him about as smart and charismatic as Sarah Palin or Bush jr. with rather racist ideals (dwarfs good, non-dwarfs bad) and he gets bored when he isn't killing things. He's the butt of innumerable jokes in the group (partially because we code switch between Norwegian and English in games and his 'pick' becomes terribly amusing)

Sometimes I'm interested in playing some sort of stereotype so I'll start off with the stereotype and polish it up a little before the game, a little during. I wanted to play the stereotype Hiruma bushi (Gozoku period) in L5R, so I made a stealthy, agile guy. During the first session I decided he liked to prank people. He took the nickname Tanuki and likes to tell tall tales about his ancestor Fearless Fukishi (basically Pecos Bill in Rokugan), tales I would craft beforehand and tell in character.

Rarely do I start with a fully fleshed character and build all the mechanics around it. They need time and circumstance to blossom.

QuintonBeck
2013-09-29, 03:00 PM
I usually find my character ending up in charge which is an interesting phenomenon, and it's not like I mean to be, I once made your typical Barbarian (Low int, likes hitting things) but his morals lead to him to dictating the actions the party would take, he didn't do the planning or anything, but he pointed the party in the "right" direction.
My most recent and most favorite character was a melee focused LN cleric who I designed specifically to be a leader type character and me and the other players adored him. He was fair but firm, helped out the party, and tried to make sure everyone was taken care of which I actually quite enjoyed. I use past tense however because recently he figured out the gods, and therefore all he had been raised to believe in, were false and he took a speedy and bloody turn towards CE and while fun it was his run as the straight-man good guy I enjoyed the most.